In many ways, The Rowan originates from typical science fiction scenarios: the colonization of worlds through accessible interstellar travel, the various alien lifeforms — both benevolent and malicious, the extrapolation of current impossibilities into future routines.

McCaffrey also draws on typical romantic conventions in The Rowan: lonely woman looking for love, unconsummated love because of obstacles, the overcoming of them to fly to the beloved's side at a time of crisis, playing nurse to his near-mortal injuries, intimate knowledge of the other's needs and fears and past, all without having to say anything — a knowledge more accurate and specific than hazy intuition.

What is unique, then, is McCaffrey's combination of these genres. Science fiction's readers are still predominantly adolescent males, although McCaffrey's fans are increasingly diverse. Thus, she effectively combines genres, as well as adding a few contemporary innovations of her own. The lonely woman...