Introduction
Hello everybody and welcome to the live question and answer session to go along with the launch of Mountain of Mars, the eighth Starship’s Mage novel. I am Glynn Stewart, the author of Starship’s Mage. Also currently writing the Duchy of Terra, Peacekeepers of Sol, and Scattered Stars: Conviction series. With books on all of those coming out shortly. We’ll talk to the upcoming release schedule later.
Because of the odd times we’re in, it feels like there are certain things that I probably should mention before we get into anything else. I’m in Ontario, Canada, for those that don’t know. And Ontario, Canada is under a state of emergency for Covid-19. There are no open restaurants. Take out and delivery are still available, but most non-essential businesses have closed and we are being strongly encouraged to self-isolate. Both my partner and myself are in high-risk demographics for health issues, so we have actually not left the house since Friday. And short of click-and-collect groceries, an online ordering system our local grocery store uses, that’s not going to change until the advice from our medical officers here in Canada changes.
So I’m a hermit to begin with, so this isn’t that big of a change for us. But it is still hard. It’s scary. The world is going to hell in a handbasket around us, it feels like. But by self-isolating, I protect myself, and I protect my spouse, who has severe asthma and cannot catch this shit. I have pneumonia-triggered heart issues. I cannot catch this shit. In general, I have been following the news and I recommend people do the same as much as your mental health allows.
It’s scary but at least here in Canada it feels like we have got ahead of it and we are flattening the curve. That means a lot if you look at the numbers of what that flattening the curve means versus an unsuppressed, uncontained pandemic. Literally staying home sick can save lives. As a couple people I follow put it, our grandparents were called to go to war and put their bodies, put themselves in danger, we’re being asked to stay home and keep ourselves out of danger. We’re pretty sure we can do that. But it’s hard. I think Chuck Wendig was saying today, it’s like normalcy is at least temporarily dead and that’s a hard thing to deal with.
So, I have a new book so I would suggest going and reading a book to get through quarantine for obvious self-promoting reasons. Our entire catalog is available through Kindle Unlimited. I know I’ve seen a few other authors dropping their prices. I don’t really feel we can do that for assorted reasons. But I do strongly recommend if you’re going to find yourself at home and could be reading a lot, checking out the Kindle Unlimited program is not the worst idea. We get paid reasonably well, not quite as well as a sale. But still relatively well for readthroughs in Kindle Unlimited. And my entire catalog is in there.
As for Faolan’s Pen, as I said my spouse and myself are self-isolating here in Ontario. Both of our staff members are working from home and to a large extent that’s how we operate normally. But still, there are still challenges that come along with this and we are taking them on. Some projects that are being delayed, those haven’t been announced yet. But by and large, the book launch schedule is expected to be maintained. That’s available on the website, glynnstewart.com. Again, I’ll talk to that later around the end of the questions.
I have a number of questions in a Word document here. I’m going to kick off with a reading from Mountain of Mars and I will answer the questions I have and then any questions that are thrown in comments. I believe my team is watching and will poke me on any questions I miss. So without further ado, we shall begin with Mountain of Mars. Chapter one, always a good place to start.
Reading
Click here to read an excerpt from the book.
So, writing this book and talking about this book while I was writing it was hard. Because the very first chapter is a huge spoiler. So consider yourselves spoiled. I mean, I can’t really read from any other section because everything in this book drives from the fact that Desmond Michael Alexander is dead. It’s on the back of the book for a reason. But Mountain of Mars wasn’t the easiest of the books to write in a lot of ways. It was the most… It’s an emotionally brutal book in many ways. Hopefully cathartic for people at this point, people responsible for the bad things that happen here, pay for it.
It’s one of my books, the bad guys don’t win. They don’t always lose entirely either, but they usually don’t win. So yeah, Mountain of Mars is out. I like it. It seems to be selling very well. It hit our highest rank ever on Amazon.com, so thank you all for that. Everyone who’s pre-ordering it and buying it and reading it got us into the rank, I think it was rank 40 in the Amazon store. Excuse me a moment.
