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What We Are Seeking
From Cameron Reed, the acclaimed author of The Fortunate Fall, comes a soaring novel of queer hope and transformation, perfect for readers of Ann Leckie and Amal El-Mohtar.
On the planet Scythia, plants give birth to insects, trees can drag you to your death, and armies of animals graft native plants into human crops.
John Maraintha has been abandoned here, light-years from the peaceful forests that he loves.
The desert is harsh and the people in thrall to a barbaric custom called marriage.
He must find some way to make a life here.
But on Scythia, survival means transformation―and not everyone is willing to accept change.
On the planet Scythia, plants give birth to insects, trees can drag you to your death, and armies of animals graft native plants into human crops.
John Maraintha has been abandoned here, light-years from the peaceful forests that he loves.
The desert is harsh and the people in thrall to a barbaric custom called marriage.
He must find some way to make a life here.
But on Scythia, survival means transformation―and not everyone is willing to accept change.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published April 7, 2026
45 people are currently reading
4915 people want to read
About the author
Cameron Reed
3 books31 followersAuthor previously writing under the name Raphael Carter.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 39 reviews
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January 7, 2026I am soooooo incredibly seated for this! Can't believe the luck I have that I don't have to wait 30 years for a new Cameron Reed novel!
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September 3, 2025A planetary romance with deep thematic resonance, this is a book about accepting the inevitability of change and transformation, even in ourselves and those we love.
April 24, 2026
I'm not entirely sure how to review this novel. It was wonderful, it made me feel emotions that I cannot possibly describe. I read it too fast, I need to read it again to absorb everything I missed. I can't wait to listen to it as an audiobook. The summary is so simple and it explains the novel and also explains nothing of the novel. The characters are layered and complex and I love them. I love the world building, the details, the density. It throws you into the world and expects you to keep up, and I love that about a speculative fiction novel. It's about identity, gender, sexuality, and the various spectrums they take. It's about colonialism, the damage it does, the ways it can be repaired or not. It's about religion and religious truama, it's about how we carry cultures with us and how they intersect with so many aspects of our lives. It's about family and the shapes family can take.
I highly suggest picking this up, the marketing has a good go of it. If you like Leckie, Le Guin, and similar authors, I think you'll enjoy this.
Update: the audiobook is delightful and was such a gut punch to hear.
I highly suggest picking this up, the marketing has a good go of it. If you like Leckie, Le Guin, and similar authors, I think you'll enjoy this.
Update: the audiobook is delightful and was such a gut punch to hear.
May 8, 2026
I'm going to redefine the term 'planetary romance'.
It used to mean a science fiction story set on another planet, not in space. The 'romance' is an old term for fantasy, not for love.
But for this book set on another planet, love and acceptance are definitely the main topic. Hence my re-definition.
John is a doctor who is sent planetside from a spaceship. His planet is matriarchal and practices what used to be called 'free love', with no legal commitments and certainly no marriage. Marriage disgusts him.
The settlers on the planet are definitely the marrying kind, some form of classic Christianity.
One of the settlers is what we would call non-binary or trans, although those terms aren't used. The term is 'jess', after the first person who became that way. Iren has declared themselves to be celibate, but that doesn't mean without feelings and emotions.
John is sidelined as a doctor and is assigned to assist a translator of the native species of humanoid. The translator, Sudharma, is an intense but quiet person who John develops feelings for.
The stage is set for the most amazing consideration and discussion of gender identities, religious beliefs, and how we interact with others with whom we don't share a fundamental view of life and society. It's a thought piece and examines how we see each other today and can learn to accept what we don't believe or share.
I'm making it sound like a philosophical discussion and nothing else. There's plenty of action, especially when the people venture out to interact with the native species, and Sudharma starts getting proficient at translation. There are exotic plants that are also animals that are incredibly dangerous. There is the possibility of death in the desert. There are plenty of examples of how alien to our way of thinking the native humanoid species is, and how their way of speaking has to be twisted just so in translation in order for Sudharma to even begin to understand them. It felt realistic.
Meanwhile, there's an augmented human from Earth who has arrived, who is connected to an AI (called 'aiyi' here), of whom the settlers are deeply suspicious since the aiyi have basically taken over management of Earth and have god-like powers. This person, Vo, becomes a lover of John and displays almost omniscient powers. In fact, this is why I kept my rating at four stars rather than five - even with Clarke's Third Law, I felt the god-like ability of Vo to be a bit too much.
Other than that, though, I can heartily recommend this book. It integrates well with the author's previous work like 'The Fortunate Fall', in that it examines gender ideation in an incredibly thoughtful manner. Cameron Reed is moving the needle on the representation of gender in science fiction, in ways that remind me of how pioneering authors were attempting it in the 1970s and 80s.
It used to mean a science fiction story set on another planet, not in space. The 'romance' is an old term for fantasy, not for love.
But for this book set on another planet, love and acceptance are definitely the main topic. Hence my re-definition.
John is a doctor who is sent planetside from a spaceship. His planet is matriarchal and practices what used to be called 'free love', with no legal commitments and certainly no marriage. Marriage disgusts him.
The settlers on the planet are definitely the marrying kind, some form of classic Christianity.
One of the settlers is what we would call non-binary or trans, although those terms aren't used. The term is 'jess', after the first person who became that way. Iren has declared themselves to be celibate, but that doesn't mean without feelings and emotions.
John is sidelined as a doctor and is assigned to assist a translator of the native species of humanoid. The translator, Sudharma, is an intense but quiet person who John develops feelings for.
The stage is set for the most amazing consideration and discussion of gender identities, religious beliefs, and how we interact with others with whom we don't share a fundamental view of life and society. It's a thought piece and examines how we see each other today and can learn to accept what we don't believe or share.
I'm making it sound like a philosophical discussion and nothing else. There's plenty of action, especially when the people venture out to interact with the native species, and Sudharma starts getting proficient at translation. There are exotic plants that are also animals that are incredibly dangerous. There is the possibility of death in the desert. There are plenty of examples of how alien to our way of thinking the native humanoid species is, and how their way of speaking has to be twisted just so in translation in order for Sudharma to even begin to understand them. It felt realistic.
Meanwhile, there's an augmented human from Earth who has arrived, who is connected to an AI (called 'aiyi' here), of whom the settlers are deeply suspicious since the aiyi have basically taken over management of Earth and have god-like powers. This person, Vo, becomes a lover of John and displays almost omniscient powers. In fact, this is why I kept my rating at four stars rather than five - even with Clarke's Third Law, I felt the god-like ability of Vo to be a bit too much.
Other than that, though, I can heartily recommend this book. It integrates well with the author's previous work like 'The Fortunate Fall', in that it examines gender ideation in an incredibly thoughtful manner. Cameron Reed is moving the needle on the representation of gender in science fiction, in ways that remind me of how pioneering authors were attempting it in the 1970s and 80s.
April 12, 2026
3.5 ⭐ CW: sexual content, homophobia, forced sterilization
What We Are Seeking by Cameron Reed is a speculative fiction scifi novel that I received from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This was a weird book. Not necessarily in a bad way, but it wasn't quite what I expected. I always feel a little weird about not absolutely loving a book by a trans author, because I want to support in any way I can.
We follow John Maraintha as he is traveling on a starship and gets sent down to live in a colony of an alien planet called Scythia. There, he must confront two different human cultures much different from his own, and also an alien species. His roommate's job is to try to learn the alien language to figure out how to communicate with a species that is born from plants. John has to navigate a culture of marriage, which feels anathema to him, and the oppressive nature of religion, as it restricts sexuality. John himself is bisexual. He also has to navigate unrequited love.
As I said, this was a weird book. I thought the main plot was really about the aliens, their language, and how they were going to navigate life with them on Scythia, but there wasn't actually much of a plot. The story even ended somewhat abruptly with no real resolution. This is really a story of concepts around language and communication, religion and marriage practices, sexuality, and gender. There was some interesting stuff with the Earth human, Vo, who seemed to be the most alien of all the humans. We are really dropped in this universe with no explanations. I found John to be a difficult MC to connect with. No matter what he did, I didn't feel emotionally connected to him. He seemed distant or disconnected and not very emotional. Even the sex scenes felt passionless.
This was also a very slow read due to the content and the writing style. I didn't dislike this book, but I wish I had gotten more out of John. I did like Iren, and the conversations around gender and being a jess (a person who takes a vow and becomes nonbinary). I wish we had seen more interplay between John and his group of friends and the rest of the colony. I think it would have kept my attention more if I felt like we were working toward something. I recommend this, if you're looking for some weird conceptual speculative fiction by a trans author, and don't mind a slow moving story.
