I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. This review is spoiler-free.

Welcome to my stop on the Goldilocks blog tour! This book snagged my attention back when it was announced and was one of my most anticipated releases of 2020. I adored Lam’s book False Hearts, and was eager to pick up what sounded like a book that was written for me. A feminist science fiction novel about five women who steal a spaceship? Leaving Earth in order to seek out a better future? Comparisons to The Handmaid’s Tale? Yes please! I’m so thrilled to say that this book absolutely lived up to my sky-high expectations and I loved it — it is easily one of my favourite books of the year so far.


Like many of the best science fiction books, Goldilocks serves as a warning to show what could happen in our future if we don’t sit up and take action now. From climate change disaster to the edging out of women’s rights, the book sets up a frightening and realistic vision of the future, all wrapped in a thrilling story of survival, the complexities of family relationships, and how far you’ll go to do what you believe is right. The book is brilliantly paced and totally captivating — I sped through it and stayed up well past my bedtime because I had to know what happened next. I love fiercely feminist sci-fi and science fiction thrillers, so Goldilocks was exactly what I wanted and needed!

The book focuses heavily on Naomi, the onboard botanist and the adopted daughter of the self-made millionaire Valerie — a force of nature with a vision for a better future, especially for women, on the distant planet Cavendish. The crew is mostly unfamiliar to Naomi, and the five women are thrown into a fascinating and perilous situation together I really loved Naomi as a character because she felt so incredibly realistic — she is flawed and so wonderfully human, but still someone the reader can admire and relate to. Her slow-forming friendships with the other women going to Cavendish was wonderful to watch develop. Through the use of flashbacks, Naomi’s background is incredibly well fleshed out and you really get a strong sense of who she is, particularly in relation to her adopted mother Valerie. This relationship in particular was one of the most compelling aspects of the book for me — you know I love female relationships in my books. The wonderfully intricate complexities of new and old female relationships is the core of this book and I absolutely loved that.

Goldilocks is a fantastic science fiction thriller that features an alarmingly relevant and frightening look at the future, but also depicts fierce women who refuse to accept the status quo and will do what it takes to change their futures. Don’t miss out on this fantastic new book!


CW: Issues around pregnancy (abortion, miscarriage, etc.)

The Earth is dying. The future of humanity is in the hands of five women aboard a ship headed for a planet in the Goldilocks zone, where conditions are just right for human habitation. The only problem is, they aren’t the authorized crew, they stole the ship from NASA after the mission was stolen from them. When things start to go wrong, Naomi begins to suspect that not everything is as it seems and someone is concealing a secret, and that Earth may be running out of time faster than they realised.

content warnings: miscarriage, abortion, climate crisis, death from virus.

I absolutely adore science fiction, especially space science fiction. So I was sure Goldilocks would be an absolute hit for me – The Martian meets The Handmaid’s Tale? Unfortunately it fell a little flat for me. I went in expecting a thrilling space science fiction, and I got quite a character focused story about family, secrets, and love that was set quite heavily on Earth. Not a fault on the books part, obviously, but a problem with my own expectations.

What I did really love about Goldilocks was the moral questions it asked. Who should make certain decisions? What gives people the right to make these world changing decisions? Does the end justify the means? What would you do to someone who went to far for the right reasons? All very interesting questions, especially considering the backdrop and context these questions were being asked in. Brilliant social commentary.

What I struggled with most with Goldilocks was the characters. None were as fleshed out as they could have been but the protagnoist, Naomi, was probably the least interesting character. I enjoyed the moral ambiguity of Valerie. Hixon and Hart were more interesting, but I would have loved more development of their characters and their relationship (f/f).

Overall, I enjoyed the questions Goldilocks posed about the future of Earth, about humanity, and about morality. Unfortuantely, it was a tad anticlimatic and the characters were not as engaging as they could have been.

A great story with deep, believable characters and a great examination if its themes. This is a sci fi Story that deserves to be an all time classic.

