As a child, Jana Jasper’s vivid imagination helped her cope with her inexplicable muteness.  Her family members loved and protected her, but Jana couldn’t help feeling inferior to the other members of California’s so-called first-family.  When Jana was nine, a brief, memorable encounter with a magical, glowing boy who was stuck in the tree outside her bedroom window changed her life.  Suddenly Jana started talking, and once she started she never stopped.  Although her family members dismissed her “Peter Pan” tale as another one of Jana’s numerous imaginary friends, Jana never forgot him.  

Twenty-three years later, State Senator Jana Jasper is desperately searching for some Phish Food ice cream at the local Safeway to help her forget the scandal that is threatening her family’s political reputation.  A tall, hunky stranger wearing body armor and a helmet accosts her in Aisle 5.  It’s Jana’s Peter Pan, very real and very grown up.  He’s traveled across the galaxy to find Jana and warn her that the Coalition, the powerful Space Force that controls thousands of worlds, is planning to annex Earth and move all of its inhabitants to other planets.  Cavin of Far Star, as he introduces himself, is committing treason by warning Jana and her fellow Earthlings, and he also has a bioengineered assassin on his tail who greatly damaged his spaceship.  He’s not concerned with his own well-being, however; he has a plan and wants to save the girl he met so many years ago when he accompanied his father on a scouting expedition.  All she has to do is, to quote the immortal words, “take me to your leader.”   

Jana has barely begun to process all of this information when the deadly alien assassin takes a shot at the couple, forcing them to flee for their lives.  Jana’s family had advised her to avoid any possible sign of trouble to protect her political career in the face of the brewing scandal, but before she knows it she is stealing and hot-wiring numerous cars, leading the police on a high-speed chase, and realizing that she is still in love with the alleged imaginary friend who certainly feels real when they kiss.  Does she have the courage to stand by Cavin’s side and save the Earth?   

Your Planet or Mine? is cute but not compelling.  Grant mines plenty of humor out of Jana’s reaction to discovering a sexy spaceman among the frozen foods, and the heroine’s inner dialogue during her adventures is filled with imaginary headlines, each more comically disastrous than the last.  There are moments of tenderness and passion as well, especially during the story’s climactic confrontation, plus the poignancy of realizing that a childhood fantasy came true in the best possible way.  But the intensity that was present in Grant’s earlier books, most notably Contact, is lacking here.  There’s little tension to Jana and Cavin’s relationship – soon after their reunion, they confess their undying love for each other, and the only unresolved question is when will everyone leave them alone long enough to finally consummate their relationship.  Also there is something just a little bit creepy to me about a man pining away for a woman who was only a 9 year old girl the first and only time that he saw her.  How could he have fantasies about making love to Jana when he didn’t even know how she looked as an adult?   

As with most of Grant’s novels, the sci-fi element is less developed than the romance.  Cavin easily adapts to Earth and, thanks to an implant translator, immediately speaks perfect English.  We learn little about life under the Coalition or any cultural differences between Cavin and Jana’s worlds.  There’s a throwaway line about Coalition and Earth humans sharing the same DNA, but wouldn’t there be some major disparities that developed after thousands of years of planetary separation?   

Jana and Cavin are both strong, brave and noble – a good match for each other.  While Jana doesn’t engage in much literal butt-kicking like most of Grant’s other heroines, she knows how to take charge of a difficult situation and hold her own with powerful politicians.  Unfortunately neither character has much depth.  I found myself more interested in the assassin who follows Cavin to Earth.  Although he’s definitely a bad guy, he doesn’t seem beyond redemption, and his struggle to overcome some rare human emotions is very poignant.   

Your Planet or Mine is a lot of fun, but it’s not Grant’s best work.  Her website promises a follow-up novel in 2007 featuring Jana’s older brother Jared and Keira, the Coalition Queen.  Considering we learn in this novel that Keira once castrated a man who tried to assault her, it might be a more memorable read.   

--Susan Scribner