The Ship With No Name

In PROVIDENCE, did the main ship have a name? If so, I somehow missed it :( Several other Providence-class vessels were named.

StarMan

You’re right! It surely has a name, but we never find out what it is. Everyone calls it “the ship.”

This is one of those oh-so-clever arty author choices, so sorry about that. The idea is to make
the ship feel a little more mysterious, more like the fabric of the environment (like “the earth”
or “the air”), and also emblematic of the whole collection of AI ships in general. Because, not
to get too spoiler-y, there is no real difference between one ship, all the
ships, and the corporation that makes the ships. I encourage you to view them all as a single
entity.

That goes for the salamanders, too. And maybe the humans! The crew are individuals,
but they’re also cogs in the wheel of a military war machine, which grinds toward a
particular outcome regardless of the hopes/dreams/desires of each person. So from the perspective
of a salamander, or a ship, there may be no practical difference between the people, either.

I’m not a big believer in oh-so-clever arty author devices, because I feel like the worst thing
you can do to a reader is remind them they’re reading a book. But if I can slip in something
like this without you noticing, I’ll do it.

Providence is out in sexy-looking paperback in just a few days!
Find a copy here.