These Broken Stars

4.5 stars!

‘Titanic in space’, that’s what I heard about These Broken Stars before I opened up a copy for myself. And in ways, it really was. Our main characters, Lilac and Tarver, are from two different worlds yet there is a spark between them as they meet on board the spaceliner, Icarus. But something happens to take down that ship and when they crash on a planet all alone, they have to lean on each other to survive.

There is so much about this plot that worked tremendously for me. From the vivid crash, to the witty banter between Tarver and Lilac, surviving the elements, the addition of an intelligent life, and an interesting twist. It was one exciting and new thing after another! I must say, this one twist FLOORED me. Like, whaaaaaat just happened? I’m equal parts weirded out and amazed by it and when you read it, you’ll know exactly what I’m talking about. It came out of left field and I always enjoy when a book can really surprise me.

The science fiction elements were spot on. It was very futuristic and some elements were unlike anything I’ve ever seen. Some might find the middle to be a bit slow as the focus is on the trek across the planet and the characters trying to find ways to survive, but I’m the type of person who finds that sort of thing fascinating so it didn’t bother me in the least.

Now on to the romance. Guys, I love some UST (unresolved sexual tension) and there was plenty here! Tarver and Lilac are like star-crossed lovers. She’s rich and has a strict dad that doesn’t allow romance in his daughter’s life and will do anything necessary to ensure that. Tarver is a celebrating hero from the military and even though sparks ignite right from their first meeting, they push each other away. Well, she pushes him away for his own good, really. And though that can often be annoying, it wasn’t so much here because it was right from the beginning.The coming back from that makes it all worth it though! The relationship blossoms and their connection is palpable.

“And Lilac, I was right. Forget everything else. Forget everyone else. You’re exactly my kind of girl.”

Overall, a wonderful read and a series I expect so much more from! Can’t wait to see what these authors do next!

~Sara @ Forever 17 Books

A slow building story that grows into something refreshing and rather spectacular! I'm dying to read the next book! Fantastic plot! YA science fiction at it's best. I didn't guess where it was going and feel like there is so much more to this story! Liked it in the beginning, enjoyed it in the middle, and loved it by the end.

This book absolutely grabbed me. I loved the characters and was sad when the book was over. I immediately did a search on the store, hoping there was a sequel. It wasn't over the top science fiction. That's not a genre I typically gravitate to. It's a very good, gripping story. And I want another one, darn it.

I thought this was going to be your typical alien, space travel book and it was so much more. It was so emotionally charged I was exhausted by the end. I couldn't have been more surprised by the clever plot twists and just the overall flow of the story. Heart breakingly beautiful. Loved every second.

The Starbound Trilogy is a good read. Although advertised as young adult, it is a good interesting read for any adult with an interest in Sci-Fi. I enjoyed the first one so bought the other two immediately. Truth be told, I love to find a series that develops a concept. When I read, I'm there, out amongst the stars. It's hard to come back to Earth when I finish the book. Hope to see more from Amie Kaufman & Meagan Spooner.

I truly loved reading this book. I love the characters and how they were developed throughout the story. I want more of this couple because they were forever changed because of the events that they lived through. This is a good start to a new series and something that will live with the reader long after they finish reading it.

Would you like to know what makes me happy? Young adult science fiction does and These Broken Stars by Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner is a respectable addition to the genre. The book centers on heiress Lilac Laroux and Major Tarver Merendsen, who survive when the spaceliner, Icarus, crashes and are stranded on what appears to be an uninhabited planet. Throw in some mystery and science, and voila! These Broken Stars.

I think one of the first things that should be addressed in this review is all of the hype around These Broken Stars. According to Meagan Spooner and Amie Kaufman's newsletter, their novel is the most requested book on Goodreads. That is a pretty high standard to live up to, but I feel like it takes away from this book. The hype monster builds, builds, builds These Broken Stars up, and it's left a little bit shaky. Now don't get me wrong, it's not a bad book but not something that I would've knowledgeably spent a year on pins and needles waiting for.

I liked the characters in These Broken Stars quite a bit. Lilac is an über-rich debutante who is on a pleasure trip with her best friend and bodyguards-in-bodices on her daddy's ship, the Icarus. Tarver Merendsen is a major at the ripe old age of nineteen-twentyish who comes from humble roots. Of course, they're thrown in together at the start of the novel for a rocky start to build intrigue, and there is more to them than it would seem to one another. (It's not a bad thing.) What I liked best is that there is an air of mystery about the "more". Where did Lilac get those tricks up her sleeves? And how in the hell did Tarver Merendsen go from soldier to major on the battlefield?

