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Karen Traviss Karen has had a well rounded career
who various high points have allowed her a unique viewpoint that she uses in creating fiction.
She’s been a defense correspondent, a newspaper and television journalist, a press officer for the police, an
advertising copywriter and a journalism lecturer. She’s also served in
the Royal Naval Auxiliary Service and with the Territorial Army. Currently she
is a political public relations manager. Originally from Portsmouth, UK she now
lives in Devizes in Wiltshire. Her work has appeared in Asimov’s, On Spec.,
and Realms of Fantasy and she is a graduate of the Clarion science fiction and fantasy workshop. She currently has 5 books in the series that began with City of Pearl, also Crossing the Line,
The World Before, Matriarch and Judge. The series looks
at military elements, police elements and journalism elements, obviously playing to the strengths of her former employment. It also features several species of unique aliens that all have diverse agendas. Into all of this is thrust Shan Franklin, the one good woman who has the moral backbone
to stand up for what is right despite the potential costs to herself. The other
key figure is Aras, the alien wess’har who has given everything of himself to protect his own species and the defenseless
bezer’nj and made himself into an outcast. Together they struggle against
the conflicting interests of humans and aliens. But Karen has not just limited
herself to this series. She also writes for the Star Wars genre. Her Republic Commando series is currently three books. She
has written for the Legacy of the Force line and just recently produced the novelization for the animated movie Clone Wars. She cites a BBC serialization of Fred Hoyle’s A for Andromeda as an early indicator of her interest in SF. Karen says that seeing the movie of 2001 made her take the leap from reading SF to wanting to write it. She is a big fan of Harry Harrison, especially Bill the Galactic Hero and fulfilled a life long dream by appearing with him on a panel at Worldcon. Heinliein, Blish, Clarke and Asimov were other childhood favorites. David Louis Edeleman David was born in Birmingham, Alabama
but grew up in Orange County, California. He attended the John Hopkins Writing
Seminars to study with such authors as Madison Smartt Bell, Edna O’Brien, and Stephen Dixon. Currently living outside of Washington, D.C., David is a writer, blogger and web programmer. His first novel Infoquake has sent ripples through the science fiction community much as its name
implies. The novel was a finalist for the 2008 John W. Campbell award and was
named by Barnes & Noble as named as the top SF novel for 2006. Multireal
the second book in series was released by Pyr books in July and author Peter Watts called it, “A thoroughly successful
hybrid of Neuromancer and Wall Street.” David also has worked on the websites
of the FBI, Rolls Royce and The US Army. He’s directed the marketing departments
of biometrics and e-commerce companies as well as taught programming to the US Senate and the World Bank. David has written articles for the Baltimore Sun and the Washington Post.
Currently he is at work on the next novel in the series Geosynchron. The Jump 225 series, which begins with Infoquake follows the rise of bio/logic programmer Natch who lets nothing stand in the way of his ambition. This natural programmer and status climber will do anything to claw his way to the top. But there are others who are watching Natch and will use him as a tool to advance their agendas which could alter the very nature of humanity’s future. Margaret Surina has developed a software that could alter the very nature of ordinary life, but she cannot bring Multireal to the masses. She finds an apt tool in Natch. But who is using who? For there are plenty of other alternative forces at work who want to control Multireal. But Natch there is only one choice - forward and anyone in his way had better move or be run down. STEAMPUNK where did this counter culture come from? And is it really counter culture? People are going goggle happy and why? If you go to BrassGoggles the UK site, you can get a glimpse of a peculiar style that is creeping into the sight of the typical person. A sort of want or desire for complicated items but from a simpler time. Gone is the sleek glossy look with solid state parts. Rather the brass gearing, the clunk of piston driven machinery and larger than life construction is making a come back in the land that birthed one of its prime inspirations, Jules Verne. France is the happy home of a subway station, the Arts and Metiers Metro Station, that is laid out in its interior as if the waiting passengers were within the belly of the nautilus, cradled in its burnished brass with portholes here and there. An art circus, The Machines de L’ile, build gigantic steam powered colossi, like an elephant that stands two stories tall has its own viewing deck, and trumpets huge gouts of water and steam. They are also responsible for a boat shaped like a manta ray, a submersible like a squid and pirate ship shaped like an angler fish.There’s a desire for airships with wings and articulated vanes rather than the personalized flying car. It’s a reaction to the idea that everything needs to be stamped out in quantity rather than lovingly embellished in a rich fashion. Its about wood, Engraving, inlays and more. But steampunk also has art and music as well such as the Vernian Process and Abney Park. In tune with the idea of embellishment, Datamancer redoes computers in the steam punk style rebuilding a laptop into a beautifully gear covered wooden box with Leather wrist rest inlays all opened with a old key. There are keyboards built out of old hex nuts and mesh, lovingly fitted together or an a scanner bound into a leather book. Steampunk while it is attributed to William Gibson and Bruce Sterling’s the Difference Engine has out grown its literary boundaries to become as style. But it is not bounded by the ideas of a purely victorian nature as evidenced by the presence of rayguns, but adapts them into itself and redecorates them in a more sumptuous fashion. Rachel Caine Born in 1961, Rachel Caine began her writing career in 1991. Publishing both short stories and novels, she has several series, The Weather Wardens, The Morganville Vampires, Red Letter Days and the recently started Athena Force series. Her short stories have appeared in the collections My Big Fat Supernatural Wedding, My Big Fat Supernatural Honeymoon and Many Bloody Returns. Rachel is now writing full time, having recently resigned from her position as Director of Communications for a multinational corporation. Rachel’s other talents are in music. As a professional musician she has played with the likes of John Williams, Peter Nero and Henry Mancini. She freely admits to an addiction to TV, movies and prefers a good Guinness to American beer. She also is a fan of Joss Whedon and Kim Harrison. Rachel’s publisher Roc has signed a deal with her for 3 more Weather Warden books following Thin Air, the most recent of her series The Morganville Vampires has been optioned for film and TV by British producer Charles Armitage.John Berkey 1932-2008 We’re told repeatedly don’t judge a book by its cover. We know from talking to authors that they rarely have a say in the art that is put on the front of their books to represent the ideas within. So why is cover art so important? Whether or not its accurate, the cover art is our first impression of the work. John Berkey was well known for making a good impression. John’s style was all about painting. He never strove for the photorealism that marks the work of some artists. Instead John’s pieces always had some elements that had a blur to them. This gave an impression of motion, that the ship or person was moving across the page. In constructing ships, John did not fall prey to the simplistic ideals. His creations were towering structures with layers and tiers that defied the necessity of symmetry. In 1999 John awarded the Spectrum Grand Master’s Award and in 2004 he was named to the Society of Illustrator’s Hall of Fame. I know I have at least ten books with Berkey covers and have many read others. Berkey was also responsible for some of the early Star Wars illustrations as well as the “old Elvis” stamp. John’s illustrations also were used in Popular Mechanics in the 80’s. Some well known covers: I, Robot; Starman Jones; and A fire Upon the Deep, The Society of Illustrators is establishing a scholarship in his name. JY
Richard K. Morgan
Born in 1965, Richard grew up in the small village of Hethersett
in Britain. He says he spent most of his youth avoiding team sports as if allergic to them and buried in books. By the time
he started college at Queen’s College in Cambridge all of that had changed and the resulting relationship affected his
studies. Looking things in the second year Richard was able to get back on track and shifted his focus to History but still
realized that the academic world required more effort than he’d realized. He left academia with what he calls a “very
average degree” and two desires from his younger years– to travel and to write. Richard ended up in London and
rapidly discovered that while writing is an interesting idea, London was full of hopefuls. In London he developed a taste
for Thai and Japanese food, Jack Daniels on the rocks and single malt Isley, none of which helped his continue his future
so he fell back on the second thought and worked out something for travel by joining the ELT, English Language Teaching profession.
This took him to Istanbul, Glasgow and Madrid where he eventually rose in the profession to becoming a teacher trainer and
eventually was given a university post. While Richard was teaching he was writing– what he wanted to write. His work
included short stories, a screenplay and finally Altered Carbon. After its sale, according to Richard, he quit his
day job and hasn’t looked back. The adventures of Takeshi Kovacs continue in Broken Angels and Woken Furies
books which visit some of the worlds of the Protectorate mentioned in Altered Carbon. Morgan has also written Market
Forces and Thirteen and Altered Carbon has been optioned for a possible movie.
