Review: Shades of Earth by Beth Revis

Shades of Earth (Across the Universe, #3) by Beth Revis
Publisher: Penguin
Publication date: May 2nd, 2013
Number of pages: 369pgs
Format: Paperback
Purchase: Amazon | The Book Depository

Amy and Elder have finally left the oppressive walls of the spaceship Godspeed behind. They're ready to start life afresh--to build a home--on Centauri-Earth, the planet that Amy has traveled 25 trillion miles across the universe to experience. But this new Earth isn't the paradise that Amy had been hoping for. Amy and Elder must race to uncover who--or what--else is out there if they are to have any hope of saving their struggling colony and building a future together. But each new discovery brings more danger. And if their colony collapses then everything they have sacrificed--friends, family, life on Earth--will have been meaningless..

It's a shame that when the first few books in a series have been great but then get let down by its conclusion. This is what happened here. I had to wait extra longer for the book to be released in Australia, so I had all these hopes. When I did get around to reading it it didn't feel like the same story I had been reading.

I understand how things were different because of the different surroundings, but I was was not impressed. People weren't who I thought they would be, there was contrived plots and it was poorly delivered. I expected much better from Beth Revis.
I was a big fan of the romance between Amy and Elder, even though I knew they were gonna have their happy ending, but in the way it happened, I didn't like.
I'm disappointed and wish things could have been different, but I guess you can't always get what you want.

In this installment, Amy and co find themselves right next to Centauri Earth and have to decide whether or not they should take the risk in landing and making it their home. Not everyone agrees, but those that do hop on their way to explore the new planet.
Soon they discover that they aren't alone, and it brings more danger than they ever anticipated. Amy isn't alone either when her parents slowly wake up and she is reunited with them, to discover she may not know her parents like she thought she did. She basically was blind when it came to why they were there, what their mission was and their intentions.

I would still recommend this series no matter if this book disappointed me. It did have its good parts, even with the bad, so I guess it was not a total waste of my time.
Everything ended up the way it was supposed to, I guess, though sometimes it's not how you envisioned it to end up.

I'd like to say Ciao to this trilogy, I'll always cherish it as the series that got me into YA sci fi and for that I'm greatful.

Rating: 3/5

Review: A Million Suns by Beth Revis

A Millions Suns (Across the Universe, #2) by Beth Revis
Publisher: Razorbill
Publication date: April 5th, 2012
Number of pages: 386 pgs
Format: Paperback
Purchase: Amazon | The Book Depository

Trapped on board the spaceship Godspeed, Amy trusts no-one.

The ship's ruler is dead and a rebellion threatens. Amy wants to help Elder as he tries to take charge, but she's torn between her feelings for him and the chaos that's pulling everything apart. As more harrowing discoveries are made about Godspeed, Amy is caught in a desperate race to unravel its secrets. Only one thing is certain.

They have to get off this ship.

I believe this was one of the most talked about, anticipated books of 2012. Ever since Beth came out with ATU, the fans have been hungry for more, myself included.
I'm not big on sci/fi, but this series really sucked me in, which is hard to do for a genre like this.
I was surprised at how much I liked the first book and by the end I could not wait until book 2.
The book isn't even out in Australia yet, so I decided to get myself a copy for my kindle. I decided I had enough waiting and it was time to check out the book everyone was talking about.

A Million Suns picks up about 2 months after the end of ATU. Elder is the leader of the ship as he tries to discover and be the leader he is meant to be, but finds that things are easy said than done in this case.
He is trying his best, but it doesn't always come across that way. There are angry people and who start to rebel against him.

When Amy starts to receive clues left by Orion, she starts to wonder if there is something going on that nobody knows about.

I think I hated him less in this book, as we got to understand the reasons for what he did. It was an interesting plot within the story, and I was wondering what it was leading to. When it got discovered... that he knew something so jawdropping.. I didn't know how to react. But I came to understand him a little better.

I might like Amy and Elder's sweet relationship, but my favourite relationship in this series, is.. well we haven't seen much of it, but is her relationship with her parents. The fact that Amy went with them on the ship because she didn't want to be apart from them tore at my heart strings. I can't wait to see them wake up so she can talk to them and be with them again.

Rating: 5/5

Review: Across the Universe by Beth Revis

Across the Universe (Across the Universe, #1) by Beth Revis
Publisher: Razorbill
Publication date: March 3rd, 2011
Number of pages: 398 pgs
Format: Paperback
Purchase: Amazon | The Book Depository

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.

Across the Universe is one of those unique books that hook you from the beginning. When I first read this book, I had not read any YA sci fi at all, I never figured it was my thing, or at least, it never appealed to me before now.
I found this story compelling, fascinating because it's the sport of thing you'd have as an adult story, to having these characters as teenagers was interesting to me.

This is a dual pov book. On one hand you have our female protagonist, Amy who was frozen alongside her parents heading to a new earth and suddenly wakes up realizing they have not arrived yet and someone has woken her up early -- without her parents.
Then we also our male counterpart, Ender. He is a young leader-in-training who will one day take over leadership of the ship he has been born and raised on. The one place he only knows. Things don't always go according to plan and Elder takes an interest in the new girl, since he has found her interesting to have someone different, his own age to talk to. Someone with different experiences than he does. Someone who lived on another earth.

After being adjusted to her new surroundings, Amy and Elder soon discover the frozens -- the others who were frozen upon arriving on the ship are suddenly being unplugged and thus dying. You would think being unplugged would then wake them up, but no, I guess there is only a proper way of doing it otherwise they die, and this is what has been happening. Someone aboard the ship does not want these people to wake up, ever and is preventing them from doing so, ever again.
Amy and Elder will have to discover the culprit and put a stop to it once and for all before someone she cares about gets hurt.

If you like sci fi with a touch of romance and mystery, then I'd recommend you check this trilogy out. It's not one to be missed.

Rating: 5/5