Why You Should Read Salvage Right Now

Today marks the release of one of my favorite YA science fiction novels! From the very first page, I was enraptured with the brilliance of Alexandra Duncan's world.

Okay, so I'm working under the assumption that everyone on Earth has seen the brilliant show Firefly, yes? If not, GET ON THAT PEOPLE, there's naked Nathan Fillion to be had. But meanwhile, you know that episode where we see Saffron for the first time? And we think she's just a completely naive girl from a planet that's kept their society rather primitive, and then she winds up on a spaceship and having adventures? Salvage reminds me of Saffron (except minus the knock-out lipstick).

Let me try to explain in words that don't rely on a deep-seated love of Firefly to understand. Salvage follows Ava, a girl raised on a spaceship that is ruled in a very specific, limiting way. But after she tastes a different life, she is forced to flee her ship. And that's just the beginning...

What I loved about this book (the same thing, btw, that I loved about The Martian and the movie Gravity) was the realism. Alexa has done her science--when Ava leaves the spaceship she's lived on all her life, she doesn't just walk off with no issues at all. But she also knows her sociology and psychology, exploring not just Ava's perspective, but also the different societies she winds up in and how Ava fits into that.

But it's also real in the way it seems like the world and the people are real. Some books you read, and you know they're fiction. And that's fine. We need an escape, and there are some books I pick up, and I know there's going to be a happily ever after, and I know there's going to good guy's going to win, and I can see the plot as it unfolds.

Salvage is not that book.

In Salvage, I had no idea what would happen next. I had no idea if Ava would find a happily ever after. If the characters I'd come to love would live.

Salvage was real.

So definitely give this one a read. It will creep inside your mind and stay under your skin for a long time.

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