A collection of eight prequel stories, set in the distant future of the Earth Girl trilogy (Earth Girl, Earth Star, and Earth Flight) In the year 2788, people use interstellar portals to travel between over a thousand colony worlds scattered across six sectors of space, each with their own contrasting cultures. On the rich worlds of Alpha sector, you aren't considered fully adult until 25, while the frontier worlds of Epsilon sector expect a girl to marry at 17. Clan centred Beta sector is notoriously permissive, while Deltan worlds consider it shocking behaviour to kiss in public. In Kappa...

Amber is one of over a million eighteen-year-olds in one of the great hive cities of twenty-sixth century Earth. She's about to enter the Lottery of 2532, which will assess her abilities and decide her hive level, her profession, her whole future life. Amber's dream is to be level 10 or above, her nightmare is to be a level 99 worker in the depths of the hive. When Lottery discovers Amber is a rare and precious telepath, she must adapt to a new life protecting the people of the crowded hive city. Her job is hunting down criminals before they commit their crimes, but she doesn't know she's...

Into the fire In the year 2788, only the handicapped live on Earth. While everyone else uses interstellar portals to travel between hundreds of colony worlds, 17-year-old Jarra is among the one in a thousand people born with an immune system that cannot survive on other planets. Sent to Earth at birth to save her life, abandoned by her parents to be raised a ward of Hospital Earth, she lives a regimented life in one of their impersonal residences. Tortured by the knowledge the stars are forever out of her reach, Jarra dreams of learning to fly a plane so she can at least make the skies of...

In the year 2519, people on Earth don't grow old and die any longer, their bodies are frozen and they start a new life in the virtual reality of the Game. Jex is almost eighteen, working twelve-hour shifts, and dreaming of when she'll be legally adult and begin her long-planned idyllic life in Game. When a bomber attacks a Game server complex, one of the virtual worlds of Game crashes, and eleven thousand immortal players die during emergency defrost. Death has struck Game for the first time in centuries, and Jex is questioned as a suspect in the bombing. With this on her record, Jex will...