Lately, I have been reading a number of books set in the future – it’s my only-science-fiction-books phase. I got The Sound of Stars from NetGalley and I am excited to share about this book with you today. Quick look at the synopsis first – I’m sure you’ll be able to guess what attracted me to it. 😉
Can a girl who risks her life for books and an alien who loves forbidden pop music work together to save humanity?
Two years ago, a misunderstanding between the leaders of Earth and the invading Ilori resulted in the deaths of one-third of the world’s population.
Seventeen-year-old Janelle “Ellie” Baker survives in an Ilori-controlled center in New York City. Deemed dangerously volatile because of their initial reaction to the invasion, humanity’s emotional transgressions are now grounds for execution. All art, books and creative expression are illegal, but Ellie breaks the rules by keeping a secret library. When a book goes missing, Ellie is terrified that the Ilori will track it back to her and kill her.
Born in a lab, M0Rr1S (Morris) was raised to be emotionless. When he finds Ellie’s illegal library, he’s duty-bound to deliver her for execution. The trouble is, he finds himself drawn to human music and in desperate need of more. They’re both breaking the rules for love of art—and Ellie inspires the same feelings in him that music does.
Ellie’s—and humanity’s—fate rests in the hands of an alien she should fear. M0Rr1S has a lot of secrets, but also a potential solution—thousands of miles away. The two embark on a wild and dangerous road trip with a bag of books and their favorite albums, all the while making a story and a song of their own that just might save them both.
Why I chose to read The Sound of Stars
** It’s the books!** A book with a secret library… what else does an avid reader need to get hooked?
Also, as a fan of the Guardians of the Galaxy, the whole music scene in this book had me wondering about the adventures of a human girl and an alien.
The focus on young adult in my reading is a bit surprising but I am always looking for good representations of the age group in science fiction. This book has seen good coverage and positive reviews from book bloggers I know and I was excited to see what it had in store for me.
Themes for Thought
The Sound of Stars is the story of Ellie, a human, and Morris, an alien. Both are the same age but come from opposite enemy lines. When Morris’ people invade Earth in the hopes to save it from humans destroying it and monetizing it as an tourist location for other aliens, humans are down to a couple of colonies, supervised by the Ilori. The Ilori are beings that need electricity to survive and they are advanced enough that they have developed these vaccines that turn humans into obedient slaves.
With all forms of art banned by the Ilori administration and two offenses deemed worthy of an execution, Earth is not a good place to live in.
On The Characters
Ellie isn’t old enough to be vaccinated yet. She is a rebel in her heart and has been running a secret library, sharing books with the people who want to read it. She has her friend, Alice, who makes sure that her clients are trustworthy and won’t throw her under the bus. On the other hand, Morris is a scientist, tasked with developing a vaccine that will change humans forever. He does not understand why art has been banned by his higher ups, and secretly spends his time collecting music.
When he discovers Ellie’s library and gets her help to find him music in exchange for saving her parents life, things get a bit out of hand. The two journey through the United States so that Morris can fulfill his secret mission of saving the humans and his own kind from the rulers.
Though this book is Young Adult, I never felt like Ellie or Morris were young adults. The situations that they live through and the role that they play – their age is irrelevant in my mind. I think the only reason Ellie was a teenager was to justify her living with her parents and not already have the vaccine. Lots of adults in their twenties live with their parents while going to university (I did for the longest time!). You don’t need to live with your parent to justify wanting to save them and care for them.
On Alien Societies
Throughout The Sound of Stars, Alechia draws a number of parallels between our world and the Ilori’s society. Ellie is a black girl who was already on the receiving end of prejudice before the invasion happened. Morris belongs to a group of labmade Ilori that are seen as dispensable by the Ilori rulers so he understands what it is like to be discriminated against. Apart from their shared appreciation of music and stories, this forms an important connection between them.
In some ways, the Ilori society is more forward. They always introduce themselves with their gender and pronoun, something that we have started to see more and more in social media profiles. “I am Kriti. I am female. I go by she/her.” I found this interesting because in their society, it is a universal standard. Everyone always starts off introducing themselves like that. There were some characters which went by ‘they.’
The representation of LGBTQ+ community was quite prominent throughout the book.
On the love for Books and Music
Every chapter begins with a quote from a book or a song name or lyrics. Though they did help bring some awareness of the artists and amazing works that have been created by humans, I did not find them linked to the chapters at all, and mostly distracting.
The Starry Eyes music album, The Sound of Stars, speaks in volumes about the journey that Ellie and Morris are taking and that is a bit uncanny but you will learn why if you read the book. 🙂
In all this though, I loved that Ellie told so many stories to Morris and how authentic he was in experiencing stories and music at the same time.
On the Ending
I enjoyed most of this book and unfortunately, it was the ending that did not meet my expectation. If this book had been advertised as a Book 1 of a series, I won’t have minded that ending, but I don’t see any mention of a follow up, so if you are looking for a standalone book, this might not be it.
The Sound of Stars is a music album by the Starry Eyed who play an interesting role in the book through their music but I found their entrance and then exit quite hurried. Towards the end of the book, a whole bigger plan is revealed and since I don’t know if there will be a book 2, I am quite disappointed that the focus shifted from working with Ellie and saving the humans to exploring other alien races (yes to get their help but after 370 of 400 pages what has all this been for?! There is a time crunch to this vaccine that is going to be administered!).
Overall, I enjoyed this book. It celebrates music and writing. Like I mentioned above, I had some problems with it, but it did a good job in my mind of highlighting where we are as a society and how even alien invasions will not necessarily unite us for one cause.
** The Sound of Stars is now out in stores so get a copy and let me know what you think! Let’s have a book-discussion! **
Amazon Print
Amazon Kindle
Many thanks to the publisher and author for providing me a review copy.
Cover image: Photo by Vincentiu Solomon on Unsplash
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