Friendships. music, books and pop culture references makes this a fun and delightful read - despite the subject matter. The queer inclusion is wonderful and adds an element of relatability! Definitely a must read!

This book was, pardon the pun, stellar. Alechia Dow is going to be an auto-buy author for me. Great rep, great characters, great plot, and GREAT cover. I look forward to seeing how much better she gets!

This book is a bit of a mixed bag. If you love pop culture references, you will likely love this. It also discusses alcoholism, colonization, anxiety/mental health, and racism. It’s a very creative book. However I didn’t love the ending and I felt that the writing could use some polishing. Still a solid YA book though.

This was so so so cute and unique!! I adored the world building and our main character Janelle. I also really enjoyed the way the aliens and their society function in this. It reminded of something that would be on doctor who, very fun and intriguing. I will say that the second half of the book did have some pacing issues and I felt like the romance moved a little too quickly for my personal taste, but I really enjoyed the book regardless and I absolutely recommend it. It also has own voices Black and Ace rep which I loved to see!

Wow, what an amazing read. I wasn't sure what to expect going into this book, but I ended up absolutely loving it. We don't see a lot of Black science fiction, especially not geared towards the young adult audience, but I think that Alechia Dow knocked this one out of the park. I'll admit, there were moments going into this where I was confused and didn't understand the significance about certain things, but about halfway through everything started to become tied together and I couldn't put it down! Alien invasion, racial politics, creativity, and a love story rolled into one? Ya'll definitely need to read this one.

I'm incredibly impressed by this debut book by Alechia Dow, and I'm so happy to have read it.

This story follows Ellie, a teenager from NYC, and Morris, an alien, on what can best be described as a dystopian road trip romance to save humanity. And I honestly loved it more than I thought I would!

First off, this reads like a book written by someone who loves stories, and I appreciated that so much. I absolutely adored all of the references to other books and stories. As someone who is sure to buy physical copies of their favorite books just in case, I could feel the love of books and stories come through in this one in a way that felt incredibly personal. In addition to all of the references to music, it helped me be able to relate to these two characters in a way that would be difficult to achieve otherwise.

I liked that the book was divided into sections, and it was interesting trying to figure out how the introductions and interviews with the band fit into the story as a whole, and I was delighted when we find out at the end just how that is! There were so many sweet and sad moments throughout the entire book and it really makes you think hard about humanity. This felt like a mashup of so many books that have come before, but it's told in such a refreshing way that teenagers today will be able to relate to. The representation was wonderful to see, and the cover is absolutely gorgeous!

I will say it was a little lengthy, but there was so much covered. It also ends on a bit of a cliffhanger with lots of loose strings, and I'm not sure if there will be another book or what will happen next.

All in all, I'm so glad I read it, and it was a beautiful 2020 story!

This is a daring tale of a girl who risks everything to keep stories alive via a hidden library and an alien from an unfeeling culture who cannot get enough music. Both of these, and all other, forms of art are banned after the Ilori invasion, and these two team up in an unlikely pair to save Earth. I enjoyed the twists, music, and story references. This was a love letter to art, and an exploration of what the world would be without it: doomed.

DNF. Thank you NetGalley and Publisher for this early copy! I decided to not keep reading this one, it was not for me. Thanks!

Thanks to Netgalley and the Publisher for providing me a copy of the e-Arc. I am very grateful! This had such an amazing premise and loved it! I will definitely read more from this author in the future!

After a breed of aliens called the Illori invaded Earth and rounded up humans in what used to be New York City, a girl named Ellie does her best to survive day to day while also harboring a huge secret. Books, music, and art have all been forbidden but Ellie has created a secret library for the other humans left in her building. The books are a lifeline to a past where emotion and humanity were not a death sentence. As circumstances within her building grow more precarious, Ellie ends up finding an unlikely ally with one of the Illori, Morris (going to refer to him by the English name he was given for ease of typing). Morris and Ellie were an unlikely team and I was intrigued how the plot would roll out. Ellie might be one of my favorite characters that I’ve ever read. She was well spoken and incredibly strong and her perspective was written with honesty, Ellie had her flaws but it balanced out so well that she felt like any teenager might who gets thrust into the “hero” position of an alien invasion. One last thing to touch on with Ellie was her mental health throughout the book. Not only was the anxiety so realistic but the trauma responses she had later on were gut wrenching. At times it was hard to read but I really thought it was different to read a YA protagonist go through something traumatic and actually have a realistic response to it. Living through events like an alien invasion are never going to leave everyone unscathed.

With this book being written in dual perspectives, I have to say that it would have been incomplete without Morris. That being said, although Morris provided insight into the Illori side of the story, there were so many various explanations that were left out until the very end of the book even though Morris knew about most of them before that point. This was the main criticism I had of the plot because while I loved how it jumped all over the place, I think that too many of the revelations were cut short because they all got crammed in at the end. I would not have minded the beginning to be shorter in order for the end to not feel quite as rushed.

