Title: When the Moon Hits Your Eye by John Scalzi
Book Beginnings quote:
Wapakoneta, Ohio / The Armstrong Air and Space Museum
Virgil Augustine's cell phone rang just as he was searching for his coat to go home.
Friday56 quote:
New York City, New York / Columbia University
Dayton Bailey was learning that timing was everything.
Summary: The moon has turned to cheese ... and now humanity has to deal with it.
Review: I decided to read When the Moon Hits Your Eye because I was looking for something lighthearted. What could be lighter than a moon suddenly turning to actual cheese? And in fact, the librarian who recommended this book quoted from Library Journal: "This book can be read as hopeful. It's occasionally insightful, and it's frequently absolutely hilarious."
Just imagine for a moment that our moon did in fact change and suddenly, inexplicably there is a whole new reality to deal with, one where no one had any answers. Then imagine that there is a volcano explosion of cheese sending debris into the atmosphere heading toward earth, like the asteroid which killed the dinosaurs but seven times larger, with an expected contact with earth just two years away. What would do? Exactly. You don't know what you'd do, but likely it wouldn't be business as usual.
Each chapter of When the Moon Hits Your Eye starts with a location heading. In the beginning many of those locations have to do with NASA as scientists try to figure out what is going on, then expand out to the White House, where the President is talking to advisors about what to do. But soon the chapters move out to other places where we encounter people trying to go about their lives, not knowing how to proceed. There are feuding brothers, both cheesemakers, who make-up after years of not speaking to each other; a young couple falling in love; students gathering to flip off the moon and its asteroid; old friends making a pact to stay together to the end; bankers trying to figure out how to save their investments and ways to entice people to not close bank accounts; a book editor who realizes her job is done since it takes books at least two years to go through the publishing process so there is no point of getting a book project going now; a billionaire who tricks legitimate astronauts out of their chance for a mission to the moon; and so many more. The parts I liked best were those where the characters embraced their humanness and there were plenty of them, some even worthy of the tears I shed. Scalzi did a really great job balancing the satire of the plot with many heartfelt messages of hope and love.
The ending was just as surprising as the beginning but I won't give it away.
As I neared the ending of the book I asked my husband what he would do if he knew the earth only had two more years. He said he'd try to mark off his bucket list of items, places to see. I'd want to focus on family and friends, making sure I had all loose ends tied up. How about you? Like the book points out a bucketful of problems would like occur much earlier than the two year deadline. So get going!
My rating: 4 stars
I love the title, don't you? In case the song is running through your head, feel free to sing along with Dean Martin:
🎵🎵 When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that's amore..🎵🎵
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