Excerpt from Gateway to the Moon by Mary Morris, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

He walks over, putting his hand on her shoulder. Looking down as if she were a bonsai, he kisses the top of her head. With a ladle in her hand she pretends to bat him away. She looks tired and the lines around her eyes and mouth have deepened. But Miguel can tell from her lush black hair, the fine features hidden in the folds of her now plump face, that she had once been pretty. She'd also been a spelling whiz. Once she made it to the state competition. Miguel certainly didn't take after her in that regard. She's still spunky, but working as a hotel maid and drinking too much beer and eating tacos have taken their toll.

"Wash your hands," she tells him.

The trailer is small and narrow. Just two rooms. Miguel sleeps in the bedroom since his father moved out. His mother sleeps on the couch. Mostly they eat standing up at the counter, but on Friday nights they eat at the fold-uptable. Now she serves him a large bowl of chicken stew with a crust of bread and brings a small bowl for herself.

His mother tends to graze rather than eat but she makes a point of sitting with him. He can tell that she isn't in the mood for talking. Sometimes when she's tired from her job at the hotel in Taos, she doesn't want to talk. Instead she works on one of her crossword or sudoku puzzles. Her real name is Gloria but her father called her Morning Glory because she is perkier in the morning, fading by the end of the day. Now most people just call her MG.

"It's good, mami," he says, patting her on the arm. His mother looks up at him and smiles. It makes him so happy to see her smile. Her whole face alters. It is as if he can see her as a girl—the one his father fell for when they were just kids themselves. As Miguel gets up for a second helping—one he doesn't really want, but he wants to see that smile break across her features again—the phone rings. His mother makes no attempt to answer it. "I got it," Miguel says.

When he picks up, he hears a woman's voice. "Is this Miguel?" She sounds light and breathless as if she is talking while on a treadmill. He pictures blond hair, blue eyes. Not from around here.

He hesitates. "Yes," he says.

There is a pause. "You called," she says, "about the babysitting job."

Then he remembers. "Oh, yes, I did."

"Good. So you're interested. That's great. Can you come by tomorrow?" He expected that she'd ask him something about his age or his experience, of which he has none, but she doesn't. It is as if she is hiring him sight unseen. "I'd like you to meet the boys," she says. "You can start work on Monday. Is that good?"

Miguel nods, and then realizes she can't see him. "Yes, that's good."

"And you have a car right?"

Miguel thinks about his father's old Chevy. "Yes, I do."

She gives him the address out in Colibri Canyon. And then she hangs up.

When he gets off, his mother asks what it was about.

"A job."

She nods, looking at him with her cold, dark eyes. "You need a job. But you also need to study." He looks back at her the way he always does. Nothing about his mother has ever seemed familiar. He has never seen a flick of her wrists, a grimace on her face, and thinks, "I do that."

Perhaps he is an alien. It would explain his link to the stars. Perhaps some starship deposited him in this place and wiped out his memory. At times Miguel scans his mother's face, looking for a trace of himself in her eyes, her mouth.

"I can do both."

She makes a face. "We'll see." They finish their stew in silence. Miguel watches the hands of his grandfather's old clock as they move mysteriously backward.

Excerpted from Gateway to the Moon by Mary Morris. Copyright © 2018 by Mary Morris. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.