What (am I currently reading)?

I am currently listening to the audiobook The Space Between Us by Doug Johnstone and narrated by Angus King.   This was published in paperback Orenda Books in March 2023,  and in audio by Isis Publishing Ltd. (also March 2023).  The genre is science fiction. 

Book Blurb   (taken from    https://orendabooks.co.uk/   )

When three people suffer strokes after seeing dazzling lights over Edinburgh, then awake completely recovered, they’re convinced their ordeal is connected to the alien creature discovered on a nearby beach … an adrenaline-soaked, deeply humane, life-affirming first-contact novel from one of Scotland’s most revered authors…

**Selected for BBC 2 Between the Covers 2023**

Connecting will change everything…

Lennox is a troubled teenager with no family. Ava is eight months pregnant and fleeing her abusive husband. Heather is a grieving mother and cancer sufferer. They don’t know each other, but when a meteor streaks over Edinburgh, all three suffer instant, catastrophic strokes…

…only to wake up the following day in hospital, miraculously recovered.

When news reaches them of an octopus-like creature washed up on the shore near where the meteor came to earth, Lennox senses that some extra-terrestrial force is at play. With the help of Ava, Heather and a journalist, Ewan, he rescues the creature they call ‘Sandy’ and goes on the run.

But they aren’t the only ones with an interest in the alien … close behind are Ava’s husband, the police and a government unit who wants to capture the creature, at all costs. And Sandy’s arrival may have implications beyond anything anyone could imagine…

Why (have I chosen to read it)?

Recently I’ve started a number of audiobooks and not finished them, so I needed something that was going to interest me as well as entertain.  I therefore went over to the Orenda Books website ( https://orendabooks.co.uk/  ) where I knew I would find something that would fit this criteria.  Doug Johnstone is an author new to me – I understand he usually writes crime fiction, and that this is his first science fiction book.  I rarely read science fiction, but such is my confidence in Orenda Books, that I chose an author unknown to me and a genre unusual for me. 

While (I am reading it)

I visited Brixen (Bressanone) in Sud-Tirol, Italy, where I enjoyed exploring their countryside, attractions and tasting some (many, if truth be told!) of their wines. 

All the best,  Emma