About.com Rating

These Broken Stars looks (from its cover) like a romance novel, and is being promoted as science fiction. And while it is both of those things, it's also a survival tale. The three aspects work very well together for an excellent debut novel from these two authors.

Publication Information

• Full Title: These Broken Stars
• Series: Starbound (#1)
• Authors: Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner
• Publisher: Disney Hyperion (US), Allen & Unwin (UK)

• Publication Date: December 2013
• ISBN: 9781423171027 (US hardcover), 9781743318522 (UK paperback), 9781423187783 (US ebook), 9781743436004 (UK ebook), B00CXXEX0A (US Kindle ASIN), B00G65G02A (UK Kindle ASIN)

The Hero and the Socialite

Tarver Merendsen is only eighteen, but due to his battlefield heroics he's already a Major and a decorated war hero. He's on his way home for a rest from putting down colonial revolts, travelling on the biggest, fanciest new starship in the universe, where he's expected to spend time each evening mingling with the upper class to help improve the military's image. But Tarver is a country boy at heart, and doesn't realize that Lilac LaRoux -- richest girl in the universe, thanks to her father's corporation -- is toying with him when she strikes up a conversation. He learns quickly, though.

Despite Lilac's cruelty, when things go wrong and the ship falls out of hyperspace, Tarver helps her get to an escape pod. When they find themselves the only two survivors, stranded on a planet that's been terraformed, but is strangely empty, they have to rely on each other to survive.

And it turns out that Lilac isn't the spoiled socialite she appears to be. She has hidden depths, and a very good reason for driving Tarver away with her cruel remarks.

Survivor in Space

These Broken Stars is definitely science fiction, but the spaceship parts of the story only take up the first few chapters. After that, our heroes are left to survive on a planet empty of other human inhabitants. Tackling an entire novel where the bulk of the chapters have only two characters to interact is a difficult task (though a very few writers have manages with only a single character), and survivor stories can easily get bogged down and made tedious by the details of day-to-day staying alive.

The authors have taken on this difficult task and not only succeeded in writing a good story, but have managed something really great. I was hooked from the first paragraph by Tarver's narration and equally taken in when the point of view switched to Lilac. Their story is compelling even when all they're doing in trudging through the woods, and once the strange events and plot twists start happening, I couldn't tear myself away from the book.

Slow Love

Too many YA romances (and I find the paranormal variety especially susceptible) have "insta-love," where the two main characters immediately fall for each other, are destined to be together, or whatever. But although Tarver and Lilac do feel some initial attraction, it's not any different than any two healthy teenagers might feel when they meet someone attractive and interesting. The pair are from very different social worlds, and they know it, and they behave as they should.

But this book is a romance (among other things), so love does eventually happen. It just takes its time building and is, I think, much stronger and more believable for it. It's also much more satisfying because the plot isn't about them falling in love, it's about them staying alive and discovering some very uneasy secrets on the planet they're stranded on. Love is just what happens along the way.

Deceptions

Even though the book's cover really does a good job of capturing at least some of the essence of the story, I kind of wish the publishers had chosen a different image. As it is, the cover will likely attract romance fans, but I worry that it could put off a large potential audience who would love the story, but might not want to be seen reading a book with a girl in a flowy dress on the cover (at least it's not pink, I suppose).

Because there's a lot of survivalist stuff in These Broken Stars, and some great science fiction, and even a little bit of action and conspiracy. Readers who like those things might not realize that this book has them, and pass it over, and that would be too bad. But at least it's a nice cover, and not an ugly one.

My verdict: These Broken Stars is one of my favorites of 2013, along with Pantomime (read my review) and An Infidel in Paradise (read my review).