I'm thrilled to be a contributor to a unique fiction project: an anthology of diverse short stories intended to inspire the delegates to the recent COP27 Climate Conference. No More Fairy Tales: Stories to Save Our Planet was compiled by Dr. Denise Baden and the folks at the Green Stories writing competitions with the explicit goal of presenting optimistic visions of a future Earth where we've embraced, and creatively addressed, the challenges our planet faces due to climate change. These stories cover the gamut of tones, styles, and genres, with a common theme of solutions grounded in real science. Experts in the relevant scientific disciplines consulted on this project, providing feedback and guidance to the writers so that their works of fiction remained plausible.

In addition to the new, previously unpublished stories, Dr. Baden also achieved the coup of gaining permission to include relevant excerpts of prior work by such science fiction luminaries as Kim Stanley Robinson and Paolo Bacigalupi. I can't describe what an honor it is just to have a story appear in the same anthology that includes these gentlemen!

If the daunting implications of climate change bring you down, give this anthology a read. It just might replace despair with hope. The future can be bright if we all work together to make it so!