Welcome to this Track of Words Author Interview, my ongoing series of quick interviews with authors talking about their new or upcoming books. These are short and sweet interviews, with the idea being that each author will answer (more or less) the same questions – by the end of each interview I hope you will have a good idea of what the new book (or audio drama) is about, what inspired it and why you might want to read or listen to it.
For this interview I spoke to Laura Lam about her new sci-fi thriller Goldilocks, which is published on the 30th April from Wildfire in the UK, and on the 5th May in the US from Orbit. It’s a topical, relevant story of space exploration tackling big issues and complex character relationships – I’ve read it, and it’s well worth checking out.
Without further ado, over to Laura…
Author photo copyright Lawrie Photography
Track of Words: What’s the elevator pitch summary for Goldilocks?
Laura Lam: Five women steal a spaceship to head to an exosolar planet to save a dying Earth, but someone on board has a secret that could jeopardize everything.
ToW: Without spoiling anything, who are the main characters and what do we need to know about them?
LL: Naomi Lovelace – botanist, foster daughter to Valerie Black. Worked for both NASA and the UK Space Agency before going back to work for Valerie’s company, Hawthorne. She’s been wanting to go to space since she was a little girl.
Valerie Black – co-founder of Hawthorne, a megacorp with fingers in many pies, but that focuses primarily on robotics and space exploration. Leader of the mission to Cavendish. Naomi’s foster mother after her co-founder died when Naomi was a child.
The other women on the ship are Irene Hart (doctor), Jerrie Hixon (pilot/engineer) and Oksana Lebedeva (engineer). Back on Earth, their main point of contact is Evan Kan, Valerie’s son, who is an immunologist.
ToW: Where and when is it set?
LL: I don’t date it within the book, but mentally I set it around 2033, which is when we’re theoretically going to send our first mission to Mars in the real world. It’s mostly set in space, but there are flashbacks set in California, Texas, Singapore, and Scotland.
ToW: What inspired you to write this story in particular? Was there a specific moment, question or idea that sparked it?
LL: I wanted to take everything I loved about astronaut films but put women front and centre. The only one I can think of that does that is Gravity, though she’s alone for most of the film. Otherwise, the women tend to be secondary characters or love interests left back on Earth, which happened to Liv Tyler twice. I’m also worried about climate change and the rising bigotry and rollbacks on reproductive health, like the Heartbeat Bills.
ToW: A lot of what’s happening in the background of this book feels very real and relevant under the current circumstances – some of which I’m sure was intentional, some probably less so – and it’s largely pretty bleak. Is this you looking at the real world and despairing? Hoping for positive change? Somewhere in between?
LL: It got unintentionally more relevant than I meant for it to be. I think the future on Earth is bleak, but that the book itself is ultimately hopeful. I’m usually equal parts pessimist and optimist – humans are capable of amazing kindness and cruelty in equal measure. And we’re very good at forgetting past mistakes.
ToW: I really enjoyed your depiction of space – it felt-even handed in portraying both the beauty and the awful, indifferent dangers. Were you specifically interested in space travel and in astronauts before writing this? Would you go up into space if you could?
LL: I was interested; I’d already written another book about women in space, after all – Seven Devils [written with Elizabeth May] sold a year before Goldilocks but is coming out after (in August!) due to differing publishing timelines. For that one, it’s much more of the Star Wars science fantasy approach, though. I was pretty intimidated to write Goldilocks and try to stay a little truer to science.
I remember when I had a phone meeting with my UK editors Ella Gordon and Alex Clarke, Alex said something to the effect of “don’t be afraid to give it space more metaphorically and literally – give us a sense of the scope of the universe.” I appreciated that comment and tried to take it to heart.
ToW: There’s a lot of interesting science in this story, from warp travel to the challenges involved in growing plants on board a spaceship, and from a dying Earth to a potential new planet – how much work went into getting the right balance of believable realism for all of this?
LL: My acknowledgements are five pages long, so that answers that, pretty much! I did six months of intense research, both solo and by asking experts targeted questions. I figured if I could translate the science into enough detail that I could understand it, it’d be understandable to most other laypeople. I tried not to let the science overwhelm the story but complement it.
ToW: The two lead characters, Naomi and Valerie, have a complex and believable relationship, and for all the science and the politics it feels like this is the crux of the story. What inspired these characters and their relationship?
LL: I love complicated relationships between parents or parental figures. With Naomi and Valerie, I’m able to combine that fraught faux-parental bond mixed with a career mentor bond, which was fascinating. Valerie has opened so many doors for Naomi due to her wealth, and while Naomi is grateful, she knows full well that it all comes with strings attached. Sometimes their goals align, such as going to space, but in other areas they really come head to head. There’s a scene near the end that I found really gut-punching to write. You’ll know when you get to it.
ToW: How does this story compare to the rest of your work? Is it going to feel familiar to readers who are accustomed to your writing, or is it a departure from your norm?
LL: I don’t think it’s terribly far removed from my books like False Hearts and Shattered Minds. They’re both feminist cyberpunks with dystopian near-futures. This one’s just a little more science focused than those. It’s a bit different from my fantasy, the Micah Grey series, but I think my writing style and interest in certain themes stays relatively consistent across my work.
ToW: What do you hope sci-fi fans will get out of this by the time they’ve finished it?
LL: I hope they think about morally grey questions. I hope they feel motivated to save our future and hold those trying to destroy it to account. I also hope they learn some neat things about space and enjoy the characters and the story.
ToW: Finally, if readers want to know more about Goldilocks and keep up with your writing in general, how’s the best way for them to do that?
LL: I’m most active on Twitter and Instagram as @LR_Lam. My main website is lauralam.co.uk, and I also have a Patreon at patreon.com/lauralam where for a few bucks you get access to writing craft posts and behind the scene snippets. At the moment most of the posts are free because it doesn’t feel right to ask people to *have* to pay during lockdown, but those who want and are able to support me still can.
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Many thanks to Laura for taking the time to answer these questions! You can also read my review of Goldilocks right here.
Click this link to buy Goldilocks, or here for the audiobook edition.
Click here if you fancy taking a look at some other Author Interviews. If you have any questions, comments or other thoughts please do let me know in the comments below, or find me on Twitter.
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