A review by lilifane
The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson

adventurous dark hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0


I didn't know much about this book when I started reading it, only that it takes place in a world where the multiverse is confirmed and where it's possible to travel between the different earths.

Cara, the protagonist, is one of the few people who get the chance to experience this, because there is one catch: you have to be dead on the other earth, to be able to survive the journey to it. And from the 380 worlds that are similar enough to travel to, Cara is dead on all but 8. So she is hired by the inventor of the technology that makes traversing possible to travel to other worlds and gather information on them, intel that will help her own world to learn and thrive. But then she makes a discovery that changes everything.

I enjoyed the first half of the book a lot. It's a little much at the beginning but the worldbuilding is phenomenal, the cast is diverse and I loved Cara's voice from the start. She is such an amazing complex character. She is strong, smart, ambitious, fragile, makes bad decisions. You get frustrated with her sometimes but she also surprises you when you expect it the least. The writing is beautiful and full of details that get important later. The plot is unexpected, it switches between slow and fast pace, between action and contemplation (it gets a little generic in the second half though). For me it was never about the plot. It's about the world and it's rules, about the character developments, about the struggles between what is right and what is easy to do, about fittng in vs. belonging. I really liked all the characters, even the villains, because due to the multiple earths and versions, you get to know a lot of different aspects of them. I loved the sibling dynamics throught the whole book, the found families, even the spiritual aspects which fit surprisingly well with everything. And then there is this slow burn wlw subplot...

It's really hard for me to describe the book because I haven't read anything like it before and there is so much to think about and discuss. And even though I think the second half was weaker than the first half, the ending was just perfect for me.
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