Emma Goto
This was author Yume Kitasei's debut novel - I actually read one of her other books (Saltcrop) and liked it enough to go back and read this one. The plot revolves around Asuka, a half-Japanese, half-American girl who is part of the crew on a spaceship that is setting out to colonise the distant planet X, leaving behind an Earth that is doomed due to the effects of climate change.
I always like it when sci-fi books do something different, so the unique twist in this book is that the space ship's crew (of about 80) consists entirely of people who are equipped to be able to get pregnant and give birth (i.e. mostly women, but also at least one trans man and another with they/them pronouns). And they are all required to try and get pregnant at least once (via sperm they have stored on the ship), with the aim of eventually getting to their destination planet and being able to raise a new generation there. In a sense mandatory pregnancy is a little dystopian... but at least all the crew knew that fact when they signed up for it.
The plot starts on the ship, but has several flashbacks to when Asuka was a student attending the astronaut candidate school. Some of the friendships she made there with her fellow students continued onto the ship, so it's nice to get a bit of backstory. The main plot on the ship itself is actually a rather interesting whodunnit where Asuka goes around trying to figure out who was responsible for a murder. There's also an all-knowing AI onboard who conveniently is unable to give away confidential information (so the AI knows who committed the murder but is unable to tell anyone) which is a bit too convenient if you ask me - should have a clause baked in for crimes or something 😂
Asuka as a character has some big complexes. For one, she has a lower status on board the ship, having been assigned as an "alternate" astronaut who does odd-jobs instead of having a fixed role. For two, some issues around feeling betrayed by her mother. And for three, while she is being sent as the representative astronaut from Japan, she doesn't feel like a "real Japanese" - having been born and raised in the US, and not being able to fluently speak the language. The author is similarly Japanese/American so I assume this is drawn from her own lived experiences.
Writing it out like that makes it seem like Asuka might be a bit of a whiney character, but I think it sort of borders on the edge of just making her seem more relatable - if anything she grows throughout the course of the book, so I'd really like a sequel just to see her becoming a more self-confident character.
The pregnancy detail is kind of interesting. When you think about it, attempting to have babies ready to go in tubes when you get to the destination planet (Interstellar-style) is a pretty tall order so maybe it would make sense that you do one step removed from that and have as many "wombs" (for want of a better word) available to go on the ship. With how male-dominated STEM and the space industry is, it is a little hard to imagine that concept ever actually taking off (pun intended), but hey, that's the fun part about sci-fi.
Originally posted at www.emgoto.com.
This was author Yume Kitasei's debut novel - I actually read one of her other books (Saltcrop) and liked it enough to go back and read this one. The plot revolves around Asuka, a half-Japanese, half-American girl who is part of the crew on a spaceship that is setting out to colonise the distant planet X, leaving behind an Earth that is doomed due to the effects of climate change.
I always like it when sci-fi books do something different, so the unique twist in this book is that the space ship's crew (of about 80) consists entirely of people who are equipped to be able to get pregnant and give birth (i.e. mostly women, but also at least one trans man and another with they/them pronouns). And they are all required to try and get pregnant at least once (via sperm they have stored on the ship), with the aim of eventually getting to their destination planet and being able to raise a new generation there. In a sense mandatory pregnancy is a little dystopian... but at least all the crew knew that fact when they signed up for it.
The plot starts on the ship, but has several flashbacks to when Asuka was a student attending the astronaut candidate school. Some of the friendships she made there with her fellow students continued onto the ship, so it's nice to get a bit of backstory. The main plot on the ship itself is actually a rather interesting whodunnit where Asuka goes around trying to figure out who was responsible for a murder. There's also an all-knowing AI onboard who conveniently is unable to give away confidential information (so the AI knows who committed the murder but is unable to tell anyone) which is a bit too convenient if you ask me - should have a clause baked in for crimes or something 😂
Asuka as a character has some big complexes. For one, she has a lower status on board the ship, having been assigned as an "alternate" astronaut who does odd-jobs instead of having a fixed role. For two, some issues around feeling betrayed by her mother. And for three, while she is being sent as the representative astronaut from Japan, she doesn't feel like a "real Japanese" - having been born and raised in the US, and not being able to fluently speak the language. The author is similarly Japanese/American so I assume this is drawn from her own lived experiences.
Writing it out like that makes it seem like Asuka might be a bit of a whiney character, but I think it sort of borders on the edge of just making her seem more relatable - if anything she grows throughout the course of the book, so I'd really like a sequel just to see her becoming a more self-confident character.
The pregnancy detail is kind of interesting. When you think about it, attempting to have babies ready to go in tubes when you get to the destination planet (Interstellar-style) is a pretty tall order so maybe it would make sense that you do one step removed from that and have as many "wombs" (for want of a better word) available to go on the ship. With how male-dominated STEM and the space industry is, it is a little hard to imagine that concept ever actually taking off (pun intended), but hey, that's the fun part about sci-fi.
Originally posted at www.emgoto.com.
