Review-Avalon

If there's one thing I like it's a book set in space, so when I heard this was a YA version of the cult classic Firefly I knew I had to check it out.  If you set a book in space you're going to get points regardless of what the book is like, but when you compare it to Firefly the bar is raised.  Arnett rose up and met that bar.  I think there's a fine line between being like x and being TOO much like x, and Arnett managed to stay on the right side of the line.  Were there similarities to Firefly?  Yes.  The overall basic plot was similar, and Jeth is a lot like Mal in some respects. The character interaction was enjoyable as well as the little twists and turns in the plot, although a few of them I saw coming.  I do have to admit that this book's villain might be one of the sickest I've read.  To put this in perspective you have to know that there are very few things that repulse me, but the reason I didn't finish this book the day I started it was because I had to put it down due to the fact I couldn't stomach what was happening all in one sitting.  It wasn't the blood, there wasn't actually a lot of that, but there were some psychological aspects of it that made my stomach churn.  In those aspects it was almost more violent than Firefly, so there is that to be wary of.  There is romance in it as well, although the female doesn't come into play until several chapters in and the romance isn't a humongous part of the story.  I also want to point out the fact that there's ONLY a boy on the cover because this book is told from a male POV, which isn't all that common in YA novels today, so A+ for that.  Overall it was an enjoyable book full of action and some mystery with interesting characters, some of which I would like to have seen a little more of.  I will for sure be reading the sequel to this book so I can see how the series ends, but thankfully this is wrapped up well enough that I'm not flailing for the second one.  Fans of Firefly should give this novel a shot (although please remember that it's NOT Firefly so it's going to be different), as well as fans of Star Trek.

4.5/5 dust spirits

*Thanks to Harper Collins for providing me with an ARC of this book in return for an honest review.