Review: Illuminae

Illuminae by Amie Kaufman
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Illuminae has a pretty solid concept going in. The overarching plot is decent for the most part, tightly scripted and with a few cool scenes (especially the after-action reports).

I don’t want to rate it below 3 stars because the book doesn’t do anything ‘wrong’ per se. The writing is easy and inoffensive. The pacing is okay. The twists are well-intentioned if a little flat. The problem is that it’s a sublimely disappointing read at times.

A lot of epistolary fiction falls into the same trap this book falls into. Epistolary books use letters and diary entries and e-mails and transcripts, but it’s hard to tell a story through those. So, sometimes, they will invent their own forms of real-world communication which can be used as a stand-in for narration. Sometimes, the letters and transcripts feel a far cry from the real thing because they are chock full of information the writer wants to give the readers. It’s unnatural. It breaks the illusion.

The first part of Illuminae maintains the illusion. Then, it rapidly degrades as we get more and more sections that are just...narrated, with a thin veneer of the epistolary. I did not like that.

The twists at the end do disservice to the book. They are unnecessary and make the large world of the book feel significantly smaller and less interesting. Turns out, the universe of the book only is way smaller than we thought. That isn’t a good thing.

The writing is very YA, though that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The problem is, it doesn’t quite work with the format. That said, it did lend to some interesting bits.

Also, there’s this weird thing the book does where it sets up rules for its AI and then breaks those rules without really explaining why those rules could be broken? I mean, it set those rules without any necessity only to break them a few chapters in. That was strange.

All in all, the format is strong. The plot and characters are okay. If you want to read it, you can have a perfectly serviceable few hours doing so. Just don’t expect too much satisfaction or joy. It’s not that kind of book.

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