Meet Adina: a woman who has never felt at home on Earth
Born at the moment when Voyager 1 is launched into space, Adina is a baby of unusual perception. Tiny and jaundiced, she reaches for warmth and light. As a child, she recognises she is different, not least because of her strange knowledge of a faraway planet. Then a fax machine arrives at home. Her mission is clear: she must report on the oddities of humankind.
As Adina grows up, she dispatches transmissions on the terrors and delights of human existence. But then she starts to wonder. Is there a chance there are others like her out there?
Adina sees our world differently. And her gentle, perceptive - and funny - observations offer a quietly joyful new view of life on Earth, the challenge of knowing ourselves and the miracle of finding our people in this vast universe.
'One of the best books I have read this year' KALIANE BRADLEY, Guardian 'I do not know how my life would be if I hadn't read this book' *Reader review* 'A stunner. Quirky, poignant, magical, heartbreaking - I loved it' *Reader review*
'A remarkable funny-sad novel' New York Times 'Beautyland is a miracle. I'll be rereading it forever' KAVEH AKBAR 'Beautiful and hilarious and transcendent . . . Bertino is an other-worldly talent' TOMMY ORANGE 'A book that I will recommend to people for the rest of my life' DAKOTA JOHNSON
Author
About Marie-Helene Bertino
Marie-Helene Bertino is the author of Safe As Houses, winner of the Iowa Short Fiction Prize, and has received numerous accolades for her short stories. Originally from Philadelphia, she now lives in Brooklyn. 2 A.M. at The Cat's Pajamas is her first novel
