This is a story about curiosity... my favorite kind.

I LOVED THIS BOOK SO MUCH. Science fiction was my first love as a reader, and it’s still the genre that gives me the most joy. This was such an adventure! I enjoyed every character, especially the station pig- a valient creature exploring the reaches of space with a brash, brave crew. I loved that this book integrated the tropes I expect in science fiction with horror elements, and the beauty of trauma recovery. Also, A+ world building!

I could go on, and on- but instead just read it when it’s out later this month.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thank you so much Netgalley & Macmillan Audio for the audio ARC- I highly recommend both reading & listening to this number to avoid missing details.

Such an interesting book. I have a lot of mixed feelings. I’m first off, I must say. I’m not an audio book fan AT ALL. I love Christopher Paolini’s earlier work, so I was willing to give it a shot. I felt that, for most of the book the narrator remains fairly flat and without any dynamics to her voice. She wasn’t a BAD reader, just a boring reader. That made it hard for me to get into the story.

The story itself was fairly interesting, though. If you are looking for Eragon, this isn’t it. If you are looking for science fiction, this is right on. The book rules itself so strongly that nothing feels odd or out of place. The characters are understandable and easy to fall for, making the reader root for them. I did feel like the book had a little bit unrealistic representations of women, but I get kinda salty any time a male author writes a female lead (which is unreasonable on my part). The plot also was more driving than the characters, so I feel like I didn’t get the opportunity to know them as well as I could have, which is a HUGE issue for me, especially with the book being as massive as it is. I’m pretty sure this is a standalone, but hope that can be addressed if the world is ever revisited.

Overall, this book is a tome that really helps develop Paolini’s voice and move him away from the world of dragons and riders. While I found some definite flaws, I wouldn’t hesitate to pick this book back up, albeit in book for rather than as an audio book.

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars is an adult Sci-fi novel by Christopher Paolini. I enjoyed this book but had some issues with the pacing. It started and ended amazingly but I found myself losing interest through out the middle. I think it maybe could use a bit more trimming. It reminded me of several other sci-fi works, like The Expanse and Children of Time, so if you enjoy those this might be a good book for you. The narrator did a wonderful job and I really enjoyed the appendix at the end going more in depth into the science behind how the faster-than-light travel works in the novel. I wasn't wow-ed by this one but it's definitely an enjoyable story and worth reading.

This book. I don't have to the words for how much I loved To Sleep In A Sea Of Stars. Paolini's writing has only improved since his last book was released and I can only imagine where good writing will go from here. I need to gather my complete thoughts, but TSIASOS gets a 5 star rating and moves to the top of my best of 2020 reads list. I don't think they could have going a better narrator for the audio, Hale breezes through the world with ease.

As someone whose only path to sci fi was Illuminae, I wasn’t entirely sure that this book would be for me. How wrong I was.

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars is a brilliant and heartbreaking sci fi adventure. I was drawn to each and every character for so many reasons.

I found myself lost in the audio, dying to listen to more, hating to stop. The narrator has such a wonderful storytelling voice.

Plus, Gregoravich (spelling?) was the most - extra and just plan haunting.

Until next time meat bags!

I want to start by saying that am not your typical Sci-Fi reader. I requested to review this book because I knew of Mr. Paolini's background and I was curious because I have been wanting to read more in the Sci-Fi genre. I really enjoyed this book. I read the ebook as well as used the audio. The narrator was WONDERFUL!!! The character voices were perfectly executed!

I HIGHLY enjoyed this book and think even if you aren't a big Sci-Fi reader, you may enjoy this also. The first 25% of the book had me HOOKED! It felt like every chapter or so had me on the edge of my seat and I even had some outward shivers/skin-crawling moments. I LOVED IT!!! From there the story took time to build so there were times where I was wanting the story to rush along, but using that slower time to build the character relationships was important. I really liked how the characters started to care for each other as friends and not just co-workers trying to make it through the galaxy and fight the alien beings. I loved the first contact moments plus others I can't talk about because of spoilers; I loved that edge of my seat feeling. I've found out I don't really care for space wars but that is of no reflection on the book. Those scenes were written in a way, I could totally picture. The ending was something I didn't see coming and while a lot of times I like nice neat endings, I'm also a fan of endings that leave some room for speculation.

