I've published 13 books and 9 shorter works. All are in the same science fictional universe, with some characters crossing over to other works. Until recently all took place on Earth. Then I wrote a book that ventured out into the rest of the solar system.
Now I'm traveling into interstellar space with a new book and I have to give thought to that larger context. Just how am I to handle that setting? Is there a galactic empire? Several empires?
Tentatively I'm taking James Schmitz Hub universe as a guide. My human interstellar community is a flat pancake located in one tenth of one of the four spiral arms rather than the entire galaxy. The community is very advanced and shares that space and its surroundings with twelve other very advanced species. All are peaceful; they are too rich and diverse to launch acquisitive wars against anyone. It also shares all that volume with about a hundred less advanced space-faring species some of which are predatory, some horribly so. There is also one or more super-advanced species with godlike powers.
So far that addresses the physical scale of the galaxy. It also addresses the possible biological variety of the galaxy and other galaxies. What about the socioeconomic side of an interstellar community?
Schmitz posited that the great distances between star systems would dictate that a star-spanning human government would be a loose confederacy of star systems rather than a federation or republic or monarchy. That makes sense to me. I also feel with Schmitz that the size and complexity of human populations of individual solar systems makes any tightly controlled interstellar governments impractical.
He also described it as deeply capitalistic to the point of including some very predatory companies little different from criminal enterprises. I feel that's a stretch though it would make for more story possibilities. We'll see as my latest book progresses.
How do you deal with interstellar empires in your stories?
Now I'm traveling into interstellar space with a new book and I have to give thought to that larger context. Just how am I to handle that setting? Is there a galactic empire? Several empires?
Tentatively I'm taking James Schmitz Hub universe as a guide. My human interstellar community is a flat pancake located in one tenth of one of the four spiral arms rather than the entire galaxy. The community is very advanced and shares that space and its surroundings with twelve other very advanced species. All are peaceful; they are too rich and diverse to launch acquisitive wars against anyone. It also shares all that volume with about a hundred less advanced space-faring species some of which are predatory, some horribly so. There is also one or more super-advanced species with godlike powers.
So far that addresses the physical scale of the galaxy. It also addresses the possible biological variety of the galaxy and other galaxies. What about the socioeconomic side of an interstellar community?
Schmitz posited that the great distances between star systems would dictate that a star-spanning human government would be a loose confederacy of star systems rather than a federation or republic or monarchy. That makes sense to me. I also feel with Schmitz that the size and complexity of human populations of individual solar systems makes any tightly controlled interstellar governments impractical.
He also described it as deeply capitalistic to the point of including some very predatory companies little different from criminal enterprises. I feel that's a stretch though it would make for more story possibilities. We'll see as my latest book progresses.
How do you deal with interstellar empires in your stories?