Q&A
Q1: “Will there be pressure from the geneticists for Kiera and Damien to have a child?”
And I now I suppose, for the meat of this Q and A, the actual Q and A. As I said earlier and as has been noted in the comments, if you have any questions that come up, feel free to toss them in there. If they’re a duplicate of what I already have in my Word document, obviously I’ll answer them when they’re in my Word document. Otherwise, I will get to them at the end. The first question I have is from Tiuri. I’m sorry, I have seen your name on the Facebook group and I’m still 100% sure I’m pronouncing that incorrectly. So, but, Tiuri is asking, “Will there be pressure from the geneticists for Kiera and Damien to have a child?”
I mean, Kiera’s 16 years old. Stop being a creepy old man. Basically, that is the answer. There is, certainly it is a factor in a point in Mountain of Mars that they’re running out of back-up Runewrights and back-up Alexanders. But certainly no one is expecting a 32, I think, 33, I’m not entirely sure of Damien’s age at this point in Mountain of Mars, have to go look it up. No one’s expecting a 30-plus year old man to have a child with a 16 year old girl. Just no. Just no. Ew. That pretty… But yes, there is a concern there. And there are suggested solutions, most of which are terrible. The comment, it is dealt with in the book.
Q2: “Has the main character’s various injuries fully healed at the start of the book?”
Next question comes from James asking, “Has the main character’s various injuries fully healed at the start of the book?” No. Damien is basically permanently crippled. He will regain over the course… By the time of Mountain of Mars, he’s been healing for about two years, I think, I’m not entirely sure on the timeline. Again, I don’t have the timeline in front of me like I do when I’m writing the book. I think it’s been about two years that he’s been healing. He’s regained some use of his hands. But not a lot. He’s looking at like, three, four, maybe five years before he can even, like, hold a glass comfortably. Well, comfortably is an exaggeration, before he can hold a glass reliably. Comfortably probably isn’t happening. He literally poured melted silver into his hands. That’s not something that you come back from, even with the medical technology of the Protectorate in the 2450s, I believe it is.
Q3: “Has anyone approached you about making an RPG based on this world?”
The next question I have is from Jason. Oops, sorry, I missed one. The next question I have is from Father Morpheus asking, “Has anyone approached you about making an RPG based on this world?” I’ve had a couple… I’ve had one conversation with a friend in that space but nothing ever came of it. Certainly I don’t have the skillset or inclination to produce something like that myself and well, I’m a little busy writing books. I’m certainly not… I’m certainly open to the idea but I’m not planning on… That’s not a project we’re planning on pushing forward ourselves right now.
Q4: “How far are we through the Starship’s Mage plan story-wise?”
The next question is from Jason M., “How far are we through the Starship’s Mage plan story-wise?” It’s not an easy, straightforward answer there. We’re in the second arc. There’s one more book in the second arc: In the Service of Mars. And that mostly deals with Legatus. That wraps up… The book that’s left in the second arc, In the Service of Mars, deals with Legatus primarily… and the Republic of Faith and Reason. So that one will focus significantly more on Roslyn and Jane. I’m currently thinking Jane will probably be a viewpoint character in that book, which she hasn’t been before.
But I’m a couple months away from working on that so all that stuff could change. But there is one more book in this arc. And then I have one more arc [with] probably about four books planned. Beyond that it depends on what I’m seeing, what threads I see in the universe to play with. But I’m looking at about five more books right now [in the main series] and then potentially some much more disconnected side stories. Still working in the setting, but currently five more books is what we’re looking at in the mainline Starship’s Mage. Those books will not all be Damien Montgomery focused. In fact, they will mostly not be Damien Montgomery focused at this point. Damien is going to be tied to a relatively specific set of tasks and responsibilities for the next few books. Ones that don’t really lend themselves to being the centerpoint of the story.
Q5: “Will characters like Captain Rice, Indigo, Julia Amiri, or even Maria Soprano cross paths with Damien?”
