Robert J. Sawyer

Dan Healing reviews Rollback in the Sunday, May 20, 2007, Calgary Herald, the major newspaper in that city. The review is on page C3; I haven’t yet been able to find it online, but it concludes: “This latest offering from sci-fi award collector Robert J. Sawyer meets all the requirements of summertime reading — it’s light at barely 300 pages, it’s populated with likeable characters, it engages the imagination and it’s hard to put down. And it has robots. Can it get any better than that?”

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Rollback is number 9 on the fiction bestsellers’ list in Calgary, Alberta, as published in The Calgary Herald, the major newspaper there:

Calgary Bestsellers
The Calgary Herald
Sun 20 May 2007
Page: C3
Section: Books & The Arts
Source: For The Calgary Herald
Fiction

1 (1) Divisadero, Michael Ondaatje. A haunting story that ranges from northern California to central France.

2 (–) The Halifax Connection, Marie Jakober A Canadian counter-intelligence novel set in the 1860s.

3 (–) Falling Man, Don DeLillo. How events of Sept. 11 have changed our world.

4 (4) The Children Of Hurin, J.R.R. Tolkein. A fantasy with orcs, dragons, dwarves and elves.

5 (3) The Horseman’s Graves, Jacqueline Baker. A German immigrant community on the Saskatchewan-Alberta border.

6 (–) Fluttertongue 4, Steven Ross Smith. A long poem looks at meanings of words and ponders language itself.

7 (–) Rant, Chuck Palahnuik. A fictional oral history of serial killer Buster (Rant) Casey.

8 (7) Yiddish Policemen’s Union, Michael Chabon. A whodunit, a love story and an exploration of the mysteries of exile and redemption.

9 (–) Rollback, Robert J. Sawyer. A new science-fiction
novel by the award-winning Canadian author.

10 (5) Lullabies for Little Criminals, Heather O’Neill. A 13- year-old girl with no mother and a heroin-addicted father.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Dozens of my short stories are available through Fictionwise.com, including Aurora winners and finalists for the Hugo, Nebula, and Bram Stoker Awards — and their all 25% off right now, as part of Fictionwise’s 7th anniversary sale.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

What a great name for a book-lover’s blog: Biblio’s Bloggins. Brilliant! The fact that the blogger loves Rollback, calling it “Sawyer’s best yet,” is just gravy … :)

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Phase Four (of four!) of the book tour for Rollback is now underway: by-plane in the United States.

It started on Friday, May 18, 2007, when I flew from Toronto to Denver. The Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers had brought me in to run a day-long workshop for them — and they kindly agreed to let me do a bookstore signing the night before. And the place to sign when you’re in Denver is the Tattered Cover, a wonderful, giant independent bookstore (actually, they have a couple of branches in Denver; I was at the one on East Colfax).

The event brought out a good crowd of 40 people: a mix mostly of those involved with the RMFWs; those involved in MileHiCon, the Denver science-fiction convention (at which I was guest of honor last year); and those who had seen the event promoted in-store or who had heard my interview earlier that day (by phone, from Toronto, just before I headed to the airport) with radio station KHOW.

One woman, who bought a copy of Rollback, said she had never bought a novel before in her life, but couldn’t resist after hearing me describe Rollback in the interview. Woot!

Mark Graham, the man quoted (if not by name) on most of my dust jackets introduced me to the audience. He’s the reviewer for The Rocky Mountain News who called me “just about the best science-fiction writer out there.” He gave a witty, comprehensive introduction, then I read from Rollback, answered questions, and signed books. It was a really, really pleasant event — and we managed to drum up some more business there for the next day’s RMFW workshop, so it was mutually beneficial.

The workshop itself was held on Saturday, May 19, 2007, at the Denver History Museum, a wonderful venue. We started at 9:00 a.m. and went through to 3:00 p.m. (even skipping our afternoon coffee break, so we could cover more material). The audience was terrific — totally attentive, and filled with wonderfully perceptive questions. Feedback on the seminar was hugely positive, and so Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers were pleased.

