Interesting world, convincing main characterIt took me a while to engage fully with this story, and I feel the second half of the book is better than the first.

This book was a rip-roaring, Non-stop action space-opera with some real laugh out loud moments. Reminiscent of 60s Sci-fi

This was pretty interesting; the author definitely had some pretty good ideas, even if the exploration of them was a little uneven in places. I definitely enjoyed this book, but I wasn't absolutely in love with it. Still, worth the read, and I would probably recommend it!

*Disclaimer: I received this book for free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.


The perfect mix between the character development and world building of Becky Chambers' A Long Way to a Small Angry Planet and the action of Star Wars, The Stars Now Unclaimed has already solidified itself as one of my favourite books of the year.

The plot is a lot more action-based than many of the other science fiction novels that I have enjoyed but Drew Williams didn't sacrifice character or world building for action. This meant that the plot was fast-paced but I finished the book with a completely clear idea of these characters and their universe.

This may sound strange but one of the things I really enjoyed about the book was that the characters swore! When they were in danger, they reacted in a realistic way. They are all deeply flawed characters and I can't wait to learn more about them and follow their stories in the sequel.

5 out of 5 stars!

wonderful space opera! with fabulous, snarky characters, great pacing and a near perfect mix of action and calm moments. I loved the world & relationship building

I have tried to start this on numerous occasions but the formatting keeps putting me off. A shame as I have heard good things.

https://www.runalongtheshelves.net/blog/2019/4/11/the-stars-now-unclaimed-by-drew-williams

Space opera ah I love it when it feels right. For me that should be a sense of epic – giant scale and characters you want to explore the universe with. A lot of people discussing paragraphs of humourless infodumps really tends to make me sleepy. Drew Williams happily brings a very refreshing frenetic look at space opera where those two things I’m always looking for were well balanced and it is a story very hard to stop reading to find out what happens next.

Our story is set in a galaxy that was hit by a truly epic disaster. A mysterious moment known as the Pulse over a hundred years ago spread across the cosmos attacking all forms of energy. Planets were kicked downwards from super hi tech to varying degrees of rougher technology including some where feudalism has taken hold once again. It hasn’t brought the various civilizations together and instead we see factions known as sects battling to bring their vision for the universe for all be that utopia or fascism.

In this our narrator known as Kamali arrives to perform one of her routine missions for the sect known as the Justified. They seek children with powers such as controlling gravity or telekinesis. She has detected a young teen called Esa who seems to match the criteria. But once they arrive, they find a rival group known as the Pax has also arrived and in contrast to Kamali’s subtle investigation they have brought a huge dreadnought and army to bear on the settlement. Eventually Esa and Kamali get off world with the aid of a cybernetic Preacher and a sentient AI powered spaceship called Scheherazade but before she can return to the Justified’s base known as Sanctum they soon realise the Pax’s aggression is not just focused on Esa but the rest of the Justified too and a battle to save her own sect then takes centre stage.

I was extremely impressed with what Williams brings to the mix in this tale. One is the sheer number of standout set pieces. We start in a simple farm settlement and slowly as the action moves across space, we visit smuggler bases made from giant abandoned starships; multi-coloured gas planet clusters and a system devastated by black hole weaponry. Williams really makes the visuals stand out in novel form and you get that feeling the universe here is immense and has tonnes of areas to be explored. And as well as the sheer number of settings the pace never makes me feel like Williams is trying to show me too much - it is very action orientated and as the scenery gets grander the odds in each action sequence are raised too. Williams makes tense shoot-outs; daring space battles and whole range fleet attacks soar with energy. It’s a very nimble set up and really drives the reader to continue to explore this universe.

As always though for a successful tale I need interesting characters and there are four stand-out female characters leading most of the action. Our cybernetic Preacher is clearly hiding a few secrets as she seems more than aware of how to shoot any type of weapon. Esa is a very grounded orphan happy to give check but realistically actually acts like a young adult and the move from street kid to lost child is delivered beautifully. I love the introduction of sentient AI who all have a sense of humour and make you care if a ship will survive each frenetic encounter.