Thank you to Netgalley and MacMillian-Tor/Forge for allowing me to review this book in exchange for an honest review. I look forward to more from Mr. Paolini in the future.

This is an entirely acceptable space opera that I think will have a lot of readers pretty happy.

It wasn't really on my radar until I found out Jennifer Hale was going to narrate the audiobook, and she really brought the story to life, even if I didn't end up connecting with it as deeply as I'd hoped I would.

For me, it felt like the book was a little less than the sum of its parts. There were plenty of good elements, like a fantastic set of secondary characters, an interesting and believable post-space colonization age (even if sometimes it didn't feel fully fleshed out to me), and a really interesting outcome for the main character, but I felt like these elements competed for attention rather than meshing together.

Bottom line, I enjoyed it, I just didn't fall in love with it.

The beginning of the novel starts fairly quickly; you're introduced to a cast of characters whose mission is to research uncolonized Adrasteia and then things quickly go awry. Kira accidentally discovers an alien room and organism when the crew is about to leave the planet. What follows is a story of the discovery of intelligent life, and what happens when humans are confronted with sentient beings 200 years in our future.

I was completely engrossed in Kira's story from the beginning and was interested to learn about the alien technology as she learned it herself. After Kira leaves Adrasteia for her journey through space, I lost interest in her story. There is a lot of monotony -- tests run on her several times and Kira being shuffled from ship to ship. The cast of non-military characters introduced in this section were the only interesting developments; these people end up being Kira's companions for much of her journey. Roughly halfway through, the book begins to focus on the war and the action makes the plot exciting again.

This novel is long. It was close to being a DNF (did not finish) title for me because the middle drags on. Large chunks of this book are unnecessary and could be removed. It feels like Paolini has been working on the novel for a long time and was reluctant to give up certain parts that weren't needed. The slower sections could have been condensed to give information without drawing it out into a saga.

Admittedly, I'm not the biggest fan of hard sci-fi. Still, the overarching story here is interesting but the execution is flawed. To emphasize this, the story part of the audiobook ends two hours before the end of the recording. The last two hours are addendums and appendices filled with scientific jargon that will be overwhelming to the average reader. There are entries on space combat, alien languages, timelines, technology... Does this information needed to be included to understand the story? No. It makes even less sense to include these after the story if they're needed to understand it.

Jennifer Hale is a great narrator and has different accents for characters that help give them extra personality. You can definitely tell that she is a popular voice actor because of her narration skills. Her voices make it clear which character is speaking, so the conversations with the aliens where they say "Kira here" or whomever before they speak seem incredibly repetitive.

Recommended for science fiction fans, especially those interested in space travel, interplanetary wars, and first contact stories.

Thank you so much, Macmillan Audio, for the chance to listen to this audiobook!
Wow! It's massive! The aubiobook is the longest I've ever listen to (until now) and it was really impressive and captivating.
I'm still new to the audiobooks, but To sleep in a Sea of Stars grabbed my attention right away!

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars is a new epic novel by Christopher Paolini and the narrator is the amazing Jennifer Hale, a Canadian American actress and singer who was able to recreate the intense and captivating atmosphere of the novel.

During a routine survey mission on an uncolonized planet, Kira finds and alien relic and right away the dust around her starts to move. In a war among the stars, Kira found herself involved in a journey of discovery, aliens, war, horrors, colonizations, battle, intense and interesting characters, different ideologies and so much more.

Everything and more happens in this book. It's a rollercoaster of emotions, with complex and thrilling characters, a plot full of twists and a really good writing style. The worlbuilding is amazing and huge and I loved reading the descriptions and characterization. Kira is an amazing and complex character and I found myself liking her more and more.
As I wrote before the book and audibook are massive, but the length wasn't a problem to me, because the writing style and the characters are really engaging and grabbed and maintained my attention until the end.

Kira Navárez is a xenobiologist in the year 2257. Her job is to to visit and build new colonies. She is on the planet Adrasteia. At first she is torn between settling with her boyfriend Alan, then they notice something very strange. What happens is that she discovers an alien artifact that changes her in ways she could not imagine. Kira then becomes a host to this artifact, a dust that becomes part of her. This dust, referred to as a xeno starts a series of events and changes to Kira that lead to tragic circumstances. This situation potentially has an ultimate effect on the fate of the human race. This book is true space opera at its very best.