I got to the airport in time to catch an earlier flight. United bumped me up to United Plus (not as good as Executive Class, but still with extra leg room), and gave me a whole emergency exit row; I had a well-deserved nap on the flight.

I’m in Calgary right now, for what’s left of the Victoria Day weekend (long-weekend, celebrating the Queen’s birthday). I’m home briefly in Toronto starting Tuesday, then Thursday Carolyn and I head out for the final stop on the Rollback book tour: Orlando, Florida, where I’m one of five guests of honor (along with Michael Bishop, Joe Haldeman, newly minted Nebula winner Jack McDevitt, and Mike Resnick — quite a line-up!) at the SF convention Oasis.

Photos:

Mark Graham from the Denver Rocky Mountain News; Chris from Tattered Cover

“Torchape,” aka Pat Smythe, a regular on my Yahoo! Groups discussion group joined the fun at Tattered Cover

Robert J. Sawyer wearing his favorite T. rex shirt and a rack of his books at Tattered Cover

Scott Brendel, workshop coordinator for the Rocky Moutain Fiction Writers, introduces Rob

The crowd for Rob’s worksop

And this one is a duck ….

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

As a guy who makes most of his money in US dollars, but lives in Canada, the high value of the loonie (Canadian dollar) is killing me. It’s at a 30-year high today, according to this report in The Globe and Mail.

One of the reasons for my switch to a cross-border Penguin Canada / Penguin USA deal was to diversify my income, so that some was coming in US dollars and some was coming in Canadian dollars. :)

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Check it out!

(Craig Rintoul of BookBits produced this.)

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

I spent a wonderful day today at A.Y. Jackson Secondary School in North York (part of Toronto), as the guest author for the “Jackson Reads” celebration.

I did events all day long: an assembly for all the grade-10 students in the morning; lunch (Swiss Chalet chicken!) with the faculty; and two afternoon sessions, one with ESL (English as a Second Language) students, and one with a mixed group, including Writers’ Craft (creative writing) students. It was a blast, and I had a great time — and, to my surprise, sold a ton of books to students!

Special moment: one of the students brought along a copy of the Chinese edition of Calculating God for me to sign (Jackson is a very culturally diverse school).

The students were polite, intelligent, and asked really tough questions, ranging from “Do you believe in God?” to “How much money do you make?” (I got a laugh when I said, “More than your principal.”)

I started my talk to the grade-10s by saying I’d spent the summer 30 years ago at their school (the North York Board of Education had a special summer enrichment program for the top 30 math/science students who had just finished grade 11 drawn from all the Board’s schools back then; it was held at A.Y. Jackson) — and I told them how I’d taken a girl I’d met at Jackson on a date to a little SF movie that summer called Star Wars …

Truly a great day!

Above: sign on a display of my books in the Jackson library; below, the grade-10 assembly in the cafetorium.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

I spent Monday night and all day Tuesday at the International Reading Association conference, which this year was in Toronto, a massive (11,000 people) convention of educators and librarians involved with reading and literacy.

Monday night, May 14, 2007, Tor YA publisher Kathleen Doherty took Carolyn and me, Charles de Lint, graphic-novel author Tim Eldred, Tor publicist Dot Lin, Tor YA editor Susan Chang, and librarian Jennifer Montgomery out to dinner at Ruth’s Chris steakhouse.

