Review: Across the Universe by Beth Revis

Title: Across the Universe
Author: Beth Revis
Page Count: 398 pages
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: So, this book was totally not what I was expecting. I'm not quite sure exactly what it was that I was expecting, exactly, and it certainly didn't blow me away the way I'd anticipated, but it was definitely a good, solid read.

First of all, the whole Elder/Eldest thing threw me off. At times, it seemed really contrived and kind of stupid, not to mention that I totally got confused whenever they were in the same room together. Secondly, the person behind the killings was ridiculously obvious to me the entire time. I pretty much knew from the beginning. And while it's good to have little hints, it was practically GLARING at me.

Onto the good: Elder and Amy were absolutely adorable together. Elder was such a good character (almost too good, at times) that I just rooted for him in everything that he did. But in the parts where they were separate, I wasn't too compelled. I really wanted to get into the story because the premise had seemed so interesting and Beth Revis can definitely write a love story, but I just thought there should've been more focus on one or the other. I didn't think it all flowed well together, if I'm articulating myself correctly.

That is not to say that I didn't enjoy Across the Universe, because I definitely did. But I wasn't as into it as I thought I would be, mostly because a lot of the science fiction aspects seemed contrived and kind of overplayed. I really loved the descriptions of the getting put in the cryo chamber and almost drowning getting out of it - I thought those were wonderful.

Also, I'm not a huge fan of books that change perspective. It seems like lazy writing to me, honestly. While I wouldn't say that I liked that this did so, but it didn't take away from the story either.

Overall, I did like Across the Universe but the mystery of the murderer as well as the science fiction aspects of the book felt a little lacking. I would definitely recommend it, though - maybe you can articulate yourself better than I can?

Overall: 3.5/5 stars