The Good for Nothings

June 22, 2020
In an attempt to win approval from her mother, the hard-to-please leader of an interstellar crime family, and to make enough money to upgrade her android best friend Elio’s failing body, Cora Saros attempts a solo job, only to be caught and thrown into a maximum security prison. After an unsuccessful escape attempt with her cellmates—Earthan thief Wren and temperamental reptilian warrior Anders—Cora and her companions make a deal for their freedom with the prison’s warden: retrieve the long-hidden keys needed to unlock an immortality-granting elixir. As the group
traverses the galaxies in search of their objective, dangers await at every turn, including hazardous planets, implacable pursuers, and Cora’s own plan to betray her comrades. With this star-hopping romp, Banas (The Supervillain and Me) pits her eclectic band of larceny-minded misfits against a hostile universe, forcing them to come together as a makeshift family. While the chain of events occasionally borders on the implausibly coincidental, the quirky characters, who are fleshed out by attributes such as tough Anders’s constant flight sickness and Elio’s insistence on a favorite food despite his inability to eat, share an endearing earnestness. A fun, galaxy-spanning treasure hunt with plenty of action and heart. Ages 13–up.

July 31, 2020

Gr 7 Up-This humorous and irreverent intergalactic romp begins when 17-year-old Cora Saros, a native of the planet Condor, and her aging android, Elio, seriously botch a heist on the planet Voatis and land in the Ironside maximum security prison on the planet Andilly. After a failed escape attempt, they and their cellmates make a bargain with the corrupt Warden to hunt down keys across the galaxies that will unlock an impossible treasure, one that grants everlasting life. Cora and Elio, along with Anders, a stoic and fierce Andillian, and Wren, a bubbly, dark-skinned, purple-haired Earthan thief, face flesh-eating plants, enemy fire, crash landings, bounty hunters, backstabbing family members, and motion sickness. Cora is a pretty decent computer hacker, but she, like the others, also has secrets and motives of her own for finding the treasure. Will these misfit criminals ultimately choose to trust or double-cross one another? Overall, the plot is fast-paced and clever and will have readers turning pages to find out what happens next. While there are some narrative leaps, the overall story is driven by dynamic, fleshed-out main characters who will have readers rooting for all four of them. A healthy mix of sarcastic banter, bathroom humor, light romance, and things that go boom round out the action with a satisfying, if predictable, happy ending. People from Condor are pointy-eared and light-skinned, and Andillians have red skin. VERDICT A great pick for fans of Douglas Adams's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Buy this for collections that serve younger teens or where science fiction is popular.-Erica Ruscio, Ventress Memorial Lib., Marshfield, MA

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