Part Four might as well be titled “Meet the Lorencips!”—your average, dorky Midwestern family. Except, occasionally they talk in a language Ruby has never heard before. And none of them seem to know what “meatloaf” is. Also, they have a semi-sentient AI hologram in the basement. Fiora holographically takes Ruby to her home planet, and it quickly becomes apparent why the Lorencips came to Earth. I discuss the importance of not italicizing different languages in fiction, characters thinking about their emotions rather than feeling them, and Starchild as an immigrant narrative. 

 Below is a link to the article I referenced for further reading on italicization: 

“The Case Against Italicizing ‘Foreign’ Words.” Barokka, Khairani. 

https://catapult.co/stories/column-the-case-against-italicizing-foreign-words-khairani-barokka