Review: Across the Universe by Beth Revis

Across the Universe by Beth Revis

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: Razorbill; First Edition first Printing edition (January 11, 2011)

Goodreads Description:

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.

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After I finished this book I had step back and contemplate it for a couple of days. It was such an amazing story that I just wanted time to think about it. The story is told from both Amy's point of view and Elder's. It switches off each chapter and the chapters are titled with the character's name whose point of view it is told in. This helps to keep things from getting confusing (which could easily happen when switching back and forth like this). The schematics of the ship is included in the book which I think was an awesome idea. Not only does it look cool, but it also helps to give perspective on where the characters go throughout the story.

Amy is such a strong female character. She had the choice of staying behind on Earth or going to a new planet with her parents and she chose her parents. To give up life as you know it to be frozen for 300 years as you travel to a new planet is an incredible and difficult decision. In addition to that she is woken up prematurely by 50 years...which means that when her parents are finally woken up she will be older than them. Of course she is distraught, but she has to push those feelings aside to find out who is killing the others who were frozen as well before they get to her parents.

Elder is being trained by Eldest to take his place as leader of the ship one day. Eldest is keeping secrets and not teaching Elder the things he really needs to know though. Elder is already starting to question Eldest's behavior but once Amy comes into the picture things really reach a boiling point. There are some pretty twisted secrets aboard the ship Godspeed. Just when I thought I would have everything figured out there would be a curve ball and I would be shocked at how things are even crazier than I first thought.

I have pretty much nothing negative to say about this book other than I hated the way Amy would refer to her father as "daddy." It is something trivial but it grated on my nerves because even though she is in a vulnerable situation she is a teenager and every time she said it it made her seem extremely immature which goes against the strength she shows throughout the story. I think had she used that term once or twice during especially distressing moments it would have had a better effect than the constant use of it.

This is a dystopian story which is extremely popular right now. I would recommend this to those who love this particular genre and also to newbies of the genre. I am so excited that this is just the first book in a series. I think it is actually strong enough to stand on its own but I am definitely not complaining that I get to read more about life on Godspeed. I'm sure there will be many more secrets unearthed and new problems arising from the decisions made at the end of Across the Universe. I look forward to seeing how things come together.

5/5