Tuesday, March 9, 2021

SciFI/Fantasy Book Review: The Sound of Stars by Alechia Dow

 




The Sound of Stars is a YA SciFi novel by author Alechia Dow.  It features a number of classic YA tropes - you have two protagonists of opposite genders (although there is a bunch of LGBTQ rep) from very different backgrounds who begin to fall in love, with the story being told mostly from their alternating points of view. You even have the two characters having a love of different media and experiencing their love and adventures through that media - books and songs here - to go along with a story of alien invasion.  

But The Sound of Stars differs from the standard formula in a key way - our heroine is a black teen from New York, who has faced racism and oppression and seen all the horrors of modern America even before her life was upended by alien invaders.  As such, her views and actions are colored by these experiences, with as much fears and doubts about humanity as about the aliens...and about the place for her in any future, regardless of whether humanity is able to come back.  It's hardly subtle - and the book's plot kind of just ends when the character journey does, which is a bit off-putting - but it mostly works and is well worth your time.  

Note: I read this book as an audiobook.  The two readers - a male for the male protag's chapters and a female for the female protag - are fine although their voices for the same characters don't really match well.  Still the book features a number of passages that are supposed to be songs sung by the characters and the audio-readers (nearly always the male reader) treats them like spoken word poetry and it really doesn't work - so I'd recommend reading this in print.  

Also as I read this in audiobook if I misspell any names/concepts, that's why.  

----------------------------------------------------Plot Summary-------------------------------------------------
When the Ilori first came to Earth, humanity was slow to react....but when they did, they reacted with weapons and war.  But the alien Ilori were too much, and now, most of the Earth is under their control, restricted by strict rules that prevent outbursts of emotion, with all their art - books, music, shows - taken away.  

Janelle "Ellie" Baker was a teen in Manhattan when the Ilori came two years ago.  Now she lives with the people of her building in fear, for two violations of the rules will result in execution.  Ellie is used to the fear - being a black girl in a racist rich New York building makes it somewhat familiar.  But despite the fear, despite what has happened to her parents, Ellie defies the Ilori by running a small library and lending out books in defiance of the Ilori's rules.  If Ellie is caught, it'll be two violations immediately and certain death.  

So the Ilori who stumbles upon her library isn't just any Ilori.  M0Rr1S is a lab-made Ilori from an elite family who is supposed to be developing the vaccine to remove human feeling and resistance.  But M0Rr1S - or Morris - resents being cast as inferior by the "True Ilori" and has a love of human music, and dreams of a world where showing emotion would be not just allowed, but normal.  And so Morris' discovery of Ellie only makes him curious and awaken him thoughts like he could never have imagined.  

And when the final steps of the Ilori plan for Earth start to come to fruition, Morris and Ellie find themselves together on the run for their lives.  But their journey and their connection will change the course of history for both humans and Ilori....and will change their own paths, forever.....
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As I mentioned above the jump, the setup of The Sound of Stars is one that will be familiar to YA fans.  You have dueling alternating narrators who are clearly destined for a relationship, from very different backgrounds - Morris as an alien, while Ellie as a human - that nonetheless share a surprising amount of similarities.  You have the two characters sharing a love of various forms of media - Ellie books, Morris music - with quotes and references to them along the way as such media leads the two into a deeper relationship.  And all of that works really well, as much as most books with these frameworks.

But what really elevates The Sound of Stars is how it deals with Ellie's experiences as a black girl growing up in America, and how that colors her view.  How Ellie feels as a result almost as terrified of humans as the aliens, for she knows what fear and hatred can drive people to do, and how it amplifies her anxiety disorder (well her hyperthyroidism) and almost makes her wonder if humanity really is worth saving.  When Ellie runs into a group of human rebels and notices that they are all White, and led by military-gear-wearing white men, it's as scary as any of her prior encounters with the Ilori...and the Ilori other than Morris are often incredibly horrifying!  Dow uses Ellie's experiences as a black girl to tell a story about prejudice and the terror it causes - and makes a key part of this story Ellie learning that despite it all there's still reason to hope for a better future...and to fight for that future.  The book is absolutely NOT subtle about all of this: drawing comparisons to how Morris' own people are oppressed to citing by name the many many victims of police brutality in this country in a manner that might make some readers wonder if those names would really be so on Ellie's mind after two years of alien conquest....and yet it absolutely works and resonates as a result. 

That said, while this theme works really well, and the characters of Ellie and Morris are well done, the plot can be a bit hit or miss with how it works out.  Multiple times the characters find themselves in trouble with either alien or human factions, and they basically manage to get out of these trouble sequence with what seems like laughable efforts.  One of the final twists, involving the one band repeatedly cited who is fictional instead of a real life one, is so obvious you'll be expecting it to come into play almost immediately, and the other final twist just kind of comes from nowhere.  And if you're looking for an ending that will wrap up the plot - you won't get that here (and there doesn't seem to be a sequel planned as far as I can tell)?  

One other negative is the book features the Alien's medical experimentation on humans being referred to as the development of a "vaccine", which I don't think is arguably the right use of that word and even if it does work, is probably a word choice one wouldn't make now in 2021 post-COVID.  

But while the plot sequences aren't wrapped up in this book, what is wrapped up is Ellie and Morris' character journeys, and those journeys and sequences of character development work really really well.  And so the ending works decently well enough despite all that's left open.  I should add for those seeking LGBTQ representation, that there's plenty here: Ellis is demi, her best friend is bi, and we have multiple non-binary characters - although I think all are aliens?  Oddly while Racism is very much a subject of this book homophobia/transphobia is not....but honestly, I think the book works better for it, as it really doesn't need to add that to get its point across, and the addition might've just made things too dark.  

So yeah, as a YA book, The Sound of Stars works pretty well and I would recommend - strong characters, excellent themes of the terrors of racism and irrational hatred, and a solid setting of alien invasion.  

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