Naomi Novik Born in 1973, in New York as a first generation American, Naomi cut her teeth on Tolkien while receiving a rich story telling background with Polish fairytales such as Baba Yaga. Her studies included English Literature at Brown University and graduate level work in computer science at Columbia University. She left school to join the game developing community and worked on Neverwinter Nights: Shadows of Undrentide. His Majesty’s Dragon, her first novel was published in 2006. She has been awarded the John Campbell Award for Best New Writer, the Compton-Crook Award for Best First Novel and the Locus Award for Best First Novel. His Majesty’s Dragon has been translated in 23 different languages. She has written three additional works in the same series and is the Guest of Honor for this year’s Norwescon 31 in March. Susan Palwick Susan is currently an Associate Professor of English at the University of Nevada, Reno. She teaches writing and literature. Flying in Place her first novel won the Crawford Award for Best First Fantasy Novel. Besides being a teacher, Susan is also a licensed lay minister, Episcopalian; a volunteer ER Chaplin and of course a Science Fiction Writer. The Necessary Beggar won the American Library Association’s Alex Award and was recently nominated for the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult Literature. She has two other books Shelter and a collection of short stories entitled The Fate of Mice. Jack McDevitt Jack like a great many writers seems to have tried several careers before settling on creating fiction,
including a taxi driver in Philadelphia, a customs officer, an English teacher, a motivational trainer and a naval officer.
He currently resides in Georgia. His work has been recognized with the following honors: The Hercules Text won the
Philip K. Dick award in 1991, Omega won the John W. Campbell award in 2003, and most recently Seeker was awarded the
Nebula for best novel in 2007. His works have been on the Nebula ballot for 10 out of the last 11 years. Two of his stories
“Black to Move” and “Cryptic” will appear in the military science fiction collection Breach the
Hull due out soon and edited by Mike McPhail. Robert Jordan Dies at 58 The author of the long running series, The Wheel of Time died on September 16th of a rare blood
disease called amyloidosis. Jordan also wrote 7 books in the Conan series and historical fiction in the Fallon
series. Jordan was born, James Oliver Rigney, Jr. in 1948 in Charleston, S.C. and after 2 tours in Vietnam graduated with
a degree in physics from The Citadel College. Fans of the series know that Jordan was at work on the 12th and final novel
A Memory of Light, when he was diagnosed last April with the disease and began treatment. Fans who have been waiting
for this conclusion to the series not only mourn his loss but wonder about the ultimate fate of this last book. Madeline L’Engle Passes Away at 88 L’Engle died of natural causes in her home in Litchfield, Connecticut on September 6th. Author
of more than 60 books that have covered such genres as young adult, adult fiction, memoirs and spiritual meditations, L’Engle
is perhaps best known for A Wrinkle in Time. The coming of age story of Meg Murray who travels to a distant world with
her companions to rescue her father is not only one of the best selling children’s books, selling more than 8 million
copies but also is one of the most banned books as well. A Wrinkle in Time was awarded the Newberry award in 1963. Danielle Ackley-McPhail Danielle has worked on both side of the publishing industry for more than ten years and she is currently employed a production manager. She holds degrees in both English and Communications for Kean College of NJ. Her work has appeared in Through a Glass Darkly, Voyages-An Anthology of World Poetry, Passion-An Anthology of the World’s Great Short Stories, For Better or Worse, Passings, Dark Furies, Hear Them Roar and The Post Modern Temperaments:Fifteen Poets. She has also written two novels Yesterday’s Dreams and Tomorrow’s Memories, which will be released this summer. She is hard at work on the third book in the series. Danielle has also edited the anthology No Longer Dreams and is working on Bad-Ass Fairies, which had a very successful launch at Balticon and is being promoted by her visit tonight. Bad-Ass Faeries is also the #3 bestselling Fantasy Anthology for Amazon.com. Danielle is married to author Mike McPhail and editor of Breach the Hull coming out in the Fall. In addition to all of the above she also established the online writing group called Yesterday’s Dreamers. ROBERT A. HEINLEIN Born in Butler Missouri in 1907, Robert Heinlein’s family moved shortly thereafter to Kansas city where he grew up. The 1910 appearance of Halley’s Comet had a striking effect on young Heinlein who became fascinated with astronomy and read every book that he could find. From 16 years old, his Interests were captured by the masters of early science fiction, Burroughs, Wells, Verne and the Tom Swift books. But it was Olaf Stapledon who won a special place in his heart. Heinlein entered and graduated from the Naval Academy and after serving on several ships was retired in 1934 due to a medical condition, pulmonary tuberculosis. His second attempt at a career in politics was also a failure, so in 1938 with a new mortgage and fresh after a defeat in the elections, he found that Thrilling Wonder Stories was accepting submissions from unknown authors. “Life-Line” however went to John W. Campbell Jr.’s Astounding and appeared in the 1939 edition. Heinlein continued to send stories to Campbell and continued to achieve sales. By 1940 he had taken care of the mortgage on his house and decided that if he received too many rejections he would retire from writing. When that happened he took up photography and masonry to fill his time. With the advent of WWII, Heinlein attempted to re-enlist only to be refused due to his health. Moving to Lansdowne, outside of Philadelphia, Heinlein took the job of a civil engineer. 1947 marked the publication of his first book Rocket Ship Galileo. In the meantime Heinlein’s first marriage was falling apart. After moving out and applying for divorce he renewed his acquaintanceship with Virginia Gerstenfeld and they were married in 1948. They moved to Denver in Attempt to find a place that would not be a likely atomic bomb target. Heinlein was writing young adult books for Scribner’s such as Red Planet and Farmer in the Sky while working on the script for George Pal’s Destination Moon. The 1950’s saw more publications in both the adult and younger genre’s as well as opportunities to travel. Heinlein received his first Hugo award in 1956 for the novel Double Star. The concepts that would become Stranger in a Strange Land began in 1955, but Star Ship Troopers came first in 1959 and garnered him another Hugo in 1960. Virginia’s allergies forced their move from Denver as well as the influx of military installations including Cheyenne Mountain which was very close to them and which Robert to revenge upon by writing about its destruction in The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. Heinlein continued to collect Hugo’s for Stranger in a Strange Land and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress. He continued to write from his new home in California and advised the government as well as participated in a Citizen’s Advisory on National Space Policy. In 1975 he was awarded the SFWA Grandmaster Nebula Award. A near death experience and declining health limited but did not stop his writing. On his 80th birthday in 1987 To Sail Beyond the Sunset came out. He died in 1988
Kim Harrison Kim left behind her roots in the upper Midwest after gaining a bachelor’s degree in the sciences and moved to her current home in South Carolina. She has five books out now in her Rachel Morgan : The Hollows series and a novella and other short stories in anthologies with her sixth book due out in March of 2008. She credits Ray Bradbury’s Dandelion Wine as one of the more influential books of her childhood having read it at age 10. She says she found the mix of real characters and fantasy compelling and enjoyed the way that Bradbury could tell you about a character both inside and out in just a paragraph. Her favorite books include those by authors: Andre Norton, Robert A. Heinlein, Jack Chalker, Richard Bach and Anne McCaffrey. Kim says that her educational background helps her in looking at the biological aspects of things like the T4 virus but quickly points out that she is not a practicing witch and was careful to keep wicca out of the Hollows books. She says she consulted one basic book on magic theory and made the rest up herself and believes that there should be work and effort involved in magic instead of merely waving a wand. She freely admits in one interview that music sometimes helps her relate to her characters such as finding Rachel’s character connected with the music of Garbage and Ivy with that of Evanescence and Nine Inch Nails for both of them, especially when they are frustrated. Kim’s connection with writing and music has taken a new direction in that a European internet DJ has now set aside an hour of his show from 1:00PM to 2:00PM, Radio xXx on Sundays to play nothing but music that would fit with the Hollows or would inspire her. When talking about her writing Kim says that she has tried to avoid developing any particular rituals, so that she can sit down and write at any given moment although she admits that an unending cup of chai tea makes this more possible. Currently she is hard at work on revisions for The Outlaw Demon Wails, the sixth book in the Hollows series and is beginning a young adult series based on a character from her short story called “ Madison Avery and the Dim Reaper”.THE NEANDERThAL NEWS Romainian and US scientists have discovered evidence of interbreeding between humans and Neanderthals in bones. While the common belief that