"The fifth call for papers by Academia Lunare—the non-fiction arm of Luna Press— Worlds Apart holds fifteen papers by a diversity of commentators. Tenured academics and fiction authors ponder how created or borrowed worlds affect mood, relationships and action.The papers define aspects of fantasy and sci-fi worldbuilding, offering insightful analyses.

For example, Sarah McPherson’s ‘Relationships with the Land’ shows how physical settings become additional characters in fantasy works, where protagonists interact with and embody the landscape of their adventures.In ‘Patrick McGrath’s Ghastly New York’, Tatiana Fajardo charts the social, political and artistic milieus of the historical time periods of McGrath’s ‘Manhattan Tales’. The influence of the gothic sensibilities of Poe and Irving and the psychological maps of Freud underpin McGrath’s fantasy worlds. This mix of the dark and the hidden makes for fascinating reading.Perhaps the most enjoyable paper is Cheryl Morgan’s ‘Worldbuilding with Sex and Gender’, which exhorts science fiction creatives to consider the multitudinous incarnations of gendered sexuality on Planet Earth. Before nonchalantly creating another bipedal, two-gendered, two-breasted species from outer space, suggests Morgan, take a good look at terrestrial mammals, reptiles, insects and arthropods. Their diversity will astound.

The collection contemplates multiple features of worldbuilding—landscape, culture, politics, language—in narrative fiction, but not how or whether worldbuilding in fantasy and sci-fi differs from worldbuilding in other genres such as romance or literary fiction.

This is not a book about how to build worlds fit for speculative fiction projects, but a theoretical commentary that identifies critical features of worldbuilding in speculative fiction. A valuable reference for students, researchers and authors, this petite volume is well worth the time of anyone interested in the production or consumption of fantasy and science fiction." Clare Rhoden - Aurealis #147