Izzie: Hello and welcome to “Live the Cute Life”. I’m Izzie.
Coco: And I’m Coco.
Izzie: Today, we will do another book review.
Coco: We will be talking about “Grimspace” by Ann Aguirre. So what is this book about?
Izzie: Before that, I’m really glad we’re doing another Ann Aguirre book review.
Coco: Me too because I felt really bad – “Blue Diablo” I really didn’t like that book so I’m glad to read a book that I really, really liked by the same author.
Izzie: Yes. This is the first book that I read of hers and it’s a sci-fi. It’s in the science fiction genre.
Coco: What is this book about? It’s a sci-fi book and there’s this girl called Sirantha Jax that has a gene that helps spaceships travel at the speed of light. They call that “jumping” in the book. When the spaceship is traveling at that speed and they’re in a sort of wormhole, they call that “Grimspace”.
Izzie: Hence, that’s the name of the book.
Coco: It starts with Sirantha Jax, the main character, in a psych ward because she was in a crash of a spaceship. The spaceship was headed to a summit with all these politicians and Sirantha was the navigator and the only survivor of the crash. She’s in this prison and this guy called March shows up and busts her out of prison.
The reason he busted her out is that he’s been hired by these people who want to open a competing jumping company. Right now a corporation has a monopoly in jumping. So that’s what the book is about.
Izzie: That’s a lot of world-building, a lot of politics in this one.
Coco: So you liked it?
Izzie: Disclaimer – it’s been years since I read this book. Coco just read it so that’s why we’re going over it. I remember liking it a lot. How was the romance? Was there a lot of romance in this one?
Coco: There is actually romance in this one.
Coco: I really like this book. I thought if I had not read “Fortune’s Pawn” before reading this one, I would have loved this book. But after reading the “Fortune’s Pawn” and then reading “Grimspace”, I’m like “This is a really good book but it’s not awesome like Fortune’s Pawn.”
The main problem I had with this book was the whole – what was motivating characters to do things.
Like March has been hired by this clan to bust this girl out of prison. And all these people that are in that operation signed up for the mission knowing that they’re going to die trying to get this girl out of the thing.
You think like “Oh” like when people are signing up for mission like that, there’s going to be a noble cause or something like that. And then “No, we just want to open the competition,” because these people have monopoly.
I know that there’s going to be other – like positive repercussions in the world – but they didn’t really get into it as like that what they were doing, it was something noble or something good.
Izzie: You know what? I think that gets develop more in the second and third book, if I’m not mistaken. Because I remember it becomes more of a noble cause, if I’m not mistaken.
Coco: Because so many people die in this book and I’m like “For what?”
Izzie: For like business like commerce.
Coco: Yeah. I know they were bad. The competition was bad and they’re doing these bad things and they crashed the ship on purpose and they’re killing people and everything.
But still it wasn’t like this – a horrible evil that they were fighting and all these people – they weren’t trying to take down the corporation. They were just trying to set up a competition. It was the weirdest thing.
And then at the very end, this one character hasn’t been in the whole book, shows up for one second. He’s like “Did you ever think why they crashed their ship?” Which is like “Oh no, I didn’t.”
And then in like one second, he puts together this film and broadcast it to the world and now everyone’s like “Yeah, screw the corporation and overthrows them.” I was like “Aaah,” that was the weakness.
But on the other side, she was a kickass character. It was really cool how they describe when they’re in hyperspace and jumping and all that stuff. What I like the most was the relationship between her and March.
Do you remember that he can read her thoughts?
Izzie: No, I didn’t remember that.
Coco: That was awesome. Because she keeps thinking barbs at him and he can read her mind so he keeps glaring at her.
Izzie: I did like how with their relationship starts because they hate each other. I usually like that.
Coco: And then there is like something very intimate between the pilot because the navigator can get into the Grimspace but the pilot is the one that takes the ship to where it’s supposed to go.
There’s like an intimate relationship when they’re in there and they end up falling in love. It’s actually really cute how they end up together and the relationship when they get together is still cute.
Sometimes when the main characters finally get together, it’s kind of like –
Izzie: Ambivalent.
Coco: Yeah. But it was cute so I liked it.
Izzie: I wish you’d read it before “Fortune’s Pawn” because it was really good on its own.
I remember really liking it, reading the second one. I think I didn’t get to the third one.
Coco: Okay. Well that’s another thing I enjoyed the first Grimspace book. But I don’t have that thing with “Fortune’s Pawn” that I was like “Oh my god, what happens next? What happens next?” And I read all three books one-after-the-other. With Grimspace after book one I feel like I’m done.
Izzie: It was good. It was really good.
Coco: I recommend that if you haven’t read it, check out Grimspace. It’s a great book by Ann Aguirre.
Izzie: How many stars would you give it?
Coco: Three and a half, almost four.
Izzie: Yeah, that’s what I would give it as well. And I really like her covers, her covers of Grimspace?
Coco: Yeah, they’re cool.
Izzie: I like them.
Coco: Thank you for hanging out with us. Please subscribe to our YouTube channel and please leave comments below, see if you like them as much as we did.
Izzie: Chao. See you around.