Milk

Milk

Everything is connected. But did you really want to know how?

Cast out by cold-hearted fosters, grieving the death of her sister in a terrorist group’s mass suicide, young orphan Jennifer Prothero joins the Lost Girls on the mean streets of Deem. She commits a dark deed to escape serial threats on her still-growing body and mind and flees into the wilderness where she is taken in by charitable homesteaders who have also adopted two shipwrecked humanoid aliens.

These enterprising spacefarers commandeer a ship belonging to the dread Watermen, unfathomable dim creatures whose predatory visits to Earth have featured collecting flesh samples from children, videographing their terror, and abducting adults.

Now footloose Jennifer, free of cultural rules for mind or body, identity in flux, uncertain of her roots, sexual orientation and place of belonging, if any, sets off on a new adventure in the stolen Waterman vessel with her genderless, voiceless alien mentors.

Instead the three find themselves at the mercy of the ship, which proves smarter than its previous owners and has a different destination in mind. It takes them to a terraformed planet where they encounter more Watermen, an enigmatic human bioengineering project, a marked absence of governing intelligence, and a dwindling community of abducted Earth folk.

Jennifer and friends must survive an encounter with the dangerous Watermen, help the abducted find their way home, and try to unravel the meaning of the mysterious planet. And as they struggle with these challenges, Jennifer continues the long journey of discovering her own nature and history.

As usual, nothing is as it seems. And that's the way it should be.