Books are like video games to me in that no matter how many I own, physically or digitally, I am always looking for more to add to my collections. In the past few months I've been on a sci-fi streak and have made an effort to try out some new authors rather than leaning on my more prolific favorites. This leads me to do internet searches of "sci fi hidden gems" and "underrated sci fi authors" and if I spent as much time reading books as I did hunting more down, I'd get a lot more reading done.
I can't remember exactly where I saw it, but as an animal lover, Greg Van Eekhout's 2018 children's novel Voyage of the Dogs caught my eye and was an almost instant purchase. VotD tells the story of Lopside and his compatriots who are dog astronauts known as Barkonauts. The Barkonauts are assigned to assist the human crew on a long term mission to set up habitat on a distant planet. Unfortunately, something went wrong during the hibernation phase of the voyage and the human crew have disappeared. Lopside and the Barkonauts must figure out what happened and survive long enough to get help.
