I was first drawn into Moss’d In Space’s orbit by the relentless (and effective) advertising, most of which featured Sachin Teng’s delightful cover art. Cue a library hold coming up right when I was hunting for something new to listen to, and it set me up for a great time. This was a light enough book that I was able to do a lot of other tasks while following along (plugging drafty windows for winter, most notably), and the narrators (Natalie Naudus and Dylan Reilly Fitzpatrick) do a great job at keeping this story accessible and engaging. I’m not sure how much this book is going to stick in my memory, but it was great fun.
The Premise:
In the far-future and back corner of the universe, Torian has quit her job in the smuggler’s fleet to buy her own ship. Partly this is to flee her captain, whom she made out with once. Really though, she wants to find a future where she can save her sister’s life, who has a disease that makes the filtered air of spaceships a slow-acting poison. Her new ship is former alien tech, has a sentient moss life support system, and a former owner who has been trying to find his old friend for a loooong time.
Read if You Like: Becky Chambers, modern cozy science fiction, snarky AI narrators (dual POV book), found family
Avoid if You Dislike: predictability, classism in cozy stories, slowwwww burn romance subplots, hand-waived science
What Worked For Me:
It was interesting to read this book alongside the newest Begley, which took a very utopian mindset to cozy fantasy and ran with it. This is a slightly different version of cozy, where the setting is anything but warm and fuzzy. I quite enjoyed the dynamics of a single planet and 13 space stations as an inherently imbalanced system. The planet (not Earth, but a terraformed planet safe enough to live on), holds all the power, and they aren’t afraid to leverage it. There’s a level of elitism and classism that felt very tangible and real, even when we barely spend any time on the planet itself. Space is perhaps not as unforgiving as it could be, but the world is a mess to anyone who isn’t born into wealth, despite the planet’s claim to be a true meritocracy. Despite a satisfying portrayal of how power corrupts, most of our actual characters fit neatly into cozy stereotypes, such as the 10 foot tall volcano-gargoyle-alien whom Torian shoots twice in panic, and he brushes off the attempted murder with grace and panache. This is quite as sticky-sweet as cozy can get, but it’s got a lot of optimistic solutions to serious problems (such as Torian’s sister’s deadly illness), and happy endings are easy to grasp.
The other bright spot for me was an incompetent lead character! Torian was trained as a solar engineer to pass the planet’s merit tests, took a stint as a security guard, then as a scrapper. She’s got an online pilot license and can’t manage to do a massive amount competently. I liked that our character was forced to rely on others, even if this incompetence mostly served as a plot device to bring her into contact with various side-characters. Too many stories give their characters an unrealistically competent toolkit, and I give major props to Thorne for not.
What Didn’t Work for Me:
I don’t know that I had much that felt was wrong with Moss’d ins pace. However, I also felt like this book was a bit too trendy. There were just a lot of elements that I felt like I’d seen before, without much done to innovate within the ‘queer found family with vaguely snarky ship AI in space’ premise. There are definitely some core differences with books like Cascade Failure (also not the most original story in the world), which is more action-focused than this one. However, I’m struggling to think of situations where I’d pull this out as a recommendation over three or four other books.
To a certain extent, this is just going to be dealer’s choice. When there’s a lot of similar title sharing space, everyone will have their preferences. Thorne doesn’t give me much to dislike here, but I also don’t think she took many risks in the story.
Conclusion: an enjoyable, but predictable cozy sci fi. Not doing much new, but it executes well-trod ideas well
- Characters: 4
- Setting: 4
- Craft: 4
- Themes: 3
- Enjoyment: 3
