The Spaceship Next Door
Buy the Book: Amazon, Apple Books, Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million, IndieBound, Houghton Mifflin, Google Play, Kobo, Audible, iTunesPublished by: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt / John Joseph Adams Books
Release Date: September 4, 2018
Pages: 368
ISBN13: 978-1328567468
New edition news
The second edition of The Spaceship Next Door will be published by John Joseph Adams Books, an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, on September 4, 2018. Look for it wherever books are sold!
Overview
The world changed on a Tuesday.
When a spaceship landed in an open field in the quiet mill town of Sorrow Falls, Massachusetts, everyone realized humankind was not alone in the universe. With that realization, everyone freaked out for a little while.
Or, almost everyone. The residents of Sorrow Falls took the news pretty well. This could have been due to a certain local quality of unflappability, or it could have been that in three years, the ship did exactly nothing other than sit quietly in that field, and nobody understood the full extent of this nothing the ship was doing better than the people who lived right next door.
Sixteen-year old Annie Collins is one of the ship’s closest neighbors. Once upon a time she took every last theory about the ship seriously, whether it was advanced by an adult ,or by a peer. Surely one of the theories would be proven true eventually—if not several of them—the very minute the ship decided to do something. Annie is starting to think this will never happen.
One late August morning, a little over three years since the ship landed, Edgar Somerville arrived in town. Ed’s a government operative posing as a journalist, which is obvious to Annie—and pretty much everyone else he meets—almost immediately. He has a lot of questions that need answers, because he thinks everyone is wrong: the ship is doing something, and he needs Annie’s help to figure out what that is.
Annie is a good choice for tour guide. She already knows everyone in town and when Ed’s theory is proven correct—something is apocalyptically wrong in Sorrow Falls—she’s a pretty good person to have around.
As a matter of fact, Annie Collins might be the most important person on the planet. She just doesn’t know it.
Praise
“Doucette’s genial, leisurely novel feels like a throwback to the squeaky-clean science fiction of the mid-twentieth century . . . The town is vividly realized and described . . . [and] Doucette’s dry sense of humor and obvious affection for his characters go a long way . . . A warmhearted ode to a simpler time and place in a community so small that everybody knows everybody else’s business.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“An enormously enjoyable first contact story you won’t forget, from a talented new voice in sci-fi!”
—A. G. Riddle, best-selling author of The Atlantis Gene and Pandemic
“Honestly, this is absolutely everything that I ever wanted in a Sci-Fi novel that I didn’t know I wanted. But let’s start from the beginning. From the first page, I was immediately reminded of J.K. Rowling’s humor. Now that is not to say that this book will read like a Harry Potter book, or that it’s the exact same sort of humor, but Mr. Doucette has a unique writing wit that is just such a pleasure to read.”
—From Dani Builds A Library
“The writer knows his way with words, it’s like reading a new Stephen King novel with many of the horror elements cleverly toned down to the background. The “suspension of disbelief” is executed very well throughout the book, against all the odds of themes like teenagers, alien spaceships and national security there is a strong credibility with the text.”
—From Netgalley reviewer Valentin Hintikka
“I bought this for my middle school aged son after talking with the author and determining that it was age appropriate. Then I decided to read it. Sometimes young adult fiction is great (Hunger Games) sometimes it insults your intelligence (TwilIght). I don’t know if Mr. Doucette set out to write a story for young adults, but it’s very appealing to them…”
—Goodreads reviewer
“The Spaceship Next Door by Gene Doucette is a story like I’ve never read before. It was refreshing, funny, and intense. It gave me goosebumps multiple times and, despite predicting a few plot twists right before they were about to happen, I was still surprised and delighted.”
—From The Page Turner
“The first chapter is called The Fault in our Starship. If you take joy in the brilliance of that, then this book will continue to give happiness.”
—Goodreads reviewer
Excerpt
