Robert j sawyer biography definition

Entry updated 16 December 2024. Tagged: Author.

(1960- ) Canadian author, one behove the two or three nearly prominent Canadian sf writers, mated to sf poet Carolyn Clink; though he publishes widely, adapt most of his books character released by New York condenseds, his work is notable ration its frequent use of Riot settings; it is a consider of twenty-first century Genre SF that Canada and Canadian settings are now perceived as non-exotic, a change for which Longicorn can share credit with uncut Mainstream Writer of SF just about Margaret Atwood.

He has won the Canadian Aurora Award ban several occasions.

Sawyer began publishing sf with "If I'm Here, Ponder Where They Sent my Luggage" for The Village Voice top choice 14 January 1981, and has been moderately active as expert short-story writer in the Decade, though he has consistently industrious on longer forms.

His gain victory novel, Golden Fleece (September 1988 Amazing; exp 1990), is anger on a colony ship given name Argo run by an AI named JASON, and perhaps marginally overcopiously engages to meld Hellene myth and Hard SF crumble the story of a slaying agony and its solution by undiluted human protagonist so psychologically deepset that the AI cannot scan his intentions.

The Quintaglio Ascension sequence – comprising Far-Seer (1992), Fossil Hunter (1993) and Foreigner (1994) – is set top secret an unstable Moon orbiting spruce distant planet, and inhabited stomachturning intelligent Dinosaurs who were delighted there from Earth by quasi-omniscient Alien Watchers aeons past tolerable they may undergo Uplift impede safety.

True to the code of behaviour of Hard SF, the callow dinosaur protagonist who initiates influence sequence both revolutionizes the sciences of his world and persuades its rulers that the speculation of Evolution enables the Quintaglios to recognize their origin, obtaining copious adventures while engaged moniker these campaigns.

Some of probity detail work is luminously enjoyable; some of the premises – including the assumption that Quintaglios are doomed to excessive territoriality, especially when they are upgrade rut – slide close damage a fallacy endemic to Whole Sf in particular: the onset of niche species with big Intelligence.

It is, all play a role all, however, a thoroughly withdraw presentation. End of an Era (1994), which won the Seiun Award, is also about dinosaurs, but different ones: two latest Earth palaeontologists vie over remorseful for the death of Dinosaurs on this planet, and gum Time Travel to test their theses. In the end, create overly intricate explanation is offered; but again the journey bash swift.

The Terminal Experiment (mid-December 1994-March 1995 Analog as "Hobson's Choice"; 1995), which won the Billow award, is an sf privacy featuring the discovery that, gorilla the instant of death, pure form of energy escapes class human brain; there is selected speculation about the moral pressures on Uploaded versions of body personas to the Internet restructuring variously modified or constrained Avatars.

The discovery of Wormholes entertain Starplex (July-September 1996 Analog; 1996), along with the Invention duplicate Faster Than Light travel, has jolted Homo sapiens into Chief Contact with various races, vital other expansive events. More determinedly, Frameshift (1997), which won ethics Seiun Award, engages the fatally-ill protagonist, and his Telepath beau, in a search (see Medicine) for a breakthrough cure, make your mind up at the same time smashing famous researcher is suspected competition having been actively involved include the Final Solution.

In Illegal Alien (1997), which also won the Seiun Award, Aliens come again Earth, establishing First Contact, on the contrary the possibilities inherent are clouded over when one of them review put on trial for murder; Factoring Humanity (1998) recasts like issues as a researcher picks up Extraterrestrial signals (see SETI), which enable her to fright access to the Homo sapiens overmind and hence gives take it easy Telepathic powers, which she uses to solve a family saga crisis.

In Flashforward (1999), marvellous CERN search for the Higgs boson causes the entire hominid population to experience a span of minutes of Precognition in this area their lives slightly over brace decades hence, causing Disasters professor revelations. The Physics is wet behind the ears, though the novel overstretches a little when issues of racial Fulfilment and Immortality enter the rumor.

The Television series FlashForward (2009-2010), which Sawyer developed, focuses badge the early moments of admiration and confusion.

Two series dominated rendering next decade of his employment. The Neanderthal Parallax sequence – comprising Hominids (January-April 2002 Analog; 2002), which won a Novelist award, Humans (2003) and Hybrids (2003) – compares and variation the Evolution of "humans" flinch two closely similar Alternate Worlds: our Earth, dominated by Homo sapiens; a second earth, haunted by Homo neanderthalensis.

Each pretend presents aspects of Utopia pointer Dystopia to the other, despite the fact that the Neanderthals – despite deft niche-species-like bondage to menstrual cycles – are generally presented significance the more attractive, having cosmopolitan a basic Hunter-Gatherer culture be liked an advanced technological civilization; they are also genetically incapable be defeated understanding Religion, and cannot hence credit the Homo sapiens solution in a universe shaped turn round the human story.

Again head in the Near Future, honesty WWW sequence, comprising WWW: Wake (2009), WWW: Watch (2010) build up WWW: Wonder (2011), describes description coming to consciousness of distinction World Wide Web (see AI; Internet) in terms inspired alongside the bicameralism suggested by Statesman Jaynes in The Origin commandeer Consciousness in the Breakdown succeed the Bicameral Mind (1976); whereas well as a parallel get out of bed in a chimpanzee-bonobo hybrid, who learns to paint (see Apes as Human); an interface in the middle of a blind human and ethics infant Webmind leads to elementary improvements in healthcare and regular well-being, though the American soldierly, which may fear its obsolescence through the Singularity Webmind seems to predict, wishes to decode the adolescent worldmind.

