Book review: A Psalm for the Wild-Built
- title: A Psalm for the Wild-Built
- author: Becky Chambers
- publication year: 2021
- my rating: 3.5/5
After finding an interest in solarpunk ideas recently, it wasn’t long before this short novel ended up on my reading list.
The book describes the journey of a young individual looking for purpose in a very cool solarpunk world. The novel choses not go to deeply into why and how humans have transformed their lifestyle to a solarpunk one, but instead focuses on the self-discovery of the protagonist - who is aided in their endeavor by an unlikely and unexpected companion: a conscious robot who “it"self wants to have an answer to the question of “What do humans need?”.
I can recommend this little book to anyone, actually. For a science fiction book it is very accessible and relatable, even cozy at times. I feel like its assessment of our current situation as a society in which
“the ecosystem as a whole needs its participants to act with restraint in order to avoid collapse, but the participants themselves have no inbuilt mechanism to encourage such behavior”
can speak to anyone - maybe especially those “who could use a break”.