Glossary
The planet Earth in this story is very different from the one we know. Everything is frozen. Even the atmosphere has frozen solid. To reflect this, I have adopted a naming system similar to that used for features on Mars and the moons of Jupiter. Here is a brief glossary of these terms.
Terra - A highland area, such as a continent. Example, Europa Terra. America Terra Borealis.
Borealis - North. Example, America Terra Borealis (North America).
Planum - A flat, level area. In effect, a frozen sea or lake. Example, Mediterranea Planum. Atlantica Planum.
Mons - Mountain. Example, Etna Mons (Mount Etna).
Other terms
Triple point - The combination of temperature and pressure at which a substance, such as nitrogen, can exist as a solid, a liquid and a gas at the same time.
Sublimation - The conversion of a substance, such as nitrogen ice, straight from solid to gas as it warms without going through a liquid phase. A more common example of this is dry ice, frozen carbon dioxide, which can never be liquid except under much greater pressures than exist on Earth. That's what creates those clouds of smoke at rock concerts.
Cryovolcano - A cold volcano which erupts liquid water instead of molten rock.
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Runaway World
Science FictionDuring the final decades of the twenty first century, a rogue brown dwarf star passed through the solar system and its gravity threw the Earth out of orbit around the sun. Two hundred years later, when the atmosphere has finished freezing onto...
