My novel Triggers — first published by Ace after serialization in Analog, and currently eligible for nomination for the Hugo, Nebula, and Aurora Awards — had a very good showing on year’s best lists, and has just been nominated for one of Canada’s top literary awards. The award is the Ontario Library Association’s Evergreen Award [...]
Now that Hugo Award nominations are officially open, I’d be remiss if I didn’t remind you that my novel Triggers, published in the US by Ace Science Fiction following serialization in the January-February, March, April, and May 2012 issues of Analog (and Audio version from Audible), is eligible for nomination in the Best Novel category. [...]
I got asked yesterday what my favorite parts of the movie Contact were — the questioner took it as a given that I must love the film. Well, I know we’re all supposed to like it because it was based on a book by Carl Sagan, and because, y’know, it’s about a kick-ass female scientist, [...]
Financial Times — The Financial Times of London, one of the most-read newspapers in the world — just reviewed my novel Triggers. It’s a short but sweet review, but wonderfully quotable:“It’s a national security nightmare — someone has access to the secrets lodged in the brain of the most powerful man in the world. There’s [...]
Reviews for Triggers by Robert J. Sawyer: “Hugo- and Nebula-award-winning science fiction author Robert J. Sawyer returns with a new hard science fiction novel which pulls together elements of a gripping political thriller with cutting edge psychological insights to create a story that works on many levels. Triggers has the pacing of an episode of [...]
Today is the official publication date of my 21s novel Triggers. The hardcover, ebook, and Audible.com versions are all out now. I begin my book tour tonight!“Hugo- and Nebula-award-winning science fiction author Robert J. Sawyer returns with a new hard science fiction novel which pulls together elements of a gripping political thriller with cutting edge [...]
Tom Shippey — the world’s top Tolkien scholar — reviews my novel Triggers in the March 31, 2012, edition of The Wall Street Journal. The review concludes:Mr. Sawyer works through the permutations with one surprise after another, including the president’s deep, dark secret–now in somebody else’s possession–that would make him a one-termer for sure. The [...]
Mississauga Life, a glossy magazine in Mississauga (Canada’s sixth-largest city, and where I live), has a lengthy, meaty interview with me in its March-April 2012 issue, as well as a wonderful review of Triggers, which says in part:Triggers is congruent with the best science-fiction in that it’s not about blasters, but about issues and social [...]
Five years ago this month, TORO Magazine asked me to recommend four “must-read” science-fiction books. Half a decade later they’re still great reads: THE TIME MACHINE by H.G. Wells (Tor): Wells created it all: time travel, space voyages, alien invasions, genetic engineering, antigravity, invisibility — you can’t write SF without riffing on good ole H.G. [...]
The Winnipeg Free press loves Wonder, as you can see in Nick Martin’s review here. The review concludes:Wonder is not only a superb conclusion to a tremendous trilogy, but stands alone as one of the best books that Sawyer has ever written.I’ll be in Winnipeg on book tour on Thursday, May 19, 2011, signing at [...]
The Globe and Mail: Canada’s National Newspaper reviewed Wonder, the “much anticipated finale to the WWW trilogy,” yesterday. I must say I like the opening:Okay, new rule. Effective today, Canadian reviews of Robert J. Sawyer and his fiction should no longer begin with “Robert J. Sawyer is a Canadian science-fiction writer” or any variation on [...]
Over at Extrapolations: The Barnes & Noble Science Fiction and Fantasy Blog, Paul Goat Allen has posted a wonderful review of Wonder and the whole WWW trilogy. As Caitlin would say, “W00t!” Robert J. Sawyer online:Website • Facebook • Twitter • Newsgroup • Email
Since we’re in the thick of Hugo, Nebula, and Aurora Award-nominating season, forgive me for this roundup of reviews of my 2009 novel Wake (published in the US by Ace as WWW: Wake). “The thought-provoking first installment of Sawyer’s WWW trilogy explores the origins and emergence of consciousness. The thematic diversity — and profundity — makes [...]
Back in June 1998, I met with the then-manager of author relations for Amazon.com at Amazon’s headquarters in Seattle. It was an opportunity to tell her what was wrong with Amazon.com’s online book-review system (in my humble opinion), which had been thrust into the marketplace without any consultation with writers’ groups. I outlined numerous difficulties [...]
The Times — a major British newspaper — reviewed my novel FlashForward (basis for the TV series of the same name) yesterday; the review is by acclaimed SF writer Lisa Tuttle, and concludes: [T]he novel is an intellectual puzzle, drawing on theoretical physics to raise questions about time and space and the existence of free [...]
