I don't much sci-fi books but this one got my interest. I liked the story and I loved how the writer create this. I prefer sci-fi to be watched, I hope this one gets a movie someday

Although it has an interesting concept it didn't captivate me, and I have lost interest in finishing the book and therefore won't be giving it a proper review and will give it a neutral 3 stars.

I received a copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

The only home that Leo has ever known is on a space station. He, along with twins Orion and Libra, were born on the Moon 2 space station. Now, fifteen years later, Leo doesn’t just have to look down at Earth and imagine what it would be like to live there. The day that the three teens will be going back down to Earth is quickly approaching, and there are so many different feelings about what this might entail. Leo has always struggled with his strained relationship with his mother. For the most part, there is no relationship, at least not in the convential sense. He really doesn’t see her often, and when he does, she doesn’t treat him like what he imagines a mother son relationship should be. Leo’s real support system comes from his grandfather, and this is who he will be staying with when he lands on Earth.

There are so many different variables that go into the teen’s arrival back on Earth. For one, none of them know what gravity will feel like, and even more importantly, how it’ll affect their bodies. Not only that, but things are Earth are in dire straights. Humans have completely wreaked havoc on Earth, leaving it on the brink of being inhabitable. What will Leo’s future look like once he’s landed?

It did not take me long once I started reading Satellite to remember what Nick Lake does not like to use any punctuation marks or capitalizations. I also quickly remembered how distracting I found it to be when I read one of his other books. I liked this book, but found it a little torturous to read at times because of Lake’s writing style. Overall, I enjoyed the twists and turns that Lake created; learning about his mother’s story, the thought of a teen coming to Earth for the first time, it all seemed so great from the outside. However, the route that Lake took left me feeling a little ripped off. I really was hoping for a story that explored Leo coming back to Earth and his transition to normal life. That was not the case in the end. Overall, I recommend this book for teens that enjoy light science fiction.

Leo has spent his whole life on Moon 2, a space station. When he turns 16, he is to go "home" to earth, but if he's never been there, is it really home? Once on earth, he finally gets to meet his grandfather, gets a puppy, struggles to walk, breaks his leg, is attacked in his home, "protected" by the men in black suits, and ends up just as alone and isolated as he was on Moon 2. When Leo is finally reunited with the other two children he grew up with on Moon 2, he needs to figure out what "home" really means to him.

I loved this book and yet, almost didn't finish it. I'd give it 4 stars for plot and premise, but 1.5 stars for the way it is presented. written in text speak it is hard 2 read, w/little punctuation and no capitals, c? I don't think many of my students write this way even in their own texts. I showed it to several of them and they said that it would drive them crazy--seems they do prefer correct grammar, even if they don't write it themselves. For me it seemed to emphasis the immaturity of Leo, and his isolation from society, which was very evident in the plot.

Favorite quotes:
here, we're more like ghosts in the attic. & everything is white or black or silver. (chap 3)

everything closed, everything waiting except me, i realize suddenly. i'm not closed i'm open. & it's going to get me hurt, so i flush my air lock suck all the hope out of myself until i'm a vacuum inside, no feelings, & then i'm ready for my mother. (chap 7)

This book had an interesting writing style and was relevant to what is already happening in today's world.

A compelling read!

I can't say that I was surprised by the direction this book took. All of the ground work was there, even from the earliest chapters. The big twist reveal? My response was more "at least you're acknowledging it" than "whoa, didn't see that coming". Now, that doesn't mean I ddin't like it. The character development was solid. A fairly compelling read.

This book was fun to read and I enjoyed it. I really liked following the story line. Some of the story line felt fresh, while some was a bet predictable.

Thank you to Netgalley and Knopf for the review copy of this book.
I found the premise of this book fascinating- a group of kids born in space are finally old enough to come "home" to Earth, but how can home be somewhere you've never been?
There is some really good science in this book, which I really enjoyed, especially relating to the effects of long term space flight. That being said, I had a really hard time reading this book as it is written in "text speak". I assume I'm not the target demographic for this book, and don't think it would bother my students, but it was really hard to get through, even though I found it pretty compelling otherwise. I will definitely recommend it to my HS students, with that caveat.

