Juggling Multiple POVs

I'm close to finishing a story with three different points of view. When I started it, I didn't intend for it to have three different POVs, just one, but the other two became necessary as I wrote. What's interesting is how the POVs ended up interacting with each other. Character A narrates the first seven chapters of the story before Character B relates what happened to him while the two were separated. B's longest stretch is four chapters. Then there's a stretch where A takes over most of the story until Chapter 21, where halfway through the story, Character C enters. C is a secondary character, but they are involved in several significant events that the other two aren't present for. Once all three characters are split up, I make a deliberate effort to rotate narration among all three of them, with each one getting a separate chapter. At the climax, I give each character a short scene in each chapter. Character C's arc will end before A's and B's. I'm just trying to figure out the right emotional pitch for their final scene. 

When juggling multiple viewpoints in a single story, do you try to give all of them equal weight, or do some characters get more scenes than others? What factors into your narration decisions? Feel free to discuss in the comments. In the meantime, I've got to work on my current chapter.

Solarpunk Creatures and Equity Assurance

Today is the book birthday of the Solarpunk Creatures anthology by World Weaver Press. You can learn more about it here. The eBook is currently $4.99 and will be at that price until the end of January. Special credit should go out to the editors:

Christoph Rupprecht Mastodon: @focx@scholar.social Twitter: @focx
Deborah Cleland Bluesky: @patchworkdeb@bsky.social Mastodon: @debisda@aus.social
Melissa Ingaruca Moreno Instagram: mel_ingaruca
Norie Tamura Twitter: @tamura_norie
Rajat Chaudhuri Bluesky: @rajatchaudhuri@bsky.social Instagram: @rajatchaudhuri Twitter: @rajatchaudhuri

I have a short story in this anthology called "The Colorful Crow of Web-of-Life Park." The story is about the relationship between an escaped parrot and the crow that freed him, as the parrot is accepted as part of the crow's family. The parrot's former owner is a biologist who helps create and administer a bird flu vaccine. One of the people she speaks to during the story is an equity assurer, which is a new job I created for the solarpunk genre. Hopefully this is a concept that can be applied in real life.

My day job is in quality assurance. Specifically, I work for an enzyme company that produces food-grade enzymes, and I help implement our food safety system. Although enzymes are used in small amounts during food production, it's important that they not contain any pathogens, undeclared allergens, or foreign material that may harm the consumer. We follow a food safety code that is the basis of our policies and procedures. We keep many records to prove that that we are following our procedures, and we also have corrective and preventative actions we take when there is a problem. Every year, an outside auditor comes to our facility to review our system and make sure we meet the requirements of the code we follow. (This year, it will be an unannounced audit, meaning it can happen any time in a two-month period.) By passing this audit, my company obtains a certificate demonstrating to our customers that our product is safe. It's a lot of work, but it's worth it to prevent food-related illnesses.

I think we need a similar system to insure everyone has the resources they need to not just survive, but thrive. Income equality in the United States has grown dramatically in the past few decades while our social safety nets have been removed or made less helpful. This isn't good for the long-term survival of our society or our environment. We need to transition away from exploitative capitalism and toward doughnut economics. (Basically, we have to work within the boundaries of our resources to eliminate poverty while not exceeding the capacity of our environment.)

Equity assurance would have two major components: a collection of codes or guidelines communities (ranging from an apartment complex to towns or even nations) would follow for equitable resource distribution, and local equity assurers who are responsible for making sure that people get the resources they need. (I use "equity" instead of "equality" because everyone has different needs. Sometimes distributing resources equally doesn't help everyone equally. See here for a more complete discussion of this issue.) This could mean obtaining gluten-free food for someone with celiac disease; education, assistance, and baby supplies for a family with a newborn; or the right medicine or equipment to help sick, elderly, or disabled individuals. It can mean helping children get a good education and opportunities to develop their talents as well as people getting the right amount of social interaction.

These two branches of equity assurance aren't new. We have examples of people throughout history who have sought to help others meet their needs, and we have systems like Medicare and Social Security to give resources to those who need it. What I want to emphasize with a term like "equity assurance" is the need to make this care for others a core value of our society. When you adopt a food safety system at a company, it becomes the basis for everything you do. We need this for our society. We also need to maintain this system. Without people to monitor the day-to-day aspects of this system, things can go wrong. We need to make sure this system works and figure out ways to fix it when it doesn't.

