Hi, I’ll be over here yelling about the reckoning of ptsd by way of art block, space princess spy school with the trans character that also gets us incredibly valuable backstory, and of course, our main character. Yes, it can get super twee and feel like CJA is throwing every bit of alphabet and the kitchen sink in, but honestly, the way that she looks at all of this through the larger lens of creeping facism, but in a Star Trek esque utopia, is still incredibly up my alley. Given the clearly telegraphed twist, I’m interested to see how this wraps with the next book. I also like that CJA introduced other POVs here, not just to balance the inevitable twist, but because it’s fantastic to see her flexing her storytelling skills a bit. Pick up the first one to give you context, but pick this one up to see her flex and have some fun.

This is one of those sequels that will rip out your heart and make you think about it long after you are done. I could not put this one down and I hope this story isn't over.

Anders is a master of sci-fi and her YA offerings continue to prove it. Bold and exciting and fresh, she continues to be one of my favourite voices in publishing.

I unfortunately did not enjoy the first book so I will be unable to review the second. Thank you for the opportunity and I love these covers!

Thanks to NetGalley, the author, and Macmillan-Tor for the ARC for review!

Dreams Bigger Than Heartbreak is the second in the Unstoppable series by Charlie Jane Anders, and her second foray into YA fiction. I wrote a review for the first in the series back when it came out, and I’ll be the first to admit I wasn’t the biggest fan. The parts were there, but it didn’t coalesce into a complete whole yet, at least in my opinion. The first book in the series focuses almost completely on Tina, and this sequel has three POV characters: Tina, Elza, and Rachel. Tina is grappling with living up to the legacy of Captain Argentian, Elza is trying to become a princess, and Rachel is attempting to gain back lost skill, while also trying to avoid the role that is being thrust upon her by everyone else. It seemed in my reading that Elza and Rachel got more page time, but that might be incorrect if you averaged it all out. To me, Elza and Rachel are more compelling characters whose character arcs I enjoyed watching unwind throughout the novel. In fact, almost every character in this sequel has a more compelling arc than in the first book. There are still moments in this one that I feel lean a little too heavy on pop culture references, in a way that feels kind of “how-do-you-do-fellow-kids”-esque, but I feel the story this time around really justifies it. All in all, I find myself excited for the third and final book in the series!

I have received this ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Dreams Bigger Than Heartbreak is the second installment within the Unstoppable series. Just like the first book, I absolutely fell in love with everyone's adventures throughout this. I was a little sad that they were on separate ones though for most of this book. Still, everything was completely magical and really fun to enjoy.

I honestly never expect to get so emotional when it comes to Tina, Rachael or Elza. Yet, I always do. Or maybe I just melted into an emotional puddle towards the end of this because so much was going on and I mentally couldn't take it. Either way, I also hoped for the best but expected the absolute worst.

That ending was so freaking good and I'm still not over it. Definitely can't wait for the next book to come out because I really need to know what is going to happen next. Again, I need good news but will probably learn to cope with whatever outcome I get. Seriously so happy that I got the chance to read this and can't wait for Charlie's next space adventure masterpiece!

Unimpressed with this sequel. I missed Tina’s POV (she’s the one I was most interested in to begin with), and I couldn’t stand Rachel. The pace was all over the place and so was the story. I won’t be continuing with this series because it’s lost all its intrigue.

I love it when it feels like an author took note of my notes and fixes the issues I had with book 1 in a series. I mean, I'm pretty sure the fantastic CJA didn't read or even need me commenting on how I liked the rest of the cast a lot more than I did the original leading lady, Tina, but opening up the story to exploring the rest of the genius teens who left Earth to explore the universe and fight the Compassion is a brilliant move.
This volume explores the varied universe that we got glimpses of in the first book mostly through the eyes of Elsa, Rachel, and the rest of the genius kids that joined Tina. We get to experience more levels of the society they're a part of now and explore all the varied aspects of how the different cultures and races interact, for better or worse. It gives a wider angle from which to experience the events of the war and the horrible discovery that ended book 1. It also gets a lot darker and the stakes are ever higher as things from the past get revealed and a darker, scarier threat shows up.
There's a bit less action but a lot more intrigue and exploration that more than makes up for it in fleshing out the characters and the world to the point that the brilliantly out-there creative ideas Anders includes in the story make perfect sense.
Overall, I'm glad I stuck with this series because this volume fixes everything I didn't like about the previous one. It pulled me in and now I'm salivating at the thought of what could possibly come next for these intrepid teens.

Happy thanks to NetGalley and Tor Teen for the exciting read!

The concept and summary for this one was sooo intriguing!! I tried really hard to get in to this one but I just couldn’t. I felt like it lacked that something to make me want to read this one.

The sequel to Charlie Jane Anders' Victories Greater Than Death is finally here! Dreams Bigger Than Heartbreak is the second novel in the Unstoppable series, and I am still utterly enthralled by this series (and the universe within).

This is the universe on the brink of change. Evil still lurks at nearly every corner – but a determined group of heroes is doing everything in their power to prevent an intergalactic war from breaking out.

