Illuminae (Illuminae Files, #1)

by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff

For fans of Marie Lu comes the first book in an epic series that bends the sci-fi genre into a new dimension.
 
 “A truly beautiful novel that redefines the form." —Victoria Aveyard, bestselling author of Red Queen

This morning, Kady thought breaking up with Ezra was the hardest thing she’d have to do. This afternoon, her planet was invaded.
      The year is 2575, and two rival megacorporations are at war over a planet that’s little more than a speck at the edge of the universe. Now with enemy fire raining down on them, Kady and Ezra—who are barely even talking to each other—are forced to evacuate with a hostile warship in hot pursuit.
     But their problems are just getting started. A plague has broken out and is mutating with terrifying results; the fleet’s AI may actually be their enemy; and nobody in charge will say what’s really going on. As Kady hacks into a web of data to find the truth, it’s clear the only person who can help her is the ex-boyfriend she swore she’d never speak to again.
      Told through a fascinating dossier of hacked documents—including emails, maps, files, IMs, medical reports, interviews, and more—Illuminae is the first book in a heart-stopping trilogy about lives interrupted, the price of truth, and the courage of everyday heroes.
 
“Prepare yourselves for Illuminae.” —EW.com
 
“[Y]ou’re not in for an ordinary novel experience. . . .”  —Bustle.com
 
“A truly interactive experience. . . . A fantastically fun ride.” —MTV.com
 
★ “[O]ut-of-this-world awesome.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred
 
★ “…stylistically mesmerizing.” —Publishers Weekly, starred
 
★ “[A]n arresting visual experience.”—Booklist, starred
  
★ “[A] game-changer.” —Shelf Awareness, starred

“Brace yourself. You're about to be immersed in a mindscape that you'll never want to leave.”  —Marie Lu, bestselling author of the Legend trilogy
 
"Genre: Undefinable. Novel: Unforgettable." —Kami Garcia, bestselling coauthor of Beautiful Creatures & author of Unbreakable
 
“An exuberant mix of space opera, romance, zombies, hackers, and political thrills.”  —Scott Westerfeld, bestselling author of  Zeroes and Uglies
 
“Stunningly creative. Smart, funny, and romantic.”  —Veronica Rossi, bestselling author of Under the Never Sky
 
“This is one of those rare books that will truly keep your heart pounding.” —Beth Revis, bestselling author of Across the Universe
 
“This book is xxxxing awesome.”
—Laini Taylor, bestselling author of Daughter of Smoke and Bone

• ISBN10: 0553499114
• ISBN13: 9780553499117
• Publish Date: 20 October 2015
• Publish Status: Out of Stock
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: Random House USA Inc
• Imprint: Knopf Books for Young Readers
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 608
• Language: English
• URL: https://penguinrandomhouse.com/books/isbn/9780553499117

Reviews

[Sam@WLABB]

I have had this book on my shelf since BEA 2015. It's visually stunning, but so intimidating in its size. Now that I have read it, I regret waiting so long to join team Illuminae. This book was so much more than I was expecting.

1. The visual presentation was incredible. This MUST be read as a physical book. (This, coming for one who only reads 1 physical book per week. I 3 my Kindle.) The graphics and layouts were a huge part of the experience for me, and like I said, I prefer ebooks.

2. The story. Wow! I cannot imagine the amount of time that went into figuring out how to lay that all out. The intricacies and the way Kaufman and Kristoff wove the pieces together -- genius.

3. The romance. This was such an epic romance. My heart ached, my eyes teared, and I swooned.

You have me until the last star in the galaxy dies. You have me.

Seriously!!!!!! (insert hearts, flowers, rainbows, and unicorns here)

4. The action. There are so many edge of your seat moments, your heart will physically hurt from working so hard.

I loved this book, and cannot wait for Gemini to arrive!!!

*_* Blew me away.
When I first started it, I enjoyed it. Solid 4 stars - such a unique concept and writing style. And Kady. Oh, so sassy Kady. But then crap. goes. DOWN. And bring in AIDEN which I love to hate and hate to love and my feeeeeeelingssss. And thennnnn I wasn't sure how it would be made into a sequel but then I understood and I AM SO PSYCHED! Also, more AIDEN please.....
Full review coming soon.

[leahrosereads]

I really wish I had written a review for this in 2016 to see how my thoughts have changed. The rating hasn't, so I'm assuming that I enjoyed it quite a bit. I absolutely loved the format! For something who can't picture the worlds I read, having clever formats like this really help immerse me into stories.

