To Be Taught If Fortunate
Date
2019
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Hodder & Stoughton
Abstract
To Be Taught If Fortunate is a science fiction novella that follows Ariadne O’Neill, the flight engineer of the spacecraft Merian. Along with three other crewmates, Ariadne is part of the Lawki program whose sixth mission consists of an ecological survey of four exoplanets, Aecor, Mirabilis, Opera, and Votum, all of which orbit the red dwarf Zhenyi and may harbor life. The Lawki program was created by the OCA (Open Cluster Astronautics) to explore space. The story takes place in the year 2162 when humanity had found a way to go on long space voyages without suffering the consequences of spaceflight. With somaforming, humans can use enzyme patches that infuse them with genetic supplementations, allowing astronauts to endure the risks associated with spaceflight, like cancer. During the voyage, the crew is on suspended animation inside torpor chambers connected to the navigation computer that is designed to initiate the awakening process whenever they’re approaching a planet. The story focuses on the exploration of extraterrestrial life on the four planets and the nature of each one. The somaform patches used by Ariadne are programmed to give her supplements so she can adapt to the environment of the exoplanets and give her conditions to continue her mission. In Mirabilis, for example, she would need much more muscle fiber so she could withstand the gravity of this rocky giant, while for Opera she wouldn’t need anything because of the planet’s similarity to Earth. During the mission, the crew of the Merian receive a message from the fifth Lawki warning them that some disaster has happened on Earth and while there don’t seem to be any technical problems with communication, no one on Earth is answering messages. The astronauts send a message to Earth asking if they should continue the mission or go back to Earth. After exploring Votum, the crew will go into torpor until they receive a reply from Earth.
Description
Keywords
science fiction , space , exploration , exoplanet , planet , genetics , extraterrestrial life
Citation
Chambers, Becky. To Be Taught If Fortunate. Hodder & Stoughton, 2019.