The world-building is where I got a little hung up in These Broken Stars. I read and loved Skylark by Meagan Spooner, so my expectations were pretty astronomical (see what I did there?) of how the setting and plot unfolded together. I just had too many questions about how things worked. For instance - terraforming. If it was only partially terraformed because of the particular trees used, why were there animals. If there had to be a mirror moon thingy, then they could not occur naturally, right? Yes, I'm one of those weird people who wants to know how the science works. I wanted to pat Lilac and Tarver on the head, tell them they're cute, and send them to make out in a cave so I could LEARN THINGS. And then again, I may've missed the forest in this book because of all the damned trees in the way.

The long and short of it is, These Broken Stars is a good book, but not what I thought it was hyped up to be. I will be rereading it when I get my finished copy, and maybe it will be All The Things for me like Skylark was. Or - more hopefully - I'll be able to judge it against itself and not a book by one of the authors. If all else fails, I'll have a pretty piece of literary artwork to face out on my bookshelf.

- 3.5/5 Stars -

So, here is my take on this story. BORING. Whereas I can make it through a story in a couple of days, depending on the length, this one took me 8 days to get through. I only finished it on principle and in the hopes that there would be this mind-blowing ending that was worth reading about 2 teens walking across a planet and hearing voices.

I had a hard time deciding to rate this a 1 star or 2. So. We will split it and go with 1.5 only because the cover was really beautiful. Which I have to say was probably the best thing about the entire book.

I have to say that I was expecting a truly wonderful book after seeing the cover and reading the description and even some of the reviews, but I was highly disappointed. I read this book after the Melissa Landers series "Alienated" and Veronica Rossi's "Under the Never Sky" and I was expecting another sci-fi adventure romance; however, that did not happen. This book put me to sleep, literally. I would be reading and "poof" out like a light. This is defiantly the book to read if you have insomnia.

This book was so boring. The beginning was good, I have to admit and I always read the sample before I buy and the sample roped me in, hook, line and sinker. But once I purchased it, shortly after continuing to read the story, it plummeted. I was expecting it to get better but it never did. Even the "twist" was like "Oh, are we done now?". He's 18. She's 16. Come on. Two teenagers alone on the planet and when they finally kiss you would think their pent up emotions and teenage hormones would kick in. Nope. Just a kiss and move on with the hiking. I think they eventually had sex though cause Tarver does say he was laying there naked beside Lilac. Of course, we don't necessarily want all those details, but maybe some do, but at least you can assume that their teenage hormones kicked in at one point, maybe. It is really unclear.

Ok. So, here is my biggest issue *****SPOILER ALERT***** Resurrection. Seriously!! I was expecting, and maybe even hoping, that he raced back to the ship with her and use the maps she created to find the sick bay and sew her up, nurse her back to health and then they live happily ever after. I was waiting for all these little things they did during their trek to tie back into their ultimate survival. The whole thing with her dying and then the beings from another dimension (which was really never explained and truly the only really sci-fi aspect of the story besides the space ship that crashed) creating a clone with all her memories, etc. because they needed her to open the locked door in the basement and free them.

So, I wouldn't recommend this book and although the next book has a similar attractive cover and the description sounds like it would be a good book, I think I will hold off on purchasing it for a while.

POSSIBLE MINOR SPOILERISH ITEMS BELOW?

This is kind of like a sci-fi Romeo and Juliet, only this seemingly doomed couple ride around in space ships and get crashed alone on a planet. It turns into a survivalist romance, where two "star-crossed lovers" find love - with a big metaphysical twist. I'm ALL about mysticism and the idea of nonphysical life forms. This is *right* up my alley in a MEGA way. However, those parts weren't fleshed out enough to be truly satisfying to me.

I felt like so many interesting opportunities to explore the planet were wasted. Too much time was spent describing events like a monsoon, snow during a stressful trek through a mountain pass, finding a wreckage of a ship, a wound that demands a search for supplies and medicine. I just wanted *more* about the strange planet, the "whispers." I feel that was incredibly undeveloped and a waste of a BRILLIANT idea.

I liked the 2 main characters. The female lead especially grew on me. She was annoying beyond words in the beginning, but quickly became a true hero.

What seemed to happen to me was that we had a great premise in the beginning, that stalled at around 30-40% into a very SLOW middle of the book, finally peaked at about 70%, and then was enthralling to the end. I LOVED the idea of what the whispers were. I wanted MORE about them, but that part seemed undeveloped and it frustrated me.

I skimmed some of the middle because it was same-old and boring for me personally. The ideas attempted metaphysically were still not enough for me to rate this more more 3 stars. It's not bad at all really, I just was expecting more action and instead got a slow-paced survivalist romance with a cool minor "out of this world" element that wasn't developed enough to satisfy me.