On a near-future Earth devastated by climate change, women are facing increasing restrictions on their lives. Five women, including botanist Naomi Lovelace and her adopted mother and mentor Valerie Black, steal a spaceship to start a new life for humanity on a planet in the ‘goldilocks’ zone of human habitation. Their journey starts well but then things go wrong. Secrets are revealed and Naomi discovers that humanity’s time on Earth could be more limited than she realised.

This is an excellent, timely thriller. I don’t read much science fiction but this book sounded intriguing and I enjoyed Laura Lam’s Young Adult book Pantomime. The split narrative set before and during the space journey was interesting and effective at showing the changing relationship between Naomi and Valerie.

A lot of the science went over my head but it seemed very plausible to me, a non-science person, and seemed incredibly well-researched. There is plenty of tension and suspense as the mission and the fate of Earth is threatened. This book is an effective exploration of the relationships, trust, and betrayals between a small group of people, amidst a larger issue of global danger.

With very relevant themes to the current global situation, I really enjoyed this book and recommend it to anyone looking for a story about space and humanity, with complex female characters and high-stakes.

Thank you to NetGalley and Wildfire for the opportunity to read and review this title.

With the Earth on the brink of collapse after years of misuse from humanity, a team of women take matters into their own hands to try and save the future of mankind. All they need is a spaceship and a plan. Valerie Black is the leader of her handpicked crew of the five best females she could find. On an Earth where women have become increasingly oppressed and restricted in what they can do, she hopes that by spearheading a mission to a new planet she can create a new society, a better one, for all. She wants to make a difference. But at what price? When things start to go wrong on board their stolen ship, it’s left to Valerie’s adopted daughter Naomi Lovelace to uncover who’s been keeping secrets from the rest of the crew, and what sacrifices she must be willing to make in order to save those loved ones left behind on Earth.

I went into this with some trepidation – I’m not known for my love of science fiction, but what really pulled me in to this was the description of an all-female crew. For too long, I’ve felt that science fiction has been heavily fixated on men. This story centres fully on these women – their relationships, their lives and opinions, and most importantly of all, how passionate they are regarding their work. Naomi is the botanist of the crew – it’s her job to ensure the rest of the crew are fed, as well as unlocking the secret to getting crops to grow on their new home planet. It’s an incredibly important job, and we see how Naomi came into the profession, and watch her many rejections as well as achievements, that make her the woman she is. Being a woman, she’s had to work harder than most men to get where she is – and that’s made her resilient and resourceful. As a scientist at heart, she analyses her predicaments and comes to (mostly) logical conclusions, but also isn’t afraid to follow her gut when required. She was a great character, with a good amount of development over the past and present timelines we read about to make me really warm to her personality and what happened to her. I cared. I cared a lot.

I also really loved that the story itself has been inspired by a part of history I knew nothing about before this. It mentions briefly the history of Mercury 13, whereby thirteen female astronauts were screened for NASA, many outperforming their male counterparts, yet never made it into space. They were overlooked because of their gender. Goldilocks takes this idea, and re imagines the women fighting back for this injustice. It’s empowering and enlightening, and got me researching more into Mercury 13 and these forgotten women.

The plot itself is fast paced, with many twists and turns along the journey as we find our crew in increasingly dangerous and tricky scenarios to keep the reader in suspense for most of the novel. I wasn’t expecting a lot of the plot points, and some do hit a little close to home in the current climate, but I liked that for each new twist we got, we would see the women struggle with very real moral dilemmas. There often wasn’t a right or wrong answer, and it was exciting to see what decisions they would make. Naomi’s very important issue that arises early on was particularly great to see unfold – I wasn’t expecting a long distance love story to grip me in the way that it did. I do wish that the author had added a bit more backstory for the other crew members however, as I felt I never really got a good grasp of their personalities compared to Naomi and Valerie. I would have loved to have seen how Valerie recruited each of them properly, with flashbacks into their past as well as Valarie and Naomi’s.

This was a really engrossing and unique novel that feels very of its time. It’s a powerful example of the importance of women in science and the difficult decisions that those in leadership must make for the good of humanity. The ‘trolley dilemma’ crops up a few times in conversation between Valerie and various other crew members. If given the choice, would you do nothing and allow a trolley to kill five people – or pull a lever and kill one? What is the right choice to make? This novel explores that ethical concept and more. A thoroughly thought provoking read that I’d highly recommend.

