Hives and heroines aside, Goonan answers the questions implicitly raised by Shelley's novel. By allowing created beings like Verity to be raised in a family, and by giving women like Rose the knowledge and ability to affect masculinist scientific creation, Goonan's heroines break the death cycle Frankenstein set into motion nearly 200 years ago. Thus Goonan tells the story that Shelley could not. Verity has all the advantages that Victor Frankenstein's creature knew he needed. In the end, then, she can save the world and travel down the river with the people she loves instead of relinquishing them all to the Victor and the creature's icy coffin.