The first of our heroes is Rachel Townsend, an Earth artist – the first of her kind ever to make it off the planet. Yet the term has come to be a painful one, as she's lost the ability to make art. Then there's Elza Monteiro, a fierce and determined sort of human. She ran for the opportunity to become a princess...only that path was not what she expected. Finally, there's Tina Mains. She's been studying at the Royal Space Academy, and she still feels like she is constantly letting down everyone around her. It doesn't help that their expectations were so high.

Yet these three, alongside their friends, will have to rally if they want to find a way to prevent a war from tearing apart their known universe. Literally.

“If you attain a high enough status, then normality is whatever you say.”

Let me be the first to say that I adored Victories Greater Than Death – it was brilliant and so much fun to read. Now, keep that in mind when I say that Dreams Bigger Than Heartbreak somehow surpassed my expectations, creating an enchanting sequel far better than I could have ever hoped for.

Maybe it's just me, but I feel like we got to know the characters better in this series segment. Perhaps that is because so much of the worldbuilding had already been done, I'm not sure. I did appreciate the opportunity to know Rachel, Elza, and Tina better. Their stories are what make this series shine.

The sheer amount of rep in Dreams Bigger Than Heartbreak (and the series as a whole) will always be something that makes me smile. Any reader should be able to pick up this series and find a reflection of themselves somewhere within the pages. I sincerely hope that is the case, at any rate.

There are a lot of pop culture references woven into the story, which I found to be a lot of fun. In my mind, it sort of grounds the more science fiction elements at any rate. I know that these references might eventually end up dating the series, but I'm okay with that trade-off. However, I know not all readers like their stories full of references, so keep that in mind.

Long story short – I loved Dreams Bigger Than Heartbreak. I gobbled it up in a single sitting and will now happily wait for the next novel in the series (Promises Greater Than Darkness) to drop.

I requested this book, not knowing that it was a sequel and had to DNF it. The cover looks amazing though!

Another sweet, funny, and imaginative gem from the ever-lovely Charlie Jane Anders.

I enjoyed the first book in this series, but the follow-up is even better. This charming and uniquely genre-bending space opera careens around the universe to all sorts of cleverly rendered worlds, while still feeling deeply evocative and relatable for us earthlings.

I was so pleased to see more of a deep dive into Rachel’s character in this book, as well as the further development of the rest of the series’ principal characters.

Anders does a wonderful job with representation, no small feat in a novel where the cast is a veritable kitchen sink of diversity. While that is always an appealing concept in theory, too often authors lean back into a checklist-style cast of characters, and the result feels more like tokenism than representation. Not so with Anders, who creates fully-formed, captivating characters of all types, making the book feel welcoming and inclusive rather than like an attempt to meet a baseline for diversity.

But it’s the humor and complex relationship dynamics of the story that really win over the reader. In a way, Anders has redefined the concept of superheroes in a way that the modern world desperately needs. And the writing, in addition to being thoughtful and well-plotted is (and I mean this as the utmost compliment) almost sneakily beautiful.

DNF at 15%.

I just genuinely had no idea what was going on and I didn't have the patience to reread and try to figure it out. I read 8% of the egalley. But restarted when I got the audiobook from my library.

The young adult sf series I wish I’d been able to read as a teen; this one, the middle of a trilogy, is a real roller-coaster, with everything amped up. Loved it more than the first one.

Dreams Bigger Than Heartbreak by Charlie Jane Anders is the middle book in the Unstoppable trilogy. Following up on last year's Victories Greater Than Death, this is Anders' first sequel - her first foray into YA and into writing something that isn't standalone. That said, this volume both manages to build on the strengths of the first book, as well as not quite live up to my expectations - it is the second book in a trilogy, the one where many threads are left open and few plotlines are taken to their conclusion. Whereas Victories very much was concluded in itself, an arc that could mostly be left on its own, Dreams took these characters, took the ensemble cast, and fragmented it again. The found family aspects of the first book that I loved so much took a bit of a back seat as each of the characters embarked on their own arc and worked on establishing themselves as an individual in their changed circumstances - which was very interesting, but felt less compelling and comforting than the first book for me personally. I still adored Rachael, my favourite character, who was given plenty of space for her anxiety to unfold (THANK YOU CHARLIE JANE for giving us such a wonderful character with anxiety rep!) - and who got to grow outside of her friendship with Tina. Definitely still a good book, and I am looking forward to reading the conclusion, even if it didn't quite have the magic of the first one.

Thank you to NetGalley and TOR Teen for this ARC. I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I really wanted to enjoy this book with the first in the series being one of my favourite sci-fis of last year. However, I found the sequel didn’t work for more reasons than I can try to count.

Normally, pacing wise I can get though a book in 3-5 days, this one put me in a reading slump and took 40 days.

The first 40% of this book is info dumping, which is unfortunate with how much of the world is created in the first book, I was hoping to expand on the world through exploration now that it was established. However, it felt that I was told more than I was shown.

In addition, countless new characters were introduced so outside of our main 3 characters, the important main characters from the first book did not get nearly as fleshed out as I would have liked.

Similarly, the story being told through 3 changing perspectives left me frustrated with the distance set between the 3 tales, especially with by the end only caring mostly for one.

