Book Review Thoughts: Gemina by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff

Book: Gemina by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff
Genre: YA SF
Rating:★ ★ ★ ★ ★


This is the second book in the Iluminae Files. This one is a different part of the story, showing what's happening in another part of the universe during the same events as the first book, Illuminae. Which means we have a whole new set of characters. Even though the first set pops in and out just a bit.

So this book takes place on a space station (the other one on space ship). In fact it's the space station that the space ship from the first book is trying to get to. And just shortly after the book opens, the station is taken over by hostiles. These people are connected to the events in the first book and for some reason, DANG, they want to kill everyone! (Reasons for this may have been subtly revealed, but if so, I didn't catch it in the midst of all the other trauma I was focused on.)

Anyway.

This one follows the tradition of the first book in that the story is told using documents. Such as, emails, texts, surveillance camera footage, journal entries, and etc. It takes maybe a page or two to get the flow of this method, but I think readers fall into the rhythm of it really fast. And once again, I find it a really fun way to tell a story. It's so unique and fascinating really.

Our heroine is the daughter of the leader of this space station and she is one spunky girl. She loves this one dude, but he turns out to be... not so good, and the dude she thinks is not so good, turns out to be the one she really likes. Of course. And she learns all this throughout the course of the events that happen after the take over, which is stressful because she, of course, is the only one who can save the day. So she sort of has her hands full.

It's so very complicated and much much more intense than I can articulate. But let me just say, whew, these are violent books. Let that be a warning to those with queasy and/or weak stomachs. Violent I'm telling you!

So once again, I was sucked in and loved this story. I'm anxious to read more and see how it all ends, because of course, there is so much  more of this story to tell! So now I wait another year I'm guessing!