Goldilocks Twins

A few days ago, I ran across an article about Keplar-62-e and Keplar-62-f, two planets slightly larger than Earth that are circling the same star (Kepler-62) and are both in the 'Goldilocks Zone'. The Goldilocks Zone is a band of space orbiting stars where the temperature allows a planet to have liquid water, and thus, it is assumed the planet could possibly support life as we know it.

Can you imagine what it would be like, to have another habitable planet in your solar system? In the case of 62e and 62f, their orbits are so close (closer than Earth and Mars) that one would be a little warm, the other rather nippy. It is speculated that the warmer one might feel like Hawaii or possibly DC in May, while the cooler one would be more like Alaska. I think we could probably find people willing to colonize both of those possibilities.

I have a story universe that deals with this possibility. I'm pretty sure other authors have postulated the possibility of 2 habitable planets in one planetary system, although I cannot name any off the top of my head. In my version, the inner planet is warm and fairly dry, kind of like eastern Colorado, and has an intelligent dominant specie. The cooler planet is more humid, with lush flora, maybe like Montana, and has no dominant intelligent specie.

The people of Planet 1 have no interest in space travel, and visitors from other planets are greeted coolly. There is no general interest in most of the merchandize offered by other planets. Occasionally an individual tribal chief might be intrigued by some trinket or another, and can be cajoled into exchanging a slave or two for that trinket.

But most of the civilized planets do not condone slavery. Accepting slaves is seen as a rescue, the former slaves are retrained and assisted to readjust to a new kind of life. And eventually, those former slaves gather together and colonize the cooler planet.

If I understand the Keplar numbering system correctly, there are 4 other planets in the Goldilocks twin system, discovered before these 'habitable' planets. Sibling planets of the twins, but assumed barren. Of course, there's always the possibility of life as we don't know it.

Trudy's Universes, Part 4

I’m going to try and wrap up this list this time. We’re getting into Universes that I don’t seem to visit very often.

O is for Orange Witch. Another fantasy universe. The protagonist is a newly-graduated witch who likes to wear orange. I dreamed up this universe more than 3 decades ago, and haven’t done much with it since.

S is for Spooks. This is where I keep any paranormal projects I might be working on. For me, paranormal includes ghosts, witches, vampires, werewolves, zombies and the like. I don’t write horror, so there isn’t much in this universe. And if I start a project here, and it really grabs hold of me, that project tends to emerge and form its own universe.

T is for Tunad. Tunad is a planet that is secretly colonized by females from a sister planet, Danut. The society of Danut is male-centered, and the females are slaves. Some female individuals are taken off-world by enlightened aliens, taught to think for themselves, and to make use of their skills, and eventually, a number of these are deposited on Tunad to form their own colony. I haven’t written in this universe much, but I love playing with the background; the colonists, the layout of the colony…

W&V is for Wolfie & Vamps. Okay, I’ve already listed one universe centered around a werewolf and vampire team, but actually, this werewolf & vampire universe has been around longer than that other one. This team is female, and their history goes a lot further back in history.

X is for X-Files. Loved the TV show, didn’t find the books to have the same impact. I have a couple projects started here, but I’m just not sure I can do justice to this particular genre.

There you go, my universes. I didn’t used to have this many. Some of these are probably on the path to fading out of existence. There’s always the possibility I will add new ones. But that’s my list right now, early in 2013.