Becky Chambers

Becky Chambers's A Psalm for the Wild-Built is a gentle slice of cozy science fiction: a tea monk and a wild robot walk into the woods together to ask what people actually need. It's a short, warm book that trades plot for big, unhurried questions about purpose and enoughness.

A patched-together tunneling crew takes on the long job of their lives, and the journey becomes a warm, character-first space opera about the small kindnesses that make a found family hold together.