Left to right: Jennifer Montgomery, Susan Chang, Robert J. Sawyer, Carolyn Clink, Dot Lin, Tim Eldred:

And the other side of the table, Kathleen Doherty and Charles de Lint:

Tor sponsors the International Reading Association’s “Science Fiction / Fantasy / Graphic Novel Special Interest Group,” now in its second year; the chair is Jennifer Montgomery. At the SIG’s meeting on Tuesday morning, May 15, 2007, the guest speakers were (in order) the authors Charles de Lint, Robert J. Sawyer, Jane Yolen, Tim Eldred, and Jessica Day George. Everyone who came to the SIG got this goodie bag, with free copies of books by all of us (in my case, it was Hominids):

There was a great crowd:

Robert J. Sawyer speaks passionately about the need for science-fiction support — nay, evangelism! — on the part of teachers and librarians:

Tor had a great booth at the International Reading Association tradeshow:

How do I know it was a great booth? Look at all these books by me!

I spent a lot of Tuesday afternoon helping Dot Lin (left) and Susan Chang man the booth (although we all escaped, along with Kathleen, Tim, and Jennifer, for a terrific lunch out):

Meanwhile, over at the Fitzhenry & Whiteside booth, there was a great display of the books I edit for their Robert J. Sawyer Books line, along with the anthologies Julie E. Czerneda did for them:

The evening was a dinner party at Crush Wine Bar — hosted by Tor for a group of 35! Carolyn and I sat at a long table with Sylvia Fenn of H.B. Fenn and Company, Tor’s wonderful Canadian distributor, and others — and I have to say the steak here was better than the one at Ruth’s Chris! It was a terrific evening, lasting from 6:30 to 10:30. Kathleen Doherty was amazing, and made sure everyone had a fabulous time.

Here’s the special menu:

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

… from last weekend’s Nebula Awards conference is reported on by Galley Cat here. It’s fascinating reading.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

That’s Dr. Paul Shuch, Executive Director Emeritus of The SETI League.

Paul is an accomplished filker (science-fiction folk-song artist) and he’s written a lovely filk based on my novel Rollback. You can read the filk here on Paul’s website.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

I’ll be on KHOW AM630 in Denver this Friday, May 18, at 9:00 a.m. Denver/Mountain time (11:00 a.m. in Toronto/New York). If you’re not in Denver, you can still listen live here.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Come on out and see me in Denver this Friday night, May 18, 2007, at 7:30 p.m., at Tattered Cover, 2526 East Colfax Avenue at Elizabeth Street. I’ll be reading from and signing Rollback.

And on Saturday, I’m doing a day-long writing seminar for The Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers.

I’m delighted to be returning to Denver!

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

And Jeffrey Beeler’s GenreCon photos are here.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

The Sarnia Observer has a nice article on last weekend’s GenreCon, at which I was guest of honour.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Hard SF.net interviews Robert J. Sawyer about Rollback here.

One of my comments in that interview: “There are clocks — biological, financial, societal — clicking in the background of everything we do. How liberating it would be not to have just a handful of decades to live! How great the art we create might be if someone could spend five hundred years on their magnum opus.”

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Wonderful writer and publisher Vera Nazarian has a great LiveJournal, which has an occasional feature called “Author Tour Stop” — and the current Author Tour Stop is by one Robert J. Sawyer, discussing his book Rollback. You can read the whole thing (as well as Vera’s comments on the book) here.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Library Journal, the bible for librarians, has given Robert J. Sawyer’s Rollback a starred review — denoting a book of exceptional merit.

The review concludes: “Above all, the author’s characters bear their human strengths and weaknesses with dignity and poise. An elegantly told story for all libraries; highly recommended.”

You can read the whole review here.

This is the second starred review for Rollback; it also got a starred review from Publishers Weekly, the trade journal of the book business.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Joe Karpierz reviews Robert J. Sawyer’s Rollback in the 4 May 2007 edition (whole number 1439!) of the long-running fanzine MT Void, published the Mt. Holz Science Fiction Society.

The review conlcudes: “This is probably Sawyer’s most character-driven story to date, and it doesn’t take away from the free flow of thoughts and ideas that we’ve come to expect from a Sawyer novel. This is a terrific and worthy entry in the Sawyer catalog. I strongly recommend you get out to your local bookseller and buy this immediately. I enjoyed it immensely.”

