Record of a Spaceborn Few (Wayfarers, #3)

by Becky Chambers

But then I began to think of the dead animals I have seen and disposed of and consumed, the ended lives I did not grieve for because I did not understand them fully. I did not see myself in them, and therefore it did not matter.

I do not feel I am explaining this experience well, dear guest, but perhaps that is appropriate. Perhaps none of us can truly explain death. Perhaps none of us should.

‘Knowledge should always be free,’ she said. ‘What people do with it is up to them.’

it is that cultural bruising is often worst when done accidentally.’

She knew better than to get dragged along by ifs in situations like these, and she shut that line of questioning down. The guilt lingered, even so. Ghosts were imaginary, but hauntings were real.

‘Either we are all worthy of the Commons, dear Tamsin, or none of us are.’

We both depend on fragile systems with a million interconnected parts that can easily be damaged and will eventually fail.

‘I barely made it, though. I busted my ass, and I got entirely decent.

You’ll always wonder if you did the right thing, no matter what the decision is, big or small. There’s always another path you’ll wonder about. But that wondering is less maddening if you know what the other path looks like, at least.

If trying something new was valid, then keeping something old was, too.