The Other Side of the Sky Hardcover – September 8, 2020

"I believe the prophecy brought us together. North, this is our destiny."North is the Prince of the Seven Isles, second in line to the throne of Alciel, and a Guardian of the Light. His home in the cloudlands is powered by technology. Prince North wants to contribute to the kingdom by piloting his glider to study Below in order to see what else is out there- he desires to explore. Nimhara is the last living goddess to walk the land, Below. She puts purpose before feeling and is magnetic in a way that is undeniable. But she is living this torture of a half-life. She is always alone. To touch her is the greatest hurt and strips her of her divinity. The North and Nimh's lives are intertwined. Nimh believes this boy is the messenger. Or he IS the message. And maybe, just maybe, she isn't fated to walk Below alone after all. They're linked by a prophecy and caught between duty and destiny. Whether the Nimh's vision is right about the OTP or not they're in this together now. Will the pair choose to save their people or succumb to the bond that is forbidden between them?I loved the bindle cat. 🐱 Meow! "What IS that?" He's just an ordinary, normal cat; however, to North, the cat is a mysterious creature. There are NO animals in the sky. "Captain Fluffypants". You know that line from Mean Girls...“She’s like a martian”...That's the duo. They don't know a thing about each others home! They're like martians 🤣. The Other Side of the Sky is perfect for fans of Brandon Sanderson. The authors did a fabulous job at building a super entertaining and intriguing world. The story reminded me of a mash up of The 100 and Dance of Thieves. Friendly heads up: there is a cliff hanger! 😱 You're going to want to preorder the sequel. Add it to your TBR!🎶 song: Light by San Holo 🎶

I was eagerly looking forward to delving into this new world by Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner after loving their previous series: These Broken Stars (aka Starbound) trilogy and the Unearthed duology. However, unlike those previous entries, ‘The Other Side of the Sky’ fell completely flat for me with weak world building and inadequate character development.Our two main characters and Nimh and North. They alternate narrating the story so you do get to see both sides of the events which I always enjoy.Nimh is the embodied divinity of her people, the surface dwellers. She states several times that she was recognised for her divinity when she was 5 years old and it has been around 10 years since that time making her 15/16 years old. She is the Forty-Second Vessel of the Divine but has yet to manifest her aspect. The previous Forty-One living gods and goddesses manifested their aspects quickly with powers such as Healing or War or Farming. Mind you, there is also not a lot of detail around Nimh’s beginning, how she was recognised for her divinity, what exactly was her divinity etc. I would have liked to know more about her backstory to better understand why she did things in certain ways later in the book.One of the main reasons that I struggled so much with this book is due to Nimh. She had no spunk or fire to her personality. She very much toes the line for the most part and I kept wanting her to show a little more spirit. Maybe some small rebellions to the life imposed on her like taking a book from the archive or smuggling food from the kitchen or deliberately misplacing the head priests favourite shoes. Just something to make her less tiresome. She always seemed to be preaching to North and it came off as unlikeable and a touch sanctimonious. Nimh also didn’t make any effort to really get to know North or to learn about where he came from but expected him to just put aside whatever beliefs he had and follow her will and ignore the consequences.North is the other main character. He is the Prince of the Seven Isles, second in line to the throne of Alciel, and a Guardian of the Light. Phew! What a mouthful. He lives in the ‘Cloudlands’. Giant floating cities that have no knowledge that there is anyone alive on the surface. We only spend a brief time in the city with him before he ‘falls’ to the surface and meets up with Nimh, and I honestly wish they had explored it a little more. There were so many plot points that could have been expanded on to give the world and North a greater depth of character and none of it was expanded upon. For example, why have the people in the floating cities lost the knowledge of the engines that keep them in the air, why can they only use gliders – why not use aircraft with engines, why was his donor father supposed to be kept such a secret. There was no payoff to any of the elements introduced during this brief time and I was so disappointed that we learnt little to nothing about the Cloudlanders through the book.My other issue with North is that he has almost little to no impact on the story. If you take him out of the book all the same events were going to occur in exactly the same manner even without him. He just follows around after Nimh and pretty much bends to her will in all things. There isn’t any substance to his character. He is not unlikeable, but I also don’t think he did anything truly worthwhile. There is no real angst or breakdown about being separated from all he knows, his family, his friends, his life. I would have liked to see him merging his technology with Nimh’s magic to combat the big bad together.The story itself also has pacing issues. The entire book pretty much takes place in about 48 to 72 hour period (earth time), and yet they fit so much into a short period of time I struggled to find the logic in how everything got done. It would have been better if everything hadn’t been so compacted together and instead the characters had more time to get to know one another and explore their surrounds to allow the friendship and (supposed) love to grow organically.The world building was very weak with too many elements left unexplored and I can’t help but think the authors could have elevated the story so much more if we knew a little more about the environment Nimh and North where in. There were mentions of ruins and an ancient civilisation, but we are only given scraps of information the lead nowhere. The mist was another intriguing concept where did it come from? Is there a link to the Cloudland’s? But we get nothing about this apart from a mention that it is getting worse. I also don’t understand how North says that his people know nothing about Nimh’s people as the cloud cover makes it impossible for them to see the surface. But! You can see the floating cities from the surface? Shouldn’t you only be able to see the clouds also?Overall, I think this would be suitable for very young YA readers. The story failed to captivate me in any way. I often felt like I was pushing myself through the book so I could finish it rather than the story pulling me through the narrative. I would highly recommend the other books from Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner but would give this one a miss. Its in my one and done pile.3 out of 5 stars!

