The Science of Fiction

Astropolis is an orbital habitat that has been in orbit of earth for around three centuries, gradually growing and expanding as new modules are built and added until it has reached over a kilometre in diameter. It’s home to several thousand inhabitants, including representatives of some alien races. There are markets and gardens, offices, restaurants, shopping malls and mile upon mile of service corridors and shafts linking it all together. Some of the oldest sections of Astropolis are now defunct, but they lie cocooned within so many layers of newer modules that they have been left in place, abandoned and gathering dust. There are observation decks that look out on nothing but the hull of a new adjunct, docking bays that lead nowhere, recycling systems with nothing to recycle and corridors with no access. As well as three of my own short stories, Astropolis has been the setting for my three collaborative stories. It’s an ideal setting because the numerous different styles and technologies fused together to form the great habitat allow authors to write what they want without fear of contradicting each other. All three have been blind collaborations, where I give the other authors the setting and minimal guidance, and then I join their contributions together to form a whole. The third of these is currently being edited. Astropolis stories: The Blind Collaborators – Aphelion – Sept 2007 Reprinted - Aphelion – Feb 2008 Travel by Numbers – Nature – June 2008 Serbian translation – Antares – Mar 2009 Estonian translation – Algernon – Apr 2009 Spanish translation – Alfa Eridiani – May 2009 Reprinted – Paralelisomos – Dec 2013 Galician translation – Nova Fantasia – Sept 2009 Up To My Neck In It – Hypersonic Tales – Aug 2009 Spanish translation - Aurora Bitzine – Oct 2009 Reprinted – Paralelismos – Dec 2013 Three AM – Golden Vision – Jan 2010 Crowd Control – Perihiloion SF – Sep 2014 New collaboration currently in progress