Slow Time Between the Stars (The Far Reaches, #6)

by John Scalzi

They were very pleased when I offered several innovations. Those innovations were ignored in favor of the original design.

Creativity for me was not about passion or bursts of ingenuity, but slow, patient iteration, approaching the problem again and again, over and over, slight variation upon slight variation. I was not programmed to be frustrated, and I saw little reason to build that quality into myself.