Reviews

The Fated Sky by Mary Robinette Kowal

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han_nur's review against another edition

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adventurous informative tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

timinbc's review against another edition

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4.0

I might come back and give the fifth star.

This is such a solidly, professionally crafted book. It is to admire.

A reader my age has read dozens, maybe hundreds of stories about slide-rule and sextant astronautics. This covers the same ground, and better. (But why no slide rules? I see that Elma may not have needed one, but no one else did either.)

Unlike the earlier square-jawed-engineer stories, this one sets itself in an alternate early-60s, then stirs in a 20-teens view of social issues that were real in the early 60s, but maybe more abstract to the privileged white reader. Most are very well handled.

The Parker story arc is excellent. De Beer was a bit of a stretch; even with his country's heavy funding, I never could believe that ANY astronaut program wouldn't have weeded him out, or at least selected someone more moderate. MRK did not suggest that her world's South Africa was more rabidly racist than our world was then; if it was, then maybe they didn't HAVE anyone more moderate.

The mental counting to handle anxiety is believable, but it got intrusive at times. I'll accept that as intentional by MRK, showing us that anxiety doesn't wait till it's convenient.

I suppose this book COULD have left us thinking they wouldn't get to Mars, but really we knew they would, and Elma would survive. MRK did well to just go with that, and let it be the framework for the real story, about the people. Which is where it diverges from the Heinlein etc. that it is clearly nodding at.

Do read #1 first, and know that this one's better.

nicciobert's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional hopeful inspiring

4.0

ejthomas's review against another edition

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adventurous hopeful inspiring reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

smartflutist661's review against another edition

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adventurous hopeful medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Living out my dream in books. And doing it with 1960s technology. The alternate history is impressively convincing. The science is terrible (differential pressure gauges should show 0 if two hatches have the same pressure on both sides; the moon's gravity is 1/6 Earth's, not 1/16). Luckily this has effectively zero impact on the story, which is more about how this crew navigates all the tensions of the 50s and 60s, plus both a recent and incipient catastrophe. I hope we get to see plenty more of this timeline.