our ancestors killed or out competed the Neanderthals has existed for some time, new evidence points out that they may have been absorbed into our species. As described by US team member Erik Trinkaus, the bones of the jaw and skull of some of those discovered show some Neanderthal characteristics but are identified as Homo Sapiens. One other indicator was the lack of shoulder muscles that make possible the throwing of projectiles. The bones have been dated at 30,000 years. Genetic evidence is being sought to support this theory. Looking for the Neanderthal genome is being accomplished by searching for DNA evidence in recovered teeth. A partial sequence of the genome has been made and will aid in comparisons to the human genome to determine the possibility of interbreeding.Neanderthals have recently received more credit for manual dexterity from researchers who have been working on the remains of their hands. One of the reasons Homo Sapiens was thought to have out survived the Neanderthals was do to the physical make of their hands. Initially it was thought that they were not able to create complex tools. Computer reconstructions of their hands show that they had nearly the same dexterity as we do. The evidence shows that they could touch the tips of their fingers to their thumbs in a precise manner, yet they did not manufacture stone implements with the same finesse as Cro-Magnon man. The disparity still remains to be explained. While the Neanderthals were perhaps at less of a physical disadvantage than we believed, they also did not suffer from some of the mental disordered that plague modern humanity. Scientists believe that such mental illnesses as schizophrenia and autism would not develop in Neanderthals since their brains stop developing rapidly at a young age while in Homo Sapiens the brain continues to grow and expand for 20 years. This expansion allows the complexity of the cortex and neocortex that allows such things as language, unfortunately such complexity and experiences over a long period of growth also allow for mental disease. While Neanderthals possessed some of the same genes that triggered the growth of a large brain, they did not have the gene which encouraged the brain to grow until the third decade of life. Complexity of the brain and language have been linked to such disorders of the mind. So perhaps there were some perks to being an Neanderthal. Maria V. Snyder Born in Philadelphia, Maria spent 12 years in Catholic school and then went to Penn State to study Meteorology. She found that the weather person business was not for her and went to work for as an air quality control scientist. During this time she began writing and after writing short stories turned to producing her first novel Poison Study. Maria’s husband, an expert chocolate taster gave her insight which helped her develop her main character whose job is tasting the food of an official to avoid a poisoning. Maria is also a brown belt in Issinryu Karate which helped her envision the fight scenes in her novel. Poison Study won the 2006 Compton Crook award, the Salt Like Co. Library’s Reader’s Choice award and was given a Starred review from Publisher’s Weekly. Magic Study, the follow up book came out in October of 2006 is a Booksense pick and a RITA award nominee. Maria spent time learning horse riding for background for Magic Study and glass blowing for the next book Fire Study due out in March 2008. She has published numerous articles in regional magazines and local papers and now teaches a writing course at the local college. Future plans include a Middle Grade reader called Storm Watcher, a Young Adult science fiction book entitled Inside Out and of course the fourth “study” novel. Ty Drago Ty is the editor/publisher for Allegory formerly known as Peridot Books, where he has served for eight years. Allegory is a tri-annual online magazine of SF, Fantasy and Horror. He has written 2 books, Phobos the science fiction mystery title published by Tor and The Franklin Affair, a historical mystery as well as many articles on the art and business of writing. Ty also manages to be a fulltime computer programmer as well. Ty is a born Quaker and a father of two children. Ty also travels extensively throughout the US and Europe. He once went to a signing that Isaac Asimov was hosting for his book One in a Trillion. When Asimov discovered Ty was working to establish himself as a writer he wrote in Ty’s book “...please keep trying…”. Phobos’ eligibility for the Joseph W. Campbell award proves that Ty efforts are being rewarded. ROBERT J. SAWYER Although born in Ottawa, Canada, Robert’s family soon moved to Toronto and he currently resides just west of the city. The middle of three sons, Robert grew interested in Science fiction at a young age from watching Searchers and Star Trek. His writing ability gained attention early as his 5th grade teacher became one of his first fans. In grade 10 Robert and a friend started NASFA, the Northview Association for Science Fiction Addicts. 1979 found Robert entering a writing contest for the Strasenburgh Planetarium in New York state. Although his story did not win, the Planetarium bought the story and he was able to meet Isaac Asimov at the awards reception. That same year he began studies in the field of Radio and Television arts at Ryerson Polytechnical Institute. Graduating in 1982, he took a job in the bookstore, Bakka, for four months before accepting a position at Ryerson to teach television studio production techniques. Robert headed up a successful movement to create a Canadian region of SFWA. Robert won the Nebula award in 1996 for his novel The Terminal Experiment, the Hugo award in 2003 for his novel Hominids and the John W. Campbell award in 2006 for his novel Mindscan making him one of seven authors to win all three of these prestigious awards. Robert also has won several awards abroad including the coveted Seiun award. He’s a busy man and his next stop on Thursday is a free lecture at the Library of Congress entitled “Science Fiction as a Mirror of Reality” and then he’s the Guest of Honor at Ravencon over the weekend. Ken MacLeod Born in Scotland in 1954, Ken MacLeod likes to mix his politics with his writing. It could be that since they are unique they inspire his creativity. Referred to as the only ‘Trotskyist, Liberatarian, Anarcho-Capitalist, Humorist Sci-Fi author” MacLeod has written 12 books with a 13th on the way, received 3 Prometheus Awards and a British Science Fiction Award and continues to enjoy expressing his political and scientific views on various web forums. MacLeod graduated with a degree in Zoology from Glasgow University and has worked as a computer programmer and written a master’s thesis on biomechanics. His view point has been generalized as a techno-utopian socialist. Ken often injects humor and double meanings into the chapter titles of his works. His novels The Star Faction, The Cassini Division, The Stone Canal and The Sky Road are grouped into a collective known as The Fall Revolution while Cosmonaut Keep, Dark Light and Engine City form the Engines of Light Trilogy. MacLeod enjoys not only speculating on the future of politics but is very imaginative in his view of technology.JOHN STEAKELY John was born in Cleburne, Texas in 1951. While at college John earned money by writing term papers for others students and realized that his literary aptitude could pay him. He cites Heinlein’s Red Planet as one of the first science fiction books he’d ever read. In 1972 he sold a movie treatment for “Vampires for Blood and Money” for $800. In 1975 John moved to Hollywood in an attempt to take the movie world by storm, unfortunately 1977 found him moving back to Texas once again. After several rejected stories, John finally sold “The Bluenose Limit” to Amazing Stories. The recognition he garnered for the story by the Scott Meredith Literary Agency allowed him to sell Armor his first full novel. John also has another novel Vampire$ which was turned into a movie by John Carpenter that seems to bear a small resemblance to the book. John also is credited with several other movies: Don’t Open the Door, Scary Texas Movie, and Playing Dead. He’s even listed as acting in the latter two movies. John is not a prolific writer with two novels and 4 short stories but an important thought to remember is that in the world of disposable novels and space constraints Armor continues to remain in print and sells consistently. John continues to work on Armor2 and an excerpt is available online at his website.Tee Morris Tee generally gets referred to as a one man show. His ability to entertain while enlightening readers about his latest project or latest TV show passion or prophesying about podcasting is somewhat legendary. I was fortunate to have been working a row over when our CRM met him and it didn’t take her long to drag me over and say, “You should talk to him.” She wasn’t wrong. We’ve been fortunate to have Tee visit twice before, so this is the third time that must be the charm. Tee has been writing since 5th grade citing the early influence of both Terry Brooks and the Choose You Own Adventures books. While attending James Madison University for his degree in Mass Communication and Theater some of Tee’s works were performed on stage. Tee’s first published work was for the JMU newspaper The Breeze covering the Poll Tax Riots in Britain in 1990. It was Tee’s time with the MD Renaissance Festival that encouraged him to create as part of the Writer’s Guild and also developed a very memorable character who Tee would bring to life in his first novel. Suddenly Tee wasn’t just playing Rafe Rafton on stage any more. After meeting co-author Lisa Lee at an online chat room as her alter ego Askana Moldarin, he was now writing as Rafe Rafton in Morevi:The Chronicles of Rafe and Askana blending the Tudor era with an eastern fantasy setting and magic. Those who know Tee know that he would hardly rest on his laurels—now several