Series: Across the Universe #1
Author: Beth Revis
Publisher: Razorbill
Publication Year: 2011
Language: English
Format: hardback
Pages: 399
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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How does it feel to be cryogenically frozen and sent to another planet? That’s what happened to Amy, a 17-year-old girl. She follows her parents on a mission to colonize a planet called Centauri-Earth. It’s a long journey to get there, 250 years long to be exact. So them along with other people in this mission are kept as frozen cargo on a spaceship named Godspeed until they reach the planet. Unfortunately, Amy was reanimated sooner than expected. She woke up 50 years sooner than it’s supposed to. Moreover, she’s reanimated prematurely, causing her almost died. She has to figure out who tried to kill her and trying to fit into her new life on Godspeed.
Across the Universe is the first book in a trilogy. It’s told from dual perspective, Amy and Elder. Elder is the future leader of the colony living on Godspeed. Beside those two, there also Eldest who is the current leader, Harley who is Elder’s close friends, Doc who is the doctor of the ship, and Orion whose job is almost like a librarian.
The story takes place in a spaceship. It adds to the atmosphere and claustrophobic feel to the story. As a person who’s living on earth, I totally understand Amy’s frustration over living in the ship. The life there feels artificial, especially with the addition of how unnatural the society living there is.
Starting this book, I thought Across the Universe would be one of those dystopian YA books where the main character would rebel against the dictator. It’s more than that. There’s a mystery added to the story. It’s almost like a murder mystery book, but it’s also kind of dystopian with how the Godspeed eldest system works. Moreover, in which I think is a plus point for this book, the eldest system has a reasonable back story. There’s a reason why they establish the eldest system and it’s totally make sense. Just imagine living in an enclosed space for years. True, in this case it’s a big ship with larger rooms to move and there are about 2000-ish people on board. Still, it’s a long journey and people could live their entire life on the ship. Conflict is definitely bound to happen and you can’t go anywhere. You’re basically trapped in the ship. There’s a need for order. This book is actually revolved around that idea.
All in all, I think this book has an interesting premise. Although some parts are predictable, I like the main idea of this book. It gives a refreshing take on dystopian YA. It has an intriguing mystery aspect. I enjoyed reading this book. I’m definitely going to read the next book.
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