Life in Outer Space by Melissa Keil


My 2 cents:

You know it's a good YA book when your own teen picks it up, and 15 minutes later, you glance over at her, and she hasn't moved (except to turn the pages as quickly as she can). That's what happened this week when I handed my daughter Melissa Keil's debut YA novel, Life in Outer Space. It's a good thing I got to it first. Sponsored by Hardie Grant Egmont Publishing, Keil's new novel is the 2012 first-ever winner of the Ampersand Project. Sam Kinnison (a year-11 movie-geek and screenwriter-in-the-making) and Camilla Carter (new-girl-at-school and daughter of a famous music critic) win readers' hearts immediately with their nerdy, brilliant, funny, cool selves.

Sam and Camilla's story is heartbreakingly authentic. I laughed (a lot), winced (a little), and nodded my head in empathy (more than once). But, mostly (like my daughter), I just turned the pages as fast as I could. Sam's friends, Mike, Allison and Adrian, round out this cast of characters at a high school set in Keil's native Melbourne, Australia. But if it weren't for the “down-under” terminology, this story could be set at any high school in the universe. As Camilla tells Sam:

“Anyway . . . school is school. I've never been to Mongolia or Afghanistan, but I'd bet money that school is the same in those places as well.” (p. 56)

A lot happens in the hallways, classrooms, cafeteria and janitor's closet at Bowen Lakes Secondary School. Complicated relationships abound, as well as: World of Warcraft games, the beach, karate, Justin Zigoni, homework, an awesome Spring Dance, parents, absent parents, movies, music, Princess Leia and Star Wars.

See if you can resist that combination. I couldn't.




Length: 309 pages
Worth Your Time? Yes, you bet your “arse” it is. There is some “language” in Keil's novel, not very much, but some.

Bonus: Check out my next blog for a riveting author-interview with Melissa Keil.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Real Mermaids Don't Need High Heels by Helene Boudreau (Author/Interview)

Image
My 2 cents: Mermaids! Mermen! Ninth grade. Jade and BFF Cori, boyfriend Luke and frenemy Lainey Chamberlain. Add all this to a small town on a lake and the ocean, and you have just hit the jackpot for YA Literature. Helene Boudreau's newest mermaid novel, Real Mermaids Don't Need High Heels , comes out this month (February, 2013). Sweet, funny (and suspenseful), this little treat of a book is ready for publication just in time for Valentine's Day! Just as Jade enters ninth grade at Port Toulouse Regional High, ready for lockers and lunch (free of teacher supervision), and walking to class with her cool, new boyfriend (Luke), she finds herself suddenly back in Defense Mode, preparing to fight off a new attack from the errant Mermish Council. New friendships form, discoveries and rescues are made, but will Jade save her mermaid family and friends in time to attend the Fall Folly Dance? And, more importantly, if she is free to go, what will she wear? 12
Read more

Interview with Melissa Keil

Image
Tell my readers a little about yourself I’m a writer and children’s book editor, and a self-confessed lover of pop culture and all things nerdy. I’ve had lots of odd and varied jobs in my career, including working very briefly as a high school teacher, but making books – writing and editing – is really my dream job. Melbourne, Australia is home, though I have lived all over the place, including stints in London, and northern Minnesota for a short time when I was younger. Life in Outer Space is my first published novel, although like most writers, I have a bottom draw filled with half-finished manuscripts. How did you get the idea for your characters, Sam and Camilla? Sam’s voice really came first; one of those odd moments where I was looking for inspiration for a new project (having decided to abandon the novel I had been working on), but really had no idea what the ‘new’ thing was going to be. I was attempting to write in a café when I spotted a poster for a horror fil
Read more

Legend by Marie Lu

Image
My 2 cents: You have about six weeks to read Marie Lu's breakout debut novel LEGEND, before the sequel, PRODIGY, is released January 29, 2013. Temple Hill Entertainment (Twilight) and CBS Films bought movie rights to LEGEND, and there is constant cyber-talk about which actors will play which characters. Will Kristen Stewart play June? Who will play Day, an Asian-Mongolian-Caucasian teen boy? Will Marie Lu get her wish of Ben Barnes portraying June's brother, Metias? Who will play Commander Jameson? Angelina Jolie? Or Meryl Streep? Enough talk about the movie that is soon to be in the making. Let's talk about the novel. First, no question, similarities abound between Legend and Hunger Games. Like Suzanne Collins, Lu sets her novel somewhere in North America's future. Both Day and June (Lu's central characters) live in the “Republic of America,” which is in Los Angeles, California, and is at war with the Colonies, the rest of the former United States, appa
Read more