I really gave this one the benefit of the doubt, and read the whole thing. But it was so disappointing.

I hated all the characters - they were so flat and cliche. And inconsistent. Trisha is supposedly the oldest of 7 kids, but then doesn't have even the tiniest shred of maternal instinct toward Mae? Chris is the leader who'll do anything for his team - except step down when he's compromised by random blackouts.

Trisha supposedly suffers from fibromyalgia, but she's a tough astronaut, so she manages pretty darn well. When she gets a migraine, her medicine only takes 10 minutes to start working. *Insert eye roll here.* The author clearly doesn't know what it's like to live with chronic illness.

The romance was ridiculous and unnecessary. (I actually picked this book up because I was told there wasn't any romance in it, so that really annoyed me.)

And the ending? It was far too easy, complete with magical characters who explain everything to the protagonists.

All this on top of the book being too long and boring in several parts, especially the first half.

There were definitely parts where I got my hopes up, thinking "this will be the part where the author redeems himself!" - but they never lasted. ( )

56699

An interesting read, kept me guessing. The following 2 quotes really stood out for me: "We need to be around the people we care about most" and "Life is poetry....Stop, watch, listen, there's poetry all over..... it don't write itself". ( )

This one fell short for me. The promis premise is awesome, and I was excited about it. However, the executing felt clumsy; the characters were kind of flat and the writing was a bit tedious.
L ( )

Yep you saw it right, I am reviewing a Christian Fiction book. I was caught WAY off guard about 2/3 of the way through when a character states:

"Life is poetry," said Mae. "Stop. Watch. Listen. There's poetry all over. And the thing about poetry? It don't write itself"

I stopped and went hmmmmm OK, but I highlighted it and saw all the commenters who had also highlighted it and they were obviously Christian readers (insert "Praise Jesus.." "God is Love.." etc.. So I had to go look here on GR to see if this was Christian Fiction I had picked up. Want to talk about a DUH moment? But I was 67% through and it was not bothering me. Heck I just had complained about another book tricking me into reading a rabid conservation commentary and spiritual agenda and this was far from that. It was a great read so far! And I cannot say I was tricked!

And then I finished it, and it was full of Christian symbolism in the end, but it was a message of hope and a message of warning, like many of these books but you know what else it was? It was a fun sci-fi thriller. It was post-apocalyptic-ish. It had all the conventions of sci-fi thrillers and PA books are suppose to have. It has a strong message, there is love, heartache, but there is also a lot of violence, so watch it there if you are expecting it to not have any of that because it was written by a well known Christian Author (which I learned later).

I really liked it! So, I am giving it 4 stars, and it is well deserving. I would recommend this to any readers even those who do not read Christian Fiction. I am not Christian, I am a proud pagan priestess. I dig Tolkien, CS Lewis, Frank Herbert and Orson Scott Card and they are all writers who construct stories with strong Christian mythos, ethics, lessons etc. But they are not preaching or witnessing between the written word. They just are telling me a tale, and this was one heck of a great tale!

PREMISE: What happens to a group of astronauts who come back to earth after being the first men on Mars. Back to a world which seems to be completely empty. No humans, no animals, nothing, they all seem to have disappeared. How do people who already have been living in confined isolation cope to living in a world with infinite empty spaces where there should be walking talking people. What if they are not as alone as they thought? What if there seems to be something out there that cannot be explained, can they accept it on faith alone?

Triggers - violence and I was triggered by the idea of an empty world. It was a dark read but the ending made it worthwhile. ( )