Stars and Bones is about the Thousand Arks of the Continuance, a fleet of sentient starships that are home to the entire human population who had been evicted from Earth by an alien intelligence known as the Benevolence, for slowly destroying their planet.

[2] The Benevolence, an alien intelligence that observes and catalogues life in the galaxy, noted with disapproval the way humans on Earth were slowly destroying their world.

Powell cited Iain Banks, Samuel R. Delany, Ann Leckie and Peter F. Hamilton as influences for the book's technology, and Michael Moorcock, Becky Chambers, Ursula K. Le Guin and Octavia E. Butler for the characters.

[1] Powell explained that he chose to set the story 75 years in the future "because I felt that was the farthest I could push it before the effects of climate change altered society beyond all recognition.

"[1] In a review of Stars and Bones in Booklist, David Pitt wrote "[w]ith a strong heroine, some really imaginative supporting characters ... and a story that packs a serious emotional wallop, the novel spotlights Powell's gifts for character-building and plotting.