Latest in the big list of surprising things that have surprised me is news that two of my favourite authors, Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter are working on a collaboration.
I would never in a million years have expected a collaboration between these two particular authors. I was going to write a post about how to Baxter, the universe is a cold, dark place that cares nothing for humanity and its interests because it *cannot* care, whilst to Pratchett uh...
Actually, to Pratchett the universe is also a cold, dark place that cares nothing blah blah blah; he says as much repeatedly, especially in the books with Death as a major character. To him, people are what create the islands of warmth and light in an uncaring universe, even if "warmth" and "light" are just concepts we make up to feel better about ourselves.
And whilst Baxter's universes are generally bleak and uncaring backdrops against which we labour for naught in the face of oblivion, even his characters manage changes for the better; they end a futile ten-thousand year long war that has consumed tens of trillions of human lives, or they may manage to help build a defence against a galaxy-spanning catastrophe that will extinguish all intelligent life, even if they can't stop the more immediate catastrophe that's going to kill off all the intelligent life in the Orion Arm, including Homo Sap.
So really, both Pratchett and Baxter are deep-down optimists in a realist world.
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