In an interview with Simon and Schuster's book newsletter, author Scott Westerfeld talks about the inspiration behind the series. Westerfeld thinks that the future will allow people greater control over their appearance: "We are definitely heading toward a world in which lots of people will get to decide how they look. That will change what we think of as beautiful, and what beauty means to us."[4] In light of this Westerfeld "wanted to write a future in which these technologies were fairly common."[4]
Westerfeld also cites "Liking What You See: A Documentary" by Ted Chiang as an inspiration.[4]
Additionally, the series shares many of its themes with the 1964 The Twilight Zone episode "Number Twelve Looks Just Like You." [1] In a blog posting, the author of the books notes that he had seen the episode in his childhood and had forgotten all the details. [2]
