I learned to love science fiction at an early age since my father introduced me to Star Trek. Since then, I've explored many different types of science fiction stories and I fell in love with a lot of different science fiction worlds. And thus my fandoms include Star Trek, Dune, Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, and most recently Doctor Who. Science fiction is a core part of my geekery.
While listening to the Audible version of Leonard: My Fifty-Year Friendship with a Remarkable Man as written and narrated by William Shatner. I've just gotten to the part when he starts talking about Leonard Nimoy joining the cast of Star Trek and it's some great material indeed. As if I didn't love Spock enough already, this endears him to me even more. The world is a sadder place without Leonard Nimoy in it.
I've always wanted to write science fiction stories, but then it always seems like such a struggle to write science fiction. I think I get overly distracted by wanting to ground my stories in some amount of actual science and thus the more I learn, the more my stories feel wrong. Then when it comes to trying to play in the worlds of established franchises like when playing the Doctor Who RPG, I'm still at a bit of a loss as to what adventures to shape. And so we get back to the conundrum of not knowing what stories to tell.
But listening to the stories of the earl days of Star Trek remind me of one of the greatest aspects of science fiction that I've come to love over the years - how science fiction is used to explore complex social issues by using far off worlds and exotic aliens to stand as placeholders for things.
Is that the secret? Do I need to find something that I want to provide commentary about? Is it more than just wanting to create a story around a cool scene?
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