Library Journal: The underqualified misfits undertaking this intergalactic art heist have no idea what mission they’ve actually signed up for. They think they’re going to steal back the art treasures that Earth gave up in return for a quick fix to their onrushing apocalypse. Now that Earth is repaired, it wants its stuff back, even if they have to steal it. The crew thinks the mission is sanctioned, their leader believes that everyone will forgive his deceptions, and the art historian is in this to get her lover back. Meanwhile, their friendly alien pilot with the handy spaceship plans to use them as a convenient scapegoat for nefarious plans of their own. It will be a miracle if any of them get out of this one alive. Tanzer’s (Creatures of Charm and Hunger) sci-fi heist caper surprises everyone, including readers, every parsec of the way.
VERDICT Inside this combination of Beth Revis’s Full Speed to a Crash Landing with Becky Chambers’s To Be Taught, If Fortunate is a story about alien con artists, self-deceptive historians, self-aware clones, and self-centered cyborgs, along with a surprising look at what it means to be real in both art and relationships.