Published: December 10th 2013 by Disney Hyperion
Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy, Romance, Dystopia, Science Fiction, Paranormal, Space
Pages: Hardcover, 374 pages
It’s a night like any other on board the Icarus. Then, catastrophe strikes: the massive luxury spaceliner is yanked out of hyperspace and plummets into the nearest planet. Lilac LaRoux and Tarver Merendsen survive. And they seem to be alone.
Lilac is the daughter of the richest man in the universe. Tarver comes from nothing, a young war hero who learned long ago that girls like Lilac are more trouble than they’re worth. But with only each other to rely on, Lilac and Tarver must work together, making a tortuous journey across the eerie, deserted terrain to seek help.
Then, against all odds, Lilac and Tarver find a strange blessing in the tragedy that has thrown them into each other’s arms. Without the hope of a future together in their own world, they begin to wonder-would they be better off staying here forever?
Everything changes when they uncover the truth behind the chilling whispers that haunt their every step. Lilac and Tarver may find a way off this planet. But they won’t be the same people who landed on it.
The first in a sweeping science fiction trilogy, These Broken Stars is a timeless love story about hope and survival in the face of unthinkable odds.
My review:
Well, I’m sure this might be a surprise for you because I have already reviewed this book. No, you’re not crazy, but after going back and rereading it I decided that I would listen to it again and write a real review, not one where more than half of it is a spoiler.
This book was just as amazing the second time as it was the first time. The characters were as fresh and complicated as I remember and I was even surprised by details I had forgotten about them.
Lilac was as privileged, stubborn and as not-crazy as I remember, but now I can appreciate it even more now that I have read the next two books in the series. Despite being a rich and spoiled debutant she certainly pushes through to her very core to survive, especially in the middle and at the end of the book.
And Tarver, he broke my heart. He was wonderfully written, from the beginning, to the interludes where he is being debriefed (where he was so sarcastic I couldn’t help but appreciate his nerve), and then those events at the end. You’ll know what I mean when you read the book.
The main plot is so beautifully simple and can be summed up into one, single word. Survive. There is a larger story arch for the next two books of the series, but just surviving, that’s what this book is about. Well, that and Lilac and Tarver trying not to kill each other while also trying to get the other to stay alive long enough to reach their goal.
Now, this book is almost entirely starring just Lilac and Tarver. Usually, only two characters together, alone would have caused me to whine about how the author was unimaginative but this works really, really well. Yes, I want other people there because the are stranded on an abandoned planet and I don’t want them to suffer, but their dynamic would have been completely ruined if there was someone else there.
Yes, this is considered a romance book, and it didn’t seem at all out of place. It fell in quite easily and it wasn’t a sudden thing forced upon two people who hated each other from the very start. If anything, these two pushed their feelings aside as the tragic accident pulls them closer together without them even knowing it. I think I lived for the moment these two finally accepted each other and I would not have had it any other way. It all just works so well!
So much goes on, yet so little happens. I mean this in the most amazing way possible. There is no one else to interfere with Lilac and Tarver’s mission of surviving, or working towards a goal other than nature and themselves. And when they get to one of the destinations, and what happens to both of them, well, it was hard. But the next place, it is so much harder. They are so sweet and it just breaks my heart.
I knew what was coming, knew what had to happen for the story to move on, and still, it rocked me and almost brought me to tears again. I knew how this book, and the series, ended, but still I couldn’t help the emotions that refused to stay pushed down. I don’t even have words to explain it in a way that will do it justice and not spoil it at the same time. Please, just read it!
★★★★★
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