years later he’s written: the follow up Legacy of Morevi; Billibub Baddings and the Case of the Singing Sword; co-written Podcasting for Dummies, contributed to the Complete Guide to Writing Fantasy, Farscape Forever:Sex, Drugs and Killer Muppets, So Say We All, No Longer Dreams and helped to edit and contribute to The Fantasy Writer’s Companion.William Gibson William Gibson was born in 1948 in Conway, SC. His father was one of the contractors responsible for the Oak Ridge Facility which built the first atomic bomb. After the death of his father, Gibson grew up in southwestern Virginia and then went to boarding school in Arizona. At the age of 19 he left the US in order to avoid the draft for Vietnam and has since resided in Vancouver, Canada with his wife and two children. Gibson’s writing career began while enrolled at the University of British Columbia where he earned a bachelors in English literature. His first published novel, Neuromancer won both the Hugo and the Nebula award as well as the Philip K. Dick award. Gibson is credited with: the creation of the term cyberspace; envisioning the internet; and describing virtual reality. Neuromancer developed a cult following that led its being hailed as pioneer novel in the subgenre known as cyberpunk. Gibson attributes his interest in science fiction to his early childhood before being sent away to boarding school whereupon he discovered writers such as William S. Burroughs, Kerouac and Ginsberg. These elements stayed with him at University but the addition of two other catalysts: punk music and a returning interest to science fiction figured prominently the creation of Neuromancer and influence his continuing work.Looking for Alzheimers —According to researcher Lee Goldstein it is possible to identify the hallmarks of the disease early on with a noninvasive test that involve a low power near-infrared laser and the patient’s eye. In order for the current course of treatment for Alzheimer’s to be most effective the drugs should be administered as soon as possible to limit the potential amount of damage caused by the disease. The deformed amyloid proteins which indicate the presence of Alzheimers are also present in the lens of the eye and its surrounding fluid. One of the tests looks at the portion of the lens where the proteins tend to gather to form cataracts. Another test uses eye drops which bond to the proteins and fluoresce under the laser’s light. The first test provides information about the number and size of the particles while the second provides more accurate data about the make up of the proteins. Tests in mice indicate that it is possible to identify the proteins in the eye before they begin their detrimental accumulation in the brain. Tests are scheduled to begin human trials next year with an estimated cost of less than $300. Goldstein hopes that the tests will ultimately be given as part of middle age physicals and notes that they may ultimately help in discovering a cure since it will now be possible to see quickly if a particular drug is working and how quickly it is effective.Jack Williamson Anyone whose bibliography requires two columns, has certainly been at the writing game for quite some time. Jack Williamson is one of those unique individuals who not only participated in the golden age of scifi but continues to contribute to the growth of the genre. Jack was born on April 29th in 1908. He grew up on a small ranch in New Mexico with a family whose income was just below the poverty line. This encouraged Jack to move on to something more. He went to college which he paid for with his writing and studied the sciences. If he hadn’t become a writer, Jack thought he might have become a chemist. Jack sold his first story to Hugo Gernsback for Amazing Stories in 1928. In his early days Jack was there at the beginnings of the scifi genre’s growth in popularity writing along side Robert Heinlein and John W. Campbell. Jack was the second person awarded the title of Grandmaster in 1975 by the Science Fiction Writers of America. In 1994 Jack was given the World Fantasy Award for lifetime achievement. Jack has been writing so long that he has some firsts in the field: first to write about antimatter, first to write about genetic engineering and he’s responsible for the word terraforming as well. Jack also has no aversion to working with others and has done numerous collaborations especially with writer Frederic Pohl. He continues to write and other recent books include The Silicon Dagger and Terraforming Earth. MATTHEW WOODRING STOVER Matthew Stover grew up in Illinois and graduated early from Danville High School. He credits both his History and English teachers for encouraging his desire to write. Reading his mother’s issues of Ellery Queen, Matthew discovered that there were places for new writers and that their work developed over time. One of the things that may have effected the nature of Heroes Die is the location of Stover’s home which was in an area that shared both urban and rural characteristics. Matt says that he could while there were many industries in town that he lived next to a farm and could walk to a place where he could see nothing but trees. Matthew is a student of the Degerberg Blend, a fighting style that combines elements from 25 world wide fighting arts. Stover also does kickboxing, canoeing, fencing, rockclimbing and still finds time for the more geekly arts of comics and RPGs. There is even some acting and theater background as well, from which Stover credits his ability to choreograph fight scenes. Matthew lives with the artist and writer Robyn Fielder. He’s the author of several other books Iron Dawn and Jericho Moon, as well as several Star Wars novels including the novelization of Revenge of the Sith. He’s also very outspoken and will take an interviewer to task if he feels the question is a bit too leading or implying something about himself or his work that is untrue. Speaking of truth, here’s a final thought from Matthew, himself - “If the truth were simple, I wouldn't write books. I'd rent billboards.” Jim Baen : a Retrospective On June 28th 2006, one of the bright stars of the science fiction and fantasy publishing industry faded from the sky. Jim died as a result of a massive bilateral thalamus stroke which put him into a coma on June 12th. Born James Patrick Baen, on October 22nd in 1943, Jim began his publishing career in the complaints department of Ace Books. Before that he served in the Army Security Agency as a Morse Code Intercept Operator and also ran a folk music coffee shop in Greenwich Village during the 60’s. Jim edited for such magazines as Galaxy Science Fiction and If. During this time he was nominated for several Hugo awards and published such authors as John Varley, Jerry Pournelle, Charles Sheffield, Spider Robinson and Algis Budrys. He returned to work with Ace books heading their science fiction books line with Tom Doherty. Jim left Ace with Tom Doherty who founded Tor and began Tor’s line of science fiction. In 1983 Jim took the chance to develop his own independent company Baen Books which publishes such well known authors as John Ringo, Lois McMaster-Bujold, Mercedes Lackey, David Weber, and Eric Flint. Jim had several unique views on successful publishing that he brought to Baen books, one of which was the idea that ebooks didn’t need to be encrypted. He simply felt that nothing should come between the reader and the enjoyment of the story and that making the books harder to read was a big mistake. Another idea he’d used before with Ace and Tor and continued was the pairing of an experienced author with a beginner to allow the development of growth in upcoming authors. Jim also was his own art director for Baen Books. Through his guidance his books gained a signature style. In the 90’s Jim started a web forum know as Baen’s Bar, the epublishing business called webscription.net and the Baen Free Library which continues to provide reading material from various Baen Books authors by promoting back catalog titles an formerly out of print books. In 2005 Jim announced a new online magazine for Science Fiction short stories called Baen’s Universe. The first edition of the magazine hit the internet in June of 2006 and was edited by Eric Flint. One can only hope that unique vision of Jim Baen will continue in Baen Books for it is a fitting tribute to the man.FRANK HERBERT On his eighth birthday, Frank Herbert stood up on top of the family breakfast table and declared, “I wanna’ be an author.” With the success of the Dune series and his many books and short story collections, few could argue with his success. But it didn’t always mean prosperity in a material fashion. Frank was very determined about everything. He didn’t graduate college because he only took the classes he was interested in, not the required ones. He never had immediate success writing early in his career because he only wrote for the publications that he wanted to. He spent a number of years moving from place to place and job to job. It was his second wife Beverly who brought most of the steady income into the household through a job in writing advertising for department stores. Having met a creative writing class in 1946, Beverly eventually gave up her hopes of creative writing to become the breadwinner for the family. Frank spent 6 years researching and writing to finish Dune which was rejected by 23 publishers before finally finding acceptance and earning an advance of $7500. Dune won the Nebula award in 1965 and shared the Hugo in 1966. Dune was not an immediate success and Frank had several teaching jobs as well as going to Vietnam and Pakistan in 1972 as a social and economic consultant. After 1972, Frank began to finally was able to devote himself fulltime to writing. Herbert wrote 6 books in the Dune Series, Dragon in the Sea-about submarine warfare, Hellstrom’s Hive & the Green Brain- both about insects and humanity’s future, Man of Two Worlds– in collaboration