Book name: Across the Universe
Author: Beth Revis
Series: Book one
A love out of time. A spaceship built of secrets and murder. When Amy is frozen aboard the interstellar spaceship Godspeed, she expects to be woken in 300 years on a new planet. Instead, someone wakes her up early…and if Amy doesn’t figure out soon, the next people woken up might not survive–including her parents.
The depth of imagination Beth had to write a story like this still does not fail to amaze me. Not only is the story played out on a spaceship but it's 300 years in the future and everything's different, evolved in a way you wouldn't really expect. This alone was interesting but combined with the complex story; which at time had me hating characters I shouldn't have and loving characters I should hate; it's just utter brilliance.
The story is told through both Amy's point of view and Elder's. The contrast between the two is very evident at the beginning but as they begin to understand one another more you can see how even though they were born millenniums apart they share similar morals.
Although I knew from the start when a certain character was introduced that he would be that guy, (Trying to keep this spoiler proof), the way that it was discovered I still found very entertaining. The ending was wrapped up very nicely.
Of course I hated how their world worked and the system seems very harsh but when I reached the ending of the book I started to understand why their world lives the way it does, it's actually rather clever and very true that the truth can't always be known. Society needs to have some form of foundation even if it is made up of lies.
The story plays on the fact that nothing goes the way it's planned, sometimes things are unfair and you have to make sacrifices. For instance Amy and her parents, which of course breaks your heart as you can't help but think how you would be feeling if you were in that position.
I can't exactly say that Across the Universe is predictable cause I only found small parts like a character predictable and some parts are actually very shocking. So yes, it's one of the books you just have to keep reading.
I really warmed to one of the non-main characters, I think mostly because he's a bit crazy and very artistic like me, and was sad by his.. well story. (No spoilers!) And other characters I just really disliked, but Amy is shown to be really alone and so the characters were not meant to be liked.
Amy and Elder's love is ever so subtle, it's like they are learning in baby steps that that feeling they feel towards one another is ok, as love is like a foreign language to Elder. Much like most dystopian books Across the Universe demonstrates how love can survive even where love is unknown.
5/5! Lost for words.
