I can’t tell you how many times I read the first 2 books of the Inheritance Cycle by Christopher Paolini. I have fond memories of finishing Eldest for what must have been the dozenth time and immediately restarting it. I used to even read the three points-of-view separately all the way through and then re-read altogether. Needless to say, I am a fan and was thrilled to receive a full e-arc of Paolini’s newest book, To Sleep in a Sea of Stars! He has been working on this book for a decade and after finishing it, I am not surprised.
World-building: The best thing about the book was the incredible amount of thought that went into the laws of physics that would govern futuristic space travel and the intricacies of far flung colonization. I was utterly wow-ed by the amount of detailed universe-building that happened and it would be a shame if more aspects of it aren’t explored in the future.
Characters: I could have used more character development. There were A LOT of characters and that sometimes made it difficult to keep track, especially since I read this over a span of 3 weeks. That being said, there was still development, I just would have liked more for such a long book. It does feature a snarky, sometimes psycho Ship Mind (which is sort of like an AI but far more complicated) and I LOVED him. I also have to mention that while the main character is a pretty badass woman, it’s obvious she was written by a male author. It’s not the most egregious example I’ve seen by any means but it’s still an issue.
Plot: It’s a very plot-driven book and full of intense space battles. It has it’s fair share of slow parts, which is due in large part to the realistic space traveling laws Paolini created. It takes months to travel long distances and a good bit of time is spent on the necessities leading up to going into cryo, the actual traveling, and waking up afterward. I was intrigued throughout the whole book by the alien life forms that are encountered. Their differences were fascinating and humanities reactions were realistic. I had some issues with the timeline of the creation of the Nightmares/Corrupted but tried not to dwell on that too much. The ending had more of a scifi/fantasy type feel and made me wonder whether a 2nd book could be forthcoming.
Overall this is a 4 star read for me! It is an impressive work of science fiction and perfect for fans of more hard scifi type books like Artemis or The Martian with a touch of the extraterrestrial.
World-building: The best thing about the book was the incredible amount of thought that went into the laws of physics that would govern futuristic space travel and the intricacies of far flung colonization. I was utterly wow-ed by the amount of detailed universe-building that happened and it would be a shame if more aspects of it aren’t explored in the future.
Characters: I could have used more character development. There were A LOT of characters and that sometimes made it difficult to keep track, especially since I read this over a span of 3 weeks. That being said, there was still development, I just would have liked more for such a long book. It does feature a snarky, sometimes psycho Ship Mind (which is sort of like an AI but far more complicated) and I LOVED him. I also have to mention that while the main character is a pretty badass woman, it’s obvious she was written by a male author. It’s not the most egregious example I’ve seen by any means but it’s still an issue.
Plot: It’s a very plot-driven book and full of intense space battles. It has it’s fair share of slow parts, which is due in large part to the realistic space traveling laws Paolini created. It takes months to travel long distances and a good bit of time is spent on the necessities leading up to going into cryo, the actual traveling, and waking up afterward. I was intrigued throughout the whole book by the alien life forms that are encountered. Their differences were fascinating and humanities reactions were realistic. I had some issues with the timeline of the creation of the Nightmares/Corrupted but tried not to dwell on that too much. The ending had more of a scifi/fantasy type feel and made me wonder whether a 2nd book could be forthcoming.
Overall this is a 4 star read for me! It is an impressive work of science fiction and perfect for fans of more hard scifi type books like Artemis or The Martian with a touch of the extraterrestrial.