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Cyborg Contact follows a cyborg ANT who travels through a wormhole to Earth on a diplomatic mission to reconnect with humans who once visited his world and bring them a warning. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
Cyborg Contact is the fourth book in The Antunite Chronicles series. I originally intended the series to be a trilogy, with Antuna’s Story, The Rise and Fall of Antocracy, and Antunites Unite. The first three books were all published in 2022, and that was supposed to be the end of the story. Two things inspired me to write this much later installment. First, the political climate in the United States prompted me to write another political satire lampooning the current administration’s policies. Second, as a Metis author, I wanted to include a strong Indigenous main character in one of my novels. I had previously included quotes from Indigenous leaders and statements that reflected Indigenous lore. Still, since the stories took place on a planet and moon inhabited only by insects and insectoids, I could not include such a character. By bringing a cyborg insect from Bilaluna to Earth, my fourth book, Cyborg Contact, allowed me to achieve both these objectives.
What challenges came with writing Earth from the perspective of a nonhuman traveler?
As Cyborg Contact is a Cli-Fi story with stinging political satire, the biggest challenge was to determine just how far I and my main character could go with my intended messages. When writing a tale on another planet, the satirical elements told by aliens are metaphors, and the story’s allegorical nature softens the parody. But when you bring an alien to Earth to further spoof an administration’s political policies, lampooning can come across more as direct mockery. I tempered the ridicule by combining political satire with a highly adventurous story and by having my main character interact with multiple species on Earth, not just humans. My human-sized cyborg ANT first interacts with Earth insects, who see him as a god. Vigilantes and ICE agents later hunt him as the ultimate illegal alien. He adopts the name Dee, short for Dios, as the insects call him, and continues to meet various ant and other insect species who help him overcome obstacles he encounters along his way. But he also meets marginalized humans, particularly immigrant teens, and an Indigenous woman, who help him learn about Earth and human civilization as Dee takes a road trip from the Yucatan to the Yukon across a near-future, splintered America. Dee’s naivety and sense of wonder tone down events that might otherwise shock or enrage a more worldly individual, as he witnesses a civilization in political and environmental turmoil.
How do you hope readers respond to the environmental themes in the novel?
I hope readers will respond with urgency to the novel’s environmental themes, which illustrate the dire consequences if we do not alter current trends. And although some may see the novel as apocalyptic, the high levels of action, adventure, humor, and cross-species connections soften the story, making it not simply a tale of drought and devastation. There are hurricanes, droughts, flash floods, and forest fires, but there are also wondrous moments in lush green jungles, blue-green seas, and arctic-boreal forests. We see the magnificence that nature offers and how that beauty can be lost if not nurtured. We also see a contrast between Indigenous traditional ecological knowledge, which reflects a measured stewardship of Earth’s environment, and a colonial civilization that has lost its way, both politically and in its overuse of our world’s precious resources.
Can we look forward to more work from you soon? What are you currently working on?
I continue to be obsessed with dystopian stories that have environmental undertones. Still, after moving my Sci-Fi stories back to Earth, I plan to keep my feet grounded here while I tell my next story from a human perspective. However, the characters may spend some time at sea before they are Marooned (the working title for my new novel).
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A cyborg ANT from Bilaluna, Dee crash-lands in a Mexican cenote and embarks on an epic road trip from the Yucatan to the Yukon across a splintered near-future America. He travels with only a syntax generator and a bag of cicadas and has little understanding of human politics. He befriends Earth insects, rescues kidnapped teens, and battles the elements and a trigger-happy border patrol. His key ally? Seka, a brilliant Indigenous chemist with a sorted past, a spirit strong enough to tame grizzlies, and a heart warm enough to melt his hard exoskeleton.
But as ICE agents close in and climate disasters escalate, Dee realizes his warning about environmental collapse might come too late. Can Dee and Seka spark the change Earth desperately needs?
Find out in Cyborg Contact, an action-packed cli-fi road trip featuring first contact, political satire, and the ultimate fish-out-of-water hero. Grab your copy to ride shotgun with the galaxy’s most charming ANT today!
Tropes
First contact, fish-out-of-water, road trip adventure, climate apocalypse, unlikely romance, found family, political satire.
Microtropes
Alien POV, cross-species bond, damsel-in-distress, hunted by authorities, stranded together, nature’s fury, Indigenous wisdom, secret police.
Cyborg Contact
Cyborg Contact, Book 4 of Terry Birdgenaw’s Antunite Chronicles, is a big-hearted science fiction adventure about Dee, a cyborg ANT from Bilaluna who travels through a wormhole to Earth. His mission is diplomatic, ecological, and personal: he wants to reconnect with the humans who once visited his world and warn Earth about the kind of climate disaster that damaged his own planet. Early on, he sums up the heart of the book clearly: “I am contacting humans so our worlds can unite, if that is possible.”