Lastly, conversations in this book did not seem to end and always segwayed into another in the next chapter. However, in contrast high points of action such as breaking into the Chapterhouse would only last a few pages and was frustrating for the payoff of events of high actions to be so short.


Overall, I unfortunately do not plan to finish the series. However, if you enjoy Gilmore Girls set in space or do not mind large chunks of dialogue and endless amounts of characters this may be the book for you!

My review of Dreams Bigger than Heartbreak (Book 2 of Unstoppable) by Charlie Jane Anders

YA novel (e-book and audiobook), Science Fiction, Adventure

5 of 5 (heck yes!)

I loved how all the characters interact with each other. Everyone’s dealing with all their hangups and everything and it’s not always easy for them to talk with each other, but I love how they always try to manage to work through the issues as best they can. The characters and the worlds they inhabit are so beautifully realized. I had as much with this book as with the first one. Keep in mind, this is definitely a middle book—you better have read the first one if you’re reading this, and it’s certainly a setup for what comes next. But I really enjoyed seeing these characters grow after what they went through in the first book.

I also enjoyed how, despite being full of positivity and awareness of how to better engage with each other, the book didn’t shy away from the reality of people being ugly or misused—there’s definitely some of that for the characters to deal with in this book (and in whatever comes next).

Regarding the audiobook: the narrators were clear and excellent choices for each character. That said, I would not recommend experiencing this book as audio only. There’s a lot going on and a ton of places and characters and details, so personally I had to review what I listened to in my ebook version of the book. I’ll probably get the hardback later on to pair with my hardback version of the first book.

As for the cover art, beautiful. I'm a huge fan of the cover art for the first book, so I was glad to see a nice follow-up. The hardcover of the first book had some amazing inside cover art as well, but unfortunately I haven't been able to inspect the hardcover of book 2 yet, but I would hope for more of that.

Oh, and thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan-Tor/Forge for providing me with the ebook for review. I ended up reviewing this late, so, as an audiobook fan, I bought myself the audio version, too, before wrapping up my first read and review. Now I'm impatient for Book 3 of the Unstoppable.

Dreams Bigger Than Hearbreak falls prey to the problems that impact many sequels: it's just not as good as the first book. Nothing is really new, in that the characters, setting, and even the basic plotline have been determined and laid out in the first volume. This one focuses on different characters than Victories Greater Than Death did, which helps some, but not enough, in my opinion.

The main storyline is about Rachael trying to regain her ability to draw, destroyed by her actions to save the universe in the first novel, while everyone in the book is trying, once again, to defeat the Vayt. It's interesting as a motivation, but it's not really a big enough issue to build a novel around - and yet, Anders does so. This is not the wide-reaching novel of first contact (at least as far Earth knows) that the previous volume was; it's a space opera, and one that leans heavily on high school-type social interactions. Every character is introduced with their gender identity, which is, I would guess, intended to be edgy and up-to-date, but since characters' gender identity have absolutely no bearing on their actions, other than who pairs off with whom, it's less of interest and more a distraction, one that could be avoided by simply using the appropriate pronouns. I have no problem with a character who changes how they perceive their gender, but it had no purpose to the story; likewise, I have no problem with the idea that aliens may have genders we've never considered, but at the same time, such should be identified with nonsense words - "fire" as a gender is rather distracting on the rare occasions it occurs, and again, it had no relevance to the story.

I'm sure that there are people who will enjoy this novel, and as entertainment, it wasn't bad; it just wasn't great, either, and if I hadn't read the previous volume, I probably would have picked this up, read a few pages, and put it back down - but I was looking for the elements I enjoyed in the first book, and I never really found them. I found it to be predictable, and I didn't like the transformation of one character into another, who then spent the rest of the novel complaining about having been transformed in that way - especially after the build-up to the transformation in both volumes.

I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

The middle book of a trilogy is tricky, but when it works, the payoff is incredible -- such is the case with Charlie Jane Anders' DREAMS BIGGER THAN HEARTBREAK, which beautifully expands the already-expansive world created in VICTORIES GREATER THAN DEATH. Queer/trans/progressive sci-fi has to be one of the most exciting, innovative genres out there, and few do it better than Anders! After the bombshell revelations at the end of VICTORIES, we pick up with Tina and Rachael and the rest of their intergalactic family as they wrestle with the repercussions of their traumatic battle, the threat of a massive war with unthinkable consequences, and the painful and exciting possibilities of new love and personal growth in the midst of so much tragedy. That Anders spends so much joyful time on the characters' prickly relationships and confused sense of direction while still managing to develop a mind-bogglingly complex A-plot is both remarkable and impressive. I also deeply love that the heartbreak of relationship strain between friends is held on the same level as romantic breakups, just as the sheer joy of close friendship is on par with romantic love. The series is a love letter to humanity, with all its flaws and promise, and I cannot wait for Book 3!

Dreams Bigger Than Heartbreak is the second book in the Unstoppable series by Charlie Jane Anders. This young adult sci-fi fantasy is full of twists and turns. It is well-paced and addictive to read with a great found family in space and an entertaining plot.