Book Review—Illuminae by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff

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This Review Contains Spoilers.

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Let me start off by saying that I absolutely LOVED this book, and I don't think there could have been a better time for me to read it then the current situation we are in. Illuminae is not only an incredible sci-fi novel, but it explores deeper themes as well—love, sacrifice, what it means to be human, and self-image.

For me, a good sci-fi novel has a ton of action, tremendous stakes, and none-stop conflict, but a great sci-fi novel has all of the above plus an underlying message that it's trying to convey to its reader. The messages in Illuminae are power and true, and they are the reason I'm deeply connected to this book.

The first thing I noticed when I picked up the book was that it's written like a case file. It's not formatted like your typical novel. Instead, the story is told through interviews, emails between the characters, reports, and video surveillance footage. At first, I wasn't sure how I felt about this but it quickly grew on me because it added an entire knew mystery to the story. Who created this file? Why was this file created? Are the people mentioned in the file (the characters) still alive?

Not only were you asking questions about the plot, world-building, and the relationships between the characters, you were also asking questions about the history of the file itself, which, for me, took the conflict level from an eight to a ten. The amount of conflict in this story never wavers. Things are constantly happening. The tension is always rising. I was physically shaking throughout the majority of this book. My stomach was in knots. I was in tears at moments, and it gave me a thrill like no other book I've ever read.

Another thing that I loved about this story were the characters. Kady Grant and Ezra Mason are the two main characters. They live on this planet called Kerenza IV, which has just been destroyed by a company called BeiTech. There are only a couple thousand people who escape the attack and make it safely to one of the three escape shuttles. On the same day their world is destroyed, Kady also breaks up with Ezra. (But to be fair, no one knew there was going to be an attack.)

Keep in mind that all of this happens before the entire book really even starts. We just hear about it from Kady and Ezra in an interview. When the story starts, they are already ready on their spaceships—Kady is on the Hypatia and Ezra is on the Alexander. The ships are trying to reach a new planet before the Lincoln, BeiTech's ship, catches up to them and blows them up. CAN YOU SAY STAKES?! This is what editors mean when they say, "Skip the backstory, and throw your characters into mortal danger ASAP."

Throughout the beginning of the book, Ezra and Kady communicate over email. We get a taste of what both characters are like and can imagine what their relationship was like before they broke up. There's lots of banter and cute moments. Ezra is 6'5" and Kady is 5'1". I don't know why, but I find it incredibly cute that he is so much taller than her.

About a fourth of the way through the book, Ezra becomes a pilot for the Alexander's military, while Kady is learning how to hack into computers and is becoming extremely good at it. The Alexander's AI system called AIDAN goes ballistic and destroys the third ship, Copernicus, that left Kerenza. Everyone is in shock after this and the leaders of Alexander are trying to blame the attack on Lincoln instead of their own AI. AIDAN is shut down, while the survivors of the Copernicus are rescued and brought over to the Alexander. Unbeknownst to everyone on the Alexander, they just let a group of virus-infected people onto their ship.

I don't want to spoil the ending to the book, so I'm not going to go into much detail about the rest of the story. I feel like my book reviews are very fact heavy, and I'm often explaining the plot and the characters a lot, but there is one more thing I want to talk about because it added so much to the story in my mind.

This thing is something I didn't know the story needed. It's something I didn't know I wanted the story to have, but it was such a unique twist and opened up the opportunity for this book to explore the theme of humanity that, after reading it, I hold so near and dear to my heart. The thing I'm referring to is AIDAN and Kady's relationship. I swear it's not what it sounds like.

Toward the end of the story, AIDAN and Kady are trapped together. We get to see a lot of the last half of the story from AIDAN's point of view. AIDAN reminds me a lot of the Thunderhead from The Arc of the Scythe series. The AI trope has quickly become one of my favorites in sci-fi/dystopian books, but this story takes that trope to a whole new level.

Throughout the end of the book, AIDAN is trying to give Kady instructions and comfort her. Kady is coming at the AI full force saying it cannot understand human emotion or behavior because it is only a machine—even though AIDAN knows every fact about the human body, every neuron, gene, muscle, and bone inside, it does not know what it means to feel grief, pain, joy, sorrow, or love. Even with all of its intelligence, AIDAN cannot grasp the complexity of human impulses. As AIDAN spends time with Kady and sees her love for Ezra and for her mother—as the system watches how people react to the loved ones they've lost, the AI begins to understand the value of a human life.

AIDAN also realizes that maybe that's something it wants—maybe it wants to experience these emotions too.

I'm very excited to see what the authors do with AIDAN's character in Gemina because, man, did that character crush me.

Final Thoughts:

I 100% recommend Illuminae. There are two things I don't really like about the book, but they are minor—first, I didn't love the reunion between Ezra and Kady. I wish it happened on the Alexander instead of the Hypatia. The second thing was at the very end when Kady talked with Ezra's mom. Looking back, I actually really like this part, but in the moment, I was confused about what was going on due to the small time jump. I also had some trouble figuring out which character was talking. Probably just me, but I thought it would be a fair thing to point out.

Overall, I absolutely loved the book. It is the best sci-fi book I've ever read. Gemina, the second book in the series, should be coming any day now. I'm excited to see what happens next!!!

Thank you so much for reading this review! I have other book reviews on my blog I would love for you to check out. Click here to check out more of my reviews. I add new ones regularly!

It's been a pleasure writing for you and until next time—stay weird and stay writing. - Lexi