“Dystopia does not predict the future, it criticizes the present”. So said Tumblr user gingerofsuburbia on a thread about the use of allegory in sci-fi. 

Though I only stumbled across this quote long after I wrote Stars Apart, I realised that I’d been following this tenet without even knowing it. I looked at all of the problems of my present, the systems of corruption and control, the vast injustices that I felt hopeless to fix… and wrote a story about someone else trying to overcome them. 

The problems of the Seven Systems – corporate overreach, governmental negligence, financial inequality, military atrocities – are really no different to those the world already faces today, just escalated to the grandiose extremes that a sci-fi setting allows. And the same is true of the interpersonal struggles of my characters.

Take Nadalia, for example – a person from an underprivileged background, rendered homeless and destitute through no fault of her own, now thrust into a world that doesn’t know who she is or care about what happens to her. Someone who lost everything because of decisions made by people who view her as nothing more than a statistic to be managed, instead of a person to be cared for. Stories like hers play out every day, out of sight and out of mind to most of us. But by raising the stakes, exaggerating the circumstances, her tragedy becomes an exciting inciting incident that readers react to.

Consider Tanya – socially isolated, struggling to make connections, constantly undermined and lied to by those she thought had her best interests at heart. So many people today face similar circumstances, and it often goes unnoticed. How many silently struggle to escape situations of coercive control? How many people today feel distant and disconnected, not knowing who or what to trust due to the abundance of manipulation and misinformation? But instead of suffering, unseen and unsupported, Tanya’s story becomes the mystery that readers want to see resolved.

In a similar vein, we all probably know someone a lot like Dexter – burned-out, haunted by some regret or missed opportunity, but trying to do their best all the same. Most of us can relate to Vinson – we’re cogs in a machine, dispassionately disregarded by those in power, keeping our heads down and doing what’s required of us. 

And of course, there are many in our lives who have the potential to end up like Ether – justifiably angry with the state of the world, and vulnerable to the manipulations of those who would twist that trauma towards targets of their choosing. Look no further than the rise of radical far-right political parties across the world, preying on the disenfranchised with messages of division and distrust.

I applied the same approach to the true villains of my story. History has always been a favourite subject of mine, and I admittedly put an unhealthy amount of time into identifying the worst kinds of people – past and present – and the patterns that helped them rise to power.  

Our world today is dominated by men like Verne – greedy and self-centred, craving control and power but unable to find satisfaction no matter how much they claim. We’ve seen the damage they can do, the wars they’re willing to wage… I merely imagined what one might do if given unchecked power on a galactic scale. 

Many of us looking on, witnessing every atrocity, watching every attempt at reform fail, can all too easily become like The Patron – jaded and devoid of hope, resorting to violence and cruelty, happy to see it all burn down with no regard for how to build something better in its place. 

And I imagine we all have had the misfortune of knowing someone like Melody at some point in our lives – someone who is narcissistic and self-righteous, who believes they’re never wrong, who will forgive or excuse any amount of awful as long as they can preserve their vision of how things should be. Not a grand, world-changing villain, but one whose presence and power can be far more personal and profound. 

This, I think, is the key to making a setting – no matter how strange or removed from our reality it may seem, at first – accessible for audiences. Take what’s real, and raw, and will resonate with readers, and make it a part of that reality. 

Like most aspiring authors, I’ve read a lot of advice, from a lot of writers, over the years. And many of them emphasised the importance of readers being able to see something of themselves in key characters, to help make the story grounded and relatable. I think it’s just as important that readers see their conflicts and problems in the story’s world as well.  Moreover, that they see characters they relate to navigating and overcoming those problems. 

I don’t expect everyone to agree with that view. For some, reading is a form of escapism, and the last thing they want to see are the same problems they’re trying to distance themselves from. But I’ve always found something empowering and inspirational in experiencing a fictional character overcome a trouble or trauma I share. It makes hope real, and a better future feel possible.