Dee is from one of two colonies on Mars, Davinci and Newton. Like the majority of citizens of Davinci, Dee is a girl; Y’s (boys), being extremely rare. Dee is a gardener and works hard on the lightly terraformed Mars to ensure the colony’s survival while waiting for Phase 2 – a supplies drop off from Earth. When she spots a mysterious meteor from Earth, she rushes to the crash site to find she’s not alone – a boy (!) from Newton is also there. While to her he is a precious, if slightly stupid, commodity to be protected, to him she is a dangerous Other and is not to be trusted.

Mars Awakens is a much needed and much welcomed ‘hard’ sci-fi for primary school readers. It does what the genre at its absolute best should – gets you excited for a distant, alien future that might very well happen. For ages 10+.

Dani Solomon is the manager at Readings Kids