Enjoyable read! I like how the perspective of each person was told in first person. Interesting plot and story. I will have to warn you it is hard to put down. The story moves along and keeps you guessing. I plan to read all of her books.

These days, you're hard-pressed to find an original, well-written book in YA. Seems like everything's been done, and done to death.
I was definitely skeptical going into this book. I mean, look at the cover. Oh, look, a girl in a ballgown, floating in the air! Considering that this describes probably one in every three YA novels these days, I wasn't holding out much hope for originality.
Of course, it didn't take me long to realize this book was unlike anything I've read before. (And the cover is completely relevant to the story, btw, particularly that floaty green dress.) In addition to being refreshingly new, it's also gripping and tense. There's something for everyone here, mainly because the story reinvents itself constantly, sliding smoothly between survival story, space opera, romance and paranormal mystery.
In short, loved it, and can't wait for the next one!

I must admit, I went against everything my primary school teachers taught me & completely judged a book by it's cover...BUT I AM SO GLAD I DID.
This book had me under it's spell from the first chapter. The characters' personalities shine through from the very start, giving life and depth to the authors' beautifully created universe. I will most definitely be suggesting this series to a friend! I've already finished book 2 & am now on the short story (:

Love the world, and the characters and EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS! ♥
Seriously. The characters were so three dimensional and the romance was slow and lovely. No insta love.
And the world building was amazing.

How to describe this book - An adventure, survival, syfy, love story.
It was okay, that is the main thought I had in my head after finishing this book. I went in to this expecting it to pull on my heart strings and leave me gasping for breath, that's what I took away from the reviews I had read of it and that's not what I got. Let me start off by saying this is a good book, it's not a bad book, I can't honestly think of one thing I hated about it, I can't think of one moment I stopped waiting to love it and starting feeling nothing for it. It just wasn't for me, I guess.

Likes -
-The Characters - I loved both characters which just makes it all the more confusing as to why I didn't like this book! The romance was sweet and slow and I love that but when they finally did get together and when all these bad heart breaking things started happening I didn't really feel anything, my heart didn't break for these characters the way I wanted it to.
-I liked that it was a kind of survival story, I'm a sucker for a survival story.
- Beautiful writing.
- Characters - Again I really did love the characters!

Dislikes -
- My main "dislike" I guess would have to be that I didn't really feel invested in this book. I don't know why, the writing was good, I loved the characters, just something about the book, the pace, the plot, just made me feel disconnected and while I was excepting this book to pull my heart every which way and keep me on the edge of my seat it just didn't.
-I guess I felt that the over all world in this book, with all the planets and the terraforming could have be explained a little more, you kinda have figure it all out for yourself and it's slightly confusing at times.
-While I liked that it was a love story/survival novel/ adventure/sy-fy I also feel that it was trying to be too many things at once and so nothing got enough attention.

In conclusion - The writing was beautiful, the characters were well developed and likable, it was just missing that 'pulling on my heart strings' factor that I so love in a book and that I was expecting in this book. And at some point along the way I kinda just stopped caring about this book for the most part. I got disconnected and never really connected again even when we got to the most important parts.

I gave this book 4 stars because It's not that it's a bad book it's just that at some point along the way it lost something for me, but I don't think that will happen to most people, I think most people will probably really enjoy this book. I guess for me it was just that it took too long to get where it was going and I kinda lost interest. I will probably at some point pick up the next book when it comes out just to see what happens but it's not something that I have the overwhelming desire to read the minute it comes out.​

Excellent SyFy adventure. Loved the suspense and mystery that flowed so perfectly through this story. My heart pounded along with each trail the characters faced and had to overcome. An excellent opening book!

Interesting story and world. I like the characters and the pacing of the story. Near the end, it gets pretty crazy and a bit confusing. I kept thinking this planet is reminding me of the TV series, LOST. That is what I mean by confusing and crazy. I think it resolved well and I look forward to the next book.

Really loved this book. I enjoyed how the story progressed. This is romantic science fiction at it's best. I can't wait to read the next book in this series. I hope to learn more about the "whispers"!

Great read! I loved the authors writing, everything flowed and was well Paced. I do wish the beginning was a bit longer, more details about the ship and Lilacs friends. I couldn't put the book down and I'm looking forward to reading the next one. Thank you Amie Kaufman, I needed that.

Amazing dynamic with the characters. Very well developed. the only thing I wasn't too into was the "whispers" (trying not to give too much away here). I thought they didn't fit too well with how the story started off. However, overall a very good read and funny in some parts