It was super inclusive. I'm not gonna lie, the first time the characters referred to each other as "they" in casual conversation, I teared up a little. The idea that it should be that simple hit hard.

It was a journey book and I"m typically not a fan of those types of books. They just take a lot for me to be sucked in. Including this one.

Once I was in though, I was fully in. The thought and detail that Anders put into the world building was absolutely amazing. I can't wait to see what comes next.

This is the queer space opera with added clone drama and concern over war that I've been waiting for. Brilliant and brutal. I love every single character.

Couldn’t keep track of this as well as I liked. Love the premise, some of the characters. Some of the conflict felt pretty removed.

Highly creative world and storyline with a wonderfully diverse cast of characters. Considering Tina’s light-hearted tone of voice, I would have liked a faster paced read. A bit too long…could have been edited better to pick up the pacing. Otherwise, a very fun, empowering, and uplifting romp through space.

Victories Greater Than Death It is a fantastic young adult science fiction with lbgt characters weaving beautifully with a range of beloved aspects of pop culture. These include the quickness of Doctor Who and the excitement and adventure of star wars.
I greatly appreciated the descriptive species of aliens and hominoids working with each other and being opposed to each other's methodologies when trying to achieve different goals.
One of my favourite aspects of the book was the diverse cast of characters present and its excellent plot. It had the right balance of maintaining the fictional world, keeping the reader within this beautiful space operatic world created. While also navigating some of the current real-life complications, like gender identity. Discussions that have been had in our world.
A great example of this was how characters would introduce themselves. Burrito was also treated to understand their pronouns, gave it a normalising feel and became a non-issue.
The range of different alien species leads to different ways of those beings' identity play reminiscent of Becky Chambers' the long way to a small planet.
Victories Greater Than Death is a book I definitely will come back and re-read. I highly recommend anyone interested in science fiction to consider the book either being added to the TV are list or moving up higher on than need to read.

I felt like I was thrown in the middle of the second book of a series and made to "figure it out" from there. The side characters were flat and didn't feel very complex or dimensional, and the main character was whiny and annoying. I felt like she was accepted by the crew as the reincarnation of this legendary captain with little effort to prove herself shown. There was also a lot of pro-imperialism, the idea that "we are HELPING" even though you are a part of a police force and get super whiney and defensive when you are criticized for the horrific actions of said police force" didn't sit right with me either. There was a lot of telling, and not a lot of showing, and some plot points just felt conveniently resolved.

The things I did enjoy was the Star Trek vibes I got from this and the representation for LGBTQ+ people. In this world it was just accepted as a matter of fact, which I appreciate in a fantasy/sci-fi world. Authors take note: You don't need to make your world as homophobic as our own is.

Overall, this book just wasn't for me. I'd say it's closer to 2.5 stars to me, but I'm going to round up to 3.

This tells a story of Tina that secretly is an alien and knows she will have to leave earth soon.
The book had a very slow pace to it which did make it heard to keep up with it and motivated to keep reading it in one or two sittings. Some scenes weren't described well and I found it hard to get I into the story.
Cool aspect of a story but not sure it came out in the writing.

So did you read Animorphs as a kid? Were your favourite books the ones that really featured all the aliens and you weren’t really into the whole morphing thing and also wanted things to be canonically queer and not just subtextually queer? This might just be the book for you!

Now the other 85% of you, that’s going to be totally unrelateable and not helpful at all! So would you like a space romp with some major found family vibes (…not unlike Animorphs) and some really fun world-building that’s really queer and a very fun time? Theeeen this might be the book for YOU!

I super enjoyed how queer this was. Everyone is introduced using pronouns, and some of the aliens use neopronouns. I think this would be a really cool book to help someone get used to neopronouns, and the idea of introducing yourself with pronouns in general. And I appreciated that at the beginning the author included a briefly seen nonbinary character who used they/them so that pronouns outside of she/her and he/him didn’t come off as “an alien thing”. The book is very thoughtful about gender and how gender and pronouns are presented as something to learn about, not to make fun of. The Earth characters struggle more with alien food than alien gender.

The book did drag a bit in the middle…ish, maybe 3/4 mark, but it never made me want to stop reading. It’s not even really dragging – just a bit meandering. I was enjoying what I was reading, but I also found myself wondering when the plot would pick up. When it did, I enjoyed what happened!