It should be noted that I am not really a science fiction fan. I can just about count on one hand the number of sci fi books I have read in recent years. But I do know that for a book of this genre to work, there has to be a good mix of character and world-building. I feel that Christopher Paolini did an exceptional job with both. To add to this, the plot was excellent and captivating.

The length of the book did not deter me. I must admit that I am very pleased that I was able to get this review copy as an audiobook, because the length as well as the content might have been difficult for me to read in a traditional format such as print. Granted, it is the longest book I have read this year, so I decided beforehand to break it up into several sections. I wanted to enjoy the story, but I also wanted time to ponder over it during the times I stepped away from it. However, that proved to be an impossible task. I began the book about midnight, slept, resumed at 6 a.m. and with only a couple of short breaks, I listened to this book straight through, at 1.75 speed. In some cases I do listen at a faster speed, but because of the meatiness of this book, I wanted the devour as well as absorb the entire story, and I was definitely able to do this.

At the end of the audiobook, Christopher Paolini discusses his writing process for this book, and this was very intriguing, giving the reader a glimpse of the mind of a writer. He also interviewed the narrator, Jennifer Hale. I was shocked to discover that this is her first time ever performing an audiobook. How she did voices for dozens of characters was absolutely incredible! Whether human, alien or robot, her performance was spot on. Because I am a lover of audiobooks, a good narrator can make or break a book. What Jennifer Hale has done is to enhance an already well-written story.

Whether watching Kira go through the many changes after taken over by the dust, meeting the multitude of other characters, including alien life forces, or the ship's robot, I was drawn into this story from beginning to end. The drama was excellent and the book quite exciting. I am more than pleased that I took a chance with this genre because I was treated to an excellent read.

Many thanks to Macmillan Audio and to NetGalley for this ARC for review. This is my honest opinion.

Overall: 3⭐

Pacing: 3⭐

Diverse cast: 4⭐

Plot: 3⭐

Worldbuilding: 4⭐*

I wanted to love this book so desperately. I grew up on Mr. Paoloni's Inheritance Saga and when I saw he had written an adult book I was so excited.

This book is just too much. As an audio book at a little over 30 hours it's massive. Apparenlty 880 pages.

It does not need all of them. So much of this could have been cut out to produce a tighter story.

There's too much description when there really doesn't need to be to the point it distracts from the story. So much on the page worldbuilding that also bogs it down.

In 880 pages a lot can happen, and a lot does. It doesn't mean that was does happen, actually needs to.

As scifi goes, the story of "aliens bad, humans worse due to expansion" isn't new. While there's a small riff on it, it's not much different and doesn't warrant the length of the book.

He created a massive universe and it felt like he wanted us to know every single thing about it. Not all of it needs to be on the page and listening to it, when it became obvious it wasn't in service to the story, it was so hard to keep paying attention.

Without all the shiny worldbuilding and massive description, it would be a faster read. I feel like I'd have enjoyed it so much more if it had been maybe 500 pages. Then that time could have been devoted to plot. It wasn't anything I haven't read before.

Even the characters can't make up for it. While they're diverse, some are hard to get close to. Plus the very beginning, we're supposed to feel bad for the loss of some characters but since we don't know them, it wasn't a big emotional punch.

I hope I'll enjoy his next book more because he really is a skilled writer overall.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to review this audio book arc.

This is an epic space opera that sprawls itself across the stars, with a somewhat Lovecraftian twist. Kira, an experienced xenobiologist, stumbles upon an alien artifact while surveying a new planet that is being prepared for colonization. Her joy at discovering proof of sentient and intelligent alien life is short lived. Dust from the alien building begins to move in a way that it definitely shouldn’t and she loses consciousness. What follows is the story of what happens when you have become host to an alien organism in a universe where the fate of humanity was depending on <i>avoiding</i> the notice of malevolent alien forces. Intergalactic warfare ensues.

