Radialloy

 Firmament: Radialloy by J. Grace Pennington.

 Summary:

 Andi is the second medical officer on board a spaceship. She loves her job, she loves the friends she has made on the ship, and more than that she loves her adopted father - Doctor Gerard Handel Lloyd. However, life is about to change for her, and it starts the day she meets the ship's new Navigator, August Howitz. (His first name is George, but you may forget that fact as I have done.)

 Slowly, things begin to unravel for Andi and she uncovers a secret about her past, while the same time the ship she has called home for so long is taken over and the lives of her friends - and her beloved doctor - are put in danger.

 It is up to Andi to save them, but to do so she might end up losing the home she loves.

 I shouldn't have liked this book. It has everything I dislike, pretty much. It is about a girl - I have bad experience with books about girls - it is about a doctor and has medical references throughout, and it is told in first person. However, not even halfway through I fell in love with the story, the characters, and I knew I would want more by the time I finished it. I loved Andi and the time spent with her and didn't want the adventure to end.

 Andi is a brave girl who does what needs to be done when it needs to be done. But at the same time she is vulnerable. She is scared, confused, and wants her father to hold her and make everything right. She was someone I felt I could relate to, someone I would have loved for a best friend in real life. She wasn't stuck up, she didn't think she was better than everyone else, she was just a great friend. I can only hope I will have the chance to go on even more adventures with her.

 The other characters were just as amazing. I LOVED the doctor. He was kind of dry, a sort of logical man who looked at life the way it was. And at the same time he was one of the most warm hearted characters I've ever met. I wished he could give me a hug and tell ME it would be all right. 

 The captain of the ship...slightly quick tempered, more concerned about his crew then himself, and always trying to set Andi up with a fitting fellow. (He looked after her as if she were his own daughter.)

 Eagle Crash, the doctor's nephew and Andi's adopted cousin. Crash was almost the kind of character I couldn't stand, almost. He is cocky and, being such a great pilot, thinks he is better than everyone. He does stupid things just to show off and gets a lot of people mad at him. But it is hard to stay mad at him for long. Most of the time I wanted to strangle him and hug him at the same time. However, he does care about his friends, a lot, and especially about Andi.

 And then you have August, the young man with one of the biggest conflicts in the book. I felt so bad for him, all the while I was yelling at him to do the right thing. He was....how do I sum up August? He was kind of complex and hard to understand, one has to look deeper into his character to see all of the amazingness there, but it is worth it. I want another book just about August - oh, did I mention he's Australian? Well...technically he isn't, but he has the accent....and that is the most important part. 

 I was also surprised that there wasn't any romance in this book. It was just an adventure, with secrets and mysteries and a rotten villain I spent the whole time yelling at. And it felt very Star Trek. In a good way - though there is no bad way for something to feel Star Trek. 

 Do I recommend this book? YES! Even if you are like me and don't like medical stories, it is worth it. The characters are worth it. They feel like a big family and they readily adopt the reader as their own.