Next question is from Big Shadow asking, “Will characters like Captain Rice, Indigo, Julia Amiri, or even Maria Soprano cross paths with Damien?” Not in this book. They have in the past, they probably will again in the future. But not in Mountain of Mars. Big Shadow’s second question is, “Will Major Niska and the Bionic Special Operations Command…” I believe is what BSOC stands for, I don’t remember off the top of my head, “… play a role in Mountain of Mars?” No. Niska shows up early on but Niska has another role to play in the setting, that does not come anywhere near Mars.
Q6: “There is a rule mentioned in a couple previous books saying that there was only one RTA per system, but Mars has three and there’s a Core world that’s mentioned that has built two.”
The next question is from Gregory asking about the RTAs, “There is a rule mentioned in a couple previous books saying that there was only one RTA per system, but Mars has three and there’s a Core world that’s mentioned that has built two.” Yes. Through the entire series Tau Ceti has had two Runic Transceiver Arrays and Mars has had three. And Sol has had three. Mars does not have three RTAs. There is one Runic Transceiver on Mars, one Runic Transceiver on Earth, and one Runic Transceiver on Ganymede. But there are three in the solar system. And then there are two in Tau Ceti, one on each of the inhabited planets. The general rule though is one RTA per system because the Runic Transceiver Array has a very large catchment area.
To have two, you have to have the RTAs talking to each other on an ongoing basis. Not just the Transceiver Mage at RTA One calls the Transceiver Mage at RTA Two, and says, “Hey we’re taking these calls, can you map here.” No, it’s like, the runes of the two matrices have to be talking to each other and to build the second one you have to know everything about the first one. So, Tau Ceti did it, it took them, I think the date might be… the timeframe might be given in one of the books. To build a second Runic Transceiver Array in Tau Ceti was a project on a similar scale to Centurion Accelerator Ring. Except they did it with hundreds of mages. Not tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of regular construction workers.
And they did it with tens of thousands of regular construction workers. It was very… To balance a Runic Transceiver Array without a Runewright was a near impossible task. They’ve done it once. And they’re currently looking at Sol going, “How did you do three?” And they did three because they had Runewrights. And the Runewrights have only, so far, they’ve only integrated Runewrights into that process once to build the three in Sol. And that is why the general rule is, yes, one RTA per system, like all rules it can be broken. It just takes a great deal of effort or… It either takes hundreds of Rune Scribes and a massive amount of effort or a couple of Runewrights and a massive amount of effort. In neither case is it a fast or straightforward process.
Q7: “What is the timing for the Audible release of Mountain of Mars?”
The next question is the inevitable one from Jim asking, “What is the timing for the Audible release of Mountain of Mars?” Nothing has been confirmed yet. A timeline between the Kindle and audio release seems to be stretching right now, and with everything going on with Covid-19, I don’t know if that’s going to impact things. I know a couple of release dates coming up for books that have already been written. Like I know the release date for Conviction and Crusade are coming up. I don’t have a release date yet for Mountain of Mars. I would guess we’re looking at June or July at the earliest. And quite possibly August or September. Potentially even later depending on the whole pandemic.
Q8: “Does teleporting another person/cat, still make them sick like it did to Amiri and Niska in earlier books? Why or why not?”
Question from Mike is, “Does teleporting another person/cat, still make them sick like it did to Amiri and Niska in earlier books? Why or why not?” It’s a question of distance, expectation, warning, and practice. So, if you’re teleported a significant distance with no warning and never having done it before, you’re going to be sick. If you’re teleported a meter from a desk to the ground, as happens to Persephone a bunch of the time, you’re probably not going to be sick. Especially if that’s the 10th, 15th, 30th time it happens. If you’re human and you have the warning of, “I’m about to be teleported,” it’s usually not so bad either because it’s basically an inner ear thing. Your brain is freaking the fuck out suddenly being somewhere else. If you know that’s coming, it’s not as bad. If you’ve practiced this in a way that the Royal Guard have, it’s again less severe. So most mages who can teleport themselves won’t be bothered by being teleported by somebody else so long as they have the head’s up that it’s coming.
