Skyward Series

Author

Published Time

September 3, 2026

Why I Am Reviewing

Our library has close to 120 member families, which means hundreds of children look through my shelves to grow, be entertained, learn new things, and cultivate their dreams. As one of the caretakers of their reading lives, I must have high standards, preview books aggressively, and read with their development and formation in mind.

My Plumfield Moms work reviewing books took on deeper meaning when we opened the library because the “readers” were no longer people “out there,” but tender souls in here. I have always tried to be careful, but now I know who I am being careful for. In this review, you will find me advocating for those souls. If it resonates with you and the souls in your care, stay a while. Maybe make a cuppa tea.

As we enter our fourth year as a library, more of my young readers have grown into teen readers. Understandably, they want the books their friends are reading. By and large, that means fantasy. Modern fantasy caters to teens with adolescent characters, intense stories, philosophical questions, challenges to the status quo, romantic passions, and a great many feelings. When done well, some of this can be a lovely sweet treat. Sadly, much of the genre has low standards for writing, celebrates progressive values, includes sensual—if not sexual—content, and is designed to addict readers before filling them with bad ideas and bad values.

I was so hopeful that Brandon Sanderson’s Skyward series would be an exception. I had watched videos of Sanderson and found him funny, creative, clever, and interesting. I had always heard that his books were clean and moral. (We are dealing with fantasy, so I accept that its rules of morality are not always identical to those of Christendom.) I also read Elantris and really liked it for mature readers. And so, I was hopeful.

How It Started…

The first book, Skyward, was indeed very interesting. It was quirky and fun and kept me guessing about where it would go. As a Star Trek fan, I laughed at the obvious Trek references and generally delighted in the storytelling. I was not impressed by the trademark teen whining and melodrama, but I understood what it was and thought this might be a great, clean addition to our very small fantasy shelf.

If the first book was a great echo of something like Star Wars (but with Trekkie nuance) the second was less so. The first book could have ended a little differently and stood alone as a great book. But in the second act of this four-act space opera, things became a little less clever, a little more progressive, and a little too convenient for our heroine.

Spensa spends nearly all of the second book away from the friends and community we appreciated so much in the first. She has too much power and too much good luck, and too many people tell her that she is their only hope. While I enjoyed the second book, I began to find it tedious. I encountered some eyebrow-raising content and found myself justifying why we could still consider the series for the library.

When It Went Off the Rails…

As Starsight grew more tedious, I kept reading in the hope that the series might be a good replacement for readers drawn to progressive books such as Keeper of the Lost Cities, which I abhor. Sometimes we keep less-than-excellent modern books as “bridge books” that help move readers away from what they have been reading at the public library and toward better options.

Sanderson is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Because the LDS revere marriage and openly care for the good of others, I reasonably expected these stories to be clean and respectful. By modern standards, they are. That said, my standards are higher than modern standards.

Fantasy necessarily asks us to accept invented worlds with strange religions and unfamiliar mythologies. That is part of entering an imagined world. But the series’ treatment of Paradise Lost is something different and far more troubling. Spensa defends Satan as a hero, reading his rebellion as courage and resistance to unjust authority. The concern is not only that defiance is presented as heroic, but that the conversation suggests Christ’s defeat of Satan has become, in this imagined future, merely an old myth that no longer bears any truth. For Christian readers, that is not a harmless piece of worldbuilding, and the story never adequately corrects or answers it.

In the third and fourth books, the romantic relationship between Spensa and her boyfriend is fraught with problems. He lets her get away with reckless, bad behavior. He is neither a strong nor compelling character. There is no balance in their relationship, no iron sharpening iron, no actual love between them. Their relationship is a teenage fantasy trope of attraction amplified by the stress hormones of living in constant peril. He exists to make her more interesting and the story more addictive. It is exhausting, annoying, and not good for our teens.

More than that, Spensa actively tries to seduce him—her word, not mine—going so far as to unclip her bra while they give each other back rubs. She wants the encounter to progress, but, thankfully, he slows it down. Throughout the books, they have several conversations about doing more and deepening their physical relationship once the never-ending war is less stressful.

Finally, in the fourth book—the most boring and confusing—we reach the climactic battle. One of the more interesting characters wonders whether she will ever return home to her family, her life, and her girlfriend.

In Summary

The series does ask important questions about artificial intelligence, the dignity of life, and just behavior in war situations. I wish that Sanderson had poured his creative genius into exploring those topics more fully rather than wasting so many pages on endless battle scenes and teen romantic angst.

The friendships are similarly disappointing and almost entirely one-sided. Everyone is inordinately patient with and forgiving of Spensa, but she remains self-centered and a poor friend. Sanderson gave her a hero complex without giving her friends enough substance or strength to balance her or offer meaningful support. All of the human characters are weakly developed, and after the first book, there are practically no adult characters of value. The only characters who are actually interesting are the two AIs.

I hoped this potentially clever and interesting space opera would be a safe, enjoyable option for teen readers in my library. Sadly, what began with so much promise ended poorly and presented too many content concerns for me to defend its place on our shelves. I will not be adding the series to the library.

Content Considerations

Sexual/Reproductive Matters

In all of the books, the regenerative and reproductive lives of aliens are wondered at and, in some places, discussed.
In Starsight, we meet alien humanoid creatures who are gender-neutral and who pair off with another – one choosing to be the “left” and the other the “right” half of the partnership. These creatures join together to create a new offspring who is born as an adolescent. That adolescent has the memories and thoughts of both parents in its mind as it spends 3 months auditioning for the role of child. In this way the family may observe the personality and tendencies of the offspring before deciding whether or not to keep it. If at the end of 3 months that family wants a new version, the offspring reenters the development chamber and is rematerialized and then reformed into a new version. Spensa is horrified by this practice.
Spensa and her boyfriend develop a physical relationship that is clearly leading to sex outside of marriage. As mentioned in the review, Spensa unhooks her bra at one point in an effort to seduce him. (She uses the word “seduce.”)

LGTBQ References

Throughout there are hints that sexuality is fluid among many of the humanoid aliens.
In the fourth book, one of the female characters references her girlfriend.

Language

Spensa and her friends uses the word d*mn with frequency.
Spensa uses a made up swear word, “scud,” on every other page.

Worldview/Theology

Spensa’s grandmother tells Spensa many, many Old Earth tales. Spensa convolutes them and misapplies them.
Spensa discusses Paradise Lost and defends Satan as a hero, interpreting his rebellion as courageous resistance to unjust authority.
The conversation also suggests that, in this imagined future, Christ’s defeat of Satan has become merely an old myth that no longer bears any truth. The story does not adequately correct or challenge her interpretation.
One of the characters is always saying “The saints this…” or “The saint said…”. When Spensa points out that we have no idea who The Saint or the saints are, the characters condemns her as a heretic. But then laughs it off as a joke. This is confusing and weird.