The Humans: A Novel

The Humans is a funny, compulsively readable novel about alien abduction, mathematics and that most interesting subject of all: ourselves. Combine Douglas Adams’ irreverent take on life, the universe and everything with a genuinely moving love story, and you have some idea of the humour, originality and poignancy of Matt Haig’s latest novel.

Our hero, Professor Andrew Martin, is dead before the book even begins. As it turns out, though, he wasn’t a very nice man—as the alien imposter who now occupies his body discovers. Sent to Earth to destroy evidence that Andrew had solved a major mathematical problem, the alien soon finds himself learning more about the professor, his family and “the humans” than he ever expected. When he begins to fall for his own wife and son—who have no idea he’s not the real Andrew—he must choose between completing his mission and returning home, or finding a new home, right here on Earth.

Praise for The Humans

“A brilliant exploration of what it is to love, and to be human, THE HUMANS is both heartwarming and hilarious, weird, and utterly wonderful. One of the best books I’ve read in a very long time.” —S. J. Watson, author of BEFORE I GO TO SLEEP

“The ever-imaginative Haig has created an extraordinary alien sensibility and, though writing with a serious purpose (the future is at stake), has great good fun with the being’s various eyebrow-raising blunders as he struggles to emulate human behavior. Haig strikes exactly the right tone of bemusement, discovery, and wonder in creating what is ultimately a sweet-spirited celebration of humanity and the trials and triumphs of being human. The result is a thought-provoking, compulsively readable delight.” —Booklist