I did not want this book to end. Ever. I can't recall ever being so invested in a bunch of characters and felt their hopes and pain so deeply - yes, they are THAT good. The writing is absolutely superb. The story... oh, the story... I wish I'd been plugged into a heart monitor while reading. So many ups and downs and "oh, please, no" moments. A few tears, a few smiles, lots of gasps, and, yes, a few expletives on my part. "Goldilocks" is so much more than the blurb can hint at without spoiling the story. You need to read this. You won't regret it.

My thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for an advance copy to review. This review is entirely my own, unbiased, opinion.

An adrenaline filled book that I could not put down. This was the perfect blend of dystopia and sci-fi and gripped me from start to finish. Some of it feels uncomfortably close to home (especially the treatment of women and the destruction of our planet), but that just serves to make the story all the more believable. I had such a blast reading this, and will definitely be recommending it for years to come.

Taking its name from the so-called “Goldilocks zone” (the habitable orbit around a star), Goldilocks is part eco-thriller, part science fiction. Having long dreamed of going into space, Naomi Lovelace’s last chance to realise her ultimate ambition lies with her stepmother, Valerie Black. Valerie’s company has been researching how best to get humanity to the planet Cavendish, a potential fresh start for our species, having thoroughly befouled the Earth. However, women are increasingly being side-lined and kept down by men in positions of power, and the mission is taken out of Valerie’s control. New plans are drawn up that will see the ship crewed by an all-male contingent. Quite understandably, Valerie has other ideas, and having already picked her ideal crew, decides that their only option is to make off with the shiny new ship before anyone else gets their booted feet through the hatch. Grand theft spaceship, as one crew member refers to it.

Valerie’s handpicked all-female crew is five strong, consisting of her, Naomi (the ship’s botanist), defected cosmonaut Oksana Lebedeva, pilot Jerrie Hixon and her wife, Irene Hart. The relationships between the different crew members are well developed throughout, with all five of them distinct and believable characters. There is a great deal of history between Naomi and Valerie of course, and much of this is explored through flashback chapters interspersed throughout the main narrative. Not only do these explore the relationships between Naomi, Valerie and other characters, they also give valuable insight into their motivations, giving us a frame of reference for their actions onboard the Atalanta. As a helpful signpost, each chapter also begins by stating when it is set - eight years before launch, two days after launch, etc. These timestamps also heighten the sense of urgency in some of the later chapters, acting almost like a kind of countdown as events begin to unfold and the pressure mounts. This is where the thriller portion of the novel really comes to the fore, as Naomi begins to suspect that someone on board is not quite what they seem. The revelations surrounding this, when they do come, had me open-mouthed with shock - always a good sign. There are also a number of big, complicated moral choices that Naomi finds herself in the middle of as a result of events onboard, which test her character and evoke a lot of sympathy for her too. Her desire to escape from Valerie’s shadow, as well as from the long shadow of her brilliant, deceased mother is a trait that only adds to her likeability.

An early mention of the Earth as it’s seen from space by this time makes for somewhat sobering reading. Lam certainly doesn’t pull any punches when it comes to showing just why humanity needs Cavendish so much, with this particular scene really resonating with me. It brought to mind the pictures in the media a couple of years ago, during that summer that seemed never-ending, of the UK scorched brown in the heat. Elsewhere in the novel, we see the havoc that climate change has wrought on society, with climate refugees in the millions, sea walls to combat rising tides and disease rampant (if you are keen to avoid all mention of pandemics right now, buy this and come back to it later). Climate change deniers (who, incredibly, still seem to exist) might take issue, but for the rest of us this is a frightening and all too believable future, which we need to be doing more to avoid. It never felt like I was being hit over the head with the politics of the novel though, whether it was those to do with climate change or feminism. Despite their foregrounding, there is a real lightness of touch around these big issues; certainly, none of the characters ever state that they’re doing what they’re doing for womankind, or with any particularly feminist motivations. Rather, they are doing what they are doing for the sake of humanity and because they are the best people for the job, who won’t be held back by some ridiculous patriarchy. Their actions certainly feel like an attempt to push back against their world’s slide into the nightmare futures of the likes of Vox or The Handmaid’s Tale, but this motivation is secondary to saving the human race.