I’ve been struggling to finish books for the last several months. I blazed through this in under 24 hours! The world building is absolutely stunning, the prose is lovely, and the story is gripping. I adore Nimh, and North is a breath of fresh air. Can not wait to read the next one :)

I've read everything these two have jointly written and not once have I been less than completely satisfied. This book continues that streak with a solidly created world, appealing characters, plenty of action and dandy twists. All of that blended together with one heck of an ending leaving me (and I suspect most other readers) drooling for what comes next.

I've read and loved these authors series "These broken stars" and I liked "Undying" but I had a hard time getting into this book. I liked the world-building a lot and both the main characters started out very interesting.North did feel like he stumbled on from a contemporary novel but my main peeve was the insta-romance.I'm a big fan of romance in YA but it needs to be earned. The entire book took place in less than a week and 24 hours in they were already throwing around the L Word and ready to sacrifice their lives and countries for each other. It just didn't work. Not only that but North started the book in what sounded like a serious relationship with his two besties and promptly forgot all about them.I knew going in this wouldn't be standalone so I was expecting a partially unfinished story and the place it left off was cool but rather predictable.I imagine I will read the sequel because it is necessary to finish the book.One last thing about the world-building. These two worlds were supposed to have separated a thousand years ago but we're supposed to believe that a highly advanced technological world, i.e. flying cloud didn't preserve the knowledge of its own working or develop any flying technology? Where is the engineers guild? the library? We have books in our world much older than 1000 years. Also, they have trains and cell phones but no technology for flying? what about airplanes? Hot air balloons? Flying cars? I found that to be a fundamental plot hole.

Really fun read

I brought this book for myself

El libro no viene en buenas condiciones, pedí un reemplazo y vino muy parecido, rayado el lomo aunque por dentro las paginas etc. están perfectas. Me lo quedé porque en inglés estaba mucho más barato que en hidra en castellano. He comprado de otras editoriales y no me ha pasado lo mismo que con este. Creo que es cuestión de la edición de USA que es de peor calidad que la de UK. Pero es para tener en cuenta y no comprar un libro que va a venir rayado por el lomo

The other side of the sky by Amie Kauffman and Meaghan SpoonerI loved this book! I haven’t read anything by Meghan Spooner before but I loved the Illuminae and Aurora Rising series that Amie Kauffman has written with Jay Kristoff! I love that we see both perspectives of North and Nimh and keep alternating between the two! They both have led very different lives, but their fates are intertwined by their ancestors. If you love fantasy novels then this is for you! I can’t wait for the sequel! FYI there is a cliff hangar!5/5 ⭐️Recommend ✅#books #reading #bookworm #booklover #bookstagram #bookstagrammer #bookdragon #booklove #bookreview #booknerd #mummyreads #UKbookstagram #thereisalwaystimeforbooks #fantasy #magic#youngadultbooks #ya #youngadult #yalit #theothersideofthesky #amiekauffman #meaghanspooner

So this book had a bit of a slow start and, for a while, I wondered whether I was going to enjoy this book as much as I thought I would. However, once i got into the story and got to know North and Nimh, I adored it! I read the second half in one sitting! The characters were amazing and their feelings felt so real. And the end! I was expecting a cliffhanger and a big reveal but then I thought I'd guessed it and then... then the last couple of chapters completely changed everything and why do I have to wait so long for book 2 😭😭