Sacrifice of Blood and Stars

On a distant dwarf planet, a young soldier discovers her mortal enemy is her only tie to the world she left behind, in a high-stakes sci-fi romance. Two months after her eighteenth birthday, scrappy Hikari Skye is ready to leave her ramshackle mobile home on Earth for icy dwarf planet Ceres and the underground bases that house Space Force. She's trading her dingy trailer park; her baby sister, Bea; and her best friend, Rho, for the excitement of the Proxy Wars and the freedom of the galactic front lines-where her father once deserted his own platoon. And the most appealing part? She's leaving behind Draeden Rache, the cocky, privileged bully who tried to kiss her last year. Appealing, that is, until Drae and Kari are tied together by the Pairing Ceremony as Sympathetics. Each week, she'll share everything with him and him alone: emotions, fears . . . and the sneaking suspicion that something is very, very wrong. As Kari struggles to survive life in a unit that can only see her as a defector's spawn, Drae and Rho work to solve a mystery of their own back at a futuristic UC Berkeley while their professor is hunted down for daring to teach beyond propaganda. With the California Federation's proxy war with the Siberian Federation heating up and Raiders creeping closer by the day, Kari and Drae's weekly interactions turn into a race against time, even as their feelings for each other grow. And there's something both Kari's tough drill sergeant and Drae's wealthy father don't want them to know . . . Fourth Wing meets The Expanse in A Sacrifice of Blood and Stars, the first book of an enemies-to-lovers science fiction series from the New York Times-bestselling author of Stranger Things: Starcourt Mall Escape.

With tensions rising on Earth, former mortal enemies find their newfound romance threatened by interstellar distance-and an alien attack. The invading alien Astrals have been stopped in their tracks, humanity's warring political factions have been consolidated under a semi-united Earth Federation government, and the lag time between Kari Skye and Drae Rache's Sympathetic Program exchanges has stretched to a week. All less than a month after they consummated their relationship on her father's Raider ship. Now, Space Force soldier Kari is deploying on a secret interstellar mission against the Astrals, with her bunkmate, Luna, in tow and her family close behind. But Kari's handsome new commanding officer, Major Apollo, is drawing her attention . . . and he may be the only one with an actual plan to stop the alien threat. Not to mention she's beginning to have strange nightmares, ones that may send her home for good. Meanwhile, Drae has become a secret agent for the Resistance against the Federation government, seeking to disarm the stars in favor of diplomacy. But Drae also finds himself tempted by Willow, the headstrong Resistance fighter who carries him messages from Resistance leader Trebond. And with tensions rising on campus, his predatory former best friend, Jude, is suddenly back at UC Berkeley-and he wants revenge. Can Drae and Kari maintain their fledgling romance? Or will the pressures of college, deployment, and long-distance love turn them back into enemies? Fourth Wing meets The Expanse in A Sacrifice of Flesh and Fury, the second book of the enemies-to-lovers sci-fi series from the New York Times-bestselling author of Stranger Things: Starcourt Mall Escape.