Avalon

Avalon (Avalon #1)
Author: Mindee Arnett
Publisher: Balzer & Bray
Pages: 432
Genre: Science fiction, Dystopian
Published: January 21, 2014
Rating: 4/5 stars
Goodreads link

Description

A ragtag group of teenage mercenaries who crew the spaceship Avalon stumble upon a conspiracy that could threaten the entire galaxy in this fascinating and fast-paced sci-fi adventure from author Mindee Arnett.

Of the various star systems that make up the Confederation, most lie thousands of light-years from First Earth-and out here, no one is free. The agencies that govern the Confederation are as corrupt as the crime bosses who patrol it, and power is held by anyone with enough greed and ruthlessness to claim it. That power is derived from one thing: metatech, the devices that allow people to travel great distances faster than the speed of light.

Jeth Seagrave and his crew of teenage mercenaries have survived in this world by stealing unsecured metatech, and they're damn good at it. Jeth doesn't care about the politics or the law; all he cares about is earning enough money to buy back his parents' ship, Avalon, from his crime-boss employer and getting himself and his sister, Lizzie, the heck out of Dodge. But when Jeth finds himself in possession of information that both the crime bosses and the government are willing to kill for, he is going to have to ask himself how far he'll go to get the freedom he's wanted for so long.

Avalon is the perfect fit for teens new to sci-fi as well as seasoned sci-fi readers looking for more books in the YA space-and a great match for fans of Joss Whedon's cult hit show Firefly.

My thoughts

I heard this was about a group of teenage mercenaries stealing spaceships, so I needed to pick this book up.

It took me a while to get into this book. But after about 100-150 pages it started to pick up. This book is slow, so don’t give up to early. In the end this book is worth it. 

The beginning is more getting to know the characters and the world. The second half is action, intrigue, plot twist and a lot of betrayal.

SciFi isn’t a genre that I read much, but dystopian is. This book is a combination of the two. That made it easier for me to get into the story. I think this book is a great introduction to YA SciFi, at least it was so for me. The technology in this book was complicated but I think they made it easy to follow because they explained it in an easier way.

The characters were fully developed. You get to know some of their backstory but not of every character. The story is from Jeth’s perspective. So he tells you a bit about the backstory of his crew. It is just a bit of what they did before they joint the crew and how they met.

The villains in this book were super evil but to themselves they weren’t. Mindee tried to show you that these villains weren’t just evil because they wanted to be evil. No when the villains were explaining themselves they really thought they were making the world better. But they didn’t realize that by trying to defeat the ITA (most powerful company in the universe) they became something worse than the ITA.

This book is definitely worth your time!