Reviews with content warning for Grief - Alone Out Here

5 ⭐ CW: death of a parent, survivor guilt, grief, self-harm, suicidal thoughts, assault, murder/death

Alone Out Here by Riley Redgate is a speculative fiction scifi thriller that is basically Lord of the Flies in space. This book kept me on the edge of my seat the whole time!

We follow Leigh, the First Daughter to an Asian-American female president. Children of dignitaries from all over the world have gathered to tour the generation ship Lazarus, which is a prototype that has been built as a way to transport as many humans off of Earth as possible in anticipation of super volcanoes going off and making it uninhabitable. Unfortunately, the volcanoes go off months before they are predicted to and the only people to escape to the Lazarus are the teens already at the launch site. As far as they know, they are the only survivors.

This book was so intense! It kept wondering what was going to happen. Redgate makes excellent use of the thriller genre by using a countdown clock to show how long they have to reach another planet. Because the eruptions happened sooner than anticipated, things weren't completely ready onboard. Not enough food, no supplies, no adults, no crew. The teens had to figure it out for themselves. We get a really diverse cast since they are from all over the world.

Redgate explores nihilistic themes and the existential crisis of being alone in space and ripped away from everything you know and the complex grief that comes with it. We also see how things escalate quickly when weapons are involved. I loved Leigh's character development and her relationship with Anis. The ending wrecked me. I've just been huffing and sighing about it lol.

Go read this book!

Content Warnings

betweentheshelves's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

Thanks to NetGalley and Disney Publishing for an advanced copy of Alone Out Here to review! Sometimes it can be hard to find science fiction in the YA genre, but I feel like we've gotten more in the last few years and I am here for it. Space kind of freaks me out, but I still enjoy reading about it!

This book is essentially being pitched as Lord of the Flies in space, which is overall a pretty accurate description. Redgate accurately captures the pressure that's constantly put on younger generations to fix the errors of the past. Which is a strong theme throughout the book. Generally, the sense of foreboding and loss is well done, permeating throughout the majority of the story. Definitely here for the tone of the book overall!

However, there are a lot of characters in this. And while not all of them are important to the main plot of the story, it's kind of easy to get lost sometimes. Some of the more technical aspects of space travel also don't quite fit with reality, which is always hard with science fiction. Yes, this is a fictional story. However, if you're going to include more sciencey aspects, I kind of want them to feel more realist.

A small thing of note, this book has been appearing on LGBTQ lists for 2022. While there is some queer rep in here, it's not at the forefront of the story. So if you're looking for gays in space, this aspect might be a bit of a disappointment for you.

All in all, if you enjoy space thrillers and don't mind keeping track of a lot of characters, you might want to pick this one up!

Content Warnings

urlocalvocaloidstan's review

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adventurous challenging dark informative mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

This book was really fast paced and had lots of ups and downs, but the writing was just not it. While it is one of the main focuses that Leigh doesn’t know what she stands for, being a politician’s daughter and constantly advocating for peace, it feels like her opinion just changes very arbitrarily. One second she’s siding with Eli, the daughter of the late pilot, who is now taking charge of the Lazarus, and the next she’s siding with Irina, the younger sister of her friend, who constantly belittles every single decision made. The way she switched her loyalties seemed very abrupt and it didn’t feel like there was much development for that.

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