Friends, we gather here today to celebrate not the end of a gloriously awesome space opera science fiction romance trilogy, but the joy this series brought us.

From Ada's adventures in POLARIS RISING to Bianca's stratagems in AURORA BLAZING and finally Cat's cleverness here, I don't see how anyone can say the von Hasenberg daughters are not a force to reckon with.

Meet Catarina von Hasenberg, otherwise known as Cat to those that matter to her, she's not here to let you hurt anyone she considers her own and she will darn well make sure that you regret thinking about doing such.

Like her siblings she suffered their parents' ambitions and schemes, however unlike her siblings she's spent a decade keeping a tight lid on the consequences of those schemes while building a persona useful to the overall goals of the House.

I'm a little in awe honestly; Mihalik had to not only build a story for Cat separate from her sisters' previous adventures, but also wrap up the ongoing threat building from those books all while giving us a plausible romance.

There was some loose ends, as well as plenty of room for a follow up book (or 3), but the book stands well on its own and closes the loop on what Ada discovered in POLARIS and Bianca dug deeper on in AURORA.

Plus the friendship between Ying and Cat was so freaking warm and felt so real.

Minor nitpicks about some things being repeated a bit much (largely anything to do with hiding her secrets or House politics) and if saving the entire known universe could be a cock-block than poor Cat had the misfortune of dealing with that, but overall this was great and a high recommendation! ( )

Review to come ( )

A solid read. This was a sci fi romance which was heavy on the sci fi light on the romance. I liked this 3rd episode in the series. Don't know if the series is over yet or not. It felt like it wrapped most things up. The world building is solid and interesting. The heroine was well written as a youngest sister who had been pampered so while she thought she was more competent than she was given credit for, she had doubts about herself. The book did a good job showing her sort of breaking out of her shell and learning to accept herself. The hero was not as fully fleshed out but he was a nice guy. He wasn't the one with the story arc so you didn't know much about him. ( )

Catarina von Hasenberg is very used to be underestimated and also to keep her secrets close to her. What people see is not always what she is thinking or what she really is Her family sometimes use her as a spy so when theres rumour of some things that are going to happen in the worlds she's the perfect candidate, both in terms of age and ability to go to a rival House summer retreat and see what she can learn.
With her she has Alexander Sterling who at one stage rejected her for his own reasons, he has secrets too and between them if they can learn to trust they will change the worlds forever
This series is a lot of fun and I'm looking forward to reading book 1 when I locate it and passing the series to my husband.. ( )

Unfortunately not as strong as the first two installments of the series. Chaos Reigning does more telling than showing in the romantic relationship between our two leads and the conclusion lacked something. It's almost as though the author had planned more novels in the series but instead wrapped things up quickly. It felt a bit like the end of Firefly. So much promise for a future world that upends existing power structures, but ultimately replicates them and leaves readers with a bit of hope but not much in the way of assurances. ( )