The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet

Some stories are much more interested in developing their core themes and ideas than a complex plot full of twists and turns. Such is The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet, a science fiction novel that leverages the quirkiness of its unique cast of characters to shed light on many of our society’s problems.

The protagonist is Rosemary, a young woman fleeing from her past while seeking employment on a spaceship. Luckily, she’s hired by the eccentric crew of the Wayfarer, which includes a reptilian pilot, a doctor with six limbs who can naturally change their biological sex, and a navigator who considers the virus infecting him an entity worthy of respect. The crew’s latest goal is to tunnel a wormhole in an ancient war zone near a tiny (possibly angry) planet: a job that promises great financial reward but will, of course, be way harder than they anticipated.

The narrative assumes an episodic structure, with each chapter putting the spotlight on a particular member of the Wayfarer’s crew while outlining some of the others’ minor traits. And it’s precisely through their bespoke conflicts and dilemmas that the book will raise several discussions about sex, religion, and depression using a plethora of fantastical elements.

We’ve got a clash of cultures inside the Wayfarer, with the aliens never hesitating to single out each human idiosyncrasy they find bizarre. The species of the reptilian pilot, called Aandrisk, is extremely affable, and they frequently manifest their affection physically. This makes it difficult for the pilot to understand all the sexual repression she notices in her human colleagues, who treat sex as taboo, neurotically associating nakedness with sensuality while considering sex a corrupting agent and a perversion of social norms. This is sheer madness to the pilot (why would a species condemn so vehemently something that makes them happy?), and she would be even more shocked to discover that this is all the fruit of centuries of religious influence and oppression. The Aandrisk’s vision is simple: physical caress (and consequently sex) is a gesture of fondness and love, so, as long as the other adult is in the mood, there is no reason to consider it reprehensible.

Religion, in turn, is a matter more directly discussed via the navigator Ohan, who accepts his impending death by viral infection because his faith says he should. Again, the book uses the traits of an alien culture to bring forth pertinent questions: with Ohan, it asks why someone believes in a religion that does them harm. If it is a personal matter of faith, and not a set of beliefs imposed by others, why not believe only in something that is good for everyone? Why accept dogmas that are harmful to oneself or to other members of society? If a religion preaches prejudice or individual sacrifice, why not reject these aspects of it, and you know, love thy neighbor as you love thyself?

Some additional elements of Ohan’s plight also make matters more complex: the killing virus alters the cognitive capacities of its bearer and can influence their decisions. Ohan’s companions, then, are faced with a dilemma: if dying were only a matter of choice on the part of the navigator, no matter how stupid and irrational they considered it to be, they would still respect his decision. However, drawing a parallel with depression, Ohan’s desire to die may not be a conscious choice, but a symptom of his disease. In that case, letting him die would not be equivalent to respecting his wish, but to stopping treating him.

The narrative brings to light several other problems through an allegorical use of its fantastical elements: it makes cloning, for example, a way to show how parents often project their own desires and frustrations onto their children – seeing in them a second chance to overcome their own past mistakes –, and uses the structure of the Aandrisk society to reveal the hypocrisy of those who are, at the same time, against abortion and in favor of lowering the minimum age of criminal responsibility, considering the potential of life more important than one that is already fully formed.

And despite all this large array of themes, the story still manages to have a competent narrative thread sewing everything together. The acceptance of the “other” is a recurring theme, establishing friendship and love as pure forms of interaction, regardless of those involved: it doesn’t matter if they occur between individuals of the same gender, of different sentient species, and even between men and artificial intelligence; love and respect are good and the rest is just you not loving the other as you love yourself (although, these kinds of people really hate themselves, that’s often precisely the rub).

The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet is hardly optimistic: in the world it presents, humanity has ruined Earth and continues to have its society structured around social inequality. Humans are still shown to promote injustice and hatred, and conflicts between people of different faiths remain commonplace. And it’s not just humanity that is capable of evil, as other species also have their own share of wars, racism, and concentration camps.

Consequently, the thematic importance of the Wayfarer crew lies precisely in its capacity to offer an alternative: the idea that people can act affectionately toward one another – despite all their differences – and that everyone’s life would only improve if they did so. The main characters, then, often border on the stereotype of the cool Canadian: they are all proactive in their fellowship, and they all understand and accept each other, offering a friendly shoulder whenever they can, knowing that everyone needs a break, especially when under pressure. In other words, they are nice with each other, and what a cool thing it would be if we collectively decided to do the same. Just imagine!

The antagonists, in turn, represent the worst in people, being a theocratic alien species, whose ideology is based on a forced hivemind that preaches that difference must be extinguished before it ends up destroying the status quo. In other words, the “other” must be eliminated. If the Wayfarer crew sees the other with the same affection as they see themselves, the antagonists see “difference” as something dangerous and disruptive: people who are not like them are the enemy. In a certain scene, a character argues that most of the world’s conflicts are caused by people being assholes, and the story portrays how seeing the “other” with hostility is the root of the problem.

Finally, if the novel offers some creative, out-of-left-field scenes, such as when the group is tunneling a wormhole, and the characters’ dialogues start to repeat without warning, indicating that they are trapped inside a temporal pocket, it also has its fair share of boring clichés, like the old, beaten explanation of a wormhole with a folded sheet of paper.

The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet’s strength lies in its ability to leverage its captivating cast of characters to tackle complex subjects in a unique way. Here, alterity is used to reveal humanity at its best and worst while offering a solution to our problems that is both simple and effective: people only need to stop being assholes. It can’t be that hard, can it?

May 11, 2025.

Review originally published in Portuguese on December 31, 2017.