Across the Universe

Author: Beth Revis
Publisher: Razorbill/Penguin

A love out of time. A spaceship built of secrets and murder.

Seventeen-year-old Amy joins her parents as frozen cargo aboard the vast spaceship Godspeed and expects to awaken on a new planet, three hundred years in the future. Never could she have known that her frozen slumber would come to an end fifty years too soon and that she would be thrust into the brave new world of a spaceship that lives by its own rules.

Amy quickly realizes that her awakening was no mere computer malfunction. Someone-one of the few thousand inhabitants of the spaceship-tried to kill her. And if Amy doesn't do something soon, her parents will be next.

Now Amy must race to unlock Godspeed's hidden secrets. But out of her list of murder suspects, there's only one who matters: Elder, the future leader of the ship and the love she could never have seen coming.

This book is the first in a new series by Beth Revis. Amy is a teen who chooses to go into space with her parents; frozen in the hopes that they will reach a new planet in 350 years. When she is woken up too early, she discovers that she is now stuck and will likely not see her parents again. Elder is the boy who will someday lead the people aboard Godspeed. They both work together to find out who woke her up and who is trying to kill the other “frozens” aboard. The answer to which was a bit surprising. I won’t say much more because I don’t want to give away too much of the plot.

I felt that I still had some questions in the end; ones that I am hoping get answered in the subsequent books. I wouldn't really say it was a romance. There is some love interest, but I think it is really one-sided. I didn’t really believe the attraction between Amy and Elder. I thought it was a bit forced. Overall, I did like the book. I found myself wondering what I would do if I was stuck in space forever. The peripheral characters are interesting. Ms. Revis has built a pretty neat world aboard Godspeed

I question the YA label of this book. There are some pretty detailed scenes in this book such as a near rape scene to name one. For parents wondering if it is good for under those YA under 16, I would say to use your own discretion.

--Kari