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A review by davidbythebay
To Be Taught, If Fortunate by Becky Chambers
adventurous
challenging
emotional
hopeful
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
This was my first Becky Chambers book and it won’t be my last. I really enjoyed how full her characters felt - and how diverse they were, even though I may be reading into her prose and seeing diversity - for example regarding Jack and his “second puberty” I took that to mean Jack is a trans man. But it is never an issue, never mentioned explicitly, and never commented upon. Her characters’ race or sexual identity or religion or any other trait is never questioned of brought up; it just is. And that’s what makes the diversity here so unique. You can bring whatever you want to these characters.
Her characters felt real and so did the environment they were in. The craft itself isn’t explored in detail, but the science and the environment of the four planets they go to definitely are well detailed. (Moons, planets, whatever they really were, I’m just calling them all planets for ease.)
My issue was with the story elements. The prose was lovely. Chambers’ plot was great. I just took issue with small things. To start with, some things were abruptly ended or switched from one thing to another. It was more about ambiance of the planets. And I liked that, but it was almost episodic at times and that kind of felt abruptly shifting the story. One such scene lead from one thing pretty much directly to the ending and it felt so quick. Like there was only so many pages in the computer’s printer and she had to finish the story on them and print it because no more was available to her. The ending was another point of issue. I liked the ambiguity of the ending to a point. But the lead up to it was paved with a series of philosophical questions that are important but just kind of dumped there. And the immediate lead up to the ending was almost like the team saying “yup. Guess we should just debate this.” And then it starts and stops and nothing is resolved yet everything is resolved.
It was an enjoyable novella. Perhaps as a novel it could have been expanded on more. Some of those philosophical questions arose earlier on in the novella, but none are sufficiently explored in my opinion. It’s almost like a character asks the question, a brief discussion is had, and you barely see two sides let alone any other sides to the arguments.
That all being said, I greatly enjoyed reading this. I’m giving it 4 strong stars despite my quibbles.
Her characters felt real and so did the environment they were in. The craft itself isn’t explored in detail, but the science and the environment of the four planets they go to definitely are well detailed. (Moons, planets, whatever they really were, I’m just calling them all planets for ease.)
My issue was with the story elements. The prose was lovely. Chambers’ plot was great. I just took issue with small things. To start with, some things were abruptly ended or switched from one thing to another. It was more about ambiance of the planets. And I liked that, but it was almost episodic at times and that kind of felt abruptly shifting the story. One such scene lead from one thing pretty much directly to the ending and it felt so quick. Like there was only so many pages in the computer’s printer and she had to finish the story on them and print it because no more was available to her. The ending was another point of issue. I liked the ambiguity of the ending to a point. But the lead up to it was paved with a series of philosophical questions that are important but just kind of dumped there. And the immediate lead up to the ending was almost like the team saying “yup. Guess we should just debate this.” And then it starts and stops and nothing is resolved yet everything is resolved.
It was an enjoyable novella. Perhaps as a novel it could have been expanded on more. Some of those philosophical questions arose earlier on in the novella, but none are sufficiently explored in my opinion. It’s almost like a character asks the question, a brief discussion is had, and you barely see two sides let alone any other sides to the arguments.
That all being said, I greatly enjoyed reading this. I’m giving it 4 strong stars despite my quibbles.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal death