Working on my own works, and to start, I'm looking for stories where BENEVOLENT aliens of some kind colonize Earth after it's experienced some kind of huge natural disaster, decimating the human population.

Any good recommendations?

" Not a moment later, one of the ship’s cannons turned, pointing directly at the man. Atois walked backwards, still unable to take his eyes off the ship or the man, not even blinking. A white-hot stream of protons poured out of the cannon, going straight through the man’s chest and burrowing into the pavement before Atois even had the chance to react. The sound came later, a violent crack in the air, louder than lightning. Even standing over ten meters from its target, Atois could feel the heat and pressure of the beam, the sound made his ears ring and he lost his balance but managed to catch himself before fully falling."

The ship firing the particle beam is about 2 kilometers away, would the dissipation from the atmosphere at this range make much of a difference in its power, especially against a weak target like a human?

I have a project on the back burner that revolves around the concepts of Copernican astronomy and mathematically-advanced dinosaurs (Think Dinotopia but without the humans and more ancient Sumerian culture)
I'm trying to find out if there's a name or title for this subgenre so I can gather inspiration both for visual development and to study the genre itself. (Like how there's Cassette Futurism and Cyberpunk and 70s Pulp Futurism). Thumbnailing my work in a visual format is a big part of my creative process, so any visual aides are important to me for writing.

It's definitely not Steampunk, since that involves Industrial Revolution-era technology. What I'm looking for is more "heliocentric models and copper, white and gold, and massive telescopes". 16th Century technology is the main focus I'm going for. Is there a subgenre like this that's significant enough to have a name yet?

Greetings everyone,

I am a huge fan of sci-fi, and have always wanted to write my own book. I am posting the first chapter of a work-in-progress called The Watchers (subject to change). I am currently 10 chapters into writing it, and really enjoying the journey. This is also my first book. I've only had a few close friends and family read what I have so far. Based on their encouragement, I felt it was time to get it out there a bit more, and to solicit feedback. I'd appreciate any and all feedback, but most importantly, would you read it? Does it seem like I'm heading in a promising direction?

Book Synopsis:
Dr. Lila Chen, a driven scientist at UTRGV, intercepts an enigmatic signal that defies explanation. As she becomes increasingly entangled in decoding its patterns, she begins a silent, rhythmic exchange with an unknown intelligence that echoes both curiosity and intent. Her connection with this distant presence grows, blurring the lines between discovery and obsession, even as her personal life falls apart. Across the cosmos, Alar, a Watcher bound to a mission cloaked in secrecy, wrestles with the weight of their assigned purpose and the forbidden allure of Earth. Together, in a dance of data and silence, Lila and Alar tread a fragile path, uncovering truths about themselves and their places in the universe. But as they draw closer, each new revelation brings them to the edge of a hidden reality that, if unveiled, could reshape everything they believe.

Link to chapter 1: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1enwDLY6iAJM9II-70F5lkFVjaorVfKc6hqMT8PGE75E/edit?usp=sharing

Quick note: I have used ChatGPT/Grammarly to help clean up my prose a bit, but no more than that. This is a passion project of mine, and is something I've been wanting to write for a long time.

Go to page 150 of your manuscript. Choose any 150-word passage. Post it here.

Others read it and provide at least one comment of positive feedback (1 up) and at least one comment of actionable feedback to improve your writing (1 down).

I'll begin with my 150 words from page 150:

“Well, Jax,” said Titan, leaning back in the creaking wooden banker’s chair. “I’ll get to that. First, I also know your parents, good people. They have nice lives in Santa Barbara. It is entirely within my control to assist them or destroy their careers and finances. Either option is fine by me. It would also be easy for me to land April in prison, not because she has done anything wrong, but you should know that I’ve developed a knack for inventing evidence and framing people for crimes. Your new girlfriend, Jenn, perhaps some jail time for her as well.

I’m on your side, Jax. I want to help you out. I would hate for April and Jenn to spend the next ten years in jail because of your reluctance to be cooperative. Hardly worth the trouble.”

Jax felt the hairs on his neck stand up and the deathly grip of anxiety. The conversation felt surreal. Threatening but conveyed in a friendly tone, as if Titan was providing him with guidance.

