Red Planet Blues

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Robert J. Sawyer’s novel FlashForward was the basis for the ABC TV series of the same name, and he was a scriptwriter for that program.

Rob is a lifelong space buff. In 2007, he participated in the invitation-only workshop The Future of Intelligence in the Cosmos at the NASA Ames Research Center. In 2010 and again in 2012, he was the only science-fiction writer invited to speak at the SETI Institute’s first two SETIcon conferences on the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. In 2011, he became an invited contributor to the 100 Year Starship initiative, sponsored by the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). A thirty-year member of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada, a member of both The Planetary Society and The Mars Society, and a graduate of the NASA-sponsored Launch Pad Astronomy Workshop, Rob has published in Archaeology, Nature, Science, and Sky & Telescope, and has done science commentary on-air for both the CBC and the BBC.

Rob is one of only eight writers ever to win all three of the world’s top awards for best science-fiction novel of the year: the Hugo (which he won in 2003 for Hominids), the Nebula (which he won in 1996 for The Terminal Experiment), and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award (which he won in 2006 for Mindscan). According to The Locus Index to Science Fiction Awards, he has won more awards for his novels than anyone else in the history of the science-fiction and fantasy fields.

He’s also won an Arthur Ellis Award from Crime Writers of Canada, and The Globe and Mail: Canada’s National Newspaper named his previous SF/mystery crossover Illegal Alien “the best Canadian mystery novel of the year.”

Rob hosts the Canadian skeptical television series Supernatural Investigator. He has been writer-in-residence at The Merril Collection of Science Fiction, Speculation and Fantasy in Toronto; at the Canadian Light Source, Canada’s national synchrotron research facility, in Saskatoon (a position created specifically for him); and at Berton House in Dawson City.

Rob has received an honorary doctorate from Laurentian University and the Alumni Award of Distinction from Ryerson University, and he was the first-ever recipient of Humanist Canada’s Humanism in the Arts Award. Quill & Quire, the Canadian publishing trade journal, calls him “one of the thirty most influential, innovative, and just plain powerful people in Canadian publishing.” His website and blog are at sfwriter.com, and on Twitter and Facebook he’s RobertJSawyer.

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