Q9: “Why, if the amplifier in the mountain is that powerful, why didn’t Desmond use it to protect the Council station instead of Damien injuring himself?”
The next question is from Pete A. asking, “Why, if the amplifier in the mountain is that powerful, why didn’t Desmond use it to protect the Council station instead of Damien injuring himself?” Desmond wasn’t in a position to. I don’t remember the exact details off the top of my head but Desmond wasn’t in the amplifier when all of this went down. And at the time when they realized that this was the situation, there was no time.
Remember also that they didn’t have real time communication. So, the Council station is about five minutes’ transmission lag, I don’t remember the exact time…distance there. But the Council station is a significant time lag transmission-wise from Mars. So for them to…they’d have to send a message to Mars, get the Mage-King who currently at that moment was thinking the situation was under control, into the amplifier, have him bring up the amplifier and take control of it and have him act. They didn’t have the time. By the time they realized that that ship was on a collision course, they had maybe 10 or 15 minutes. And they weren’t sure they’d have the time, so Damien acted.
He saved lives. It’s what Damien does. It’s not a question of… With the amplifier basically, its problem is, it is not omniscient. It gives a massive amount of visibility and a massive amount of power, but it does not give omniscience. It’s referred to a few times as making the person on the throne of God inside the solar system. The biggest shortfall is they’re not omniscient. The amplifier and its simulacrum… The simulacrum actually has a time lag. It’s not significant, but it exists. And so, if someone’s attacking Sol with a fleet, you’ve got time to act, to get someone into the amplifier and remove that fleet. If there’s a ship 10 minutes from collision with the Council station, you don’t have time to call Mars and hope that the Mage-King gets into the amplifier in time. So you act with the resources you have. In that case, Damien’s runes and a room full of mages.
Q10: Many authors use playlists to get them in the mood for their current writing projects. Do you approach each of your various series with the same viewpoint or does it change from one to another? If different, what would you be able to add to the playlist for your current ongoing series?”
The next question, my second last, so, please feel free to throw questions in the comments, is from Dave. “Many authors use playlists to get them in the mood for their current writing projects. Do you approach each of your various series with the same viewpoint or does it change from one to another? If different, what would you be able to add to the playlist for your current ongoing series?”
I basically have five or six thousand, someone’s PM-ing me sorry… Five or six thousand questions in… Sorry… Blah. Five or six thousand songs in a…
(technical difficulties for Glynn)
Okay. Sorry, I’m being told there are comments popping up that I am apparently not seeing. I love the internet, I love Facebook, I swear.
But I have about five thousand songs in a playlist in a program called MusicBee, which I started using after iTunes was saying that they were going to convert stuff over to a streaming service. And then I was using Google Play, which is apparently going to convert over to a streaming service. And I really would like people to just let me buy MP3s and stick them in the library. But currently I’m using MusicBee and I don’t have split out playlists, everything is just one giant playlist. I’ll skip over stuff that doesn’t fit my current mood. So, that’s basically where I’m at there. I don’t really look for new music to add to my playlist for specific projects. Most of my music is picked up from YouTube recommends. It shows me here’s this song like other things you’d listen to, and I click on it and I like it or I don’t. If I like it I go listen to everything else by the artist and then I go buy the music.
Q11: “You obviously have quality connections with science nerds. If I were to guess for timeline how many years out are such things as Alcubierre drives, quantum entangled communications, zero point cells, and massive engines.”
John is asking the last question I have. I’m apparently going to be getting a bunch of questions forwarded to me in a moment and we’ll get to those we when get them. Saying, “You obviously have quality connections with science nerds.” You’re assuming a lot there. “If I were to guess for timeline how many years out are such things as Alcubierre drives, quantum entangled communications, zero point cells, and massive engines.” Fudge. I don’t know. Alcubierre, I know, we’re doing some very crude basic experimentation with that are basically around: is this a thing that can even be possible?
