Small Orange Fruit

by Mandy Ashcraft

If reincarnation were fact, would you be guaranteed rebirth on the same planet? The Department of the Afterlife on Aleya has a lengthy history of reincarnation errors, and for a 23-year-old waitress named Suzan, death didn’t go as expected. In fact, it went downright wrong; she found herself being redirected in a “go towards the light—no wait, actually not that light, go down the hall to the left and go to that one, past the fountain” scenario and ended up on planet Earth. Gilbert Chalk's new neighbor isn't exactly your average girl next door; she's from the universe next door. Until the auditors of the afterlife correct their mistake, Suzan is left with nothing but time to find out what it means to be alive, to be dead, and to use a West Texas food truck as an interplanetary mobile phone. Gilbert discovers a bizarre connection to Suzan's home planet, but unfortunately Aleya isn’t the way she left it. How do you ever get back home when everything about “home” has changed? Do you really want to go back?

262 pages, Kindle Edition

Published March 1, 2018

About the author

My name is Mandy Ashcraft. I'm 30 years old and live in Corpus Christi, TX with my husband Dustin. My interests include black tea lattes, science fiction, baking, and ducks. My favorite authors are Douglas Adams, Orson Scott Card, Philip K. Dick, and Kurt Vonnegut. I'm a pretty simple person; I've always wanted to spend the night at the hotel that inspired The Shining, to visit my birthplace of Guam (I left 29 years ago...I wonder if anyone remembers me?), and also to own a home with windows in the kitchen. That might not sound like something worthy of a life goal, but when you don't have windows in your kitchen, you add it to the list. Other than that, I'd like to help colonize Mars. I love to read, and I dream of taking my future children to the public library. Right now my child is a chihuahua so they won't let her in. I hope you enjoy my work; I'd love to hear from you. For more information visit mandyashcraft.com

Reviews

[Ginny · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very fun read.

I was kinda sad that Gilbert & Suzan didn't end up together, but at least she stopped the old man he got what he deserved!

[Matthew Siegal · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the funnest reads of 2022 for me so far. The story is surreal following a man who has inherited a house and the care of a historic home across the road, which is inhabited by a woman from another planet who is waiting to be reincarnated. They set off on a mission to speed this process along and that’s all I want to say as I’d hate to spoil the story. Suffice to say there is a lot more that goes on.

I can 100% see shades of two of my absolute favourite authors, Kurt Vonnegut and Philip K. Dick. It has all of the surrealism you’d expect from these two names with trippy body shifting (Dick) with the accessibility and humour of Vonnegut.

I am really excited to see what’s coming next from this writer.

[Virginia Allen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting idea

The story held my attention and had some different views of the work without preaching. It was fun and funny.

[James Piss · Rating 4 out of 5]

so litke. 's an orange?