First of all, I love this cover!! The one on Goodreads is different, but I find this one more appealing even if the other seems more relevant to the story. I found the story to be okay. Good premise though.

The beginning and especially the dialogues at the beginning felt a lot like a young teens/ children book kind of writing style, but once you were further into the book, it got better! The descriptions of the surroundings and actions were pretty precise and interesting, because a lot of the time the author used comparisons I would have never thought of but were very accurate.
There were some action packed scenes, but for me personally, there could have been more stuff going on.
The ending was really interesting, especially the time/ making your future concept was awesome and it started an interesting thought process!

Nowhere on Earth is one part sci-fi, one part adventure story. I really enjoyed this story of survival - both against the elements and against the bad guys. Rugged terrain and the beauty of an icy Alaska backdrop brings a sense of harshness and danger to the story, while the mystery of Emily’s past and who and what exactly Aidan is, draws the reader in.

Emily is on a mission to save her brother. They have snuck aboard a plane heading from nowhere Alaska to Anchorage. Emily has been wanting to escape since her parents dragged her to Alaska and away from her friends and ballet, wanting also to escape the trouble she is in at school. But when the plane crashes, she, Aidan and the pilot must depend on each other to survive. Emily will do anything to protect Aidan, even if it means fighting off the men who come after them. Because Aidan isn’t from Earth and they want to prevent him from being able to go home.

It’s funny, the fact that there are aliens, spaceships and ‘people’ from another planet is almost a side story in this book, one that isn’t overly explored. Details of how or why or what aren’t explored. If you want to know everything about the aliens, where they come from, what they want, how their technology works or where they live, you won’t find it in this book. Emily readily accepts that Aidan is from another planet, though his spaceship is kind of hard to dispute.

We join Aidan and Emily after the plane crash, so her finding him and his spaceship, him joining her family, and their decision to flee is all filled in as backstory. It works, as it places the focus of the story on Emily and Aidan’s survival as they navigate the plane wreckage, trying to make the journey on foot and out running the bad guys.

Emily is awesome. She is a dancer, but as her parents’ daughter she can shoot, hunt and hike. And she’s not afraid to stand up for herself. She’s the perfect character to survive a plane crash in the middle of the snowy wilderness. As we learn about what happened to cause the trouble at school it becomes clearer show strong she is. Then she takes out the bad guys and gets Aidan, Bob the pilot and herself down the mountain on the plane wing!! She is clever, strong and doesn’t back down from a fight.

Nowhere on Earth was and yet wasn’t what I was expecting. The story of adventure and survival ticked all the boxes for me and I loved the strength of Emily. The bits about aliens and Aidan were curveballs I wasn’t sure what to do with. It works for the flow of the story, so long as you are okay with not learning more. And I think the details we do receive make the story of Emily’s past, her relationship with her family and facing her demons that much more important.

The publishers provided an advanced readers copy of this book for reviewing purposes. All opinions are my own.

For some reason, this book just didn't click with me. I'm pretty picky, I guess. I'm not even sure what it was about it that didn't resonate. It's absolutely a great book, just not for me.

3.5 stars rounded up to 4

This was a nice enough story about miscommunications in family & coming of age in the woods and through physical adversity but I just wasn’t sucked in as much as I could’ve been.

I thought I’d feel a lot more protective towards Aiden but I didn’t!

Overall though, good for contemporary sci-fi fans & it’s an easy read so doesn’t take too long to read but is 352 pages which is good.

Emily is 16 and a stowaway on a plane that just crashed in the wilderness of Alaska. What follows is a wild and intense story about a girl on the run to save an alien boy whom she calls her brother from the “men in black”.

I liked that the story picks up in the middle of the action and weaves the story of how we got to that point in among the plot. It is pretty intense in terms of the survival aspects as I’m sure you can imagine when it comes to a survival story in the wilderness of Alaska running from the government. There is one pretty graphic scene involving a dying animal, so if that’s something sensitive for you, definitely skip it. This was a fast paced story that kept my attention pretty easily, but it still just felt like it was missing that special something that would have made it something memorable.

This story was absolute perfection! I really enjoyed it. I wasn't sure what to expect, but this book delivered so much. It had tense action scenes, tear filled family connections, drama, and so much heart. If you want a book that reminds you of what it means to be human, pick this up. Four stars!

This book is like E.T. meets Hatchet. A quick, adrenaline fueled mission between a girl and an alien and what it means to find home. Best for grades 4-6 or readers who enjoy sci-fi/fantasy genres. Thanks for the free copy in exchange for my honest opinion. My 7th grader enjoyed the opportunity to read this galley during quarantine!

4.5/5

I received this ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

This was a wild ride!! After like the first two chapters, I was hooked. And the chapters are so short, which was kind of a relief since the book before had ridiculously long chapters.

It starts with a plane crash. There are survivors: a teenage girl and her little brother. They are running from something. But what? Then the men arrive. They are hunting the girl and boy.

Emily was a great character, I loved her spunk and quick wit immediately. Aidan, her younger brother, was very interesting and the relationship between these two was so heart warming and poignant. I seriously loved them so much.

