Book Review: A Mars Adventure

Red Star Rebels by Amie Kaufman

Published: February 2026

Summary from Goodreads:

It’s 2067, and the Graves family has transformed Mars from a lifeless rock into a chaotic patch of settlements. You can buy a one-way ticket to a new life–if you’re rich.

Enter Hunter Graves, the handsome, ambitious grandson of the man who settled Mars. With spectacularly bad timing, Hunter arrives at the United Nations base just as an emergency evacuation sends everyone scurrying for safety. Except he’s left behind. Uh-oh.

Also Cleo, a sharp-tonged stowaway with no intention of dying today, and even less patience for overconfident trust fund boys. But the enemy of your enemy might just help you survive, so here we are.

It turns out the evacuation is just a cover for the mercenaries who come next, and the plan to blow up the base–and every trace of their crime–in eight hours.

Now, Hunter and Cleo have one shot to stop the explosion, escape alive, and deal with the inconvenient fact that they’re falling for each other.

Confession:

This was such a fun read! It was well paced with lots of action. I loved all of the ways the two main characters came up with to slow down the bad guys. I also loved their little romance. But the ending felt a bit rushed and I felt like we were left hanging a little bit too? I just wanted a little bit more about what came after the end.

The story is told from dual points of view, which I just loved. Both Hunter and Cleo were fun characters to spend time with. Cleo is very smart, clever and very inventive when it came down to thinking up ways to slow down the mercenaries. I really enjoyed her fiery personality. I also really liked Hunter. He is smart and clever too, and it didn’t hurt that he was so well versed in technology. He was a bit clueless about life on Mars, but he learned pretty quick. These two made a very good team, and I really enjoyed watching their romance bloom, even under these dire circumstances.

The mercenaries were a mixed bunch,and mostly cut out characters of that type. But we did get to know one of them well. Sabrina was a bad ass but she also had a conscience. She really didn’t want people to get hurt and was an important part of the ending.

The story was a good one too. I loved all of the action.The pacing of the story was great. There is a lot of story packed into less than 300 pages. The setting was quite realistic too, although I doubt we will be that far along in colonizing Mars by 2067, but who knows. The politics surrounding the colonies felt realistic, as did the company’s ruthless behavior. There were a couple of twists that were foreseeable, but that didn’t take away from the story as a whole. The ending was a little rushed and wild, but fit with the rest of the story. I would have liked just a little bit more though. It felt a little incomplete at the end.

If you have enjoyed this author’s other space romance books, this is one you will want to read. If you haven’t read her stories before, this isn’t a bad one to start with. It was fun and full of action. Plus the characters are both clever and smart and ones you can cheer for.