Revelations
Revelations is a romantic science fiction novel in which life, even when it doesn’t turn out the way one expected, can still be meaningful.
In Sara L. Daigle’s science fiction novel Revelations, a half-alien woman, her alien husband, and their friends confront a series of personal challenges.
After learning that she is half-alien and has empathic powers, enduring her mother’s death, having a child, and marrying the scion of a powerful ruling family from the planet Azelle, Tamara is just starting to adjust. An unexpected pregnancy and trouble on Azelle upend her world yet again. As she struggles with these new developments, her husband Alarin deals with a devastating injury and shocking discoveries about his troubled family’s history. This series of events pushes them to their limits, resulting in a nightmare scenario that changes them as individuals and as a couple.
The exposition of the early chapters relays events from previous books in the series, making it easy to jump into this story with no prior knowledge. After the first few chapters, though, this expository approach becomes tedious, causing the narrative to be dominated by redundant conversations rather than action. This allows only glimpses into the book’s exciting universe, which features a planet on the edge of rebellion, unique alien cultures and languages, and cell phones and student exchange programs that connect people from different worlds. These elements of the plot often serve as background for the more ordinary, human dramas that the characters face. Clever foreshadowing hints at an important event while remaining subtle enough to escape detection, though a later plot point is too reminiscent of a previous point to be believable.
Tamara remains far removed from the action on Azelle. Her focus is on her home life in Denver, where she deals with multiple pregnancy-related surprises and a terrible accident that threatens her relationship with Alarin. As such, she is a passive heroine whose main role is to express emotions about the dramatic developments in others’ lives. Still, the ways in which Tamara’s friends and family band together in times of crisis is heartwarming. Even when separated by circumstances beyond their control, they are in each other’s thoughts. They make every effort to support each other. And this series entry’s conclusion promises a brighter future for everyone, even those who, like Tamara, are still coping with grief and loss.
Part of a series, Revelations is a romantic science fiction novel in which life, even when it doesn’t turn out the way one expected, can still be meaningful.
Reviewed by
Eileen Gonzalez
Disclosure: This article is not an endorsement, but a review. The publisher of this book provided free copies of the book and paid a small fee to have their book reviewed by a professional reviewer. Foreword Reviews and Clarion Reviews make no guarantee that the publisher will receive a positive review. Foreword Magazine, Inc. is disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255.
