The Sharers are immensely sophisticated in the life sciences, but have eschewed all unnatural technology. The huge and complex ecosystem of Shora is inhabited by the Sharers, an all female race who reproduce by parthenogensis, without males. Thousands of years in the future in a distant part of the galaxy, lies the planet Shora, entirely covered by a world-spanning ocean. She continues the tradition with A Door into Ocean. Richard Langsmith at Milliemodels has done some awesome interpretations of The Highest Frontier, including a spacehab model, Frontera 3D.Joan Slonczewski's first novel, Still Forms on Foxfield, made the Locus list of distinguished first novels and was a nominee for best novel of the year. For arts and humanities majors she teaches the notorious course Biology in Science Fiction. She contributes to the nation’s economy by employing students to conduct research on bacteria in extreme acid or base, like the stomach or pancreas respectively. The brain-dwelling microbes convince artists to paint scandalous art (scandalous to a microbe).īesides writing books, Joan teaches microbiology at Kenyon College, authoring with John Foster the textbook Microbiology: An Evolving Science.

The new planet Prokaryon has intelligent natives–but where? In Brain Plague, intelligent microbes invade human brains and establish microbial cities. The Children Star continues the “Elysium cycle” with a mystery planet, settled by impoverished children from an overcrowded world. Daughter of Elysium continues the Sharers’ story, in a saga encompassing several planets and a population that live for a thousand years. The book depicts an ocean world run by genetic engineers called Sharers who repel an interstellar invasion using methods similar to Tahrir Square. Joan’s classic A Door into Ocean was cited by Isaac Asimov for its theme of pacifist revolution. The ultraphytes evolve like an RNA virus–which is a lot more bizarre than normal evolution, with alarming results. Their space habitat is run by a tribal casino and protected from ultraphytes (UV-photosynthesizing aliens) by Homeworld Security.

In The Highest Frontier, student-athletes go out in space to Frontera College, where they discover how to save planet Earth. Two of Joan’s books won the Campbell Award for Best Science Fiction Novel: The Highest Frontier, and A Door into Ocean. Joan Slonczewski has a web page at Kenyon College, and email.

A Door Into Ocean by Joan Slonczewski