Starsight (Skyward Book 2)

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Author(s)

Brandon Sanderson

Publisher

Delacorte Press

Genre(s)

Age Range

12+

Release Date

November 26, 2019

ISBN

978-0399555817

All her life, Spensa's dreamed of becoming a pilot and proving herself a hero like her father. She made it to the sky, but the truths she learned there were crushing. The rumors of her father's cowardice are true--he deserted his Flight during battle against the Krell. Worse, though, he turned against his team and attacked them.

Spensa is sure that there's more to the story. And she's sure that whatever happened to her father that day could happen to her. When she made it outside the protective shell of her planet, she heard the stars--and what they revealed to her was terrifying. Everything Spensa has been taught about her world is a lie.

Humankind has always celebrated heros, but who defines what a hero is? Could humanity be the evil the galaxy needs to be protected from? Spensa is determined to find out, but each answer she discovers reveals a dozen new questions: about the war, about her enemies, and even, perhaps, about Spensa herself.

But Spensa also discovered a few other things about herself--and she'll travel to the end of the galaxy to save humankind if she needs to.

Editor reviews

2 reviews

A Solid Continuation

August 26, 2020

Overall rating

5.0

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Strap in, sci-fi fans. This series continuation goes off-world and ups the ante to a galactic scale.

Blessedly, Sanderson's second installment doesn't suffer from the slump of second-book-syndrome. Although it DOES pluck our heroine completely out of her element and sends her on an espionage mission into the heart of the alien civilization that's been keeping her people captive for generations. As it turns out... her jailors are nothing as she'd imagined. And there is a larger element being drawn into the fight--one that threatens the very existence of all space-faring species.

“Not that there’s anything wrong with humans. I find their frail, emotionally unstable, irrational natures quite endearing.”

The downside is... we see very little of the side characters and team dynamic from the first book--as Spensa is separated from her squadron for the duration. It's largely just our MC, Doomslug, and M-bot (which, to be honest, was all this reader really needed.) But if you were hoping for advancement to that tiny romantic subplot, just try to think of it as on hold for now.
The upside? A handful of fascinating new characters--including a non-gendered alien pilot who's technically only a few months old, a being that seems to exist as a semi-corporeal "smell", and an entire crew of sentient gerbil-like creatures led by a "king" (who, delightfully, reminded me of Reepicheep from Chronicles of Narnia.)

Us vs. Them mentalities are examined at length; along with an enriching smatter of alien cultures, political maneuvering, and varied misinterpretations of non-universal cues (i.e. facial expressions and body language.) And this is, thankfully, all done quite organically as our MC encounters them. True to Sanderson's usual form, ethical quandaries and thought provocations are never ham-fisted in handling.

“That's what war is," Cobb told me. "A bunch of sorry, desperate fools on both sides, just trying to stay alive. That's the part that those stories you love leave out, isn't it? It's always more convenient when you can fight a dragon. Something you don't have to worry you'll start caring about.”

This book answers several mysteries from Skyward, and presents readers with a whole new set of wonderings. And like it's predecessor, it will leave you hanging on hoping (and perhaps impatiently waiting) for more.

Favorite Quote:

“Feelings aren’t proof. Feelings are the opposite of proof."
"Not when the thing you’re trying to prove is someone’s humanity.”