Title and Author: Across The Universe by Beth Revis
Publisher: Razorbill
Publication Date: 11 January, 2011
Paperback/Hardcover: 398 Pages
Genre: Young Adult, Sci-fi
Summary:
A love out of time. A spaceship built of secrets and murder.
Seventeen-year-old Amy joins her parents as frozen cargo aboard the vast spaceship Godspeed and expects to awaken on a new planet, three hundred years in the future. Never could she have known that her frozen slumber would come to an end fifty years too soon and that she would be thrust into the brave new world of a spaceship that lives by its own rules.
Amy quickly realizes that her awakening was no mere computer malfunction. Someone-one of the few thousand inhabitants of the spaceship-tried to kill her. And if Amy doesn't do something soon, her parents will be next.
Now Amy must race to unlock Godspeed's hidden secrets. But out of her list of murder suspects, there's only one who matters: Elder, the future leader of the ship and the love she could never have seen coming.
Review:
I couldn’t wait to get my hands on this book since I first heard about it and I’m so glad to have finally been able to read it.
Amy is frozen for a 300 years trip across the universe to a new planet but when she is awaken too soon, things start to fall apart. She quickly finds out her awakening was not an accident and that someone on the ship is trying to kill some of the frozens, including her parents.
This story is told in duel perspectives by Amy and Elder, which kept me interested since I wanted to know what both characters were thinking and feeling.
Amy is a likeable character. She’s strong and fights for what she believes. She suddenly found herself in a place completely different from what she was used to and struggles to adapt. In a way, it was easy to relate to her since her emotions were real.
Elder was born in the ship but he’s not so different you can’t relate with him as well. He’s curious, smart and maybe a little bit rebellious. He doesn’t want to do what Eldest tells him to, he just wants to find the truth. He’s the next in line to run the ship but still decides to help Amy. Plus, it's obvious he's very interested in Amy right from the start.
When it comes to the secondary characters, Harley was definitely my favorite. He’s Elder’s best friend, an artist with a kind and sweet personality.
Eldest was a bit terrifying and became more and more as the story developed. The Feeders were scary in their own way as well.
The plot was fun, interesting and easy to follow. My only small problem with the plot is that the mystery part isn’t really a big mystery. I could tell what was going on and who was responsible for it.
One think I really liked was how Beth Revis was able to create this great new world inside the ship.It was easy to see how things changed and evolved during the years. Revis really did a wonderful job in creating a whole new world inside a ship that is both different and not so different from our own world.
Beth Revis writing style is amazing and is able to make the characters and their emotions seem real, something not every author is able to do.
All in all I really enjoyed this book. The characters are interesting and the plot is engaging and well written.
This is a great debut novel, an engaging and fast read, that I’m sure anyone who likes Science Fiction as well as Young Adult books will be able to enjoy immensely.
Rating: Somewhere between Worth Your Time and Must Read (4 1/2 Stars)
