Space Rocks takes the alien invasion theme and turns it on its head. Chorkle lives on an asteroid that humans have decided to use for an iridium mining colony. Of course, Chorkle's people the Xotonians, aren't very pleased by the new arrivals. Suspicion, misunderstanding, and other problems arise as the two races stumble through this "first contact." (Sorry "Star Trek" fans, there is no Prime Directive for these space travellers.) The younger members of the mining colony do have a few things in common with Chorkle including a craving for Feeney's Original Astronaut Ice Cream* bars and playing video games like Xenostryfe III. In spite of their presence in an outer space colony, the children are very realistic. They watch movies, play games, argue, race their rocket bikes and talk about their online friends from Joynyt.com. Although Chorkle is Xotonian, he seems to have the same kind of problems human kids do - disagreeing with his parent, dealing with bullies, not being good at sports.
Readers may notice a few similarities between the story and parts of "Lost in Space," such as the kids being included on the mission as part of the PR, unexpected wormholes popping up, etc. Between the possiblity of war between Xotonians and humans, space battles, a really vicious game of oog-ball, and discovering long lost technology, there is plenty of action to you turning the pages. If you enjoy sci-fi/fantasy with humor, action, and characters you can relate to (whatever their species), then check out
Space Rocks.
I read an e-book provided by the publisher through NetGalley. It was published on February 6, 2014.
Chorkle, the alien, has his own Twitter account @chorklefromgelo .
* Mr. O'Donnell's wife made her own version of Feeney's Original Astronaut Ice Cream.
The second book,
For the Love of Gelo! is now out.
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