As much as I liked John Scalzi’s The Kaiju Preservation Society, I liked When the Moon Hits Your Eye even more. This is a standalone, but Scalzi said it’s sort of in a group with his last two novels, The Kaiju Preservation Society and Starter Villain.
It begins at the Armstrong Air and Space Museum in Wapakoneta, Ohio where staff members discover that the moon rock in the exhibit has changed to cheese. In contacting other facilities around the world, they realize all the rocks are now cheese. When the moon looks different, it’s learned the moon itself has changed to cheese.
Scalzi tells the story from all kinds of viewpoints. If the moon changed, governments, NASA, astronauts are not the only ones affected. We meet a professor emeritus of philosophy and his retired friends at a cafe, members of a religious cult, two young employees at cheese stores in Wisconsin, a couple college students, a billionaire determined to land on the moon, a writer. I can only imagine how much fun John Scalzi had as he brainstormed how different people would react to the moon changing to cheese.
A friend read When the Moon Hits Your Eye, and didn’t care for it as much as I did. This one just worked for me, with its various viewpoints and philosophical bent. If you read it, come back and let me know what you thought.
When the Moon Hits Your Eye by John Scalzi. Tor Books, 2025. ISBN 9780765389091 (hardcover), 336p.
FTC Full Disclosure – I received a galley from the publisher, though NetGalley, with only a promise of an honest review.
Sounds like fun to me!
It was, Carol!
I am waiting for this one, of course. I’ve read most of Scalzi’s books. I liked KAIJU more than STARTER VILLAIN, but I also recommend REDSHIRTS if you like the standalones, especially if you ever watched Star Trek.
I liked Kaiju better, too, Jeff. And, Redshirts was funny. I did feel as if the last section of that book wasn’t up to the previous ones, though.
I have a hold on this at the library
I hope. you enjoy it, Sandy!
So, I wen to check on my library holds and found I am number 61 on 7 e-book copies owned. So, then, I figured the Cloud Library is always faster, sometimes amazingly so (as with the new Suzanne Collins Hunger Games prequel, with 550 holds on 75 copies in Brooklyn, Jackie is already reading it on the Cloud), so why not put it on hold there? Why? Because when I went on, they had the book available, I downloaded it, and I am reading it now!
So, boys and girls, if you read e-books, check if your local library is connected to the Cloud Library (New York, yes; Brooklyn, no; Palm Beach County, yes) and sign up. It is much faster getting popular books.
Great heads-up, Jeff. And, you’ll be able to talk a little about it on Thursday.