The Blighted Stars (The Devoured Worlds, #1)
Megan E. O'Keefe
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.
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0 0“For it matters not how small the beginning may seem to be: What is once well done is done forever.”
When I saw a reviewer say that this book gave vibes from The 100 (a show that I love), I knew I had to read it. Even then, I wasn't expecting to read this in one sitting, staying up all night until 8:30 a.m. to finish it.
This book is told in multiple POVs, focusing on Tarquin Mercator, the son of one of the biggest business men in the universe, and Naira Sharp, a spy who got convicted trying to stop the Mercator's from causing harm. While aboard a ship headed to a new planet, something goes awry and they need to escape before going down with it. Tarquin enlists Naira's aid, without realizing who he's really asking, and they, along with the rest of the crew, take a shuttle down to the planet. There, they have to discover the mysteries surrounding them, all while trying to stay alive and facing unknown threats.
One of the things I really loved about this book was how unique the concept of prints are. Humanity has evolved and people can now be printed into new bodies. If someone ships themselves they can be awakened again with their memories. If they simply die in a body, they can come back but forget everything that happened. The biggest problem though, is if someone has an extremely traumatic death, they risk cracking, meaning they can never be printed again. This forces the characters to take caution in what they do, knowing that if they can't ship their bodies or get off the planet in some way, all the knowledge that they've gained will be lost forever.
I was also kicking my feet every time Tarquin and Naira interacted. I loved the dynamics between both characters as they're forced to work together to get everyone off the planet. Naira was testified and found guilty by the Mercator family, but for some reason has been printed into one of their guards bodies, where she now has to protect the person that she hates most. She has to stay close to Tarquin, while trying to prevent him from figuring out who she actually she is.
I would very highly recommend picking this up! Even at over 500 pages, I flew through this, wanting to uncover the mysteries of the world with Tarquin and Naira.
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