Monica Hughes has seen the future-- not to mention the past and present. Her stories transcend time, embracing terrific plotting, non-stop suspense and real life characters. The author of more than 30 young adult and children's novels, she continually challenges herself and her readers to create exciting, gripping stories of ordinary kids facing extraordinary situations.

Now, in "The Other Place", Hughes returns to her most popular setting-- a not-so-distant future world. The Fairweather family, mom, dad, eight-year-old Billy and pre-teen Alison, have just been charged with crimes of subversion against the all-powerful World Government. Now they are about to become "disappeareds", all traces of their existence wiped cleanly away. The Fairweathers are sentenced to five years in the mysterious penal colony of Habitat W- a self-contained, controlled and eerily sterile indoor place that opens to a seething desert of fierce wind and sand. Strangely, Mr. and Mrs. Fairweather robotically resign themselves to their fate. But Billy is convinced that somewhere beyond the barren desert, there is a paradise to be found. His escape from Habitat W sets off a chain of startling events that helps Alison to discover "the other place" and a new hope for their future.