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For once I'm not actually doing a bit; those "any resemblance to real persons living or dead" disclaimers genuinely exist because of Rasputin.

Spy Hop Killer Whale

Weekly Bookish Question #499 (July 5th - July 11th, 2026)

And it's that thing where you mentally place yourself as the second, auxiliary party to someone else that you consider to be "In Charge" of whatever space or occupation or responsibility you are assigned to

And when you are IN that mindset, it *feels* like you're being responsible. It *feels* like you're being respectful, and helpful, and contributing to the load.

But what you don't SEE- because it *feels* like deference- is that the other person who you're seeing as The Authority you report to- by being assigned that role, has also been assigned the invisible load of BEING YOUR MANAGER.

This is by FAR most commonly seen in husband-and-wife relationships, where the man says, "just tell me what I can do to HELP- you don't have to do it all by yourself, but it's like you won't even tell me when you NEED help. You just do everything and then get mad at me for not doing it first. I can help clean. I can help with the kids. I can help"

But I also see it- and am guilty myself of doing it- at work, at school, in public- that mental, "this is THEIR space, and i will be respectful and helpful to THEM"- without realizing that subservience in this manner isn't actually a good thing. That it actually shifts the burden of responsibility to the other person. That aspect was totally invisible to me.

I didn't understand that when I was told, "if you see something that needs to be done, just DO it", or, "take the initiative", what they ACTUALLY meant was, "I am not above you", or "you have equal say in what kind of environment you want to live or work in", or "I do not want full control over what happens here, I do not want to order you around, I do not want to be in charge, what I WANT is to co-command WITH you"

Being in The Assigned Authority position NOW, that is all so much clearer.

I am the senior member of my team at work, and now, every time I train a newbie, every time I finish catching them up to speed and giving them a list of everything that needs to be done, my next big hurdle seems to always be, "now take pride in the space when I'm not around". "Now don't assume I'll tell you when something is due or what orders to plan things in".

Now, having been on both sides of the struggle, I can appreciate the sticking points here

TO THE PERSON "IN CHARGE": The person deferring to you doesn't understand the invisible labor you're doing. They genuinely believe you know more, you WANT more, you see things they don't, and that they are being respectful and good by staying out of your way and waiting on your orders. THAT is the bit that's not clicking.

TO THE PERSON "WANTING TO HELP": "Help" implies that you are providing assistance to a problem that belongs to somebody else. Stop thinking like that. Understand that the problem belongs to BOTH of you equally, and consider what kind of shared space you BOTH want. What is your SHARED GOAL? Not THEIR goal, but a goal that belongs to you too. Own your space.

This is not a Commander-Lieutenant problem. This is a Partnership problem.

Botanical [ 8 colors ]

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.