This a quick, action-adventure survival tale. On the run from an unknown threat, Emily is determined to get her younger brother to somewhere safe. This is made much harder when the plane pilot, Bob, becomes injured in their escape from the plane crash.

The story made so many good points, and had so many overarching themes that I loved. The main two where family and living in the present. Overall: really quick and fun read that I loved.

I requested a copy of this book because I was really intrigued by the plot. You know those books where you don't really connect immediately when you pick it up, but once it grows on you, it sticks. This is that book! You have to be patient since the pacing is slow, but you will enjoy the ride once you're done.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Children's Books for approving my request to read an early copy of Nowhere on Earth in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you so much to net galley for sending me a copy of this book. I really enjoyed this action packed book. It starts with a plane crash and goes from there. Who recommend to like minded readers

Even if the plot reminded me of other books I read it was an engrossing and entertaining read.
A well thought cast of characters, a plot that flows and an interesting world building makes this story a good read.
Recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine.

“Stories are powerful things. People look for them, even when they don't exist.”

representation: MC has Salvadoran heritage.

[trigger warnings are listed at the bottom of this review and may contain spoilers]

This was super intriguing and fast paced! We're thrown right into the action from the get go and all we really know is that a girl and her 'brother' are on the run after being in a plane crash. The writing is super simple with a few memorable quotes sprinkled in, but overall it was a really easy & fast read even if I wanted the writing to be a bit more sophisticated!
I didn't expect there to be a little discussion on sexual harassment, but it definitely added more meaning and backstory to the main character's story.

If you're looking for a fast-paced survival story with a hint of sci-fi, this is the book for you! While I enjoyed it and sped through it, it wasn't super memorable for me though, so 3 stars it is!

trigger warnings: plane crash, fire, sexual harassment, guns, gun wounds, gore, animal death (wild animals only).

Thanks so much to NetGalley & Random House Children's for the e-arc!

~ Thank you to NetGalley, Random House, and Knopf Books for providing me with an early copy for review! ~

This was a super quick read with some very interesting ideas. Ultimately, I do think the story is slightly forgettable, but the messages it carries are very memorable.

I went into this hoping for a fast-paced survival story, and that is definitely what I got out of it. Of course, Aidan (the young boy in this novel) also represents a much larger message, one that is quite poignant and fitting.

I think Nick Lake wrote this book as a way to get some of his random ideas out into the world, and I think it was effective. I could resonate with a lot of Emily's thoughts and especially loved seeing a 16-year-old girl function so brilliantly in the wild. I envy her resilience out there and always hope I would be able to respond the same way.

The main themes of this book are love and personal liberty, and I think the growth between Emily and her family was illustrated in a very unique way (surviving in the wilderness trying to protect an alien child lol). So for that, I give this book high praise.

This definitely makes me eager to read Lake's other work, Satellite, which I've had on my shelves for a little while but haven't gotten around to quite yet.

Book Review: Nowhere on Earth by Nick Lake
Pub Date: 26 May 2020
Read courtesy of http://netgalley.com

One word: derivative.

First, though, this book didn't know what it wanted to be. It felt easy to read, but right off the bat (chapter 1, paragraph 1) the author threw in "big words," which could easily turn off the reluctant reader who might have otherwise found this a highly accessible book.

Second, I honestly do not know if my high schoolers like reading stories where the teenage protagonist (Emily) is smarter than the adults, but I personally dislike that as a plot method. Yes, teenagers mostly do think they are smarter than their parents, but to make that the premise of a book, as if the teen is a superhero and the parents are clueless, gets old.

OK, back to "derivative." Quite early in the story I felt like I was reading E.T., the Extra-terrestrial. This feeling resurfaced often. Then the Men in Black reference was repeated (and repeated) throughout the book. Then the plane crash was like Hatchet. I even got a hint of Star Wars with a line that sounded like, "These are not the droids you are looking for." Then a little bit of Star Trek was thrown in with their "prime directive"; Aidan couldn't interfere with the Earth's history. I hit my limit when Aidan's departure mimicked E.T.'s "I'll be right here" and I pictured the author thinking, "Queue E.T.s glowing finger." That wasn't the last unoriginal reference, though; the goodbye scene with Emily and Aidan turned into the intro from The Big Bang Theory.

I found the author's descriptions of Emily's father to be inconsistent in that his personality didn't match his character in the end. Throughout she describe him as "all military precision and attention," "Emily's dad had many useful things in his backpack - that was his style...," "...her dad, sticking to the logic of the story," "She was still averting her eyes. Her dad would see her lies in an instant, if he looked into them," "...her dad said needlessly, and Emily realized something else: this was how he dealt with stress. By trying to understand, to analyze," and "That was Emily's dad: no need to discuss what kind of message, or how, or anything irrelevant like that. Pure focus on the plan." Then at the end,

"There was an awkward silence, and then they laughed. They tried not to talk too much about the time after the plane crash - he parents told themselves a story abut it, that they'd been in a rush to get to civilization, but Emily could tell they only partially believed it, and that the best way for them to reconcile the events with the kind of people they understood themselves to be was to not think about it."

