Review: To Sleep in a Sea of Stars (Part I) by Christopher Paolini

Rating: 10/10

Snyposis

*** PART I OF TO SLEEP IN A SEA OF STARS ***

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars is a masterful epic science fiction novel from the New York Times and Sunday Times bestselling author of Eragon and the Inheritance Cycle, Christopher Paolini.

During a routine survey mission on an uncolonized planet, xenobiologist Kira Navárez finds an alien relic that thrusts her into the wonders and nightmares of first contact.

Epic space battles for the fate of humanity take her to the farthest reaches of the galaxy and, in the process, transform not only her – but the entire course of history.

Review

Note: I was given an early ARC access via Netgalley. Thank you to Stephen, Pan-Macmillian, Tor, and Jamie-Lee Nardone – Links will come when it goes live.

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars Part 1 needs to be put in a televison show. It is like the Expanse season 3-4-5 and Star Trek Discovery Season 1 put together. What an amazing concept. It does contain some sterotypes of characters, but it works and I’ll tell you why. This whole concept of a woman discovering an alien space station in the outer edges of space, and then having the alien called the Soft Blade inherit her and kill the remaining members of her station, including Alan…is well amazing!

Why is this not a Netflix show? Amazon? This is the stuff that most hardcore sci-fi fans would want to see. It’s a realistic avenue of what actual human contact with aliens would be. It had so many Expanse moments that I was shocked by the number of references or themes that I got out of it when I read it. The UMC are the worst corporation ever, including the politicans that sent Kira and her team to Adrasteia, an earth-sized moon that contains a lot more secrets. Carr is the worst doctor in existance.

I almost felt rage at the UMC and it’s nebulous ways of wanting to get rid of Kira’s team. Kira and Alan are such a great couple…you’ll see what I mean. The world-building is enormous, and the grasper aliens are some of the best original creations of all time. I did feel that the Soft-Blade Alien and the Grasper conflict was shown relatively well. I also loved that Kira had an idea of the langauge, but not enough to fully understand their conflict. This needs to be a TV show with John Williams as the composer. This already has the ambitious make up of an excellent sci-fi tv show that already needs to be made.

There’s so much more…that will leave you wanting to discover what happens in part 2. I do like this concept of partial galleys though my preference is towards full galleys. It really got moving fast when I read on.

From me? 10/10. You’ll enjoy this a lot.

Amazing world-building, breath-taking descriptions of high-flung galaxies and tentacles….fast and witty dialogue.