But the standout is Kamali. She is our lead narrator in this story, and she is an intriguing choice of lead. She claims she is a soldier (certainly very skilled at hand to hand and space-set dogfights) but she seems very focused on recruiting kids for her cause. She carries a lot of guilt from her previous life (pre-pulse), but she is refreshingly pragmatic and someone that the cast can gently (or sometimes less so) tease. You want to know why Kamali is doing what she is doing and the fact she has decided the Justified are right makes you want to know more about what makes this sect tick. That sets off a much larger and mysterious plot that I suspect future volumes will return to but in this its very much a battle of two factions with very different mentalities. There is a whole theme across the book about learning to do better from your mistakes (as well as taking responsibility for the aftermath of them) whether that is a personal one or a galactic one. Its curiously uplifting to see that sometimes people can do better.

There is a lot to discover in this novel and I’m intrigued how this will pan out further, but I think its safe to say that Williams is giving us something very enticing. Fans of the Expanse, Star Wars and fast-paced SF should form an orderly queue and get this book into their eyes now. I suspect this one will be very popular!!

This was a fairly enjoyable but ultimately forgettable space adventure. It tells the story of Jane and her mission for the Justified to locate and retrieve gifted children who have been genetically altered by the pulse - an energy release that sent some worlds back to the stone age. There are some nicely quirky AI's in this that I really liked and I found the idea of the pulse and it's effects quite interesting. Otherwise, much of this plot was quite unoriginal and didn't really break any new ground. That being said, it was well written and enjoyable whilst reading it, but I can't see it being one of those narratives that really sticks with me long term. If you like your sci-fi quite light and lots of action, then certainly give this one a try.
I received a free copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review.

After reading this book I've come to a sad conclusion. Even for a reader like me, there are some things that belong on the page and some that belong on the screen. And space battles, in my opinion, belong firmly on the screen.



On paper this should have been just my cup of tea, I love Firefly, worship Star Wars both of which are obvious influences on this story - hell the main character is a female mash-up of Mal and Han Solo. And the story is good, if a little derivative, but the battles just don't play out well on the page so I found myself scanning these and getting a bit bored. Which is a shame but it just isn't for me. However, if you like your written sci-fi to include these you'll be happy with this novel. I just felt this would have made a better script than a novel. If I were the author I'd be knocking on Netflix's door right now.

This debut novel reminded me of older Space Opera, but it is a lot of fun.

Our teller of the tale is space pilot and ex-soldier Jane Kamali (though her name is not known for most of the book.) She lives in a galaxy where The Pulse, a seemingly burst of electromagnetic energy, has travelled across the known worlds.

To most people, (but not Jane), the cause of The Pulse is unknown, but is a secret only known to a few. The consequences of it though are wide-ranging. The effects have varied from planet to planet. Some planets have been knocked back to a semi-feudal state, others not affected at all. Generally, the radiation left behind by the Pulse renders much equipment useless if it is left exposed.

Jane is originally from the Justified sect and now, for reasons that will be told through the book, works for the mysterious Sanctum. Her job is to travel from planet to planet, extracting children who have special gifts (such as telekinesis), and then take them back to Sanctum to get them to help prepare for an apocalypse-to-come.

At the start of this story, Jane and her AI sentient spacecraft, Scheherazade, are in the process of extracting teenage Esa, who has been shown to have telekinetic powers on a frontier planet. However, Jane is not the only person trying to get to Esa. Soon after her arrival on the planet they find that other aliens, the Pax, arrive with the same objective. Jane escapes with Esa and with the help of Alexi54328 (also known as Preacher), a semi-mechanical Barious, they get off-planet.

Whilst on their way to dropping Esa off, Jane & Scheherazade intercept a distress message from Marus Lonustan, a fellow Sanctum worker who has information vital to Sanctum. They retrieve Marus, who is gravely injured and in a coma. To help Marus get better, they reluctantly enlist the assistance of Javier Ortega, despite a major fall-out in the past, and after a battle with the Pax at a space station and space pirates at a radio transmitter, return to Sanctum.

The bad news they bring is important. Sanctum, for over one hundred years hidden, has been located by the rather Borg-like Pax, who are now sending a large space fleet to destroy the base and enslave the people there. There will be one large battle to determine the future of the galaxy.



Sound familiar? Reading that summary, a hardened regular Space Opera reader may recognise elements of the story as familiar. Fast spaceships, nasty aliens, talkative AI, big battles… it is pretty obvious that the author is a fan of Star Wars, Alien and perhaps Firefly, if not Westerns like The Magnificent Seven.

