Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Across the Universe by Beth Revis

   
Across the Universe
(Across the Universe #1)
by Beth Revis
Summary from Goodreads:

"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."

Rating:

Thank goodness! I’m finally done with this book. Honestly, it was a pain to finish. I apologize to those who like this book because I really didn’t enjoy it.

First of all let me point out that the book’s excerpt, was very much deceiving. I really did think this was a love story. Okay so there are bits and pieces of the love interest between Amy and Elder but it’s not as radiating as I thought it would be. 

So before I go any further to the things I don’t like about this book, I will admit that the plot of the story was intriguing. The mystery, secrets and lies are all in tact and very much convincing you to read on and wait for it to be revealed. There’s like so much history and development brought on to the ship, Godspeed, and the vivid description of it makes you wish you could see the ship in the flesh. As if you’d like to see how much it created an earth-like environment within metal walls as told in the book. Almost wanting you to be part of it and relish the experience.

My problem was how shallow things seem to occur. Things were very much predictable and I couldn’t seem to understand how the protagonists couldn’t have guessed it any sooner? Also the chaos that has uplifted now and then seemed to have not much impact to disrupt the ship. I mean, there was a part were the alarm buzzed loudly indicating a problem with the frozens beneath the ship but it didn’t even create any scene among the residents living there. Yes, I know they’re all zombie-like but what about the “crazy” ones in the hospital. They’re the sane ones in this story right? So, like, they didn’t hear it? Something? Nothing? Okay fine, moving on…

Another problem I encountered was the characters. They don’t stand out. It’s like you’re walking on a neutral territory or whatever. When I read books, characters are very much important to me and I like those who leave marks in my heart with their personality, but sadly I didn’t feel that way with the characters here.

I tried my best to be optimistic as I read through but every so often, I keep checking how many pages do I have left until I finish this book. Not a good sign. From there, I already knew I was struggling to appreciate this. 

Anyway, even with all the negativity I’ve drained into this review, I will admit the Across The Universe is a good sci-fi story. It has so much potential, but the vagueness of how it was executed was what got me weary about it. Yet, I will give this series a chance and read the next book, and maybe it would change the impression I have about it. As Savannah (Ashley Tisdale from Hellcats series) always says, “Positive outcomes only!”