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Meet Adina: a gentle, unforgettable alien for our times, a companion to anyone who has ever felt homesick at home
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. When a fax machine arrives at home, her suspicions are confirmed: it allows her to communicate with her extraterrestrial relatives, who have sent her to report on the oddities of Earthlings.
As Adina makes a life for herself among humans, she dispatches transmissions on the terrors and delights of their existence. Then, at a precarious moment, a beloved friend urges her to share her observations with the world. Is there a chance there are others like her out there?
Beautyland is a shyly joyful novel about real life on our planet, 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
‘A perfect little polished garnet of a novel’ New York Times
‘Beautyland is a miracle. I’ll be rereading it forever’ KAVEH AKBAR
© Marie-Helene Bertino 2025 (P) Penguin Audio 2025
