SF is the only genre explicitly designed to explore the impact of scientific and technical change. The moment you posit a discovery that changes the way we understand Nature—human, biological, subatomic, what have you—you’re talking science fiction by definition. Those are the kinds of issues that interest me the most, and SF is the only genre big enough to explore them.

The Turnip is a re-telling of a fairy tale by the same name, which for my money is the single strangest story in the entire Grimm canon. The original Turnip has always been a source of fascination to me, because it is so clearly parts of two different stories cobbled together, and because one of those is clearly drawing on ancient Germanic mythology (the whole hanging-upside-down-from-a-tree-for-wisdom bit).

The initial aesthetic was inspired by Mad Max: Fury Road and Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys, both colourful, post-apocalyptic dystopian stories. Ratter’s tattoo machine is based on the real-life prosthesis of tattoo artist JC Sheitan Tenet. The themes of gender and extinction come from my own anxieties about current events. I’m fascinated by the concept of human extinction.

Funnily enough this story started out as “Ariadne and Theseus in space”—at some point in the ideation stage it took a sharp left from its origin. I think if you squint you can still see bits of it, but Ihuet has a different fate and Tazenket is as different from Theseus as day is from night. But as my agent says, this is the ideal mechanic of inspiration. I never feel bound to where an idea comes from or what its first form is.

This story first came out of my interest in medical history—I was reading about the history of medical uses for molds and began thinking about how cheesemakers in pre-modern times probably would have been the experts in cultivating molds. I also really enjoy writing about people who are not trained in conflict and violence being thrust into situations that would usually be solved with violence.