Those of you who have been wondering about the lack of tablet technology in the earlier Astronomicon novels are probably too young to remember the time when they existed (and had for years) but had not even-slightly caught on.

I began writing the first Astronomicon novel back in 2001 and, at that point, it really looked like tablets were going to be a thing for geeks and would never become mainstream.  I got my first tablet computer in 1997. The Apple iPad didn't come out until almost a decade after I began writing that first book.

My prediction at the time was that mobile phones were going to be the big thing, especially as their processing power increased and the screens got larger. My assumption (probably flawed) was that mobile phones would not be taken on space missions due to the need for a base-station infrastructure for them to function. Also, they had not, at that point, become the craze they are now.

More recent books have included tablets but more as a tool than any kind of social outlet.

For the Arcadian (in Astronomicon: Behemoth) I made the switch from built-in computer systems to removable tablet computers which would be more use after a colony had been established. At some point, I will need to modify book one to match both the ship layout and the technology as the Arcadian and the Elysian are supposed to be identical sister ships.