Hey all,
I've just been wracking my brain on this and I'm really struggling.

Say I'm traveling at .9c to a planet 1 light year away. I make the return trip, also at .9c. So I'm away from Earth for about 2.2 years from Earth's perspective.

But with time dilation, I've only been gone slightly less than 1 year "my time." So I'm 1.2 years younger than my theoretical twin on Earth.

Here's what I'm struggling with - wouldn't I still have experienced 2.2 years on my spaceship? In other words, my heart would've still pumped blood for 803 days (2.2 years), just like my twin on Earth, so our heart's "ages" are still the same?

Or did I truly just experience 1 year, so I only "woke up in the morning" 365 times?

Thanks!

So I am reading a sci-fi novel from an author I have never read before. I think it is important for writers to also read the genre they work in.

The first two chapters so far have been massive info dumps about world building. Everything that has actually happened in the book could have been one chapter minus the info dumps.

Please writers, stop doing this. I am hoping it gets better as I get deeper into the book.

Just a question that I'm not sure how to ask an answer for.

Well galactic empire is not really the right term. But I guess I'm trying to show a Galactic Empire (called the The Solarian Confederacy) which is rules 25% of the galaxy. Yes that's 100 billion star systems. It's been interstellar for 750 years. There's 10 Billion humans for each of these star systems so approximately 1 Sextillion human beings in the entire galaxy. Interstellar travel is expensive but something the average human citizens can afford.

Like a one way ticket to the nearest star system in this setting takes a few days, and costs several months of wages. The nearest clusters and sectors takes a few weeks and several years of wages. Crossing the galaxy takes years and several decades of wages for the average human.

But you can.

The Solarian Confederacy is a moderately functioning society spanning a hundreds of billion star systems, populated by humans. It features decent but stagnant technology, political stability marked by occasional unrest, and a mix of cultural expressions, though a dominant culture often prevails. The military is adequately prepared but lacks advanced capabilities. Economic prosperity is stable yet uneven, with significant disparities. Social equality exists but needs improvement, and exploration is cautious, emphasizing sustainability. Environmental practices are average, and healthcare access varies regionally. Diplomatic relations with other civilizations are maintained, though tensions can arise, reflecting the empire’s ongoing challenges and quest for progress.

I'm just going to go with standard science fiction stuff and say that the average human being here lives to be 150 to 180 years. So mild life extension but that's it.

There's 40 rival alien empires in the galaxy and 100 different other sentient alien races.

The oldest known interstellar race that is still active is 20,000 years old but obviously used to rule most of the galaxy before something happened that nearly destroyed them.

And so on. So this is humans dominated galaxy.

There's conflict in this galaxy. For example just in The Solarian Confederacy own borders with human versus humans there are 1200 local skirmishes, 10 civil wars and 600 pirate-related conflicts.

Outside of the confederacy the humans are at war with 5 of the 40 rival alien empires.

That's not to say the aliens are themselves basically blameless. There's 50 other wars with aliens versus aliens, 8000 pirate and police actions and 20 known civil wars.

But obviously in a galaxy of hundreds of billions of star systems this is small scale.

But back to my main point. How would you show such a galaxy in terms of scale?

So I tinkering with a galactic conqueror that demands tribute or taxes to fill his coffers and fund his luxury lifestyle, but what form would those taxes be—universal currency, precious metals, or biochemical products with enormous market value?

I'm doing some work on a story involving a group of slaves who manage to overthrow the crew of the slaver ship and turn it into a pirate ship, but of course want to upgrade once they get the chance.

What are some good kinds of ships for pirates to utilize?

Edit: They steal supplies to sustain their meager crew (under 40) and have no real port of call. All regions within reach are hostile.

I'm not talking about the long bone deformities of Belters, more like intentional evolution for zero G station inhabitants.