Read the whole review here.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Chris Szego, the manager of Toronto’s SF specialty bookstore Bakka-Phoenix Books, has posted the April bestsellers’ list for the store (which she reports to Locus, the SF trade journal). Note what she says about Rollback‘s placement in the top position. :)

And note, too, that I have two titles in the top three: my Aurora Award-winning essay collection Relativity is third on the list — woohoo!

Hardcover Titles

1. Rollback, Robert J. Sawyer (by a huge margin — more than the rest of the hardcovers put together)

2. Children Of Hurin, J.R.R. Tolkien (sadly, not the deluxe version)

3. Relativity, Robert J. Sawyer

4. 1634: The Baltic War, David Weber & Eric Flint

5. Lees Of Laughter’s End, Steven Erikson*

6. Sun Over Breda, Arturo Perez-Reverte

7. New Moon’s Arms, Nalo Hopkinson

8. Ysabel, Guy Gavriel Kay

9. Name Of The Wind, Patrick Rothfuss

10. Last Colony, John Scalzi

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

For all of July, August, and September, 2007, I will be on a writing retreat at Berton House.

During that time, I will only deal with the most-pressing of business-related emails, and I won’t be answering general questions, giving writing advice, writing introductions to other people’s books, blurbing other people’s novels, or doing “just one small favor” that “will only take five minutes” for anyone.

Sorry, but this is my get-away-from-it-all time, and my sole priority will be working on my new novel, Wake.

Hope you all understand! :)

Cheers,

Rob

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Who knows? But here’s what I ordered from Amazon.ca last night:

Global Brain: The Evolution of Mass Mind from the Big Bang to the 21st Century Howard Bloom; Paperback; CDN$ 16.05

The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph From the Frontiers of Brain Science Norman Doidge; Hardcover; CDN$ 15.50

God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything Christopher Hitchens; Hardcover; CDN$ 16.49

The first was because my great friend Pat Forde recommended it when I was at his place on Friday; the second because Norman and I were on TVOntario’s The Agenda a couple of weeks ago; the third because it was much discussed by people in Kitchener on Friday, and Martin Levin wrote about it in his column in the Books section of yesterday’s Globe and Mail. Also, did didn’t hurt that Amazon.ca has both the Doidge and the Hithcens at 50% off right now, because they’re best-sellers.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Kim Covert of The Canadian Press wire service recently reviewed Rollback by Robert J. Sawyer. The review ran in many Canadian newspapers including the Montreal Gazette, the Ottawa Citizen, the Vancouver Sun, the Saskatoon Star Phoenix, and the Regina Leader Post.

It can be read online here and here and here and here, among others.

Says Covert: “Sawyer’s novels are always part science and part philosophical exercise, raising questions of morality and ethics in the future that resonate in the present. He doesn’t get too heavy-handed with either the science or the morality, which makes his books interesting for fans of all genres. This is a good, quick-paced and thought-provoking read.”

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Rollback is the Science Fiction “Pick of the Week” for this week in the Denver Rocky Mountain News. Yay!

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Yay! I’m jumping up and down! My great friend, and one of the best writers in the business, has finally gotten the major award he has so long deserved: Jack McDevitt has just won the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America’s Nebula Award for Best Novel of the Year, for his novel Seeker. Way to go, Jack!

The full list of winners:

Novel: Seeker – Jack McDevitt (Ace, Nov05)

Novella: Burn – James Patrick Kelly (Tachyon Publications, Dec05)

Novelette: “Two Hearts” – Peter S. Beagle (F&SF, Oct/Nov05)

Short Stories: “Echo” – Elizabeth Hand (F&SF, Oct/Nov05)

Scripts: Howl’s Moving Castle – Hayao Miyazaki, Cindy Davis Hewitt, and Donald H. Hewitt (Studio Ghibli and Walt Disney Pictures, U.S. Premier 10 Jun05. Based on the novel by Diana Wynne Jones.)

