The Eternal Message of Hope

Happy New Year, everyone! Hope 2020 is treating you well.

Recently, I was one of several SFR authors who contributed to a blog about our takes on Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. Below is my contribution:

BIG FAT SPOILER ALERT!

If you haven’t seen the movie yet, turn away from the dark side!

As one of my besties & I took our seats in the theater to see The Rise of Skywalker, a sense of finality came over me. This was it, the last movie of a surprise franchise that began over forty years ago. I was a skinny, bespectacled seventh grader when A New Hope released. I was also living in Japan, and at that time new cinema releases were out for a year in the U.S. before they were sent overseas. (They did send Mark Hamill to visit his old high school, which was on the same Army base as the middle school I attended, but that’s another story.)

All we could do was wait. As fate would have it, my dad was transferred stateside and we left the week before Star Wars arrived at the base theater. The first thing my mom did after we arrived in California was to take my sister and I to see the movie—a whole week before my friends got to see it! It was awesome, and it seemed like the story (like the lines) would never end.

But, it has.

Did The Rise of Skywalker live up to my expectations? Overall, yes. Do I have questions? Most definitely. Would I change anything? Yes! The most glaring issue to me—which started in The Force Awakens—is the relationship between Poe and Finn. OMG, people! These two should’ve gotten together!

Now, I’m not a Rose-hater…I actually love her character. And since the powers that be did not see fit to romantically link Poe and Finn, then why not let Finn and Rose hook up? All in all, it would’ve been great if they hadn’t even tried to force that relationship to begin with, but to turn around and cover it up in the latest movie like it’d never happened? Messy loose end.

My biggest heartache was that Rey and Ben will never get together. He dies, she lives, minus the greatest love of her life. This is, of course, my internal romance writer soul crying out at the injustice of them not getting their happily ever after. How-e-ver, there is always a price that must be paid, and Ben’s death—his separation from the woman he loves—is his price. And most of me is good with that.

If I could, what one thing would I change in this movie? Simple. When Luke and Leia appeared to Rey (beautiful and touching, imo), Ben should’ve been with them. He found the good within himself at the eleventh hour, much like Anakin did. And, he quite literally gave his life for her. (Tell me you didn’t cry about that! I did. Like hormonal teenager.)

Bottom line: Despite the still unanswered questions, J. J. Abrams did a phenomenal job wrapping up the Skywalker saga. I wish it could go on forever, but after forty plus years, I’m happy.

I wonder if Abrams would consider going back and remaking parts 1-3…?

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Laurie A. Green did a brilliant follow-up piece on this blog yesterday, and really nailed it. (Read here) 

And gang, you REALLY need to see this see this Rey + Ben video!

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This is happening right now in my world!

My next book in the Prophecy series will release March 10^th! Skylar’s Gift is a novella set shortly after Collision, Book Three in the series.

Reserve your copy now for a special preorder price! (Price goes up after release.)

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USA Today Bestselling Author, Lea Kirk, loves to transport her readers to other worlds with her sci-fi romances. 

When she’s not busy writing about the blue and green aliens of her Prophecy series, she’s hanging out with her hubby, five kids (the nerd herd), and a spoiled Dobie mix pup. 

She's currently working of the fourth book in her Prophecy series, and three new books for a new series to be released this fall. 

For more on Lea's writing journey, check out her:

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GUEST: Laurie A. Green The Story Behind the Story @AuthorLaurieAGreen

Pets+Space: The Story Behind the Story 

In early 2016, I was asked by Pauline Baird Jones if I wanted to be part of a new science fiction romance anthology, Pets in Space. Wait, what? Pets plus space! Coolest idea ever! Yes! Count me in.

But in spite of my enthusiasm, I was a little unsure what sort of pet I’d write about or what kind of premise I could dream up for a new tale to be part of my Inherited Stars series. It didn’t take long to realize I’d done a bit of musing on the heroine of a future novel having some sort of a starship-friendly pet, possibly a ferret or weasel. When I started to brainstorm on that, I realized it might work as an expanded concept.

