Most of the books I have listed as media tie-in on this site are books that have been adapted to the big screen. However, Starman is a novelization of the Starman screenplay by the king of novelizations, Alan Dean Foster. Well, at least the king of science fiction movie novelizations. In other words, he writes a novel version of the screenplay. Unlike when they make a movie from a book, when it’s done in reverse the novel is very true to the screenplay. Most of these novelizations are pretty bad. This one isn’t. 

          The story is the definition of the standard first contact trope. Aliens find evidence of humanity. Aliens travel to earth. Aliens send investigator to earth to explore. Alien travels for a time as a human, along the way coming to appreciate humanity’s features. Usually there are complications along the lines of militaristic or hostile people, frequently government agents as in this story, who view the alien as a threat and attempt to capture or neutralize what they don’t know. Alien returns recognizing homo sapiens possibility for good as well as destruction.

          Foster does a pretty good job of making all the pieces fit together, covering for plot holes in the movie. I don’t remember the dialogue well enough to determine if it’s straight from the movie or Foster’s creation. Starman’s alien clones the body of a recently dead person (Scott Hayden) for travel on earth’s surface, as earth isn’t conducive to his natural form. At first he kidnaps Jenny Hayden to take him to his rendezvous point for pick-up, but in a classic case of Stockholm syndrome Jenny comes to love the new Scott along the way and helps him avoid capture.