Paradise 21 (New Dawn, #1)

by Aubrie Dionne

Aries has lived her entire life aboard mankind's last hope, the New Dawn, a spaceship traveling toward a planet where humanity can begin anew-a planet that won't be reached in Aries' lifetime. As one of the last genetically desirable women in the universe, she must marry her designated genetic match and produce the next generation for this centuries-long voyage. But Aries has other plans. When her desperate escape from the New Dawn strands her on a desert planet, Aries discovers the rumors about pirates-humans who escaped Earth before its demise-are true. Handsome, genetically imperfect Striker possesses the freedom Aries envies, and the two connect on a level she never thought possible. But pursued by her match from above and hunted by the planet's native inhabitants, Aries quickly learns her freedom will come at a hefty price. The life of the man she loves.

• ISBN10: 1937044033
• ISBN13: 9781937044039
• Publish Date: 2 August 2011 (first published 1 July 2011)
• Publish Status: Unknown
• Out of Print: 2 April 2014
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Entangled Publishing, LLC
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 248
• Language: English

Reviews

As seen at: Miss Book Reviews

I love Science Fiction books. Especially if they’re set in space. That’s what drew me to this book.

The plot:
Aries, a lifer aboard A New Dawn, one of the last ships holding human kind, has her life planned out for her. Her designated match, her job, the way she lives. This is so when their ship reaches the new world they will inhabit and make home, the best of the best are the ones to populate the world. The genetically desirable and only the genetically desirable. They left the rest on planet earth years and years ago.

Aries was matched to Lieutenant Barliss, a man she has no interest in and repulses her. She feels like a prisoner on board the ship and decides to do something about it, so she plays the game well while secretly planning her escape.

She manages to escape to a desert planet by crash landing her escape pod, then moves on hoping to find somewhere permanent to stay. She soon finds out that there are dangers on this planet, the lizard men and the large monster worms, both of which travel under the ground and attack by surprise. She loses all her carefully saved rations to the lizard men and nearly dies at the hand of one of the large monster worms.

Luckily another human stumbles upon her, the only other human on the planet; Striker. He’s the most handsome man she has ever laid her eyes on, but he’s also a space pirate and she knows she can’t trust space pirates. But with him being her only hope at survival what other options does she have?

The bottom line:
This book is interesting, it was a little different to what I had expected. There weren’t many things about ‘space’ happening, but it was set on another planet, it focuses more on the romance and how it develops rather than anything else. That is the main plot line. Even at that though I did feel that the romance was rushed through, they were kissing before I even had the chance at believing that Aries felt that way about Striker.

I had fun reading this. It was interesting and the setting was different. It was written in three points of view, Aries’, Striker’s and Barliss’ so that was interesting to read each characters point of view. But I do think this is the reason why I thought the romance was rushed and there wasn’t much of a build up. There wasn’t that much time to lay down the ground work when alternating between the three.

Overall, I thought this book was interesting and fun to read.

Paradise 21 has a mixture of Science Fiction and Romance with intense action scenes that has you holding your breath until they are over, and a love that tests the distance of space.

[Cocktails and Books]

How would you feel if a computer picked your "perfect" job and mate? What would you do if your "perfect" choices weren't what you wanted? These are questions that face our heroine, Aries in Paradise 21.

Born and raised on the spaceship, New Dawn, Aries is one of the "chosen" lifers who have been selected to repopulate Paradise 21 with perfect human specimens after fleeing from a destroyed Earth. While she was always seen as being compliant, Aries questions the direction her life is taking. She plots her escape after her best friend died in a faulty attempt. But when she finally gets off the New Dawn, it's to crash in Sahara 354, a desert planet with scorching sunlight 24 hours a day. It's there she meets Striker, a human man who was stranded there 5 years prior after his crew mutinied and left him for dead.

Striker combats every prejudice Aries has ever been told about the pirates that took over the last outpost before Earth was destroyed. He's the exact opposite of her computer chosen "mate" but she finds herself wanting to be with him. Even when hiding from lizard men and sandworms, he makes her happy.

Striker wants to find a planet he's named Refuge and colonized it for all of those that were left on the space station. He's also determined to hatch the eggs of the angel like race he found in their deserted space craft on Sahara 354. Striker is very emotional and guards himself from feeling the kind of hurt he did when his girlfriend and fellow crew members stranded him. But there's something about Aries that breaks through his hardened heart and makes him want to try love again.

If you're looking for a hot romance, you won't get it here. Instead we get an interesting sci-fi storyline where a strong willed woman goes against the grain to do what she feels is right for herself rather than walking the path preordained by a computer.