with his son Brian, Soul Catcher– his one non-scifi fictional work as well as many others. Dune remains the world’s best selling science fiction novel and was the first to look at ecologic change as a theme. Frank Herbert died on February 12th in 1986 after a prolonged battle with pancreatic cancer. Frank Herbert’s home on Olympic Peninsula in Washington state has been turned into a self supporting ecology demonstration project.Upcoming Projects on the SciFi Channel -The Lost Room featuring Peter Krause, formerly of Six Feet Under and Elle Fanning focuses on a homicide detective who finds a key that contains powers that mysterious others are scrambling to acquire and a young girl who vanishes into a hotel room. - SciFi has okayed the beginning of production on a series for Pain Killer Jane. Skiffy had earlier produced a Saturday movie about the military officer who gains unusual healing abilities. -Outpost will focus on a group of explorers who find a unusual buried object on a distant planet. The series will be produced by astronomer David Grinspoon and written by Eric Jendreson (Band of Brothers). - In Devil’s Advocate a theology professor finds himself immured in a world of secret conspiracies and religious espionage when he is hired by a corporation as part of a team to explore inexplicable occurrences. - Ben Endlund (the Tick) is responsible for Witch Doctor where sudden extraordinary powers of healing change a man’s life. -Stoner, a slacker, in an alternate reality Los Angeles where superheroes actually exist, accidentally is mistaken as a hero. Actually Stoner was originally reported in WTS as Slacker several months ago. As with any projects that are reported, until they are actually given the green light for production, they are mere propositions. SciFi also is looking at developing late night programming which may include Prove It , a panel discussion show hosted by Mark DeCarlo (Curb Your Enthusiasm). C.S. Friedman At age twelve on vacation in France, young Celia S. Friedman ran out of reading material. She purchased the only English book she could find; Isaac Asimov’s Earth is Room Enough and decided to herself that Science Fiction was the ultimate form of literature. Her earliest work, a vampire novel, languished between the pages of her math notebook. At 14 she began developing the concept that would become In Conquest Born and then its sequel The Wilding. She later discovered the Society for Creative Anachronism and a desire to design period costume. She joined the League of Renaissance Swordsmen and performed at various fairs and continued her education towards an MFA in costume design. Her continuing writing was noticed by colleagues who encouraged her to seek publication; but it wasn’t until 1983 before she felt that she had written something worthy. After moving to Winchester, VA to teach at Shenandoah University, she took a summer to put her work together and after increased urging by her friend Rick Umbaugh, she submitted and to DAW and awaited her rejection letter – which never came. DAW has since published the rest of her books. And since then she has stopped designing and teaching costuming but decided she couldn’t step fully away from teaching, so she now teaches creative writing at a local high school. Celia points to Cordwainer Smith, Octavia Butler and Verner Vinge as factors influencing her writing. Some of her costuming patterns remain available through Medieval Miscellanea Press and Amazon Dry Goods. Paul Levinson Paul covers a wide range with his writing from his focus on communications to the forensic scifi stories of Phil D’Amato. When not being asked to comment by the likes of Jim Lehrer or Larry King Paul is writing stories like The Silk Code which won the Locus Award for Best First Novel in 1999, The Consciousness Plague which won the Mary Shelly award for outstanding Fictional Work and his novella Loose Ends was nominated for a Hugo, a Sturgeon and a Nebula in 1998, 1998 and 1997 respectively. Paul was also involved in the History Channel production, Fantastic Voyage: Evolution of Science Fiction providing extensive commentary. Paul also has worked in the music business both writing and performing. Paul was the President of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America from 1998 through 2001. Paul is currently the Department Chair of Communication and Media Studies at Fordham University. This is Pauls’ third visit with us. He first joined us with Walter Hunt, author of Dark Wing and on his next visit he was joined by Tee Morris, author of Morevi. Nominees for the Sidewise Award Best Long-Form Alternate History : The Summer Isles—Ian R. MacLeod Humanitas—Sophie McDougall A Princess of Roumania—Paul Park Best Long-Form Alternate History : “Harvest Moon”-William Barton “Illuminated Heretic”-A.M. Dellmonica “The 2005 Hugo Award Ceremony Script”-Kim Newman and Paul McAuley “Panacea”-Jason Stoddard “Pericles the Tyrant”-Lois Tilton Awards will be announced at L.A.Con IV, the 2006 WorldCon, Aug. 23-27, Annaheim, California. Sunburst Finalists Someone Comes To Town, Someone Leaves Town —Cory Doctorow Gravity Wells:Speculative Fiction Stories- James Alan Gardner The Wave Theory of Angels—Allison MacLeod In the Palace of Repose-Holly Phillips Spin-Robert Charles Wilson The Sunburst award for Canadian Literature of the Fantastic will be announced in the fall. GENE WOLFE While not a prolific author in novel form Gene has always offered works that have a certain density of meaning to them. Few are easy straight forward reads, especially due to his penchant for using unusual and exotic language. Gene was born on May 7, 1931 in New York state. He saw action in the Korean war and then later Earned a degree in Medical Engineering from Houston University. Gene retired from the editorship of the magazine Plant Engineering in 1984 to write full time. Gene has written numerous short stories and has several collections available. Perhaps the most famous of his works are the Books of the New Sun which follow Severian and his travels in the far future where the Earth’s sun is waning in power. All of the books have received various awards with Claw of the Concilator receiving the Nebula in 1981. Gene also won a Nebula for the novella The Death of Doctor Island. If you’ve followed Gene’s work in the past or enjoyed Gene’s book Knight that we just read, you may be interested to know that Gene is the fan guest of honor at this years Balticon Convention which will be held at Hunt Valley from May 26-29th. BALTICON 40Just a few high-lights of the upcoming convention to entice you to visit if you haven’t already thought about it : Guest of Honor : Neil Gaiman Musical Guest of Honor : Lorraine a’ Malena Artist Guest of Honor : Lisa Snellings-Clark Events: SF live theater by the Usual Suspects; the Masquerade Saturday night with prizes awarded for costumes; Klingon feast Sunday night; Sunday Night Film Fest featuring films submitted for review; presentation of the Compton Crook award (Saturday before the Masquerade); two musical performances by Lorraine a’ Malena and Ego Likeness and a LARP programs as well. In addition to these events there are the Dealers Room, the Art Show, the Computer Gaming Area and Theater showing films practically around the clock. Add to that multiple panel discussions every hour during the day, science track discussions, filk performances and various parties at night– it’s enough to make one tired just thinking about it. Balticon also offers a writer’s workshop, an art program, a costuming program and activities that are geared for youngsters 4-12. You can also catch up prior visiting authors such as: Peter Prellwitz, Tee Morris, David Sherman, or say “hi” to Paul Levinson before his visit in June. Find out more at : www.balticon.org/index.html NEBULA AWARDS 2005 Best Novel : Camouflage—Joe Haldeman Best Novella : Magic for Beginners—Kelly Link Best Novelette: The Faery Handbag—Kelly Link Best Short Story: “I Live With You”-Carol Emshwiller Best Script: Serenity-Joss Whedon Andre Norton Award: Valiant-Holly Black SCIFI CHANNEL’S NEW SLATE FOR THE FALL Here are some of the shows that SciFi is preparing to debut: -Blink : what if you had a chance to change the one instance thateffected your destiny profoundly? A group engineers second chances for people at that pivotal moment. -Persons Unknown : puts a group of strangers in a deserted town with no memory of their arrival and to make things difficult there’s also no way to escape. -The Bishop : Young slacker discovers he has a supernatural gift and therefore must seek the reasons for its origin. -Destination Truth : Follows investigations into the unexplainable. -Ground Control : a half hour late night show that looks into anything genre related as well as supernatural or inexplicable. -Caprica : This is the spin-off from Galactica set 50 years pre-cylon invasion and focuses on the Adama and Greystone families as well as the development of artificial intelligence that leads to the Cylons. GARY BRAVER Is actually a pen name for Gary Goshgarian who started his formal education with a full scholarship to Worchester Polytech for physics. It didn’t take Gary long to discover that his passion lay in writing and teaching writing rather than working on the how and why of physics. He started his own humor magazine and wrote for both the newspaper and the yearbook. Upon graduating, Braver went on receive several more degrees in English. Gary started teaching writing science fiction in the early seventies when he described it as “unfashionable”. Gary also writes nonfiction articles which cover such subjects as travel and scuba diving. Gary likes to focus on family and it shows through his writing. He wants to take the big science ideas and ask how their advent would effect the typical family He also believes that a great deal of our scientific advancement is overrated since we haven’t evolved ethically enough to be consistent in a manner to police our own developments.
