Joelene Reviews: Academy 7 by Anne Osterlund

Aerin Renning has been alone since her father died. Without him, her only chance of survival was to learn to fight and to be of more use than the people around her. When the chance to escape arises, it’s not even a question. She takes it knowing that if she’s caught, the penalty is death.

Dane Madousin was born to privilege. With it comes freedom, safety, and education. But not love.

When Academy 7 – the exacting but prestigious school that was built to train leaders – offers each of them a place, they accept. Aerin has nowhere else to go, and Dane would do anything to anger his distant father.

I’ve had Academy 7 sitting on my shelves for several years now. After having it pop up under Amazon recommendations and having book bloggers speak highly of it, I ordered and bought a copy. Then proceeded not to read it for several years. Having noticed it again after a recent clean, I decided to give it a go. I regret not having done so sooner.

Academy 7 is just as good as all of those bloggers kept saying. The characters are strong and sympathetic. Their struggles are affecting without being melodramatic. Despite being a futuristic sci-fi, Osterlund doesn’t get caught up in dazzling us with the world, preferring to tell a compelling story.

On the other side of that, readers who are sci-fi lovers may find Academy 7 too bland for their tastes. The story is good, but it’s a story that could as easily be set in modern times or in the past with a few tweaks.

Much of the story revolves around the two main characters and if they were less compelling than Aerin and Dane, this story would have fallen flat. Both Aerin and Dane are amazing characters in their own rights, though. They have enough similarities that their friendship makes perfect sense, but on the surface they’re very different. Dane is over-confident and tends to make light of things while Aerin is constantly anxious and is very serious about issues that she’s passionate about.

They strike sparks off each other because Aerin wants Dane to care about issues but he’s too scared to care about anything. And he wants her to open up, when staying closed keeps her safe. In some ways they’re both self-made. Aerin had to teach herself everything after her father died, and Dane may as well have not had a father so he had to figure most of it out for himself too.

The only issue that I had with Academy 7 is the backstory. While Aerin and Dane’s relationship is painstakingly honest – rarely falling back on convention, but forging its own path – the backstory is stereotypical and overdramatic. It serves its purpose, but Osterlund did such a good job of injecting real humanity into the relationship between Aerin and Dane that I sort of wish she had pushed their parents’ stories to the same level.

Academy 7 is a genuinely fantastic read. The characters are amazing, and while it is romantic, the focus is more on being a wonderful story than a love story.

Academy 7 – Anne Osterlund

Speak (May 2009)

ISBN: 9780142414378