22-Aug-2025: Review: Notes from Small Planets

Preamble: I bought this book in Surabaya, at a small pop-up book fair. I spent a bit browsing through the books (they were from big bad wolf!) and found this book, already opened with no other copy available. I asked the cashier how much it was, to my surprise it was only 80k! I saw the premise and took a quick glance at the contents; it looked like something I'd enjoy. The book is a fictional travel guide with footnotes by the in-universe author and editor. If you know me, you know I love a meta narrative.

This book explores 8 different worlds that were once accessible to people on earth. Think of it as vacation worlds. Mysteriously, the worlds were closed off alongside any and all writing about them- except this book, which was found as a rough draft in a now-bankrupt office. The writer, Floyd, is a diplomat from earth. His editor, Eliza, "helps" him in putting together this book. Throughout the travel guide you read their back-and-forth banter alongside an unfolding meta-plot. There are also excepts from Floyd's travel journal to give it a more epistolary feel. That's the premise of this book, if you're interested, go give it a read! I think this book is for young adults, since there are a lot of "fucks" peppered in the prose.

Onto the review! Spoilers from here on out. I won't spend too much time recapping the contents of this book, but tl;dr it draws heavily from sci-fi and fantasy tropes, as well as existing IPs such as mad max, harry potter, star wars, and other IPs I haven't watched yet (read the goodreads reviews for a full list). As I was explaining this concept to a friend, he said it seemed like I bought a knock-off book of discworld. To which I can't compare directly since I haven't read Discworld. Nevertheless, I was happy to have this in my collection.

I feel like this book relies too heavily on expecting the reader to be "in" on the cliches and jokes that it's trying to satirize, if satire is the goal. It tries to poke fun at the tropes it's regurgitating and does nothing interesting with any of the concepts. Think of the sorting hat from harry potter, it's depicted (with a different name) in the book as being outlandish, alongside the concept of the 4 school "houses," but it only serves to "poke fun" at the concept instead of exploring its implications. e.g. how we humans keep making arbitrary groupings and how that affects the psyche of the hcildren that fall into the "misc" house instead of the "brave" house.

It does try to engage with the topic when it comes to dystopian, post-nuclear fallout world (wasteland). The travel guide explains that uprisings have been a core staple of the world, noting that nothing really changes even after dozens of dictators have been toppled. This tries to be a critique on "after-the-revolution" mentality. It could either be read as the author feeling apathetic towards the political climate in which it's an endless cycle of getting rid of "bad guys," or it's a commentary on how there is no "post-revolution" world in a sense that it is a gradual and constant thing we must work towards improving instead of expecting one "Big Event" that changes the course of history. I think this chapter does boost my ratings on this book a little bit, but it's a shame that it's right at the tail end of the novel instead of it being front and center.

There is a throughline of Floyd saying "orcs bad" and Eliza trying to dismantle his biases, which is a trite observation on fantasy races and its politics, but it doesn't say much about it. Yes, orcs are just like any other fantasy races; yes, the prejudices Floyd holds is uncomfortable, then what? Floyd writes the entire book, he's not punished for these opinions he holds. Is it a commentary on how bigots are free to spew ignorant race "science" while editors are too weak to fight back, leaving merely footnotes pushing back at the idea but ultimately not having any final say in the matter? Why do we turn to fantasy races and recreate the same dynamics we have on earth, just Othering the other side even more? I wish the book engaged with these topics on a deeper level instead of just making off-hand remarks and expecting the reader to laugh with them at the absurdity of the tropes.

The real author of the book, Crowley, remarks in the afterword that he intended to poke fun at the cliches and tropes that he loves, obviously he doesn't want to turn into A Floyd, and paints Eliza as the moral anchor of this travel guide. But how does that hold up in the text? If I were to read the book without the afterword, how would I feel about Eliza and Floyd's dynamic?

At first I couldn't put a finger on the tone of the book. It feels as though Crowley is poking fun at Eliza being a stubborn "sjw" trying to push back on Floyd's merely whacky schenanigans. I didn't know if the narrative supported Eliza or Floyd because the humor of the book is very Floyd-centric, that is to say, almost dudebro-ish in its crass comedy. He gets to speak for the majority of the book, and it's written in his tone, while Eliza is reduced to footnotes and the occasional paragraphs she "forces" Floyd to include. She doesn't seem to have a lot of authority over the publication, despite her expertise in the matter. Despite Crowley intending for Eliza to be the moral anchor of the story, I felt like the tone and concept of the book as a whole doesn't support that idea.

My initial plan was to give this book 1.5/5 stars, because I felt like it's a nothingburger of a satirical take on sci-fi and fantasy. Nearing the end, and after reading the afterword, it managed to affect my reading of the book in a better light, to be completely honest. I do think Crowley has good intentions but the execution is flawed. I feel like, as satire or parody, you have to say something about the subject matter instead of just poking fun at its absurdity. Ask questions like why is it absurd? what are its real-world implications? is it merely human to want these tropes in fiction or is it our everyday biases pushing us towards that direction?. It tries to grapple with some topics in a profound way, but not enough to justify the premise of the book.

Overall, I wouldn't recommend this to someone who's on the hunt for good commentary (or "satire") on sci-fi and fantasy. Its observations are trite and humor is crude at times. I think it has value in its novel presentation of being a fictional travel guide with banter between the writer and editor, alongside its charming graphs and maps. I felt like Eliza should have gotten a more prominent role/effect in the book to hammer down the fact that she's the moral anchor of the story. It's a good coffee table book (which I could say for most of my collections) and a neat format to have in your collection, but when you read it closely it's nothing special. I wish this book was better because it had so much pontential, but it ends up just riffing off references and well-known IPs. 2/5 stars.