“Satellite” presents an earth in the near future, suffering heavily from the effects of global warming. Drought, hurricanes, rising sea levels and river waters so cold that if any living thing falls in, immediate death from hypothermia is certain. Some wild animals like lions and elephants are already extinct. Mankind is looking up to space for any earth-like planet to colonize.

In such backdrop, three babies are born in a space station: our narrator Leo, and twins Libra, and Orion. Their mothers are astronauts themselves. But these kids cannot be brought by their mothers yet because their young bodies are too fragile to survive the impact of re-entering the earth’s atmosphere. So they remain in standby in the space station raised by rotating astronauts until they reach the age of sixteen years old, presumably strong enough to survive the journey back home. But what is the definition of “home” for these kids? For Leo, it’s strange to call earth his home because it’s some place he hasn’t been.

The book is divided into three parts. The first part is Leo’s life in the space station. It is a slow start for me mainly because the book has to establish the nuts and bolts of life in space. The second part, which narrates Leo’s experiences in earth is where things start to become fascinating. The reader re-discovers the wonder of seeing things for the first time through Leo’s eyes. The way Leo describes ordinary things on earth — the smell and taste of bacon, the sight of eggs frying in a pan, the feeling of locking eyes with a cow or touching a puppy—is so poetic, it brings me close to weeping. This is the great parts of the book.

Now for the meh parts. Upon his arrival, I expected Leo to experience interaction with various earth-raised teens. Sadly, the nearest school has been closed off and the people he met are limited to his retired astronaut turned ranch owner grandpa, some farm hands, and the employees of the Company which took over NASA. Leo spent a sheltered life on his grandpa’s ranch. He tried to contact Libra and Orion but discovered that his connection with them has been cut off. He was kept in the dark for so long,my anticipation for what’s really going on becomes boredom. And when some action seems to start weaving in the story, in the form of mysterious people leaving him notes implying that he needs rescuing, Leo dismissed the surfacing doubts about the people he trusts and just went on with his privileged life on the ranch. I imagine a wasted future earth where teens outside Leo’s bubble live hard-knock dystopic lives. But Leo’s narrative feels too detached and lacking urgency. Eventually, Leo was not able to do anything much. He is always dependent on people around him. Even on the third part of the book when Leo supposedly stands up for himself, his actions are pretty much perfunctory.

The book is written with deliberate shortcuts in spelling and capitalization. For instance, “I see you.” is written as “i c u.” And “doctorate” is written as “Dr.ate”. Maybe it was used for futuristic vibe? Or to denote that hey, the world is ending, who’s got time for proper spelling? Whichever case, I am not bothered by it but some might not like these kind of stuff in their books so I’m jut saying it right here.

Speaking of futuristic style, fashion in this imagined future is so forward and gender bending. Men wearing make-up, nail polish, and heels is commonplace. And there is one mention of a woman having her gene modified to grow beard. It’s mildly amusing but feels rather irrelevant to the story, TBH.

Another irrelevant aspect of the book for me is the romantic subplot. Yes, it’s so small and does not eat up the main plot but that’s my point, it’s so small that the book could’ve done away with it. Personally, I’d rather not give Leo much hope in romance. The book keeps on repeating this thing about the moon loving the earth from a distance and him having no one near him after all is like the perfect moon to earth. I’m rambling here but if you already know the ending like I do, I think you’ll understand.

“Satellite” has its merit in giving its readers Leo’s all wide-eyed and wonder perspective. It was a delight feeling his sensory overload with earthly things after being born and raised inside a tin can in space. But the plot’s progression is so slow with its sections of autopilot action crammed in the third part of the book. Leo, Libra, and Orion are the hero trio that could have been. They have this game while in space of blurting out things that they would do on earth. I hoped and dreamed those things with them. I imagined them having legendary adventures on earth like becoming mermaids or such. (I heard that astronauts of NASA nowadays spend training in deep sea levels because it resembles zero gravity so becoming a mermaid is totally not a far-fetched idea) But sadly, those dreams did not fly...or swim for Leo, Libra and Orion, with the three of them just ambling through the story by letting people around them manage their lives.

