Of course airlines have about one hundred fifteen employees per airplane; but most airlines need to sell tickets. The SR-71 program (which didn't) ran with about forty employees per airplane. NASA, with four spacecraft, has over twenty thousand people employed to support shuttle operations. This may explain why Phoenix, which wouldn't need more than fifty people to operate, would charge less than one percent of what NASA charges to put cargo in orbit.
Item: Despite all the talk of global warming, there is just as much scientific evidence for the coming Ice Age. Experiments have failed to detect solar neutrinos in the quantities expected, and astronomers tell us that we are going into a new period of minimum solar activity. The last such prolonged period was known as the "Maunder Minimum," and coincided with what has come to be known as "The Little Ice Age." Moreover, archeologic evidence shows that in the last Ice Age, Britain went from a climate a bit warmer than it enjoys now to being under sheet glaciers in considerably less than a century.
Of course our story is fiction. Many of the characters are fictional, too. But some are based on composites of real people; some are real people with their names changed; and some appear here under their own names. A few have even paid to be in the book! We allowed certain fan charities to auction off the right to play themselves in Fallen Angels. Because the book takes place in an indefinite future we have made free use of an author's right to change details of age, or occupation, or city of residence.
Readers who find the action of the book surprising must consider that we have, if anything, tamed down the reactions of organized science fiction fandom had there really been a downed spaceship in a society that hates science and technology.
As to the society portrayed here, of course much of it is satirical. Alas, many of the incidents--such as the Steve Jackson case in which a business was searched by Secret Service Agents displaying an unsigned search warrant--are quite real. So are many of the anti-technological arguments given in the book. There really is an intellectual on-campus movement to denounce "materialist science" in favor of something considerably less "cold and unforgiving." So watch it.
There are many literary references in Fallen Angels. A few are explained in the text; others are left for the delight of readers familiar with science fiction and fan publications.
One is worth explaining here. In Robert A. Heinlein's early work "Requiem," the hero dies in a successful voyage to the moon. He is buried on the lunar surface by companions who have no grave marker other than a shipping tag for a compressed air cylinder. When Mr. Heinlein died, he was, according to his instructions, cremated and his ashes scattered at sea from a U.S. Navy warship. Some of us feel it would be appropriate to honor him by placing a pint of seawater and a suitably inscribed shipping tag on Mare Imbrium. The poem to be inscribed is R. L. Stevenson's "Requiem."
Acknowledgment of everyone who has, either directly by commenting on the manuscript, or indirectly through his or her life and example, contributed to this book would require a volume a great deal longer than the book itself. We therefore apologize now for taking the easy way out: as you might suspect, this section is being written the night before the final manuscript is due.
The song "The Phoenix" is copyright 1983, by Julia Ecklar, and is used by permission of Julia Ecklar. The song "Starfire" is copyright 1983, by Cynthia McQuillan, and used with her permission. Both songs and many others much worth listening to are performed on tapes sometimes available at science fiction conventions. Excerpts from the songs "Black Powder and Alcohol" and "Bring It Down" are used with permission of Leslie Fish, and are available on her tape Firestorm.
We do want to acknowledge the special help of Gary Hudson, President of Pacific American Launch Systems, Inc., who generously helped us get Phoenix right. We only wish that we had the money to let him build the rocket. Any one of us would be glad to ride it with him. Ann Roebke Hudson deserves equal thanks. Clearly, any mistakes in the science and technology are ours, not theirs.
We also thank Jim Baen, our editor and publisher, and Toni Weisskopf, Executive Editor at Baen Books; we suspect that few books have ever been delivered this close to a previously scheduled publication date.
As to everyone else, you mostly know who you are. Thanks!
Larry Niven
Jerry Pournelle
Michael Flynn
Hollywood, California,
and Edison, New Jersey, 1991