Brendan Colley’s first novel was the much feted The Signal Line and introduced us to his wild and wonderful world within a world of Hobart. Brendan’s new novel The Season for Flying Saucers promises to deliver just as much of a ride.

When the lights appear on the first night of summer Hobart is abuzz. Locals and paranormal pundits alike agree, it’s shaping up to be a good season.

Noah is skeptical. His life is spiraling more than a little; estranged from his family, his wife has left and he’s just been fired from his job. Noah’s sure if he can make payments on the family home he’s bought back and not sure if there’s much of a family to fill it with. Truthfully there’s really nothing to leave behind if they do come to get him.

Weird has followed Noah ever since the night twelve years ago when his father disappeared in the lights. Since then he’s been infamous, inseparable from the lights and this Season for Flying Saucers is shaping up to be a doozy.

Of course with the lights comes the scrutiny. Now Noah is thrown into a too close for comfort version of his childhood as both his mother and sister move in and try to sort out the mystery and their fraught family dynamic.

Brendan Colley has crafted a wickedly fun and far out exploration of the lengths we will go to for family. Within the double brick of Hobart’s northern suburbs we are shown the possibility of a universe much larger than we imagine and yet still not big enough to escape your mum's disapproval.

Noah has hung on to the possibility of his father being a part of something bigger. That his disappearance might have some meaning. It’s coloured his world and now his family must come together and try to figure out all the things they left unsaid all those years ago.

The novel plays with our own need to discover and to believe by dangling hooks and misdirection as we watch the world watch Noah and the lights that seem to be fixed on his house. While we wonder at the possibility of the impossible we see a group of people coming together and working their way through a different type of impossible.

I really loved both Brendan’s first novel and now The Season for Flying Saucers. Both novels understand that our need to believe moves in both directions and even as we look out to the fantastical in the world there is so much about our inner lives that is equally surprising when we take the time to pay it the attention it’s due.

This is the kind of sci-fi and spec-fic that is exciting me in Australian writing today. It understands that as we continue to live in a world that might generously be described as sub-optimal we are looking for answers large and small. I won’t tell you if the lights in the sky turn out to be real but I can tell you that in The Season for Flying Saucers, the time spent looking for them is well worth your while.