Avalon by Mindee Arnett Blog Tour

Avalon

Author: Mindee Arnett
Publisher: Balzer + Bray
Publication Date: January 21, 2014

Synopsis:

A ragtag group of teenage mercenaries who crew the spaceship Avalon stumble upon a conspiracy that could threaten the entire galaxy in this fascinating and fast-paced sci-fi adventure from author Mindee Arnett.
Of the various star systems that make up the Confederation, most lie thousands of light-years from First Earth-and out here, no one is free. The agencies that govern the Confederation are as corrupt as the crime bosses who patrol it, and power is held by anyone with enough greed and ruthlessness to claim it. That power is derived from one thing: metatech, the devices that allow people to travel great distances faster than the speed of light.
Jeth Seagrave and his crew of teenage mercenaries have survived in this world by stealing unsecured metatech, and they're damn good at it. Jeth doesn't care about the politics or the law; all he cares about is earning enough money to buy back his parents' ship, Avalon, from his crime-boss employer and getting himself and his sister, Lizzie, the heck out of Dodge. But when Jeth finds himself in possession of information that both the crime bosses and the government are willing to kill for, he is going to have to ask himself how far he'll go to get the freedom he's wanted for so long.
Avalon is the perfect fit for teens new to sci-fi as well as seasoned sci-fi readers looking for more books in the YA space-and a great match for fans of Joss Whedon's cult hit show Firefly.

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Review

There are a lot of reasons I shouldn’t have liked Avalon. I’m not really in to space-y stuff. I mean, I like Doctor Who but I wouldn’t exactly call the Tardis a spaceship. I prefer character driven novels over action, and Avalon has a lot of action. And I usually hate it when each character’s are not given a separate distinct personality. But for some reason Avalon and I clicked and I found myself really enjoying the story.

Avalon follows a group of teens who are mercenaries for a space crime boss, Hammer. Jeth, the main character, lost his parents and through a series of bad events Hammer comes to own Jeth’s parents ship, Avalon. After a botched job Hammer asks the crew to go and retrieve a ship from basically the Bermuda Triangle of space and offers them enough money to finally own Avalon. Except, this deal is too good to be true.

Jeth was a likeable character. He is the leader and I liked seeing how the other characters deferred to him. It was also interesting to see how he made decisions during tough situations and riddled out the motives of those around him. I especially enjoyed the relationship between Jeth and his sister Lizzie.

My one gripe with the story was that because this was kind of a rag-tag group there were quite a few characters and some of them got lost in the shuffle. A few of the characters were never given solid personalities and only made appearances when it was necessary to the story. There were two I kept getting confused and honestly they were interchangeable in my opinion. I hope as the series continues these characters are further fleshed out and given their time to shine.

Much of Avalon was action based. There was always something new going or some kind of plot twist thrown at the crew. It was a very different read from my usual thing. I usually love character driven books but all of the action of Avalon made up for the lack of character development and by the end I couldn’t wait to see what Arnett was going to throw at the crew next.

Overall, while Avalon isn’t my usual thing I ended up really enjoying the story. It was exciting, different, and I think it has a lot of crossover appeal for both male and female readers. It will also appeal to readers, who like me, don’t often enjoy space-y things.

About the Author

Mindee Arnett lives on a horse farm in Ohio with her husband, two kids, a couple of dogs, and an inappropriate number of cats. She’s addicted to jumping horses and telling tales of magic, the macabre, and outer space. She has far more dreams than nightmares.

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Avalon by Mindee Arnett Blog Tour