I don’t have internet. Okay, my computer is being very weird. I really hope this is going out because it’s telling me in one screen that I don’t have internet. We’re doing some very basic stuff still in that project for the Alcubierre stuff, testing concepts, certain particles and such that should be showing up. If it’s possible. I don’t know what’s going on with those experiments, they’re very esoteric. So, that I still wouldn’t expect to see anything in the next hundred years. Quantum entangled communications, our current science suggests that that’s not possible, unfortunately. It’s something I still use in my fiction because it was believed to be possible five or 10 years ago, but we now know that it probably most certainly isn’t. Zero point energy is the same thing. Something that we once thought was potentially a possibility we now know is not.
The massive engines on ships, to a certain extent, are a matter of engineering. The concepts exist. We understand how to build a fusion engine in theory. Just like we understand how to build a fusion reactor in theory. Both of these are things being worked on by various people in various places. I know there’s a company in… Sorry, I’m now trying to follow a Slack conversation where people are getting me the comments that are being posted that I’m not seeing because I’m having weird internet glitches.
Yep. So I know that there is a company in England that’s working on an early phase fusion ion engine, which is basically what is being used in a bunch of places in my fiction. But that’s where we’re at. Fusion reactors again, there’s about four different projects. Lockheed Martin, it’s their Skunkworks group is working on a micro plant, that’s a thing we’ve been working. There’s a micro fusion plant that Lockheed Martin is working on and then there are several large projects in Europe. So far, we’ve yet to achieve a fusion plant that produces more power than we put into it. I figure that one’s going to be 20 years away till suddenly we’ve got it, is pretty much where I figure we’re at with fusion. The rest of it is gone. It’s stuff we now know isn’t possible.
I’m really concerned that this might not be going out at all at this point, but… Peter is apparently asking if, “Why Des the Fourth wasn’t using it?” Exact same problem, you don’t have him in the amplifier. He’s not there. Okay. The heir is not generally in there.
Q12: “Mountain felt short, what was the thinking behind focusing the whole novel on the investigation?”
Someone’s asking, “Mountain felt short, what was the thinking behind focusing the whole novel on the investigation?” Mountain is not short. It’s a 90,000 word novel. That was the thing, that was the story that needed to be told there. The transition between Damien as Hand and active troubleshooter, and Damien as Lord Regent and chained to a desk, I felt was critical enough. It’s a critical enough pivot point in the series that it needed a book of its own. And what originally there were supposed to be… Originally the books Mountain of Mars and what will be In the Service of Mars, were intended to be one book.
And then I realized that Mountain of Mars, the entire plot line of Mountain of Mars takes place in about three weeks, and In the Service of Mars takes place over about… is going to take place over about six months to a year. So if I made them the same book, Damien would show up for the first third of it and basically disappear for the last two thirds. It made more sense, especially given that I did want to get into the investigation, I did want to get into and really cover the transition between “Damien as roving troubleshooter and Kiera as the spare” to “Damien as Lord Regent and Kiera as the Queen.” That development of those two characters I felt needed that focus.
I’m not seeing anything else in here. I think that is the last of my questions but I’m not getting… Yeah, I’m apparently having technical difficulties here with my various software pieces which is always entertaining. Hopefully I’m still coming through, but I’m not getting…but I think that’s… I’m not getting the Facebook comments, and Slack is telling me it can’t connect.
Q13: “How did the plot about this series first appear in your mind?”
Okay, someone is apparently asking, “How did the plot about this series first appear in your mind?” I think that’s been asked before. And it basically boiled down to… In science fiction, you’re making up stuff anyway. You have to be. Like, we don’t have a means in our current science that we think would allow for FTL travel. This question’s from Simon about how did…
(Technical difficulties)
Okay. Sorry, we’re having… I’m getting stuff, some stuff here, some stuff is being passed to me physically, it’s… and always entertaining. Hopefully I’m keeping you lot entertained too, I can’t tell if you’re saying things to me, I’m not seeing. I’m seeing some stuff through on Slack.