What We Are Seeking by Cameron Reed is a speculative fiction scifi novel that I received from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This was a weird book. Not necessarily in a bad way, but it wasn't quite what I expected. I always feel a little weird about not absolutely loving a book by a trans author, because I want to support in any way I can.
We follow John Maraintha as he is traveling on a starship and gets sent down to live in a colony of an alien planet called Scythia. There, he must confront two different human cultures much different from his own, and also an alien species. His roommate's job is to try to learn the alien language to figure out how to communicate with a species that is born from plants. John has to navigate a culture of marriage, which feels anathema to him, and the oppressive nature of religion, as it restricts sexuality. John himself is bisexual. He also has to navigate unrequited love.
As I said, this was a weird book. I thought the main plot was really about the aliens, their language, and how they were going to navigate life with them on Scythia, but there wasn't actually much of a plot. The story even ended somewhat abruptly with no real resolution. This is really a story of concepts around language and communication, religion and marriage practices, sexuality, and gender. There was some interesting stuff with the Earth human, Vo, who seemed to be the most alien of all the humans. We are really dropped in this universe with no explanations. I found John to be a difficult MC to connect with. No matter what he did, I didn't feel emotionally connected to him. He seemed distant or disconnected and not very emotional. Even the sex scenes felt passionless.
This was also a very slow read due to the content and the writing style. I didn't dislike this book, but I wish I had gotten more out of John. I did like Iren, and the conversations around gender and being a jess (a person who takes a vow and becomes nonbinary). I wish we had seen more interplay between John and his group of friends and the rest of the colony. I think it would have kept my attention more if I felt like we were working toward something. I recommend this, if you're looking for some weird conceptual speculative fiction by a trans author, and don't mind a slow moving story.
May 2, 2026
The writing is crisp, the world-building an immersive anthropology, and the moral lessons are delivered by deeply empathetic characters. The cleverest move is the triangulation. By making the protagonist’s own people the deviants from the perspective of the "marrying" cultures, and the third gender role as problematic for libertines and fundies alike, Reed strips disgust of its claim to objectivity. What looks like natural order is just whichever arrangement got there first and trained its children to gag at the alternatives.
What earns the novel its place on a philosophical SF reading list is that it avoids an easy liberal landing, despite making a clear case for sex/gender freedom. Sanctioned celibacy is still seen as a cage, even though it is celebrated as freeing. The tolerant culture’s bargain - "you may exist if you do not desire" - is the same bargain that the Catholic Church has cut with gay people.
Reed reminds us where sexual disgust does its dirtiest work: at the borders of the permissible body, policing not just who counts as human, but who counts as a full sexual citizen. Any politics of liberation has to do more than just redraw those lines; it has to dissolve the unexamined "disgust infrastructure" that polices them.
What earns the novel its place on a philosophical SF reading list is that it avoids an easy liberal landing, despite making a clear case for sex/gender freedom. Sanctioned celibacy is still seen as a cage, even though it is celebrated as freeing. The tolerant culture’s bargain - "you may exist if you do not desire" - is the same bargain that the Catholic Church has cut with gay people.
Reed reminds us where sexual disgust does its dirtiest work: at the borders of the permissible body, policing not just who counts as human, but who counts as a full sexual citizen. Any politics of liberation has to do more than just redraw those lines; it has to dissolve the unexamined "disgust infrastructure" that polices them.
April 27, 2026
idk the writing felt weird and stilted. ESPECIALLY at the first half of the book. It did get somewhat better though when you got into it, maybe because the plot carried it.
- They (tried) to make it like a mixture of mundane (as mundane as space colonies can be i guess lmao) daily life and cultured mixed with these 'philosophical' dialogues (or rather, think pieces). It was fine, but when you read through it, you can obviously clock what the writer was trying to do, which ruined the fiction and plot narrative for me.
- Thats my gripe i guess, that this book was not COMPLETELY good, not fully baked. Where it was bad, it was so boring, trite, and annoyingly stale but when it was good, it was so nuanced, tender, meditative and smart.
- Reading this made me feel like The Woker, but like, in a good way lmao
- ALSO BECAUSE this book heavily focused on language and communication i have a bone to pick with them, well maybe more like an inquiry. They used the word sunscreen as a name for a pill to help them with the sun. But does sunSCREEN not literally mean something you apply (topically) to protect you externally from the sun? It doesn't work when it a pill you ingest. IDK IT JUST BEEN ON MY MIND
- They (tried) to make it like a mixture of mundane (as mundane as space colonies can be i guess lmao) daily life and cultured mixed with these 'philosophical' dialogues (or rather, think pieces). It was fine, but when you read through it, you can obviously clock what the writer was trying to do, which ruined the fiction and plot narrative for me.
- Thats my gripe i guess, that this book was not COMPLETELY good, not fully baked. Where it was bad, it was so boring, trite, and annoyingly stale but when it was good, it was so nuanced, tender, meditative and smart.
- Reading this made me feel like The Woker, but like, in a good way lmao
- ALSO BECAUSE this book heavily focused on language and communication i have a bone to pick with them, well maybe more like an inquiry. They used the word sunscreen as a name for a pill to help them with the sun. But does sunSCREEN not literally mean something you apply (topically) to protect you externally from the sun? It doesn't work when it a pill you ingest. IDK IT JUST BEEN ON MY MIND
May 3, 2026
This is exactly the kind of book I've been waiting for. It has a great premise for describing to other people ("a barbaric custom called marriage"!), but the really good part of the book are the relationships between the characters, how they talk about them, and how they grow in the story. I would have liked the book to be longer and spend more time talking about how these colonists are going to shape the world with the "basket men," but the book itself didn't seem as interested in that. Or it just got lost in everything else. I'm giving it five stars anyway because it's my rating system and it's not a grade!
March 29, 2026
I’m rather torn about this book. On the one hand, the world building is admirable, inventive, and extraordinarily clever. However, there are also entire chapters where nobody does anything, but sit around and talk and that drives me crazy. Cameron Reed has transitioned to female since their first book and I can really feel the author’s personal issues bubbling through the characters and it ruins the story for me. Ultimately, it’s not a bad book, but I found it kind of a slog and I would have liked if the plot had centred around the indigenous life-forms.
Thanks to Tor Books who kindly sent me an ARC for review.
Thanks to Tor Books who kindly sent me an ARC for review.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
A doctor traveling through space is told he must stop at a colony world called Scythia, to assist a translator who is investigating what might be an intelligent alien species, albeit one that has been difficult to communicate with. It's not his choice, but as he has no connections to his own society and is at the mercy of the whims of the ship that has been transporting him, he has no real way to refuse. It helps that he finds he likes his new companion, but the world he's going to is very different from his own... the people there have a practice which to them is perfectly normal and even expected, but to those of his own world is regarded practically with horror... the institution called marriage.
Disclaimer: I received an advanced review copy of this book for free through Netgalley. I don't think it affected my review.
I was super excited to get a chance to read this book. The author's previous work, The Fortunate Fall, was a powerful post-Cyberpunk novel, full of inventive ideas ahead of its time and one of my favorites when I finally found it (it went out of print quickly, although that has since been corrected). It's been almost thirty years since that book and the author's second. Which was also a source of a bit of trepidation, the fear that perhaps the author has 'lost' the edge and sci-fi chops that so charmed me in the early book.
That fear was dashed pretty quickly. We open strong with a fantastic opening recasting the idea of seasons onto a starship in a way I don't think I've ever heard before but instantly made perfect sense to me and opened my mind in the way great SF does. We then soon move onto a planet, where the book takes a turn into planetary romance and we investigate an ecosystem where the line between plant and animal is blurred to the point of nonexistence, but does it with such skill that I could believe it was not just a gimmick but an actual way an alien world might work. The book introduced me to a variety of different species of different ecological niches, and never losing an understanding of how evolution works (even, at one point, hanging a lantern on one of the few slightly implausible ideas by pointing out that it was evolutionarily unlikely... and then going on to justify reasons it might happen anyway). We also deal with the problems of interacting with an alien culture and language and how humans might fit in with an alien society, both peacefully and potentially catastrophically, even without evil intentions. All these elements are like catnip to me, as my favorite books are the kind that make me think and see possibilities.