But my ferret-weasel didn’t stay a mustelid for long. It soon evolved into a bio-engineered StarDog. That mental process went something like this…

Fifteen hundred years in the future, animals will most likely be bred for different purposes than they are today. If they’re bred at all. By then, bio-engineering may be commonplace to produce animals that perform specific functions, like being the perfect shipboard mascots on space crafts as well as skilled vermin hunters to keep the vessels “clean.” So to build my pet, I needed an animal well-suited to a closed environment that would also incorporate desirable traits to perform these specific tasks. What might that genetic recipe look like?

Going back to the original idea, I started with a bit of weasel DNA. Weasels are small, agile and terrific vermin hunters in the wild. But my pet wouldn’t be in the wild, so it also needed some user-friendly genetics from domesticated canine and feline genes. Traits that would incorporate the loyalty of dogs with the easy-care attributes of cats. Obviously you can’t walk a pet in space, so the critter needed to have instincts to use a granule box while in flight, much like a housecat.

But my mascot needed something more: Attitude. It had to be fearless enough to take on the worst of starship pests, like snakes, scorpions and their future counterparts. That’s how the natural abilities of the champion of all vermin wranglers—the venom-resistant mongoose—got blended into the mix.

A pet was born—or, incubated—for the first Pets in Space story.

Adding StarDogs to my universe led to a number of series-altering effects. For instance, how does the heroine come by such an exotic animal? Surely they’d be expensive. What was the backstory of my StarDog?

As those ideas began to unfold, the entire series evolved right along with my StarDog. New characters emerged, such as the scientist who created StarDogs and his affiliation with the covert Network, an entity that played an important role in the companion novel, Inherit the Stars. Fresh conflicts sparked; StarDogs were employed as spies on enemy ships. Lurking dangers threatened; those enemies sought to wipe out the StarDog lab. The finished story was one I was truly proud of but that also added some unexpected twists and layers to the whole storytelling arc behind the series and future books.

When I was asked if I’d like to write a new story for a second Pets in Space collection, I was stymied all over again. What pet would I write about this time? Maybe a story about a horse in space? Someday, but this was not that day. Crocodile in space? No, not my idea of a cuddly pet. Guinea pig in space? Hmmm. Very cute, but the idea just didn’t take hold. Nothing seemed to be clicking, until I remembered that Captain Navene Jagger and Ketsia Tayah, two of the original minor characters in Inherit the Stars were meant to have their own adventure post Inherit the Stars…and what if their story involved a StarDog?

And so it does. ;)

Courting Disaster: StarDog 2 picks up where StarDog and Inherit the Stars left off, carrying readers three calendars (years) into a brave, but uncertain new future beyond the close of the novel. Jagger and Ketsia soon learn the galaxy still harbors a dangerous threat, contrary to the HEA everyone had been counting on. This story ended up serving not only as a sequel to the two past stories, but also as a prequel to a future book, Inherit the Vengeance.

Here’s a bonus! If you haven’t yet read StarDog (or even if you have), then I invite you to enter the Inherited Stars Universe as my guest and download a free copy of StarDog—the original Pets in Space story—via Instafreebie. Here’s the link: https://www.instafreebie.com/free/lTsVO

Thanks so much to Paranormal Romantics for hosting me today!

About Embrace the Romance: Pets in Space 2

Twelve award winning and bestselling Science Fiction Romance authors join forces with twelve original, never released stories in USA TODAY bestselling Embrace the Romance: Pets in Space 2.

Courting Disaster: StarDog2

A commander of a spaceship faces the toughest decision of his life when he vows to protect the woman and her StarDog that he is escorting through a dangerous section of space.

About the Author

Laurie A. Green is an award winning, USA TODAY bestselling author, a three-time RWA Golden Heart® finalist and a science fiction romance enthusiast who founded the SFR Brigade community of writers, which now totals over 1,000 members.

She confesses to being an Andromeda Galaxy groupie and would someday love to own a vacation home on Mars or Titan. She’s enthused to be a part of this wonderful anthology mash-up of two of her favorite things–pets and space.

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