Dear INVADED (Alienated #2) by Melissa Landers

Cara always knew life on planet L’eihr would be an adjustment. With Aelyx, her L’eihr boyfriend, back on Earth, working to mend the broken alliance between their two planets, Cara is left to fend for herself at a new school, surrounded by hostile alien clones. Even the weird dorm pet hates her.

Things look up when Cara is appointed as a human representative to a panel preparing for a human colony on L’eihr. A society melding their two cultures is a place where Cara and Aelyx could one day make a life together. But with L’eihr leaders balking at granting even the most basic freedoms, Cara begins to wonder if she could ever be happy on this planet, even with Aelyx by her side.

Meanwhile, on Earth, Aelyx, finds himself thrown into a full-scale PR campaign to improve human-L’eihr relations. Humans don’t know that their very survival depends on this alliance: only Aelyx’s people have the technology to fix the deadly contamination in the global water supply that human governments are hiding. Yet despite their upper hand, the leaders of his world suddenly seem desperate to get humans on their side, and hardly bat an eye at extremists’ multiple attempts on Aelyx’s life. The Way clearly needs humans’ help but with what? And what will they ask for in return? Click here to read more about Guest Post by Author Lauren Hammond.

Dear Invaded,

I absolutely adore YA Sci-Fi, and you were no exception. I devoured the first book in your series, and anxiously awaited to find out what would happen next in Cara and Aelyx’s individual journeys.

Your story picks up right where Alienated drops off, with Cara forced to go to Aelyx’s home planet, L’eihr, and Aelyx back to Earth to help solidify alliance negotiations. But their jobs don’t turn out to be as easy as they would seem. Cara finds herself with alien clone bullies, a new diet, and extreme classes/physical training on top of trying to gain basic human freedoms as the human representative on a panel preparing for a human colony of L’eihr. Meanwhile, Aelyx is busy being shuttled from one PR event to another trying to help his people’s image and gain the Earthen’s trust, but someone keeps making attempts on his life. With both Cara and Aelyx struggling to survive on opposite planets, how can they all learn to live together in peace?

I felt terrible for Cara. Trying to adjust to life on a new planet without chocolate? No, thanks. And then Aelyx is nearly getting assassinated at every turn of your pages. To say their lives are effed up during the entirety of you is a vast understatement, Invaded. My heart churned with despair for each of them. As always, Cara’s snark had me laughing out loud, but despite that usually being my fave part of a book, I found that my favorite part of you was the new relationships that were formed in your pages. Seeing some more of characters we have yet to and new ones too, was indescribable. It made your story that much more complex and heart-warming. MANY NEW SHIPS AND OTPs ABOUND.

On top of the new ships, I enjoyed Cara’s chapters the most, because something cray was always happening on L’eihr, whether it be suspicious meteorites or creepy members of The Way. Something was always going down. It captivated me. And the blog posts! I was extremely happy to see that Cara started up a new blog. Maybe I’m biased about the blog posts thing but I WOULD LOVE TO SEE MORE OF THIS IN BOOKS!

All in all, I may have enjoyed you a little more than your first book. I think the only thing I would have loved to see more of inside your pages that were in Alienated was the steamy scenes between Aelyx and Cara. I remember fanning myself during Alienated, but unfortunately, since our couple is separated for the majority of you, Invaded, those steamy scenes were few and far between. Maybe your author, Melissa Landers, has a steamy comm call convo up her sleeves? One can hope!! (As I definitely am!) Four stars to you, Invaded.