On top of all of that, even if you left out the aliens entirely, there's strong characters and their own personal stories and different viewpoints provided by culture. The author doesn't skimp out, and over the course of the book see at least six different human cultures, some familiar as being based on familiar Earth cultures, others that may have a loose inspiration but weren't as familiar to me, and still others extrapolations of trends and philosphies. Each has its own perspectives, biases, ideas about sex and gender, and contradictions and subcultures within the ideas they espouse (sometimes even subcultures within subcultures!), which sometimes cause friction on a world with multiple cultures, even when everybody is largely doing their best to be accepting of such differences. There's a lot going on, but the book doesn't feel bloated from this either, everything's just introduced naturally as part of exploring the world and characters. And, in addition to all the character dramas, there's a bit of survival adventure as well that leads to some action and tension for those who crave that aspect of things. It's one of those books that halfway through I was potentially ready to call one of my favorites of the year, as early in the year as it was.
And then sadly, it just kind of... lost steam? Or rather, all those plotlines and elements I was enjoying just faded into the background while the story instead shifted into an intense focus on a handful of those characters and their personal lives, which isn't always a bad thing, except that really the story mostly narrowed to one specific character and their decision to 'come out' in a society that wasn't entirely welcoming. And to be sure, these are important stories to be told, I'm happy to explore this aspect, I just... wanted closure or at least a lot more development on all the other stuff too, the stuff I was super digging in the rest of the book, stuff that was just left with no resolution at all. Maybe the author had a point in mind about the lack of easy resolutions, because even the character moments that dominate the end of the book don't really get 'wrapped up.' There's merely a major step taken but, in a world where there's already a lot of deep prejudices, the story doesn't even tell us much of their long term fate beyond the immediate reactions of a few friends. We learn even less about some of the other character relationships I was interested in... some of them, we don't even get a hint of what happens, which, considering I think this was meant to be a standalone, is a choice I don't entirely agree with.
I still loved the stuff I loved. The book didn't lose me to the point that I disliked it. I actually had the book pre-ordered (a rare step for me!) before I got the chance to read the advanced Netgalley preview, and I'm not even quietly cancelling my preorder. There's still a lot to like in the book, and I want a copy, and I want to support the author because this is just more evidence that there's a fantastic mind for writing science fiction at work. But I can't deny that I was a little disappointed in a few of the specific storytelling choices, that turned it from an easy four star review (if not higher) to... 'maybe I'll round up to four stars.' I probably will. My disappointment doesn't temper my eagerness to read more Cameron Reed. So yeah, four stars. But it puts me once again in the position of waiting for the next Cameron Reed book. Here's hoping it's less than thirty years!
Disclaimer: I received an advanced review copy of this book for free through Netgalley. I don't think it affected my review.
I was super excited to get a chance to read this book. The author's previous work, The Fortunate Fall, was a powerful post-Cyberpunk novel, full of inventive ideas ahead of its time and one of my favorites when I finally found it (it went out of print quickly, although that has since been corrected). It's been almost thirty years since that book and the author's second. Which was also a source of a bit of trepidation, the fear that perhaps the author has 'lost' the edge and sci-fi chops that so charmed me in the early book.
That fear was dashed pretty quickly. We open strong with a fantastic opening recasting the idea of seasons onto a starship in a way I don't think I've ever heard before but instantly made perfect sense to me and opened my mind in the way great SF does. We then soon move onto a planet, where the book takes a turn into planetary romance and we investigate an ecosystem where the line between plant and animal is blurred to the point of nonexistence, but does it with such skill that I could believe it was not just a gimmick but an actual way an alien world might work. The book introduced me to a variety of different species of different ecological niches, and never losing an understanding of how evolution works (even, at one point, hanging a lantern on one of the few slightly implausible ideas by pointing out that it was evolutionarily unlikely... and then going on to justify reasons it might happen anyway). We also deal with the problems of interacting with an alien culture and language and how humans might fit in with an alien society, both peacefully and potentially catastrophically, even without evil intentions. All these elements are like catnip to me, as my favorite books are the kind that make me think and see possibilities.
On top of all of that, even if you left out the aliens entirely, there's strong characters and their own personal stories and different viewpoints provided by culture. The author doesn't skimp out, and over the course of the book see at least six different human cultures, some familiar as being based on familiar Earth cultures, others that may have a loose inspiration but weren't as familiar to me, and still others extrapolations of trends and philosphies. Each has its own perspectives, biases, ideas about sex and gender, and contradictions and subcultures within the ideas they espouse (sometimes even subcultures within subcultures!), which sometimes cause friction on a world with multiple cultures, even when everybody is largely doing their best to be accepting of such differences. There's a lot going on, but the book doesn't feel bloated from this either, everything's just introduced naturally as part of exploring the world and characters. And, in addition to all the character dramas, there's a bit of survival adventure as well that leads to some action and tension for those who crave that aspect of things. It's one of those books that halfway through I was potentially ready to call one of my favorites of the year, as early in the year as it was.
And then sadly, it just kind of... lost steam? Or rather, all those plotlines and elements I was enjoying just faded into the background while the story instead shifted into an intense focus on a handful of those characters and their personal lives, which isn't always a bad thing, except that really the story mostly narrowed to one specific character and their decision to 'come out' in a society that wasn't entirely welcoming. And to be sure, these are important stories to be told, I'm happy to explore this aspect, I just... wanted closure or at least a lot more development on all the other stuff too, the stuff I was super digging in the rest of the book, stuff that was just left with no resolution at all. Maybe the author had a point in mind about the lack of easy resolutions, because even the character moments that dominate the end of the book don't really get 'wrapped up.' There's merely a major step taken but, in a world where there's already a lot of deep prejudices, the story doesn't even tell us much of their long term fate beyond the immediate reactions of a few friends. We learn even less about some of the other character relationships I was interested in... some of them, we don't even get a hint of what happens, which, considering I think this was meant to be a standalone, is a choice I don't entirely agree with.
I still loved the stuff I loved. The book didn't lose me to the point that I disliked it. I actually had the book pre-ordered (a rare step for me!) before I got the chance to read the advanced Netgalley preview, and I'm not even quietly cancelling my preorder. There's still a lot to like in the book, and I want a copy, and I want to support the author because this is just more evidence that there's a fantastic mind for writing science fiction at work. But I can't deny that I was a little disappointed in a few of the specific storytelling choices, that turned it from an easy four star review (if not higher) to... 'maybe I'll round up to four stars.' I probably will. My disappointment doesn't temper my eagerness to read more Cameron Reed. So yeah, four stars. But it puts me once again in the position of waiting for the next Cameron Reed book. Here's hoping it's less than thirty years!
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Highlights
~all the cool things are out of sight
~bugs that are mammals that are plants
~killing a tree makes you hetero
Here is the description this had on Netgalley when I requested it (and still has at the time of this writing);
Having now read it, What We Are Seeking is not a book I would describe as one of ‘queer hope’. And I am so tired of books promising that and just delivering a set-up as bad or worse than what we have in the real world right now.
Which, to be clear, is a failure (or lie) of the book’s marketing, not the author. It’s not Reed’s fault I went into this with the wrong expectations. But whose fault it is doesn’t change my reading experience, unfortunately. That being said, even if the publisher had not called this a queer hope book, I would not have enjoyed it. It was dull and depressing and did the thing of teasing me with seriously interesting things at the edges of the story, but focussing on other stuff I couldn’t care less about instead.
John is unwillingly dropped onto the planet Scythia, a dry, dusty environment populated by settlers from two different cultures, both of them deeply conservative. They don’t trust him because he comes from a matriarchal culture that practices free sex and doesn’t have marriage; he thinks they’re all insane because from where he’s standing, marriage is a barbaric practice. (Very little in the book proves him wrong.) John’s responsibility is caring for Sudharma, a deeply lovely man on Scythia to try and learn the language of the native aliens and determine if they’re another sentient species. John makes friends, learns a bit about the aliens and Scythia’s strange flora and fauna, and is peripheral to the tensions around a teenager who wants to take the vow to become a jess, a nonbinary gender found in the culture of some of the settlers.
And that’s kind of it. There isn’t a big plot, and there’s no impetus, no driving force moving the story along. On a line level, the prose is graceful and lovely; there’s some fantastic asexual and aromantic representation (not the same character, for once!); and the life that’s evolved on Scythia is nicely unique and weird. But the book itself drifts and waffles and meanders, introspective and philosophical rather than having a plot. And normally that wouldn’t be a huge problem for me; the anthropologist-esque eye John turns on the settlers is something I usually quite enjoy. But the settlers’ cultures are deeply boring, patriarchal and Christian and maddeningly conservative. The history and culture around the jesses was fabulous, but we got so little of it, and all of it via being lectured by the one jess character.
