Scavenge the Stars is a gender-flipped YA retelling of The Count of Monte Cristo. Why it has that title, I'm really not sure since this is definitely a fantasy and not a sci-fi. That aside, I thought there was a lot to like here. Amaya is a complicated heroine with a thirst for revenge and a gray sense of morality. The world is evocative with a strong sense of place, though the wider world felt more vague in its descriptions. It is diverse with thoughtful and cool touches, like a social convention involving a pin that gender non-binary people can wear to indicate their use of they/them pronouns. I enjoyed a lot of the book, but the beginning and end felt a bit muddled.

The first part of the book felt a little confusing to me and it took awhile for me to get a sense for where the plot was headed, but around the 35-40% mark things became more clear and I became more invested in the characters and the mystery surrounding Amaya's past. I think part of this might be the dual perspective in different timelines that suddenly becomes aligned. I think this might have worked better if Cayo's perspective was added later on so that the timelines always aligned. I get that the idea was to keep a sense of mystery, but I think it ends up just feeling confusing. The ending also didn't read super clearly. A lot happens in a short period of time and not all of it makes sense.

That said, I thought that the characters were interesting and fairly well-developed and I liked the idea of this girl trying to get revenge and dealing with moral uncertainties. I know this is the start of a duology and I'm not really sure in needs a second book, but it could be interesting. This is definitely action packed with twists, so worth checking out if the plot appeals to you. This is one where I suspect there will be people completely in love with it, but I just didn't connect with it as much as I might have liked. I received an advance copy of this book for review from the publisher. All opinions are my own.

CW include violence, enslavement of children, physical abuse, murder, depictions of blood and gore, terminal illness, loss of a loved one, torture, death of children, drug & alcohol use.