The Space Between Worlds

As the protagonist and narrator of The Space Between Worlds, Caralee undertakes a journey that becomes a complex exploration of identity, trauma, and belonging. She is a dynamic, round character who is initially defined by a hardened survival instinct that she forged for herself in the wasteland of Ashtown. Because Caralee is from Earth 22 and is now an imposter taking the place of the late Caramenta, her doppelgänger on Earth Zero, her arc involves confronting her past and reconciling the fragmented versions of herself into a cohesive, ethical whole. Her role as a traverser—a “world walker” who engages in multidimensional travel—makes her valuable to the powerful elites at the Eldridge Institute, but only because her alternate selves are dead thanks to poverty, violence, and systemic oppression. This grim reality positions Cara as a living embodiment of The Systemic Exploitation of Marginalized Groups.

Her dubious status as a rarity also fuels her ambition to secure a permanent place in the privileged Wiley City, but this goal forces her into a state of constant performance as she vacillates between the different personas that she has been forced to don over the years: Caralee, her identity at birth; Caralexx, the name that she once took as the property of the Earth 22 Nik Nik’s; and Caramenta, the pious Ruralite whose life on Earth Zero she has since stolen.