Illuminae

Oh boy. This may be a long one. You have been warned…

Illuminae is a very unique story that uses so many different formats and images that you never know what is coming next! So the story is about a girl called Kady and a guy called Ezra. The morning they break up, their ice cold planet (an illegal mining populace) gets invaded (or more like destroyed) killing thousands upon thousands of occupants. The two manage to escape into different ships. The story is about the three ships that manage to get out, trying to outrun the Lincoln who keeps trying to hunt them down. Further to this, AIDAN, the AI on the main ship, Alexander, decided to defy command from the commander and orders the team to shoot down their sister ship the Copernicus. With the marine commanders attempting to cover the truth up, there is Kady on a separate ship who is determined to find out the truth. With Ezra on the Alexander, Kady makes contact in order to get answers. Kady’s hacking skills are beyond compare and she works trying to find the truth… Boy does it kick off from there. Add in an illness that drives people psychotic and bloodthirsty along with an insane AI who takes on a life of his own… Kick off indeed.

I was SOOOOOO hesitant to read this. I wasn’t keen on the storyline but once I had it in my hand, I knew that I was going to love it. The book is organised like a file full of documents that help piece together all of the events from the invasion to the end. So you go through messages, camera equipment, audio files, etc. You genuinely don’t know what is going to happen next or what form it is going to tell us in (a couple of examples are below). It is full of adventure and heartbreak and death.

It stinks of death. The entire way through it. And I love it. I adore authors who are not afraid to kill their characters, regardless of their role in the story. It just makes it that much more tense! And this story is tense. Its also really interesting to read it through data and solid evidence rather than through a perspective, it really adds that edge to it where there is no narrator that you know has to survive etc.

The imagery of this is incredible. Not only is it with the cover image, the insides are just as beautiful. I ended up pausing so many times just to look at it and take it all in. Added such a cool dimension to the story.

Kady is an awesome, kick-ass, sarcastic hacker and you have total faith in her the entire way through. Such an amazing character and I love that she isn’t afraid to feel but then get on with stuff (like saving the ship). Ezra is also a great character and I adore them both. I like the different dimension that their relationship takes from the beginning.

All in all, an extremely clever and incredibly well-done book. The ending was just SO GOOD. It made the entire thing just shine that much brighter. I cant really articulate how much I enjoyed it and I cannot recommend it enough. If only for the uniqueness of the tale.

When can I have the next one?!!?!?