Im not a physicist or a doctor of any kind, but I geuss what I'm wondering is if being in 0 gravity for a certain amount of time could be used to heal certain physical problems? like if you had some sort of spinal condition where your spine is too compressed or something along those lines (again, Im not a doctor I dont know if that kind of thing is even a real condition) would being in 0g for an extended period of time allow your spine to be able to stretch out? Idk. So I geuss my question is could going into space be used as some kind of medical treatment/physical therapy for certain conditions, and if so what conditions/what benefits would you get from that?

It's seems like complex paradoxes always forced me to go the multiverse route, where going to the past creates a new universe. But I find this boring, because there are no consequences for characters messing with time.

Eyeball Planet World and Moon Diagram.

I'm trying to put together some ideas for my planet - story/plot mostly written (1st draft). Rather, trying to figure out the ramifications of such a system. Have watched videos, the few I could find. Have found some articles. None consider the possibility (that I've found) of a moon for the tidally locked planet.

My thought is that the moon, whose orbit is in line with the habitable ring, would provide a few hours of something closer to daylight where otherwise there would be just twilight. No extra warmth, just light.

Hot air rises on the light side of the planet, circulates back to the dark side. Winds would probably be constant blowing cold into the habitable zone. Maybe.

Canyons in the hottest regions of the light side could still contain life in the shadow. I can imagine something like the Grand Canyon, US having lush vegetation down inside - as long as not too directly inline with the star.

On the dark side, people expanding their range via long deep tunnels. On the surface, most things frozen. Very little if any plant life because of the extreme lack of sunlight.

Back to the moon though. Any thoughts on what effect this would have - realistic or not. I really want/need the moon to allow for brief daylight along the habitable ring but I want it to seem at least somewhat realistic - the story has a mix of horror, fantasy, and sci-fi, so...

Any thoughts?

So my ships use the standard Alcubierre drive version of space travel with the space time puddle. While folding, they continue to use the main fusion torch drive to create simulated gravity, otherwise, they’d be weightless the whole time. My question is, do they have to do a braking burn after exiting FTL speeds or can they alter the fields with the Alcubierre drive to cancel out their acceleration at their destination?

Or is there no way they could have an agricultural revolution?

No not actually. I appreciate any constructive criticism or ideas as to what the story could be. Here is a brief history. Ask me if you are curious about more aspects.

2103: Interstellar travel was just becoming a reality. On the brisk of a World War, heads of several megacorps around the world devised a plan to flee Earth in fear for their lives. They took around 100,000 people with them, along with the technologies of their companies. No one knew for sure where they had gone, though this defused the global situation almost instantly.

2156: The nations of Earth tracked down traces of their movement, and found that they settled on the 4th planet of Polaris B, which they named Polarila. Earth tried to impose taxes and regulations on the corporations of Polarila. Humanity, narrowly dodging a World War, only to be caught up in another war between the worlds. Polarila won and received independence.

Today, 2212: More than half a century has passed since the war, and the nations of Earth has developed diplomacy with the corporate federation decades ago. Humanity has once again enjoyed peace and prosperity … but for how much longer?

There are many elements of my series that seem like something from an anime or manga work, so I guess it isn’t that surprising that my books are selling in Japan. Thanks to the folks that have picked them up. The illustrated version of book 3 is on hold indefinitely as I am working on a music and graphic novel concept project until next year.

Hey All,

Optical sensors, primarily in the form of telescopes, are one of the dominant forms of space observation currently. As passive sensors, with no atmospheric attenuation or horizon to constrain them as they do on earth, these make extremely accurate and powerful observation tools in any setting.

This is part of the justification for the "there is no stealth in space" phrase, which I have found particularly interesting in forums such as atomic rockets, who have a very lengthy page discussing it (found here for those interested). Imaging telescopes, particularly in the mid-infra red range, are particularly effective, with a 3 Kelvin background noise, while every craft must emit in this approximate band, meaning they are always detectable (just as a summary for context).

I do however, find this phrase somewhat defeatist, and quite problematic for writing. The perceived dominance of passive sensors in a future war leads to reduced interaction and agency for characters, particularly captains or crews. Characters must make decisions when using active sensors such as Radar/Lidar, ranges, pulses, pulse types, light speed lag concerns can all factor into the writing, making a characters decisions impact the flow of battle, and the information they receive. Passive sensors by contrast, can constantly scan the known universe with exceptional accuracy, locate and track any target automatically.