Overall, I think that The Sound of Stars was a spectacular debut novel from Alechia Dow. It was a whirlwind adventure sprinkled with timely social commentary that was really hard-hitting While the beginning started off a bit slow, by the end I was frantically reading in order to find out what was going on. It’s been years since I’ve read any type of alien invasion book and this one really hit it out of the park for me and I would highly recommend it.

Not your typical YA dystopian novel! I expected a fight with an alien race, but this book had so much more joy than I anticipated. I love the additions of music and the discussion of racial issues. Truly a delightful book!

I’ll include another copy of the book cover down here so that you can reference it in all of its pretty sci-fi glory.

So, if this is your first time on my blog, you might not know that I’m absolutely obsessed with book covers. I’m hoping to be an art director or book cover designer in the future, so whenever I see book covers that I love, I simply have to identify why I love them, hence these reviews!

I think that the two most striking things about the cover for The Sound of Stars is the color palette and the really cool stylized typography! While the color is fairly simple, I think that those two design choices are what help it scream it’s genre loud and clear: YA Scifi.

The typography was the very first thing I noticed when I saw this book on Netgalley months ago. The text almost glows against the swirling colors behind it, making it really pop. The way that the sans serif letterforms connect with lines (especially between the T and U, the N and F, and the T and A) both work to connect the text together and lead the reader’s eye through the piece, as well as conveying a more “sci-fi”-esque feel. That, coupled with the little dots and lines on the text, makes me believe that a lot of thought and effort went into the typography for this cover, and that this wasn’t just a typeface that the designer found online. It was likely hand designed with this cover in mind.

Next, I want to touch on the color palette. For me, the color palette is what makes this book so striking and gives it the feeling it does. I was trying to reimagine it in any other color palette, but none of them felt right. The colors used here both give me major scifi vibes, but also hints at the soft romance that we’ll get later. It doesn’t scream hard scifi at all, which I normally associate with cool colors. Even the blue used here is on the warmer side of things.

All in all, I absolutely adore this cover. I like that it doesn’t scream scifi as overtly as some covers, but at the same time, it does. Major respect to the creative team behind this cover!

I liked the start of this story. It started out strong but then it seemed to slow down too much for my taste. I put it down for awhile and came back to it later but still could not get into it enough to finish it. Sadly it is a dnf at 50%.

I love the cover of this book! That’s what originally drew me to it. It was very eye catching...but I had a very hard time getting into it. It just fell really flat for me.

Loved the premise, writing, and characters. Can't wait to read more from this author. A really interesting book that is done in a way that makes you think and feel the entire time you're reading

I loved this book, but it took me a long time to read it because the journey bits slowed the pacing which made it very easy to put down and difficult to pick back up. The ending however was so worth it and I look forward to the next book.

I loved the concept of this book and the MC who loans out books (YA!!!!) when books are illegal. I actually really like the female MC and if the book would have just been her POV, I probably would have kept reading. M0RR1s however turned out to be really boring which surprised me because I thought the occupying force's POV would be interesting especially a partially android/robotic one. For this reason, I just couldn't find it in myself to go past 14%.

This book wasn't totally what I expected but I ended up really liking it. I'd recommend it for sci-fi fans everywhere! Dow has beautiful prose. Full review to come!

-DNF @32% -

Janelle "Ellie" Baker's world was invaded by an alien race called the Illori. The humans that weren't killed are under strict control and aren't allowed items like music or books. Ellie has a secret stash of books that she distributes to people in her apartment building, despite knowing that these books could get her killed.
M0R1S is a lab-born Illori who has a love for music, something thought could result in his execution.
When M0R1S finds Ellie's books, instead of turning her in, he asks her to find him some music.
Can Ellie and M0R1S put a stop to the Illori's plans?
Will they get caught?

I was excited to read The Sound of Stars as it sounded like an intriguing read, especially with the aliens taking over Earth. However, it ended up not being for me.
Ellie was an OK protagonist, but I didn't feel that I connected with her.
M0R1S's chapters were a bit confusing for me and I really struggled to be interested in him as a character.
The plot was OK but I really struggled with the writing style and didn't feel invested at all in the storyline.
It got to the point where I was forcing myself to continue and so I decided to DNF.
I might try to read this again at some point in the future.

Unfortunately, this wasn't for me.

I really enjoyed the overall premise of the book. I always enjoy the idea of alien races conquering earth and seeing the changes they bring. There is a lot that can be done with the alien invasion trope and this book certainly does it well.

I also enjoyed the characters. They were complex and had a lot of backstory to make them really come alive. One thing I think this book did that I didn't love was there was a lot of telling rather than showing especially when it came to Janelle's background. I would have preferred reading about experiences she had rather than just her saying she experienced it.

The ending of this book was by far the best part with a twist I did not see coming at all! I really ejnoyed it and can't wait to see what happens next.