All the stories never told

Science fiction author Kage Baker has died, too young, of cancer.

I've been reading her books for so many years that it feels oddly like losing a friend. I loved the world she built; I loved the stories she told, especially the first two, In the Garden of Iden and Sky Coyote. Joseph, Lewis, Mendoza and the rest were astonishing creations, for whom my affection never faltered.

The great thing about the Company novels was that the premise Baker created allowed her and her immortal cyborgs to access any and every point of human history, from the Paleolithic up through 2355. So in Iden, Baker gave us a protagonist who was:

- rescued as a child from the dungeons of the Inquisition
- cybernetically enhanced
- immortal
- educated to 23rd century standards, specialising in botany
- contemptuous and fearful of "mortal monkeys"
- nineteen years old, and utterly without experience

...and turned her loose on sixteenth-century rural England during the reign of Bloody Mary.

Enough from me. Here's Baker's world explained by one of her characters, from the beginning of her first novel; here are some of her stories, viewable or listenable for free; here's a lengthy appreciation by Marty Halpern, who published some of her work.

Farewell, Ms Baker. Ad astra.