Winner of the second ever Andre Norton Award for Young Adult Science Fiction and Fantasy: Magic or Madness – Justine Larbalestier (Penguin Razorbill, May05)

Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master: James Gunn

Author Emeritus: D.G. Compton

Service to SFWA: Brook and Julia West

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Just got a copy of the wonderful new book The Gospel Gospel According to Science Fiction by Gabriel McKee (published by Westminster John Knox Press). It’s a fabulous survey of how science fiction has treated religion, god, spirituality, and so on over the years — and it has good discussions of my novels The Terminal Experiment, Flashforward, Calculating God, Hominids, Hybrids, and Mindscan. I haven’t read the whole thing yet, but I’m really enjoying it. In its starred review, denoting a book of exceptional merit, Publishers Weekly says, “This fascinating hybrid of theology and science fiction is creative, lucid and contains impressive scholarship.” I agree.

McKee, the founder of the blog SFgospel.com, has a Master of Theological Studies from the Harvard Divinity School, and previously wrote a book about religion in the works of Philip K. Dick.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

The by-car Southern Ontario book tour for Rollback could not have ended better. We had a packed house at the Chapters Bookstore on Fanshawe Road in London, Ontario. They’d originally only had a handful of chairs set up, but people kept pouring in, and they had to keep getting more chairs. It was a great audience, with great questions, and, at the end, the events coordinator there said to me, “Thank you for showing me what’s possible for an author event.” Go me! :)

I hit the road four weeks ago today promoting Rollback, starting with the book launch at Toronto’s Bakka-Phoenix Books. I’ve done events now in Toronto, Ontario; near Rochester, New York; Albany, New York; Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C.; Richmond, Virginia; Alexandria, Virginia; Winnipeg, Manitoba; Vancouver, British Columbia; Edmonton, Alberta; Calgary, Alberta; Saskatoon, Saskatchewan; Oshawa, Ontario; Vaughan, Ontario; Kitchener, Ontario; Sarnia, Ontario; and London, Ontario. I did events at a nice mixture of science-fiction specialty stores, independent bookstores, big chain stores, and public libraries.

I hit the local bestsellers’ lists in Winnipeg, and Canada’s national BookManager bestsellers’ list.

I got major review coverage; lots of radio interviews, including nationally on the CBC, CBC affiliates in Regina, Calgary, and Windsor; other stations in Montreal, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Philadelphia, Olympia (Washington state), Nashua (New Hampshire), and even Vienna, Austria, plus the National Public Radio affiliate in Rochester, New York; TV interviews in Toronto, Kitchener, Edmonton, and Winnipeg; lots of online and blog coverage; and major write-ups in the arts weeklies in Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, and Saskatoon; and the cover of Quill & Quire the Canadian publishing trade journal.

And now, at last, I’m done with the different-city-every-day whirlwhind. I still have events in Denver next weekend and Orlando the weekend after, but the marathon of book touring is over. Whew!

The Chapters chain has always been very good to me, and I’m very grateful for their support; this is the sign on the London store

A placard advertising my event

The place was packed!

Who am I to argue with the sign?

Cool shirt!

Dinner afterwards at Swiss Chalet with members of Science Fiction London, the local SF club

Rob’s old friend Richard Gibbens, a member of Science Fiction London

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Today, Saturday, May 12, 2007, was the final day of Phase Three of the Rollback book tour: by car in Southern Ontario.

Carolyn and I woke up at 9:00 a.m. in Sarnia, Ontario (just across the river from Michigan), and hustled over to the Sarnia Public Library for the sixth annual GenreCon, a free, public one-day festival of genre fiction held there.

