In April 2009, I was asked by Cosmos, Australia’s leading science magazine, to contribute to their “Bookmark” column. Normally, that column has scientists recommending books; for the first time ever, they asked a science-fiction writer to do it instead. My suggestions appeared in issue 27: Robert J. Sawyer is a Hugo and Nebula Award-winning science-fiction […]
Happy 15th anniversary to my website — it’s older than Amazon.com, was the first science-fiction author site on the web, has been giving away fiction since the first week, and has over 1,000,000 words of content. Check it out at sfwriter.com. Robert J. Sawyer online:Website • Facebook • Twitter • Newsgroup • Email
The latest issue of The Journal of Consciousness Studies (Vol. 17, No. 5-6) lists “Notable Quotes” from this year’s Toward a Science of Consciousness conference in Tucson, including these from my keynote address:“Canada should have British culture, French cuisine, and American know-how. Instead, Canada has British cuisine, American culture, and French know-how.” “Scholars ask me […]
Here’s a first look at the cover for Wonder, concluding volume of my WWW trilogy, coming in early April 2011 from Ace in the US, Penguin in Canada, and Gollancz in the UK. Click the image for a larger version, and click again if your browser is still scaling it down. The covers for all […]
On Sunday, May 23, 2010, the 30th anniversary Aurora Awards banquet was held in Winnipeg at Keycon, this year’s Canadian National Science Fiction Convention. Fan Organizational nominee Kirstin Morrell used Robert J. Sawyer’s Twitter feed to tweet the proceedings live as they happened. Below is what she had to say; above is a photo of […]
The winners of the 2010 Prix Aurora Awards were announced over Victoria Day weekend at a gala banquet in Winnipeg concluding Keycon, this year’s Canadian National Science Fiction Convention. Liana Kerzer was mistress of ceremonies. The winners are: Best Novel in English: Wake by Robert J. Sawyer (published by Penguin Canada) Meilleur Roman en Français […]
All events are free and open to the public: Vancouver, British Columbia Vancouver Public Library Central Branch Alma VanDusen Room on the lower level 350 West Georgia Street In conjunction with (but not at) White Dwarf Books Wednesday, May 5, 2010, at 7:30 p.m. Calgary, Alberta Hillhurst Sunnyside Community Centre Hearth Room, 1320 – 5 […]
This morning I submitted the manuscript for Wonder, the third volume of my WWW trilogy, and my 20th novel, to my three English-language editors: Ginjer Buchanan at Ace Science Fiction in New York Adrienne Kerr at Penguin Group (Canada) in Toronto Simon Spanton at Orion/Gollancz in London I spent six years working on this trilogy. […]
My book tour event in Calgary, Alberta, for Watch, has a new, bigger venue: Friday, May 7, 7:30 p.m., Hillhurst Sunnyside Community Centre, Hearth Room, 1320 – 5 Ave NW. The time and date are the same as before, but the place is different. The event is not at Pages at Kensington bookstore, but the […]
Today is the day everyone saw a glimpse of during their flashforwards in FlashForward , the ABC TV series based on my novel of the same name. It also happens to be my 50th birthday. In honour of both, I provide the English text of an interview I just did for a Hungarian publication. Enjoy! […]
Hello, Robert J. Sawyer reader! Welcome to my twice-a-year newsletter. This time: new novel, FLASHFORWARD news, cross-Canada book tour, and more! === NEW BLOG ADDRESS! I’ve switched my blog to WordPress, which necessitated a slight change to the address. My blog can now be found at: https://sfwriter.com/blog/ === WWW: WAKE now out in paperback! WWW: […]
The Toronto Sun runs a “This Week in Canadian History” each Monday, and today’s edition has two shout outs to science fiction. April 26, 1912: Novelist A.E. van Vogt was born on a farm in a Mennonite community in Manitoba. Rather than writing boring coming-of-age-on-a-farm stories, van Vogt opted to pen sci-fi classics about space […]
The weekend of May 28-30, 2010, at the Banff Centre, it’s the 49th annual Banff Book Discussion Weekend, this year featuring Robert J. Sawyer and his Aurora Award-nominated novel Wake, with Rob in attendance, plus discussions of three other books. Banff is a gorgeous ski-resort town in Alberta (although skiing season will be long over […]
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My great friend Rick Wilber has a new novel out called Rum Point: A Baseball Novel. Rick is well known in SF circles for (among other things) being the administrator of the Dell Award for Undergraduate Excellence in Science Fiction and Fantasy Writing, associated with Asimov’s Science Fiction magazine. But he’s also a life-long baseball […]