That may be enough for many readers. However, The Stars Now Unclaimed, to its credit, takes these familiar tropes and uses them to make a fast-paced, great kick-ass adventure story. Unlike some other books I have read recently that use the usual tropes and no more, this one does bring something new to the table as well as a degree of familiarity. For example, though not entirely new (I’m sure Star Trek: Generations may have had something similar) I liked the idea of the Pulse, and the fact that it seems to work at different levels and in different ways was a nice touch (if perhaps scientifically improbable and a tad convenient.)

It also helps that the book recognises its roots and hearkens back to the basics of the genre that go all the way back to the 1930’s. Whilst it’s not quite Firefly’s “Western in Space”, the fact that there are isolated worlds, creating separate frontier-planets, reminded me greatly of the sf-exploration novels of the 1950’s and 60’s. There’s also a nice sensawunda here in the creation of different places, spacescapes and alien races. Drew introduces lots of races here to look at, from the lizard-like Tyll to the Alien-ish feral Reint, and the Terminator-like Barious. A council meeting of Sanctum feels like an alien United Nations (except they rarely are united!) and creates a lot of scope for future stories, should the author wish it.

There will be, I’m sure, lots of readers who will talk about the story not being scientific, with fights with laser beams and planetary cannon being unlikely and the unfeasibility of Death Star type bases mentioned, but that’s not what we’re reading for. We’re really reading about the characters and the jeopardies they get themselves into, and their interpersonal relationships. And it is these that get us through to the end.

Slightly on the downside, the fact that the narrative is based on the perspective of only one person means that the troubles they have, grim as they are, mean that the lead character is never really put at risk of death, though admittedly they come darn close. (Again, many readers will expect that, I suspect.)

There is also the issue that such focus creates in that, in order to get the bigger picture, Jane seems to have to get around and do an awful lot for one person – for example, to begin with she is a cracking space pilot leading the charge against enemy craft, later she’s part of a platoon fighting aliens in a nuclear reactor, and then she’s tackling ground-troops almost singlehanded, followed by being a key player in a vital spaceship raid. At times it does make you wonder a little what the rest of Sanctum were doing…

And whilst there were times when the odd convenience occurred, the odd plot-hole appear and it felt a little like things were being moved from one set piece to another or ticked off a list, there’s enough positive energy and charisma to maintain momentum throughout and forgive the minor issues. It could actually be a little too long at times, with one battle following the next in quick succession.

But, I quibble. This is not the sort of book to analyse in detail and overthink. Instead it must be said that, overall, The Stars Now Unclaimed is a blast from the start. For all my moans, great characters, impressive world-building and lots of big battles are probably what any Space Opera fan will wish for. Don’t think about it too deeply, but the ride is great.

Perhaps most pleasingly, there is a move towards a fairly definite resolution at the end, though (of course) the story can be continued. I’m sure more could be told about this galaxy should the author wish it.

I’d personally love to read more.

The Stars Now Unclaimed is one of this year’s most fun debuts for me.

This is a Non stop action packed story with great characters.
The story moves at a fast pace and is very much like a Star Wars story.
Although quite long this would have had 5 stars if the ending was slightly better.
I thoroughly enjoyed this.

Plot: Jane Kamali is an agent of the Justified with one job: to collect “gifted” children from around the universe and return them to the Justified’s base. The reason? To stop the Pulse, a wave of energy that had thrown some worlds back to prehistoric technology while sparing others, from returning. But with the Pax on her tail, it’s not so easy.

My thoughts: This is the book I’ll admit I struggled to get through on holiday that really slowed down my reading pace. It’s not that it wasn’t good, because I think in other circumstances I might have enjoyed it a little more, but it turned out not to be for me at all. It felt like Star Wars – another action-packed read for the trip! – but in written form, and as someone that’s not really a fan of Star Wars (sorry!), this just didn’t appeal. I’d expected something that focused more on the Pulse itself, the effect it had had, the reasoning behind it and more – while I did get this, it was packed amongst a lot of fighting and killing which just isn’t my style. I also struggled to identify with the main character, and at first, I hadn’t realised it was a woman! I can’t say whether that’s because she was deliberately written more gender-neutral as a character thanks to her role (and the fact that some species in this world were also gender-neutral, so maybe it’s not so much of a thing as it is here), or whether it was simply because she was written by someone who didn’t write well from a female perspective. Either way, this meant I couldn’t click with the story as well.
On the good side, I did like the premise of a Pulse that had thrown worlds back to ancient technologies and the idea of people like Esa being born with powers to save that. Esa’s character was wonderful, as was Javi who had me laughing out loud occasionally. I also enjoyed the idea of spaceships with personalities, and learning about different species in different worlds. If this is your thing, you’ll love it, sadly just not for me.