Scythia is boring and dry and the people living on it painfully familiar, and I was left longing to explore John’s world, or the delightfully strange culture of the star-ships, instead. I would have been very happy to read a book about jesses on their origin world. To have all this interesting worldbuilding dangled in front of me, but set the story on the dullest of all the worlds we hear about instead…wtf?
There are little hiccups of interest here and there – there’s Vo, the wonderfully odd human from mysterious Earth, joined in some way to the eldritch aiyi, who may just wipe out the humans on Scythia if the aliens turn out to be sentient. John’s relationship with her was refreshing and really fun; Vo is probably my favourite character in the book, functionally neurodivergent because of her connection to the aiyi, but still fully capable of connecting to and caring for other humans. And Sudharma’s quest to understand the basket-men – the aliens – was…intellectually interesting, even if it wasn’t gripping until very near the end of the book. But we barely glimpsed the aiyi, and what they and Vo could do; and the most fascinating aspects of the basket-men’s culture and understanding of the world were dropped on us in the very last pages, with no time to explore them or see them in action. Sudharma is concerned that the settlers might come to enslave the basket-men, but nothing happens in that direction (thankfully, but it still feels like a massive waste of potential plot). Sudharma is also prepared to alter his own brain to better understand the basket-men and their language, something John frets over for much of the book, but
What kind of story is it? Honestly, I don’t know. I find it hugely depressing to look at far-future settings, thousands of years in our future, that are still homophobic, transphobic, misogynistic af. Sure, baby steps are made over the course of the book, but they are very much baby-steps: What We Are Seeking ends with a lot of grinding misery in the future of all our characters, with the promise that in a couple of generations things are going to get even worse when the sci fi tech eventually fails. Queer hope? What queer hope? Like: thanks, I hate it! Every single bit of it!
Read the rest at Every Book a Doorway!
~all the cool things are out of sight
~bugs that are mammals that are plants
~killing a tree makes you hetero
Here is the description this had on Netgalley when I requested it (and still has at the time of this writing);
From Cameron Reed, the acclaimed author of The Fortunate Fall, comes a soaring novel of queer hope and transformation, perfect for readers of Ann Leckie and Amal El-Mohtar.
On the planet Scythia, plants give birth to insects and trees can drag you to your death. Artificial monsters stalk the desert, and alien basket-men have wandered into town.
John Maraintha has been abandoned here, light-years from the peaceful forests that he loves.
The desert is harsh and the people in thrall to a barbaric custom called marriage.
He must find some way to make a life here.
But on Scythia, survival means transformation—and not everyone is willing to change.
Having now read it, What We Are Seeking is not a book I would describe as one of ‘queer hope’. And I am so tired of books promising that and just delivering a set-up as bad or worse than what we have in the real world right now.
Which, to be clear, is a failure (or lie) of the book’s marketing, not the author. It’s not Reed’s fault I went into this with the wrong expectations. But whose fault it is doesn’t change my reading experience, unfortunately. That being said, even if the publisher had not called this a queer hope book, I would not have enjoyed it. It was dull and depressing and did the thing of teasing me with seriously interesting things at the edges of the story, but focussing on other stuff I couldn’t care less about instead.
John is unwillingly dropped onto the planet Scythia, a dry, dusty environment populated by settlers from two different cultures, both of them deeply conservative. They don’t trust him because he comes from a matriarchal culture that practices free sex and doesn’t have marriage; he thinks they’re all insane because from where he’s standing, marriage is a barbaric practice. (Very little in the book proves him wrong.) John’s responsibility is caring for Sudharma, a deeply lovely man on Scythia to try and learn the language of the native aliens and determine if they’re another sentient species. John makes friends, learns a bit about the aliens and Scythia’s strange flora and fauna, and is peripheral to the tensions around a teenager who wants to take the vow to become a jess, a nonbinary gender found in the culture of some of the settlers.
And that’s kind of it. There isn’t a big plot, and there’s no impetus, no driving force moving the story along. On a line level, the prose is graceful and lovely; there’s some fantastic asexual and aromantic representation (not the same character, for once!); and the life that’s evolved on Scythia is nicely unique and weird. But the book itself drifts and waffles and meanders, introspective and philosophical rather than having a plot. And normally that wouldn’t be a huge problem for me; the anthropologist-esque eye John turns on the settlers is something I usually quite enjoy. But the settlers’ cultures are deeply boring, patriarchal and Christian and maddeningly conservative. The history and culture around the jesses was fabulous, but we got so little of it, and all of it via being lectured by the one jess character.
Scythia is boring and dry and the people living on it painfully familiar, and I was left longing to explore John’s world, or the delightfully strange culture of the star-ships, instead. I would have been very happy to read a book about jesses on their origin world. To have all this interesting worldbuilding dangled in front of me, but set the story on the dullest of all the worlds we hear about instead…wtf?
There are little hiccups of interest here and there – there’s Vo, the wonderfully odd human from mysterious Earth, joined in some way to the eldritch aiyi, who may just wipe out the humans on Scythia if the aliens turn out to be sentient. John’s relationship with her was refreshing and really fun; Vo is probably my favourite character in the book, functionally neurodivergent because of her connection to the aiyi, but still fully capable of connecting to and caring for other humans. And Sudharma’s quest to understand the basket-men – the aliens – was…intellectually interesting, even if it wasn’t gripping until very near the end of the book. But we barely glimpsed the aiyi, and what they and Vo could do; and the most fascinating aspects of the basket-men’s culture and understanding of the world were dropped on us in the very last pages, with no time to explore them or see them in action. Sudharma is concerned that the settlers might come to enslave the basket-men, but nothing happens in that direction (thankfully, but it still feels like a massive waste of potential plot). Sudharma is also prepared to alter his own brain to better understand the basket-men and their language, something John frets over for much of the book, but
What kind of story is it? Honestly, I don’t know. I find it hugely depressing to look at far-future settings, thousands of years in our future, that are still homophobic, transphobic, misogynistic af. Sure, baby steps are made over the course of the book, but they are very much baby-steps: What We Are Seeking ends with a lot of grinding misery in the future of all our characters, with the promise that in a couple of generations things are going to get even worse when the sci fi tech eventually fails. Queer hope? What queer hope? Like: thanks, I hate it! Every single bit of it!
Read the rest at Every Book a Doorway!
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
My thanks to both NetGalley and Tor Publishing Group for an advance copy of this work of speculative fiction that though set in the far, far future, asks questions that we as a world deal with today, what makes a person, why are so doomed to repeat mistakes, and why is changes something that people love to talk about in tech, but so afraid to do in their own lives, and in their own species.
I came into science fiction through the show Star Trek and the movie Star Wars. Being young, seven and eight, I wanted more of what I saw, and my reading reflected that. Series stories about aliens and battles, cosmic dangers faced by armadas of star fighters with right on their side. As I got older, and found more and more books at tag sales and book sales. this sort of science fiction stayed with me, but I did branch out. I came to the realization that science fiction talks about the future, and what might be, the stories are written about what is happening in the present. Jingoistic tales of men and blasters, endless wars, free love, tainted loved, AI, all things in the media, used as plot points. Some offer solutions, draconian in some, eden-like in others. A few are brave enough to say, we don't know. I know what these characters will do, I don't know what you the reader would do if faced with these same problems. Sometimes leaving questions, questions that stay with the reader. Like this book will stay with me. What We Are Seeking is the long awaited next book by Cameron Reed, a story about the future, how we view ourselves, how we communicate, and how we love, set on a planet that is facing these problems, and far, far more.
John Maraintha was born on a planet where monogamy was frowned on, where men and women had specific tasks, and where being an orphan left him alone in many different ways. John took to the stars, being what he thought was going to be a profession he could use to help his people, a star ship doctor, though John might have been hired for other reasons. John is told that a planet, Scythia, needs a doctor, so he is volunteered to be that doctor. Scythia is a planet that values marriage, values monogamy, and John knows this will be hard for both he and the people on the planet to accept. Scythia is also in a first contact stage, and a translator scholar is being sent with John to learn the ways of this native race. One with very different biological ways of being. John finds himself on a planet that is different in many ways, with under currents that will take him quite a while understand. More difficulties arise as an creature from Earth has appeared, blocking other ships from contacting Scythia while dealing with the first contact situation. Change is coming to the planet, in ways that few can see, nor understand. And John fears what might happen when people are faced with difficult decisions, and even worse changed to way they have always thought about the universe.