Further, active sensors can provide interaction between characters - the ship targeted by an active sensors knows, and can re-act accordingly. They can jam, further increasing the complexity and interest of fight scenes. Active sensors also have side-lobes, beam shapes, spectrum control techniques, cryptography and all manner of other fascinating aspects to explore in a hard sci-fi setting.

Essentially what I am contending is that a setting dominated by passive sensors such as optical (and radio) telescopes misses out on depth and intrigue that can otherwise be included for the more nerd inclined among us. There are other examples of sci-fi that's too hard leading to problems for writers, such as the laser problem, described here.

As such, one of my current areas of investigation is countering the prevalence and effectiveness of space telescopes. It is particularly optical passive sensors that are a thorn in my side, as radio telescopes, or passive EM arrays using what is essentially the receive part of a radar, are not a problem. Those can be fed false signals, or jammed as a regular active sensor could be.

Anybody have any ideas on how to get around the omniscience of these sensors? Some considerations I have been exploring include:

- Passive sensors cannot give range in a traditional sense. Optical telescopes can obviously get range to celestial objects using a variety of methods, parallax, Hubbles law etc. These (please inform me if I'm wrong), don't really apply to a near future space war, where targets are moving at high velocities, but are in the same solar system for example. There are, of course, many ways around this. Primarily, triangulation of multiple sensors to give a track. This is less of a concern than it might seem at first, as sensor fusion and light speed lag can make targeting tricky here. Also communications jamming can start to come in here - giving the characters some agency to influence each other.

- Directed infra red counter measures or DIRCM methods (here if you're still reading) are becoming increasingly popular with militaries for jamming infra-red homing missiles. This is obviously hard to find information on, but essentially, shining a laser into an infra red seeker blinds it. These are essentially the extrapolation of ye olde optical dazzler (here for those interested). This is a big question mark, as those who know, obviously can't say, but my initial problems are mainly range, the laser presumably has to either, be strong enough to overload pixels, or have sufficient diameter to fill enough pixels to obscure the targets signature. There's a lot more complexity to explore here, but fundamentally, DIRCM requires very accurate targeting, tons of energy, and has a range far less than the telescope (as opposed to radar jamming which naturally has a range advantage for instance).

- "Back end" electronics. Obviously, a telescopes ability to see is limited by its ability to process what it sees. Aiming errors, vibration from its platform, spot noise, heat from its own radiators, etc. All electronics are also vulnerable to attack via back end attacks, particularly high power microwaves (here). I have problems with these methods as there are "limiting" one ship, rather than "granting" another ship more agency. Taking options away rather than giving counter options to another is less interesting writing IMO. HPM weaponry is also well within weapons range, so just obliterate your opponent with a laser at that point.

I'd love peoples thoughts/contributions to this discussion, and I hope you learnt something that will help your worldbuilding/writing! If anyone could provide me with any forums to discuss this kind of thing, or anywhere they know that I can learn about/discuss space telescopes and their electronics that would also be appreciated!

Imagine if gravitational force got stronger, or another constant changed. Would this break technology today?

That is the premise of Arcanum, where magic causes physical laws to become fuzzy and changeable. I had a similar concept in mind involving a multiverse where physics are mildly different, and was wondering if this might ruin technology if we moved to another world.

I could imagine things like conductivity changing, and now our electronics no longer work or barely do so, as they're now far from optimal. Or conductivity is slightly higher, and it causes short-circuiting.

What do you think? In a Level II Multiverse, would our technology stop working if we somehow went to a second universe?

Episode four of The Books of Thoth has finally arrived. For those of you just joining the fun, The Books of Thoth is an audio drama anthology. You’ll hear stories of the past, the future, and alternate worlds.

“It Was The Best Day Ever” follows Citizen 123192-A. He lives in a grim totalitarian dystopian society known as The PostState. A boot in the face forever. But he doesn’t let it get him down. In fact, he’s about to tell us about how much he loves life in The PostState. He’ll burn books, rat out his fellow Citizens to the authorities, and maybe even eat a ration bar or two. It’s sure to be the best day ever!