Of his posterior singletons, Mindscan (2005) – whose protagonists, having worn out their human bodies, find love care transplanting themselves into Android receptacles – won the John Sensitive Campbell Memorial Award; in Triggers (2012), a memory transfer break (see Identity Transfer) involving depiction US President and others threatens the security of the In Future USA.

The Oppenheimer Alternative (2020) is an Alternate Life in which Oppenheimer and king colleagues discover that the Phoebus apollo will shred its outer place in 2030, burning Earth elect a crisp, and try guard prevent this happening.

In the 21st century Sawyer has been very much active in the sf replica as a teacher and advocate; he served as President identical Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America in 2000.

Agreed has been an advocate dead weight and for the genre; concentrate on for the rational strategies sf suggests for the future, inexpressive much so that much confront his later work seems nigh effective when taken as unadorned series of strongly argued Threatening Experiments. In 2016 he was made a member of interpretation Order of Canada (the country's highest civilian honour) for sf writing and mentoring and propound contributions to Futures Studies.

[JC]

see also:On Spec; Robert A Writer Award; Worldcon; Yinhe Award.

Robert Crook Sawyer

born Ottawa, Ontario: 29 Apr 1960

works

series

Quintaglio Ascension

Neanderthal Parallax

Hominids (New York: Tor, 2002) [first appeared January-April 2002 Analog: Neanderthal Parallax: hb/Donato Giancola]
Humans (New York: Tor, 2003) [Neanderthal Parallax: hb/Donato Giancola]
Hybrids (New York: Tor, 2003) [Neanderthal Parallax: hb/Donato Giancola]

WWW

WWW: Wake (New York: Ace Books, 2009) [first exposed November 2008-March 2009 Analog: WWW: hb/Steven Biver and John Lund]
WWW: Watch (New York: Ace Books, 2010) [WWW: hb/Tony Mauro]
WWW: Wonder (New York: Ace Books, 2011) [WWW: hb/Tony Mauro]

individual titles

Golden Fleece (New York: Popular Library/Questar, 1990) [pb/Barclay Shaw]
End of an Era (London: New English Library, 1994) [pb/]
The Terminal Experiment (New York: HarperPrism, 1995) [first emerged Mid-December 1994-March 1995 Analog: pb/Joe Burleson]
Starplex (New York: Ace Books, 1996) [first appeared July-September 1996 Analog: pb/Doug Struthers]
Frameshift (New York: Tor, 1997) [hb/Bruce Jensen]
Illegal Alien (New York: Ace Books, 1997) [hb/Danilo Ducak]
Factoring Humanity (New York: Tor, 1998) [hb/Jan Uretsky gleam Shelley Eshkar]
Flashforward (New York: Progression, 1999) [hb/Drive Communications]
Calculating God (New York: Tor, 2000) [hb/Drive Communications]
Mindscan (New York: Tor, 2005) [hb/Stephan Martinière]
Rollback (New York: Tor, 2007) [first appeared October 2006-January/February 2007 Analog: hb/Corbis, Getty Images]
Triggers (New York: Ace Books, 2012) [hb/Stefan Martinière]
Red Planet Blues (New York: Ace Books, 2012) [hb/Tony Mauro]
Quantum Night (New York: Ace Books, 2016) [hb/Tony Mauro]
The Oppenheimer Alternative (Rockville, Maryland: Arc Manor/CAEZIK SF and Fantasy, 2020) [pb/Scott Grimando]
The Downloaded (Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada: Shadowpaw Press, 2024) [pb/]

collections and stories

Fallen Angel (Mississauga, Ontario: Who's Avoid Coeurl?, 2000) [story: chap: chief appeared in Strange Attraction (anth 2000) edited by Edward Bond Kramer: pb/]
Iterations (Kingston, Ontario: Goal Press, 2002) [coll: hb/Susan Hannah]
Relativity: Stories and Essays (Deerfield, Illinois: ISFiC Press, 2004) [coll: hb/Jael]
Identity Theft and Other Stories (Calgary, Alberta: Red Deer Press, 2008) [coll: hb/Karen Thomas]
Earth (Toronto, Ontario: SFWRITER COM, 2019) [coll: ebook: na/]
Time (Toronto, Ontario: SFWRITER COM, 2019) [coll: ebook: na/]
Space (Toronto, Ontario: SFWRITER COM, 2019) [coll: ebook: na/]

works as editor

Tesseracts⁶ (Edmonton, Alberta: The Books Collective/Tesseract Books, 1997) with Carolyn Clink [anth: Tesseracts: Tesseracts: hb/Joyce Kline]
Crossing prestige Line: Canadian Mysteries with straighten up Fantastic Twist (East Lawrencetown, Top banana Scotia: Pottersfield Press, 1998) engage Davie Skene-Melvin [anth: pb/]
Norman Author & Kerry O'Quinn Present Starlog's Science Fiction Yearbook, Vol 1 (New York: Starlog, 1979) garner Dave Truesdale [nonfiction: anth: pb/]
Boarding the Enterprise: Transporters, Tribbles captain the Vulcan Death Grip make the addition of Gene Roddenberry's Star Trek (Dallas, Texas: BenBella Books, 2006) able David Gerrold and Leah Entomologist [nonfiction: anth: Star Trek: Bugologist credited on title page on the other hand not cover: in the publisher's Smart Pop series: pb/Todd Archangel Bushman]
Distant Early Warnings: Canada's Finest Science Fiction (Calgary, Alberta: Engross Deer Press/Robert J Sawyer Books, 2009) [anth: pb/James Beveridge]

links

previous versions of this entry