Anyway, I plan to make equity assurance a theme in any more solarpunk stories I write. I did write another short story last year that featured equity assurance, but I haven't found a home for it yet. Establishing equity assurance for the world is certainly a long-term project, but one we need to pursue.

Writing Goals 2024

As I try to finish my current work in progress, I thought I should consider what projects I want to work on in the coming year. I've mentioned before how obsessed I've become with the Good Omens show on Amazon. I'm currently writing an alternative universe story with the Good Omens characters for the Archive of Our Own website. There are at least two more stories that I want to write in that setting. This is the kind of story that won't leave me alone, so the only way to "cure" myself of it is to write it down. Unfortunately, once I write a story in one setting, I get more story ideas. Currently there are two more Good Omens stories I want to write (three, if I include writing an alternate version of an event I already wrote about.)

If I can ever get back to my own original projects, I still have my third cozy mystery to finish and two projects in the fantasy Season Avatars universe (a short story collection and a novel starting a sequel series). I haven't decided yet if I want to enter the annual solarpunk short story contest run by Grist.org. I have a couple of possible ideas, but nothing's fleshed out yet.

No matter what projects I choose to work on, there's plenty to keep me busy this year. Do you have any writing goals for the year? If so, what are they?

IWSG: 2023 Books in Review

Welcome to 2024! I hope it's a good year for you. Since this is the first Wednesday of the year, it's also the first Insecure Writer's Support Group post for the year.  Learn more about the IWSG on their website and Facebook page.

Our hosts this month are Joylene Nowell Butler, Olga Godim, Diedre Knight, and Natalie Aguirre.

I'm skipping the proposed question this month (it has to do with following people through Bookbub, which isn't something I do) to bring you my 2023 reading year in review, courtesy of Goodreads. You can see my books here. My original goal was 175 books, which I temporarily raised to 200 books before lowering it to 170 books. I ended up with 171 books. Goodreads does list book collections as a single item, so the total number of books I read is actually higher. My genre breakdown is slightly off (I think I missed a couple of rows when I went through the list), since it only adds up to 161 (the missing 10 are probably more mysteries):

Fantasy: 27

Science Fiction: 8

Mystery (including fantasy mysteries): 87

General Fiction: 5

Non-Fiction: 34

Here are some of my favorite books I read this year:

The Last Days of the Dinosaurs

Kindred

A Mirror Mended

Justice for Animals

Outlive

That Self-Same Metal

For 2024, I'm lowering my goal to 150 books. The reason I'm doing that is because I would like to stretch myself and read a wider genre. I enjoy cozy mysteries and can find many of them offered for free or for a reasonable price, but I would like more incentive to read more non-fiction books and more books on my to-read lists. I belong to a local book club and a Good Omens book club on a Discord server, so hopefully they'll help me find books I wouldn't normally read.

If you track your reading, how many books do you read each year? Did you have a favorite book? Feel free to share your answers in the comments.

IWSG: Reviews and Kudos

 

It's time for the final Insecure Writer's Support Group post for 2023. You can learn more about the IWSG on their website or Facebook page.

Our hosts this month are C. Lee McKenzie, JQ Rose, Jennifer Lane, and Jacqui Murray.

Here's our question for December: Book reviews are for the readers. When you leave a book review, do you review for the Reader or the Author? Is it about what you liked and enjoyed about your reading experience, or do you critique the author?

As an author, it's hard for me to read as a pure reader, especially since I spent many years reviewing other people's work in an online writing workshop. This is part of the reason I seldom write reviews. I worry any comments might be perceived as critique and might invite retaliation by other authors. I mostly use Goodreads to track what books I read and occasionally to read other people's reviews.

I do make an exception for fan fiction. Fanfic writers write not for profit, but to share their passion with their community. Kudos and comments are a key motivator for fanfic authors, so I do feel obligated to leave them. Any comments I make are about the reading experience; comments aren't the place to critique the author.

Do you review other authors? If so, what's your reviewing approach? Feel free to share more in the comments.

Olga Ulbrich, 1932-2023

Sometimes things are happening beneath the surface that you don't see until it's too late. We found that out the hard way this month. My mother, Olga Ulbrich, was admitted to the hospital in late October for dehydration. A couple of days later, we found out that she had Stage 4 liver cancer. It had already metastasized from elsewhere in her body, but we never found out where it had started. She was admitted to hospice on November 11th and passed away on November 19th. She was 91. Here's a link to the funeral notice; her obituary hasn't been added as of the time I'm writing this post. Attached is a photo of my mother from when I was a baby. She's on the right; my aunt is on the left, and my great-grandmother is holding me in the center.