A contemporary theme, strong characters and a tightly woven plot full of twists and turns make Goldilocks both an exciting and highly satisfying read. It warns without ever feeling like it preaches, and we would all do well to heed it. The strong, female crew is also very refreshing in a genre still dominated by male characters. Prescient, urgent and thought-provoking.

A tightly plotted, suspenseful space thriller that kept me guessing until the very end! I loved how the different strands of politics, science, and interpersonal relationships all wove together to make the story what it was, and the focus on *growing*- plants, people (literally and metaphorically), relationships, societies- made it an incredibly compelling read.

Honestly, I'm so glad that I read it now, during the COVID outbreak. The vision of the future of Earth it gives is realistically bleak, but Lam allows for a grace and humanity in her writing that has the same hope as the first, tentative shoots poking from the dirt after a hard winter,

Please give this a read. I'm always a sucker for space books, and Goldilocks has taken its place among The Calculating Stars and Planetfall as one of my favourites.

GOLDILOCKS is the rare kind of sci-fi that kept pace from beginning to end without any kind of lull or overly descriptive narrative. I have just finished the book on a wow whilst congratulating myself on already having secured an order for a signed hard copy; it was that good.

This did not feel like a story I’d read before, it was fresh and gripping. The protagonist Naomi was the daughter of a renown scientist and protege of a leading researcher into all things space science. This story was set in the backdrop of a close dystopian patriarchy with an active programme of sidelining women and their rights. Therefore, this story took a matriarchal path into the future on another world.

I could not predict the twists in GOLDILOCKS, nor could I predict many of the character developments. But I knew Naomi, I came to admire her, cheer for her, will her survival. The team she was working in was complex with allegiances unknown. The morality and ethics of the mission had me taking quick in-drawn breaths, thinking…what???

“Success will never be linear. Success is illusive, it’s a mirage. What you learn, what you do, how you react – that’s what matters.”

Success came at a price in this story, this mission and whether the crew were willing the pay that price was the nugget to follow through the story. The ‘baddie’ of the piece came from initially unexpected quarters for me, although later I questioned why I hadn’t been more suspicious.

The science in this story was utterly palatable, readable and not beyond any readers’s comprehension. I liked the botany aspects of the science, I found the futuristic nutritional ideas fascinating. This was an intelligent read and I devoured it front to back.

I am now off to work out if I can turn Alexa into a male voice in my house…you have to read to understand this subtle but creepy suggestion.

Thank you to Headline Books for the early review copy.

Really enjoyed Goldilocks the story of rebellious women stealing a rocket ship and attempting to save the world - a world which is increasingly disparaging the skills and worth of all women.

This is a social story but also an adventurous one, with an intriguing group dynamic of characters and a story that is full of little twists and turns. A dying planet, one who will go to extraordinary lengths to prove a point all wrapped up with a science fiction speculative bow.

Very good indeed. Recommended.

