But our current climate crisis doesn't threaten only coastal cities. It threatens the very fabric of democracies, the way we live, and how the world functions in general. So, when all "turnarounds" failed, the rich went to the Dandelions, 104 space modules orbiting the Earth—a solution devised to actually "replace" the need for a planet. It's an extreme scenario, and rather unlikely in the real world, but one that nevertheless lingers in the minds of billionaires all the time. You can read more about the Dandelions and how they were projected in The River That Passed Through My Life, the novelette that closes this collection.

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The idea of a Rioverse came years ago, when I read a piece of news in The Guardian about what would happen with some cities (Miami, Osaka, Shanghai, and Rio among them) if the average temperature in the world went up only 3C. People forget that the rise of sea levels isn’t only tied to the melting of glaciers and ice sheets, but also to thermal expansion: in higher temperatures, the fundamental particles get more energetic and excited, and water occupies more space. In the article, there was a map of Rio with a simulation of how the city would look like if the water levels rose dramatically, with the ocean forcing its veins through the streets, fusing with lagoons and lakes, blurring the coastlines, and changing its map. It was inevitable to think about how people would survive in this version of Rio.

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Despite its post-apocalyptical nature, the Rioverse is also a place full of hope. It can be seen in all three stories in this collection, but perhaps especially in When It's Time to Harvest, set a bit further into the future than the other two. I like to describe the Rioverse as post-apocalyptical moving to Solarpunk and perhaps aiming for utopia at some point in the future. So, despite all the chaos and struggle inherent to a world shook by a severe climate crisis, you'll surely find hope, fight, and life all around, mainly in the characters inhabiting this future Rio (and hopefully never to be real).

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I have four stories in this world, three of which are in this collection and the other one unpublished. I also have plans to write more stories set in the Rioverse. So, you'll hopefully embark on another adventure soon enough.

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---Renan Bernardo