Although I'll probably post for the Insecure Writer's Support Group next week, I plan to take the next few weeks off. My final post for 2023 will cover my reading challenge.

Gods of Writing and Stories

A recent show on Disney Plus (I don't want to identify it in case of spoilers) saw one of the characters become the God of Stories. In this situation, the god took on responsibility for maintaining the multiverse, allowing a multitude of stories and different lives to flourish. I really like this idea because in my Season Avatars universe, there is a goddess who calls Herself the Grandmother of Stories. She is one of the primary gods of the Hidden Archipelago, but Her interest in stories draws Her to events around the world so She can witness historical events. (She not only provides story recaps for the reader but also appears in the climax of the series.) The Goddess of Stories grants Her Avatars gifts with language and public speaking, and one of them will feature in the next book in this setting (it's tentatively called Avatars Abroad.)

Inspired by the show and my work, I tried to come with an actual god or goddess of stories from mythology. I'm not sure there's one devoted specifically to storytelling. The Egyptian god Thoth is associated with writing; when I visited the British Museum in 2006, I brought back a small statue of Thoth (pictured) and offered him my leftover English money. Unfortunately, that wasn't enough of a sacrifice to jumpstart my writing career, but there are plenty of other gods also associated with language and/or intelligence (see this list from Wikipedia.) The Greek Muses are probably the best known goddesses associated with creativity, but plenty of other pantheons acknowledge the importance of creativity. Here's one such list. It includes Hindu and Japanese deities in addition to some of the more well-known ones. 

Do you have a "patron muse?" (As a Beatles fan, I consider John Lennon my muse since he also was a writer.) Can you think of any other deities who might be a god or goddess of stories? If so, feel free to share in the comments.

Old Story Drafts/New Tumblr Account

The other day, while I was looking for a document, I came across old printed drafts of some of my novels. I even found a copy of the very first novel I attempted to write. I used to save drafts as ways to prove I was the original author of my work. However, most of the stories (except the first one) have been published, often in versions quite different from the drafts I've saved. I've glanced at lines here and there, but I don't intend to hold on to these drafts anymore. I intend to shred them when I have time. I also found some poems I wrote in high school. Some of them make me cringe now, but a couple of them weren't too bad. I'm not sure what else to do with them, so I might publish them on my Tumblr account. If you use it, I'm smua70 there.

Do you keep printed copies of your old drafts? Why or why not? Feel free to share in the comments.

IWSG: NaNoWriMo

How is it November already? With a new month comes a new post for the Insecure Writer's Support Group. Learn more about them on their website and Facebook page.

Our hosts this month are PJ Colando, Jean Davis, Lisa Buie Collard, and Diedre Knight.

Here's our question for November: November is National Novel Writing Month. Have you ever participated? If not, why not?

For those who might not be familiar with NaNoWriMo, it's an annual challenge to write 50,000 words of a new work in thirty days. This requires an average of 1,667 words per day. I've participated twice, once in 2007 (when my son was still a baby; I figured it was a good way to kickstart my writing again), and in 2010. Although I hit my writing goal both times, I never finished either novel. For me, writing at that speed doesn't produce quality work. I suppose I could try to find those drafts and revise them, but I have so many other projects that it's unlikely to happen. I currently have three different stories in progress, though one is consuming much more mental space than the other two and therefore devours most of my writing time.

To those who are participating in NaNoWriMo, I wish you luck and offer you this tip: try writing on your phone. Save your work in cloud storage so you can access it anywhere on any device. I write in Word, so I have the Microsoft 365 app on my phone. Although writing on my phone does occasionally introduce extra spaces and odd characters into my work, I can fix those errors when I'm on my laptop. A phone is much more portable than a laptop or even a tablet.

Time to end this blog post and return to my story. If you're participating in NaNoWriMo, feel free to share a description of your work in the comments. 

 

Restaurants and Revenge: Full Cover Reveal

Just a quick post today to share the full paperback cover for Restaurants and Revenge:

 

 

 

 The actual file was too big to load properly, so I had to take a photo of it. I've ordered a paper proof of the book, so hopefully the paper version will go on sale next month.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Solarpunk Creatures Cover Reveal!

