Heart of Iron (Heart of Iron #1)

I didn’t think I was going to like this book – sci-fy isn’t really my genre of choice – but the back cover blurb just sounded so freaking good, even with the whole being in love with a robot thing. I mean, come on, space outlaws are pretty much space pirates, and pirates are cool. I’m not a Star Wars fan, tech/mecha kind of bores me, and robots have creeped me out since Sky-Net, so I really thought it was going to be a pass. I downloaded a sample, because trying never hurt anybody, and I was pretty much sold from page three. I really loved this book. It was different without being too different, we have a whole Anastasia element thrown in, on top of a cool-as-hell ship Captain with fiber glow hair, a boy looking for his father and finding a little bit more than he bargained for, a sarcastic pilot with secrets of his own, a “Metal” who seems pretty human from the get-go, a prohpecy, a big bad…I mean, really this book kind of has everything. (Spoiler-ish) I was a little thrown at first that a human girl was all in love with a robot. It’s kind of weird, however way you spin it. But the author did a really incredible job of making it not that weird once you get to know the characters, and the plot, a bit more. (End spoiler-y part) Anyway, if this review is disjointed – and it might be – here’s the gist: it’s a good book that’s definitely worth the read. I’m looking forward to reading the sequel. Oh, it doesn’t really end on a cliffhanger, so much as “here’s the end of part 1.”

My expectations were insanely high for this book: I mean, Anastasia in Space! Robots! Rebels! Rogues! I\’m a sucker for space stories and I need some good pirates in my life, so I was stoked beyond belief when I heard about this book. Instant preorder. So I would take this review with a grain of salt, since I might be a little overly critical. The worldbuilding in the book was phenomenal. I loved the solar system where the adventure takes place, the religion the author created, the political tension. I loved how the author took the familiar narrative of Anastasia\’s story and wove it into the fabric of space. However, this worked also against the author, because some of the twists were seen miles, and I mean miles, ahead. Even in the blurb you can work some details out. It also means if you can figure out who the supporting characters represent, you can figure out the villains ahead of time, too. Which is not to say that the author didn\’t have any tricks up her sleeves! She still manages to surprise the reader throughout the book. The true strength was in the characters themselves: into Ana, the brilliant rebel, who I want more than anything to know IRL. Or Jax, my absolute favorite character, who I need to read more of right now. Everything about his race, the Solani, made my heart soar. And the imagery used is stunning! Though perhaps a little overused – so much swearing on Iron and Stars, y\’all – but it\’s so gosh darn gorgeous. There are lines upon lines I want to highlight and remember forever, or even paint on my wall. All in all, while the plot is mildly predictable, the characters are loveable and the ending will leave you gutted. I can\’t wait to learn more about the metals and to see Ana fight for a cause. This is only the beginning of what\’s going to be a formidable series!

3.5 stars This book probably would’ve gotten a higher rating if I wasn’t so sick & tired of books about royalty. Especially YA SF about royalty. When I was actually reading this book, I was totally into it. Seriously, it’s a book that seems written for me with so many of my own favorite tropes used in it. First of all, any book with a human-android romance will prolly win me over. And then the secondary POV characters have a alien-human m/m romance where touching is problematic?! Hello, did *I* write this book? Some of my fave tropes are also spoilery, so I’ll leave them for you to discover. And it’s cool that it’s a reimagining of the Anastasia story. But every time I put the book down, I had to convince myself to pick it back up. The YA SFF shelves are inundated with books about royalty, & I’m just…exhausted by them. So many themes get shared between those books, making me wonder: do I really want to dive back in to the same-old, same-old? It’s kinda a sad thing & maybe a future reread will change this book’s stars (that was an intended pun) when I’m not feeling so burned out on “royalty in space”. But as I read the author’s acknowledgements, I couldn’t help but feel joy on her behalf for having this book ready when “royalty in space” was what publishers were wanting. So she prolly doesn’t mind too much that this one reader is burned out on it 😉 Recommended for fans of: YA SF, royalty in space, the Anastasia story, human-android romances, human-alien romances, both straight & gay romances, romances where touching’s complicated, amnesia, brainwashing, fiber-optic hair

Ana loves the robot/AI who saved her as a child. She falls in love with him knowing that he can\’t really return her love in a substantive way. So all her actions seem reckless and stupid, on balance. When he\’s eventually programmed to kill her (SPOILER), I wasn\’t really surprised at all, in fact, I would have been more shocked had he not come after her. What is sad, to me, is the perpetual myth/legend/storyline of women, especially young and beautiful women, falling in love with someone or something that is unable to return their affections…the impossible love, as unattainable as Galitea, as Spock on Star Trek, as Data on Star Trek Next Gen, as the holographic doctor on ST Voyager, etc. Somehow writers seem to find these one-sided love affairs irresistible, while they always make me sad for the person doing the yearning, because they will always remain unfulfilled.

I loved this book, I couldn\’t put it down once I started it, yeah there was some instalove with two characters which I\’m not a huge fan of, but you know what I didn\’t actually mind because I loved the story and characters so much and oh that ending, can\’t wait for the next book.

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