Critics' Opinion:
Readers' rating:
Published Jun 2016
352 pages
Genre: Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Speculative, Alt. History
Publication Information
An evocative debut, perfect for fans of The Leftovers and We All Looked Up, about the discovery of a mirror planet to Earth and how it dramatically changes the course of one Indian-American girl's junior year.
For Tara Krishnan, navigating Brierly, the academically rigorous prep school she attends on scholarship, feels overwhelming and impossible. Her junior year begins in the wake of a startling discovery: A message from an alternate Earth, light years away, is intercepted by NASA. This means that on another planet, there is another version of Tara, a Tara who could be living better, burning brighter, because of tiny differences in her choices.
The world lights up with the knowledge of Terra Nova, the mirror planet, and Tara's life on Earth begins to change. At first, small shifts happen, like attention from Nick Osterman, the most popular guy at Brierly, and her mother playing hooky from work to watch the news all day. But eventually those small shifts swell, the discovery of Terra Nova like a black hole, bending all the light around it.
As a new era of scientific history dawns and Tara's life at Brierly continues its orbit, only one thing is clear: Nothing on Earth - or for Tara - will ever be the same again.
"Starred Review. [A] quiet, thoughtful debut novel ... Like a space explorer, Tara is thrust into the uncharted territory of life and must decide how she will navigate this new part of herself." - Kirkus
"For the most part, the focus is on Tara's social struggles, which reveal that even the most outwardly perfect girls can be insecure, damaged, and flawed." - Publishers Weekly
"Khorana perfectly captures the excruciating pain of a high-school society divided by race and socioeconomic status ... beautifully drawn." - Booklist
"The writing style is eloquent, and the characters are well developed, particularly Tara, who is struggling as the only Indian girl in an all-white school. Will appeal to readers who enjoy realistic fiction with a splash of sci-fi." - School Library Journal
"Elegantly crafted and emotionally rich, Mirror in the Sky is a dazzling gift of a novel." - Nina LaCour, author of Hold Still, The Disenchantments and Everything Leads to You
"Chilling, powerful, and real, Mirror in the Sky will have you thinking about all the tiny decisions that have shaped you and thrumming with the question, 'What if?'" - Emily Henry, author of The Love That Split the World
"In her thought-provoking debut, Aditi Khorana brilliantly blends the speculative with the contemporary. What results is a story full of layers, and rich with characters so engaging and complex I continued to think about them long after I turned the final page." - Stephanie Garber, author of Caraval
"Beautifully written, surprising and poignant, Mirror in the Sky is a book you will not soon forget. If there is an alternate Earth, another you has probably already read this and loved it." - Lynn Weingarten, New York Times bestselling author of Suicide Notes from Beautiful Girls
This information about Mirror in the Sky was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Aditi Khorana spent part of her childhood in India, Denmark, and New England. She has a BA in international relations from Brown University and an MA in global media and communications from the Annenberg School for Communication. She has worked as a journalist at ABC News, CNN, and PBS, and most recently as a marketing executive consulting for various Hollywood studios including Fox, Paramount, and Sony. Mirror in the Sky is her first novel. She lives in Los Angeles and spends her free time reading, hiking, and exploring LA's eclectic and wonderful architecture. For more information, visit aditikhorana.com.
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