Also I love Racheal and Tina’s friendship. There is romance in this, but I think the main relationship in the book is really between Rachael and Tina. It’s a really good friendship book. And I like Rachael in general – her character felt very real to me, and she was really good fat rep. I also liked how her anxiety and need for alone time and space (like… metaphorical space, but literal outer space) was handled.

Overall, I had fun with this and I’m not even the biggest science fiction person. If you are a big sci-fi fan, definitely check this out because I think you’d have a fun time. Definitely would recommend this, and I’m very glad I finally got my butt into gear reading it!

Representation: Oh god my notes suck, I’m sorry. Tina is queer – she describes her orientation as “I’m picky” which gives me demisexual vibes but she never uses a canon label (which is obviously fine). We also Elza, who’s Black and Latina, and trans. A lot of the aliens also have nonbinary genders which you can take or leave as representation but I think is a lot more realistic than the entire galaxy being binary.

Tina’s crew of Earthlings also come from all over the world, including India and China. It’s nice that the smartest kids on Earth weren’t all from the US lol. Also, her best friend Racheal is fat, and has social anxiety, and I love her.

Sorry that’s the best I’ve got.

Content notes: There’s some pretty typical space violence, and death – the kind of thing you’d expect to see in Star Wars. Less violence than Animorphs, probably. (You thought I couldn’t fit another one in! But also it’s true, that series was brutal.) Elza talks about transmisia and her experience as a trans woman in Brazil. It’s not super graphic, but it’s there.

I love the world building and the characters were all great and well fleshed out. I was hoping there would be a sequel and was thrilled to find out this was the first of a trilogy. Although, the book doesn't have a feeling of "Here's part of the story, go buy the rest". It's a complete book and I can't wait for the others

Thank you to netgalley and the publishers for an arc to review

I was really excited about this book as I've recently gotten into sci-fi but this just bored me. There was a lot of info dumping and a lot of unnecessary info dumping at that. Our MC knows all this stuff about the different species and we just go so many pointless facts. It felt like "LOOK LOOK SEE A TOTALLY WELL ROUNDED WORLD" but it just.. didn't matter to the story and gave me way too many things to have in my head.

At the beginning of the book, I was thinking it was a space opera, think Guardians of the Galaxy, that didn't have a ton to hold it together. But, as the characters got into space and moving where I felt they should be, it got much more interesting. I liked the kids and enjoyed the "captain's" musing on the situations.

Tina Mains is not your average teenager. First of all, she’s not human but a clone of a dead legendary alien. One day, her safety beacon will activate and she will leave her boring and ordinary life to have space adventures.

Once the highly awaited day comes, Tina is finally able to leave Earth. However, she quickly realizes that things are not exactly what she expected. She might be the clone of a legend but it doesn’t mean that she’s one, at least, not yet. The memories of her past life that were supposed to reappear once in space are lost. Tina now simply knows a lot of fact about space but she can’t remember a single event from her life as a legend. It also doesn’t help that a galactic war is going on and that her failure to remember anything is not going to help the Royal Fleet. Thankfully, Tina is not alone, she has her best (human) friend with her plus her new found family of human teenagers and aliens. Together, they will end the war… or die trying.

Victories Greater than Death is a fun and fast-paced YA space adventure. It’s almost overflowing with frenetic energy and ideas and I found myself being unable to put the book down. First of all, Charlie Jane Anders takes no time to introduce the stakes. The aliens appear very quickly in an epic and explosive scene and once Tina leaves Earth, the adventure truly begins!

I don’t read a lot of YA but Charlie Jane Anders is one of my favorite authors so I knew I had to give it a try. I’m glad I did because it was a very different experience from the YA books I’m used to reading. First of all, unlike a lot of YA titles, even if Victories Greater than Death has a romance storyline, it’s not central to the story. Friendship is.

Rachel is Tina’s best friend and their relationship is at the heart of the story. Rachel is an artist and an introvert yet, she follows Tina to the other side of the galaxy without hesitating. Rachel is always there to support Tina, she plays a crucial part in the story and she is as badass as Tina in her own ways.

Putting friendships at the forefront of YA books is important because it shows that a friendship can be as important (if not more) than romantic relationships. Friendships turn us into who we are and good friends know you better than yourself. By building a strong group of friends, Anders subvert the trope of the Chosen One to assemble a team of people willing to fight to protect each other and try their best to make the world a better place.

