Review: The Aurora Cycle

This is honestly one of the best series I've read in a while. If you've looked at my past reviews, most of my recent reads haven't gotten the greatest ratings. I mean, to be honest, they almost put me in a book slump, but this series brought me right out of it! The Aurora Cycle has two books so far, Aurora Rising and Aurora Burning, It hasn't been decided how many books will be in this series yet, but the authors, Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff, have said at least three. This is classified as: YA Sci-Fi.

Quick Synopsis: This series is about a group of misfits coming together to save the galaxy. Aurora, one of the characters, is who this story surrounds. She has been awoken from a cryogenic freeze period after 200 years, and she has strange powers, to say the least. The squad is hunted and chased at every corner, barely getting out of some tight scrapes. Each squad member has a specific skill set, which all come to use, and they're all completely different and original characters.

First off, I just want to note some similarities I found between The Aurora Cycle and other things. The first book is EXACTLY like Guardians of the Galaxy, almost to a fault. I mean, it makes sense, since Jay Kristoff, one of the authors, is a Marvel fan. But still. Second, the Syldrathi race reminds me a lot of the species in Avatar. And I mean the Avatar movie, with the blue people. Not Avatar the Last Airbender. I noticed this mostly in the second book. Kal also reminds me of Matthias from Six of Crows.

Next, I found that the POV's were really well done. The book is written in third person omniscient, and each of the squad members take turns. You can normally tell which character is narrating, even without the headers, because each character is so different and unique. This is a difficult thing to achieve, as I've noticed when reading other books.

I really really loved that there was so much action in both of these, but it got a little tiring after a while. Sometimes I would just think don't they ever get a break? They're CONSTANTLY during some kind of battle or action scene, which leaves little room for the simple things, like the relationships between the squad members or any part of their routine in the ship. It was really fast-paced, and that's a good thing since most books aren't, but it felt a little overwhelming at times.

There was a lot of sarcasm and banter, and I found it funny and enjoyable most of the time, but sometimes it felt a little forced. Like they were trying too hard to be funny and it just wasn't. This didn't happen very often, though. I love the way Auri curses haha. She says "mothercustard" and "son of a biscuit" and "holy cake" and I honestly think it's so funny.

To me, it felt like Auri didn't have much of a personality. She was just scared and nervous most of the time, or reminiscing about her past. I feel like we don't know her well enough, even though she's the main focus of the books. In contrast, the rest of the characters are very well-developed and I enjoyed learning about them. In Aurora Burning we learn more about everyone's backstories and it's very interesting.

There were a lot of events, so I feel like some of them were rushed. Specifically, when Aurora is trying to master her power in the Echo. I think that was too easy. There should've been fewer events, so that what was in the book could be expanded on and not rushed through.

I LOVE LOVE LOVE Kal and Auri so much OMG. They're my new OTP. My favorite couple (next to Feysand), no doubt. The nickname Kal has for her is adorable, and the way he protects her is the CUTEST THING EVER. Again, it deals with soulmates, or "lifeloves" in this book, which is one of my all-time favorite tropes. I have Sarah J. Maas to thank for that. So, of course, Kal and Auri together made this series 1000x better.

Both books were super captivating and hooked me in from the beginning. I was never bored. Every time I had to put it down, I wanted to pick it right back up. There is not one character I don't like, and that's really a testament to how good the character building is. Except for Auri, of course. I like her, but she's kinda bland, like I mentioned earlier. I'm REALLY mad that I have to wait at least another year before we get the next book in this series. It ended abruptly, and I NEED the next one.

I really liked this series. As you can tell, it has some problems, so it won't be getting five stars, but it's close. 4/5 stars.