A Prayer for the Crown-Shy by Becky Chambers

A story of kindness and love from one of the foremost practitioners of hopeful SF.

After touring the rural areas of Panga, Sibling Dex (a Tea Monk of some renown) and Mosscap (a robot sent on a quest to determine what humanity really needs) turn their attention to the villages and cities of the little moon they call home.

They hope to find the answers they seek, while making new friends, learning new concepts, and experiencing the entropic nature of the universe.

Becky Chambers’s new series continues to ask: in a world where people have what they want, does having more even matter?

A Prayer for the Crown-Shy is the coziest little communist book. 

In the second of the Monk and Robot series, Sibling Dex and Mosscap continue their slice of life adventures. Sibling Dex, a human/Tea Monk, and Mosscap, a kind Robot, became best buds in A Psalm for the Wild-Built. They search for any meaning in life and why existence matters. In this follow up, Dex shows Mosscap the rural inhabitants, life on the road, camping by the coast, and the joy of spending time with loved ones. 

I find some sense of comfort as a depressed person with life anxieties within these pages. I’m reminded to take the joy in the quiet, calm little moments. Becky Chambers reminds me why it’s ok just to exist and enjoy life. Mosscap’s outrageous enthusiasm for the little things sparks something in me I don’t want to forget. 

Becky Chambers really wants us to think about the idea of fulfillment in these books. This isn’t simply a cozy speculative novel. It’s a novel about our society. Capitalism warps our ideas of what we find fulfilling in life. In order to be successful and happy, apparently we need to show the numbers in our overworked lives. Day in and day out, we give and give and die for companies that feel no sympathy for how we feel. We are easily replaced. We’re nothing but a machine putting in the numbers to increase their wealth. That mindset works as one and impacts the whole.

But in Becky Chambers’ world, the robots left the factories to live in the forest. Mosscap wants to discover what humans need. Have the human’s improved? What makes them feel good about themselves, what they enjoy in life, and the joy in little quirky habits of humans. Dex is such a kind person, always trying to help others and never themself. They feel lost in this world. Dex feels empty in the way many depressed people in our society feel. 

That’s what’s so enjoyable about Mosscap, though. A robot, an object, gives hope to humanity. It reminds us of happiness and brings us further away from this depressing need to have a reason to live. 

Feeling happy and enjoyment in something is enough. Taking time in between things for yourself is necessary to be fulfilled. There doesn’t need to be some grand epic adventure for something to be important. That, essentially, is what Becky Chambers does so brilliantly. 

This is the type of book I like to read in between the dark, gloomy fantasy books so dear to my heart. It gives that balance in the in-between. The same way this book resembles the little in-between moments of life, it’s a great book to pick up in between the chonky epics. It’s short, cozy, and makes you want to go on a little gay camping trip. 

So much of this book is intelligently thought through. When looking at these books, I notice this one isn’t as structured. The plot isn’t as tightly organized. I felt like wandering for most of the time, unlike A Psalm for the Wild-Built. There’s more of a ‘where are we going precisely?’ aspect that could have been clarified into a tighter purpose. No matter the intent, books still need some structure so it doesn’t feel like they’ve been chopped up into different pieces. I enjoyed this a lot but just because I love something doesn’t mean I should ignore the flaws. Chambers is saying something really brilliant here, but it lacks editorial work that could have made it look more like a single thing. 

A Prayer for the Crown-Shy by Becky Chambers is a great big smile of a book. Soft, comforting, and full of brilliant philosophical ideas but not as impressive and structured as the first.

Thank you to Tordotcom for an ARC for review.

A Prayer for the Crown-Shy is available for preorder now. You can find Kopratic’s review/art of the book here as well.