To be fair, there were some positives. The author obviously took a great deal of thought into making Aidan's character's abilities consistent and plausible. That's a real plus, since the story wouldn't have worked at all without this being tight and dependable. I was also pleasantly surprised at how clever the author had Emily be at the end with the man in the gray suit, playing like she knew as much as her parents did about the events that occurred.

However, I think the author did more thinking about how he could mix ET with Agent J or Spock than he did about making an original and absorbing story.

This is a honest review. I received this book at netgalley from the publisher an writer.

Summary:
Emily is 16 years and on the run, she has gotten herself in trouble at school. ,When she finds a little boy named Aidan wandering in the woods, she knows she needs to help him find his way home. But getting him home is not as easy. because Aidan is not from earth. To help him she and Aidan are on board off a little plane. But when this plan goes down into the side of a snowy mountain, it’s up to Emily to ensure Aidan and their pilot, Bob, make it off the mountain alive. But the "men in black" are hunting them down. The 3 of them needs to survive in the frozen landscape and try to help Aidan to get home. And the learning more about each other, and about life, than they ever thought possible.

I give this book 4 stars.
This book is not something I would have picked up on my own. But the story is well written. Sometimes I had some trouble to know who said what, and I had to reread the part. But the story of love. To be depend on each other in difficult circumstances really had me drawn into the story. This book is a fast but enjoyable story and I can recommend this book if you like a little bit of syfi .

Nowhere on Earth had me hooked from the beginning! This book is different but in a great way. It's a story of survival in the Alaskan wilderness after a plane crash. The plot was very engaging, and the characters (one who isn't a human) were very well developed. I also loved how well the past story of the main character Emily fit with her current story and didn't disrupt the flow of the book. Nowhere on Earth was an engaging book that I enjoyed reading.

So--whoa. Nowhere on Earth was an incredibly unique and interesting book unlike any other I have read before. When I first started reading, I thought it would just be a regular plane crash, survivalist, girl-and-her-kid-brother novel. Then there is an added layer of "Hm, why is there this secrecy here with the main character?" and "can we trust this pilot?" and THEN ka-boom. All of a sudden this seemingly normal book is not normal at all. We are in full-blown sci-fi land. Kid brother is not from Earth and we need to send messages to aliens and, of course, all of this is in the middle of the Alaskan wilderness. So I am rating this book four stars for being fast-paced, unique, and a healthy dose of what I think YA needs more of in the vein of sci-fi! Thank you, for granting me this book!

Thank you to NetGalley, Nick Lake, and Random House Children's for the opportunity to read Nowhere on Earth in exchange for an honest review. 

What initially drew me to this book was the point in the back-of-book blurb which reads: "But getting home is no easy matter, especially [when] Emily finds out that Aidan isn't even from Earth." Cool, aliens! I'm into reading about aliens right now...

Despite this book featuring an alien, it was quite mundane in the science-fiction elements. Rather, this book sends a powerful message about what it means to be a family.

After accidentally setting her new school on fire, Emily isn't sure how to confront her parents. When she runs outside after hearing a crash, she finds a little boy and a not-so-inconspicuous spacecraft. Aidan, as the boy calls himself, uses an alien ability in which he looks like something that needs to be cared for and protected by any who see him (as long as they don't see his true form underneath, which Emily has). This means, when Emily's parents see Aidan for the first time, their memories are flooded with him as if he was always the little boy in the family.

Knowing Emily must escape the small Alaskan town, from her misstep at school and to help Aidan get home, the two stow away on a man's delivery aircraft. When it crashes in the mountains in the middle of nowhere Alaska, men dressed in white with more than a few guns are on the prowl, probably to catch and dissect Aidan. In the pursuit of what Emily calls the "men in black" (even though they are wearing white, ha ha...), the trio (Emily, Aidan, and shot and injured pilot Bob) make their way down the mountain.

Emily's goal is to get Aidan to the old HAARP facility where he can send a long-range communication to his people and thus be saved. During their journey, Aidan and Emily's relationship proves that family is more than blood. Bob's past comes to life, and Emily's relationship with her own parents is explored.

A major message is that the past is the past and the present is the present, but the future is in the hands of the individual. Occurrences of the past will not be forgotten. Those who we have lost are never forgotten. 

While the story felt somewhat simple to me, in terms of my alien expectations, I absolutely loved this writing style. The chapters were usually quick and focused. The structure was interesting as well. The book starts with the plane crash and the reader is filled in periodically throughout the book about Emily's past. This keeps the action going while giving well-paced breaks to the reader.

This book was riveting and intriguing. Nick Lake's writing style is phenomenal, and I am definitely interested in reading some of his other works, as I devoured Nowhere on Earth rather quickly. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in a solid story that feels close to home.

* Even with a sci-fi touch, Nick Lake is able to connect the reader back to reality with current cultural links and jokes such as Nickelback being a horrible band.
* Suspense - always a cat and mouse chase, as soon as you think they’re all safe and free from harm, they’re not.
* E.T vibes with the extra-terrestrial trying to find their way home.
* The mind-blowing gift at the end was a bit underwhelming for how it was portrayed through the novel.
* Not everything made sense, was a little confusing.