Harlan Ellison (1934–2018) wrote and edited more than 120 books and more than 1,700 stories, essays, and articles, as well as dozens of screenplays and teleplays. He won the Hugo Award nine times, the Nebula Award four times, the Bram Stoker Award six times (including the Lifetime Achievement Award in 1996), the Edgar Allan Poe Award of the Mystery Writers of America twice, the Georges Méliès Fantasy Film Award twice, and was awarded the Silver Pen for Journalism by PEN, the international writer’s union. He was named a Grand Master by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America in 2006.
J. Michael Straczynski is a legendary American writer and television producer—best known as the author of The Complete Guide to Scriptwriting, as the creator and showrunner for the science fiction TV series Babylon 5 and, from 2001 to 2007, the writer for the long-running Marvel comic book series The Amazing Spider-Man.
Born in Decatur, IIlinois,
Richard Peck has written over 18 novels for young readers. He is the winner of the 1990 Margaret A. Edwards Award, a prestigious award sponsored by the Young Adult Library Services Association of the American Library Association in cooperation with
School Library Journal; the 1990 National Council of Teachers of English/ALAN Award for outstanding contributions to young adult literature; and the Mystery Writers of America Edgar Allan Poe Award.
Patton Oswalt is an American stand-up comedian, actor, voice actor, and New York Times bestselling author. He has released television specials and critically acclaimed comedy albums, including the Grammy Award-nominated My Weakness Is Strong. He put together the Comedians of Comedy tour and television series and he has held recurring character roles on many television shows. He has appeared in more than twenty films and has worked as a voice actor in King of Queens, Cartoon Network’s Robotomy, and the Disney animated film Ratatouielle.
Dan Simmons is the Hugo Award-winning author of several novels, including the
New York Times bestsellers
Olympos and
The Terror. He lives in Colorado.
Max Brooks is a senior nonresident fellow at the Modern War Institute at West Point and the Atlantic Council’s Brent Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security. His bestselling books include Minecraft: The Island, The Zombie Survival Guide, and World War Z, which was adapted into a 2013 movie starring Brad Pitt. His graphic novels include The Harlem Hellfighters.
Adrian Tchaikovsky was born in Lincolnshire before heading off to Reading to study psychology and zoology. He subsequently ended up in law and has worked as a legal executive in both Reading and Leeds, where he now lives. Married, he is a keen live role-player and occasional amateur actor and has trained in stage-fighting. He's the author of
Children of Time, the winner of the 30th Anniversary Arthur C. Clarke Award, and the
Sunday Times bestseller
Shards of Earth.
Cory Doctorow is a special consultant to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an MIT Media Lab Research Associate and a visiting professor of Computer Science at the Open University. His award-winning novel
Little Brother and its sequel
Homeland were a
New York Times bestsellers. Born and raised in Canada, he lives in Los Angeles.