In its brief 14-episode run, 'Firefly' gave viewers as much chance of witnessing a horseback chase or train robbery as a laser gun and spacefight in any given episode. Snappy one-liners and silly hats were a constant, of course.

There's a fairy story called the 'The Shoemaker and the Elves' where this old cobbler keeps leaving leather out overnight and wakes up the next day, and there's a new pair of shoes. Co-authoring is a little like that. You send off the manuscript to your partner, and a few days later, you check your email, and hey, there's more book in here!

I sit opposite and look at the pile of books in front of him. Babel is one of the only places in the world that has real books anymore. My mother sends teams across the Glass, bringing back all they can find in the old world’s ruins and collecting them in Babel’s great library. Most of them already exist in our computer archives, but there’s nothing quite the same as sitting with a real book in your hands. Breathing in the ink and feeling all those wonderful lives beneath your fingertips. In between the pages, I’m an emperor. An adventurer. A warrior and a wanderer. In between the pages I’m not myself—and more myself than in any other place on earth.

Too many books. Too few centuries.

Who am I to deny gravity, Aurora? When you shine brighter than any constellation in the sky?