(Technical difficulties)
All right, we think we know what’s going on. No, we have no idea what’s going on. We think the questions at least are getting through. So the series began out of if, we’re hand waving anyway to create the FTL, well, A Wizard Did It. It’s a trope on TV Tropes, where whatever is going on is explained by “a wizard did it.” So you have, there’s the Minovsky particle where you’ve got the one thing that justifies all of your fancy tech. The mass manipulators in Castle Federation, for example. Or Element Zero in Mass Effect, that kind of thing. So for Starship’s Mage it was just like screw it, a wizard, literally, a wizard did it. All of our fancy tech that’s beyond stuff we can reasonably project is magic.
And from there everything else sort of fell into place around that concept. And then various things came along from there. The Eugenicists and everything around them fell into place. I wrote a short story a long time ago now, 2012 I think, that got turned into the first Starship’s Mage novella. And then everything kind of exploded from there. We’re at 11 novels. We’re over a million words of Starship’s Mage now I’m pretty sure. So that feels like a lot.
Q14: “So The Service of Mars shifts to a new perspective?”
Nate asks, “So The Service of Mars shifts to a new perspective?” Yes. Service of Mars will potentially have Damien in it but it will primarily be from Roslyn Chambers’ perspective. Because Damien’s chained to a desk. And I’m not going to do Honor Harrington and try and come up with reasons why a character who should be at home doing her job is out screwing around doing dumb shit. So Roslyn will be our viewpoint character for at least In the Service of Mars, and then I will kind of reassess what I will be doing with the next arc. The current plan is the next arc will be primarily Roslyn. But we shall see.
Q14: “You should set up a Discord server.”
Someone else suggested that we set up a Discord server. No. I am too easily distracted. When I’m working I literally have everyone from my cats to my spouse locked out of my office. I have to block out social media. I have to block out Slack chat for the Faolan’s Pen team. I have to block out a lot to be able to work. Adding a Discord server to that just sounds like adding a distraction from hell to me. So, it’s not anything I’m currently planning on doing.
Q15: “Will Damien ever need to get his Runes back?”
And Nate is now asking, “Will Damien ever need to get his Runes back?” Need? Maybe. Will he? I don’t know. I currently don’t have anything currently planned around Damien regaining his Runes. There are options there that haven’t been delved into, in terms of what he can do. He hasn’t felt it necessary to really take the risks of experimenting. For him to get his Runes back he’d have to experiment with placements of them or even redoing them on his hands and especially with the level of injury to his hands, that’s not something he wants to risk experimenting with.
Upcoming Releases
So I think that is everything we have. Assuming I’m not missing questions. I’m not quite sure why my internet’s being this weird but that’s where we’re at. The last thing I want to touch on while I’m waiting for more questions to get thrown at me, if anyone does, is our upcoming release schedule. I’m not sure how far out we’ve got on the website off the top of my head. But I have a list for a while. Currently, in April we will be launching Relics of Eternity which is the seventh Duchy of Terra book. That is written. That is actually done and with proofreaders at this point. Early in June we will be launching the Peacekeeper Initiative, which is the second Peacekeepers of Sol book.
I am almost done that one. It should be done very shortly and go off to copy editors and so forth. In July, we will be launching Deception the second Scattered Stars: Conviction book with Kira Demirci. That one is next up on my plate. There is one project I’m going to try and squeeze in between Peacekeeper Initiative and Deception, but I don’t want to talk about that one just yet. Just because who knows what’s going to happen with it with everything. And then the one everyone cares about today, The Service of Mars is targeted to launch September 1st. Followed by Shadows of the Fall, the eighth Duchy of Terra book in October and the third Peacekeeper book in November. And that’s actually the rest of the 2020 release schedule right now.
We might try and squeeze, depending on what goes up, I’m hoping to have either something for May or August but it will depend on how the next couple of weeks go with the end of the world and all that. Certainly we do have six more books scheduled to launch this year already and I’m looking forward to sharing that work with you. I’m well ahead for once, which is good, because the world decided to explode and that may cause me some problems over the next few weeks, we’ll see.
