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But First, Take Off Your Shoes

Surviving an alien invasion is hard. Surviving it alongside the hyper-critical mother who disowned you for daring to follow your own path—well, that’s harder.

When spaceships attack the city, Chloe breaks five years of silence to ensure her mother, Thúy, is safe. This would be a great time to reconcile, except it’s difficult to unpack years of multi-cultural and generational resentment while dodging laser beams and explosions. Luckily, Jimmi, the hunky Airforce airman they meet during their escape, serves as a welcome distraction from the constant mother-daughter bickering.

When Chloe becomes the first person to survive an alien abduction, she finds herself thrust in the middle of interplanetary warfare. Chloe can’t even reconcile with her mother, let alone two warring planets. Good thing she has the help of a group of alien conspiracy theorists who find her in the middle of the desert while on their way to a convention in Las Vegas.

When Chloe’s attempt to play mediator between Earth and the aliens results in failure, Chloe must embark on a rescue mission with her friends through the famed Luxor pyramid hotel where a dramatic showdown awaits—and daughters learn that sometimes to save the world, you have to reconcile with your mothers.

Science fiction | Women’s Fiction | Comedy

AUTHOR NAME Pronunciation:

VIK-ee LAHN

Short Bio:

Vickie Lan is the author of But First, Take Off Your Shoes. She is also an award-winning communicator, short-form filmmaker, and host of the S peculative Sandbox podcast. When she’s not storytelling, she’s fixating on one of many hobbies, including reading, knitting, baking, sketching, voiceover, drinking (tea!), and competitive dog grooming. One of those is made up.

LONG BIO:

Author and podcast host Vickie Lan has sold her debut novel, But First Take Off Your Shoes (title subject to change), a genre-blending work of women’s fiction, science fiction, and comedy, to Union Square & Co, an imprint of Hachette, slated for publication in Fall 2026.

Represented by Ali Herring of Spencerhill Associates, Lan’s novel centers on an estranged mother and daughter forced to reconcile their fractured relationship in the midst of an alien invasion. Combining humor with emotional depth, the story explores themes of diaspora, identity, and intergenerational tension through a distinctly original lens.

Early readers and industry professionals have praised the manuscript as “a blast,” highlighting its “complex, intricate mother-daughter dynamics, whip-smart humor, and hooky apocalyptic plot,” as well as “a lovingly detailed and emotionally rich depiction of diaspora life.”

The project has been described internally as Crying in H Mart meets Mars Attacks for its merging of intimate cultural storytelling with absurd, high-stakes spectacle.

Lan was inspired to write the novel as a serious exploration of a multi-cultural mother-daughter experience against a comedic science-fiction backdrop. “I originally thought of aliens as a way to make my mom laugh,” said Lan. “I asked myself, what science fiction scenario would she find utterly ridiculous?” The result is a surprisingly poignant exploration of intergenerational trauma and forgiveness that has touched readers of many backgrounds.

In addition to her fiction writing, Lan hosts the podcast Speculative Sandbox, an audio “playground” where writers explore the craft of storytelling, tropes, and character archetypes across genres.

But First Take Off Your Shoes marks her debut novel.