a little extrapolation did n't bother her ; hell , that was part of a fiction writer 's business , and people who thought it belonged solely to science-fiction or fantasy writers had never looked through the other end of the telescope , had never been faced with the problem of filling in white spaces that no history could provide c things , for example , like what had happened to the people who had colonized roanoke island , off the north carolina coast , and then simply disappeared , leaving no mark but the inexplicable word croatoan carved on a tree , or the easter island monoliths , or why the citizens of a little town in utah called blessing had all suddenly gone crazy c or so it seemed c on the same day in the summer of 1884 .