From the editor

Since you read newspapers, I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you that the headlines about climate change have gone past ‘‘concerning’’ and beyond ‘‘alarming’’ to ‘‘it’s time to really freak out now’’.

Every day, scientists and reporters try to come up with new ways to explain the problem, to quantify it and communicate it, and to galvanise us to make the urgent changes required.

(This week, Stuff launches its own long-term reporting project – ‘‘Quick! Save the Planet’’ – intended to make the issue unignorable.)

The trouble is, the problem is so big and we feel so small in comparison. We are so used to our daily routines and ways of thinking about the world. And for those skim-reading in a hurry, what’s happening with bees or permafrost or glaciers can sound tangential.

Perhaps this is where writers can step in to help. Maybe a well-written, well-imagined novel can paint the picture more vividly, and illustrate the interconnectedness of everything, in ways that scientists can’t. I’m not sure I really, fully felt the consequences of bees being imperilled until I read Douglas Coupland’s Generation A, which is set in a world where bees are extinct and fresh fruit and vegetables are rare.

This week, David Herkt talked to a few New Zealanders writing ‘‘cli-fi’’, an emerging genre that’s like sci-fi, but, sadly, much more real. See page 8.