The Wanderers was a March 2017 Indie Next List Pick, an Amazon Best Book for March and received starred reviews from Kirkus and Publishers Weekly. It was short-listed for the 2018 Chautauqua Prize, and named one of 2017's Best Books by Book Riot and The Verge.

In an age of space exploration, we search to find ourselves.

In four years Prime Space will put the first humans on Mars. Helen Kane, Yoshi Tanaka, and Sergei Kuznetsov must prove they’re the crew for the job by spending seventeen months in the most realistic simulation every created.

“Fascinating…A masterful psychological novel, full of rich characterization and a surprisingly gripping narrative.” —Los Angeles Times

“A breathtakingly honest and incredibly beautiful examination of the heart and soul of humankind.” —Newsweek

“Every single character in The Wanderers feels distinct and vivid, a planet in his or her own right.” —Laura Miller, Slate

"Engrossing. . . . Although the contours of a space drama may seem familiar to a 21st-century readership, Howrey, through the poetry of her writing and the richness of her characters, makes it all seem new. A lyrical and subtle space opera." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"Three astronauts and those who know them best explore the limits of truth and love in Howrey’s genre-bending novel. . . . The voices are distinct, each member reviewing and acting on his or her own emotional telemetry with equal parts brilliance and blunder, and the stakes are high, with any heartbeat capable of tipping the scales against the crew’s survival. . . . With these believably fragile and idealistic characters at the helm, Howrey’s insightful novel will take readers to a place where they too can 'lift their heads and wonder.'" —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"[C]onfronts ageless questions of why humans explore, what they are looking for, and what happens when they find it. Evoking the authenticity of Neal Stephenson’s Seveneves with the literary sensitivity of Ann Patchett, Howrey has made the mission-to-Mars motif an exquisite exploration of human space, inner and outer." —Booklist

“The Wanderers is phenomenal. A transcendent, cross-cultural and cross-planetary journey into the mysteries of space and self, the novel explores the dangers and necessities of venturing away from the familiar and finding home in the unknown. Howrey’s expansive vision left me awestruck.”—Ruth Ozeki, New York Times bestselling and Man Booker shortlisted author of A Tale for the Time Being

“An expansive tale of the costs of human ambition, The Wanderers is unquestionably the work of a brilliant writer at the height of her powers. Meticulously researched and magnificently rendered, Howrey’s dazzling novel on humankind’s most ambitious project is, in itself, a work of wondrous skill and ambition, a book about space that’s truly about people, but also about the lonely wonder of true trailblazers, the disparate cast behind a great life, and the compromises that build success. Fiercely inventive and deeply empathetic, Howrey’s exquisite novel demonstrates that the final frontier may not be space after all.” —J. Ryan Stradal, New York Times–bestselling author of Kitchens of the Great Midwest

“Elegant, thoughtful, gorgeously written. A meditation on solitude, connection, aspiration, imagination and reality, which builds effortlessly to moments of immense power and honesty. There are passages near the end of this book that I will never forget.” —Charles Yu, author of How to Live Safely in a Science Fiction Universe and Sorry Please Thank You

“The Wanderers is a wonderful exploration of space, trust, and what it means to be a conscious creature, finely-tuned and funny from the first page to the last. I loved getting lost in Meg Howrey’s off-kilter world of astronauts and their simulated fantasies. She’s a writer with an amazing eye for freedom and confinement and the thin line that sometimes lies between the two.” —Jonathan Lee, author of High Dive

“The Wanderers is a stealthily brilliant novel. A distinct, shimmering vision of who we are and where we think we want to go. Meg Howrey’s three astronauts and their families seem to embody the whole human race at the signal moment of a growth spurt. They exist, as we do now, at the edge of science fiction, their story propelled by a seriousness and intelligence wrapped in a comic and tender humanity. Meg Howrey delivers this vision in a prose that feels new, sui generis, its own necessary vehicle, with a kind of sleek precision that is at once simple, gorgeous, and profoundly moving.” —Peter Nichols, national bestselling author of The Rocks and A Voyage for Madmen

“Howrey subtly explores the tensions between our inner and projected selves. Thanks to her wry sense of humor, it totally works.” —The Washington Post

"Meg Howrey has perfectly captured the pull of outer space, the joy of exploration, the power of human endeavour and our thirst for freedom - and within that she shows us too the ties that root us to Earth, the love and loss, the humour and fragility that make us who we are. The Wanderers is an astounding, insightful, exhilarating ride." —Helen Sedgwick, author of The Comet Seekers

"The Wanderers is a revelation - a riveting tale of space travel that is also a profound exploration of self. It is full of ideas, full of life and - bless it for this - full of humour. A wise and wonderful novel - I loved every page of it." —Antonia Hodgson, author of The Last Confession of Thomas Hawkins