Format: Paperback, 350 pages
Release Date: March 19, 2019
Publisher: Ink Monster
Source: Edelweiss/Publisher
Genre: Young Adult / Science Fiction
Maité Martinez has always yearned for more than waitressing in a greasy diner, especially when most people have left the polluted ruins of Earth behind for a better life on other planets. It’s not just working at the diner that’s making life hard for her. Being a half-human, half-alien girl has never been trickier. With the corporate government hunting down the last of her father’s alien Auanare race living on Earth, hiding her growing special abilities has become a full-time job on its own.
Every minute Maité stays on Earth is one minute closer to getting caught. The stress is almost more than she can bear, and when a fancy Space Tech officer gets handsy with her at the diner, she reacts without thinking.
Breaking the officer’s nose wasn’t her smartest move. Now she’s faced with three years forced labor on the volcano planet, Abbadon. With the job she’s slotted for, it may as well have been a death sentence.
It doesn’t take Maité long before she realizes there’s more to the mining on Abbadon than Space Tech has let on. As she makes unlikely allies, Maité uncovers Space Tech’s plot to nuke the Aunare homeworld. The firepower stored in Abbadon’s warehouses is more than enough to do the job ten times over.
As the clock ticks, Maité knows that if she can’t find a way to stop Space Tech, there will be an interstellar war big enough to end all life in the universe. There’s only one question: Can she stop the total annihilation of humanity without getting herself killed in the process?
Off Planet, by author Aileen Erin, is the first installment in the authors Aunare Chronicles. 19-year old Maité Martinez lives in a reality that makes her very existence, the daughter of a Human mother and an Aunare Man who is second in line to the Aunare King, dangerous to her health. In fact, it could get her killed on sight if the truth ever gets out. But, what's even worse, is that if she is caught, it could lead to a war between Earth and Aunare that will likely see no victors when all is said and done.
For over 10 years, Maité and her mother Elizabeth have been on the run staying in the shadows, changing their names, living in poverty, and worrying that they are one wrong step from being captured by SpaceTech. The same SpaceTech that killed off every single Aunare living on the planet on a day that is being called Liberation Night. SpaceTech
controls all of the Earth's governments as well as numerous colonies
across the galaxy. Instead of making things better, they have created a
world of too much violence, too much corruption, and too much poverty.
While Maité is trying to keep her cover from being blown in Albuquerque, she also teaches martial arts, waitresses at the same cafe as her mother, and is a member of the ABQ gang. She's changed her name so many times, that she sometimes gets confused as to who she really is and why so many people are after her.There are very few people who know of Maite's secrets. One of those people is Roan who is like her brother and best friend rolled into one person. Roan knows that Maité and her mother are high value targets that SpaceTech has offered a very large bounty for information that leads to their capture. But, he values trust over a large reward.
One night while waitressing at her greasy cafe, a customer gets grabby hands with her which triggers an immediate and bloody reaction. Covered in blood, with Roan as her only support, Maité runs without her mother. She is soon arrested and sentenced to a year on Abaddon, the dung heap of the galaxy. Abaddon is literally hell (volcano planet) for those who are sent there. But, it is Maité who ends up getting the worst of the treatment as she is forced to work in over 100 degree heat. Maité knows that she walked into a trap specifically designed for her.
She is a pawn in a much larger game that will lead to war between Earth and Aunare if she just happens to die on the planet doing a job that only bots are supposed to do. She has to figure out a way to prevent a war while also making some new friends and allies including Audrey, Sebastian, Ahiga, and Tyler who watch as Maité fights and struggles for survival every day without complaining. She has to deal with hostile work environments, sabotage, and those who won't shed a tear if she dies.
I have to say that this story was petty damn good. It was better than I expected. That is until the end when the momentum got lost and the story switched to a Planet that she doesn't remember, a name that she hasn't been called in over 10 years, and a father who is a stranger to her. In the beginning, and for much of the book, Maité is a character who you can easily root for. Maité
is also prone to making mistakes. Mistakes
due to her lack of control, or the fact that she is tired of hiding and
running.
From her sham of a trial that gets her sent to Abaddon, to her meeting Declan and Ahiga, both who work for SpaceTech, the setting is set for some pretty twisted scenes. Then we meet Audrey and Santiago and Tyler who look at what is happening to Maité and understand that nothing about her situation makes any sense. Her relationship with Declan isn't one that I supported. Declan tries to help, encourages her to fight like hell to stay alive, but isn't there in a pivotal scene which sees another character make his debut.
My least favorite part of this book is the final chapters.
Maité turns into a character who I don't recognize. She now has to deal with lots and lots of things that she never had to think about when she was on the run. The question of the apparent romance angle between Declan and Lorne also must be sorted out as well as her new status as the lost heir of Aunare.
Maité turns into a character who I don't recognize. She now has to deal with lots and lots of things that she never had to think about when she was on the run. The question of the apparent romance angle between Declan and Lorne also must be sorted out as well as her new status as the lost heir of Aunare.
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