Book Review: Mothership

Mothership by Martin Leicht and Isla Neal

Series: Book 1 of the Ever-Expanding Universe

Official Website

Description: Elvie Nara was doing just fine in the year 2074. She had a great best friend, a dad she adored, and bright future working on the Ares Project on Mars. But then she had to get involved with sweet, gorgeous, dumb-as-a-brick Cole—and now she’s pregnant.
Getting shipped off to the Hanover School for Expecting Teen Mothers was not how Elvie imagined spending her junior year, but she can go with the flow. That is, until a team of hot commandos hijacks the ship—and one of them turns out to be Cole. She hasn’t seen him since she told him she’s pregnant, and now he’s bursting into her new home to tell her that her teachers are aliens and want to use her unborn baby to repopulate their species? Nice try, buddy. You could have just called.
So fine, finding a way off this ship is priority number one, but first Elvie has to figure out how Cole ended up as a commando, work together with her arch-nemesis, and figure out if she even wants to be a mother—assuming they get back to Earth in one piece.

Review: This was the first book I picked up when I went to my new local library. I really liked the name, and the fonts used, and the color scheme, and the title of the series, and everything was just so aesthetically appealing. And it had to do with pregnant teens, which lately I've been on a kick with. I dunno, it's just that pregnant teens are really funny? And witty? Usually? I'm obsessed with all pregnant women. It's amazing what the human body can do.


All pregnant chicks aside, this is not a post letting the internet know of my fascination with women. It's about this book, Mothership, which tells the tale of Elvie Nara, this witty pregnant teen who was sent off into space. Set in the future, with cool gadgets and other weird things like space cruise lines and such, Mothership is a trip. And that's probably the corniest thing I have ever written, but it's true. It's just jam-packed with action, and something is revealed on every goddamn page. I'm actually not even sure if I'm complaining about this, because I'm excited to read the sequel, because that was a helluva ending.

As my boyfriend put it, this book is like a cheesy B-rated movie. There's something ridiculous around every corner. It's like the authors put topics in a hat, and tossed the hat around, and created the book with those little pieces of paper. Everything fit together, I didn't sense any plot holes, but it was just so IN YOUR FACE weird. I have no idea how to describe this other than "this is what you imagine when you picture a sci-fi book with pregnant teens set in the future."

This book, as you can probably imagine, was filled with so many different types of characters. You had the stereotypical characters hated by the MC. Then you had the MC's male best friend, who Elvie "never thought of that way!". Sassy pregnant girl who smoked cigarettes and hated everyone. Cool adult everyone could trust. Same cool adult who fucks everyone over in the end. Cute boy who impregnated MC who dated and impregnated nemesis of the MC. Guy who knocks up MC is an alien. Ya know, the usual.

Elvie, I regret to say, was very forgettable. Yeah, she was brave and she had to make a lot of hard decisions, but so does every single YOUNG ADULT FEMALE IN BOOKS NOWADAYS. The only thing I will remember about Elvie is her awesome name and the fact that she fell on her butt a lot in the book. I'll probably remember her father before I remember her if someone asks me about Mothership. I mean, her father kept files in his house of possible things that can go wrong. And he had a 'daughter becomes pregnant' folder. C'mon. How can you hate a character that does that? And yes, the scenes between Cole (the ALIEN who impregnates both Elvs and nemesis) and Elvie were cute, but they were unmemorable. Okay, maybe I'll remember when he told her, "Elvs, you really rev me up." after she fixed his car. That was adorable. Other than that though? Nope.

The world futuristic world created by Leicht and Neal was very interesting. At least they explained what the futuristic gadgets were. I read this one where they didn't explain things at all and it sucked. I'll definitely read the sequel, but just to see what happens with the baby.

Overall, Mothership is a book you want to read if things have gotten too serious in your life and you need a some laughs. It definitely helped me get out of my book-reading funk.

"I book it down the two flight, one hand on the railing, one hand under my belly, and I thank my lucky stars that I decided to go on my ice cream crusade with my most semnsible yellow flats on. I'm running so fast, I could be the star of my own cardio workout video- Get Chases With Elvie!- but when I rash into the exit, the door doesn't budge."

-Mothership//Martin Leicht & Isla Neal