Communion Of Dreams

Via Phil Plait, news that in observation of the 10th anniversary of the Cassini launch, NASA has just released a bunch of very cool images and vids from the probe. Given that I set the bulk of Communion of Dreams there in the neighborhood of Saturn, I always find it stunning to see actual images which reflect what I envisioned. In particular, the scene in the book when the first research team is approaching Titan is perfectly caught in this image. Wow.

And here’s a passage from Plait’s post which precisely echoes my own sentiments, and would be prophetic if Communion was real rather than fiction:

We don’t go to these exotic locations in the solar system because we know everything that’s going on, or because we know what we’ll expect to see. We go because we don’t know. But we also go because we need to have our positions rattled, our notions shaken, our ideas tested. When we see Saturn from above, or co-orbit with a moon, or see a rainbow reflected in particles of ice a billion kilometers away, the only thing we can be sure of is that we’ll see new things, unexpected things.

Unexpected things, indeed.

Jim Downey