As a young (and dragon obsessed) teenager I read Eragon and its sequel, Eldest. I loved them, and particularly loved the idea that they had been written by some my age. They made me feel like I could do anything I wanted and were a fun adventure to boot. Prior to completing the series, I watched the terrible movie adaptation and, unfairly to the author, suddenly lost all desire to continue—I know author’s rarely have much control over how adaptations of their work turn out, but this was the experience that really soured me on the idea of movies based on books and I have had low expectations of such films ever since.

So now, well over a decade has passed and I saw that he had written a new book. A new book with a catchy title and a beautiful cover, even. So it plopped right into my TBR list and I was anxiously waiting for it to be released. Then, a couple days ago I saw that a review copy of the audiobook was available for request through NetGalley. Perfect! I now had a way to see how his storytelling has evolved over the years, even earlier than I had expected. (I definitely want to thank the publisher for granting my request).

So, here is my review:

This is a monster of a book. The audiobook is well over 30 hours long (including over two hours of dense appendix material). AND it is extremely plot heavy. It doesn’t try to be a quick read. I flew through it anyway, listening to it in 4 to 7 hour increments while at work and then still having the energy and desire to listen to a couple hours after dinner.

Jennifer Hale, who is the narrator of the audiobook does a spectacular job. This is one of the comparatively rare instances where i truly believe that a book is likely better as an audiobook than it is in print. The voices for each character manage to be distinct and easily identifiable, which is one of the common pitfalls I’ve found many narrators struggle to avoid, particularly in long books with large character lists. Each character has unique and clearly identifiable tones of voice, accents and speech patterns (though some of the accents are heavy enough that I worry that the text may have written that dialogue as an “accented” dialect. I’m hoping it was just a inspired acting choice rather than a mildly cringey authorial choice. Accented dialogue in text is a particular pet peeve of mine, as it is great at coming across as classist at best and racist at worst. I may have to follow up with the print version after the book is published)

The book is long and has plenty of space (ha) to do some truly intricate world-building. It reads like a love letter to every sci-fi adventure that has ever ventured out into the space between the stars and manages to build a unique place for itself among the network of tropes it uses as scaffolding. This is a serious story, which was a little disappointing to me, as I tend to enjoy my space operas a little more to the adventures and hijinks side of things, but there is a ship called the “Extenuating Circumstances” which made me laugh a little every time its name was mentioned, so there is that. In fact, most of the ships have entertaining names: Wallfish (snail), Unrelenting Force, Finger Pig (admittedly an alias, but still.

The intricate world-building goes hand in hand with the fast paced plot and together serve as the strength and backbone of the book. Early on, character work is not one of the book’s strengths—particularly in the first quarter of the book where a whole pile of characters are introduced that have little to do with the remainder of the story, which makes it a little harder to engage with at the outset. While the main character receives some fairly solid development (barring the occasional moment where it is incredibly obvious that this female character was written by a man; the <i>not masturbating</i> scene was a particularly egregious offender), many of the other characters introduced in the first few hundred pages either have surface level depth or come across as plot devices more than as people. But then, people don’t really watch Marvel movies for the character work—it’s all about the adventure and flashy action—but they sure do love watching them anyways. This book can definitely support itself on its own adventure and flashy action.

The second half of the book is definitely better than the first. We finally have time to get attached to the crew of the Wallfish (after the beginning of the book, I was worried we were about to face an unrelenting parade of characters who leave the story once they’ve fulfilled their dramatic plot roles, but really Falconi and crew end up growing delightfully into a close found family.)

Kira is a somewhat unlikeable lead. She makes a never ending series of unfortunate decisions—not always her fault—that have varying levels of catastrophic results. She’d probably stab me if I slapped her, but man did I wanted to slap her sometimes. (Particularly when she is bemoaning the fact that she is a danger to the people around her, while simultaneously not wanting Sparrow’s help in gaining better control over the xeno or when she is too busy being angry at the way she is being treated to realize that it is in fact <i>reasonable</i> for people to worry about the danger she represents). Her relationship with The Soft Blade is fascinating, the logistics of which carries some vague echoes of Marvel’s Venom Symbiote, though it is rather less noticeably sentient than Venom.

