For some reason, all of a sudden everybody and everybody seems to have decided

[conuly]

to talk about A Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet and the sequel, A Close and Common Orbit.

Coincidentally, I just got around to reading them.

The science behind their spaceflight is implausible, but you know what? Nobody trips over their own two feet because their ship stopped accelerating, nor does that equal a dead stop, and I'm okay with that. It's a low bar, and they clear it.

Otherwise, I'm waiting on the third book. They're very character-driven novels, and so different from each other. The first, in particular, reads like a TV series, with each chapter its own standalone episode. It was hard for me not to hear the characters as those from the various Enterprises, and at one point I was half-expecting somebody to suddenly declaim on freedom and self-determination and the Prime Directive. If Q had popped by to deliver a moral lesson, a pizza, and a couple of Borg I would've been utterly unsurprised.

There's a narrative hidden in the road trip, but it's really about the journey.

And then in the sequel we've got alternating viewpoint chapters, past and present, and instead of a crew journeying together they're very much about separate people being individuals, and also freedom and self-determination. I expected more of the same, and it... really wasn't.

There are probably things I can say about the stories and the characters and all that... but really, I'm stuck on the vastly different writing styles from two books by the same author set in the same universe with some overlapping characters. I'll save all other commentary for after I've read the next one.

Comments

[monanotlisa]

Yeah, they are...not at all the same, the two books so far -- they're set in the same universe and overlap when it comes to the characters, but style and themes vary.

You could, I think, render A Closed And Common Orbit a television series too, but it would probably work better as one long movie. Whereas The Long Way To A Small, Angry Planet is totes a tv series.

[sabotabby]

I loved the first one, haven't read the second yet. But the first one is like eating an entire container of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream. It is my go-to book for giving to friends who are going through a bad time.

[heron61]

I enjoyed both novels quite a bit and eagerly await the third, but I think your statement "The science behind their spaceflight is implausible" undersells the situation. It's quite clear that the law of conservation of energy simply does not exist in this universe:

Your body has been given a three-day 'booster charge', which will give you the energy needed to start moving (and, of course, to support your core consciousness). By then, your onboard generator will have harvested enough kinetic energy to keep you going. You'll be able to power yourself by that point. Unless you spend several days completely motionless in bed, you'll always have enough power.

Given the author seems quite well educated, I can only assume this is a deliberate choice.

[conuly]

My bar is extremely low, okay? It begins and ends at "NO TRIPPING OVER YOUR OWN TWO FEET IN SPACE"

[heron61]

*nods* Not a bad policy.

[archangelbeth]

Classic Treknobabble, with perhaps a slight update for more modern buzzwords! *giggle*

[stardreamer]

My comment about the hyperspace drive after reading the books was "it's still handwavium, but some thought has been put into making it plausible handwavium".

I actually read the books in reverse order; a good friend whose taste in books is very close to mine recommended the second book, and after reading it I went back and picked up the first one. I don't think I missed anything by doing it that way, since the books are very different and have only minimal character overlap. What I think I liked best about them is that they are not human-centric, and that's unusual and interesting.

[conuly]

Yeah, I don't ask for hard science in my sf. It's cool if it's there, but that's not what I'm reading for. I'm okay with it being pure wishful fantasy. I just want some sign that the author has spent a few minutes thinking about it.

What I think I liked best about them is that they are not human-centric, and that's unusual and interesting.

And at least a little effort was put into making them more than just partial humans. You know - humans, but super aggressive! Humans, but super backstabby! Humans, but super smart and not too big on feelings! Humans, but eversomuch moreso!

[lavendertook]

They are quite wonderful. I also can't wait until her next one and hope she has a long productive career writing away. I so agree with the chocolate chip cookie dough comment--that's it completely. And you said it about the books--both different and both wonderful.

[thewayne]

Third book is available on Amazon right now, presumably also on other sources. It's official release is in a couple of weeks. And it looks like a different setting in the same universe.

[archangelbeth]

*checks iBooks; ebook above impulse-buy level*
(especially after tossing a friend enough money to buy a replacement desk chair(
*checks Libby; local library only has the audiobook*
*there are 2 copies and 3 people are in the queue already*
*mutters darkly*
*checks iBooks again; audiobook is definitely above impulse-buy level*
*grumps around*

funny you should mention those books

[darkoshi]

A few weeks ago, I bought 3 ebooks from kobo.com, intending to read them on my Kindle. It was sort of on a whim, so I didn't spend a lot of time researching the details like usual. When downloading the books, I found out that 2 of them have DRM, which I still didn't realize all the implications of. Today I finished reading the first DRM-free book, and intended to convert and copy the other 2 (which coincidentally includes A Long Way...) to the Kindle, and found out that I can't, gah, because of the DRM. (Never again! Never again!) But I found and downloaded a tool that may make it possible. I'll try it out another day.

[ruuger]

I read the first book a while ago and thought it was entertaining in a Joss-Whedon-popcorn kind of a way.

I did have some serious issues with the way that it handled non-gendered language, though, because I thought it was extremely obvious from the way that the aliens with non-binary genders were written that the author had never actually studied any languages that don't have gendered pronouns (Finnish is a non-gendered language and I've done EN-FI-EN translations that required juggling with gendered/non-gendered language, so it frustrates me how native English authors often just basically search-and-replace he/she with they/zie/etc and call it a day).

The non-human cultures in general also felt a bit planet-of-the-hats in a way that suggests to me that the author hasn't had that much experience interacting with people from cultures that are different from their own. Like the author really wanted to have diverse alien cultures but had not actually given thought how those cultures would function in real life.

[larryhammer]

These caveats.

At least for Planet -- haven't gotten around to Orbit yet.

[greghousesgf]

I loooooove your icon.

[ruuger]

Thanks!

[thewayne]

I quite enjoyed them. The simple description that I apply is that to me they feel like a more mature Douglas Adams. I don't get as much enjoyment out of the Hitchhiker's series as I did when I was a teen, he was just too chaotic. And that also goes for his Dirk Gently books. Becky Chambers' books are internally consistent and, for me, a much more enjoyable read.

I read the first book a year or two ago, the second book was a part of last year's Hugo packet for which she was nominated for best novel. She didn't win, but she was nominated.

As I understand it, the first book was pretty much a self-publish job and could probably have benefited from a good editor, but I still enjoyed it. It's rare for a book to actually emotionally affect me, but that ending was quite something, and it was a perfect entry for the second book. The second book was, as you point out, quite a departure from the first, but still obviously the same author and series. I thought the alternating chapter perspective was a nice device for revealing backstory. The third book, Record of a Spaceborn Few, is to be published July 28, but apparently you can buy it right now on the Brazilian river.