A closed and common orbit

by Beck Chambers

A follow up novel to The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet tracking the events in the lives of two characters. Firstly the new version of the Lovelace AI from the Wayfarer, now named Sidra and transfered into a human like body. Secondly, the life of Penny who escaped as a slave on a renegade planet of enhanced humans with the help of an AI named Owl trapped inside an immobilised transfer shuttle that had been scrapped on the same planet.

It depicts the struggle an AI can have in adapting to a new environment and is also a very intersting take on the bonds that could form between humans and AIs. Whilst written in 2016, this is quite topical at the moment given the rise in teenagers turning to chatbots for self help with depression.

I finished the last 250 pages of this book in the 2 days before the new year suffering from a bad virus infection.

From 12.12.2025 to 31.12.2025