Kady and Ezra are decent characters to follow, though with the awesome format, I do think we lose a bit of character development. Even so, what we get is good. I'm really digging the politics and mystery behind this book, and I'm looking forward to moving to Gemina soon.

[liz089]

Read more about this review and others on my blog Freyja Eats Books

STANDALONE or SERIES.
This is the first book in the Illuminae Files, the second instalment will be released later this year.

REVIEW.
I choose this book because everybody was so incredibly enthusiastic about this one. I read it was about space and love and well, that combined with all the positive reviews, made me want to read it. So when I made a big order at Amazon, I decided to add this one to it.

I have got to say, that I am very happy that I ordered this one in paperback and did not try to read it on my Kindle. Stupid me, but I didn’t even know this book was “different”. So when it came in I was surprised this book was so heavy ! When I looked in it, I was blown away ! Not just text, but a lot of schematics and document style pages… so awesome ! It is something completely different from what I always read and I loved that !! SO ORIGINAL !!

So this book is collection of documents, that slowly gives us the whole picture of all that happened.

The story is about Kady and Ezra, and it starts when their planet (Kerenza) is attacked by BeiTech. They are just in a bad break-up when everything gets blown to bits, and they make a run for it. Luckily, a distress call was made and a couple of space ships come to the rescue. Kady ends up in the Hypatia, and Ezra, because he got hurt, ends up in the Alexander. There is also a third ship, the Copernicus. They flee and are on their way to a space station, Heimdall. Normally this would not take so long, but because the ships took damage it will take months to get there. And not only that, but one of the enemy ships, the Lincoln, is following them to make sure nobody will learn what happened on Kerenza.

Everyone is trying to get it together, when suddenly AIDAN (the AI of the Alexander) starts shooting at the Copernicus which results in killing the entire ship. Luckily, Kady is a great hacker, and she finds out what they are trying to hide. How AIDAN has gone “crazy”, and the reason he killed everybody is that some creepy virus (Phobos) has spread among the crew of the Copernicus. Unfortunately.. some survivers came to the Alexander..
So together with Ezra and some other people, she starts to work to make sure AIDAN won’t kill more people and the Lincoln doesn’t end up killing everybody.
Ohhh this book was so exciting !! In the beginning it took me some time to get into it, mainly because of the way it is written. Because you view the story from so many points of view, you don’t really connect to the main characters in the beginning. Later on, when things start to get more pressing, I got more into it and was really rooting for them !!

On the other side, I really loved that it had those multiple points of view, because it gave a good oversight of everything that was happening. It showed things from multiple perspectives and not only that, but a lot of objective (sort of) views as well. All in all, you really know what is happening.

I really liked how this story was set in space on board of different space ships. I haven’t read much books about that.. and normally it doesn’t really attract me.. but this one did. It had a bit of a Dead space feel to me.. with the virus and zombie/creepy like people. It kept me on the edge of my chair, and I kept reading and reading more, wanting to know more and more..

Like I said, I had not much feeling for the main characters in the beginning. But after a while my feelings started to develop. All those horrible things happening to them.. those are not things a 17/18 year old are supposed to get through, all those people dying.. Losing your family, your planet, your home, your stuff.. Nothing left of your life before, everything destroyed.

And if that is not bad enough already, some creepy virus starts spreading, making people into murderous crazies. The ones that are left that you know, suddenly start attacking you.. wanting to kill you.. Just brrrrrr !!!!

So yeah, I really started to like Kady after a while. She is a strong independent girl who doesn’t let others tell her what to do. And at the ending of the book, she is downright heroic. So awesome and admirable ! Ezra kept a bit of humour in things.. but I didn’t have that much with him. I prefer AIDAN ^^

After everything that happened, their break-up didn’t seem so important anymore, their issues just childish, and I loved that they developed. How they ended up supporting each other and falling back in love.. Throughout the whole book you see them developing from just children/teenagers in grown-ups. They need to, otherwise they won’t survive, it makes it more real.

Oh and the plot twist towards the ending.. I really did not see it coming !! I was like WHAT !?!?! HOW !?!?! NO WAY !?!?!