I'm blogging early this week to participate in the cover reveal for the Solarpunk Creatures anthology by Worldweaver Press. (I'll update this post with more information once their blog announcement goes live.) 

I have a short story being published in this anthology; it's call "The Colorful Crow of Web-of-Life Park." It's about an escaped parrot that joins a murder of crows while its former owner develops a bird flu vaccine for wild birds. 

The anthology will be available January 16th, 2024. You can preorder it through the following links: 

Universal Amazon/Apple Link: https://mybook.to/solarpunkcreatures 

World Weaver Press Product Page: https://www.worldweaverpress.com/store/p186/Solarpunk_Creatures.html

 Paperback pages will take a few more days to appear, but the book will eventually be available in paperback from Amazon, Book-a-Million, Barnes & Noble, etc.

I'm excited to be part of this anthology and look forward to reading the stories by the other authors.  

Reader Expectations

I finally caught up with the first season of Ahsoka a couple of days ago. Without going into plot details, my impression was it should have been called a live-action version of Rebels. The impression I had going into the show was that we would see more of Ahsoka's backstory; however, her story seemed to be a minor part of the show compared to Sabine's, Hera's, and Ezra's, let alone Thrawn and the other antagonists. Consequently, I enjoyed the show less than I would have if I'd been thinking of it as another season of Rebels. 

I think it's important to set reader expectations before they start the story. For me, the title didn't set the right expectations for this show, and I have to admit I didn't pay much attention to the series or episode descriptions. Of course, images and book covers also set reader expectations. 

Was there a book or show that gave you a different initial impression than what you had after reading or watching it? Feel free to share examples in the comments.

IWSG: AI Stole This Blog

It's hard to believe October is here when it's so warm where I live. The calendar still changes even if the seasons seem to be at a standstill, which means it's time for another Insecure Writer's Support Group post. Learn more about the IWSG on their website and Facebook page if you're not already familiar with them. 

Our hosts this month are Natalie Aguirre, Kim Lajevardi, Debs Carey, Gwen Gardner, Patricia Josephine, and Rebecca Douglass. 

Our question for October is a controversial one: The topic of AI writing has been heavily debated across the world. According to various sources, generative AI will assist writers, not replace them. What are your thoughts?

As you may have guessed from the title of this post, I'm not a fan of AI. Please refer to the photo below:

If you look at the third line, you'll see this blog was harvested for Google's database for training AI. This was done without my knowledge or consent. There's a copyright notice at the very bottom of this page, so harvesting my words this way should be a copyright violation. Even if this blog is a minute part of the AI database, Google will profit from my free labor, and I'll receive neither recognition or compensation. I know other writers whose entire books were harvested for other AI engines. (So far, I've found no proof my books were affected.) 

Artificial intelligence may be a tool, in theory neutral until used. However, in a world of late-stage capitalism, this tool comes equipped with original sin. The creators of AI steal other people's work in an attempt to replace human writers and artists for profit. AI work has flooded KPD and magazine portals, making it even more difficult for humans to gain recognition. If you consider creativity the peak human endeavor, then leave it for humans. We don't need AI to give us ideas when there so many ideas out there, waiting for the right mind to notice them. And while it might not always be easy to put those ideas into words, it's the struggle that makes writing a calling. We all need to demand tech companies stop embedding AI into everything while making it nearly impossible to escape. We need to demand better regulation of this industry. If we don't, we will lose ourselves.

What are your thoughts on using AI? Whether or not you agree with me, feel free to share your thoughts in the comments.

September Writing Update and Cover for Restaurants and Revenge!

Only three more months left of 2023. I still have so many projects I want to work on but so little time. Hopefully now that the annual recertification audit for work is over, I'll be able to use some more vacation time. I'll need it to clear some of these projects listed below:

Short Stories: I have one short story currently on the market, and I just finished reviewing my short story author proof for the forthcoming Solarpunk Creatures anthology.

Restaurants and Revenge:  I just got the cover for Restaurants and Revenge! Expect to see the ebook coming soon to the major distributors!

 

I'm about halfway through the next book in the series (Bubble Tea and a Body), but it's currently on the backburner.

Season Avatars/World Avatars: Once I finish up Restaurants and Revenge, I can focus on The Season Between, a collection of short stories that will bridge the gap between the Season Avatars and the sequel World Avatars series. I'm currently drafting the first book of the World Series, Avatars Abroad, which will feature mostly new characters. I'm also trying to plot the overall arc of the series. I know how I want it to end, but getting there is always the challenge.

