STARBOUNDERS

Witty, richly imagined, and superbly plotted, STARBOUNDERS launches Epstein and Jacobson’s new series in page-turning style.

Epstein and Jacobson’s brand-new middle grade series is an exciting sci-fi adventure. It introduces Zachary Night, a twelve-year-old Starbounder preparing to join the Inter-Planetary Defense League (IPDL), just like his parents, and their parents, did many decades ago. At Indigo 8, the IPDL’s training academy, hidden away in New York State’s Adirondack Mountains, Zachary quickly befriends Ryic, a long-limbed extraterrestrial from the planet Klenarog, and the human teenager Kaylee, who fires up Zachary’s competitive spirit (and maybe something else as well). Just as quickly, the trio find themselves flouting the rules at Indigo 8 and being punished with having to do disciplinary duty (aka mopping the floors) on an IPDL freighter – and missing out on the much more exciting galactic safari for the other first-years at the academy. It’s not exactly how Zachary had imagined his outer-space debut. But it’s aboard the Dreadnought Epsilon that things start going seriously wrong – and suddenly Zachary, Ryic, and Kaylee find themselves in the middle of a galactic conflict that threatens the very existence of earth. Adam Jay Epstein and Andrew jacobson have been writing for film and television since they met in college, including “Not Another Teen Movie” and extensive work with MTV. Adam lives in Los Angeles with his wife, Jane, their daughter, Penny, and a black-and-white alley cat who hangs out in their backyard. Andrew lives four traffic lights away. They are the authors of the bestselling middle-grade series THE FAMILIARS (HarperCollins Children’s Books; editor Barbara Lalicki), which has been sold in 14 countries and is being developed into a motion picture by Sony Animation, with Sam Raimi (“Spiderman”) attached to produce and Doug Sweetland, veteran Pixar animator and Academy Award nominee for his 2009 short “Presto,” to direct.