This Splintered Silence

by Kayla Olson

From the author of The Sandcastle Empire comes a sci-fi thriller that’s equal parts Illuminae and One of Us Is Lying.

Lindley Hamilton has been the leader of the space station Lusca since every first generation crew member on board, including her mother, the commander, was killed by a deadly virus.

Lindley always assumed she’d captain the Lusca one day, but she never thought that day would come so soon. And she never thought it would be like this—struggling to survive every day, learning how to keep the Lusca running, figuring out how to communicate with Earth, making sure they don’t run out of food.

When a member of the surviving second generation dies from symptoms that look just like the deadly virus, though, Lindley feels her world shrinking even smaller. And as more people die, Lindley must face the terrifying reality—that either the virus has mutated, or one of their own is a killer.

• ISBN10: 0062484907
• ISBN13: 9780062484901
• Publish Date: 27 December 2018 (first published 13 November 2018)
• Publish Status: Out of Stock
• Out of Print: 12 May 2021
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Inc
• Imprint: HarperTeen
• Format: Hardcover
• Pages: 368
• Language: English

Reviews

[shannonmiz]

You can find the full review and all the fancy and/or randomness that accompanies it at It Starts at Midnight

3.5*

This was quite a fun book! While not perfect, I found it to be quite enjoyable and I was certainly invested in the mystery aspect of the story. Let's break it down into likes/dislikes, because I cannot really talk about the plot too much for fear of spoiling!

The Stuff I Liked:

• •It was incredibly entertaining. Despite any other flaws, I just plain really liked the story. Is it murder? Is it a virus mutation? Something else? I am not telling obviously, but you get the idea- there are a lot of possibilities. Which keeps the reader engaged, as you'd imagine. And while I thought I might have figured it out a few times, I didn't actually until much later.



• •The explanations seemed legit. I mean, okay, I don't actually know from a scientific perspective because I am not some kind of... space biologist or something. But to my common sense it sounded reasonable. And really, that is all I need. Sometimes in the "adults are gone" shtick, the reasons are... suspect at best. Here, that isn't the case.



• •I really felt for Lindley and the other characters. Can you imagine all the adults just dying over a few week period? Because it sounds awful. Not only do you have to figure everything out on your own, but you have to deal with a crap ton of emotions while you're doing it. Then throw in dead friends and well, it's not a great scenario.



• •The stakes are crazy high. I mean, they're in space by themselves with who knows what killing them. I don't actually think stakes get much higher, as a rule?

The Stuff I Didn't:

• •Especially at first (but really throughout the thing) I had a hard time keeping track of who's who. Lindley is the main character, and narrator. And we spend a ton of time in her head, obviously. And she does spend time with other characters, but there are just so many of them. Even her "inner circle" is six people, and man, I had trouble keeping them straight.



• •The romance situation is a veritable Gale-Katniss-Peeta love triangle. But where the aforementioned triangle added something to the story, I didn't feel like this one did. I didn't really care who, if anyone, she ended up with, though I didn't dislike either guy either.

Bottom Line: Super entertaining and full of action and mystery, it's definitely worth checking out if you're a sci-fi fan!