Genre: YA, Sci-Fi
Series: N/A
Publication: May 1, 2018 by HMH Books for Young Readers
Source: Personal Library
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Seventeen-year-old Stella Ainsley wants just one thing: to go somewhere—anywhere—else. Her home is a floundering spaceship that offers few prospects, having been orbiting an ice-encased Earth for two hundred years. When a private ship hires her as a governess, Stella jumps at the chance. The captain of the Rochester, nineteen-year-old Hugo Fairfax, is notorious throughout the fleet for being a moody recluse and a drunk. But with Stella he’s kind.
But the Rochester harbors secrets: Stella is certain someone is trying to kill Hugo, and the more she discovers, the more questions she has about his role in a conspiracy threatening the fleet.
Brightly Burning was another book that has been sitting on my TBR pile for forever. One of my goals this year was to read more from the TBR stash in addition to review books. Brightly Burning piqued my interest with the comparison to being ‘Jane Eyre in Space’. I love all things Austen and was looking forward to this sci-fi spin on Austen’s classic.
I certainly saw the similarities. In Brightly Burning, the creepy manor is now a creepy spaceship and ‘Rochester’ is a nineteen-year-old boy named Hugo, whom is shrouded in mystique and secrets. Our heroine, Stella is young, savvy and very inquisitive…very much like Austen’s Jane. Donne pretty much did a play by play of Austen’s novel but swapped adults for teens and a rural countryside setting for space. I felt like it was a good attempt for a YA Science Fiction novel but everything from the characters, plot to the world-building fell a bit short. In my opinion, I didn’t care much for the characters nor found them likeable. Stella was kind of annoying and Hugo was oddly off-putting…I just can’t exactly put my finger on the why. And the supporting characters were also underdeveloped and unmemorable. The plot as I said was a play by play, so it unfortunately made everything very predictable. I thought the world-building could’ve been better realized but Donne was more focused on the romance aspect of the novel. All the boys were oddly interested in Stella who was pretty much described as a plain Jane. Super cliché, special snowflake syndrome there. Not a fan.
I initially thought the voice activated technology/ A.I. Rory was cool but then I realized, it’s not so sci-fi because it’s something we have right now with Amazon Alexa or Google Home. But I do like that Donne used the depopulation idea which is relevant to what is happening today in the news. I had high hopes for Brightly burning but unfortunately it didn’t meet my expectations. If I can sum the novel up in one word, it’d be: underwhelming.
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