The Galaxy, and the Ground Within by Becky Chambers
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Chambers does it again with her character-driven warm-fuzzies-in-space-opera fiction.

I've enjoyed all of these books for exactly what they are. Not a traditional space-opera in any normal sense of the word except in the dodads, alien species, and space-travel, but while we DO have all of these bits, the story is always down-to-earth, small, and focused on getting by, developing relationships, and sometimes even a taste or three of a few universals.

You know, like being upset with governmental stupidities in crisis, learning to live and love in very restrained and difficult situations, and coming to grips with old injustices and even the injustice of certain ideas.

In other words, it's our modern world with SF trappings. 'Wayfarers', in the title, is not misleading. We're literally stuck in a space truck stop for the entire novel.

It's not getting out of this backwater place that is the core of this plot. It's getting out of ourselves.

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