Victories Greater than Death is without a doubt inspired by Star Trek and Star Wars. The aim of the Royal Fleet is to protect every alien species against threats however, Anders puts her own twist to it. Each ship in the Royal Fleet has two captains and a very loose hierarchy to make every voice matter. Inclusivity is key, queer relationship are normalized (Tina has a romantic relationship with a trans-girl), every character shares their pronouns when they introduce themselves and aliens come in all shapes, sizes and colors.

My only complaint with Victories Greater than Death is that it was a bit too short for me. The book is less than 300 pages and it didn’t give a lot of room for character development. The pacing is frenetic and the characters jump from an emergency to another and I wish Anders gave us a touch less action and a bit more time to learn about each character.

However, I had a lot of fun with this book and I’m looking forward to the sequel. I need more space adventures with Tina and her team of loveable aliens and teenagers and I can’t wait to revisit this world!

⭐⭐⭐⭐
Rating: 4 out of 5.
I received a copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. My thanks to Netgalley and Tor Teen for the ARC.

This was such a letdown I’m almost confused. I’ve read Charlie Jane Anders’ newest book, on writing advice, when it was being released as online essays on Tor.com, and now I feel like I should doubt everything I read there. Victories Greater Than Death is Anders’ YA debut after publishing in the adult SFF sphere, but I have no idea what this book was supposed to be. At times it felt like I was reading adult, at other times I could’ve pulled chapters from middle grade or early readers books, and I barely understood half of what was happening because the writing was so choppy and all over the place. What was marketed to me and what I wanted were entirely different from the story I ended up getting, which wouldn’t have been a bad thing had the real story made absolutely any sense.

Tina has known since childhood she’s not destined for an ordinary life; her mother has been open with her that she is a clone of a famous alien general, one who died in noble combat trying to save the universe. When she comes of age, her people will return for her, her memories will be restored, and she will retake on the role of general to save the universe. Except her enemies come for her first, entering the Earth into a galactic war, it turns out she’s defective and her memories will never be returned, and now her and several other Earth teenagers are thrown onto a crappy spaceship. With figures from Tina’s past that she can’t remember pursuing them, her motley Earth crew struggling to acclimate, and the looming reputation of the dead general looming over her, Tina must discover how to help the galactic cause herself, even as everyone very literally expects her to be someone else.

The basic plot of this isn’t bad. I requested the book for a reason. But what’s sold to us as an intergalactic war, a teenage girl struggling to live up to an alien general with a completely different life, personality, and culture as her, and the exploration of a vast array of universal cultures is just… so one-note. Tina discovering that she can’t acquire her counterpart’s memories in the beginning of the book, that her destiny is shattered, is brushed away in one page. The intergalactic war seems ridiculous, given that the book emphasizes what a dump their spaceship is, yet is manages to outmaneuver, outgun, or escape from enemy forces easily in literally every single encounter they have with them. Massive displays of force are shown (destruction of planets and species), yet our plucky young heroes are able to escape unscathed every time? With ease? The introduction to every new alien species we get follows the same formulaic sentence pattern: we get their name, a brief description of what they look like with Tina suitably gawking, and then a useless little fun fact about their species that tells us nothing about their actual lives. There’s no thought to how these cultures interact, or their place in the greater universe, or even how they’ve all been effected by the war. It’s like Anders introduced all these interesting plot pieces and refuses to move them around even a little.

I was frustrated by the narrative’s focus on the teenagers that end up aboard the ship, even though I knew logically that this was supposed to be a YA novel, which focuses on teens. Getting invested in the lives of these kids was impossible, as, just like everything else, they all seemed to be one-dimensional ideas of what Anders thinks teenagers act like. Alternatively moody/angsty or hyperactive powerhouses, the efforts to distinguish between the characters rang false. They were all given different hobbies or interests, yet I found it hard to tell them apart because they all had virtually the same personalities. I found myself doubting the romances that blossomed due to the character’s similarities. I will give Anders credit: all the characters come from different cultural backgrounds and life experiences, and it was obvious in the text that she had done a lot of research to portray things as accurately as possible. She details some of her sensitivity reading process in the acknowledgements, and I commend her for doing enough assisted research into even the minutiae of different lifestyles. I just wish that these different detailed backgrounds had any effect on the characters’ personalities.

Lastly, the writing style was just really choppy. We started in media res in almost every chapter, in the middle of conversations with no background, battle sequences with no context, planetary explorations with no explanations, which is not only repetitive but exhausting. I shouldn’t have to put together puzzle pieces every three pages to figure out where we are or what our characters are doing. Having an understandable plot is like, the very basis of books, especially YA books.

