Connie Willis
A delightful novel about alien invasions, conspiracies, and the incredibly silly things people are willing to believe in—some of which may actually be true—from the Nebula and Hugo Award-winning author of Blackout and All Clear.
When level-headed Francie arrives in Roswell, New Mexico, for her college roommate’s UFO-themed wedding—complete with a true-believer bridegroom—she can’t help but roll her eyes at all the wide-eyed talk of aliens, which obviously don’t exist. Imagine her surprise, then, when she gets abducted by one.
Odder still, her abductor is far from what the popular media might have led her to expect, with a body like a tumbleweed and a mass of lightning-fast tentacles. Nor is Francie the only victim of the alien’s abduction spree. Before long, he has acquired a charming con man named Wade, a sweet little old lady with a casino-addiction, a retiree with a huge RV and a love for old Westerns, and a UFO-chasing nutjob who is thoroughly convinced the alien’s main intention is to probe them and/or take over the planet.
But the more Francie gets to know the alien, the more convinced she is that he’s not an invader. That he is in trouble and that she’s got to help him. Only she doesn’t know how to—or even what the trouble is.
Part alien-abduction adventure, part road trip, part romantic comedy, The Road to Roswell is packed full of Men in Black, Elvis impersonators, tourist traps, rattlesnakes, chemtrails, and Close Encounters of the Third, Fourth, and Fifth kind. Can Francie, stuck in a lime green bridesmaid’s dress, save the world and still make it back for the wedding?