My blog is currently hosted by Blogger, which is owned by Google. I use their FTP blogging service so that the URL of my blog can be hooked to my SFWRITER.COM domain: sfwriter.com/blog.htm. But now Google is eliminating that service — yup, just yanking it, poof, gone. Anybody know of a blogging solution that will […]
I posted this on Lou Anders’s Facebook wall, in a conversation about making sure cover artists get credited, but want to share it here, too: And let’s not forget the ART DIRECTOR. Rita Frangie, the art director for Ace, has done absolutely amazing design work for me, Joe Haldeman, Allen Steele, Charles Stross, and others, […]
The rock band Van Halen used to insist that there be no brown M&M’s in the bowls of M&M’s backstage. They weren’t just making outrageous demands to wield power, but they wanted to insure a level of attention to detail by the people behind the scenes, so that nothing actually important would get overlooked. Just […]
One of the reasons I love The American Heritage English Dictionary, Unabridged, is the extensive notes on word origins. This is from the entry on “Wednesday.” We say the names of the days of the week constantly, but for most of us they are nonsense syllables. The seven-day system we use is based on the […]
A really nice video. Thanks to Arwen Rosenbaum for the link! Visit The Robert J. Sawyer Web Siteand WakeWatchWonder.com
Testify, Keith! Keith Olbermann clip. Amen, brother. Visit The Robert J. Sawyer Web Siteand WakeWatchWonder.com
An email exchange I had over the last day (an NDA is a “nondisclosure agreement”): Him: “I have a screenplay that is written. My project would be very close to what seems to be at the heart of everything you are seeking to accomplish in your writings and if you are interested in reading it […]
A grade-ten student named Ryan wrote to me today to see if I’d be willing to answer some questions for a paper he was writing for school. I said sure: 1. About how long have you been writing? I’ve written stories ever since I was a little boy; my mother has one I wrote when […]
A great op-ed from John D. Dingell, the longest-serving congressman in U.S. history, on the current health-care debate in the United States. Well worth reading the whole thing, but here’s how it ends: Let me close with a personal note. I make an effort to treat each class of Congressional interns to a lunch in […]
Speaking of putting political views into one’s writing, I found the following from the book I’m currently reading very well said. It’s from The Age of Empathy: Nature’s. Lessons for a Kinder Society by primatologist Frans de Waal. He writes: What confuses some is that fairness has two faces. Income equality is one, but the […]
I’m hoping Google searches will bring some people here: On October 16, 1975, Robert J. Sawyer, Richard Gotlib, and Ted Bleaney founded NASFA, the Northview Association for Science Fiction Addicts, based at Northview Heights Secondary School in Willowdale (later North York; later still, Toronto), Ontario, Canada. We’re having a 35th anniversary reunion party on Saturday, […]
Mark your calendars: An event is being planned for Saturday, August 14, 2010, in Calgary, Alberta, called “How To Be a Kick-Ass Writer,” at which guest speakers (including Robert J. Sawyer) will discuss how Canadian genre writers can succeed in a global print and film market. More details as they become available. Visit The Robert […]
The Toronto store, which opened earlier this year, was gorgeous, and I had many friends who worked there. And the Polo Park store will always have a special place in my heart, because the premiere party for FlashForward, the ABC TV series based on my novel of the same name, was held there on Thursday, […]
There’s a great article in today’s Calgary Herlad about the new anthology Gaslight Grotesque: Nightmare Tales of Sherlock Holmes, edited by my friends J.R. Campbell and Charles Prepolic. You can read it here. (The Herald has the photo caption backwards, by the way. That’s Jeff on the left and Charles on the right.) More about […]
I have a nice new pub in my neighbourhood, in a renovated, century-old house. Been there twice now (both times with Hugo and John W. Campbell Memorial Award finalist Nick DiChario), and both times it’s been very good. If you also live in Mississauga, give ’em a try — a new business has a hard […]