I was the Guest of Honour, even though I could only be there for the first three hours. Still, I had a blast. I did a solo talk about science fiction from 10:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. (the only solo event at the conference); the next hour was a meet-and-greet (with a lucky draw for three copies of Rollback, donated by H.B. Fenn and Company). Then there was a panel discussion on genre-crossing, moderated by Sarah Zettel.

A great crowd for Rob’s talk.

Rob signs a book for Jeffrey Allan Beeler, one of the organizers of GenreCon (the other organizer was Ellen Dark)

Bestselling fantasy writer Kelley Armstrong and bestselling science-fiction writer Robert J. Sawyer

A panel discussion on crossing genres. Left to right: fantasy writers Caitlin Sweet and Kelley Armstrong, moderator (and SF writer) Sarah Zettel, short-story writer Jean Rae Baxter, and SF writer Robert J. Sawyer. Sarah was in favour of genre jumping; Rob was against it (unless you’re very prolific, and even then you should do it under separate names); the conversation was quite lively.

GenreCon was a great event. Many thanks to the sponsors: the County of Lambton and the Bookkeeper — and to H.B. Fenn and Company, Tor’s Canadian distributor, who paid for my hotel and donated copies of Rollback as prizes.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Carolyn and I hit the road at 9:00 a.m. on Friday, May 11, 2007, for a trip to Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario. I did two TV interviews there. The first was on Daytime on Rogers Cable; the second was the noon news on CKCO, the KW CTV affiliate.

I’ve had a long, pleasant association with KW; Carolyn and I lived there in 1980; my Hominids was the “One Book, One Community” reading choice for all of Waterloo region in 2005, and I was the Edna Staebler Writer-in-Residence at the Kitchener Public Library last year.

After the noon news interview, Carolyn and I met up with Hugo-nominated SF writer Pat Forde and Linux guru Marcel Gagné at Solé for a wonderful, leisurely lunch, then headed off to meet Pat’s newly adopted daughter, Maeve. We all hung out for the afternoon — a welcome respite in the very hectic Rollback book tour, and at 5:30 repaired to Eastside Mario’s (Italian restaurant) for dinner with the SR PJs (“Senior Pajamas”), my writers’ group — which consists of Pat, Hugo-finalist James Alan Gardner, and wonderful new writer Suzanne Church — as well as Marcel, his wife, Sally Tomasevic, and their son Sebastian (Hominids is dedicated to Sally and Marcel).

Then it was time for my reading and talk at the Chapters superstore in Kitchener. We had a packed house, and despite me being totally exhausted, the event went well.

After that, Carolyn and I hit the road for the two-hour drive to Sarnia, Ontario, where we stayed overnight in a hotel; tomorrow, I’m guest of honour at GenreCon, the free, one-day, all-genres convention at the Sarnia Public Library (other guests include superstar fantasy writer Kelley Armstrong and Crime Writers of Canada president Rich Blechta, plus my writing-group buddy Suzanne Church).

Some photos:

My first interview of the day was on Daytime, the Rogers Cable morning news show.

Host Mark Paine interviewed Robert J. Sawyer about Rollback

Next up was the noon news at CKCO, the Kitchener CTV affiliate

A beauty shot of the Rollback cover

Robert J. Sawyer on CKCO noon newscast

Hugo-nominee Patrick Forde and Carolyn Clink at Eastside Mario’s for dinner

A placard advertising Rob’s event at Chapters in Kitchener

A packed house at Chapters

Long-time friend Fraser Gunn. Rob and Carolyn shared an apartment in Waterloo with Fraser Gunn and Lynn Conway in the summer of 1980.

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site

Most people in Toronto and much of southern Ontario can get the Kitchener CTV affiliate CKCO (Channel 13 there) if you have anything beyond basic cable. And I’ll be interviewed at about 12:30 p.m. (give or take) tomorrow, Friday, May 11, on the CKCO Noon News about Rollback, and my reading that night at the Chapters at 135 Gateway Park Drive in Kitchener. So: set your VCRs!

The Robert J. Sawyer Web Site