Stuart Gibbs’ Spaced Out is Out of this World Fun

It’s the year 2041, and all twelve-year-old Dashiell Gibson (or Dash, as his friends and family call him) wants to do is not live on the Moon. He is tired of the cramped space of Moon Base Alpha, which is no bigger than a soccer field; he would love some fresh fruit and vegetables, not the tasteless food they have (that they must rehydrate with their own reclaimed urine no less); and to top it off, he was recently involved with solving a murder mystery involving the Moon Base’s own doctor (in Space Case, the first of the Moon Base Alpha series). After all that, now Dash is being visited in his mind by an alien that no one can see or talk to but him. What’s a kid got to do to have a little fun on the world’s first Moon Base?

In Spaced Out, Stuart Gibbs, the author of the Moon Base Alpha series, as well as the Spy School Series, and the FunJungle Series, captures readers’ imaginations with his creative descriptions of what everyday life would be like on the Moon. Gibbs also piques their interest through a new mystery that the Moonies (the people who live at Moon Base Alpha, also known as MBA) have to solve when the commander of the base, Nina Stack, goes missing. And, an extra layer of mystery is added when the alien that Dash has befriended, whom he calls Zan Perfonic, wants to know all about humans for some strange reason that she won’t reveal. Dash is worried it has to do with something very serious, like the fate of humanity. There are a few other kids living on the Moon with their families besides him, including his little sister, Violet, his friends, Kira and Roddy, and, unfortunately, brother-and-sister bullies Patton and Lily, whom he would rather not see every day, thank you very much. Combine all that with the case of the missing commander, and life on the Moon is proving to be no (moon)walk in the park. But, it’s also very exciting and full of possibilities. The Moonies get the rare chance to actually live on the world’s first Moon Base, to walk and drive lunar rovers on the surface of the Moon, and to see what it’s like with much less gravity, just to name a few of their out-of-this-world experiences.
Middle grade readers will love getting caught up in the outer space world that Gibbs has created on the Moon at MBA. Spaced Out is an exciting page-turner that will keep them guessing until the end, and it will fill them with curiosity and excitement about what life would really be like living on the Moon, from where they would sleep and eat to what dangers they would encounter. SPACED OUT is a fun read sure to keep kids interested and become fans of Dash and the other cast of characters living and working on Moon Base Alpha.
Do you think your and your kids would like living on the Moon?