Review: The Blighted Stars by Megan E. O'Keefe

The Blighted Stars

Megan E. O'Keefe

(The Devouring Worlds #1)

Publication Date: May 23, 2023

Hardcover, 544 pages, Orbit

Genres: Adult, Sci-Fi

Goodreads

When a spy is stranded on a dead planet with her mortal enemy, she must first figure out how to survive before she can uncover the conspiracy that landed them both there in the first place.

 

She’s a revolutionary. Humanity is running out of options. Habitable planets are being destroyed as quickly as they’re found and Naira Sharp knows the reason why. The all-powerful Mercator family has been controlling the exploration of the universe for decades, and exploiting any materials they find along the way under the guise of helping humanity’s expansion. But Naira knows the truth, and she plans to bring the whole family down from the inside.

 

He’s the heir to the dynasty. Tarquin Mercator never wanted to run a galaxy-spanning business empire. He just wanted to study rocks and read books. But Tarquin’s father has tasked him with monitoring the mining of a new planet, and he doesn’t really have a choice in the matter.

 

Disguised as Tarquin’s new bodyguard, Naira plans to destroy his ship before it lands. But neither of them expects to end up stranded on a dead planet. To survive and keep her secret, Naira will have to join forces with the man she’s sworn to hate. And together they will uncover a plot that’s bigger than both of them.

My Review

Do you like the worldbuilding of The Expanse series, or even The Last Watch by J.S. Dewes? Are you a fan of The Last of Us? Have you read YA sci-fi books like Illuminae or Aurora Rising and just want something a little more sophisticated? Then, The Blighted Stars is the perfect next read for you.

The Blighted Stars follows two primary POV characters, with a couple of other POVs thrown in every once in a while to shake things up. Tarquin Mercator is the geologist son of one of the ruling families in the whole space system, and he's out to prove his family isn't killing worlds. So he undertakes a mission on another mining planet to find answers. Naira Sharp, on the other hand, is the disgraced and imprisoned bodyguard of Tarquin's father, and Tarquin is the one who helped put her away. When she gets printed into a new body on the same ship as Tarquin, well, a lot of things go wrong. Especially when they're forced to crash-land on a dying planet. The Blighted Stars definitely has the suspense of a stranded-on-a-deserted-island story and add onto that some creepy creatures, mysterious infections, and people keeping big secrets, and you get a wild ride.

The worldbuilding in The Blighted Stars is heavy. Like the author really did her research, or at least, she made up some really cool, smart-sounding stuff. And while this is a science-heavy book, for those who are less scientifically-minded like me, it was still easy to drift over those explanatory sections and not miss out on the next plot development, except in a couple of cases. So don't worry about memorizing all the things. But, if you're a fan of geology, biology, or epidemiology, then this will be right up your alley.

The two main characters are also super fun. It's a bit of a gender flip. Instead of the rough-and-tough survivalist guy, we get Naira Sharp, the badass female bodyguard, while Tarquin is the more peaceable character with knowledge about rocks, not fighting or leading. He also has a cute (or so I imagine) robot companion. I genuinely liked Tarquin and Naira's dynamic. Their conversations and banter were great. I was pretty devastated whenever they were apart, as those chapters dragged a little bit. Time flew by so fast when the two of them were bickering at each other. But, that could just be the romance reader in me that loves the relationship tension. However, this 100% isn't a romance book. It's just the first book in a sci-fi series that has romantic elements.

All in all, I enjoyed this first book, and I want to read book two whenever it releases. It does take some time to get through this 500-page tome, but it's worth it. Just don't pick it up when you have lots of things going on. You'll want to dedicate some brain power to this one.

*Note: I received a copy of this book to review from the publisher. This in no way affected my opinion/review.