Gravity

Barnes & Noble.com: Tess, thanks for taking the time to share with us some of your thoughts and experiences with regard to your latest thriller, Gravity. The concept you've created here is both fascinating and horrifying and utilizes science from the fields of molecular biology, virology, medical technology, space exploration, and marine biology, to name a few. It appears you've done a great deal of homework researching both the facts and the possibilities. Without giving away the true horror behind the menace in Gravity, can you speculate on just how feasible the scenario you created might be in real life?
Tess Gerritsen: When I wrote Gravity, my No. 1 goal was to create a scenario that was completely plausible. With that in mind, I made certain that everything that goes wrong aboard the space station actually could go wrong in real life, from the escape of the organism into the space station's air to the series of disasters that befall the station and later the orbiter, to the political crisis that envelops NASA as a result. While the DNA-stealing organism, "Chimera," is of course fictional, it is in fact modeled on a real microbe -- Archaeons, which dwell in some of earth's most inhospitable environments. When I first learned about these amazing organisms, thriving in superheated waters at the bottom of the ocean, my first thought was: "What if you brought these things up from that high-pressure environment and put them in weightlessness? What if they began to change? What if they began to assume their real shape because they are not, in fact, of this earth?" That's how the plot of Gravity was born.
The details about NASA, the shuttle, and the space station were all based on months of research and conversations with NASA sources. The space station in Gravity is based on the blueprints of the actual International Space Station, which is now being launched in increments. The details about environmental control, orbital docking, commercial rockets, EVA's are all based on fact. The book has since been read by a NASA engineer and a flight surgeon, and both of them have told me how amazed they are that I managed to get it right. As the engineer said about my scenes in Mission Control, "I've been there, done that, and that's how it is!"

bn.com: It's certainly effective! You've combined some very graphic horror -- such as dead bodies, blood and guts, and a few hair-raising descriptions of some pretty nasty ways to die -- with cerebral horrors like the anticipation of certain death, isolation, loneliness, helplessness, and fighting an enemy one can neither see nor understand. So what scares Tess Gerritsen?
TG: Airplanes! Heights! I'm definitely a land-based humanoid.

bn.com: Several of the characters in Gravity have had a lifelong dream of becoming an astronaut and traveling the stars. Would you go to space if you were given the chance?
TG: Okay, I confess. Despite my fear of heights, I wanted to be an astronaut! I think most of us have had that dream, especially those of us who spent many happy hours as children watching Star Trek. If I were given the chance (say, if NASA decides to launch a "novelist in space"), you can bet I'd be ready to go. However (and I say this as a sober-minded parent), I can also say that the risks would make me think long and hard about it. Space is not a place for amateurs and certainly not a place for starry-eyed novelists. It takes training and skills to be an astronaut. To say that anyone can just strap himself or herself in and lift off is like saying anyone can perform brain surgery in ten easy lessons. Space travel, as it now exists, is a job for professionals.

bn.com: Do you envision a day when space travel may become commonplace?
TG: Yes, I do. Commercial space travel is now in development, with a number of private aerospace firms building reusable launch vehicles that can send smaller payloads to space, including passengers. I recently saw that one company is already taking reservations for future passengers willing to pay for a trip into orbit!

bn.com: By placing a lot of your action on a space station where help and rescue are days away, escape is impossible, and the lack of gravity adds a new layer of terror to some of the more graphic scenes, you add a whole new dimension to the "ordinary" horrors of medicine and science run amok. Where did you get the idea to combine all these elements?
TG: I've always been fascinated by the space program. I vividly recall hearing the broadcast of Neil Armstrong taking his first steps on the moon, and even now, just thinking about that moment can still bring tears to my eyes. Then, about two years ago, I was traveling in Europe when I heard news about the collision between Progress and Mir. I remember thinking: Three men are about to die up there. And it occurred to me that that must be the ultimate horror, to be facing the prospect of your own death, trapped in space, while the whole world can follow the final moments of your life. With more research came more elements of horror: What is it like to die of explosive decompression? How do you deal with a medical emergency in weightlessness? What happens to blood as it pours out of an exsanguinating body in a space station? Earthbound horrors are magnified in the hostile environment of space.

bn.com: They certainly are! Your descriptions of the way things behave in a weightless environment (some of them things we wouldn't want to encounter in any environment!) were very vivid and often quite spooky. What sort of research did you do to create those scenes?
TG: I read everything there was to read about life in microgravity. I read astronauts' accounts, NASA reports, space medicine textbooks. I combed research publications about microbial and tissue culture behavior in space. I spoke to flight surgeons about emergency medicine in orbit. After a while, I actually began to dream about weightlessness (those were amazing dreams, too!), and when writing a scene that takes place aboard the station, it became second nature to me to envision everything without gravity. After I finished the book, it took months for those dreams of weightlessness to go away.

bn.com: Obviously there was a lot of hard work and lengthy research that went into the writing of this book. What parts of the writing process were the most fun? And which parts were the most drudgery?
TG: The research for Gravity was absolutely the most fun part of creating the story. Since I have such a deep interest in the space program, digging into the details of NASA was like playtime for me. Getting the inside tour of Mission Control, having the chance to talk to people at Johnson Space Center -- these are the sorts of experiences that remind me how lucky I am to be a writer!
As for the drudgery of writing, of course there's always that aspect of the work. Books don't write themselves: There's months and months of just plain putting pen to paper. And there are days when I don't know where to go with the story or how to get my characters out of the awful situation I've put them in. I admit, when I got to the climax of Gravity, I didn't know how to save Emma. It took several weeks of sleepless nights and lots of hand-wringing to come up with the answer.

