Craig Smith

Charlie Maidly and the Kink-Konk of Mars Craig Smith

Charlie Maidly moves to Mars with his parents and his dog and the last remaining members of the human race. Charlie is a sensitive and an imaginative boy, and he is growing up fast. Mars has a strange effect on him and he begins to manage his strong moods by telling stories to his friends. The planet also has a strange effect on his dog - who begins to talk! One day they come across a native of Mars - the Kink-Konk - who exists despite the grown-up scientists insisting that there are no natives of Mars! The Kink-Konk is searching for his lost relatives. The Kink-Konk is an irritable, charming, poetic, and maddening creature - a lot like Charlie himself. Together they journey across Mars on an adventure of discovery. Philosophy, emotions, thrills and tragedy are all played out across an accurately described Martian landscape. It's the next best thing to actually being there! The stories Charlie tells and the story he is living become intertwined, enriching each other, and deepening the strange alien effect the Red Planet exerts over the friends. A new world and a fresh start are forged out of the memories of Old Earth...but nothing can be known for sure in such a melancholic, poetic, and ultimately inhuman landscape.

Join Charlie, his friend Emilia, his dog VW, and the quirky and unpredictable Kink-Konk on a journey through the geology and geography of Mars, and through the landscape of the hearts and souls of the children, young pioneers facing the challenge of growing up on an utterly alien world.