I think that is all of my questions, I’ve got someone saying, “Love the books.” Thank you very much Matthew. I’m quite pleased with Mountain of Mars, especially the response to Mountain of Mars so far. It’s kind of funny, the books with the Starship’s Mage series that I’m most hesitant about are often the ones that people seem to like the most but that’s just the case of here’s where we’re at to a certain extent. I have a million words of Starship’s Mage and it’s starting to feel a little, I don’t know. I’m glad you guys are still liking, are liking them. I’m not burning out on the Starship’s Mage. I am a little bit burned out potentially with Damien Montgomery himself. But that’s how things go.
Q16: “Would it be too spoiler-y to say if Roslyn might be a good Hand?”
Someone is asking, “Would it be too spoiler-y to say if Roslyn might be a good Hand?” She might be. But she might be better off for the Protectorate where she is. Or where she will end up. She is a naval officer and she is currently still a rather larval naval officer but as the books come along that will change.
Q17: “Will the next book be Damien focused?”
Matthew is asking for a hint about the next book will look like and if it is Damien focused. The next book will probably not be Damien focused, it will be focused on Roslyn Chambers and Jane Alexander dealing with what’s left of the Republic of Faith and Reason. And the fact that the Republic of Faith and Reason never expected to hold Legatus. And I think that’s as much as I really am going to say about it right now.
Closing Remarks
In any case, I think that I am going to call it there. I have been chattering on for 45 minutes and I still need to actually get some work done today. Books, they don’t write themselves. It would be nice. I hope everyone is staying home if you can, staying safe. There’s a lot of talk out about social distancing and it is the right thing to be doing right now. You might be okay, but someone else used the comparison of a Hoplite for me. Hoplites wore their armor for themselves. They carried their shields for the line. Social distancing isn’t for you. Social distancing is for the vulnerable people around you. It will help keep you safe. But it will also keep your parents safe. And your friends who are sick safe. The asthma sufferers you know. The people with heart issues. The people with lung issues. These people are all more vulnerable and by protecting ourselves, by doing the social distancing, by keeping that two meters of distance, by coughing into your sleeve and all of that stuff we are buying those people a level of safety they might not otherwise have.
And we’re buying time for the outbreak to work its way through the population in a way that doesn’t overwhelm the medical system. We don’t want people to die because too many people need ventilators at a given moment. And I know that you’re hearing this social distancing spiel from everybody right now and there’s a reason for it, it’s because it’s what we have to do. I’ve seen numbers suggesting that if we don’t, even if we do it, we’re looking at millions of dead in North America. And if we don’t do it, we’re looking at millions more. We have to take every precaution we can, because I don’t want to live in a world where we let six to 10 million people die because we couldn’t follow the instructions to just stay home. And work from home. And be careful. It’s scary and it should be scary.
And what I want more than anything else is in six months to be able to sit down and look back and go, yeah it looks like we overreacted. I want the luxury to be able to say we overreacted. And the way we buy that luxury is by doing everything we can. So again, stay safe, listen to your medical professionals. If where you are is anything like here, you’ve got a senior medical bureaucrat, most likely, they’re called chief medical officers here, and I think it’s a similar title in most states, giving announcements every day as to what the right thing to do is. Listen to them. They’ve spent years acquiring the skills and the knowledge to be able to tell you what the right thing to do is.
I’ve spent years learning to be good writer so I write the books you guys like. They spent years learning how to deal with epidemics like this. So let’s listen to them. And let’s take care of ourselves and take care of each other. I’ll be back in a few months with another one of these [Q&As], I don’t believe we’re planning on doing one for Relics of Eternity at this point. And we’re moving towards, I think, doing them quarterly. So I will be back probably in June with the launch of Peacekeeper Initiative, I think is my current plan. So, everybody take care of yourselves. I will talk to you again. Bye.
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