Let’s call it an interesting spin on what everyone likes to call the ordinary love story.
So, as you know, I’m huge on writing, and I believe that the best way to learn how to write is by reading other peoples’ works, no matter how good or bad it is. After all, you’re not the smartest or best writer in the world.
This book, however, was unlike a lot of the things I’ve read before. This is a book I like to call “A Pleasure Read”, so I wouldn’t go running and talking about this book on my AP Literature Exam. But imagine yourself living on Earth a hundred years later and meeting your soul mate, but he is from another planet. So essentially, an alien.
1. The Story
Thinking that you could fall in love with somebody who isn’t even your own species sounds repulsive. But the author here describes the setting in which the reader doesn’t feel like it’s as strange as it sounds, now; it feels like you are the main character, Cara, and that you have now fallen in love with any other ordinary boy. Because that’s what Aelyx, her lover, is: he is an alien that looks like a human.
Wait what? I know this is science fiction, but reality has to take a step in here. The only thing that makes this guy even merely attractive is the fact that he’s looks human. What if he was one of those creepy green aliens that we always see? Like ET? That’s an alien.
He’s not human. He’s not her species, but I would have to say I connect with the main character. This is what I got from it. It’s like when you fall in love with someone at your school who everyone is scared of because he comes from the slums. Does that change how you feel about him? Maybe it does, but it shouldn’t. And that’s exactly what Melissa Landers is able to portray
2. The Act of Feeling
There is an interesting dichotomy here between what is passion and what isn’t. Very simple: girl is human, so she 
experiences emotion very strongly, and boy is an alien, who thinks very logically. We are affected by our past and we are morphed into certain ways because of how we’ve been trained to think. Aelyx comes from a planet where order has dominated everything in order to solve peace. But with no balance, there comes consequences in which logic has been heightened so much that love is gone. First of all, that’s not possible, but I guess it can be with aliens.
What is the most interesting is that she has brought someone who has convinced himself that he is apathetic to any emotions and thinks that love is silly into a world where love is the only thing that keeps teenagers pumping blood. Part of being an adolescent is the ability to feel more strongly than others, and it is strange to an outside perspective to see it happen. The best part is when he begins to start feeling those emotions, too, learning that there is more to life than just logic.
Overall, this was not my favorite book of all the time, and the only reason why I’m writing this is because I just finished reading it. Picturing what happened in this book was very difficult for me. The concept was a good basic coat, but I await the day when I find an author who can take these great ideas and launch through the industry with writing capabilities and inspiration.
I’m not saying this book was terrible, however. The author included a lot of things that are current issues, now, as teenagers: bullying, stress, emotional roller coasters, angst, etc. And she’s right: logic is success and we should all be logical. We can still rub our noses into our textbooks and write every word down that our teacher lectures in classes, but that doesn’t influence the fun factor. This is where balance needs to be found, and I know it’s hard because it’s hard for me.
Take note before I end this post: I do not absolutely hate or absolutely love certain books. I do not have a favorite and I do not have loathes. Most books that I read end up in my middle range because it does take some planning and skill to actually pass through a good publisher. Keep that in mind, and try to be more open to weird ideas, like this one.
100 Ways to Write 