McCormack started her Star Trek writing career with fan fiction focused on Cardassia, inspired by the events of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: I am a fanfiction writer by history and inclination, by which I mean my instinctive response to a text which affects me in some way is to move into the space of that text, inhabit it as entirely as possible, and start writing from within it. I had barely finished watching “What You Leave Behind” before hitting the keyboard. I had to write about this: about Garak’s remorse, Ziyal’s murder, Damar’s sacrifice. I found—thank my lucky stars—a beta reader of great skill (a professor of English literature, no less), who coaxed from me my first novel–length piece of writing, an alternate universe story in which Enabran Tain successfully destroys the Founders a