Oliver Ines enters the world on an unfortunate date --- January 28, 1986 --- “the day Challenger fell out of the sky.” That tragedy --- which killed seven astronauts, including high school teacher Christa McAuliffe --- echoes throughout Cecile Pin’s compact but emotionally resonant second novel, CELESTIAL LIGHTS. The book follows Ollie from his childhood in a small English village to his time as the commander of an ambitious mission to Jupiter's moon, Europa.

As a child, Ollie is shy and awkward. One of his few friends is Philly, a precocious eight-year-old who spends her days hunting for the elusive New Forest cicada. Philly’s path is set young. When the pair reconnect years later after a long separation, it’s no surprise that she’s become an entomologist. Ollie, meanwhile, takes longer to discover his purpose. He studies engineering in college, then joins the Royal Navy, where he finds himself uniquely suited to life on a nuclear submarine. It’s a world apart from the stultifying confines of his hometown, as well as from the confusing adult world, where he sometimes feels like a “specter” who wanders through life rather than inhabiting it.

"...compact but emotionally resonant... CELESTIAL LIGHTS...will appeal to fans of literary speculative fiction like Emily St. John Mandel’s SEA OF TRANQUILITY..."

Ollie’s reflections on his childhood and young adulthood alternate with excerpts from his personal log during the Phoenix Mission, aboard the spacecraft Talos. CELESTIAL LIGHTS, which will appeal to fans of literary speculative fiction like Emily St. John Mandel’s SEA OF TRANQUILITY, is set in an alternate present day where advanced space travel has allowed humans to colonize the moon and walk on Mars.

Ollie and his three fellow astronauts are halfway through their 10-year journey when the book begins --- long enough for all of them to begin to question if the mission’s lofty aims were worth leaving behind their lives and loved ones on Earth. In Ollie’s case, his decision to join the mission, which is funded by an Elon Musk-esque mogul named Mark Massey, has devastating consequences on his relationship with his now-wife, Philly, with whom he shares a son, Tommy.

Ollie’s journey to Europa is pure science fiction. But Pin uses the conceit to explore themes of human connection, belonging and ambition. Many readers will relate to Ollie when he returns to visit his parents for the first time since leaving for college. Back in his old house, he experiences a disorienting feeling that he was “entering a home that was both mine and foreign,” while the neighbors’ innocuous questions about his life have him feeling “stifled by everyone’s curiosity.” The “certainty” of math and physics provide a welcome comfort. Desperate to leave the small world of his family and childhood behind, he turns his attention to the stars. Few people head to space to put distance between themselves and their hometown, but the tension of both loving the place you’ve come from and wanting to leave it behind is a familiar one.

Ollie has convinced himself that the Phoenix Mission’s potential benefit to humanity is worth the enormous personal cost to him and his crewmates. But behind his lofty arguments and PR-friendly statements in support of the trip is a self-serving desire for greatness. Yet, as the years in space pass and the mission takes a dark turn, it becomes clear that for all his genius, Ollie has been unable to calculate the true price he’ll pay to be inscribed in the history books. He sees himself as a pioneer charting a course to the furthest reaches of the galaxy. But to Massey, the Talos team members are just pawns in his grand design. When a fellow astronaut expresses outrage over lax safety protocols, Massey’s response comes straight from the corporate playbook: “Take it up with HR.”

Before he leaves, Philly pleads with Ollie not to forget the rich life he has at home. “We’re here…. There is so much here, on Earth, for you,” she tells him. But for Ollie, the leaving is unavoidable. “Perhaps to achieve our goals, it wasn’t sacrifice that was required, but rather a letting go. Perhaps our whole lives were just a series of letting go,” he thinks. Jettisoning the things and people that hold him down ultimately leaves Ollie weightless. He might make it to Europa, but will there be anything back on Earth to return to?