The crew of the Wallfish really is quite wonderful, particularly Captain Falconi and ship mind Gregorovich. The semi-AI ship minds are one of the best features of the whole thing, both in terms of character development and world-building. Gregorovich is an over-the-top delight, as is the way the book treats AI systems in general—unlike most sci-fi, the AIs in this story, particularly the ship minds, are treated with the same respect as humans, treated <i>as</i> humans even if they are just a giant brain in a vat (or neural sarcophagus, as it may be)

Epic. That's all I really need to say about this space opera.

As someone new to sci-fi in general, diving straight into a 32-hour long audiobook is... ambitious. I knew that it could either make me love or hate sci-fi forever, and I'm glad to say it's worked in favor of the former. Paolini's language is expressive, emotional and absolutely beautiful, which is something I liked just as much as the gripping story of Kira's discovery on a new planet (not to spoil anything). I could feel every emotion and picture every detail.

This being said, the writing was not the easiest, so it's perfect for anyone looking for a literary challenge, but not necessarily a language learner. That's why I I'm giving this book four stars - I loved it very much, but it was definitely on the wordy side, and I think it could have been written in a more concise manner.

Also, getting this novel in the audiobook format is something I highly recommend. The narrator is incredible and her voice is as dramatic and mesmerizing as I could have wished for.

*Thank you to the Publisher for the advance copy of this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

Kira Navarez, a xenobiologist on top of the world, has one last mission to complete before settling down and hopefully helping to colonize a planet with her new fiance. She just has to do this one last thing. Unfortunately, that one last thing ends in total and complete destruction and a nightmare for Kira. Think Alien--at least at first--but with space dust instead of eggs.

I was absolutely thrilled to get my hands on an audiobook of this, even though it's so long it's intimidating. And I think that's sincerely my biggest gripe with this. The audiobook is THIRTY hours long. The print version is almost a thousand pages. And, yeah, sci-fi/fantasy dips into that page range often, but this just seemed too long. It dragged at times. I loved the characters (ship mind Gregorovitch was absolutely my favorite) for the most part--I just wish this had been split into a duology or a trilogy. I don't really think any of it should have been cut out, though the writing style was very floral and dramatic at times (more on that later), and definitely wordy, it fit the book in a way that's kind of hard to define.

Jennifer Hale as a narrator was a perfect choice. She handled the different tones, characterizations, etc so fluidly that it was easy to distinguish between who was talking even when the narration didn't specifically use a name. Her voice in this book was just fantastic and I feel like the big reason I was able to get as into this as I did is because of her narration.

I mentioned that the writing style was very floral and dramatic. At first--for at least a good 15% of the book--I thought the problem was a male author trying to write a female protagonist. But after some reflection, I think it's just the style of the author. Seriously though, "the fire of a thousand suns" is something I say (and have only heard said) to elicit a laugh and it's definitely not something I've read in a serious context. But eventually I was able to get used to the writing style and I felt like it fit. It just took a little while.

The characters all felt like unique people and I enjoyed the developing relationship between Kira and the Soft Blade--that, more than the impeding doom, kept me hooked on this one.

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for the advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

This book is long - probably much longer than it has to be, but also there's a lot that happens over the course of 800 pages of plot (and something like 100 pages of extra material). We see so many cool aliens, lots of different people (both alien and human) with all kinds of ideologies that don't necessarily play well together, different technology, lots of action and battles and spaceships and maneuvering. We're never left bored, even when we're just traveling from one place to another - the travel time is handled rather brilliantly by having characters go into cryo-sleep, so the passage of time is nearly instantaneous for them. But there's also... too much. There are so many characters, most of whom are only passing-relevant for at most 100 pages. And I don't know whether it's because I mostly listened to the audiobook (and this book requires a lot of focus), but I feel like a lot of things weren't entirely explained.

Which brings us to the negative portion of this review. There are several moments in this story where I was very much struck by the irrefutable fact that it was written by a straight man starring a woman. Kira is very casually sexualized a handful of times in the story - in a way that kind of soured my experience. The sex scenes are weird and don't feel very natural at all (using the words "embrace" and "clutching" a lot in a way that shows that the moment is being taken altogether too seriously; it felt very staged) - but luckily there are only two of those. Also, the ending was weird. It was a very classic-epic-fantasy "parting of ways" where people get gifts based on their personality/contribution to the quest. Like... not really how I would have pictured a book like this ending. Paolini, your Eragon is showing.