The potential of this book and the dedicated research were enough to bring this to two stars for me, but no further. I can’t say I hated reading this book, I just literally did not know what was happening half of the time with neither the character relationships nor the plot. The introduction of interesting pieces only to have them discarded or misused was frustrating, and I feel like this book failed to pull together any semblance of cohesion. Victories Greater Than Death was a disappointment on almost all fronts, a promise of a sci-fi epic that crumbled with the slightest breeze.

Still, much thanks to NetGalley for providing me with a copy of the book.

On the surface, Victories Greater Than Death is the ideal book for me: it's comped to Star Wars and Doctor Who, two of my favourite media franchises, and I'm a huge science fiction fan. I did enjoy it in the end, but it wasn't quite the read that I was expecting going into it. It felt like it was limited from its full potential by the length and the age range, but there was definitely a lot of potential there and I think the sequel will be really great.

I have a soft spot for YA science fiction, and science fiction in general, and from that perspective I thought it was good. The comps of Star Wars especially felt very accurate to me, because there are narrative elements common throughout the Star Wars franchise that were used in Victories Greater Than Death. I thought this was both really good craft, because even though they're difference media, Star Wars is massively impactful on scifi in terms of building and writing, and it also a really nice nod to it and its fans. In this regard, the people who would most enjoy this are those who eagerly consume scifi, because of the richness drawn from other sources, but someone just dipping their toes in could probably be sucked in without needing all of that.

The concept of Tina having to live up to the legacy of this decorated alien war hero who was in the middle of an intergalactic war was cool, especially considering the twist on Chosen One it provided. She was surrounded by all of these experienced warriors looking to her when she's just trying to keep up, and even deeper, the war is more personal than she realises. This tied in well with the whole epic, saving the galaxy plot, but it was at times frustrating to have so little clarity because so much was happening at once in terms of plot. I did think that while the themes of the plot were common building blocks of society, with a bit intergalactic war and a race to stop the opposing side, the original twist on this made the plot fresh and entertaining when it picked up. There were also some plot points that made me feel very strong emotions but that I can't reveal for reasons of spoilers, so if you read this, you may get very angry at certain characters.

The world building in this book was both excellent, in that it was very detailed, and weak, in that I could see that the author had built worlds in her mind but the sheer vastness of this universe didn't transfer well to the length and tone of the book. The thing that stood out was the use of pronouns by the universal translator - almost all characters introduce themselves using their pronouns, which was a really cool, simple and inclusive tidbit highlighting how aliens almost certainly wouldn't conform to the most common human gender norms. There's a vast number of species and history and general worldbuilding, to the point where there could have been a whole guidebook to the universe. Normally I would love this level of world building, but I think the lack of visuals did make it a bit tricky to keep track of who was what species and looked like what because of all the descriptions.

The cast of characters is a large one, and by the end I loved them all in their own ways. It was clear how much work Charlie Jane Anders put into each and every one of them, which made it impossible for me to not like them all. Aside from Tina, our main character who was definitely needing to find her feet, I liked Rachel, the best friend, a lot, because I liked the dynamic between her and Tina, although I would have liked to see more of that. All of the main cast had their own strengths that ended up joining together to make a pretty solid team considering they only just found out about everything that was happening, and together they held up remarkably well in a realistic way considering everything they went through.

Please don't be dissuaded from reading this if you have an interest: I think my opinion stems from right book, wrong time syndrome, and I can see my feelings changing if I decide to reread before reading the second one. There was some really good content, but not all of it gelled with me, and although I think it's great set-up for a sequel and I appreciate the potential and the clever use of classic science fiction inspirations; there were some heartbreaking moments, and some laugh-out-loud moments, but unfortunately I felt a bit more lukewarm towards this than I would have hoped.

I ended up getting a physical copy of this to consider it for the YALSA Quick Picks for Reluctant Readers list. It seems really promising and I can see myself recommending it to lots of teens.

I'm not a huge fan of SciFi but this book was truly incredible! The diversity in this novel was amazing and so nice to see in such a casual setting. Charlie's worldbuilding was also well detailed and descriptive. I also loved the other topics touched upon in this book and it's clear Charlie cares so much. It was a little info-dumpy in places and there were quite a few action scenes, but otherwise, the plot was pretty good. Definitely a great start to a series, and I adore that cover!

