This novella has a bit of a different feel, although it is still a sci-fi, space-faring novel with more of a human element than I've ever read in sci-fi before. It's the story of the small crew of an extrasolar research vessel in an age where scientists have realised that the best way to allow humans to inhabit other planets is to change the humans rather than the environment they're going to. Because the crew are travelling vast distances between planets, they go into what is effectively stasis while travelling. Their mission is to research, study and explore each planet and send their findings home before moving on to the next planet.
Like TLWTASAP, this has a decent plot, but the real focus is on the characters. Despite the fact that this is a novella, each character is well-rounded and by the end I really felt like I knew them. The plot is just the crew going from planet to planet - what this book is about is how they each react to their situations.
This book is emotional and ultimately hopeful. It's a love letter to science and also to humanity; the space exploration program isn't funded by governments or private corporations but by millions of civilians crowd-funding it because there was a danger that space exploration would no longer happen. I think the author genuinely believes in the collective goodness of humanity. I am more cynical than the author and I think that the general public would only crowd-fund a space program if they could vote each week on one of the astronauts to be thrown out of the space craft, but that might just be me.
4 stars