Ariadne O’Neill is on a mission to explore four habitable planets together with three crewmates. It’s the twenty-second century, and modern science has enabled humans to “somaform,” allowing space explorers to adapt to the changing and hostile space environment through synthetic biological supplements.
As they hop from one alien world to another, careful not to alter anything, Ariadne contemplates on what it means to study outer space while the home planet they left behind is changing drastically. As they complete their mission, the crew soon faces a difficult and heartbreaking decision: Do they go back to the world that may have already forgotten them, or do they continue on to explore the vast unknown until their resources run out?
Introspective, melancholic, contemplative
Quiet weekend nights or lunch breaks at work
Slow-burn, measured
“How can you think of the stars when the seas are spilling over? How can you spare thought for alien ecosystems when your cities are too hot to inhabit? How can you trade fuel and metal and ideas when the lines on every map are in flux? How can anyone be expected to care about the questions of worlds above when the questions of the world you're stuck on — those most vital criteria of home and health and safety — remain unanswered?”
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5
Give it to Becky Chambers to craft a sci-fi novella that feels like a hot cup of coco on a rainy day. There are no mind-blowing twists and turns, nor are there frantic, edge-of-your-seat scenes that turn your knuckles white — what one would normally expect in this genre. Chambers’ brand of sci-fi is quiet, and I find that refreshing (I first fell in love with her work when I read the Monk and Robot series).
In To Be Taught, Chambers manages to explain technical and scientific concepts without boring or alienating the reader. The book does not read like it’s a manual for space exploration despite the fact that it is about space exploration and all the complex ideas that go with it. I rejoiced with Ariadne’s crew when they landed on Mirabilis and found a verdant world teeming with life; I was equally fascinated as they discovered bioluminescent creatures in the dark waters of Aecor; I felt their desperation when they got stranded on harsh, stormy Opera; I shared in their awe and bewilderment when they discovered single-celled organisms that could challenge the origin of life itself.
Amid all these wonders, Ariadne comes back to one question that mirrors today’s realities: Is it worth chasing after the stars when the planet we inhabit is on the brink of extinction? It’s this central question that Chambers leaves her readers to ponder. And it’s this style of storytelling that made me a fan of the author.