If you are an adrenaline junky who likes a good old fashioned space opera, The Stars Now Unclaimed was written for you. An unadulterated guilty pleasure with a grip of steel, this book is action packed and full of sarcasm. Two of my most important criteria when indulging in a guilty pleasure. *Insert cheeky grin here.*

In this novel we follow the adventures of a nameless heroine who travels the galaxy collecting 'gifted' children on behalf of the Justified. These special children started appearing after a pulse swept through space and set most planets back very far in their technological evolution. Far enough, for some, that they don't even have electricity much less space travel capability.

What's the best bit of this book? World building is right up there - and most impressive - but it would have to be the action. Our nameless heroine is not shy about risking her life or that of Scheherazade, her ship. She jumps right in to every situation with great tech and a soldier's heart and skill. We go from one fight straight to the next but it feels like riding a rolling coaster. It is all good fun and thoroughly exhilarating.

The characters were also important to the story. I loved the good-natured bickering, the variety of life forms our girl encounters, the easy comradery of the Justified and the big sense of good vs. evil. The Stars Now Unclaimed is a real gem. Perfect to take on holiday or just enjoy on a rainy day. It will take you places you wouldn't expect plus you will fully enjoy the journey.

This novel is packed full of action, dry humour, and very likeable characters. The writing flows, there is always more depth and more stories to unmask, as well as new species of living beings to encounter as we imagine life in space waaay in the future.
Williams is a great author who has created some kick ass female characters. Williams has the right balance of description and narrative, with a story that keeps evolving. Recommend for all SciFi fans

Good ideas, interesting characters, but a few too many battles for me. 4/5 stars.

Wow, but does this hit the ground running! The story starts as it means to go on, throwing us into the deep end of events without much explanation as to what’s happening or how the status quo came about. Not that we’re given time to ponder those questions anyway, as it’s pretty much all action from page one.

As you always hope for with sci-fi, the world-building is good and the characters are an interesting mix. The author makes the most of the intergalactic setting and gives us humans, aliens and AI either rubbing along or trying to blast each other out of the sky. I particularly like that the main character is a world-weary female soldier whose gender is irrelevant. What is relevant is that she’s extremely good at her job; her skills and knowledge are so central to her identity we don’t even find out her name until late in the book.

Unfortunately I eventually became weary of all the armed conflict. The book starts with a battle. Then there’s another. Then another. Then another. This is a war story and if you’re not interested in reading fight sequence after fight sequence then I’d give this a miss. I started to tire of them after a while even though the author does introduce variety into them. In this it reminded me of my experience of Pierce Brown’s Red Rising, particularly as I got further into the trilogy. However I know other readers didn’t find this an issue and so I think would enjoy this book more than I did.

Overall: if you liked Pierce Brown’s Red Rising trilogy, or like war stories with a sci-fi twist, you should definitely check this out.

The novel follows the work of an, at first, unnamed member of a group known as The Justified. Her job is to travel the galaxy, ravaged by something called The Pulse which has destroyed – to a greater or lesser extent depending on which planet you are on – modern machinery and computing, to find children with special powers. Space itself is unaffected but all planets, moons have been returned to a variety of states from pre-spaceflight to unable to sustain internal combustion engines. Space flight is possible – on ships operating with sophisticated artificial intelligence – but trying to land on a planet can result in all the ship’s electronics being totally ruined. The only race in the galaxy whose home planets were largely unaffected is the Pax: a race who are now trying to assimilate everyone they encounter into their sect. That sect is single-minded and has a total belief in ‘might is right’ – fascist is probably the best word to describe them.

