Review: Across the Universe by Beth Revis

Title: Across the Universe

Author: Beth Revis
Publisher: Razorbill

Published: January 11, 2011

Pages: 398

My Rating: 4.5/5

Misc.: Hardcover

 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.


Synopsis taken from GoodReads.

My Review:
From all of the hype going around about this book, my expectations were high. I'm happy to say that the book did not disappoint. Beth Revis created  a wonderful novel about the future and what is in store for us humans. In her book, important people are being frozen and loaded onto a spaceship that is set to land 300 years in the future on a new planet. That being said, something goes wrong when our main character Amy gets unplugged 50 years early. The book is set on Godspeed, the spaceship.

What I loved about this book is just how carefully the plot was planned out. There were twists, turns, secrets, and shocking revelations, but by the end of the book, everything fit together perfectly. The world that Beth Revis created was so unique, down to its inhabitants. The people living on the ship at first shocked me because they're so different from people today, but then I realized, we're completely different from people 250 years ago too. Learning about the culture and the Elder/Eldest system was one of the things that kept me hooked.

However, I felt that the characters kept me from giving this book a 5/5 rating. I didn't really see the connection between Amy and Elder. Also, it didn't seem like being frozen for 250 years affected Amy that much. I thought there should have been at least a little bit to show for that. Although, it was nice to see Elder grow as a character throughout the book. Also, it was nice to see that this book was one of those books where the side characters were more than just side characters. Harley, Elder's best friend, played a big role. Though I liked the characters, I would have liked to see a little more sparks between them, you know?

Overall, I thought this book was great read. It was unique and definitely unlike anything I've read before. I would recommend it to readers who love dystopian or sci-fy, or even romance. I can't believe we have to wait all the way until January 2012 for A Million Suns though D: