To Sleep In A Sea Of Stars by Christopher Paolini

 Boy howdy, this was a big book. To start, I've got to say full disclosure: I'm a Paolini fan. The Inheritance Cycle was a must-read for me growing up as I was absolutely floored someone the same age as me could write a New York Times bestseller. I went into this book exited and eager to see what he could do with a Sci-Fi genre story. And when I went into it, it just kept going....and going.....and going. 

If it wasn't for being a fan of Paolini, I probably would have given up on this one without finishing it. The Sci-Fi elements of the story are standard, and you can totally feel the loving homage to many standards of the genre, but the new or exiting or distinct components are few and far between. With minimal spoilers, girl explores alien world, girl finds alien artifact, shenanigans ensue. 

I think my biggest criticism of Sea Of Stars is that it setting-hops so fast and frequently. The places and plot points move so quickly that it is hard to really get a sense of their importance or value. It literally feels like an entire series-worth of stuff happens in this one book, with character arcs and different find the McGuffin quests that could have been stand-alone books in and of themselves. You'd start to get interested and exited about the plot we were on, and then it would hop to the next thing and you'd just be like....but I was enjoying that last place we were or thing we were trying to find. Slowing down the story progression and giving us more time with the characters or locations would have improved the book greatly. 

The part that I give Paolini amazing credit for is the fantastic research and believably he put into the scientific parts of the technology of his world. The space travel and speed issues are handled in an interesting way. Plus there's rail guns. I'm always down for anything that has rail guns, minimal questions asked. 

All things considered, a slightly better than average Sci-Fi adventure with bonus points for scientific integrity and world-building and extra bonus points for a first novel in the genre. Paolini remains on my must read list, but I'd recommend he read a couple Stephen King books to learn about pacing out a large novel without giving a reader whiplash (The Institute being a good example.)

Disclaimer: I received a free digital copy of this title from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.  


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