New Ceres is precarious: its New Enlightenment constrains society as well as liberating old thoughts and literature and drinking customs. The planet plays interstellar politics to defend its independence and it recruits refugees from Old Earth and the conquered New Alliance planets to maintain some dangerous habits.
New Ceres posits a future world that has chosen to embrace the Age of Enlightenment, and remains entrenched in 18th Century culture and technology almost two hundred years after its foundation. New Ceres has been created as a shared writer world, where characters and themes created may be extended, touched on and elaborated by future authors.
"We've built a tower to be closer to the sun," said Brother Linnaeus.The other three golden monks attending him at his bedside in the votarium murmured their assent. Brother Linnaeus rather wished they wouldn't do that so much, but his temper had been…impetuous…in his younger days. We all have our sins, he thought. How else would we earn forgiveness?
The rococo splendour of the lobby did not faze Padraic, but the thought of selecting his future bride filled him with an unaccustomed nervousness. "How old did you say they are?" he asked. His companion, Dasan, also unimpressed by the finery of their surroundings, gave a slight shrug as their footsteps echoed loudly through the hall. "Not old enough," he said.