Good Omens: Confession time--the main characters of this show have taken over my brain (in case that wasn't obvious from some of my previous posts). Yes, I'm writing fanfic about this series as a way of coping with the Season Two finale. Hopefully Season Three won't take another four years to air!

What projects are you working on? Feel free to share in the comments.

Characters/Scenes Living in Your Head

How much do you think about the characters from your stories? For me, some of them (like the Season Avatars) take up more of my attention than others (like Abigail from my cozy mystery or characters from my short stories). For me, the more I think about certain characters, the more I want to write them. Sometimes it helps me plan scenes so that they actually flow when I can write them down. Other times, it helps me get ideas for events, but it's still a struggle to get the words out. Just some random thoughts at the end of a long work day when it's easier to write about writing than actually writing.

An Author's Afterlife

My husband and I have been working on planning our estate. It's relatively easy to find a lawyer to prepare a will, a trust, and other documents; however, these types of documents don't discuss intellectual property like books and copyrights. Honestly, I'm more worried about what's going to happen to the stories I wrote as opposed to what happens to my book collection. Fortunately, there are some resources out there to help authors, particularly indie authors. In particular, when I searched for resources, I found one author referenced repeatedly: Michael L. Ronn. Here are some discussions with him on various websites:

 https://selfpublishingadvice.org/the-ultimate-guide-to-estate-planning-for-authors-part-1-the-author/

https://www.thecreativepenn.com/2022/08/22/estate-planning-for-authors/

https://authorsguild.org/resource/estate-planning-tips-for-authors/

I've also chosen to order two of his books dealing not just with an author settling her estate, but a guide for an author's heirs. I won't get these books until after this post goes live, so it'll be a while before I can determine how helpful they'll be. I have done some initial steps to deal with my intellectual property by making a list of my published works in a spreadsheet. I've also created folders to gather current editions of my self-published work and the associated cover art. 

Ultimately whatever happens to my stories after I die will depend on how much effort my heirs (which will most likely be my husband and/or son) are willing or able to put into maintaining my work. It's hard to tell if there will be any interest in my work in the long term. Nevertheless, if I'm going to spend hours writing, editing, and promoting my work, I would like to give it as much opportunity to connect with readers as possible.

Have you started thinking about your legacy as an author? If so, and if you have any advice, feel free to share it in the comments.

Happy Birthday, IWSG!

 

This month, the Insecure Writer's Support Group celebrates its twelfth birthday. If you're not familiar with them, you can learn more about them on their website and Facebook group.

Our hosts this month are Sonia Dogra, J Lenni Dorner, Pat Garcia, Sarah at the Faux Fountain Pen, and Meka James.

Here's our questions for September: The IWSG celebrates 12 years today! When did you discover the IWSG, how do you connect, and how has it helped you?

I don't remember when I discovered the IWSG, but I know I've been participating for a couple of years at least. I learned about them through Alex J. Cavanaugh's blog. (Alex has been kind enough to appear on this blog, host me on his, and comment regularly. Thanks for your thoughtfulness, Alex!) Participating in this group has allowed me to connect with other writers, though unfortunately real-life obligations make it difficult for me to follow and comment on other blogs these days. 

If you're reading this post as part of the IWSG, thanks for stopping by, and enjoy the celebration!

Writing Update

 Here are a few quick notes about my current writing projects:

I'm still waiting to hear back from my cover artist regarding the cover for my cozy mystery Restaurants and Revenge, the sequel to Murder at Magic Lake. It's been about six weeks, so it might be time to follow up with them. I've got about 30,000 words written for Book Three in the series, which will be titled Bubble Tea and a Body. However, I haven't had much time to work on that lately, since I've returned to my Season Avatars world and started a couple of unrelated short stories to boot. 

Although I finished the main story in the Season Avatars series regarding Chaos Season, a magical weather storm that mixes up the seasons, I still love my heroines and want to spend more time with them. I also want to explore the implications of the series ending and let the world modernize somewhat. So I want to write a spin-off series called World Avatars, which will allow me to introduce new characters and revisit old ones. I have a sense of the main events, but I have to decide how many books they will need and how to plot each book as a stand-alone story and part of the overall series. Although I don't have much time to write on my lunch break, I use the time to jot down notes for the series.The first book will be titled Avatars Abroad and will feature a quartet of mostly new characters exploring the country next door. Before I publish that, I'll need to publish another short story collection, The Season Between, set between the two main series. Ideally, I'd like to publish Restaurants and Revenge first before working on the collection.

