Skyward

Loved this book so much and can't wait to start the sequel

Really cool concept for a graphic novel. Gorgeously illustrated. Will definitely check out other volumes.

Personally, I have a love/hate relationship with Brandon Sanderson. He's an author who everyone raves about on Booktube, but I cannot seem to get into. I thought his Steelheart YA series was fine. Not anything spectacular, just fine. And the first book I read of his infamously awesome Mistborn series left me feeling confused as to why I had not loved it like so many others. This latest experience with Sanderson left me hesitant to pick up anything else by him. Still, my curiosity was peaked when I saw this book at my local library. Then, the next thing I knew, I had read the story in a little over a week, and what was more, I enjoyed reading it. This makes me think that this novel just might turn around my opinion of Sanderson yet.

Spensa is a girl who lives on a world attacked from space by the Krell, a race of aliens who do not want them to leave the planet after her ancestor's crash landed there hundreds of years ago. Her society lives under ground in a series of caverns for safety as they desperately try and find a way to get off the planet, before the Krell destroy them. Spensa has had enough, and decides to become a pilot, just like her father. There is just one problem though. Her father, an ace pilot, was very highly honored amongst the members of her community, which made it all the more troubling when he fled during a large Krell attack, forever branding him a coward, and Spensa a coward's daughter. Spensa must endure bullying all her life. It only gets worse when she enters flight school, as she faces doubts from both her squad and instructors alike that she will turn and run like her father. Spensa's determined to prove them wrong and try and be the best pilot she can be in her fight against the Krell. But as Spensa starts her training, she begins to suspect that there is more to her battle with Krell than what she has been told, and that there is more to her fathers' defection than meets the eye. Will she be able to find out what is really going on, assuming she survives combat?
As far as characters go, Spensa is a standout because she is written well with balance to her personality. Many times, in YA, main characters seem to be almost too perfect. They can do no wrong and succeed at seemingly every challenge they face. Sanderson, however, writes Spensa as to take her strengths and turns them up a notch so that they become weaknesses. Spensa has a certain intensity in her desire to become a pilot and over confidence at wanting to fly. One can see her goal of becoming a pilot as someone being proactive, but many times, it causes Spensa to come into conflict with her teammates and instructor, which often gets her into trouble. At the beginning of the story, her confidence is to the point where she feels she knows more than her teachers, but she quickly finds out that she has a lot to learn and can be very naive when she takes her book learning and puts it in context of the real world. Over the course of the novel, she learns to temper these two flaws, making for a convincing character arc by the end of the book. She is one of my favorite characters in the novel and may just become one of my favorites in all of YA fiction.

Sanderson also writes the motivations of the main antagonists well. There are a few people who seem to be against Spensa becoming a pilot, and yet, by the end of the book, all their motivations become clear and are understandable, given what we know about them. Compared to books of the last few years, where villains must be either completely evil, with no redeeming qualities, or someone who's actions are completely justified, I think this is a nice compromise. We the reader see why they took the actions that they did, and can understand them, even if we still support Spensa in the end.

The world building is also on point, as one can expect from Sanderson. His stories have a knack for keeping all forms of power/weapons on balance with one another, so that no one has complete dominance over the other. That is on display here, and it makes for good action. Sanderson also writes with just the right amount of pacing so that, for the most part, everything moves well, and no one scene outstays its welcome.

As for the negatives, there are a few I need to mention. One would be how many themes are brought up, but are never properly addressed. The only two that are given any real attention are the views on cowardice and the idea of being defiant in a militaristic society. Other themes are brought up only once or twice in the novel, and then never seen again. Themes like the effect of the military being a priority in a society, and children being placed in roles of authority and being asked to kill at such a young age are brought up only once and ignored the rest of the time. These themes are good ones to explore, and yet are never given proper screen time (page time?), which is a shame, considering the impact they can have on the teenage reader.

Then there are other elements that I know Brandon Sanderson had to include because this is a book for the YA genre. One is the budding romance between Spensa and another character. While I won't expand on it here for spoiler's sake, I'll only say that it does not seem to make sense given what we have seen from their interactions together. Also, the ending seemed to wrap up a little too nicely, as though it was planned with many Dues ex Machinas in mind, with of course, Spensa leading the charge in the final battle. These attributes of the YA genre, or YA-isms as I like to call them, do not really detract from the book, I just expected more from such an accomplished writer.