Honestly, the real star of this book is debut audiobook narrator Jennifer Hale. Her background in video games and animation really show in her ability to suffuse even a single word with whatever emotion is needed. There are so many characters (see above) and she differentiates them all so well between accent, tone, pitch, whatever. Not to mention the very video-gamey battle sounds (which were actually written in the text... strange).

Written by Christopher Paolini, To Sleep in a Sea of Stars follows Kira, a scientist who travels the universe studying planets before they are colonized to catalog the biological creatures and plants there.

First of all, this audiobook has a fantastic narrator, one of my favorites. She has a good voice, and unlike other narrators, doesn’t try to do a big swing in voices between men and women, but instead the accent/how words are said. I, personally, really appreciate it.

One of the things that makes this a joy to listen to is how Paolini sets the setting, it slowly builds up as needed, and is very vivid. As well as how he introduces the reader to the science side of this science fiction novel.

This is such a well written novel, and from the get go I was interested in Kira and what was going to happen to her.

Paolini also does a wonderful job of hinting at what could happen, that lovely foreshadowing, but I still didn’t really know where the story was going to go (and this is one that I am not going to spoil for anyone).

If you enjoy science fiction, speculative fiction, or the kind of novel that wonders ‘what if’, and you enjoy excellent writing and one of the few narrators who not only doesn’t have an obnoxious try-hard male voice, but is also one of the few that I don’t speed up to listen to, I 100% recommend this novel. If you enjoy mystery, give it a shot.

If you just like contemporary fiction, go ahead and give this a pass. Otherwise, I think you would probably enjoy it.

I did receive this audiobook in exchange for an honest review.

I really enjoyed the narrator’s voice. It seemed to fit the character (Kira) well. It was easy to follow along (with the sample) at times I had to go back and figure out where I was because her voice was soothing enough to put me to sleep or doze off. The story is a wonderful science fiction work of art. Paolini did a wonderful job it reminded me of Arthur C. Clarke’s 2001 mixed in with Marvel’s Venom. I think the 32 hrs of audio were excessive but the narrative flowed very well.

This journey through space, packed with friends worth fighting for and foes to keep you up at night was invigorating and well worth the 32 hours of audio. Jennifer Hale did a terrific job of narrating and truly made this book even better. The start was a bit rough, but as soon as Kira found an ancient alien relic, I got absorbed into the story. It had lots of profanity and a few rough patches: I was surprised to find that Kira had little emotional reaction over what happened with her team members and it took me a bit to get into the book but it was very likable and an overall good book. I usually don't read sci-fi but I enjoyed this.

Kira has always wanted to discover life on a new world. She travels with survey missions to uncolonized planets to determine if they can handle human life. During one of these missions, Kira stumbles across an alien relic. Her excitement is over the top until the ancient dust all around her starts moving. This discovery was just the start and as war begins in the stars, Kira must travel the galaxy to save humankind. Does Kira have the skills and knowledge to stop this war? How far will she have to go to find all the answers?

To Sleep in a Sea of Stars is an epic science fiction novel that is not for the weak reader. The print copy is just under 900 pages and the audiobook tops 32 hours! Even though it is very long, it is a stand-alone story. I just looked at the book as a duology or trilogy that was released all at once. I understand why Paolini didn’t separate the story; there really weren’t any good pausing points. At the beginning of the story, I had trouble understanding all the “advanced” science, but once my mind wrapped around the technology, I was fully absorbed by the story. I loved this book and recommend it to those who want to invest time in a good sci-fi tale.

I very much screamed when I found out that Christopher Paolini was publishing a new novel. In fact, I tried incredibly hard to get my hands on an ARC of this book. Having loved this author's work since I was a young girl, there was no question that I needed to read his newest work. For much of my life, since I was 10 years old carrying around what would one day become a very battered copy of Eragon everywhere I went, this man has been a hero of mine. Now twenty-seven, <em>To Sleep in a Sea of Stars</em> was unquestionably a must-read for me.