Laura Lam is a friend with whom I have worked on a number of events, so I was delighted when Wildfire sent me a copy of her latest book, Goldilocks, to review. After a start in fantasy, Lam has since moved towards near-future science fiction thrillers, and Goldilocks continues that trend, with an examination of an Earth only a few decades into the future…
Goldilocks is a book of two halves. In the first half, we are witnessing a heist – although it’s a heist with a very low chance of getting caught, since they’ve already got away with it, essentially, and the pursuit has no way of catching up. The second is a revelatory story of secrets and lies, and the premises of the heist being turned on their heads; to talk too much about that would be hard to do without revealing the whole plot. Suffice to say that both halves are well-told, with the first half feeling tense but moving slowly, while the second half ratchets up the stakes and the speed, such that the not-leisurely-but-not-frantic heist turns into something very different with a different feel.
Where the strength of the novel lies is as much in its characters as in its plot; Goldilocks has a tight, small cast of characters. The astronauts – Naomi, Valerie, Hart, Hixon, and Lebedeva – are well realised as distinct individuals with personality and motive; Evan, left behind on Earth, is a little bit of a cipher at the start, but comes to be a fuller person as the novel moves on. Everyone else feels a little one-dimensional, especially Cole, who is more stereotype than person, but that is somewhat lampshaded in the novel itself. Lam’s slow teasing out of Naomi’s past and of Valerie’s personality, as mission leader, across the course of the novel works very well for keeping the reader engaged and interested, while not guiding the reader too much towards obvious conclusions the characters themselves don’t reach until later.
As a reader, I often have mixed feelings about so-called hard science fiction; too often, it seems to be an excuse for a writer to show off their knowledge, or an attempt to convey too complex concepts simplified without actually successfully communicating them to a lay audience. Lam threads that needle beautifully in Goldilocks; the science is clear – especially the botany of Naomi, but also the astrophysics and engineering – but not to the point of being handwavy or false. Rather than weighing us down with equations or excessive detail, Lam communicates ideas and theories rather than absolute specifics.
One final note, on reading the book in these strange times of April 2020; having turned the book in in January, some of Lam’s predictions have become strangely real. Less the space travel, and more the terrestrial world, on which she talks about everyone wearing filter masks (for environmental, rather than viral, reasons) and a pandemic. It is strange to see these predictions of the future turn real around one…

Laura Lam is a very underrated author who utilises unique imaginative storylines as we have seen in her previous novels. Her debut novel Pantomime and the two subsequent novels for example were initially introduced as young adult novels but were easily accepted by an older readership. Several novellas followed these in the form of Vestigial Tales. Hearts and Shattered Minds took us in a different perhaps darker direction. All of which I might add I found immensely readable.
However I digress somewhat and will turn my attention to Goldilocks for which I was pleased to receive an early preview.This latest offering is a foray to the stars. We have a planet almost destroyed by environmental disaster and women basically restricted and not given the equal respect accorded to the male portion of society. A group of women basically hijack a space mission hoping to find a way of saving humanity and their total annihilation.
Valerie Black is in charge together with other women, one of those being Naomi whom she has treated as a daughter but Naomi has been avoiding contact with her for some time. However all involved seemingly in agreement about the seriousness of what they are attempting. Unfortunately aboard the ship things begin to go awry, Naomi suspects someone is hiding something and the situation could be worse than they thought. Part of this plot line may sound familiar. The repression of the female portion of the human race the end of the world but this is no Handmaids Tale nor is it a children’s story as the title Goldilocks suggests.
The world building is very good and also the interaction between characters are well defined. No spoilers here. Looking forward to much more from Laura.

Goldilocks by Laura Lam is an epic story focusing on four women who have dreamed of travelling to the stars. Their destination is an exoplanet named Cavendish, situated in the habitable zone (the goldilocks zone) of its star. It is just right for humans to be able to live on its surface, and it offers a safe haven for humanity to start anew. Earth has been turned upside down. Climate change has ravaged the surface of the planet, forcing many people to flee their countries which have become inhospitable. Scientists predict that Earth can only host human life for another thirty years. And so there must be a plan B for when that becomes an eventuality. Cavendish offers humanity that chance.

A mission lead by Valerie Black is set to become the first human-controlled mission to Cavendish. It also means that the three other women will become the first human beings to set foot on a world outside of our solar system. But all doesn’t quite go to plan during the mission.

This genre is quite different from what I usually read, but I have become a fan of science fiction more recently, and this book seemed right up my street when I first heard about it. And there are elements of a thriller to this book as well which intrigued me even more. I think I am a bit of a nerd when it comes to learning about the solar system and the universe. I could see that Laura Lam had done her research.

There are so many topics that Laura Lam explores in her book, climate change, feminism, and greed are some of the main themes. Climate change is something that has been brought to the forefront of people’s minds recently. It is scary what is happening in the world now, but I dread to think what the world could be like in thirty years time if we don’t do anything about it. Laura Lam sets her book in the not too distant future, so it brings those fears a lot closer to home.

