16 votes
Accepted

Is the Descolada based on an actual virus?

No. The Descolada's pathology makes no sense for a real-world virus. First of all, "changing random genes" would result in death from all the infected cells dying in the body long before an ...
ApproachingDarknessFish's user avatar
10 votes
Accepted

Why don't the piggies plant a seed when they kill Pipo and Libo?

DISCLAIMER: this is all from my memories of reading these books many times as a teenager, and it's possible that I have remembered the details wrong. Other folks should feel free to dispute this ...
Michael Seifert's user avatar
9 votes

What is the Speaker for the Dead cover depicting?

Spaceships doing generic spaceshippy stuff But I also hated the cover on my bestselling book, because the art came from a game sold in the UK and it depicted spaceships doing generic spaceshippy ...
ibid's user avatar
  • 93.6k
6 votes
Accepted

The founding of Starways Congress

Starways Congress had control over the ansibles. The far-flung colonized worlds were self sufficient, but the human need to belong to a greater community and receive the scientific and cultural ...
aherocalledFrog's user avatar
1 vote

Is the Descolada based on an actual virus?

Transmittable cancers While they don't randomly change the genome everywhere, cancer cells do represent a mutation of the existing genes. And in particular, the transmissible cancer known as Devil ...
personjerry's user avatar

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