The lack of superstition aboard the ship gets brought up now and again, but you may have noticed that there’s a significant dichotomy between Tanyth’s world and ours. It’s not just “a medieval Earth.” It’s a different planet.*

I considered the idea of “bad luck to have a woman aboard” but that’s a stereotype I wanted to play against rather than to, and there’s much in Rebecca’s back story that requires this to be absent in this world. Whether I get to write that back story remains to be seen, but I’m looking forward to the final book in the trilogy – The Hermit of Lammas Wood.

*I designed the orbital mechanics of the world before I wrote the first word. The key elements are the axial tilt and an elongated orbit. You see these evidenced in the 13 month calendar and the progression of holidays. The effects are subtle and not easily pulled out of the text, but they’re there.