Blog Tour - Steal the Stars By Nat Cassidy & Mac Rogers {Review & Giveaway!}
Title: Steal the Stars
Authors: Nat Cassidy & Mac Rogers
Publication Date: November 7th, 2017
Genres: Science Fiction
THE NOVEL BASED ON THE DEBUT SCIENCE FICTION PODCAST FROM TOR LABS
Dakota “Dak” Prentiss guards the biggest secret in the world.
They call it “Moss.” It’s your standard grey alien from innumerable abduction stories. Moss still sits at what looks like the controls of the spaceship it crash-landed twenty-five years ago. A secret military base was built around the crash site to study both Moss and the dangerous technology it brought to Earth.
The day Matt Salem joins her security team, Dak’s whole world changes.
It’s love at first sight—which is a problem, since they both signed ironclad contracts before joining the base security team, vowing not to fraternize with other military personnel. If they run away, they’ll be hunted for the secret they know. So Dak and Matt decide to escape to a better life on the wings of an incredibly dangerous plan: They’re going to steal the alien body they've been guarding and sell the secret of its existence.
And they can’t afford a single mistake.
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First of all, the concept of this book is more than fascinating and I feel like it's worth reading just because of its uniqueness and authenticity. Second of all, the beginning was a bit confusing which is something I wanted to mention before moving on with this review, just because it's what kept me from being completely blown away by it. It took a while for me to get used to what was going on and the writing style didn't really help. This particular narrative isn't one that I'm too fond of, generally speaking, but as the story progressed more and more, I really got into it and by the end, it wasn't such a huge problem after all.
I would also like to mention that, the book itself is based on a podcast which I would have loved to listen to before actually reading Steal the Stars because that would make the experience even more interesting and exciting but, unfortunately, that didn't happen. I cannot say whether this particular novelization is exactly the same as the novel itself or if the narrative is similar or completely different so, if you have the chance to listen to the podcast, definitely go for it!
Moving on, the story follows Dak, a very different main heroine from what we're used to in Fiction and books in general. She's all about taking action first and asking questions later, which makes her quite aggressive and very determined to achieve her purpose. She's portrayed as a flawed character who lives in this extremely flawed world and always gets her way, through manipulating and lying. She uses her authority to get out of difficult situations and even abuses the power she's given, in order to see things done her way.
She hides a lot of skeletons in her closet and I'd go as far as saying that, she's completely relatable. She's, in a sense, the perfect reflection of the society she lives in and probably, the one we're asked to live in today. Which doesn't make her a bad or evil person at all. Quite the opposite actually. She's strong, physically and mentally, practical and knows how to make the choices she has to make, no matter the consequences. Same goes for Matt. Based on how he's portrayed through Dak's eyes, he appears to be the perfect man but, he has a lot of demons to deal with on his own. Which makes their relationship very interesting to read about. Their romance was very intense and well written, as was their chemistry. It definitely felt like one of those once in a lifetime experiences that you don't come across that often in life! And they definitely delivered!
While the narrative wasn't my cup of tea, I can't deny that it was quite interesting. I'm coming back to it because I feel like it's one of the most important parts of the story and something that readers will definitely appreciate! It's the combination of the first and second POV, which I personally haven't encountered in a while. Dak is the narrator of the story and actually addresses Matt as ''you'', which is what I personally found difficult to get used to when I started reading the book. It is an intimate way of telling a story, which not a lot of authors can see through successfully.
The pacing, for me at least, was extremely slow and started picking up way after the middle of the book. I prefer fast paced stories but was very glad that the story picked up after a while. The beginning was more of an introduction which I really appreciated because it cleared some things up, but I enjoyed the fast paced part of it a bit more. As Dak and Matt's relationship develops, so does what is happening around them. We're slowly introduced to everything that makes up this very peculiar story and it's like the setting and the world develop alongside these very interesting characters!
Lastly, the ending blew me away in the best and worst way possible. It really messed with my mind and my entire being which means that, it was perfect! I'm still not sure what happened and how it happened, which is something I've never encountered before. Don't get me wrong, I'm still confused and I had to read the last chapters a couple of times to get somewhere. But it really surprised me, both in a good and a bad way, that I still need a couple of days to process everything that happened. Overall, Steal the Stars is definitely a book worth reading because of its very different way of narration and development!
Nat Cassidy is an actor, director, musician, and playwright. He has appeared on shows such as The Following (Fox), The Affair (Showtime), Red Oaks (Amazon), High Maintenance (HBO), Law & Order: SVU (NBC), as well as on stage in numerous productions and workshops both Off- and Off-Off-Broadway. Nat’s plays have been nominated for a combined total of 17 New York Innovative Theatre Awards, including 3 times for Outstanding Full-Length Script (which he won in 2009, and in 2011 for Outstanding Solo Performance for his one man show about H.P. Lovecraft). In 2012 Nat was commissioned by The Kennedy Center to write the libretto for a world-premiere opera, and in 2014 his play Any Day Now was chosen to be part of Primary Stages’ ESPADrills (The Duke Theatre, directed by Tony-nominee Moritz von Stuelpnagel). He is also thrilled to be writing the novelization of Steal the Stars, which will be published by Tor Books in November 2017.
Mac Rogers is an award-winning audio dramatist and playwright. His audio/podcasts dramas The Message and LifeAfter have been downloaded over eight million times. His stageplays include The Honeycomb Trilogy (winner of the New York Innovative Theatre Award for Outstanding Premiere Production), Frankenstein Upstairs, God of Obsidian, Ligature Marks, Asymmetric, Viral, Universal Robots, Hail Satan (Outstanding Playwriting Winner at FringeNYC 2007), and Fleet Week: The Musical (co-written with Sean Williams and Jordana Williams; winner of Outstanding Musical at FringeNYC 2005). He has earned acclaim from The New York Times, The Guardian, Backstage, The Wall Street Journal, Time Out New York, New York Post, Flavorpill, io9, Fangoria, Tor.com, Show Business Weekly, New York Press, and many others.
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{In an epic final showdown in the Texas desert – as Sierra closes in from all sides – Dak and Matt finally learn the truth about Moss.}
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