Aurora Rising (The Aurora Cycle #1)
By Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff
Genre: YA Science Fiction
Recommended For: Ages 14+, astronaut wannabes, star gazers, space-loving thriller readers, Guardians of the Galaxy fans, kids at heart (meaning any age will enjoy it), readers who are drawn to larger casts of characters with diverse personalities.
The year is 2380, and the graduating cadets of Aurora Academy are being assigned their first missions. Star pupil Tyler Jones is ready to recruit the squad of his dreams, but his own boneheaded heroism sees him stuck with the dregs nobody else in the Academy would touch…
A cocky diplomat with a black belt in sarcasm
A sociopath scientist with a fondness for shooting her bunkmates
A smart-ass techwiz with the galaxy’s biggest chip on his shoulder
An alien warrior with anger management issues
A tomboy pilot who’s totally not into him, in case you were wondering
And Ty’s squad isn’t even his biggest problem—that’d be Aurora Jie-Lin O’Malley, the girl he’s just rescued from interdimensional space. Trapped in cryo-sleep for two centuries, Auri is a girl out of time and out of her depth. But she could be the catalyst that starts a war millions of years in the making, and Tyler’s squad of losers, discipline-cases and misfits might just be the last hope for the entire galaxy.
Luna’s Top Thoughts:
- Dynamic story full of action
- Constant rising tension and ever increasing stakes
- Lots of POV characters, but each has a different and fun personality
- Intriguing, need to know more plot
- For me, it was a stay-up-past-my-bedtime-cause-I-can’t-stop-reading book
- Lack of substance in one of the romantic subplots
The Review:
Aurora Rising is the first book in what I can already tell will be a thrilling, hang onto your seats, space adventure with one of the best cast of characters I’ve read about in a long time. After stumbling across a teenage girl who has spent the last 200+ years in cryo, goldenboy Tyler’s life takes a series of unexpected turns. He gets what starts as his nightmare squad that quickly turns into her dream squad and a second family. Together, they travel through the galaxy trying to escape people they thought were there to protect them in order to protect precious cargo themselves, Aurora, the mysterious cryo girl with mysterious powers.
I knew I would love this book before I read it. Everything I read said it was amazing and I thought Kaufman’s and Kristoff’s Illuminae Files series was chef’s kiss. But I can’t believe I loved it AS MUCH AS I DID!
Aurora Rising is a perfect example of a story that starts with a small mystery, who is this random girl in a random space craft, and grows into a save-the-galaxy situation. I thought the pacing was good in the book, no parts dragged for me but it also wasn’t so quick it felt jumpy. And the steady rise in tension made it harder to put the book down the farther into I got.
There were pros and cons with the characters, but mostly pros. It was an incredible cast of people that formed this squad. Each person had a unique quirk to their personality, and each person had a specific skillset. What really impressed me was how the authors managed to showcase each skillset in use in a way the majorly impacted the story. None of it felt like fluff purely for entertainment’s sake. Speaking of entertainment, the banter was top notch. The interactions between the characters provided needed levity in certain situations, but was also used as a tool to form connections between them and help them overcome their baggage.
My only two minor cons with characters are that while we get to know some characters really well, others were underdeveloped. Also, I did get a deeper sense of who these people were and missed that feeling of being in their heads as they navigate struggles and contradictions within themselves. Put differently, I felt like a side-line observer to any personal growth they had and I think an opportunity was missed to get a deeper, more internal glimpse of that growth. But I actually didn’t take points off for that. I had to remind myself that this was written for teenagers, who usually prefer faster-paced stories with more action and less character development, at least in book one. I did love the characters though, so I look forward to getting to know them more in books 2 & 3.
I think the only reason I can’t give this book a full 5 stars is because of the romance subplot. There were 3, and two of them were good. Slow paced, which I think is fine for YA. But one really bugged me. It felt like a cheap way to have insta-love while trying not to call it insta-love. And I’m not taking points off for personal preference because the reason I don’t like anything that feels like insta-love is because in that scenario, there is nothing to build a relationship on. There were very few scenes with one of the couples together and they practically never interacted with each other. This gave me no connection to them as a couple so I was actually angry when the romance started to bloom. Their reasons for paying attention to each other felt flimsy at best. I could see it getting better in later books, but there just wasn’t enough in book 1 to make it satisfying for me.
The ending was explosive and mind bending and definitely set up larger problems to deal with in subsequent books. However, I got confused a couple times and there were some solutions that felt very out of the blue and like there wasn’t much foundational work laid to make it possible, but I also didn’t want to take off points because I could just be easily confused haha.
All in all, Aurora Rising is a moving found family story set in the exciting wide open space. It is a thrilling ride that leaves you ready for another round at the end. I can already tell this will be a frequently recommended book from me.
Luna’s Lucky Rating: 4.5/5 Lunas
