The novel “The Fated Sky” by Mary Robinette Kowal was published for the first time in 2018. It’s the second novel in the Lady Astronaut series and follows “The Calculating Stars”.

Elma York serves on the route between the Earth and the Moon but during a return to Earth the spacecraft ends up off course. She realizes that things on the planet are complicated when a group of armed people kidnaps the crew. Those are Earth Firsters.

That experience has a positive outcome but Elma still finds herself in the midst of controversy when the first mission to Mars is set up. She’s now known as the Lady Astronaut and is very often used as the face of the space program in public relations.