I first read Cameron Reed years and years ago, a science fiction story that looking back was remarkably prescient, and really well written. Thirty years later Reed again hits with a story torn from the headlines it seems, asking questions, and blowing minds with so many big ideas on technology, alien races, biology and even the tenants of faith we are grappling with today. This book is excellent, the writing is so good. The ideas, Reed drops more ideas on a page than some books can do in a trilogy. The world is so rich, the universe so creative and wonderful that it feels like the eighth or ninth book in a series. Some books it takes a while to get the groove, this one set the pace about ten pages in and never ever lost the narrative. The characters are rich, especially John, who seems so well nerdy in the beginning, a naive in a mean universe, who really is the linchpin of the whole story. Reed asks many questions. What is life, what is love. What is family. And lets the reader decide. In many ways a sad book, but at the same time a book that says, life if not a life without change. Without difficulty. Without love. Maybe not physical love, but a love of something. Questions I never thought I would read in science fiction.
It's been a few few days since finishing this book and I still can't get it out of my mind. I do hope the Reed comes back to this story, though letting my mind fill in the blanks has been almost as wonderful as reading this book. I book to make one think, one hope, and even care. I hope I don't have to wait for more by Cameron Reed.
I came into science fiction through the show Star Trek and the movie Star Wars. Being young, seven and eight, I wanted more of what I saw, and my reading reflected that. Series stories about aliens and battles, cosmic dangers faced by armadas of star fighters with right on their side. As I got older, and found more and more books at tag sales and book sales. this sort of science fiction stayed with me, but I did branch out. I came to the realization that science fiction talks about the future, and what might be, the stories are written about what is happening in the present. Jingoistic tales of men and blasters, endless wars, free love, tainted loved, AI, all things in the media, used as plot points. Some offer solutions, draconian in some, eden-like in others. A few are brave enough to say, we don't know. I know what these characters will do, I don't know what you the reader would do if faced with these same problems. Sometimes leaving questions, questions that stay with the reader. Like this book will stay with me. What We Are Seeking is the long awaited next book by Cameron Reed, a story about the future, how we view ourselves, how we communicate, and how we love, set on a planet that is facing these problems, and far, far more.
John Maraintha was born on a planet where monogamy was frowned on, where men and women had specific tasks, and where being an orphan left him alone in many different ways. John took to the stars, being what he thought was going to be a profession he could use to help his people, a star ship doctor, though John might have been hired for other reasons. John is told that a planet, Scythia, needs a doctor, so he is volunteered to be that doctor. Scythia is a planet that values marriage, values monogamy, and John knows this will be hard for both he and the people on the planet to accept. Scythia is also in a first contact stage, and a translator scholar is being sent with John to learn the ways of this native race. One with very different biological ways of being. John finds himself on a planet that is different in many ways, with under currents that will take him quite a while understand. More difficulties arise as an creature from Earth has appeared, blocking other ships from contacting Scythia while dealing with the first contact situation. Change is coming to the planet, in ways that few can see, nor understand. And John fears what might happen when people are faced with difficult decisions, and even worse changed to way they have always thought about the universe.
I first read Cameron Reed years and years ago, a science fiction story that looking back was remarkably prescient, and really well written. Thirty years later Reed again hits with a story torn from the headlines it seems, asking questions, and blowing minds with so many big ideas on technology, alien races, biology and even the tenants of faith we are grappling with today. This book is excellent, the writing is so good. The ideas, Reed drops more ideas on a page than some books can do in a trilogy. The world is so rich, the universe so creative and wonderful that it feels like the eighth or ninth book in a series. Some books it takes a while to get the groove, this one set the pace about ten pages in and never ever lost the narrative. The characters are rich, especially John, who seems so well nerdy in the beginning, a naive in a mean universe, who really is the linchpin of the whole story. Reed asks many questions. What is life, what is love. What is family. And lets the reader decide. In many ways a sad book, but at the same time a book that says, life if not a life without change. Without difficulty. Without love. Maybe not physical love, but a love of something. Questions I never thought I would read in science fiction.
It's been a few few days since finishing this book and I still can't get it out of my mind. I do hope the Reed comes back to this story, though letting my mind fill in the blanks has been almost as wonderful as reading this book. I book to make one think, one hope, and even care. I hope I don't have to wait for more by Cameron Reed.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
I received a free copy from Tor Books via Netgalley in exchange for a fair review. Release date April 7th, 2026.
I've heard excellent things about Reed's previous novel, The Fortunate Fall, so I was excited to get a chance to read her latest book. In What We Are Seeking, ship's doctor John Maraintha is unexpectedly assigned against his will to serve on an isolated new colony. Scythia has just discovered a possible new intelligent alien species, and John must navigate the tumultuous first contact while enduring both the colony's very different culture and permanent exile from his home planet.
I was immediately captivated by the strong, confident prose and the anthropological SF bent of the plot, which both reminded me strongly of Ursula Le Guin. Of course, Le Guin would do the same story in a exquisitely spare novella of a hundred-something pages, but that's Le Guin for you. There's a half-dozen odd cultures in What We Are Seeking, and Reed does an excellent job making them feel distinct. From John's fixation on poisons to the Ischnuran three-gender system, the ship-crew's overbearing paternalism, and the Zandahean post-Christ Christianity, cultural differences are the backbone of the story. And of course, it's hard to go wrong writing a first-contact story, the SF answer to the murder mystery. John and his fellow exile, the linguist Sudharma, slowly puzzle out the mystery of who the basket-men are and how their culture works amid the wildly different biology of Scythia. On Scythia, all plants metamorphosize into an animal, which in turn plants the seed of a tree or shrub.
Although What We Are Seeking is set among alien scenery, at its heart the story is about themes closer to home: sex and gender. John comes from a culture that finds marriage an abhorrent, unnatural tie, but his perspective is not entirely validated by the narrative. Yes, the Christian-based marriage as performed on Scythia is restrictive, but mostly due to the confines of patriarchy and heteronormativity. John's culture comes with its own lack of choice—the total separation between father and child, the taboo on reciprocal exchange in specifically sexual relationships, the way a man can't rent an apartment without everybody assuming he's a bottom. Sex is freer, but convention is just as binding.
While John is our only viewpoint character, my favorite character was by far Iren, who is in many ways more central to the fight to shape Scythia's budding culture than John himself. Iren is what we'd probably call asexual nonbinary, but their identity is discussed in terms of Ischnuran culture, where they're a jess, a gender non-conforming person who traditionally swears a vow of chastity. Iren is a lovely character, messy and nuanced and with complex feelings about the traditional celibacy. I do wish they weren't always filtered through John's point of view, though—John does not have a cultural understanding of any of this, and I feel we spend most of the time learning about Iren's experience through John asking insensitive questions. Iren carries a heavy narrative weight as effectively the only trans character who has to constantly explain their experiences, but on some levels that's a deliberate choice Reed has made. As the plot advances, it's slowly revealed that specific prejudices that kept jesses from being included as colonists, and Iren explicitly sees themself as the founder of what it will mean to be a jess on Scythia.
Slow, meditative, and thoughtful, with an excellent touch for writing a wide range of cultures. Reed thoroughly earned the comparison to Ursula Le Guin, and I need to read her earlier novel, The Fortunate Fall, immediately. Highly recommended.
I've heard excellent things about Reed's previous novel, The Fortunate Fall, so I was excited to get a chance to read her latest book. In What We Are Seeking, ship's doctor John Maraintha is unexpectedly assigned against his will to serve on an isolated new colony. Scythia has just discovered a possible new intelligent alien species, and John must navigate the tumultuous first contact while enduring both the colony's very different culture and permanent exile from his home planet.
I was immediately captivated by the strong, confident prose and the anthropological SF bent of the plot, which both reminded me strongly of Ursula Le Guin. Of course, Le Guin would do the same story in a exquisitely spare novella of a hundred-something pages, but that's Le Guin for you. There's a half-dozen odd cultures in What We Are Seeking, and Reed does an excellent job making them feel distinct. From John's fixation on poisons to the Ischnuran three-gender system, the ship-crew's overbearing paternalism, and the Zandahean post-Christ Christianity, cultural differences are the backbone of the story. And of course, it's hard to go wrong writing a first-contact story, the SF answer to the murder mystery. John and his fellow exile, the linguist Sudharma, slowly puzzle out the mystery of who the basket-men are and how their culture works amid the wildly different biology of Scythia. On Scythia, all plants metamorphosize into an animal, which in turn plants the seed of a tree or shrub.
