Pop science goes flying off in all kinds of fashionable directions, and it often drags a lot of SF writers with it. I've been led astray like that myself at times.

Australian SF book publishing has undergone a boom recently, and sometimes it's easier for new writers to sell a book to a local publisher first, which then makes a US edition more likely.

It's important for the explorer to be willing to be led astray.

Widespread caffeine use explains a lot about the twentieth century.

My mind is led astray by every faint rustle.

He turns off the techno-shit in his goggles. All it does is confuse him; he stands there reading statistics about his own death even as it's happening to him. Very post-modern.