To Be Taught, If Fortunate

By: Becky Chambers

Narrated by: Brittany Pressley

Length: 4 hrs and 30 mins

Publisher's summary

"Extraordinary...A future sci-fi masterwork in a new and welcome tradition." (Joanne Harris, author of Chocolat)

A stand-alone science fiction novella from the award-winning, best-selling, critically acclaimed author of the Wayfarer series.

At the turn of the 22nd century, scientists make a breakthrough in human spaceflight. Through a revolutionary method known as somaforming, astronauts can survive in hostile environments off Earth using synthetic biological supplementations. They can produce antifreeze in subzero temperatures, absorb radiation and convert it for food, and conveniently adjust to the pull of different gravitational forces. With the fragility of the body no longer a limiting factor, human beings are at last able to journey to neighboring exoplanets long known to harbor life.

A team of these explorers, Ariadne O’Neill and her three crewmates, are hard at work in a planetary system 15 light-years from Sol, on a mission to ecologically survey four habitable worlds. But as Ariadne shifts through both form and time, the culture back on Earth has also been transformed. Faced with the possibility of returning to a planet that has forgotten those who have left, Ariadne begins to chronicle the story of the wonders and dangers of her mission, in the hope that someone back home might still be listening.

©2019 Becky Chambers (P)2019 HarperAudio

Heartwarming and heartbreaking!

To Be Taught, If Fortunate
by Becky Chambers
I love all the other books she has written and enjoyed this one too but I was disappointed with the ending. Of all the choices that was possible, the least rational one was chosen and didn't fit with the book.
The characters and plot were good. The book was short so the character's development wasn't the usual Chambers exquisite but still I felt I knew them enough to know they would not have chosen the ending! Ugh!
I gave the book a 3 1/2 rounding to a 4!
Terrific narration. I got this from Audible.

Exceptional

Beautiful, poignant, the best kind of sci-fi in my opinion. I'll read anything Becky Chambers writes.

Outstanding.

Typically when you try to read an authors work in reverse publication order things get rougher as you go. Not so the case with Becky Chambers. Psalm for the Wild Built and its sequel may be my favorite but To Be Taught if Fortunate really is outstanding,

Beautiful Novella

What an inspiring and captivating story. Listened to this on the road between Idaho and Wyoming, and it melted the hours away. The characters were funny fleshed out, even for a shorter story, and the narrator did a fantastic job of bringing it all to life. Like all good stories, I am a little sad that it is over, but love the things it has unlocked that I will continue to think about for a long time to come.

Outstanding performance, a must listen

Big ideas, thoughtful ethics, difficulties as humans doing amazing brave work....and making dreadful errors.

The Summary doesn't do it justice

Like everything I've read from Becky Chambers, this is emotional, funny, gripping, and a thousand other descriptors, almost all of them good. More classic science than her Wayfarer books, very similar to The Martian I thought. A good read, however you take it.

Perfect, a true call to...

Something. Read to find out! It's a really well written and well paced. Don't let the length fool you, it has more emotion and great story than most 10+ hour books.

Beautiful, devastating, and hopeful all at once

All I can say is that I hope this will one day be recognized as the masterwork it is. So much captured in such a small space. Solid science, heart for miles, and gorgeous writing. Loved it.

Brilliant

This was very different from Ms. Chambers’ prior works. Far more reflective on what science means, what it is for, and why it should be done, and how a few probing explorers would feel and act in exploring new worlds, rather than how entire societies would feel and act and develop in space. Still thoughtful as to social patterns, but doing so through a solitary group isolated together, rather than as part of a larger whole. Very well written, as always with Ms. Chambers. The narrator, Ms. Pressley, does not seem to naturally take to male voices, but this is a minor limitation, particularly given how well she expresses the wonder and thoughtfulness that are the core of this book.

This is not an action book. But I found it gripping and finished it in a go and listened at 1x speed so as to miss nothing. A lot of things happen, and it does remind me a lot of The Martian with less humor but wider intent and scope. The narrator and the rest of her small crew journey to several distant worlds to explore for science’s sake, and discover life. And that discovery and how they react (on several different worlds) provoke analysis of what science is and should be for. That analysis is fascinating and unusual.

This is overlayed with the fact that communication with Earth takes 14 years so their news is always that far behind, plus the crew were in hibernation for twice that along, so even the out-of-date updates are jarring, as times have changed. A lot. This, also, was well-envisioned.

Ultimately, the brief shining moment that led to space exploration for its own sake worked to get our crew into space, but what about since then? What is Earth like so many decades after they left? I did not see the conclusion coming, and afterward, could not have envisioned a better one.

Chambers never fails to make me feel... human

it's like Becky Chambers came upon the human race and one just how to explain up to the universe. And she did it again.