bn.com: There were parts of Gravity where the flavor of the story felt like Stephen King and Michael Crichton were taking a once-in-a-lifetime journey with Carl Sagan. What writers do you think have influenced you the most in your writing career? And who are some of your favorites to read?
TG: Both Stephen King and Michael Crichton were definitely big influences for me: King because he can look right into the heart of a character and put that character on the page, in living, breathing color; Crichton because he proved that science can be entertaining. But I'm a voracious reader of just about every genre, from historical novels to science fiction. Just show me good writing!

bn.com: Speaking of characters, your heroine, Emma Watson, is wonderful: tough yet soft, bright yet not beyond making mistakes, confident but not cocky, and just flawed enough to make her very human. How much of Tess Gerritsen is there in Emma? And how much of you is there in any character you create?
TG: There's a little of me in every heroine I create. I think most of my heroines have similar traits. They try their best, but they sometimes fail, or they make honest mistakes. In other words, yes, they are human. They are not perfect. That's where I most easily identify with my characters -- where the flaws come in. Emma, I confess, is quite a bit braver than I would ever be. Faced with the crisis she faces aboard the space station, I would probably decompensate!

bn.com: The underlying love story in Gravity is incredibly sweet, a bit painful, and truly moving in that Jack ends up making the ultimate sacrifice in the name of his love for Emma. As someone who started out writing romances, what do you think is the importance of love in life?
TG: The love story is, in truth, the main focus of Gravity. Yes, it's a biotech thriller, but it is first and foremost the story of two people who are desperately in love trying to find their way back to each other, even if it means reaching across the void of space. I don't think there is any more powerful human emotion than love. All I have to do is consider what I would be willing to face in order to protect my children, and the answer is...anything.

bn.com: In your first medical thriller, Harvest, your theme was murder for stolen organs and the black market sales of same. In both Life Support and Bloodstream the culprit was a contagion of some sort. What do you think poses the greatest medical threat to humankind today?
TG: Our own behavior. Humans have a way of being self-destructive in so many ways, from smoking to drug addiction to taking plain old dumb risks. We are our own worst enemy.

bn.com: In Bloodstream, you used the tiny town of Tranquility, Maine, as a picturesque setting that served to masquerade a shocking secret. In Harvest you make great use of darkened streets and the twisting labyrinth in the belly of a huge freighter ship to augment the suspense. Now, with Gravity, you've used the awesome and ominous setting of space to magnify the terror -- with great success, I might add. How important do you think setting is in your work?
TG: Very important. In many ways, the setting is a character in itself. Certainly that was true in Bloodstream, where the threat seemed to emanate from the small town, a winter-locked place that was both claustrophobic and dark. Sometimes, when planning a novel, I'll actually start off with the setting first. That was what happened with Gravity. I couldn't imagine a more terrifying place to be than trapped in a space station with dead bodies floating around me.

bn.com: Well, you imagined it very vividly! You did a marvelous job of making every scene in Gravity highly visual, and I see that the movie rights have been bought by New Line Cinema. Any thoughts on how well it will translate to the big screen? And who would your ideal cast be for the main characters?
TG: I'm very pleased that the screenwriter is Michael Goldenberg, who wrote the script for Contact. I think this bodes well for an intelligent, thoughtful script -- one that will explore the deeper issues of just what extraterrestrial life will truly be like, and whether we will recognize it when we see it. As for my ideal cast? I'm envisioning Jodie Foster and Kevin Spacey!

bn.com: In Gravity you touch on the two areas that still remain vast unknowns to us here on earth: outer space and the darkest depths of the oceans. What are your thoughts on the potential for both miracles and mayhem coming from any discoveries we make as we explore these final frontiers?
TG: There are always dangers to exploration. Yes, there will certainly be deaths as we move into space or deeper into the sea -- but that's the risk man takes whenever he moves into unknown territory. That compulsion to push into the unknown is what makes us, as a species, unique -- we are always asking what's beyond the next mountain. As for the benefits of exploration, we don't always know what the rewards will be until we get there. Columbus couldn't have anticipated the riches he'd find in the New World. And we can't possibly know all the good that will come from space travel until centuries down the line. That's why I feel so strongly that we have to keep looking toward the next horizon, that we can't let our enthusiasm for space exploration wane. When Armstrong set his foot down on the moon, that was a triumph not just for Americans but for every human being. It symbolized man at his very best -- reaching for the stars.

bn.com: What stars will Tess Gerritsen be reaching for next?
TG: I'm always looking for new challenges. What I don't want to do is write the same old medical thriller over and over again. Maybe that's why I've moved out of the hospital setting for the moment. I just couldn't get excited about another story about evil doctors or nasty pharmaceutical companies. Also, I'm a naturally curious person, and I love learning about new things, digging up odd bits of biological trivia that I can weave into a terrifying story. So I guess you can expect more biological thrillers from me but usually with weird twists!

bn.com: We'll be looking forward to them. Thanks for taking the time to answer our questions, and good luck with all your future endeavors.