After the epic disasters and hard science future of the two novels that preceded Rolling Thunder, this novel feels almost like an idyll, or a romantic comedy. How do you see the story of Podkayne fitting into the larger questions about the way Earth handles environmental disaster and space colony politics that you raised in the first two novels of the series?

I don't, really. Podkayne is a Martian, through and through. Though she is saddened and horrified by events on Earth, she is more concerned with how it will affect Mars. She's not a scientist, nor is she political. Her only concern about the ongoing destruction of the Earth is for the people being uprooted, displaced, and killed, and with what she and her fellow Martians can do to help. The fate of the planet doesn't much concern her. You could think of her mission to Earth late in the story as being like the Concert for Bangladesh. She's doing what she can, but knows she can't stop anything.

You've talked about how Heinlein is one of your influences, and certainly critics have compared your work with Heinlein's. When it came to writing a novel that is overtly an homage to a specific Heinlein book, why pick Podkayne of Mars? What is it about that novel in particular that drew you in?

It really wasn't the novel itself, it's all the juvenile novels. I believe I mentioned six of them in the last chapter. (Can you find them all?) I don't think Heinlein's Podkayne is like my Podkayne.

One of the compelling aspects of your writing is that you're never afraid to bring romance and sex into your hard SF space opera scenarios. But the romance has changed a lot over the past 4 decades. You've gone from tales about alien-human sex, lesbian lovers, and people who get sex changes as easily as haircuts, to tales about much more conventional, heterosexual human marriages like the one Podkayne has. What's changed for you? Will you ever bring your readers back to worlds where aliens with three sets of genitals cavort with sex-changed humans, or are you more interested in dealing with human relationships that more closely resemble those that exist on Earth now?

Different things are appropriate to different stories. These novels are set in the near future, whereas the others are set in the distant future. I don't see things changing that much in 50 years. So I don't think anything has changed for me. When I get back to that other universe, there will be more unusual sex. One of these days I hope to write a third novel in the Steel Beach, Golden Globe trilogy, entitled Irontown Blues. The reason I haven't written it is that I don't yet know what's going to happen.

There's an overarching pessimism to Rolling Thunder and the rest of the series regarding how humans deal with climate disaster. Did the recent disasters in New Orleans and after the Asian Tsunami affect your perspective in these novels?

As I said in the Afterword to Red Lightning, I had already begun writing about a tsunami (which was originally going to hit Indonesia) when the real tsunami arrived ... in Indonesia. It scared the hell out of me. I'm not in the prophesy business, I'm a writer, I tell stories. I had hoped that would never happen again, but it did, in the same book. This time I had completed writing about the tsunami in Florida and the breakdown in social order that resulted, when Katrina hit New Orleans, and I found myself looking at the very scenes I had described. I wondered if I had been unreasonably pessimistic in my descriptions, but must say I felt vindicated, because Katrina was not one ten-thousandth as destructive as the disaster I described ... and yet, things fell apart. "Y're doin' a heckuva a job, Brownie!" So am I pessimistic? What has happened in the last seven years that would lead me to optimism?

Mutterings among critics and writers indicate that space opera may be on the rise again. What are some themes from classic space operas of the 50s and 60s that you'd like to see SF writers taking on again? And what are some themes you'd just as soon leave behind?

Space opera has not only arrived, it has conquered all, since the release of Star Wars. Don't get me wrong, I loved that movie (and none of the sequels), but I don't see it as science fiction. The 50s and 60s, as I remember them, was the time when SF was moving away from the pulp crap of L. Ron Hubbard and hacks like him, and into more concerns of sociology and character. I frankly don't read much SF, haven't for a long time, so I don't know if space opera has taken over the written word, but it sure dominates on the silver screen. Even one of the few movies I've seen recently that seemed to be trying for at least a smidgen of scientific accuracy, Sunshine, was pretty stupid.

For those who love the Heinleiny side of Varley's writing, Rolling Thunder will be a real treat. Loosely modeled on Heinlein's space adventure Podkayne of Mars (but with a decidedly happy ending), it's a sweet space romance, a kind of comic idyll following on Red Thunder and Red Lightning, the hard SF actioners that preceded it. Sure, there's action, and there are amazing, mysterious, musical aliens that only Varley could create. But mostly it's the Freaks and Geeks-style story of a late teenager discovering herself, getting laid, and starting a band.

Podkayne does grow up a little, but her adventures in maturity have little to do with space adventures — instead, she has to come to terms with her unexpected mega-fame after she composes a song using samples from the Europan aliens' songs. After writing the song, she has a close encounter with the aliens which leaves her in suspended animation for over a decade. She awakens to find herself the founder of "Pod music," a genre she can't understand and isn't even sure she likes. Meanwhile, the aliens have flown to Earth and started a mysterious project to change the weather — a project that may make the planet totally uninhabitable for humans.

It's interesting, and weirdly fun, to see these space operatic events through the eyes of somebody who is much more concerned about who to invite to her latest party, or which shoes look best on her. It's also intriguing to see Varley trying his hand at writing an airheaded girly-girl, since he's best-known for writing strong women characters who would be more likely to wrassle a dinosaur or become President of Mars than worry about how Earth gravity will force them to wear bras. And of course, Varley can't quite resist a few scenes where Podkayne gets to be a double-fisted, ultra-competent hero.

But if there is a weakness to Rolling Thunder, Podkayne is it. She feels less like a fully-human character and more of a postmodern homage to Heinlein. And sometimes her slangy patter — a mashup of 1970s hippie talk and references to Google — falls flat. But there are so many cool things happening in this novel that you won't be able to dwell on its flaws for very long. The Europan aliens, and glimpses of Earth mired in a climate change so horrible it's nearly impossible to contemplate, are breathtaking and unforgettable.

Varley's perverse sense of humor is ultimately what buoys Rolling Thunder along. But he also remains his libertarian curmudgeon self, infecting an otherwise light story with a difficult, grudging hope for human life. Despite how much homo sapiens sort of sucks, he seems to be saying, there are some unexpectedly good eggs left. And hopefully, they'll be the ones who survive.

Rolling Thunder's official release date is tomorrow, but we hear it's already in stores.

Rolling Thunder [Amazon]