Alright sorry about that! Here is the first of two review today.
Customary warning: This is a reminder that these are my personal opinions. My thoughts and feelings are not your thoughts and feelings. I may not always be the target audience for a book; sometimes I am. If I do not like a book, that doesn’t mean you’ll dislike it. If I love a book or simply like a book, you may hate it. Take everything I say with this knowledge. If it sounds interesting to you despite what I’ve said, then go ahead and read it. You’ll only know you like something if you read it yourself.
That being said… Spoilers ahead.
The Life Below by Alexandra Monir
Synopsis From The Book
It was hard enough for Naomi to leave Leo, a fellow Final Six contestant, behind on a dying Earth. Now she doesn’t know who to trust.
The International Space Training Camp continues to dodge every question about its past failed mission, and Naomi is suspicious that not everything is as it seems on her own mission to Europa. With just one shot at Jupiter’s moon, Naomi is determined to find out if there is dangerous alien life on Europa before she and her crew get there.
Leo, back on Earth, has been working with renegade scientist Dr. Greta Wagner, who promises to fly him to space where he can dock with Naomi’s ship. And if Wagner’s hypothesis is right, it isn’t a possibility of coming in contact with extraterrestrial life on Europa—it’s a definite, and it’s up to Leo to find and warn Naomi and the crew.
With questions piling up, everything gets more dangerous the closer that the mission gets to Europa. A storm threatens to interfere with Leo’s takeoff, a deadly entity makes itself known to the Final Six, and all questions the ISTC has been avoiding about the previous mission get answered in a terrifying way.
If the dream was to establish a new world for humans on Europa…the Final Six are about to enter a nightmare.
Sci-Fi | YA- PW |Multiple Character Deaths, Betrayal, Government Corruption | Friendship, Trust and Doubt
Initial Thoughts Before Reading:
It’s been forever since i read the first one but I’m expecting this to take a small amount of time. It wasn’t a heavy read last time. I think this is the last book so let see how everything works out. With the Earth be saved?
Initial Thoughts After Reading:
Woah! So this can’t be the last book. There is no way that it can be. The end of it was clearly a set up for a third. Please let Sam stay safe. Please please please. This book was fun with all the space and alien parts that made the series even more Scifi. I had fun.
Plot Overview:
Part 1. Naomi: Naomi wakes in the morning to find that their communications have gone down. Someone sabatouged them. Flash back to 42 days before, and the crew has made it to space. Beckett is assigned leader and they disagree, but can’t change the decision. Naomi tells Sydney about the bacteria and Sydney does not believe her. Naomi cries over Leo and the fact that the space organization wants to pair them off. Sydney shows her a test, and they both panic at the results.
Leo: Leo watches Naomi leave and begins his training. Lark and Asher arrive to help him. The world learns that they are missing, and they work harder to get him out within the week. A tornado touches down and in order to avoid all being lost, Leo takes off into space and blacks out.
Part 2:
Naomi: they no longer have communications and try to figure out why. Naomi blames Beckett who says no. When they get to Mars, they find the supply they were supposed to get, it’s contaminated. An alien attacks them and Dev dies to save them.
Leo: after weeks of traveling, Leo arrives and tries to board their aircraft. He fails and is almost shot down, he attempts again and is allowed on by Naomi. The crew vote for him to stay and then they find their pilot (robot) trying to destroy Leo’s coms. The robot self destructs and they send a message to earth that they will be using their solar panels for food and demand to know who sanatoged them
Part 3:
The crew arrive on Europa and their other robot lands them in the wrong place. They land, Leo is the first out, and they set up camp, despite Leo saying not to. Minka disappears. They find out that the planet is alive and Beckett says he brought weapons to kill the life. Minka come back and leads them to the place of their drill. They escape and know they have to escape. Naomi realizes why they were all chosen. Beckett tries to blow up the life anyway and Leo stops him. Beckett is struck by the under ice life as is Leo. Leo is saved and isn’t attacked by the life but Beckett dies.
The novel ends with Sam watch a video of the survivors getting to the place they should have landed (against mission protocols). Sam is told by Dr. Takumi that it was all a test, to help learn to aid humans in adapting
What I Liked:
Leo; I liked him in the first book but I respect him so much more now. This boy was in space for multiple months, ALONE. Mad respect my goodness.
Naomi; Girl did her best to keep everyone together, and I give her props for being able to figure so much so quickly.
Progress of space; Watching the timeline as they went through space, was satisfying and not too long winded. I liked this.
Death consequence; People died. I was afraid at first that this wouldn’t happen, but it did. Not just one, but multiple people. I like the weight of that consequence.
Alien life; I liked learning about the alien life, and can’t wait to learn more about it in the next book.
What I Would Have Liked or Changed:
I don’t want the characters to die. Look, I like the weight of the consequence of space but I don’t want characters to die. It hurts me.
Rating: 4/5
Notable Quotes:
None
Still don’t have audio files. Sorry.
Marlena Marie 
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