FAVORITE QUOTES.
“Interviewer: So. Tell me about your mother.
Ezra: You're taping this, right?
Interviewer: Audio only. Camera is faulty.
Ezra: Okay, well for the benefit of the sight-impaired, I am now raising my… oh, dear… yes, it's my MIDDLE finger at Mr. Postgrad here.
Interviewer: Mr. Mason...
Ezra: Now I'm wiggling it.
Interviewer: Terminating interview at 13:58 on 03/19/75.
Ezra: Look at it wiggl-
-audio ends-”
.
“Part of being alive is having life change us. The people around us, the events we live through, all of them shape us. And that's what I think you're afraid of. Maybe not of dying. But of this you, the you you've become, ceasing to exist.”
.
“The universe owes you nothing, Kady. It has already given you everything, after all. It was here long before you, and it will go on long after you. The only way it will remember you is to do something worth remembrance.”

FINAL THOUGHTS.
It really was something different than I am used to, but in a good way. This book is like thinking out of the box times a 100. SO ORIGINAL. I would totally recommend reading this, it is just great ! I would recommend though that you get it hardcopy, because I don’t think reading this on your Kindle (or other devices) does the book justice. So, I would love to give this book 5 Freyja’s, because this way of writing is just beyond amazing and deserves nothing less. Can’t wait for the next one !!

[Nicole Lynn]

Mind blown!! Review to come :)

I was really wary of this book for many reasons (cowritten, unconventional etc.), but also intrigued. Its marvelous, so amazingly done and so very unique in its presentation.

[Nany]

I think that the writing style and story were interesting, but I hated the main characters and their romance so much that I wanted the book to just end, but it wouldn't and I get frustrated. So, I decided to read something else and finish this book another day, but I couldn't pick it up again.

Ok, after someone told me that I needed to finish this book because the ending was amazing, I did pick it up again, and even though I didn't like the ending I really enjoy the last part with all the running and suspense, but probably because there wasn't any romance in it.

[ross91]

I really liked this book! A bit long imo, but still entertaining. I especially liked AIDAN, really well done! Now I just need to wait for the sequel!

[inlibrisveritas]

Illuminae is a unique take on the sci-fi space genre, that went right past interesting into addicting and consuming!

I was a bit hesitant about Illuminae. I knew I wanted to read it, but I wasn’t sure what to expect when everyone spoke of the different layout of the story but it turned out to be one of the most of visually appealing books outside of children’s picture books that I’ve read in recent years. Our story is told through a series of ‘documents’ like instant messenger chats, emails, computer logs, and debriefs. So instead of getting an up close and personal view of the action we see everything unfold through a secondary play by play. While it does put some distance between the reader and the character, I really loved the format. Some of the pages were far more powerful because of the images and the way the words we displayed, and it’s really amazing how much of the story you can glean from a simple pictograph.

Our main characters have three very different roles within the fleet that is fleeing a warship. Kady, is a bit of a technological genius who doesn’t like being kept in the dark and begins her hacking into the databases of the fleet to find out the truth. I really love her sarcasm and attitude, any character who sasses their way through a crisis is a kindred spirit. Then there is Ezra, Kady’s former boyfriend, who is the opposite of her but wholly devoted despite their falling out. He takes on the roles of a pilot, on a different ship in the fleet. I really love the email interactions between these two, because even though they are limited to contact purely in text form they really have a nice dynamic Then there is AIDAN, the AI on the ship Alexander…and probably my favorite character and the only one you really get to be inside the ‘mind’ of. Ever since HAL came to the screen, we’ve had an obsession with AI taking things into their own ‘hands’ and AIDAN is no exception to that. I loved getting to see it’s self awareness grow and just what happens to an AI that discovers it’s capable of independent thought.

Illuminae is a thrill ride from beginning to end, with a ton of different twists that I wasn’t expecting and and ending that has me ready for the second in the series. I have so many questions!

[Sarah Says]

****ing brilliant!!! Best book I've read this year. I can't figure out how to review this book without sounding like a gushing thirteen year old who's just won tickets to One Direction. It was beautiful, quirky, funny, action packed, exciting, thrilling, twisting, turning, loving, murdering, madness.

I loved the layout idea! The story is told through memos and messages, transcribed footage and images. The textual images are stunning. At one point you have to turn the book 360 to read the spirally writing. You feel like your falling into the void. All the little notes made it feel as if you were really reading a report of actual events. The writing was brilliant I felt as if I was watching the transcribed video footage.

The story line is just my kind of thing; super computers, deadly viruses, young lovers separated and unlikely heroes - I can't say too much as it'll give away all the fabulous twists and turns. Just went you think you know whats going to happen, the whole thing switches up. HELL YES, Five Stars, bring on book two and three.