Although What We Are Seeking is set among alien scenery, at its heart the story is about themes closer to home: sex and gender. John comes from a culture that finds marriage an abhorrent, unnatural tie, but his perspective is not entirely validated by the narrative. Yes, the Christian-based marriage as performed on Scythia is restrictive, but mostly due to the confines of patriarchy and heteronormativity. John's culture comes with its own lack of choice—the total separation between father and child, the taboo on reciprocal exchange in specifically sexual relationships, the way a man can't rent an apartment without everybody assuming he's a bottom. Sex is freer, but convention is just as binding.
While John is our only viewpoint character, my favorite character was by far Iren, who is in many ways more central to the fight to shape Scythia's budding culture than John himself. Iren is what we'd probably call asexual nonbinary, but their identity is discussed in terms of Ischnuran culture, where they're a jess, a gender non-conforming person who traditionally swears a vow of chastity. Iren is a lovely character, messy and nuanced and with complex feelings about the traditional celibacy. I do wish they weren't always filtered through John's point of view, though—John does not have a cultural understanding of any of this, and I feel we spend most of the time learning about Iren's experience through John asking insensitive questions. Iren carries a heavy narrative weight as effectively the only trans character who has to constantly explain their experiences, but on some levels that's a deliberate choice Reed has made. As the plot advances, it's slowly revealed that specific prejudices that kept jesses from being included as colonists, and Iren explicitly sees themself as the founder of what it will mean to be a jess on Scythia.
Slow, meditative, and thoughtful, with an excellent touch for writing a wide range of cultures. Reed thoroughly earned the comparison to Ursula Le Guin, and I need to read her earlier novel, The Fortunate Fall, immediately. Highly recommended.
April 14, 2026
3.5*
What We Are Seeking felt a bit like the Donovan series, though... tamer. Quieter, perhaps, and definitely tamer. But the same idea: what happens to people on a new planet with its own life forms when they're left on this planet for life. Our main character John is from a generation ship, and he definitely did not expect to be spending the remainder of his life on far-flung Scythia, but he finds himself there all the same. The inhabitants of said planet come from two other, more established planets that each have their own functioning rules, mores, and societies. Suffice it to say, those often clash. Add to it that there are all kinds of biological entities, both native to this planet and not, that are wreaking havoc in their daily lives.
While the plant stuff was cool, it wasn't the most enjoyable part for me, mostly because I think I am bad at picturing stuff like that. Anyway, I was far more invested in the characters and the conflicts. How no matter how much time has past, no matter how far flung into the galaxy human beings find themselves, we cannot help but have the same fights, make the same mistakes over and over again. Groups worrying about other people's decisions that don't affect them, using one's religious beliefs to try to control others, groups thinking they're inherently superior based on birthplace or language or whatever. The psychology, the humanity of it is so intriguing.
I will say, there were some moments that felt a bit draggy for me, but it was still worth it. That, and the romance bit had me a little... flummoxed? There was a love interest for John that felt very out of left field. He'd had some interesting interactions with several folks who I could have seen being a romantic interest for him, but when he announced who he was in love with, I simply hadn't gotten that vibe at all. Never did, frankly. But I did enjoy some of the side romances in the book, so at least there's that!
Bottom Line: New world, same humans.
You can find the full review and all the fancy and/or randomness that accompanies it at It Starts at Midnight
What We Are Seeking felt a bit like the Donovan series, though... tamer. Quieter, perhaps, and definitely tamer. But the same idea: what happens to people on a new planet with its own life forms when they're left on this planet for life. Our main character John is from a generation ship, and he definitely did not expect to be spending the remainder of his life on far-flung Scythia, but he finds himself there all the same. The inhabitants of said planet come from two other, more established planets that each have their own functioning rules, mores, and societies. Suffice it to say, those often clash. Add to it that there are all kinds of biological entities, both native to this planet and not, that are wreaking havoc in their daily lives.
While the plant stuff was cool, it wasn't the most enjoyable part for me, mostly because I think I am bad at picturing stuff like that. Anyway, I was far more invested in the characters and the conflicts. How no matter how much time has past, no matter how far flung into the galaxy human beings find themselves, we cannot help but have the same fights, make the same mistakes over and over again. Groups worrying about other people's decisions that don't affect them, using one's religious beliefs to try to control others, groups thinking they're inherently superior based on birthplace or language or whatever. The psychology, the humanity of it is so intriguing.
I will say, there were some moments that felt a bit draggy for me, but it was still worth it. That, and the romance bit had me a little... flummoxed? There was a love interest for John that felt very out of left field. He'd had some interesting interactions with several folks who I could have seen being a romantic interest for him, but when he announced who he was in love with, I simply hadn't gotten that vibe at all. Never did, frankly. But I did enjoy some of the side romances in the book, so at least there's that!
Bottom Line: New world, same humans.
You can find the full review and all the fancy and/or randomness that accompanies it at It Starts at Midnight
April 6, 2026
The hardest books to review are the ones I love like kin. This is the first e-arc I finished and then immediately read again. That's the highest praise I can give. I also went and bought Reed's debut. I feel like What We Are Seeking follows in the careful treads of Le Guin's, The Dispossessed (which is my favorite book).
I resonated deeply with the outsider on a planet full of people with strange moral convictions that feel unkind and restrictive. This book feels like it teaches us all how to communicate, as if we are the aliens with each other. I literally went from the first reading of this book and had a conversation with my husband that healed a hurt we'd been having. I was still in the book-speak, and it felt like a template to understanding and compromise.
This is not a utopia. There are hard things happening to good people. There are fights still to come. There are bigots. What happens to John at the very start is shockingly awful. What happened to Iren is worse than a crime. And yet...I still felt hope. It means something to me to see people (yes, characters but I felt these were people!) being so compassionate with one another despite the pain. Being found family in a way that instructs us all. I love the idea that there is an entire world full of nonbinary people (just like here!) living their best lives, and they want to bring that best to other worlds--even if it means fighting old fights again. The selflessness paired with boundaries in this book is astonishing for a reader of our times.
The world-building is original and bizarre. The AI situation is even stranger--and I hope there's a second book somewhere (anywhere!) in this universe that goes into that more. I'd also love to spend more time on John's home planet. The very first page when "the summer captain would be laid to rest beneath the stars" made me gasp with its beautiful prose. Just talking about it here makes me want to read it a third time.
This felt like someone holding a skein of yarn they'd plied, slowly and lovingly letting the strand go as it curled into a perfect heart. Not a fist, not a palm, but a clasped hand holding me gently as it showed me love.
Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Publishing Group for an e-arc in exchange for an honest review.
I resonated deeply with the outsider on a planet full of people with strange moral convictions that feel unkind and restrictive. This book feels like it teaches us all how to communicate, as if we are the aliens with each other. I literally went from the first reading of this book and had a conversation with my husband that healed a hurt we'd been having. I was still in the book-speak, and it felt like a template to understanding and compromise.
This is not a utopia. There are hard things happening to good people. There are fights still to come. There are bigots. What happens to John at the very start is shockingly awful. What happened to Iren is worse than a crime. And yet...I still felt hope. It means something to me to see people (yes, characters but I felt these were people!) being so compassionate with one another despite the pain. Being found family in a way that instructs us all. I love the idea that there is an entire world full of nonbinary people (just like here!) living their best lives, and they want to bring that best to other worlds--even if it means fighting old fights again. The selflessness paired with boundaries in this book is astonishing for a reader of our times.
The world-building is original and bizarre. The AI situation is even stranger--and I hope there's a second book somewhere (anywhere!) in this universe that goes into that more. I'd also love to spend more time on John's home planet. The very first page when "the summer captain would be laid to rest beneath the stars" made me gasp with its beautiful prose. Just talking about it here makes me want to read it a third time.
This felt like someone holding a skein of yarn they'd plied, slowly and lovingly letting the strand go as it curled into a perfect heart. Not a fist, not a palm, but a clasped hand holding me gently as it showed me love.
Thank you to NetGalley and Tor Publishing Group for an e-arc in exchange for an honest review.
March 14, 2026
I received an arc from a Goodreads Giveaway, this in no way impacts my review.
What We Are Seeking is an incredibly odd book. It took a while to get into as I honestly understood none of it for a while. Even after finishing it, I think it would take another read through or two for it to really sink in. That being said, I did really enjoy it by the end.