We can discern several bits of worldbuilding from this episode. We know that people don’t marry in the PostState, but are assigned by the Department of Reproduction. The Bureau of Mental Transgressions and the Corrections Department are responsible for rehabilitating (read: lobotomizing) citizens who try to rebel, or think too many unpatriotic thoughts

We know that the world is in a state of nuclear war. In fact, it seems the wars tend to wax and wane at times. There are other nations besides The PostState. I envision the PostState comprising North America, Brazastar being Brazil, and Mblun being Nigeria. Sinopan I see a comprising China, Japan, Korea, abe maybe Southeast Asia as well.

Ah, but there’s another element to all of this: we can’t be sure how truthful what we hear is. Citizen 123192-A clearly isn’t playing with a full deck. We also know that The PostState heavily censors and revises everything. Our protagonist works at a Revision Furnace, which means a book burning factory, in essence. There’s also an active resistance movement, known as FreeState, working to bring down The PostState.

So, what if there are no thermonuclear wars? And what if the other nations aren’t real? There’s a semi-popular theory among the 1984 fandom that Oceania is limited only to Britain. According to this theory, the rest of the world is fine, and Britain has become a North Korea-style ultra isolationist nation. So, perhaps the same is true for The PostState?

Now, you all probably want me to give a definitive answer. And to that I say, well, I know what I think the answer would be. But I’ll let you all come to your own conclusions. Way I see it, both interpretations are equally valid, you just get slightly different stories.

I would like to take a moment to thank my cast for helping make this episode possible. Thank you to Jay Callan, Cameron Gergett, Melissa Bowens, Tiffany Perdue, Julie Hoverson, Ed Haynes, James Barnett, and Karim Kronfli.

I include several references to classic dystopian fiction in this episode. See how many that you can spot. This episode was my longest to date. Almost twice as long as my previous episodes. I certainly hope it was worth the wait.

The Books of Thoth is hosted on RedCircle: https://redcircle.com/shows/6701d0b5-6b14-4b76-992d-02f391b5cf42

You can also find it on all major podcast platforms:

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3hQ94fOX5V03CXg8ZLgMZ9

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-books-of-thoth/id1716132833

RadioPublic: https://radiopublic.com/the-books-of-thoth-6pQno2

Amazon Music: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/79a3cad8-de67-4e6e-bb57-0567e0460c4d/the-books-of-thoth

iHeart: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/269-the-books-of-thoth-127954491/

Podcast Addict: https://podcastaddict.com/podcast/the-books-of-thoth/4730175

Player FM: https://player.fm/series/the-books-of-thoth

TuneIn: https://tunein.com/podcasts/Storytelling/The-Books-of-Thoth-p3911191/

Pocket Casts: https://pca.st/b1vs77tq

Podbean: https://www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/cqaub-2da068/The-Books-of-Thoth-Podcast

Podchaser: https://www.podchaser.com/podcasts/the-books-of-thoth-5528099

Audible: https://www.audible.com/podcast/The-Books-of-Thoth/B0CN3CLRMY

And it is also on Apollo Podcasts and Pandora, but I can’t link to them.

And of course, here’s the official webpage. Just a little hub that leads to the transcripts, the Twitter account (@BooksofThoth), and all the place you can listen to The Books of Thoth: https://booksofthoth.carrd.co

Wouldn't the gravity generator hold the air in place? That's how it works on earth :)

Just fully flying around space with the top down...

So as a forewarning, I'm asking directly because I've been writing my own scifi audiobook that follows this sub-genre, where most alien species are inspired by earth animals:

That said,

The question I wanted to pose was something I've been musing about today to myself. What makes animals as inspiration work, and what doesn't? And what I mean by that is like for example using a Boar-like to represent a species who has the collective/political personality to act aggressive. Or songbirds to represent aloof and flighty. Or... In the case of my own story, raptors for predatory behavior.