DAVID FORBES David was born in 1965 and has called the southern central area of Pennsylvania his home for quite some time. David says that he was led to Star Trek the original series by a model he found of the Enterprise. After that came Star Wars and the Lord of the Rings as well. He has spent the last fifteen years working in banking specializing in marketing and e-commerce. He also lists Frank Herbert’s Dune and Philip K. Dick’s Valis as recommended reading. David went to both Carnegie Mellon and Penn State where he graduated with a degree in English. Amber Wizard is David’s first published book and there are several more books to come in the Osserian Saga. David also has a young adult book that is currently being shopped to publishers.Bram Stoker Award 2005 Nominees [presented by Horror Writer’s Association of America]Novel: Creepers by David Morrell Dread in the Beast by Charlee Jacob, Keepers by Gary Braunbeck, November Mourns by Tom Piccirilli Seiun Nominees for the 45th Japan Science Fiction ConventionTranslated Novel: Altered Carbon by Richard MorganDiaspora by Greg Egan Neanderthal Parallax Trilogy (Hominids, Humans and Hybrids) by Robert J. Sawyer Revelation Space by Alastair Reynolds Space Chantey by R.A. Lafferty The Swords of Lankhmar by Fritz Leiber Tuf Voyaging by George R.R. Martin Venus Plus X by Theodore Sturgeon NEAL ASHER Neal Asher was born in 1961 in Billericay in Essex, the UK. He first grew interested in the genre by reading Tolkien’s Hobbit and credits his parents love of SciFi for his desire to write. He was complimented on a story written for an English class when he was .sixteen. Neal spent a number of his younger years at various factory jobs that left him with the distinct desire to escape that particular type of work. He turned instead to landscaping and for more time to write. Up to 2000 he accumulated a contemporary novel and beginnings of several fantasy trilogies as well as a number of short stories. He was able to get several of these published or serialized but had not real success until Pan Macmillan offered him a three book contract. From this contract came The Skinner, Gridlinked and prequel to Gridlinked, Line of Polity. Cosmos Books also gathered together Africa Zero and Army of God into a single volume to be published. Pleased with the success of Gridlinked which was nominated for a Hugo, Pan Macmillan offered a further 3 book contract which contains Cowl, the Brass Man and The Voyage of the Sable Keech. The Brass Man is the follow up to Gridlinked and The Voyage of the Sable Keech is the follow up to The Skinner. Cowl is a stand alone novel with a very unique vision of time travel. Neal has also written a three-part TV series, Trines and a one –hour drama entitled The Executioner’s Lie. Unfortunately neither of these projects is currently under development.
Jack Hillman When he wasn’t writing for the insurance and medical journals, Jack was dreaming of something else as evidenced by the publication of There Are Giants In This Valley. Certainly interests in mythology, Arthurian legend and various works of scifi and fantasy have influenced Jack’s fiction. Jack also has penned 4 dinner theater plays that have been put on in Eastern Pennsylvanian venues. He does speaking engagements for writer’s conferences, writer’s groups and school gatherings. Jack was awarded the Keystone Press Award in 1998. Writing either as either a contributor or author, Jack also does a number of articles for several websites. When one views the topic list that Jack has covered in the past, it’s evident that he has an interest in ancient weapons as well as their creation and style of use. The Top Ten for New Earths Margaret Turnbull at the Carnegie Institute of Washington has created two lists of 5 of the best possible locations for Earth like planets close to us. One list of five is targeted for the SETI project and the other for the Terrestrial Planet Finder mission from NASA. Unfortunately the Terrestrial Planet Finder Mission has been shelved by NASA due to budget cuts. Turnbull used several definitions to set up her list which first looked at 19,000 stars that had potential habitable zones. Next the stars need to be at least 3 billion years old, no more than 1.5 times the mass of the sun and have at least 50% of the iron content of our sun. All of these are believed to be necessary to the production of rocky planets possibly harboring life. For the Seti list: -Beta Canum Venatiorum, a sunlike star about 26 light-years away in the northern constellation Canes Venatici. Astronomers have been looking for planets around the star but have found none to date. -HD 10307, another sunlike star, 42 light-years away. Nearly the same mass, temperature, metal content as the sun and a companion star. -HD 211415, about half the metal content of the sun and a bit cooler. -18 Scorpii, a popular target for proposed planet searches. An identical twin of the sun. -51 Pegasus, which was the first normal star beyond our solar system known to have a planet. The Jupiterlike planet was detected in 1995-could harbor Earthlike planets as well.For the TPF List : - Epsilon Indi A, about 11.8 light-years from Earth, somewhat cooler and smaller than our sun, and was recently found to have a brown-dwarf companion. "Star Trek" fans consider it the home of the Andorian race. In the original "Star Trek" series, it was the base of operations for an evil entity called "Gorkon."-Epsilon Eridani, 10.5 light-years away, somewhat smaller and cooler than our sun, known to have at least one planet. By some scifi accounts, Epsilon Eridani is the star for Vulcan on "Star Trek." But trekkers have come to favor another star in the same constellation.... -Omicron 2 Eridani, also known as 40 Eridani, is now cited in most "Star Trek" literature as Vulcan. Yellow-orange star about 16 light-years away, roughly the same age as our sun. -Alpha Centauri B is part of the triple-star system 4.35 light-years away. Considered one of the places in the Milky Way that might offer terrestrial conditions —used in Isaac Asimov's Foundation series. -Tau Ceti—same brightness category the sun, metal-poor, compared to the sun, but long-lived enough for life forms to evolve. It has also served as a locale for science-fiction works ranging from Ursula Le Guin's "The Dispossessed" to the TV show "Earth: Final Conflict." The TPF candidates had to fall into a certain optical output category because too much light would obscure the planet and too little would not indicate its presence through reflection. TAD WILLIAMS in what seems to be a common theme among writers Tad Williams has a long impressive list of jobs before he became a writer: Designing military manuals, newspaper boy, selling shoes, singing in a band, hosted a syndicated radio show for ten years, taught both grade school and college classes, worked in theater and television production. He’s currently writing television and films scripts and comic books as well as novels. Born in 1957 Tad grew up in Palo Alto and when his friends went away to college, he spent more time trying to make it on his own. When DAW finally offered to buy Tailchaser’s Song, Tad finally saw an opportunity to do what he wanted and get paid for it. Tad works on an epic scale. Very few of his books do not feature wide sweeping lands or large lists of characters similar to both Robert Jordan and George R.R. Martin being primarily focused on fantasy. His Otherland Quadrilogy is a unique blend using the technology that he describes to place his characters in more traditional fantasy settings.Tad lists the following author as some of his influences: Fritz Leiber, Michael Moorcock, Ray Bradbury, Theodore Sturgeon, Harlan Ellison, Roger Zelazny, and Ursula Le Guin. Williams’ most recent work Shadowmarch is the novel realization of a web based creation that used both art and text and finally was released in hardcover in November of 2005. LiftPort Continues Rising Last year at Balticon a forward thinking company by the name of LiftPort, concerned with the development of the technology necessary to create space elevators gave a presentation on their current efforts. They also began a series of tests last year using weather balloons to lift a ribbon to discover if their robotic climber could make a mile high ascent. Well last time the problem was with the ribbon. This time unfortunately the test failed due to the climber. In order to reduce the weight of the climber, nylon gears were used. Unfortunately the climber gave out at about 1500 feet which was however 500 feet higher than the previous trial. LiftPort has some interesting ideas in that it is not only working toward the large scale elevator reaching to LEO but also in creating a project called HALE, High Altitude Long Endurance for use as a communications array that maybe used in an upcoming training exercise in Utah which will be simulating a Mars landing. With the blessing of the FCC, Liftport hopes to be able to contribute to the exercise. Hitting Home Plate The mars rover Spirit has just arrived at a highly anticipated target, the layered rock dubbed Home Plate. Many ideas and conjectures are flying about the creation of the rock as the science arm is being deployed to investigate further. The apparent nature of the rock has excited scientists in their search for proof of prior existence of water on Mars. Stellar Record Keeping Goes Awry Globular Cluster Messier 12, about 23,000 LY away, is about 1 million stars lighter than scientists had calculated. Astronomers find that for every bright star there is a corresponding ratio of dimmer older stars. Also brighter stars tend to be more massive than smaller cooler ones. With these ratios, in the case of red dwarf stars about 4 to 1, they can determine the population of stars in a given area. Whenever a more detailed study of the color of stars in the cluster was undertaken, scientists discovered there were many missing red dwarf stars up to 1 million. Astronomers now believe that the cluster shed these stars over time . The orbits of globular clusters as they swing around the Milky Way occasionally bring them through the central regions of the galaxy where stars around the edges of the cluster maybe stripped off. Astronomers have found that Messier 12 has a “tidal tail” of stars following it in its orbit. The other less fortunate stars ejected during its passage