An incredible out-of-this-world take on the Chosen One story about a teen girl cloned from a famous intergalactic hero taken to space to fulfill her ultimate destiny--until it all goes haywire. This book is action packed and full of heart. It's basically Star Trek meets A Long Way to a Small Angry Planet, and I am so here for it. I especially recommend the audiobook which is narrated by Hynden Walch (Priness Bubblegum, Starfire, etc.) and be sure to listen to the end when she and Charlie Jane Anders interview each other and just generally fangirl together. Truly can't recommend enough.

Powerfully written and heartfelt, Victories Greater Than Death is the space adventure that will inspire and entertain young readers. Full of adventure, great characters, and humor, Victories Greater Than Death is a must-read.
Thank you to Netgalley and the Publisher for the opportunity to read and review this title. All opinions and mistakes are my own.

Disclaimer: I received this e-arc from the publisher. Thanks! All opinions are my own.

Book: Victories Greater Than Death

Author: Charlie Jane Anders

Book Series: Unstoppable Book 1

Diversity: Pronoun usage, Non binary side character, Plus Size side character, Indian side character, Asian side character, Brazilian transgender side character, Black gay side character, Anxiety rep side character, F/f romance

Rating: 1/5

Recommended For...: young adult readers, science fiction

Genre: YA Sci-fi

Publication Date: April 13, 2021

Publisher: Tor Teen

Pages: 288

Recommended Age: 14+ (Child abuse mention TW, Death, Slight sexual content, Gore, Violence)

Explanation of CWs: 1 mention of child abuse in the past. There is lots of violence and death and gore in this book. There is also one scene that's suggestive of sex.

Synopsis: Tina never worries about being ‘ordinary’—she doesn’t have to, since she’s known practically forever that she’s not just Tina Mains, average teenager and beloved daughter. She’s also the keeper of an interplanetary rescue beacon, and one day soon, it’s going to activate, and then her dreams of saving all the worlds and adventuring among the stars will finally be possible. Tina’s legacy, after all, is intergalactic—she is the hidden clone of a famed alien hero, left on Earth disguised as a human to give the universe another chance to defeat a terrible evil.

But when the beacon activates, it turns out that Tina’s destiny isn’t quite what she expected. Things are far more dangerous than she ever assumed. Luckily, Tina is surrounded by a crew she can trust, and her best friend Rachael, and she is still determined to save all the worlds. But first she’ll have to save herself.

Review: So while I managed to get through this whole book (and it was a struggle) I hated every moment reading this book past 15%. The book really felt bland and tropey, and when I say tropey I mean the book tries to use a ton of the usual tropes of YA sci-fi but fails to write them and tell them well. The book wasn't anything very unique and there was just so much clutter in the book to go through in order to understand who was who for the aliens and what was going on. The author didn't let the side characters really develop or grow and while I loved that they all were very diverse, the author didn't write their identities into how they interacted with their environment. In fact, all of the characters felt super 1 dimensional and flat. There was too much telling and virtually no showing. The world building was awful. And the book, overall, was just awful and there's better books out there that utilize the same tropes, but they actually work.

Verdict: Not for me but maybe for you!

Outsmart Your Enemies. Outrun the Galaxy.

“Just please, remember what I told you. Run. Don’t stop running for anything.”

Tina never worries about being 'ordinary'--she doesn't have to, since she's known practically forever that she's not just Tina Mains, average teenager and beloved daughter. She's also the keeper of an interplanetary rescue beacon, and one day soon, it's going to activate, and then her dreams of saving all the worlds and adventuring among the stars will finally be possible. Tina's legacy, after all, is intergalactic--she is the hidden clone of a famed alien hero, left on Earth disguised as a human to give the universe another chance to defeat a terrible evil.

But when the beacon activates, it turns out that Tina's destiny isn't quite what she expected. Things are far more dangerous than she ever assumed--and everyone in the galaxy is expecting her to actually be the brilliant tactician and legendary savior Captain Thaoh Argentian, but Tina....is just Tina. And the Royal Fleet is losing the war, badly--the starship that found her is on the run and they barely manage to escape Earth with the planet still intact.

Luckily, Tina is surrounded by a crew she can trust, and her best friend Rachel, and she is still determined to save all the worlds. But first she'll have to save herself.

Buckle up your seatbelt for this thrilling YA sci-fi adventure set against an intergalactic war from internationally bestselling author Charlie Jane Anders