Scan barcode
itsbumley's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent, Genocide, Injury/Injury detail, Self harm, Death, Forced institutionalization, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Body horror, Murder, Violence, Blood, Gore, Suicide, Child death, Gun violence, Grief, Mass/school shootings, and Pandemic/Epidemic
booksawyer's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
I finished this book at 12:54 AM because it was so good.
I first tried reading Illuminae when I was in 8th Grade, and for some unimaginable reason I DNF’d it after about 200 pages. I don’t think I really understood what was going on.
Now, as a college student who has read a lot more books since then, this book was everything! I loved Kady, Ezra and many members of the supporting cast.
I chose to read this book physically while listening to the audiobook, and I loved that method. It was the perfect balance of the visual formatting of the book with the brilliant audio production. Highly recommend this method if it is available to you!
This book shocked me, excited me, and devastated me through many twists and turns. I felt triumph and failure as the characters experienced ups and downs. This book is so engaging and brilliantly told.
I don’t consider myself a Sci-Fi person. I can’t think of any Sci-Fi books I’ve read beyond teen dystopia, but this book certainly was my cup of tea and it makes me excited to pick up more from this genre.
Overall, Illuminae is a must read and I can not recommend it enough.
I first tried reading Illuminae when I was in 8th Grade, and for some unimaginable reason I DNF’d it after about 200 pages. I don’t think I really understood what was going on.
Now, as a college student who has read a lot more books since then, this book was everything! I loved Kady, Ezra and many members of the supporting cast.
I chose to read this book physically while listening to the audiobook, and I loved that method. It was the perfect balance of the visual formatting of the book with the brilliant audio production. Highly recommend this method if it is available to you!
This book shocked me, excited me, and devastated me through many twists and turns. I felt triumph and failure as the characters experienced ups and downs. This book is so engaging and brilliantly told.
I don’t consider myself a Sci-Fi person. I can’t think of any Sci-Fi books I’ve read beyond teen dystopia, but this book certainly was my cup of tea and it makes me excited to pick up more from this genre.
Overall, Illuminae is a must read and I can not recommend it enough.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Violence, and Gore
Moderate: Grief, Death of parent, and Child death
Minor: Child abuse
jessi_c's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
I went into this with space adventure vibes of Firefly/Serenity, but I ended up with the horror, space thriller vibes of Serenity. When that tonal shift happened, the story took off and I got incredibly absorbed to the bittersweet end. I was supposed to slowly read this thru the month of Aug and here I am, finished a week in. Going to find the other two books to fill the month. Well done!
Content Warnings
Graphic: War, Injury/Injury detail, Suicidal thoughts, Violence, Suicide, Grief, Child death, and Death
Moderate: Murder, Blood, Suicidal thoughts, Gore, Gun violence, Body horror, and Vomit
Minor: Cursing
mothreadsbookssometimes's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
hopeful
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Illuminae was a fantastic book and I can’t wait to read the rest of the series. I first read the Aurora Cycle trilogy, and I loved it so much that I had to read the rest of Kristoff’s and Kaufman’s works. And boy, am I having a time!
Illuminae is a very YA-friendly sci-fi mystery/thriller (I know it’s not tagged as a thriller, but it is) with minimal swearing (“censored on reports”), and only vague references to sex (jokes about “your sister” and references to acts done prior to the events of the story).
Take it from someone who normally hates thrillers, this book is good. Admittedly, there’s a lot of death and blood (only a few disturbingly gory parts, though), so do keep that in mind, but I didn’t find it too uncomfortable and I’m normally a very squeamish person.
Can’t wait for the next book!
Illuminae is a very YA-friendly sci-fi mystery/thriller (I know it’s not tagged as a thriller, but it is) with minimal swearing (“censored on reports”), and only vague references to sex (jokes about “your sister” and references to acts done prior to the events of the story).
Take it from someone who normally hates thrillers, this book is good. Admittedly, there’s a lot of death and blood (only a few disturbingly gory parts, though), so do keep that in mind, but I didn’t find it too uncomfortable and I’m normally a very squeamish person.
Can’t wait for the next book!
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Blood, Death, and Violence
Moderate: Body horror, Child death, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Pandemic/Epidemic, Gore, and Death of parent
Minor: Confinement, Cannibalism, Alcohol, Fire/Fire injury, and Self harm
I know it’s a lot of content warnings, so do proceed with caution. I’m not very good with blood/gore, but I only had a couple small parts (see below) that made me uncomfortable. There’s a lot of death, but it’s not vividly gory until about 45% (I think) into the bookchildoflight's review
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Abandonment, Violence, Grief, and Pandemic/Epidemic
Moderate: Death of parent, Police brutality, Gun violence, Confinement, and Schizophrenia/Psychosis
Minor: Child death and Suicidal thoughts
marsh_mall0w's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Confinement, Death, Gore, Grief, War, Pandemic/Epidemic, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and Violence
Moderate: Child death, Medical content, Police brutality, Torture, Vomit, and Colonisation
Minor: Medical trauma, Death of parent, Misogyny, and Fire/Fire injury
edie_maeve's review against another edition
dark
emotional
inspiring
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.5
This book.
