A Prayer for the Crown-Shy

I won't do a full review of this book, I think my review for book 1 covers this just as well. In my mind, this is just part 2 of a novel called Monk & Robot. In Part 1 we escape to the forests and have tea among the trees, this book is about the return to civilization.

All the charm and coziness of the first book is in here, but I think this entry is more about discovery or rather, re-discovery. The majority of this book is about Mosscap's interactions with the larger population of humans, the players of the first entry have traded places. Dex shepherds Mosscap across the countryside in the same way that Mosscap leads Dex through the forest. I already loved Mosscap as a character and this book is all the better because of the pointed focus on it. It's not only lovable, it's a fantastic lens through which to examine humanity. There are some amazing thoughts and observations on the everyday lives of human beings in this book; common behaviors and interactions are all parsed by Mosscap as it seeks to learn what it is that humans need.

I appreciated the balance between philosophy and narrative that Chambers strikes here, and they haven't lost the thread they were onto between books. There is a fantastic contrast struck through the setting despite the continued naturalist focus, it really crystalized for me as I read through the titular passage (and that gets an A+ from me). I expect we might see a third and possibly final installment of this series and I hope that it ties in just as well as this one did.

TL;DR: Out of the forest and into the woods. Second verse same as the first.