I could be wrong about my own interpretation of this book, but it feels like it mostly was about cultural identity and living next to and with other cultures. For example, jesses. As a trans person myself I was not a big fan of how they were portrayed in this book. It was more a cultural third gender than anything else, as while they could transition in any way they chose they were only allowed they/them pronouns, and had to go through a special ceremony to be acknowledged. They also weren't all trans, as it became a catch all on one world for queer people (ex asexual people were included in it in some cases). However, as the book goes on it is explained why this practice is, and the problems with it, and how those living in the new world want to adapt and grow. It's not meant to stay static, and they're choosing new traditions to be better.
John is another example of this. Over time he learns more to accept other cultures, such as the practice of marriage, even though he does not agree with it. His own people are a target of ridicule, but eventually the book explains how they got to be where they are too. He was hard to manage at first but as you got to know him and where he was coming from he made more sense, especially as he grew and evolved.
The setting of this book made the confusing first half worth getting to the easier second half. A world where animals come from plants is a fun one to explore in a science fiction novel, and not something I had seen before. It also adds another cultural layer with the basket-men and how they perceive the world.
Overall it was well worth getting through the first half of this book. I plan on reading it again, and hopefully I can fix this review afterwards, when I understand it more.
What We Are Seeking is an incredibly odd book. It took a while to get into as I honestly understood none of it for a while. Even after finishing it, I think it would take another read through or two for it to really sink in. That being said, I did really enjoy it by the end.
I could be wrong about my own interpretation of this book, but it feels like it mostly was about cultural identity and living next to and with other cultures. For example, jesses. As a trans person myself I was not a big fan of how they were portrayed in this book. It was more a cultural third gender than anything else, as while they could transition in any way they chose they were only allowed they/them pronouns, and had to go through a special ceremony to be acknowledged. They also weren't all trans, as it became a catch all on one world for queer people (ex asexual people were included in it in some cases). However, as the book goes on it is explained why this practice is, and the problems with it, and how those living in the new world want to adapt and grow. It's not meant to stay static, and they're choosing new traditions to be better.
John is another example of this. Over time he learns more to accept other cultures, such as the practice of marriage, even though he does not agree with it. His own people are a target of ridicule, but eventually the book explains how they got to be where they are too. He was hard to manage at first but as you got to know him and where he was coming from he made more sense, especially as he grew and evolved.
The setting of this book made the confusing first half worth getting to the easier second half. A world where animals come from plants is a fun one to explore in a science fiction novel, and not something I had seen before. It also adds another cultural layer with the basket-men and how they perceive the world.
Overall it was well worth getting through the first half of this book. I plan on reading it again, and hopefully I can fix this review afterwards, when I understand it more.
April 14, 2026
Thank you, Tor, for the physical ARC. All thoughts and opinions are my own!
It took me a little while to finish this book. It's not that it's bad; it's actually really good. It is mostly a philosophical book. There's hardly any plot, but it has many amazing, complex characters.
Reed has taken a lot of ultimate questions about race, gender, sex, religion, and what our future could look like. I think the hardest thing about this book was realizing that it's so far in the future, yet we are still dealing with all the harmful rhetoric we face today. I want to feel hopeful that we have a future where we can all get along and accept each other. I'm sure it's a pipe dream, but if you are looking into a philosophical book about a hopeful future, this really isn't it. John had preconceived notions, and it was nice to see him realize how he needed to be more open to other ideas. I think that's the biggest theme in this book. We are all different with different backgrounds, and we should be open to it all.
I do wish the various places characters were from had been explored more. We have so many interesting backgrounds mixed together, but don't explore them too much. I enjoyed the relationships John made and the found family that I came to adore. The world was interesting too, with the plants/animals/trees. There are some things that I'm not sure I completely understood. The fact that animals came from the plants was a really cool aspect, though.
Overall, I enjoyed my introduction to Cameron Reed's work. I think many people will appreciate the message and the characters. If you don't enjoy philosophical (how many times can I say that?), then this might not be for you.
It took me a little while to finish this book. It's not that it's bad; it's actually really good. It is mostly a philosophical book. There's hardly any plot, but it has many amazing, complex characters.
Reed has taken a lot of ultimate questions about race, gender, sex, religion, and what our future could look like. I think the hardest thing about this book was realizing that it's so far in the future, yet we are still dealing with all the harmful rhetoric we face today. I want to feel hopeful that we have a future where we can all get along and accept each other. I'm sure it's a pipe dream, but if you are looking into a philosophical book about a hopeful future, this really isn't it. John had preconceived notions, and it was nice to see him realize how he needed to be more open to other ideas. I think that's the biggest theme in this book. We are all different with different backgrounds, and we should be open to it all.
I do wish the various places characters were from had been explored more. We have so many interesting backgrounds mixed together, but don't explore them too much. I enjoyed the relationships John made and the found family that I came to adore. The world was interesting too, with the plants/animals/trees. There are some things that I'm not sure I completely understood. The fact that animals came from the plants was a really cool aspect, though.
Overall, I enjoyed my introduction to Cameron Reed's work. I think many people will appreciate the message and the characters. If you don't enjoy philosophical (how many times can I say that?), then this might not be for you.
March 16, 2026
This is a very philosophical book about human nature and "what we seek"; namely focusing on how we find love, family, and community. Many of the problems we face in the world today are still being faced, far in this science fiction settler future. For the first 60% of the book I'd describe it as equal parts philosophy and science fiction plot, past the 60% mark the book becomes very, very focused on the semantics the characters face, what their viewpoints are, how they handle resistance and differences, and how they reconcile with the fact that they are stuck on this new planet with each other and the hostile environment they face. At this point it felt like the story plot was kind of abandoned in favor of exploring the characters' arcs. Not a bad choice; but don't expect much resolution at the end of the book. True to many philosophical pontifications; you will be left to form your own opinions and thoughts based off what the author provided you.
And interesting thought experiment about cultural identity and how we accept change and influence in our lives. While this is marketed as science fiction, please do not expect action and adventure. This is a slow moving, highly reflective book about human nature.
And interesting thought experiment about cultural identity and how we accept change and influence in our lives. While this is marketed as science fiction, please do not expect action and adventure. This is a slow moving, highly reflective book about human nature.
April 10, 2026
This is a book that is SO perfectly tailored towards my personal tastes, it makes it difficult to review. What We Are Seeking is a very philosophical, introspective exploration(I hesitate to call this a story or claim it has a standard plot) as a new society forms on an alien planet. Cameron Reed uses the blank slate of a newly formed colony on an alien planet with no outside human societal influence as a sandbox to intensify and explore attitudes and treatments of gender, relationships, and sexuality across several very contrasting ideologies. The colonizers are comprised of devout christians, free love societies, Jainists, and even human societies that have developed their own very alien(but still absolute and black and white) expectations of gender and sexuality. The plot of cohabitation and integration takes a backseat to pure exploration of the differing values of the opposing factions in the colony. It worked for me, but this is a really strange book to recommend- in vibes it falls somewhere between the Jesuit missions of Mary Doria Russel's "The Sparrow" and character focused "cozy" stories like Katherine Addison and Victoria Goddard's work. This is going to hold a place in my heart for a while, and I hope it finds its audience.
May 3, 2026
I am... confused by this book. It doesn't really feel like a story so much as a bunch of worldbuilding cobbled together. We learn lore and read extensive discussions of the cultural (and most especially sexual) differences between these societies. We get a smattering of character backstory too. The cast is surprisingly large but wasn't that hard to keep track of.
But I was left feeling like... what was the point of this? There is no structure to this story. It just kind of trails off at the end. The pace is unbelievably slow, but I kept going because I thought we were headed somewhere. I thought there had to be reasons for the insane detail Reed includes about just about everything. But there doesn't seem to be any reason for anything. It all just kind of is.
I can't even call this a first contact story, because that takes such a backseat to learning about every way human sexuality has changed since colonizing the stars. Which was interesting? I guess? But still ultimately pointless.
Not badly written, it just doesn't go anywhere. Skip unless cool ideas are why you pick up a book and no other reason.
But I was left feeling like... what was the point of this? There is no structure to this story. It just kind of trails off at the end. The pace is unbelievably slow, but I kept going because I thought we were headed somewhere. I thought there had to be reasons for the insane detail Reed includes about just about everything. But there doesn't seem to be any reason for anything. It all just kind of is.
I can't even call this a first contact story, because that takes such a backseat to learning about every way human sexuality has changed since colonizing the stars. Which was interesting? I guess? But still ultimately pointless.