DNF -- I really did not like the style the author used for the perspective of the protagonist. I always get deep into the character, and this one took me to a very alien mindspace, which I know was the point, but made it very difficult for me to enjoy. The idea sounded awesome, so if readers can get past the style, they might enjoy this book.

This is a science fiction story about a boy who was born on an orbiting space station reaching age fifteen and coming "back" to Earth. Leo has spent his whole life on Moon 2 along with two other kids his same age. Orion and Libra are twins. Their mothers are all astronauts who cycle in and out of the station. Leo's mother is distant while Orion's and Libra's is more affectionate. Leo's main connection is with his grandfather who is a rancher in California now but was a famous astronaut.

This story worried me at first because I normally do not enjoy stories with non-standard English but this one quickly drew me in and I buzzed right over "i" for "I", "c" for "see", and "u" for "you" among other abbreviations. The story is told by Leo who feels that Moon 2 is his home and who is curious about Earth but doesn't really want to live there.

There are all sorts of adventures like emergency space walks and secret rocket launches. There are also tender moments like those between Leo and Comet, the puppy his grandfather gives him when he gets to the ranch. The story is told poetically and is quite lyrical considering that it is written by a young man who is interested in math and physics and who wants to be an astronaut himself.

We can also see that the adults in the new space program and otherwise around Leo are keeping secrets from him. Finding out those secrets explains a lot about Leo, Orion and Libra. Also kept from Leo is the state of life on Earth with global warming, ice caps melting, and drought that are making life on Earth more precarious.

I was intrigued by the changes that life in space had on the kids' bodies. Leo has low bone density, low lung capacity, and a vulnerability to any stray virus. And he is in the best shape of the three kids who were raised in space.

This book is a great adventure and packs quite an emotional punch too. I strongly recommend it for science fiction fans and those new to the genre.

Wow. I am into this book. 3 teens, who have spent their first 16 years aboard a space station, are brought back down to Earth and have trouble adjusting. So this is science-fiction-ish, but also coming-of-age-ish, and also gripping space-adventure and edge-of-your-seat-action-ish. Loved it. (Thank you NetGalley for the advance e-galley! And thank you Nick Lake for a book that absorbed me as much as 'In Darkness!')

I'm not sure what all to make of this book. On the one hand, the story is good and held my interest: three teens born and raised in zero G on a space station come down to Earth and experience things like gravity, getting sick, being outside, etc. for the first time. It's a great fish-out-of-water story and I'm a sucker for fish-out-of-water stories. There's just one problem: the whole thing is written in textspeak.

Seriously, the whole thing. There's no "see" or "you" just "c" and "u" and "ppl" and "dr.ate" instead of "doctorate" and I is never once capitalized. It's annoying and distracting and every time I'd see it, my eye would twitch. I spent this whole book in a state of constant eye-twitching.

But! The story is still pretty cool - it's five minutes into the future, there's no more NASA, it's now privately owned by a mysterious group referred to only as "The Company" (who seem pretty damn shady) which owns the space station, Moon 2, where these kids grew up. This company invested billions of dollars in these kids and yet did not bother to teach them proper grammar...? Again, if you're not able to take a breath and look past the textspeak, you might not make it all the way through this book, which would be a shame, as, again, it's got a good story featuring a protagonist of color and some strong, well-handled LGBTQ themes. Leo (or protagonist)'s first person narration does limit the scope of the story - we get all sorts of hints about something bigger going on outside the kids' world, including conspiracy theories and a major media scandal, but we never really get to see it as The Company keeps the kids pretty tightly in their control. It would've been nice to introduce a second perspective, perhaps from someone within the company, or Leo's mom or grandfather, but since this is Leo's story, you get to take everything in from his eyes.

In goddamned textspeak. Ugh.

Still, this book is worth it despite the textspeak. Though if it were up to me, I would have gotten my editor pen and taken all of that out. It's annoying. But if you can look past the writing (which is pretty hard, since this is a book) Satellite has a really good story behind it. It's got space adventures! I'm a sucker for space adventures.

Good thing I read a kindle edition of this book, if I had gotten a paper copy, I would've gone nuts with my red editing pen.