So yesterday morning (in the UK), I woke up to the amazing news that the Mars rover Curiosity landed safely on the surface of another planet. It absolutely blew my mind. I’m sure I’m not alone when I say I dreamed of being an astronaut as a teenager (a terrible Physics grades put an end to that dream!) and so seeing the delight on the faces of the men and women of NASA who poured their blood, sweat, brains and energy into making this landing a success was so exciting. I don’t know whether Olympics fever has made me extra emotional, but it was so incredibly heart-warming to see their hard work come to fruition. And now I can’t wait to see the images that Curiosity comes back with!
This renewed excitement at seeing humanity reach out to the stars couldn’t have come at a better time for our debut novellist Janet Edwards, whose sci-fi novel Earth Girl touches on a subject we can all relate to: what if everyone could explore the universe, except for you?
Earth Girl has been picking up loads of buzz lately, including being chosen by the Amazon Kindle editors as their YA Book of the Month (August) and receiving this rave review from Kate of ‘For Winter Nights’ blog, who says Earth Girl ‘ is the best YA novel I’ve read this year and I am confident that it will be one of my contenders for novel of the year.’
To celebrate Curiosity’s landing, we’re giving away an early copy of Earth Girl! To enter, answer this ridiculously easy question in the comments or e-mail us: thevoyager@harpercollins.co.uk by 16 August 2012: On 6 August 2012, what planet did the Curiosity rover land on? [for residents of UK + Commonwealth (excluding Canada) + Europe, only]
To pre-order the paperback edition of Earth Girl (Aug 16 2012), visit Amazon or Waterstones or support your favourite independent retailer.
To pre-order the Kindle edition of Earth Girl (Aug 16 2012), click here.