Not badly written, it just doesn't go anywhere. Skip unless cool ideas are why you pick up a book and no other reason.
January 31, 2026
This is the kind of book that I absolutely love reading and don't get enough of these days: a book that is willing to sit me down with gender and chromosonal theory, create an absolute satire of modern religious and the absurdity of antitrans activists, and still have interesting things to say about how you find yourself through community, all while taking a tour of the stars and dealing with the absurdity of prejudice always being the one thing that makes it to the stars too. John and Iren get to make some real fun statements about the oppression of marriage while they're at it, but we also get an absolutely joyful tour of cultures, while one toys with the idea of conceiving a child. Yes, there's hate and absurdity, but there's still the possibility of the future, and knowledge being shared among the ships that travel, and the possibility of better for the future as well. I'm going to be finding this physically too, because I love the cover art. Comes out in April, preorder now and sit down with a good meal and someone you love to read this.
Want to Read
April 3, 2026High marks from the New Yorker's Stephanie Burt:
https://www.newyorker.com/books/under...
The New Yorker seldom features SF, so this was a pleasant surprise.
Excerpt:
"It’s partly space opera—far future, with starships and aliens—and mostly set on a colonized planet: the kind of premise made popular by “Star Trek.” It’s a cracking, fast-moving adventure story, with a wilderness-survival plot, love stories, coming-out stories, and a whodunnit. It’s about desert botany and zoology, and reproductive freedom, and new tech, and religious faith. And it asks us to sleuth out—in its world, and our own—connections among all those things."
Unmentioned in her review is that the novel was first published as by Raphael Carter, a pen-name.
"Raphael Carter" also had an influential blog, The Honeyguide, in the late 1990s. I was lukewarm on The Fortunate Fall, rating it (much later) as 3 stars.
https://www.newyorker.com/books/under...
The New Yorker seldom features SF, so this was a pleasant surprise.
Excerpt:
"It’s partly space opera—far future, with starships and aliens—and mostly set on a colonized planet: the kind of premise made popular by “Star Trek.” It’s a cracking, fast-moving adventure story, with a wilderness-survival plot, love stories, coming-out stories, and a whodunnit. It’s about desert botany and zoology, and reproductive freedom, and new tech, and religious faith. And it asks us to sleuth out—in its world, and our own—connections among all those things."
Unmentioned in her review is that the novel was first published as by Raphael Carter, a pen-name.
"Raphael Carter" also had an influential blog, The Honeyguide, in the late 1990s. I was lukewarm on The Fortunate Fall, rating it (much later) as 3 stars.
Review of advance copy received from Edelweiss+
It reads like a long philosophical conversation on the topics of sexual customs, transitioning, tolerance and choice. In a good way -- I liked that, and I liked it. It's a bit didactic at times, and I'm honestly wondering if the ending will change before publication -- I can't tell if that's where it's meant to end. It makes sense in some ways, and not in others.
All of that aside, the world building is fascinating and the characters are excellent. I'm particularly intrigued/freaked out by the possibilities of AI in this imagining. Long, but I kept wanting more time with it, and it's staying with me. Lots to think about. I also really loved how much care and attention is given to food preparation and enjoyment. I love the gravitas that food has when the eaters are more appreciative of how central it is to survival.
Advanced Reader's copy provided by Edelweiss.
All of that aside, the world building is fascinating and the characters are excellent. I'm particularly intrigued/freaked out by the possibilities of AI in this imagining. Long, but I kept wanting more time with it, and it's staying with me. Lots to think about. I also really loved how much care and attention is given to food preparation and enjoyment. I love the gravitas that food has when the eaters are more appreciative of how central it is to survival.
Advanced Reader's copy provided by Edelweiss.
April 2, 2026
Fans of Ursula K LeGuin’s The Dispossessed may find themselves fully engrossed in this story about a doctor who reaches an alien planet alongside a linguist and the journey they go on to understand the cultures at play here. This is very heavily a theme- and a character-driven novel. The themes explored are vast but include: gender identity, transgender experiences, body autonomy, monogamy, religion, and how language shapes how we relate to each other. I did fully appreciate how impactful this novel was; however, my personal reading style does require a little more of a structured plot to fully enjoy a sci-fi read. This one is very heavily dialogue-focused which did require me to push through at times. Thank you to NetGalley and TOR for an eARC in exchange for my review of this lovely novel!
April 8, 2026
A Joyfully Jay review.
4.25 stars
I’m not sure where to start with regards to What We Are Seeking. The book itself is a beautiful jumble of language, societal commentary, and environmentalism. It is a story that is often in conflict with itself, yet well written and engaging, but the end is strangely unsatisfying.
I was, at times, frustrated by What We Are Seeking, occasionally confused, but always entertained. And I really must stress how much I enjoyed the book, despite my issues with it. It is unique and original and it tackles a lot of important issues in clever and compelling ways.
Read Sue’s review in its entirety here.
4.25 stars
I’m not sure where to start with regards to What We Are Seeking. The book itself is a beautiful jumble of language, societal commentary, and environmentalism. It is a story that is often in conflict with itself, yet well written and engaging, but the end is strangely unsatisfying.
I was, at times, frustrated by What We Are Seeking, occasionally confused, but always entertained. And I really must stress how much I enjoyed the book, despite my issues with it. It is unique and original and it tackles a lot of important issues in clever and compelling ways.
Read Sue’s review in its entirety here.
Did Not Finish
April 5, 2026I haven't read this author's previous work from decades ago that is very well-reviewed. This one has a very promising premise and hype but 40% in, I'm having to pause because it's just not holding my attention on an emotional level. The worldbuilding is interesting in very specific ways and the people are caricature versions of societal norms that are problematic just to drive home that point. The main character is sort of just adrift and I'm having a really hard time getting a coherent sense of where this is going. It's not dissimilar to thought experiment works of Connie Willis and Samuel Delaney, I'm just not the kind of patient reader that enjoys being dragged forward through the author's disjointed exploration of one cool premise. Maybe I'll finish on audiobook someday.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
This was excellent, thanks to the publishers for the ARC. It reminded me a bit of Karen Lord's books, though there was more action (I like Karen Lord's writing a lot, they are slow/meditative on purpose). People from a few different societies end up on one planet, their social structures/ways of understanding relationships come into conflict, though not really explosive conflict. Very good world building and character development. My only complaint is that some plot points seemed 'skipped' - a plan for action would then be something that had already happened, rather than spending the time to experience the tough part.
Did Not Finish
March 15, 2026This was definitely a case where it was me, not the book. I gave it to 30% before giving up - it just wasn't pulling me in. Now, if you're a reader who likes a dense, slow, thoughtful progression through interpersonal relationships to explore deeper concepts, this book might be excellent for you. It's also a bit hard sci-fi in the sense that it goes into over-explanation and description of just about every single thing that occurs, even down to seemingly unimportant things. It just wasn't personally holding my interest.
Thank you to Netgalley for the digital ARC of this title - all opinions are my own.
Thank you to Netgalley for the digital ARC of this title - all opinions are my own.
April 25, 2026
This is a first contact novel in multiple forms.
There is very interesting alien biology and sentience to study and one of the main characters is a translator.
But there are also a number of human cultures that have been shaped by different environments and most of the novel observes them from an outsiders point of view.
This is a very anthropological novel in the vain of Le Guin. As a queer man from a poly-amorous matriarchal culture observes a monogamous patriarchal culture.
In the end this novel is about the freedom to become your true self. It is not utopian, there are downsides, but it is unrelenting in it's respect of consent.
There is very interesting alien biology and sentience to study and one of the main characters is a translator.
But there are also a number of human cultures that have been shaped by different environments and most of the novel observes them from an outsiders point of view.
This is a very anthropological novel in the vain of Le Guin. As a queer man from a poly-amorous matriarchal culture observes a monogamous patriarchal culture.
In the end this novel is about the freedom to become your true self. It is not utopian, there are downsides, but it is unrelenting in it's respect of consent.
May 1, 2026
A preachy but enjoyable Star Trek-like exploration/colonization of a new world, with new species. The real focus is the humans, most bound by tradition and taught by religion to fear and despise those who don’t conform …. but some seeking out non traditional family structures and finding ways to explore LGBT+ relationships. The author was certainly writing for the present with lines like: “All I know is that there’s nothing wrong with [names redacted] that doesn’t come from being told there’s something wrong with them. I do not know why Jesus Christ would found a church that’s so fucking adamant otherwise.”
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