 Erinn Bentley | Welcome to our mid-August Weekend Picks! Many of you have already gone back to school, and many of you are preparing to do so. As the shift in schedules is underway, Dr. Erinn Bentley has your sci-fi YAL reading needs covered. And, as AI may be on the minds of many of our ELA teacher-readers, this pick will have us all considering the future. Dr. Erinn Bentley is a professor of English education at Columbus State University, where she also serves as the Associate Director of the Center for Global Engagement. She enjoys mentoring pre-service secondary English teachers, graduate students, and her doctoral candidates. In addition to teaching YA literature and pedagogy courses, Erinn leads study abroad programs for education majors in Belize, Ecuador, England, and Japan. In her free time, you’ll probably find her on a robotics field mentoring FIRST teams as part of the Columbus Space Program. |
Illuminae by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff
 | One of my favorite sci-fi YA novels is Illuminae by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff. The first in the Illuminae Files series, this space opera is thrilling to read as well as visually stunning. Set in 2575, the novel opens with two interstellar corporations at war over a distant mining planet. Barely escaping a deadly attack, teenagers Kady and Ezra are whisked away by a rescue fleet; however, the drama and danger are far from over. The drama: Kady and Ezra had a messy break up just hours before they escaped. The danger: They escaped on separate ships - one with a plague, the other with crazy AI, and both being chased by the attackers who bombed their planet. When none of the fleet’s leaders provide straight answers as to how they will survive, Kady uses her hacking skills to unravel the mystery of what’s really go on. And the only person who is there for moral support: her ex-boyfriend. |
| This novel really is a roller coaster ride of a read. With both protagonists in constant danger, there are plenty of action-packed scenes and plot twists to keep the reader engaged. As Kady and Ezra communicate through secret chat messages, we also witness their (literal) star-crossed on-again, off-again romance. I appreciate how each character is portrayed. On the one hand, Ezra is cocky and impulsive; however, we also see him break into tears when his buddy dies. Similarly, Kady is fearless and sassy, but she also has moments of deep vulnerability when she confronts all that she has lost. As a reader, I was not only rooting for them both to live, but to also find their way back to each other. |  Jay Kristoff and Amie Kaufman |
In addition to the exciting plot and endearing characters, Illuminae is one of my favorite novels due to its unique format for storytelling. Far from a traditional narrative, Illuminae is a compilation of artifacts: Text chats, interview transcripts, memos, diary entries, ship schematics and surveillance footage, and the poetic inner thoughts of the fleet’s AI. The reader gets to see the plot unfold from every perspective imaginable.
The best part of this novel (in my opinion), though, is AIDAN. I have no idea how the authors were able to make this reader fall in love with a machine, but they did. Ironically, the most compelling, complicated, and beautiful character in Illuminae is AI, and he/it(?) makes readers question morality, humanity, life, and death.
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