Still, as far as Brandon Sanderson goes, this book was a pleasant surprise for me. While I would be hesitant to say that he is my favorite author, like so many people seem to claim, I will say that I am excited to see where this series goes, and I am eager to see how Spensa continues her journey to the stars. I give it a four out of five.

Had me hopping around!

For Stormlight fans: this YA, soft sci-fi book reminded me heavily—in the best ways possible—of the Shattered Plains scenes from The Way of Kings, except with Starfighters instead of ladders and shards, Krell instead of Parshmen, Acclivity rings instead of gemhearts, and Spensa instead of Kaladin. Further comparisons could spoil the story, for example... M-Bot is Syl, and Spensa's growing magical bond with M-Bot unlocks some important superpowers for the sequel..

It was also reminiscent of Ender's Game and Armada but, in many ways, more fun and gripping than either.

Sanderson is a masterful writer, and it shines though every word in this book.
I could reiterate thoughts others have expressed - you need some time to warm up to Spensa (but when you do, you can't help but love her), M-bot is fantastic, Cobb is wonderful, the entire Skyward Flight is full of nuanced and complicated characters who I all loved and cried for. I can't wait to see more of Jorgen particularly, I think there's some good setup there for some fantastic character development. I'm also super excited to see what Rig/the DDF can do to help upgrade their ships with the tech M-bot has.
I can't wait to see more of this world.

Review originally posted on A Reading Brit

In love with this. Truly, completely in love with it. My favourite read of the year so far. I was super excited to start the next one, more than willing to go out and buy it directly after finishing the first. When I discovered it wasn't out yet, I was devastated. I didn't realise that Skyward was so recently published, so just assumed the next one would be out, and wasn't emotionally prepared for it not to be.

The Characters

Spensa – Our glorious main character. She's got great depth, with details of her life revealed expertly by Sanderson. Everything she says and does has a clear motivation and her backstory perfectly suits who she is and what she does throughout. Despite the fact this is a sci-fi, where nothing should really be relatable, I could totally understand why she acted the way she did and why she was angry at the world. I felt really sorry and angry for her at first and then ended up cheering her on as the story progressed. At one point, I actually physically punched the air in celebration because apparently this book really got to me.

Cobb – Cobb is the best instructor going. He's different to the rest of the instructors and seemed to genuinely care for his cadets. His backstory, again, was expertly woven in and, as the reader, we can understand why he does what he does.

M-Bot – I don't know where to start with this. Honestly, you've got read this to understand M-Bot, who he is and why he's so freaking fabulous.

Jorgen – His arc here from jerkface (Spensa's words, not mine) to a loveable character is great. It doesn't happen overnight (well, I read the book overnight!), and I went from hating him to rooting for him.

I won't mention anymore characters, but they were all so fantastic, unique and worthy that I could easily mention every single character, where normally I'd only feature the main few. I mean, I feel like I need to mention Doomslug, at least. If you read Skyward, you'll know what I mean.

The World

The world! Where do I even start? The world this takes place on is Detritus, which is a fantastic name for this planet. The descriptions we get throughout this novel makes it sound like a hard, but rewarding place to live. The sci-fi elements aren't heavy at all, there's no difficult scientific sounding descriptions, so I'd say this would be a decent novel to start with if you're interested in sci-fi but don't want anything too heavy. The world felt so real as I was reading it. I could truly imagine the falling debris and the hell that could follow them.

Overall, I'd say Brandon Sanderson is going to be a new favourite for me. In the time between finishing Skyward and finishing this review I've also read Mistborn, which I also really enjoyed (you may except a review at some point!).

Would I read it again? Yeah, I'll read this before the next one comes out. I can also see this being a comfort read for me. You know, one of those books you go back to if you're in a slump or if you want something good to read.

Will I be picking up the next in the series? Hell yes!

Would I recommend it? 100% absolutely without a shadow of a doubt yes.

Is it going on my favourites shelf? See above! My love for this book is way more than I ever expected it to be. I need more people to read it so I can shout about it with them!

This was a frustrating read due to a stupid main character who has trouble controlling her mouth and her temper. She's also a judgmental little hypocrite, too – constantly whining about how people judge her and call her a coward just because of her father, and then she goes and does the EXACT SAME THING to pretty much EVERYONE she meets.

i was gonna give this one star but m-bot deserves more than that

That. Freaking. Ending.

