Author: Lucy Saxon
Genre: Young Adult, Steampunk
Release Date: 5th June, 2014
Source: Bloomsbury Sydney. Thank you!
Goodreads | The Reading Room
Catherine Hunter is the daughter of a senior government official on the island of Anglya. She’s one of the privileged – she has luxurious clothes, plenty to eat, and is protected from the Collections which have ravaged families throughout the land. But Catherine longs to escape the confines of her life, before her dad can marry her off to a government brat and trap her forever.Review by Nara
So Catherine becomes Cat, pretends to be a kid escaping the Collections, and stows away on the skyship Stormdancer. As they leave Anglya behind and brave the storms that fill the skies around the islands of Tellus, Cat’s world becomes more turbulent than she could ever have imagined, and dangerous secrets unravel her old life once and for all . . .
*stares at the title*
*thinks for a while*
*looks at the title again*
*thinks some more*
Nope. I still don't get it. I don't understand why the book is called Take Back the Skies. Did the characters fly around in the Stormdancer and try and "take back" the territory of the sky from some sort of enemy? Not really. I do believe most of the action side of things were done on land. Except one battle at the end. Which was still not a "taking back" of the skies. Eh, let's just move on.
The world building wasn't that great, but that might be more of a reflection of the type of world building that I personally like- which is as much information as possible. Actually, taking into account the fact that this book seems targeted at the younger YA age range, I think the world building is probably acceptable. I'm probs just being a bit harsh here haha.
The romance was relatively well done on the whole, although there were some moments where it swerved dangerously into instalove territory. Ditto the "love triangle". Our love interest is the roguish redhead, Fox, who perhaps doesn't have the most creative of names, but is still an intriguing character. Although all he and Cat seem to do half the book is argue, I think by the end of the book, their relationship is actually quite a solid one. On the other hand, the other side of the love triangle, James, was ridiculous. He literally sees Cat for the first time in at least 10 years and suddenly feels like he's in love with her. And feels jealous when he sees her with Fox. Um, whut.
There were many twists and turns in the plot- some of which were quite unexpected. In particular, I'm thinking of the ending. The ending is incredibly daring for a debut author. Of all the things I would expect to happen, especially considering this book is the first in a series, just...wow. Definitely quite ambitious. And rather unprecedented, methinks.
Lucy Saxon is most definitely an author to look out for. I expect to see great things from her in the future.
p.s. this book was apparently written by Saxon at the age of 16. WHAT EVEN.
Really liked it
Ratings
Overall: 8/10
Plot: 4/5
Writing: 4/5
World Building: 2.5/5
Characters: 3.5/5
Cover: 3.5/5