through the central regions of the have wandered out of the Milky Way and form an extended halo of dim stars. Aren’t you glad astronomers don’t do your taxes . . . O John Ringo OJohn Ringo is a man who has worn many hats: army obviously, having participated in the Grenada intervention; camera salesman, database manager and finally my favorite– pay-per-visit catfish pond manager. But now John has settled rather firmly into the role of professional writer firmly entrenched in the Baen books camp. How exactly did that happen? Word has it that John was participating in an online chatroom that Jim Baen was known to frequent and when the politically oriented conversation got a heated, John to Jim him was crazy, but added perhaps he shouldn’t say that since Baen had John’s manuscript. Which started a hunt for the novel which suddenly couldn’t be found. Long story short, the precursor to Gust Front, A Hymn Before Battle was purchased by Baen books starting John’s career. John has a number of books out currently including several collaborations. He continues to be a strong force in the Baen books library. John is known for his outspoken views and penchant for wandering conventions dressed in a utilikilt. ET Come On Down While the US government has steadfastly denied the existence of UFO’s and ET visitation, some of the other world governments have begun taking a different stand. To our north, Canada’s former defense minister, Paul Hellyer is supporting the Canadian Exopolitics Initiative which is designed to prepare their nation for what they consider inevitable contact. This shouldn’t be too surprising as Alberta proudly created a UFO landing pad as part of its centennial celebration in 1964. Not to be out down by the Canadians, the Chinese are now also making preparations as well. Officials in Guiyang received a 20 million dollar grant from a Taiwan based company to fund a UFO research facility. This stems from mysterious occurrences in the Baiyun district which have led people to believe that ET has already, stopped by and we’d better get set to roll out the red carpet. Zhou Xiaoqiang, a secretary-general with the Beijing UFO Research Association contends that people often mistake common occurrences in unusual circumstance as UFOs and that extraterrestrials are more likely to appear in a peaceable fashion than cause the events which led to the funding. In the mean time the US just watches the show- does this mean China and Canada are more likely to receive a visit? Robert Rankin Oddly enough, it’s difficult to find things out about Mr. Rankin. Apparently he didn’t quite finish school dedicating himself to the potential 9-5 grind at the tender age of 17. During a job checking invoices he discovered someone else after him was double checking his work. He found the best method finding time to write was by simply moving the papers from the in bin into the out one and let the next person up the line do the work. This seems to have established his path to freedom. It seems that during the 70’s he was a prop supplier for the film industry which means that he supplied the glasses for aliens in the Star Wars cantina scene and also worked on Raiders of the Lost Ark. Robert would like to see his works classified in their own genre called “far fetched fiction” which as one of its principle requirements means they are deliberately amusing without of necessity being comedy. Sprout Mask Replica is purported to be autobiographical and contains some of Robert’s poetry at the beginning of each chapter. After further research it appears Robert was born in 1949 and repeated Google searches show that author Iain M. Banks continually lists Rankin’s books on his “now reading forum”. Since Banks is right up there next to cleanliness, that must mean that this Rankin fellow is alright. . . Rankin is a self proclaimed 12th Dan Master of the noble art of Dimac an obscure method of self defense and only some of this article is apocryphal. . . Peter Prellwitz Originally born in Arizona Peter has made quite a tour of the states dwelling in Wisconsin, California, Hawaii, Massachusetts, New York and currently in Pennsylvania. Peter is the MIS for a precious metals refining company based in the Philadelphia area as well a writer of both short stories and novels. Peter’s book Horizons received the 2003 Draco award and his Shards series, consisting of four books, is currently in the process of being made available in trade paperback. Peter enjoys history, languages and backpacking. We’re pleased to welcome Peter to our meeting tonight where he’ll be reading selections from his works and answering your questions. ASTEROIDS . . . NOT JUST A GAME ANY MORE Recently the rocky remains that drift among the planets have come into the news as the Japanese probe Hayabusa makes its rendezvous with the asteroid Itokawa. The Japanese Space Exploration Agency or JAXA is confident after a trial run that they will be able to touch down on the asteroid. However due to some bad timing and ill luck they have lost the small probe called Minerva that was designed to land on the asteroid and hop about taking pictures. The Minerva probe about as tall and as round as the length of a pair of scissors was deployed during a course correction when the Habayusa was under autopilot. Since the asteroid is so small and has such a tiny surface gravity it didn’t take much to make Minerva miss its target. Habayusa is set to touch down on the asteroid thisSaturday the 19th. But some folks are looking ahead with a bit of trepidation to another asteroid rendezvous because this time asteroid Apophis is coming to visit us in 2029. Some folks are beginning to wonder if it just might decide to drop in and stay and are beginning to plan just how to deal with an unwelcome visitor. Former astronaut Rusty Schweickart, chairman of the B612 Foundation has been calling for NASA to find ways to remove the threat of Apophis. In general it is believed that its passage near Earth in 2029 will be benign but there are concerns about its return in 2036 which has a chance of intersecting with the Earth’s orbit. Currently the asteroid must pass through a 600 meter probability keyhole in a certain space at a certain time to become a danger. Apophis is being tracked and observations in 2013 and 2029 will determine if it truly becomes a threat and the necessity of using projects that range from mirrors, mass drivers, nuclear weapons or gravitational effects from hovering space craft to deter our potential unwelcome visitor. But we have time to make the appropriate measurements before panicking and to see Chicken Little before it leaves the theaters. World Fantasy Awards for 2004 Novel: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
John G. Cramer John Cramer is a Professor of Physics at the University of Washington and an active researcher in particle physics with past experience at several high energy colliders including CERN. John is involved with the Center for Experimental Nuclear Physics and Astrophysics at the University of Washington and also teaches. John was born in Huston, TX and gained his degrees from Rice University. He is married to Pauline Cramer and has three children Kathryn, John III and Karen. John has done a great deal of work associated with the Department of Energy as well as serving abroad in Germany at the Max Planck Institut für Physik and other universities and the Los Alamos National Laboratory. John is also working with the STAR collaboration at RHIC/BNL and two collaborations at SPS/CERN. John is currently working on: Ultra-relativistic heavy ion physics, pion and kaon HBT interferometry, silicon drift detector and time projection chamber detection techniques; the interpretation of quantum mechanics; ultra-high energy astrophysics. John has written for ANALOG magazine taking over a column formerly written by Jerry Pournelle called The Alternate View. These cover a broad range of topics and can be accessed from John’s home page. They provide excellent overviews for the beginning of research and are written at a level that can be easily understood by the interested reader.New Concepts In Development For the Future NIAC, NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts, has a multiple phase process for selecting projects to invest in for future development. Here are some of the ideas which have reached the second round of the selection process: The New Worlds Imager, which will use a star shade similar in construction to a solar sail to focus in falling light to allow a space borne telescope to image newly found planetary objects. The construct will have individual panes similar to petals and will be as wide as a soccer field. The trailing telescope will follow at 50,000 miles and is believed to be able to provide images of such clarity as to be able to define weather patterns on far away worlds. This project is sponsored by Webster Cash of the University of Colorado at Boulder. A Deep Field Infrared Observatory near the Lunar Pole, a telescope will be placed at the moon’s pole but will be unique in that the lens will actually be liquid. The primary use will be for observing infrared sources and this project’s investigator is Simon Worden of the University of Arizona's Steward Observatory. Redesigning Living Organisms for Mars, Looking beyond the mere exploration of Mars, this study will look at the genetic modification of plants to allow them to adapt to the low temperature, atmospheric and high radiation conditions present on the Martian surface. Wendy Boss of North Carolina State University is the principal investigator. 