The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet

Some stories are more interested in developing ideas than creating a convoluted plot full of twists and turns. The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, a science fiction novel written by Becky Chambers, falls into this category, with a narrative committed to raising discussions based on the particular dilemmas of its characters.

The protagonist is called Rosemary, a young woman who is fleeing from her past and seeking employment on a spaceship. She is hired by the eccentric crew of the Wayfarer, which includes a reptilian pilot, a doctor with six limbs who can naturally change their biological sex, and a navigator who considers a virus that is infecting him an entity worthy of respect. The crew’s latest goal is to tunnel a wormhole in an ancient war zone near a tiny planet: a job that promises great financial reward and few problems, since the alien species that guards the place has just formed an alliance with the Wayfarer’s clients.

To tell Rosemary’s journey to that small planet the narrative assumes an episodic structure. Each chapter has the responsibility to develop a particular member of the Wayfarer’s crew while outlining some characteristics of the others.

Through the dilemma of these characters, the book raises several discussions about sex, religion, and depression, contextualizing them around typical elements of science fiction. The clash of cultures is one of the central ways in which this is accomplished, with aliens never hesitating to point out the human idiosyncrasies that they consider bizarre. The species of the reptilian pilot, for example, called Aandrisk, is extremely affable, and they frequently manifest their affection in physical form. This makes it difficult for her to understand all the sexual repression she sees in her human colleagues, who often treat sex as taboo, neurotically associating nakedness to sensuality and considering sex a corrupting agent and a perversion of social norms. These are all absolutely surreal attitudes for the pilot, who would be even more shocked to understand that this is all fruit of centuries of religious influence and oppression. The Aandrisk’s vision is simple: caress and sex are just gestures of fondness and love, and, as long as the other adult is in the mood, there is no reason to consider them reprehensible.

Religion, in turn, is a matter directly discussed via the navigator, Ohan, who accepts his death due to a viral infection just because his religion says he should. Again, the author uses the characteristics of an alien culture to bring forth pertinent questions: with Ohan, for example, the novel asks why someone believes in a religion that does them harm. If it is a personal matter of faith, and not beliefs imposed by others, why not believe only in something that is good for everyone? Why accept dogmas that are harmful to oneself or to other parts of society? If a religion preaches prejudice or unnecessary individual sacrifices, why not reject these aspects of it? To make the debate even more complex, the author inserts more elements into the situation: the virus, for instance, alters the cognitive capacities of its bearer and can influence their decisions. Ohan’s companions, then, are faced with a dilemma: if dying were only a matter of choice on the part of the navigator, no matter how stupid and irrational they considered it, they would still respect his decision. However, drawing a parallel with depression, Ohan’s desire to die may not be a conscious choice, but a symptom of his disease. In that case, letting him die would not be equivalent to accepting his wish, but to stopping treating him.

The narrative brings to light several other problems through an allegorical use of its fantastical elements: it uses cloning, for example, to make more evident how parents often project their own desires and frustrations onto their children – seeing in them a second chance to overcome past mistakes –, and uses the structure of the Aandrisk society to reveal the hypocrisy of those who are at the same time against abortion and in favor of lowering the minimum age of criminal responsibility, considering the potential of life more important than one that is already fully formed.

Despite all this diversity of ideas, the story still has a narrative thread sewing everything together. The acceptance of the “other” is a recurring theme, establishing friendship and love as pure forms of interaction, regardless of those involved: it doesn’t matter if they occur between individuals of the same gender, of different sentient species, and even between men and artificial intelligence; love and respect are good and the rest is just prejudice.

Chambers’ novel, however, is hardly optimistic: after all, in the world it presents, humanity has ruined Earth and continues to have its society structured around social inequality. Humans are still shown promoting injustice and for their own benefit, and conflicts between people of different faiths remain commonplace. Furthermore, in this universe, it’s not only humanity that is capable of evil, since other species also have their own share of wars, racism, and concentration camps.

Consequently, the thematic importance of the Wayfarer crew lies precisely in its capacity to offer an alternative: the idea that people can act affectionately toward one another – despite all their differences – and that everyone’s life would only improve if they did so. The main characters, then, often border on the stereotype of the cool Canadian: they are all proactive in their fellowship, and they all understand and accept each other, offering a friendly shoulder whenever they can, knowing that everyone needs a break, especially when under constant pressure, such as in a work environment.

The antagonists, in turn, represent the worst of people, being a theocratic alien species, whose ideology is based on a forced hivemind, which thinks that any different idea must be immediately eliminated before it ends up destroying the current paradigm. In other words, it preaches that everyone must think alike to maintain order, and that the “other” must be eliminated. If the Wayfarer crew sees the other with the same affection as they see the ones like them, the antagonists see “difference” as something dangerous and disruptive. In a certain scene, a character argues that most of the world’s conflicts are caused by people being assholes, and the story shows how seeing the other with hostility is the root of the problem.

Chambers does a remarkable job in her debut novel, showing some creativity in certain scenes: when the group is tunneling a wormhole, for example, there is a moment when the characters’ dialogues start to repeat without warning, indicating that they are trapped in a temporal pocket. The book, however,  falls into cliché territory from time to time – like offering the old, beaten explanation of a wormhole with a folded sheet of paper – and it suffers from some pacing issues, since most of the chapters, although important thematically and for the development of the characters, rarely advance the main plot.

The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet’s strength lies in its ability to present a range of captivating characters and use them to tackle important and complex subjects. Here, Becky Chambers uses alterity to show humanity at its best and worst while offering a solution to our problems that is both simple and effective: people only need to stop being assholes.

April 01, 2020.

Review originally published in Portuguese on December 31, 2017.