As for the short stories, they're "for the love" projects, so I only work on them after I've written at least 500 words on Avatars Abroad. Hopefully when they're done, I can return to Bubble Tea and a Body. Two is probably the maximum number of projects I can write at once, especially when I'm juggling so many other things (work, parenting, daily chores, etc.). I definitely keep busy!

What projects are you working on? Feel free to share in the comments.

Yellowface and the Writing Life

Every month, I like to do a diversity read, a book by someone from a different background than me. I consider it a way to support diversity and grow as a human being by experiencing other existences vicariously. Ironically, R. F. Kuang, the author of Yellowface, doesn't want people reading her work just because it was written by an Asian author. Her book, which is about a white woman author who steals a manuscript from her dead friend, Athena (a superstar Asian author), is also a send-up of the publishing industry. It shows how the system of elevating a few carefully chosen authors as tokens of diversity hurts writers of all backgrounds. However, for me, the book also illustrates the perils of being too much of a "career author."

June Hayward, the narrator of Yellowface and the author who steals her friend's first draft, is one of the most self-centered characters I've ever read. She has no responsibilities, no genuine relationships, and no interests other than chasing writing success. She's addicted to reading about herself on social media, whether it's good or bad. Even some of the ways in which she tries to give back, like establishing a scholarship in her friend's name and mentoring other young writers, are done to enhance her image. June not only fails to grow as a person during the events of the book but becomes even more racist and self-obsessed, able to write about nothing but herself yet expecting the whole world to be waiting for her words.

As I said before, this book is a satire, and June is meant to be an extreme. However, she does show the importance of maintaining a healthy balance in one's writing life and in life in general. Given that her interactions with the real world are minimal, it's not surprising that she suffers writer's block partway through the book. Even Athena mines other people's experiences and uses them nearly unchanged in her own work. It's important to have experiences of your own to inspire you and real-life knowledge of things and interests you can combine to create a unique story. It's also not healthy to seek out all of your self-validation online or base it on winning other people's attention. While I do find useful things and even a community on Facebook, I'd rather spend more time reading and less time doom-scrolling. After all, there's more to life than being an author.

Despite my comments on Yellowface, I'm still interested in reading one of Kuang's other books, Babel: An Arcane History. Part of that is yes, I still want to read diverse authors, but also because I'm interested in the premise and have heard good things about it. Hopefully the characters in that book will be more well-rounded.

Off-Earth: Ethical Questions and Quandaries for Living in Outer Space

Traveling and living in space will pose a variety of technical challenges, but there are plenty of other social challenges that space will pose. Who owns space? How will workers get paid? How will we handle reproduction in an environment with limited resources? To start considering these questions and their answers, I recommend reading Off-Earth: Ethical Questions and Quandaries for Living in Outer Space, by Erika Nesvold.

Nesvold starts the book by acknowledging that some people may wonder why we should go to space when we still have so many problems to fix on Earth. There are a couple of reasons why we should start planning for space anyway. The first is that developing the technology needed for space travel may help us improve the situation on our planet. The other is that there are people and companies determined to get into space, so we need to plan accordingly. Attempts to regulate space internationally have had limited success, so we need to learn how to do so quickly.

Each chapter of Off-Earth raises a different question. (Some of the examples are listed in the first paragraph.) At the beginning of each chapter, Nesvold describes three scenarios, some based on history, others set in the future, about the topic. There are plenty of historical examples where exploration and exploitation of resources and people led to tragedy. If we don't learn from these examples and set up regulations/customs/laws before we establish lunar settlements or asteroid mines, we'll only repeat our mistakes.

At the end of the book, Nestvold discusses how we as a species can start discussing these questions. One thing we should do is to look to non-Western societies for possible solutions. For example, people living in the Arctic have experience with extreme environments like the ones in space. We could learn from them, but we shouldn't just appropriate their knowledge but make sure they're included in space exploration. One group Nestvold fails to acknowledge are science fiction writers. We have experience creating thought experiments about alternate societies in space. If authors consider ethical questions in their works, we can influence the development of real space societies, hopefully in ways that will be sustainable and beneficial for all.