4) Microbots for Large-Scale Planetary Surface and Subsurface Exploration, This project will look at the development of large quantities of spherical independent robots for planetary exploration in contrast to the current rover driven program. These robotic explorers will also have the ability to explore under the surface as well. This project is being looked at by Steve Dubrowsky from MIT. Investigation of the Feasibility of Laser Trapped Mirrors, once again looking at technology to improve our imaging devices, this concept uses two laser beams to provide structure to an ultrathin layer of particles providing a mirror surface 100 nanometers thick. Such a mirror would require less than 3.5 ounces of suspended material and would measure 115 feet wide. Elizabeth McCormack of Bryn Mawr College is the prime investigator. For more information about NIAC and the other projects they have considered or awarded monies to in the past visit their website at: Archimedean Death Ray Just because the Mythbusters say it’s so, does not make it so . . . And MIT’s Project Engineering class 2.009 set out to prove it. For those not familiar with the myth, Archimedes was supposed to have created a “burning glass” to use against ships anchored in bow range in the harbor at Syracuse. With this he was able to set the ships who were blockading the harbor aflame. Now the Mythbusters took on the idea and called it a bust, but the students had another idea. They wanted to purely prove the feasibility of the concept not the historical likelihood. First they constructed their mock boat of 1” thick red oak and placed it for the first test 100 feet away in the Killian Court area of the school. The very first test used a 1’ square flat mirror and produced a 3-4 reflection on the boat mock up. The second set of trials used 20 mirrors and then the team went and bought all of the stock at the local store giving them 129 mirrors to work with. Setting up the mirrors in an arc the students were plagued by intermittent high cloud cover that seriously effected the efficiency of the mirrors. Also they discovered it was very hard to aim the mirrors effectively leaving reflections all over the target. On a positive note several smoke wisps of smoke were observed. For the second test the boat was moved to the top of the West Garage building and set a distance more likely for bow range. The mirrors were once again positioned in an arc of two rows. 127 mirrors were used, two did not survive the prior experiment. To deal with the aiming issue, a targeting mirror was made to cast an “x” on the side of the ship. The crew of ten students had to work quickly to aim the mirrors as the fact of the earth’s rotation becomes very obvious when working with either telescopes or mirrors as any astronomer will testify. Mirrors were aimed using a prop on the back for the horizontal component and simply turning the mirror for the vertical. The mirrors were then covered so that the aiming “x” remained visible. For the first run of the uncovered mirrors cloud cover, while faint and wispy, makes life difficult. So difficult that even though there is evidence of heating, the transverse of the concentrated light actually passes the end of the ship. Not to be out done, the students move the ship to line it up, since their mock up is 10’ compared to the actual 100’ length of the ships, this is deemed acceptable. After 10 minutes of sustained exposure the volatiles begin to boil out of the wood and flames erupt. The fire burns a hole through the ship before it is doused by safety conscious students proving the feasibility of the concept, if not its likelihood. Ignition occurs at about 1100 degrees F. It should also be considered that the roman ships were often made of cedar or cypress and painted with colored wax which may have aided in ignition. Interestingly only 5% of the students polled found the idea feasible. Julie Czerneda Julie Czerneda grew up on a series of air force bases and through her school age years developed an interest in biology and animal communication. She married her former chemistry partner and finally settled in Orillia, Canada. Julie has said that she cannot imagine a universe without life through out it since there is such a wonderful diversity of life here on earth. She is the author of several series: the Web Shifter series, the Trade Pact series and more recently Species Imperative. Currently In the Company of Others remains her only stand alone novel. The book was nominated for a Philip K. Dick award and won a Prix Aurora award as well as an RT Reviewer’s award.Julie also is the editor of Tales from the Wonder Zone collections specifically designed to use SF and speculative fiction to teach language arts and science to elementary school students. She is the co-author with Annette Griesmann of the teacher’s guides that accompany the collections. She is also the author of No Limits: Developing Scientific Literacy Using Science Fiction based on workshops for students and teachers by Julie. Julie also edited a companion volume called Packing Fraction and Other Tales of Science and Imagination which features stories by Robert Sawyer, Charles Sheffield and Jan Sterling. Julie is also an accomplished editor having produced several collections for DAW science fiction including: Space Inc., ReVisions, Summoned to Destiny and Fantastic Companions. Coming Soon : Peter Prellwitz I’m pleased to announce that we will be welcoming Peter Prellwitz in November to talk about the first book in the Shards Universe series. A number of the Shards books are currently available in audio format but November 4th will see the first in print. Peter will be here to talk about the universe he’s created and peopled as well as read from some of his works. Peter’s other works include The Science of Magic and Horizons which received a Draco award in 2003 and was a finalist for an Eppie. Find out more about Peter and the Shards Universe here:http://shardsuniverse.net/ Larry Niven Larry was born in 1938 in Los Angeles and went on to attend CalTech. Fortunately for the sciFi world, Larry dropped out a year and a half later after discovering a used bookstore full of old scifi magazines. He did go on to receive a B.A. in mathematics and a minor in psychology from Washburn University in Kansas. He completed one year of graduate work at UCLA before dropping out to do what he does best– write. His first publication “The Coldest Place” appeared in the World of If in 1964 in the December issue. Niven is known for his hard science fiction, Ringworld– one of the first novels featuring a megastructure and his work with the government’s various commissions on the exploration of space. Niven has won a Nebula and several Hugos, Locus Awards, Ditmars as well as the Prometheus award and the Seiun Award.A number of his fictional works share a common backdrop set in the Known Space universe. Niven is particularly prolific at creating aliens that in Campbellian fashion think as well as a man but not like a man. One of the thing Larry excels at besides writing his own fiction is collaborating with others. He has done several trio collaborations which few other authors can claim to have even tried. Sir Arthur Clarke once named Niven as his favorite author. His story “Inconstant Moon” was adapted as an Outer Limits episode and “The Slaver Weapon” was redone as an animated Star Trek episode. Jerry Pournelle PhD. Jerry was born in Shreveport, Louisiana. Pournelle went to the University of Washington where he earned his Bachelors in Psychology and Mathematics, his Masters in Experimental Statistics and Systems Engineering, and his Doctorates in Psychology and Political Science. Besides writing science fiction, Pournelle also had a column with BYTE magazine, chairs the Citizen's Advisory Council on National Space Policy and The Lunar Society, Inc. and has served as an advisor on Space Policy and as a board member of the L-5 Society. Jerry has been a science editor for both Twin Circle Magazine and Galaxy SF as well as a columnist for Analog and Infoworld Magazine. Pournelle is a member of the British Interplanetary Society, Royal Astronomical Society and the Operations Research Society of America.Jerry was awarded the first John W. Campbell award in 1974. Pournelle was one of the first writers to use a computer for writing. EZEKIEL, Jerry's first personal computer, is currently on display in the Museum of American History, History of Computing and Communications exhibit. Jerry also can claim to be one of the original bloggers and you can find more at www.jerrypournelle.com/.
Terry Gilliam: The Brother’s
Grimm and more
Terry Gilliam,
of Monty Python fame and the director of the new film, The Brother’s Grimm said that he tried to stay
closer to the original version of the Grimm fairytales rather than the sanitized versions. He commented that even the brothers
themselves were responsible for editing some of their own stories, such as Rapunzel who was actually pregnant by the prince
when the witch confronts her. The first edition of their book contained 500 stories which was then cut back to 100 stories
to broaden the appeal to the masses. Looking closely at the previews of the movie you might recognize Monica Bellucci, the
statuesque Persephone from the Matrix movies. But you’ll be hard pressed to recognize her as her alter ego the
500 year old witch who terrorizes the Brothers in the movie. Bellucci worked to change her voice for the disparity in ages
of since she plays both the young version and ancient version of the witch. Bellucci said that she was very surprised with
the end result since she had no real idea how things would turn out, due to the number of effects and the amount of postproduction
in the film. She said that she was astonished by the transitions between the two aspects of her character.
Gilliam says that his next project Tideland is about the resilience of children in the face of change. The main character loses her mother to a heroin overdose and then deals with the pain by creating her own fantasy world that involves talking barbie doll heads & an unusual neighbor who wears a beekeeper’s hat. Terry has also said that he has hopes to continue to pursue one of his dream projects that has eluded him for a decade. Now titled the Man Who Killed Don Quixote, which will not be a remake of the film that cost Gilliam time, money and some sanity and finally became immortalized in the documentary, Lost in La Mancha, this new interpretation will utilize some of Cervantes story elements and exists as a screenplay written by Richard LaGravenese {Fisher King}. Since Tideland will be premiered at the Toronto Film Festival in September, it seems that Gilliam will soon be ready to tilt at windmills once more. The Hugo Awards 2005 Best Novel: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke Best Novella: "The Concrete Jungle" by Charles Stross Best Novelette: "The Faery Handbag" by Kelly Link Best Short Story: "Travels With My Cats" by Mike Resnick Best Related Book: The Cambridge Companion to Science Fiction, Edward James and Farah Mendlesohn, eds. Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form: The I |