The moon festival on Haollstrom IV actually comes from a late night walk with my dogs on Avenham Park, a place that has featured in several stories already in one way or another. There seems no limit to the inspirations it offers. We were quite surprised that particular evening to hear the sounds of drums and moving lights on the other side of the river and went to find out what was happening. What we found was a group of students from the local university playing drums and juggling with lighted torches and strobe lights around a classical folly called the Belvedere which, although badly vandalised, at night provided a beautiful backdrop to it. The whole thing was completely unofficial. The local council would never have authorised a public gathering at midnight. It was spontaneous and amazing and happened every full moon.

And it just had to go into a story. So it became a ritual on Haollstrom IV. The candles in the apples and the wild dance were added in to make it even more exotic.

The rough ending of the party was another matter. So far that has not happened on Avenham Park. But Haollstrom is a planet with problems. Of course it is. Otherwise there would be no story. Much of the problems surround Camilla’s family. And this was a bit of a shock to some readers who had come across Camilla’s family as children in the Marion and Kristoph stories. It struck them as sad that Drew, who was actually a pageboy at the wedding of Chrístõ’s parents could have gone to the bad and his family divided about his actions.

Brandon, is actually my daughter’s name, and yes, she does prefer girls. I gave her a heroic role, as the rebel holding out against Drew and gave her a lieutenant who was more than just a friend. It stands to reason that gendermorphs, with their sensual nature, would explore more than just heterosexual relationships, and some would choose different ways of expressing their affections.

The two tier society of Haollstrom has been referred to more than once in stories. The aristocracy live above ground, the workers below, but in normal circumstances they do so in good conditions and are content. They are free to visit the public parks on the surface and have health care and education. Drew’s actions almost undid that content.

I was intending, originally, for it to actually BE Drew doing this of his own accord, but it seemed unlikely that one of the family would go so far to the bad without some alien influence. Even so, the death of Drew is a traumatic event, one of the reasons why I wanted the earlier story, Play Off Final, as a counterbalance.

The race to rescue Humphrey, isn’t part of the main plot, of course. But I wanted it in there just to add a bit of drama and to remind readers of how valuable Humphrey is to Chrístõ and his crew.