Are you serious??

I need the next book. NOW. I need answers and I don't want to wait to have the complete series.

Spensa is incredibly written. Sanderson captures her emotions so well, and I almost felt what she did the whole way through. The plot was exciting, and I cannot wait to read the sequel.

Abandoned at 20%.

I am sorry to say this, but the story did not catch my interest at all. I just found it very plain.

Sanderson is one of those authors that rarely puts a foot wrong for me. Skyward is his take on SciFi and it knocks it out the park again.

The world of Skyward is an intriguing one - humanity is trapped on a planet that isn't Earth continuously fighting against the Krell, an ambiguous alien race. An elite group of fighter pilots combat this threat, fighting an attritional battle that they are losing. Spensa, our main protagonist is the daughter of a disgraced pilot, but longs to follow in his footsteps into the sky.

The main bulk of the story is a coming of age tale of Spensa training to become a pilot and the obstacles she has to overcome to get there. At the same time there are some brilliant allusions to something more going on - how did her father end up disgraced, what happened and how did humanity end up in this war?

Sanderson has a wonderful easy reading prose that is so comfortable to relax into. His world building and character work is second to none. This particular work sits on an intriguing boundary between YA and adult SciFi, yet works brilliantly well as both. A stellar read and I look forward to continuing the series!

“I shall hunt your firstborn children and laugh with glee as I tell them of your death in terrible detail, with many unpleasant adjectives. “4 stars because the beginning had too much arguing going on between teammates and as realistic as that was, I always like it better when characters get along and have each other's back. (Nyxia book 1 did the same thing and then we got better team interactions in book 2 which was 5 stars).Parts 4 and 5 were really good and gave me more heart-to-heart between the team.- Favorite character: M-bot! Spoiler Broken-down AI's are always the best! - Least favorite: Ironsides (pffffffft!) How petty can you be towards a teenager?- Initially-didn't-like-but-grew-on-me: Jerkface :D- Too pure for this world: Kimmalyn!- Favorite piece of tech: Spin's lightlineThis was a very engaging book from start to finish. The characters weren't cliched and did things in a very human manner. Spensa was very well written and showed more emotions than expected in the beginning. Also, I laughed out loud every time she stood on a chair to gain height advantage over the person she was arguing with 😂The whole intrigue surrounding the aliens, the defect and M-Bot was nicely done. M-Bot alone took this book from 50 to 100! SpoilerSo M-Bot was like Nightblood (from [b:Warbreaker 7969594 Warbreaker (Warbreaker, #1) Brandon Sanderson https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1414766180s/7969594.jpg 1257385]) but in a sci-fi setting and more sass and craziness.

Very YA, but a fun and engaging story. I definitely want to read (well, listen to) the next one.

I very much wanted to like this story. The artwork is well done, and the narrative is inviting and interesting. But, I could not get past the impossibilities behind the science. That might just be me. If they would have addressed any of the science things: oceans, oxygen, plants, animals, anything it would have been a better story for me.

This book is amazing! I love this world! I know it's only February but I have no doubts that Skyward is going to be my TOP favorite of 2020.

This was lovely! The fun of Star Wars with the excitement of Hunger Games.

Sanderson but simplified and Sci Fi

Initial impressions of Sanderson's first foray into Sci Fi were that it felt quite simplistic and most certainly written for a younger audience. However, this played into a very positive aspect as it allowed the book to be read quickly and flow smoothly.

This book has arguably my favourite character in any book, ever. I've never read dialogue and had to stifle an audible laugh. The character brought constant joy and really shows Sanderson's personality.

Finally, the story constantly gives you little snippets to keep you reading and the finale is fantastic, if not a little rushed. I really felt like this could be a phenomenal 2.5hr movie. It would make a phenomenal Sci Fi version of Hunger Games - powerful female lead, “chosen one” vibes, a great political intrigue and the same audience. Definitely read!

4 to 4.5 stars. Sanderson does it again and reinforces my impression of him as one of the most consistently solid writers around. I started off this book a little nervous honestly and kinda wasn't completely feeling the book until about 25-30% in. I ended off very much satisfied and probably going to pick up the next one.