I was not expecting this.
The second I opened it, I was transfixed.
I know that if you look at most of my other reviews with written parts are very positive, but this book really hit the spot.
The relationships and the actions of the characters, epic, and the plot is just phenomenal. There are a couple things I dislike, hence the 4.5 instead of 5 star rating, but the story was well told through this format.
Kristoff and Kaufman are an amazing duo, and their other series, The Aurora Cycle/Aurora Rising series is beautiful as well, and I highly recommend it.
I was not expecting this.
The second I opened it, I was transfixed.
I know that if you look at most of my other reviews with written parts are very positive, but this book really hit the spot.
The relationships and the actions of the characters, epic, and the plot is just phenomenal. There are a couple things I dislike, hence the 4.5 instead of 5 star rating, but the story was well told through this format.
Kristoff and Kaufman are an amazing duo, and their other series, The Aurora Cycle/Aurora Rising series is beautiful as well, and I highly recommend it.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Death, and Gore
Moderate: Child death, Blood, and Death of parent
alexa's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
2.75
so. i have been collecting some thoughts throughout this whole thing and they might not be especially cohesive, but that's ok, i was always more of a bullet list person.
i like the format of this, it was really interesting and fun, even if limited the amount of what you can learn about the world. some things were weirdly the same considering we're 500 years in the future, as i already expressed.
it might be just me, but the romantic drama between 2 high school seniors was the least interesting part of this thing, i found it irrelevant and at time or two a little bit annoying, but i suppose that's 17/18yo allo people for you. dunno, never been there.
honestly in general, i did not feel much attached to or interested in the characters beyond like a superficial level.
the ai in this was so weirdly melodramatic and rambling aside from its twisted logic which i'm assuming comes from the damage sustained.
in the q&a at the end, the authors mentioned talking with psychiatrists as part of the research that went into this and it does not sound very inspiring, considering the level and amount of demonization of people struggling with psychosis is staggering and infuriating, i think it was actually my biggest problem with this book.
the authors were quite good at creating tension and making one need to read on to know what happens next, i'll give them that.
however, i'm not entirely sure about continuing the series. it's likely i will i guess? not if they continue the ableism though, i'm not gonna stand for that
Content Warnings
Graphic: Ableism, Blood, Grief, Murder, Gore, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , and War
Moderate: Death of parent, Child death, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Body horror, and Confinement
lauramcc7's review
adventurous
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Child death, Death of parent, Violence, War, Gun violence, Medical content, Suicide, Blood, Death, and Murder
maeverose's review against another edition
Before I get to the review, if you were unaware, Jay Kristoff is racist and antisemitic, so if you wanna read this or any of his other books maybe buy them used.
I’m sorry but I don’t understand how people like this book. If you do, that’s great but wow it was so annoying to me. It literally took me over a year to get halfway through before I decided I couldn’t do it anymore.
Every character except Kady acted the exact same. They all acted like 15 year old boys who made misogynistic jokes and took nothing seriously.Even the AI talks like a teenager’s edgy poetry They were in an extremely dangerous and terrifying situation, literally watching people die in brutal ways, and they were cracking jokes as if everything was fine. The romance was cringey and felt completely out of place and unnecessary in this story. I have no idea why Kady liked Ezra. I’m 100% convinced that the only part Amie Kaufman got to write was Kady’s character and her scenes. The entire tone of this book was so off, it’s primarily focused on the romance, but there’s all of this extremely messed up stuff going on in the background that seems to be pretty urgent and important, but nobody is focusing on it as much as they should? And they’re cracking stupid jokes at the same time?
Omg and can we talk about Ezra literally calling women ‘fems’..? You cannot convince me a woman wrote that.
The one thing I did like was the epistolary format of it. This could’ve been such a cool story if it had been written by different authors, had no romance, and got rid of the out-of-place humor. (And was adult instead of YA..)
I’m sorry but I don’t understand how people like this book. If you do, that’s great but wow it was so annoying to me. It literally took me over a year to get halfway through before I decided I couldn’t do it anymore.
Every character except Kady acted the exact same. They all acted like 15 year old boys who made misogynistic jokes and took nothing seriously.
Omg and can we talk about Ezra literally calling women ‘fems’..? You cannot convince me a woman wrote that.
The one thing I did like was the epistolary format of it. This could’ve been such a cool story if it had been written by different authors, had no romance, and got rid of the out-of-place humor. (And was adult instead of YA..)
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death of parent, Misogyny, Child death, Stalking, Confinement, Gore, Mental illness, Murder, and Grief
A pandemic, A virus that makes people homicidal