In the future version of the world which Laura has created, Valeria Black and her team are among the women fighting back against a male-dominated society. And when they take charge of the Atalanta, the ship which will take them to Cavendish, it angers leaders back on Earth. In their eyes, the women are criminals.

Laura Lam keeps the tension mounting as the crew on the Atalanta race towards their new destination. But as events escalate back on Earth, soon a perilous decision will have to be made. This leads the book to an explosive and a satisfactory climax. I’m sure will stay with me for a while.

This book deserves to be huge. If you’re a fan of sci-fi and thrillers, you will definitely enjoy this book. But if you haven’t stepped a toe out of each genre, I would highly recommend giving this book a go.

There's a lot to enjoy about Goldilocks. The main character Naomi was an excellent mix of tenacity and vulnerability, and I enjoyed the juxtaposition between how she attacked scientific problems and how awkward she felt in personal relationships. I also enjoyed how Naomi recognised her privilege (which is so rare in fiction) without getting defensive. I also really enjoyed the relationship between the crew, and how they were all drawn to the magnetic Dr Black.

While I thought the first 100 pages or so was exciting and pacy, I felt the pace of the story slowed considerably once they were in space, and the journey ended up being completely different to what was set-up in the initial pages. While it was a good, well-thought out twist, I just wasn't as interested in where that took the story. I really wanted it to be about establishing a colony on Cavendish. I also felt that the book could have been a bit longer. I wanted to hear more about Dr Black's rationale, and more about the lives of the other crew members, as I felt that would have laid more emotional stakes that would have better explained their final decision.

While there were aspects of this book I really did love, overall I had the sense that this ground had been covered before by other authors (both recently, and several years before), much of it felt familiar, which reduced my enjoyment of the book.

However, if you enjoyed Goldilocks you might also want to check out Do You Dream of Terra-Two? by Temi Oh, Across The Void by S.K. Vaughn, Planetfall by Emma Newman, Ammonite by Nicola Griffith, and A Closed And Common Orbit by Becky Chambers.

I'll start by saying that I loved the concept for this book. The first few chapters of this book where it goes into the crew stealing the spaceship is one of those 'fist punching the air' feminist fiction moments - of course I want to read a bunch of female scientists saying screw you to the people trying to steal their work and hijacking a spaceship!  It's a great start to a book and I'll be looking for this strong of an opening in similar books in the future. 

I'm the first to say that space survival as a genre isn't my cup of tea. It's not that I don't think the books are entertaining I just find it really upsetting to deal with the idea of being in an environment where you might suddenly not be able to breathe - any other asthma/chronic respiratory condition people with me? But this book managed to bring in so many other threats to existence (not a sentence that would normally make me happy) so it feels like a much more nuanced look at what it would take to stay alive on long haul space travel than just 'oh there is no air outside'. 

What's interesting about this book is that it isn't simply about escape, but about the earth these women leave behind and the terrible things that are happening there. For the most part, Lam managed to avoid creating a narrative of 'oh no the men we have left behind whatever shall we do' and instead it's about responsibility, and justice and...a whole other bunch of ethical decision making that I wasn't expecting. So, while it is a thriller, this book has a lot of the more emotional aspects that I would expect from a less-thrilling science fiction book. 

Potential small spoiler in the next paragraph read at your own risk. 


My other personal issue with this book was that I felt like one particular plotline (I won't say too much but it involves pregnancy) felt like it took over the book. I think that might be a wonderful thing for some readers but for various reasons - mostly my total lack of desire to be pregnant at any point - I just wasn't here for it as much as I might have been. I don't think I would have minded if it had felt more like a side plot but the focus just felt a little imbalanced to me. 

Some aspects of this book are quite difficult to read, there are some important issues tackled. If you're trying to completely avoid any virus-related content I'd maybe leave this one for a little while. But I think this book does what science fiction does really well, it poses questions that, while we may not be thinking about them now, we'll almost certainly have to face a variant of at some point - and who is to say we can't apply some of that thinking to our lives now?