The book works best as a travel story told through a truly unusual narrator. Dee’s first contact isn’t with governments or scientists, but with ants, hurricanes, jaguars, cicadas, abused children, sailors, and eventually public leaders. That gives the story a lively, episodic feel. Each stop teaches him something about Earth, and because he’s both alien and insectoid, ordinary things feel freshly strange. Food, language, boats, politics, and even hotel lunches become chances for comedy, curiosity, and connection.
Birdgenaw’s tone is playful and earnest at the same time. Dee loves puns, rhymes, sensory descriptions, and insect-based comparisons, so the narration has a goofy charm that keeps the climate message from feeling dry. The book also has a strong compassionate streak, especially in Dee’s bond with Juan and Isabella and in the way it treats interspecies friendship as something practical, not just sentimental. Dee doesn’t simply preach cooperation. He rescues, learns, apologizes, improvises, and keeps showing up.
The environmental theme becomes clear once Dee reaches a public platform. His message to Earth is direct: “Climate change is real! It’s not a hoax!” That line fits the book’s approach. This isn’t subtle climate fiction, but it’s sincere, accessible, and built around adventure rather than despair. The story imagines first contact as a chance for mutual correction: humans once helped Bilaluna change course, and now Dee hopes Bilaluna can return the favor.
Cyborg Contact is a warm, oddball, idea-packed novel about friendship across species, climate responsibility, and the value of seeing Earth through nonhuman eyes. It’s at its most enjoyable when Dee is reacting to the world with a mix of wonder, confusion, and moral seriousness. Readers who like ecological science fiction with humor, a hopeful outlook, and a narrator who’s unlike anyone else in the room will find a lot to enjoy here.
Pages: 312 | ASIN : B0GX2ST9HB
The Antunite Chronicles
Antunites Unite follows different ants who are trying to prevent their colonies from being enslaved by cyborg insects. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
The first two novels in my trilogy, The Antunite Chronicles, were the backstory of my wife’s children’s book Black Hole Radio-Bilaluna. They explained how Earth insects were transported to a planet in a far-off galaxy, transformed into cyborg insects, decimated their world, and nearly destroyed their moon. The third novel of the trilogy is much more open-ended since it occurs long after the period described in the children’s book. Yet the characters are still cyborg insects that have returned to their rejuvenated planet. So, although the plotline was less constrained, I again drew the world-building and character archetypes from my wife’s story. The premise for the plot, however, was heavily inspired by the dystopian novels Brave New World by Aldous Huxley and 1984 by George Orwell. As in book 2 of my trilogy, an authoritarian dictator seizes control of the planet, but this draconian leader takes it to an entirely different level. Rather than the environmental crisis of book 2, the leader thrusts the citizens of book 3 into a dystopian world where all aspects of their lives are controlled. Unlike Brave New World and 1984, which have very depressing endings, in Antunites Unite, spies from the planet’s moon implement actions that result in a positive conclusion for the planet’s residents.
What themes were important for you to explore in this book?
The trilogy’s primary focus is on the struggle between altruism and aggression, two characteristics that are critical to insect social interactions but equally important to human civilization. These two motivations underlie the conflict between authoritarianism and social control versus freedom and insectism that is prominent in Antunites Unite.
Insectism is a political philosophy on Poo-ponic and Bilaluna that stresses benevolence and treating others how you wish they would treat you. This ideal reflects my views on the importance of humanism in our society and across cultures worldwide. The opposing view to insectism stressed in Antalonia is the sentiment that ants are better than other insects. This xenophobic attitude also causes red ANTs to feel they are superior to black and brown ANTs. Thus, the book represents an allegory for the racism and speciesism that permeates our world.
I selected red ANTs as the oppressors in this story because red ants on Earth are usually more aggressive and are most often the species of ants that exhibit hostile behaviors that justify their label as slave-maker ants. They earned the name because of their efforts to subjugate other species of ants (often black ants) into sustaining their colony.
All three books of my trilogy highlight the similarities between ants and humans. Through my research, I discovered that despite their vast differences in size and appearance, ants share a third of their genes with humans. Like humans, ants work together and understand the division of labor. Like humans, ants can be aggressive toward other species, as well as with other ants they consider ‘others’ because they have different genes, smell different, or come from distant nests.
The main points of this story are timely, with the horrors and atrocities taking place in Ukraine and elsewhere, failing democracies, and the growing acceptance of authoritarianism worldwide. Ants in Antalonia, like humans on Earth, need to learn how to squelch basic aggressive instincts and xenophobia that drive a lust for power and to conquer one’s perceived enemies. Instead, they must strive for altruistic enlightenment that inspires compassion for those like us and those who are different, allowing for inclusiveness as we work towards common goals that elevate all in our world, insect or human.
What drew you to writing young adult and teen science fiction novels?
My wife, Ann Birdgenaw, started the second book in her children’s chapter book series, Black Hole Radio, where her young heroes travel through wormholes to distant planets. Initially, she was undecided about what type of aliens her protagonists would meet, and I helped her decide and gave her some ideas about the alien world. As she progressed in her book, I continued to give her input. However, at some point, she felt the plotlines were getting too complex for the target age of her readers. She suggested I write a backstory about the planet in a book targeted at older kids, and I took her up on it and started my fiction writing adventure.
