The Stardust Grail Audiobook By Yume Kitasei cover art

The Stardust Grail

A Novel

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The Stardust Grail

By: Yume Kitasei
Narrated by: Katharine Chin
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Long-listed, NPR Best Book of the Year, 2024

Long-listed, Esquire Magazine Best Books of the Year, 2024

Long-listed, Kirkus Reviews Best Books of the Year, 2024

Save one world. Doom her own.

Maya Hoshimoto was once the best art thief in the galaxy. For ten years, she returned stolen artifacts to alien civilizations—until a disastrous job forced her into hiding. Now she just wants to enjoy a quiet life as a graduate student of anthropology, but she’s haunted by persistent and disturbing visions of the future.

Then an old friend comes to her with a job she can’t refuse: find a powerful object that could save an alien species from extinction. Except no one has seen it in living memory, and they aren’t the only ones hunting for it.

Maya sets out on a breakneck quest through a universe teeming with strange life and ancient ruins. But the farther she goes, the more her visions cast a dark shadow over her team of friends new and old. Someone will betray her along the way. Worse yet, in choosing to save one species, she may condemn humanity and Earth itself.

A Macmillan Audio production from Flatiron Books.

©2024 Yume Kitasei (P)2024 Macmillan Audio Adventure Asian & Pacific Islander Creators First Contact Science Fiction

Critic reviews

"Kitasei’s outstanding sophomore outing clears the high bar she set in The Deep Sky, combining a high-stakes space adventure with exquisitely crafted worldbuilding and plausibly imagined interspecies communication." —Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Broad in scope, covering everything from the rise and fall of alien civilizations to what it means to be a person, this is a luminous work, vacillating between the highs and lows of human experience and how they might translate across alien worlds." —Kirkus, starred review

"Come to The Stardust Grail for Indiana Jones-style outer space heist adventure, stay for the sensitively drawn characters and thoughtful exploration of other forms of life far beyond our own—Yume Kitasei's second novel is an engaging, fascinating story that you don't want to miss." —Veronica Roth, New York Times bestselling author of Chosen Ones
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I think I would’ve enjoyed this book had I read it on paper. The audiobook makes the slow pacing stand out more and the alien pronunciation game hard to follow. I also would like to see Auncle’s speech written out and see what the narrator based her interpretation on, for me it took away from my enjoyment enormously. Rather undoable really. Didn’t enjoy listening.

Interesting premise

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To me the best sci to is about humans, alien. species and exploration. This author has created a universe where humans and aliens all interact with unexpected consequences. What is is normal and expected behavior, even necessary for survival, may be impossible to understand and detrimental to other aliens. This book has an excellent plot that slowly exposes all of the above. The narration is great and the characters likeable. The world building is fascinating. Highly recommend listening to or reading this book.

Science fiction as meant to be

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Excellent use of tone and voice changes. The characters could be easily identified, which made the entertaining story even more interesting.

Performance

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Liked this title, it was an interesting mix of Sci-fi, gore, and seeing an alternate future

Interesting mix of Sci-fi and mystery

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For literary purposes it might have been interesting idea to give alien pronouns to every character (including humans), but for comprehension and enjoyment this was a very bad idea. The narrator does her best but it becomes very tedious very quickly. It’s also hard to follow which character is being referred to during conversations with more than two characters.

Pronouns are out of control

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Very much liked the story, and the pacing was great . Ignore the review that says they've read this before, because they are either lying or didn't read it. It's obviously not objectively great; I'm not insane enough to boldly state my opinion as a fact.

But if you like To Sleep In A Sea of Stars with a slightly higher chance with the writer going back to this universe soon, you may want to check it out.

Great story, interesting characters

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This will not give anybody a headache, I speculate. Don’t expect sparkling writing, but a serviceable read when concentration might be hard to find.

Entertaining YA sci-fi

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Thoroughly enjoyable story overall. The performance was impeccable. I enjoyed the use of a variety of pronouns in the story and the exploration of the ideas of other species- it was ingenious and a new take.

Great listen

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Unfortunately, *Stardust Grail* wasn't to my taste. The constant cry of "Mayyaaaa!" became a grating refrain throughout the book. The plot lacked originality and was filled with rather unlikable characters. While it drew inspiration from adventurous tales like Indiana Jones, it didn’t quite live up to the expectations or the hype.

Not my cup of tea

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The narration of UNCLE in this book is incredibly annoying--pull my hair out annoying. I just couldn't continue. This is a DNF for me.

While the writing is good, the premise fell short. We've seen this premise over and over again: scholar girl with a cause, leaves everything behind for it, blah, blah, blah.

Toss in not enough humor and not enough tension, boom you have The Stardust Grail.

Hard pass.

Seen this premise before.

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