Across the Universe (A YA Book Review)

Across the Universe by Beth Revis

The short synopsis of this book is that Amy is cryogenically frozen along with her parents (one a scientist and one part of the military) and placed on a ship that will take 350 years to reach a new planet: Centauri Earth. The book opens with Amy going through the freezing process. From there the book alternates between first person POV with Amy and first person POV with Elder, who is a teenager on the ship (Godspeed) and preparing to become the successor of Eldest, the ship’s leader. Things start to get interesting when Amy is unceremoniously pulled from her cyrochamber 50 years too early. Soon, Amy is learning about the strange inhabitants of Godspeed and that the ship is full of lies, secrets, and misinformation. To add insult to injury, someone keeps pulling out the “frozens” and leaving them to drown in their own melted cryofluid. Elder—enamored with Amy who is unlike anyone he’s ever known—begins to help Amy investigate who could be behind such a crime and more importantly why.

I gave this book 3.5/5 stars. I’m not sure if I was expecting it to be more in my face because it came to me very highly recommended from several people. The beginning felt a bit disjointed to me, however, in retrospect I think it was due to the amount of world building that needed to take place. I enjoyed this book, but it wasn’t like I couldn’t put it down and go do something else (which for me is factor in a 4 plus rating). I really feel this book was setting up for book two, A Million Suns, and I see that both that book and Shades of Earth have higher ratings than Across the Universe. I definitely will continue this series (after all The Lunar Chronicles didn’t start off strongly with Cinder, but it’s one of my favorite series). I look forward to seeing what the future holds for Amy and Elder.Save