Homebound: A Novel

Summary

From public librarian Portia Elan, this time-hopping debut novel transports readers across centuries and continents in search of the things that hold us together, even as the world is falling apart—for fans of Emily St. John Mandel and Ruth Ozeki.

“A joy. It kept me up all night.” —Madeline Miller, author of Circe and The Song of Achilles

Cincinnati, 1983. Becks is nineteen, blasting her Walkman and hiding from the fact that her beloved uncle is dead. When she discovers the unfinished computer game he left behind, she pours her anger and creativity into finishing it—one last collaboration that will echo long into the future in ways she could never imagine.

Berkeley, 2078. Dr. Tamar Portman is a brilliant scientist wrestling with her responsibility to humanity’s precarious future—and to her mysterious creation. But when a project takes her out of academia and into the private sector, the ambitions of powerful people put everything at risk.

The Atlantic, 2586. A jaded sea captain, Yesiko, will do whatever it takes to keep Babylon afloat and her fragile crew alive. Until she encounters the one compromise even she may be unwilling to make.

And somewhere along the way, there is Chaya: a four-hundred-year-old robot, collecting stories and mining their own memories in a determined search for another like themself.

All four are bound by a longing for connection, and by a futuristic traveler on a time-slipping solo mission through space. A story about our deep interconnectedness, Homebound is a clear-eyed adventure into humanity’s future and capacity for love. Readers will be whisked away and returned to their seats with renewed hope.