Ant and Cleo Book 1

Hmmmm, yes ...interesting, I really enjoyed Saucerers and Gondoliers, it was a new slant on sci fi humour and very original. The author has a good writing voice and introduces some great characters, notably Ant  and Cleo, our heroes and Truman J Slughound, the super tracking slug that can find our heroes  anywhere and then helps on numerous occasions with escapes. This sci fi world has various secret colonies in space, unknown to the rest of us down here on earth. We meet the Russians, still very soviet , the Americans who are very 'red neck' and the Brits who are 'very British!'
The Russian, Captain Popov was a great character who had me grinning several times and I may well be one of the few readers that remembers the Banana Splits from my childhood summer mornings during school holiday, thanks for that blast from the past.
All in all a very entertaining story, well written and edited, I would look for more from this author.

An unusual, amusing, and entertaining read. I wouldn't class it as one of my favourites, but I would read it again.

What kind of novel is it? Well it's sort of satire science fiction ... erm ... it's political commentar... er, that's not really right either ... how about this: there are aliens, and the book is an absolute riot. The dialogue is great, the descriptions are droll and witty. Here's an example:

There's only two sorts of people who wear jumpers, coats and ties," said Ant under his breath.

"Racetrack tic tac men and policemen. Leg it."

They legged it.

Unfortunately, he legged it after them.
There are one or two places where it wears a bit thin, but I found myself chuckling on pretty much every "page." The two main characters, Ant and Cleo, are well developed, heartwarming, cocky teenagers that somehow manage to stow away on an Alien craft (even getting their chance to vomit in zero gravity!) Their shenanigans get them involved in an interplanetary cold-war type conflict.

A few notes. One, the book is by a British author. There were a few slang passages that I had to really think through, but it isn't incomprehensible by any means. Two, being British, it sometimes pokes fun at Americans. If you are militantly patriotic and can't take a joke, perhaps you should, you know, not read it. If you can take a joke and enjoy a discworld type humor, only from a sci-fi angle, you should definitely grab this one.

Overall Rating: Four Stars. If you are into campy, quirky dry humor - or if you have a secret desire to send all of the rednecks to the moon - I recommend this book as an excellent read.