Friday YA: Undying (Unearthed #2) by Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner

If you haven’t read Unearthed please know there are slight spoilers for that novel ahead.

At the end of Unearthed Mia and Jules were trapped aboard what was an abandoned alien spacecraft when suddenly it was no longer abandoned. The Undying stepped through a portal filling the ship to capacity. Mia and Jules are still trapped but this time living in the duct system trying to find a way to get off this ship and back home to warn everyone that the Undying were no longer extinct but were on their way to take over Earth.

Similar to Unearthed, Undying was very fast paced, full of action, and the budding romance of Mia and Jules. However, unlike Unearthed I found myself a little less wrapped up in the plot. Although this is a science fiction novel I think when the setting moved back to one I’m familiar with it became a little more mundane. Yes, they were trying to save their planet but instead of the focus being on two teenagers who were trying to survive, the introduction of so many adults to the plot subdued their ability to act immediately. Mia’s jump before you think nature was still in play, but her doubts about their ability to save the earth were tied to the fact that they were so young. When I read YA fantasy and science fiction I immediately throw away the thought that these are kids that have the responsibility to save the world. Kaufman and Spooner chose to make adults a larger part of this plot. By doing that it took me out of my head and made me start to ask those questions again. Why and how are this “kids” going to make everyone believe that the Undying are here already and trying to take over. It wasn’t a huge problem but it did stop me from enmeshing myself fully in the story. I didn’t have that problem in Unearthed. I went along for the crazy ride and really enjoyed it.

Mia and Jules were adorable as a couple. Their feelings were on display to the world and even though they had private moments of doubt their feelings were clear from the start. I also enjoyed the political nature of this novel. You have this other species trying to eradicate the existence of “proto” humans from Earth, but within that species is a faction that disagrees. It gave Dex, one of the Undying, depth and through his actions gave the Undying humanity. If you didn’t have that comparison you wouldn’t have cared at all for their existence.

I did enjoy this novel even though the pace was slower and bogged down in the middle. I think it was a fitting sequel to Unearthed although if I’d had my way they would have kept the action up in that space ship, but that would’ve been a totally different book. LOL. ❤️❤️❤️❤️

Opinions from around the Blogosphere.

“Although I did enjoy it, unfortunately, I felt like this one fell a little flat. I mean, it was still enjoyable and I really loved the two main characters, but it was just missing the adventure and the mystery that I loved about the first book. ” The Chronicles of Danielle

“Unfortunately, I didn’t like this book quite as much as the first. I mean, Earth is simply a boring setting when you’ve been to another planet. There was also no thrill of characters falling in love with each other (because, well, they already had).” Brylie and Books

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Copyright 2019 Deborah Kehoe The Reading Chick All Rights Reserved

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