Where is that boundry where you're doing it well, and where you're just kind of stereotyping behavior based on wild animals, and imposing it onto these written people and personalities? We as humans have cultures and behavioral ticks that can be at least in part influenced by our histories and upbringing. For example, we assosiate the Eagle/Birds of Prey with Rome or the USA because those symbols were adopted by those entities. Would depicting an Eagle as hawkish, warlike, imperial and stern come off as tropey? In fantasy some people make the connection between orcs and undeveloped cultures in human history, sometimes to derogatory effect.

Does anyone have tips for yknow- making it feel detatched from that latter example?

As a note, ah- yknow I know the nature of the question, but try not to make it political or apply your answers to current events. I'm not looking for that, just some input in these general directions. I haven't had the opportunity to brainstorm with some of my usual buddies who usually put up with my incessant musing.

I’ve been using Space Engine as a reference, but it’s almost entirely speculation. I also know that we realistically only have one solar system to use as a starting point, but perhaps there’s a fancy mathematical equation that can give an approximate average?

If there’s no concrete answers, what do you think the average number would be?

Are we above average and most systems only sport a couple of planetoids, or are we below average and the universe is teeming with terrestrial/gaseous balls?

Reseraching this for my project has been quite... infuriating as 99.99% of cases it would just loop back to 'what rare minerals would be abundant in asteroids!' articles. Cool news, but, literally opposite of what I am looking for.

I know water/ice won't be issue(filtering it to be usable level is another discussion but lets ignore it for now), carbon is abundant too, popular metals like iron, nickel, gold, platinum etc are known to be found in high amounts.

So far, only material I can persume to be virtually impossible to find in asteroid would be sedimentary rocks that are biological matter of origin like limestone.

EDIT: Hard-to-get material suggestions so far

• Sedimentary rocks, esp organic (ex Limestone)

• Helium, and He-3

• Igneous rock (ex granite or basalt)

• Rich deposits of Uranium or Thorium

• Plastics polymer

• Lighter metals such as Lithium

• Plastic

• Wood

• (Natural) rubber

In the setting I’m working on, they are building 36 space port cities around the equator on Earth that will have 100km space towers in the middle of them. With an orbital ring planned once the space towers are built.

I’m currently planning each city to be built to house 1,000,000 people but I’m not sure if that is too big or not big enough. The cities in the ocean would be massive artificial islands weighing 100,000,000 tons with anchor pillars going to the ocean floor.

Edit: So I basically found out that 1,000,000 people would actually be way too much, a city built to accommodate 200,000 people would be much closer to what would be needed/realistic unless Earth got really populated because most people wouldn’t want what amounts to a nuke in their backyard that will go off if it ever loses power. Half that number would be people who maintain the tower, the fusion reactors and the floating city structure along with their families.

I am currently working on a sci fi story in which humanity is long gone. (Due to currently unknown reasons, as I haven't found a suitable explanation yet.) One core beat of the story right now though is around an alien robot exploring an old O'Neil Cylinder. In my mind, it is worn and rickety on the outside, but full of life inside. Animals roam around, and human made robots perform simple menial tasks between them.

Unfortunately, I cannot figure out how to justify the still surviving ecology of the cylinder, given the assumed time that has passed in the story. Food supply, oxygen production, water: these are the things I'm trying to justify.

How would you go about explaining this in a convincing way?

WIP=Work In Progress.

so the entire cast of your story, including antagonists is stuck on a mile long, 50 floor space ship with no way out. Only your protagonist or protagonist's are aware of the Thing at the start, can they figure out who is the Thing and kill it.

The Thing's powers are: shape shifting(including stabbing or otherwise infecting people with their own cells and slowly replacing the victims cells until they are a thing). It also has some level of genetic memory, so that the Thing's descendents know what it knows.

Weaknesses: Fire and anything else that destroys cells, can't replicate or tolerate inorganic material, so if it replaces someone with visible prosthesis they will lose said prosthetic, or anything else like crowned teeth or metal plates inside the body.

So sometimes the outer hull of ships in my book are covered in a variety of different nanites that can just materialize into missiles and other weapons seamlessly from the ship’s exterior. And there’s also armor plating that can be materialized, but they need to have some warning prior so they have time to transform.

What kind of adaptive surfaces do you include in your writing?