Alien Vacation

This Nickelodeon tie-in sends Allen Strange and his human friends Robbie and Josh from their suburban routine to Tunisia, where competing factions are after artifacts connected to Allen's home planet Xela. The international setting gives the story more geographic texture than most TV novelizations manage, and the friendship dynamics that made the series work translate reasonably well to the page. Allen's tension between loyalty to his human friends and longing for home is the emotional core worth caring about. The honest caveat is that this is a tie-in first: readers unfamiliar with The Journey of Allen Strange will be catching up rather than just enjoying the ride, and the book has no significant literary standing independent of the show. For fans of the series looking for more Allen Strange, it is a solid extension.