<b>But Also, Holy Hell Was This LONG</b>

The basic premise of this book is the experience of a young xenobiologist, Kira Navárez, when she finds an alien artifact that changes the course of her life forever. Truthfully, I feel like delving any further into the premise would be to fall dangerously into spoiler territory. The truth is, there's a <em>lot</em> to this book and I almost feel at a loss as for where to start. I an, at least, say this:

<em>To Sleep in a Sea of Stars</em> was too long.

Now, don't get me wrong. I love long novels. I can sit for <em>hours</em> reading. Authors who are able to write more and more content for brilliant characters are amazing. In other words, long stories can be<em> wonderful.</em> Much to my dismay, as I journeyed further and further into this one I kept feeling <em>astounded</em> at how much time I'd spent with it and how much time I had still further to go. Hours in and I just stared at it, wondering how I had 60% left of the book to go.

I was proven wrong every time I felt <em>certain</em> the book was about to reach a climax and soon, conclusion. In a sense, it almost felt as though Paolini was trying to drag out his story for no reason. But, at the same time, I also really enjoyed the intricacies of the plot he created. If there's anything about this story superbly well done, it was the plot. There are so many interwoven pieces to it that you can't help leaving the book feeling impressed. The plot, by far, is this novel's greatest strength.

So, if incredible (almost suffocating) length is what I have to pay in order to have a brilliant plot? Hey, I'll pay it.

<b>The Characters</b>

Perhaps it's ironic, but my biggest gripe with <em>To Sleep in a Sea of Stars</em> is the characters. On the one hand, they're excellent. They have incredible personalities and you have <em>ample</em> time to get to know them. At times, you truly feel like they could be real people. But despite having a brilliant plot and incredibly well-written action sequences, Paolini utterly fails at portraying emotion.

I find it admirable that a massive amount of research went into Paolini's writing process for this novel. The fact that he wanted to tell a science fiction story with as much scientific accuracy has he could is nothing short of amazing. But, if he's going to do that much research on <em>science</em>, why the hell couldn't he do so for psychology?

It's funny, because he does a little bit with the shipmind<em>,</em>Gregorovitch. What Paolini did here was actually rather impressive (I loved him). And it's all based around the trauma of isolation. The problem is that it's so minute in comparison with everything all the other characters go through. The most stark of these issues lies with main character, Kira herself.

<b>What's Wrong With Kira</b>

Point blank, Kira never truly seems to deal with traumatic events in the way a real person would. As a result, it becomes incredibly difficult to believe that she cares about <em>anything</em>. We're <em>told</em> that she loves Alan and her team members. We're <em>told</em> that she cares about a lot of things. Unfortunately, so often I found that the telling of these things came alongside a useless lack of <em>showing</em>. And though it is like this through the whole book, the most egregious comes in the beginning as Kira has almost <em>no</em> true emotional response to an incredibly traumatic loss.

There was absolutely <em>no</em> hatred either for the alien relic that she could have blamed for the event. Nor was there any self-hatred for her role in the event. At times there were brief moments of grief, but even those were glossed over. And it's not as though Paolini didn't have time to delve more deeply into potential responses a person might have to such trauma. The book is 880 pages!

But, instead of having his main character react to this event in a realistic and emotional way, he had her briefly freak out, have a few very short moments of sadness, and...become concerned with whether or not she'd ever be able to have sex or masturbate again. I don't need to point out why this is problematic, do I?

<b>Narrator!</b>

Okay, so the only way I was able to get myself a copy of this book was thanks to the wonderful people at Macmillan Audio who auto approved me for their audiobooks. As it stands, I don't have a <em>lot</em> to say about the audio other than that it worked well for the story. Jennifer Hale did an excellent job. I have no complaints.

<b>To Wrap Things Up</b>

So, yes. I liked this book.

But, as even Paolini pointed out, it's not without flaws.

I almost feel as though this would have worked better as a tv show. It would account for the length and result in multiple writers available to address the issues. Namely, the biggest issue being the lack of realistic emotion in 90% of the main character and a good portion of the book. Women would have been (hopefully) involved to decrease the problems that often seem to arise when men write them. And, finally, there would have been previous little (again, hopefully) telling instead of showing.

So, good book? Sure. But it's got some problems.

<em>I was provided a free copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.</em>

This review will be live on the Reader Fox blog on September 9, 2020.