nuclear warfare, including thousands of innocent people being blown up extreme violence, although it’s not particularly descriptive or graphic lots of sexual innuendos and lewd comments in the form of email chats (which may well go over the heads of younger readers) So for other parents of younger readers it contains the following: If I had known exactly what was in the book I probably would have waited a couple more years before buying it for my daughter (she picked it herself off the shelf at Kmart). It’s a fast paced and thought provoking sci-fi told from a collection of documents, email conversations, security footage reports and the mad ramblings of an AI system who controls one of the space ships. I read this book after my daughter (almost 12) read it in record time and immediately asked for book two.

Some of the transcripts include personal memories of the central romance as well as a few jokes and references about sex (but only a couple of kisses are described). Wide-scale violence includes the destruction of entire spaceships and most (if not all) aboard, as well as the initial attack on a mining colony. The violence is occasionally graphic, as the infected people kill others via mutilation, dismemberment, decapitation, and blunt-force trauma - basically any means necessary. Strong language is redacted from the documents, but readers can still tell or guess what the words were, despite the blacked-out letters. The story unfolds via a mysterious file that includes transcripts of recovered interviews, emails, surveillance footage, chats, and an advanced AI system's memory. Parents need to know that Illuminae is a sci-fi space epistolary thriller that takes place in the distant future. Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Drinking, Drugs & Smoking in your kid's entertainment guide.

Illuminae by Amie Kaufman