Virgin Astronaut Bucket List

Mars-bound genius hides in high school, meets chaotic hockey player.

Seventeen-year-old Kara has a one-way ticket to Mars but detours into an ordinary high school to finish a private bucket list before departure. She tackles teenage milestones with spreadsheets and algorithms, treating social dynamics as solvable equations. The controlled experiment collapses when a bruising hockey enforcer crashes into her routine, his unpredictable nature shattering every forecast she built. Kara must now navigate a reality that refuses to compute.

• romance
• school
• enemies to lovers
• sci fi

1. Genius Kara selected for Mars mission
2. Secretly enrolls to complete bucket list
3. Clashes with volatile hockey enforcer

Anyone who enjoys a brilliant outsider upended by messy human connection.