Broken Echoes: An LGBTQ+ Space Opera Prequel Novella. Stars Without Borders, #0

A Prequel to Broken Orbit - A Sci-Fi Novella of Identity, Grief, and Letting GoBefore the ghosts haunted the ship, they haunted her memory. Rebecca Ann Jacobs, Rae, wasn't always a mechanic drifting through deep space. Before Indira. Before the stowaway. Before the sabotage. She had a family, a home, and a secret that quietly fractured her from within. Born Israel Jacobs, Rae spent years hiding her true identity behind callused hands and a carefully constructed life, devoted parent, loving husband, skilled technician on Midreach Station.
But beneath the surface of the laughter, routine, and love, something was breaking. And when Rae finally found the courage to live as her authentic self, she lost everything that mattered. Then the shuttle crash came. Now, consumed by grief and quietly transitioning in the shadows of the stars, Rae must learn to survive in a universe that offers no comfort, no forgiveness-and no second chances. Told with haunting intimacy and lyrical precision, Broken Echoes is a raw and emotional novella about gender, loss, and the echoes we carry when everything falls apart.
A perfect entry point into the Broken Orbit universe, this origin story explores how one woman's quiet transformation became the foundation for a mystery much larger than herself. A must-read for fans of character-driven sci-fi like Becky Chambers, Martha Wells, and Ann Leckie.