Amy Kathleen Ryan
Glow (Sky Chasers, Book 1)
Macmillan St. Martin’s Griffin (US: 13th September 2011); Pan Macmillan (AU: 1st October 2011; UK: 7th October 2011)
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The deep-space setting is above and beyond the best part of Glow. The descriptions of the sky, stars, and nebula outside the spaceships are amazing; so beautiful to read. Amy Kathleen Ryan has crafted a fabulous pageturner, though some elements leave a lot to be desired:
Point #1: The romance. A love triangle in YA fiction; who would have thought? Glow has a whiff of Ally Condie’s Matched: heroine is engaged to one guy, but would rather be with the other dangerous, mysterious guy.
Point #2: The religion. Though brought up Catholic, I consider myself atheistic. But in the case of this novel, I don’t like how religion seems to be shorthand for cult/evil/naive/stupid. Yes, I find a lot of things wrong with organised religion, but judge not lest ye be judged and all that.
Point #3: The characters. I just don’t like any of them, maybe because I’m a bitch.
But even with its problems, Glow is compulsive reading, and I’m eagerly awaiting Book 2. More deep-space novels, please!
Tez Says 