I guess relative to Sanderson's other works, Skyward might be considered a YA in that it has teenage protagonists and has a bit more action and less political maneuvering as in his adult fantasy novels. But as you might expect, there are none of the tired old YA tropes here. I spent a lot of the book trying to predict what was going to happen and I thought I had the book in several instances, but Sanderson somehow finds a way to subvert my expectations and give the plot a twist I didn't see coming. The only one development I guessed correctly was thinking that Spensa was going to eventually eject in some dire situation, have her plane wrecked, and then eventually fly in on M-Bot to save the day in some epic final battle, but there were at least ten more tropes that I had guessed but didn't happen.

Our main protagonist Spensa had a really good character arc. She was almost insufferable at the beginning with her blustering naivete, even though I suppose she had somewhat good reason. She did eventually develop as a character after her experiences in the book and grew pretty tolerable by the end. My favourite character is probably Cobb, but only after M-Bot and Doomslug. (I also wonder if M-Bot is a call to Martha Wells's Murderbot, or if it was just a huge coincidence?) I also liked that Ironsides was morally gray at best.

The world was pretty realistic overall. It is 100% believable that humankind would find a way to continually stratify their society into the more and less privileged (and geographically so in this one) no matter how much of a pickle they end up in, and that the more privileged ones would always find a way to make situations balance in their favour. What I found the most bizarre about this world is their obsession with cowardice. Even from the very beginning, I thought it odd that they labeled Spensa's father a “coward”. Sure, you could conceivably label a deserter as a coward, but it was just so odd that everyone was so hung up about that, and showed the same treatment to Spensa. I guess it might be because the society was such a militaristic one, but I just couldn't get past it. And to for some instructors/pilots to view the act of ejecting oneself from a plane when it's beyond salvaging as cowardice?! That's just wild to me.

Thoughts on the ending: Can we say deus ex M-Bot?! There were some tropey parts about the ending but it was written so satisfactorily that overall I'm not even mad. I kept imagining the ending of the movie Independence Day, where the small lone ship flies into the mothership to prevent it from destroying Earth. It kinda felt like that was going to happen when Spensa was about to dive into the lifebuster but I guess not. I liked the answers we got and while it still raised more questions so that the rest of the series can go on, I didn't feel like we were just left on one big cliffhanger, or like this was just one half of a full book. I'm glad it didn't happen that the Krell were the original inhabitants of Detritus and that the humans were the invaders. I've just recently read a book where that happened and I would not have been pleased if that had been repeated here. I'm glad also that we did find out what happened to Spensa's father, but also that we have more to explore re: Spensa's “defect”. I'm guessing it's some kind of weird telepathic connection but I doubt that it stops at the Krell, it's probably much bigger than that.

This book was amazing! It was really fast-paced, the story sucked you in immediately and it was action packed. I loved it. Can't wait to read book two!

Overview: A good old fashioned adventure story with good morals, action sequences and teamwork. Suitable for adults from ages 10ish to 2000.

On 1st Reading: An SF adventure that is seriously hard to put down. This book focuses on the struggles of one character yet feels like it is laying the groundwork for a much more epic adventure. I am glad it took me a while to get round to reading this book because I so want to get my hands on the sequel when it comes out later this month.

On 2nd Reading: OK this is fun. That's pretty much all I need to say, but really Mr Sanderson packs it with an intriguing mystery, likable characters (especially M-Bot!) great humour (mushrooms!) and a way of writing action sequences that pull you right in. A really good read.

On 3rd Reading Still good :-)

3.5 to 4ish. Spensa in the beginning was downright insufferable and while I understand that was part of her character it forced an unenjoyable reading experience. Spensa does grow up a bit and open more towards the last 100 pgs or so and becoming down to earth. I'm interested in the sequel and I hope for more character development from Spensa.

2023 Update:
This book is absolutely fantastic! I am not even a sci-fi nerd and I still loved it so much.
With the final book coming up soon, I'm curious about how it will end.


Original Review:
Without a doubt my favorite Sci-Fi to date. Brandon Sanderson is just a gifted author. For an author who has so far written dystopian/crime/high fantasy, to come up with such an amazing science fiction is just unbelievable.
If he were to write contemporary/chick-lit tomorrow, I know I would read it and love it.

Cannot wait for the next book.

I wasn't feeling this until about half-way through, but that's par for the course with me and Sanderson. Definitely in the middle ground for YA - teen goes to school and in the process overcomes past demons and grows up, but without the requisite romance which was SO REFRESHING. I will definitely be comfortable with my almost-teen reader reading this one.