From the moment that the Justified (later revealed to be called Jane Kamali – an ex-soldier who has been around since before the Pulse over a century earlier. I did a little cheer when her name was revealed, obviously) finds her latest gifted child, a young woman called Esa, the action comes thick and fast. Jane has to return to Sanctum, the Justified’s secret home world, with Esa but on the way manages to pick up some colleagues (including one who is running from a death penalty for treason), and a Barious (a race of robot-like beings who are, somehow, very snobbish about AI ships like the one she is now on). As they run the Pax keep following them: are they just unlucky or have the usually rather stupid Pax found out some very important information?

I didn’t mind all the fighting, bombs and blowing things to bits with extreme prejudice – I actually enjoyed the fact that the person doing most of the fighting was a female (or even two females as Barious are usually referred to as ‘she’). There was a lot more than I usually find in my choice of reading but it was mixed in with some nice characterisation. Jane, because of all the trouble she has getting Esa back to Sanctum, spends more time than usual with the girl – she’s usually a ‘pick ’em up, drop ’em off and don’t make friends’ kind of woman – and we see Esa having to learn a lot in a short time. Jane can cope with teaching her to use weapons but coping with the emotional needs (and rather black and white world view) of a teenager is more challenging. I’d complain that we don’t see that much of the girl, or her powers, which are stronger than usual, but this is the first book of a series so there is time. I’m hoping we also find out more about Jane’s past, find out where the Barious came from and whether the Pulse is coming back to do even more damage. Which means, damn it, I’m going to have get into space opera because now I need to know…

I'd recommend 'The Stars Now Unclaimed' for existing sci-fi fans who enjoy an adventure story set in space. It's a fun read but I would say that it's nothing ground-breaking or progressive for the genre.

~ Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to review this title ~

Fast paced, high velocity and packed with great characters, this space based adventure is really out of this world.
I really enjoyed the concept, my only complaint was just a touch too much fighting which made it slightly longer than necessary.
But all in a really fun debut, and the first in what promises to be a great series.

There is a place for space opera in science fiction but this just a platform for interminable fighting of a rather dated type. Neither the setting or the action showed much imagination. The essence of good science fiction is ideas which this novel lacked. But if a good punch up is your idea of fun this story has it in spades.

Firstly, I loved the concept of this book. The idea of a universe in which some planets have been sent back into a time before technology was absolutely fascinating to me. I don't know that you get to fully explore the idea in this book, I'm hoping there will be more worlds to be seen in future titles, but it does make for a very interesting set of limitations for the characters. You may have the technology to blast an entire city off the map, but you can't use it because as soon as you enter the atmosphere your technology will start to degrade. Something about that really captured my imagination and I like the way it needs to be worked around rather than simply using tech as an easy excuse to fix things. 

This book is quite slow to start, but once it gets going it is very action packed. There are some moments later on where you do get a little bit fatigued by the constant battle. I'd compare it to that feeling you get watching The Return of the King where you're just very ready for a bit of a break from swords and orcs thwacking one another. This was a little like that but with lasers - and there are no orcs. 

I do feel that, overall, this story is setting up something quite exciting. I'm not sure there's enough plot or character development in this story to carry it entirely into five-star territory. That's not to say that it isn't an enjoyable read, but I'll look forward to reading later books as I think that's where the characters will begin to shine through. 

There are also some interesting choices made that I couldn't quite figure out, for instance, we get told about the existence of space pirates, we go with the characters to the enormous space pirate ship and then immediately leave. It does make sense for the plot, don't get me wrong, but I felt very betrayed as pirates are one of my favourite things and putting them in space is a surefire way to get me excited. Again, I really hope that's setting something up for a later book because I now need my space pirate fix. 

I've said space pirate too many times now. 

There are some really interesting characters in the mix in this book. Of course, there is the AI Scheherazade, no story like this is complete without a sentient spaceship, but you also have the tension between Scheherazade and the Preacher, who is also an AI but is in a body (part of a dying race). I liked the dynamic between them, and that the author had considered how two very different AIs might interact in this kind of society. Jane herself is also worth mentioning, she avoids being too 'chosen one and also the best at fighting and shooting and thinking and everything' as can sometimes happen in stories like this. There is a bit of a romance plot that at times I felt took away from her strength by making her seem a little bit of a clichéd ex-girlfriend but I can live with that. 

The Stars Now Unclaimed feels like the start of something that has the potential to be truly exceptional. I shall be keeping an eye out for further titles in this series! 

My rating: 4/5 stars

I received a digital advanced review copy of this book for free from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.