Failsafe (Failsafe #1) by Anela Deen Review

5/5 Stars 200 pages
Published May 20th 2018 by Fine Fables Press

This book, unlike the last book, was something that was right up my alley, and something I knew I was going to love from the moment I started it. In a time where humans haven’t lived outside a computer for many, many generations, their world is claustrophobic and dangerous. Outside of their settlements live drones that shoot to kill on site, and although they can grow their own food, they can barely grow enough for everyone, especially now when the supplies have stopped being delivered.

 

Sol is different, however. Though she has epilepsy, she doesn’t let that stop her from changing the world that they know, and trying to save everyone she know, and more. She’s not afraid of going out into the Interspace, and her unique dreaming ability lets her know where and when the drones are going to be around, and where the supplies should be. But this comes with a cost to her health, both physical and mental.

 

Though she lives in a time where people aren’t able to chose their mates due to the very little genetic differences between everyone in their settlement, everything changes when she meets Echo one day while out on a supply run. Though he’s not like anyone she’s ever met, and she’s a little scared to trust him at first, he proves himself to be an

Photo by Markus Spiske on Pexels.com

amazing and very strong companion. The two will do whatever they need to do to change the world as they know it.

 

This book was exciting and interesting, and it was everything I wanted it to be and more. Though I wanted there to be a sequel, I think that it ended at such a place where I’m happy if there isn’t ever one. The characters and the story were both really easy to imagine and get sucked into, and though this doesn’t happen very often, I don’t have any questions or complaints or even thoughts leftover that I’m wondering about. In my eyes, this was a perfect book to get me out of my reading slump, and I think it’s something that I’d love to read again and again, that’s just how much I loved it.

 

If you love stories about young adults who want to change the world, no matter how different it is from out own, then you’re going to love this, and I hope you love it as much as I do. Definitely check it out if you get the chance, and it’ll make a beautiful addition to your collection! I’d love to check out other books by the author because of this one.

 

If you’d like to grab a copy, you can do so here.

Here’s a link to the author’s Twitter, if you’d like to keep up with them!

 

Thanks for reading! I’d love to chat in the comments if you have anything you’d like to talk about, this book or any other topic! Hope you have a good day, and stay safe!

 

**I’ve been informed by the author that there will in fact be a sequel!** Patiently awaiting that.

The Luminous Dead by Caitlin Starling Review

The Luminous Dead by Caitlin Starling 4/5 Stars 352 pages
Published April 2nd 2019 by Harper Voyager

With a beautiful and mysterious cover, The Luminous Dead pulled me in with comparisons to The Martian, and Annihilation, both books I loved. Inside the cover is a story that jumps right into the action with Gyre in third person, wiggling through a crevice. I had no idea what I was stepping into, and this is another book that once I started, I didn’t want to put down until I was finished.

 

Gyre had assumed that there would be a team with her on this expedition, and that she would enter through a mining camp before going underground. Both assumptions were wrong. Basically alone except for one voice through a com that barely talks to her at first, her suit is her new skin, she won’t even be able to take it off to sleep for the time that she plans to be underground, over a month. She notices something strange, however, and that is that someone’s been in the cave, had access to the old camps inside and recently. At first she spends her time carrying equipment down from the surface to the first camp, but that’s when the mystery begins to form around her.

 

Later she falls while surveying an area, and the voice inside her com, Em, is unexpectedly angry. However, she finds a body at the bottom, and that was something she wasn’t expecting. The body wears a suit just like hers, and when she tells Em that she’s done with the expedition, Em remotely locks her suit and forces her to stay in one spot until she agrees to keep going. That’s when she learns that there have been thirty-five expeditions before hers, and out of the thirty-five, only eight have came out of it alive. This is the beginning of the longest journey of her life.

 

Overall, I really enjoyed reading this book, and the only thing I have to say that I didn’t like about it, is that if I didn’t read the description, I would never have known that she lied her way onto the project. It jumped straight into the action, and although the description was interesting, I feel like I did miss a part of the book because of it. Everything else, I loved. I do think that the comparisons made are true, this book reminds me of the tunnel/tower in Annihilation, and how alone Gyre was reminds me of how alone Astronaut Mark Watney was in The Martian. If you’re into those two books, I would say go ahead and check this one out.

 

The book is available here, and here’s a link to the author’s Twitter, if you’d like to keep up with them.

Thanks for reading!