Overall, I thought this was a good book but not one I'll be tempted to repeatedly re-read. I pondered over the star rating for this one, but I think so many of the things that bothered me were personal things I had to plump for the 4 stars. 

My rating: 4/5 stars

I received a free digital advanced review copy of this book from the publisher. All opinions are my own. 

Goldilocks is out April 30th!

Reading at home at the start of the Covid-19 crisis, I put Goldilocks up next as some pure escapism...a five women crew on a space ship, off to colonise a new world...perfect!

Ah. Not all is as it seems on the ship, and not all space missions are created equally, Set in a future where the world has been mined and abused into an increasingly hostile environment, the social structure of the US has become equally hostile to women in a dystopian denial of rights; so five women "steal" a space ship and head for Cavendish.

I really, really enjoyed this. Even though there are only five women on board, it took some longer than others to start to really become real in the story, but that fits the pattern of events unfolding on the ship.

As a huge lover of sci-fi (especially space travel) I was very excited to be approved to review this one!

5 women steal a spaceship from NASA and embark on a trip to Cavendish - a planet capable to sustaining human life. It had all the potential, yet it didn’t really take off for me.
The premise is fantastic, but it seemed like the author barely scratched the surface of the world that they were creating.
We’re told that Earth is slowly becoming inhabitable and that women’s rights are basically non-existent, yet never provided with anything more solid to describe/explain this climate.
Similarly, the characters didn’t feel complete. As I read this, I couldn’t explain why any of the characters would embark on a journey like this. None of them were really given backstories as to why they would want to pursue this, plus there were a couple of characters that seemed like that had zero introduction.
I guess everything needed to be more fleshed out. There are so many interesting topics raised that could have made for some very good discussions!

Overall it didn’t quite match my initial expectations. A fantastic premise with some glimpses of cool science, but not fully fleshed out.

Many thanks to the author, publisher and Netgalley for sending me a copy of this book in return for an honest review.

The first half of the book is interesting, the comparions to The Martian and The Handmaid's Tale are pretty apt. But then it moves into Watchmen territory and it just doesn't work. There was already an interesting story, then it just gets bogged down. A shame. Not for me.

Naomi is an expert in growing plants in the soil of an alien planet. She just isn't there yet. She has spent her career building up to this moment, only for it to be snatched from her grasp by politicians who don't want women in space. But her former boss has a plan. The future of humanity is in their hands.

This such an unapologetically science-based mission in space, and you can just tell Laura's been researching everything about space thoroughly (there's an event that's similar to something in a book I read last year, and it is so much more sensible and thought through than that other book). If you like books about space travel grounded in reality, add Goldilocks to your shelves.

The future in which it is set is one inspired by the slow erosion of women's rights by right wing politicians in the US, combined with escalating climate change. The planet's only hope is to find a new home, and the Atalantis is built to take the first crew to settle Cavendish. The ship was designed by women, with an all-female crew, until the president pushed women out of jobs, including the space programme. Knowing the replacement team would be a failure, Dr Valerie Black takes matters into her own hands, and they steal the ship.

The book follows Naomi Lovelace, Dr Black's prodigy, who is the botanist on board, responsible for producing the crew's food, unappetising blocks made from algae, as well as establishing agriculture on Cavendish. Growing up Valerie?kept posing the trolley problem to her (that one about if you are in an out of control vehicle and you have to choose between hitting and killing one group over another), and this becomes relevant to the whole story.

As well as Dr Black, the crew is made up of Lebedeva a Russian engineer, Hart the medical doctor and Hixon, the pilot. There are hard choices to be made, as they evade any retaliation from Earth and make their way to a faraway planet that has only been visited by probes. And what about the people they left behind?

I was drawn in by the science and sucked into the stories of the crew and the dilemmas they face. The characters are fully formed, and flawed, just as you'd expect. There's sadness and joy, and a whole lot of tension.

If you're wondering, the title is Goldilocks because Cavendish is in the sweet spot of not too hot and not too cold.