Meg Howrey’s THE WANDERERS is the kind of book that, just a decade or so ago, would have seemed like pure science fiction to most of us. Now, however, as the goal of human travel to Mars seems like a primary objective not only for NASA but also for the private companies that are competing in the realm of space exploration, this novel seems far from far-fetched.

At the center of THE WANDERERS are three veteran space explorers, all with plenty of time at the International Space Station and other missions under their belts. They have been selected to be the crew for the first-ever manned mission to Mars, a project of a for-profit aerospace company called Prime. Helen Kane, Yoshihiro Tanaka and Sergei Kuznetsovare are not only experienced, they are uniquely suited in temperament, physique and intellect to withstand the grueling requirements of a multi-year deep space voyage.

"Apart from the fascinating details of how astronauts deal with various challenges...the glimpses of the astronauts’ lives aboard the spacecraft offer many opportunities for reflection on humanity and the nature of human connections."

But Prime isn’t taking any chances, and consequently the three would-be Mars explorers will be subject to a full-scale simulation of their potential voyage. For the next 17 months, they will be involved in a sophisticated simulation deep in the Utah desert, one that utilizes actual equipment and virtual reality technology to reproduce --- as much as possible --- the experience of traveling to Mars, exploring the planet’s surface, and returning to Earth once more.

Accounts of their “journey” from each astronaut’s perspective are interspersed with accounts of what life is like back at home for those they’ve left behind, namely Helen’s grown daughter Mireille, Yoshi’s wife Madoka, and Sergei’s son Dmitri. Mireille is justifiably proud of her mother but wonders what she’s missed out on by virtue of having a mother who is anything but maternal --- and she embarks on a cautious friendship with Luke, a Prime employee on the ground control team. Madoka, a high-powered sales executive for a robotics company, wonders if there’s something wrong with her own emotional apparatus, as she comes to terms with the fact that she has little desire to have a child. And Dmitri, in the wake of his parents’ fresh divorce, is trying to understand his own sexuality and how it shapes his identity.

These scenes, while pivotal to the novel’s overall narrative arc, are less compelling, in the end, than the more exotic scenes of Helen, Sergei and Yoshi’s lives aboard the simulator. Apart from the fascinating details of how astronauts deal with various challenges --- both those endemic to the human condition and those manufactured by Prime’s ground control team to test the astronauts’ fitness for the mission --- the glimpses of the astronauts’ lives aboard the spacecraft offer many opportunities for reflection on humanity and the nature of human connections. As the three cope with boredom, discomfort, self-doubt, and eventually even desire and paranoia, their isolation also prompts these most capable, most self-reliant humans to reflect on love, human frailty and the real meaning of home.