It’s 2094, seventy years after the environmental crash on Earth. Sixteen-year-old Daria and her family are excited that one of the exchange students from the planet Chela will be coming to live with them. She’s completely wrapped up in her wildlife-conservation work with endangered species. Her room has literally become a menagerie supported but barely tolerated by her family. When seven-foot-tall Fen arrives, he’s different to be sure, and he gives Daria genuine reasons to worry about his ultimate goal during his stay. The novel is written from Daria and Fen’s perspectives, and occasionally those of minor characters. Gilmore’s wild premise about the future and her ability to keep readers guessing combine to provide a complex, absorbing science fiction story full of surprises. (Ages 12-15)

What a time for an exchange student to arrive, Daria thought, especially one from another planet! Daria is one of Earth's youngest licensed breeders of endangered species, and she has enough to do caring for her menagerie without having to cope with Fen.Besides his color-shifting and endless questions, there is something about the way the lanky alien looks at her animals and his stubborn, even hostile refusal to talk about the creatures of his own world that makes Daria nervous.Fen, on the other hand, can't be happier with his new Earth family.Hoping for one pet, he lands in a zoo.Not one of his fellow exchange students, living in homes scattered across the Earth, has been as lucky, but each has found at least one animal to love, and all cherish the same wild, mysterious dream.With a sharp eye for human, alien, and animal ways, Kate Gilmore has written a challenging tale.