The Stars Are Fire

"Doubt thou the stars are fire;

Doubt that the sun doth move;

Doubt truth to be a liar;

But never doubt I love."

--William Shakespeare, Hamlet

In a time before history, people looked to the sky and wondered at the stars. Long before we knew their true nature, the night sky was a heavily populated landscape upon which countless civilizations wove stories of their own. They found shapes in the stars, turning them into mythic creatures, heroes, and gods. The stars fostered hope and served as dependable waypoints by which humanity eventually navigated and explored our world. Later, we would look to the stars and dream of visiting them, they became a symbol of the great potential of our species and our capacity to dream.

The stories in this book carry on that tradition. They look to the stars seeking to imagine the sorts of worlds we might one day see, or the kind of world we might one day build together. Each of them is a glimpse of human possibility, a light in the dark, and a reminder to hold tightly to hope and wonder.