*This review is spoiler-free but there may be spoilers for book 1 and 2*
Synopsis:
Kady, Ezra, Hanna and Nik narrowly escaped with their lives from the attacks on Heimdall station and now find themselves crammed with 2,000 refugees on the container ship, Mao. With the jump station destroyed and their resources scarce, the only option is to return to Kerenza–but who knows what they’ll find seven months after the invasion?
Meanwhile, Kady’s cousin, Asha, survived the initial BeiTech assault and has joined Kerenza’s ragtag underground resistance. When Rhys–an old flame from Asha’s past–reappears on Kerenza, the two find themselves on opposite sides of the conflict. With time running out, a final battle will be waged on land and in space, heroes will fall, and hearts will be broken.
My Thoughts:
I had way too high expectations for this book. I thought each book in this series would get better and better, as I liked Gemina more than Illuminae. However, I found this pretty disappointing. It was by no means bad, it just wasn’t mind-blowing or amazing.
The plot – I find this to be slower-paced than the first two, I found myself bored and waiting for something good to happen. I basically force myself through most of it, it was uninteresting, I wanted to know what happened; it just dragged a lot. I wanted so much more but I think my expectations were just too high.
A lot of the plot is recycled from the previous two, it was very repetitive and predictable. So very predictable. I think that was the most disappointing part, was just knowing what was going to happen and how everything would wrap up. I wanted to be mind-blow and on edge but I wasn’t for most of it. The second half definitely gets better, it picked up a bit, not much, but enough for me to get more invested.
The story takes place after the events of Gemina, so we follow all the characters from the previous books as well as a few new characters on Kerenza.
I have to say; I much preferred reading about the ‘old’ characters. I found myself wanting to get to their parts rather than read about the new characters on Kerenza. I really didn’t feel connected to these characters, like I did with the previous ones.
Asha and Rhys were just a bit bland, in my opinion.
I still really love the formatting/ layout of the book. It is such a cool and interesting way to consume a story and I think it works really well for a sci-fi novel. The drawings/ illustrations were really nicely done, as in the previous novels.
Characters:
Kady & Ezra: I loved seeing the main characters from Illuminae. Kady was always a favourite of mine, Ezra is okay. I liked following her character again.
Hanna & Nik: Again, I loved seeing these guys! They’re probably my favourites from the whole series, with the addition of Ella, I love her too!
Asha & Rhys: Meh. Didn’t really get attached to these two. I didn’t connect with them and I wasn’t really invested in their characters or story.
AIDAN: Why is a murderous, psycho AI system so entertaining? Literally one of the best parts of the whole series and especially this book. I love AIDAN. He’s creepy and interesting.
Rating: 3/3.5 Stars
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Credit: 
Credit: BotanicaXu
Official art by Kevin Wada
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Literary Leisha 