As the original storyline was quite juvenile, yet the themes and messages were more mature, I targeted young adults. As an allegory of human nature taking place on another planet with displaced insects, I have difficulty choosing the genre for the resulting novels. One could call the story a beast fable, yet as an allegory, it also has elements of satire. The idea that insects could evolve to become highly intelligent is unbelievable, so that one could see it as a fantasy. Still, the story contains many scientific facts about insects. It also takes place within a far-off galaxy, so I felt it best fit within the science fiction genre or perhaps within the speculative fiction category. I say speculative fiction because of the narrative’s robust post-apocalyptic and dystopian themes, which bring the novels into the realm of what if.
Will there be a book 4 in the Antunite Chronicles? If so, when will it be available?
Not for now. However, my trilogy originally started as a novella that expanded into three novels. The novella was a historical account written as a satire of former President Donald Trump and his administration. It had little dialogue, primarily written as fictitious historical quotes. I was fortunate to have an early draft read by a fellow scientist, Sci-Fi author, and book coach, Nina Munteanu. Nina inspired me to expand my story to include more dialogue and action scenes, and my novella grew first into a novel and eventually into a trilogy, The Antunite Chronicles.
The novella was initially entitled Poo-ponic Plague, with plague referring to the toxic environment caused by ignoring a rapidly developing climate crisis on Poo-ponic. Yet, as the novella grew into a novel and the novel into a trilogy, it became apparent the efforts of the trilogy’s first character, Antuna, would have a lasting impact on the insect civilization of Poo-ponic throughout its history. Thus, the first book, which centers on Antuna and her friends and their struggles, understandably became Antuna’s Story. Antuna’s descendants, and later followers of her philosophy, became known as Antunites, explaining the trilogy’s title.
I wrote the original title before Covid-19 started and changed it to avoid referencing a pandemic like the one that has tired all of us. I split the book in two when the story got too long. Then I changed the title for book 2 (The Rise and Fall of Antocracy) to reflect the creation and failure of the democracy dominated by the cyborg ants on Poo-ponic. Given the vast amount of time between the two historical periods for this story, there was a natural break that justified splitting the story into two books.
I wrote the first draft of Antunites Unite (book 3) in November 2021 as part of National November Writer’s Month. NaNoWriMo is a challenge to write a 50,000-word book during the 30 days of November. I only considered entering NaNoWriMo during the last week of October 2021 and had no plan or outline for the story. Yet I met the challenge with a 53,000-word first draft of book 3 completed during the month. Still, I knew this was a rough draft that would expand. Following comments from my developmental editor and a series of beta readers between December 2021 and Spring 2022, and after considerable editing, my second draft topped out at around 85,000 words. Still not completely satisfied, I sent this draft to another beta reader and a line editor. After subsequent revisions, copy editing, and proofreading by my reading-partner wife, I completed the final draft at 95,000 words or about 400 formatted pages after ten months.
As for book 4? Who knows, November is looming!
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Generations after cyborg insects return to their revitalized planet, a draconian red ANT ruler takes over the colony exterminating other insectoids and enslaving brown and black ANTs by genetic and social engineering.
The queen BEE on the planet’s moon must rely on two tiny ants, Rose and Jasper, raised amongst their enemy, to infiltrate the Antalone cyborg elites. They must dismantle a dystopian regime that uses histrionics, bionics, and socionics to subjugate its populace.
An allegorical Brave New World that is out of this world, where the fate of the Antunites depends on chameleon ANT spies who plot a revolution to unshackle their kin.
Can Rose and Jasper accomplish what no ANTs have before them?
Antunites Unite
Antunites Unite by Terry Birdgenaw is the third book in the Antunite Chronicles. This series is a great starting point for budding lovers of high science fiction. Warrior Cats meet Ender’s Game, and the characters are regular AND cyborg insects.
In Antunites Unite, we follow several different ant characters as they fight to keep and restore order among their colonies. Not only does the reader have to keep track of different characters and their plot threads, but those are also not necessarily chronological. The chapters jump in time often whenever current events need explaining, which is when we jump back in time to the events that caused the current situation. Luckily, the book starts with a helpful list of characters in chronological order and a quick recap of the story so far, and each chapter starts with the name of the ANT or BEE ruler at the time.
The story is great for younger readers, as it is fairly easy to follow despite the time jumps and different characters. I can see it inspire many new lifelong readers and lovers of complex science fiction to the likes of Dune. It is a pretty light-hearted read, and those that are mature readers should remember the target audience is young adults and teens. The series is filled to the brim with writing conveniences like paragraphs of exposition starting with a variation on the line: “As you know…”, always spoken by a wise character to a young character who is new to the job and has a new perspective on the world around them.
Antunites Unite (The Antunite Chronicles Book 3) is a young adult science fiction novel with a dystopian theme. The story is rich and complex while still keeping the story accessible to readers not as well-versed in the depth of sci-fi.
Pages: 373 | ASIN : B0BCT1SFJY
