A World to Get Lost In: Review of Jo Walton’s Everybody’s Perfect

Stephen Saperstein Frug Under Review:Everybody’s Perfect. Jo Walton. Tor Books, June 2026. Most novels rest upon multiple foundations, yet in many cases one of these elements bears the majority of the load: some novels are largely character sketches, others have exciting plots through which only stock characters step. Jo Walton’s Everybody’s Perfect rests upon its worldbuilding: it is a world study, analogous to a character study: the worldbuilding is its best and central feature. This is not to say that its characters are not interesting (for they are); nor is it to say that the novel has no plot—it does have one, or rather a heap of scraps of plot which together serve as one, as a sufficiently large pile of rags might serve in place of a blanket. Walton does her best to tie them together at the end, but unless you are able to enjoy the bits and pieces in their fragmentary state (which you might; I certainly did) having them joined after the novel is over will be as useful as a…