Analog Science Fiction and Fact, the world’s top-selling English-language SF magazine, recently changed book reviewers. Of course, all of us long-time Analog readers have been curious to see what sort of approach the new reviewer, Don Sakers, was going to take, and so I turned with interest to “The Reference Library” section of the October [...]
The TV series FlashForward, made by ABC Studios in Los Angeles, and based on Robert J. Sawyer‘s novel of the same name, has now sold to a staggering 100 territories worldwide. Recent additions: AXN (Central and Eastern Europe), AXN (Japan), Channel 1 (Russia), Fox International Channels (Russia), M-Net (Africa), Orbit Showtime (Middle East), ProSieben (Germany),TF1 [...]
Flashing back to April 1999, when my novel FlashForward received a starred review — denoting a book of exceptional merit — from Publishers Weekly, the US trade journal of the book-publishing industry. The review concluded: “This first-rate, philosophical journey, a terrific example of idea-driven SF, should have wide appeal.” The full review of the novel [...]
Reviews of the Aurora Award-winning novel FlashForward by Robert J. Sawyer, basis for the ABC TV series of the same name: “A thoroughly entertaining novel. The characters and story keep you turning the pages to see how this future turns out.” — CNN “A creative, soul-searching exploration of fate, free will, and the nature of the [...]
A wonderful review of my Hugo Award-winning Hominids is here at the blog Pick-Locker. The five-star review concludes: This book pushed everything to its limits, questioning morality, immorality, evil and good. It was confusing, irritating, annoying … and yet it was also the most entertaining, and informative book I’ve read in a long time. It [...]
There’s a lovely review of the anthology Federations edited by John Joseph Adams right here, which says in part: The strongest story in this anthology is Robert J. Sawyer’s “The Shoulders of the Giants.” It’s a beautiful story. It’s worth the price of admission. w00t! Visit The Robert J. Sawyer Web Siteand WakeWatchWonder.com
I visited Toronto’s Merril Collection of Science Fiction, Speculation and Fantasy on Tuesday, and had a look at the expensive but comprehensive standard reference work Anatomy of Wonder: A Critical Guide to Science Fiction, edited by Neil Barron. I own an old edition from the 1980s, but the Merril had the most recent one, the [...]
Saying, among other nice things: “I shouldn’t be shocked that Sawyer has done has homework and is able to predict things that could happen in the near future. He’s had a long, distinguished career of doing just that and his new novels are always those I look forward to reading next. WWW: Wake is no [...]
Over at The Grumpy Owl, Ryan Oakley has a detailed review of my novel Wake. It’s a flattering review, yes, but more than that, Oakley gets the book: Wake often feels like a counterargument, both in style and content, to Neuromancer. One hopes that the next two volumes will step out of Gibson’s long, dark [...]
The case of the missing Amazon reviews … Well, okay, it’s not much of a mystery. :) But if you’ve only seen the (very nice) reviews of my Wake on Amazon.com, you’re missing the ones that have been posted on Amazon.ca (the Canadian counterpart). Often, Amazon consolidates reviews across its divisions — but in this case [...]
No, not Don Halifax — the main character in my novel Rollback — but the Halifax Chronicle-Herald, the major daily newspaper in the capital city of the Canadian province of Nova Scotia, which starts its list entitled “Beach Reading: Fiction Picks for Summer,” compiled by David Pitt, with my Wake, published in Canada under Penguin’s [...]
Now, that’s a review! The June 11, 2009, edition of FFWD (aka Fast Forward Weekly: Calgary’s News and Entertainment Alternative) has a wonderful, lengthy review of my Wake by Hugh Graham. Here’s the opening, a little piece from the middle, and the close: I love the fact that Robert J. Sawyer is smarter than me. [...]
And a very nice review it is, too: A brilliant look at interspecies communication with some remarkable insights into the future of artificial intelligence; one of Robert Sawyer’s best efforts and one that will open your eyes to new possibilities. He’s likely to score a hit with everyone from Gibson and Stephenson’s crowd to science [...]
The Fort Morgan Times (Fort Morgan, Colorado), has just published a nice review of my novel Wake. The review begins: “www:Wake” by Robert J. Sawyer is another delight from the pen of an author who knows how to romp through the kind of speculation which makes science fiction most fun. Most intriguing is the end, [...]
It’s a nice little capsule review that in fact makes no mention of the TV show; rather, it’s a roundup of reviews of books that are being read by Boston-area book clubs, and says: “Flash Forward,” by Robert J. Sawyer. A science-fiction story that explores many of the questions of time travel and has well-developed [...]
