Children of Time is a 2015 science fiction novel by Adrian Tchaikovsky.
In the distant future, humanity seeks to create new habitats for itself on distant planets, terraforming them and seeding them with life. Dr. Avrana Kern is heading one such project, orbiting the tentatively named “Kern’s World”, where the plan is to release monkeys 
infected with a nanovirus that will accelerate their evolution. Through an act of sabotage from an anti-technology group that has also destroyed much of Earth, the monkeys are never released, and the virus instead infects a species of spider, Portia labiata. The book follows the evolution of the spiders and their eventual civilisation, as well as a remnant of humanity that fled to Kern’s World hoping to find paradise.
also children of ruin and children of memory, the sequels, are really good
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Outing myself as a weirdo who does notice when people make small changes, I guess? I notice how someone does their hair, what accessories they have, etc.
Semi-related, but it’s also like, I notice how someone walks, how the mood of the room shifts. I think to take someone only for what they say is to ignore a lot about who they are. There’s a lot that happens in an interaction before you speak. :::
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Yeah, the people I thought of as my closest friends essentially wanted space but wouldn’t tell me that. So I don’t know if I fully believe people when they say they want to talk, or let’s stay in touch. What you’re describing works great, assuming you aren’t being lied to. If I could trust that someone who said “let’s stay in touch” was actually going to try and stay in touch with me, then things would be different.
I think of “interest” and “care” as being passive or active. There’s passive interest or care, “I’ll listen to you if you show up” “You can always talk to me about that” or active interest or care, “I’ll check in if you don’t show up”, “Last time we talked about this. How’s that going?” If you’re passive, you wait for their problems to come up. If you’re active, you see how the other person is doing with their problems. :::
gender
I have never known guys to like, want to talk about things. Guys sit there and are like “oh, huh.” Guys don’t ask questions, they don’t express interest beyond grunts. Like, I told my closet guy friend last time we visited I wanted to be more open, and he got super uncomfortable. We haven’t talked since. We might still be close…? We might!
That’s what being a guy is.
Women seem to just be more willing to relate. Women are more willing to express themselves honestly, tell friends how much they care or when they’re being dumb. Stick up for each other in real ways, more than empty platitudes. Men want to acknowledge your problem and for if to go away the next time they see you.
Men want to talk about things in their line of vision, and not much else. I understand men to avoid talking about feelings that they haven’t settled within themselves. I feel like women care more about helping and supporting one another. Men are programmed to abandon one another.
I don’t think that I think that women have it figured out, but there’s so much about being socialized as a guy that makes me feel invalid in having emotions and desires and expressing them and wanting that from my friendships. I literally am like, “oh, I’m a guy who means well, that means I creep women out and should never annoy them with whatever my deal is”. And it’s hard to ever be intimate with a limiting belief like that.