Writer Guest of Honor:
Ian McDonald
Courtesy of Jim C. Hines.
Ian McDonald is a science fiction writer from Northern Ireland. He lives just outside Belfast with Enid and three cats, with eleven legs between them. He has thirty-five different kinds of gin—the fruits of research for the Luna series. Speaking of which, his most recent novel is the second in the Luna series: Wolf Moon (Tor, 2017). The third part of this future history of the Moon, Moon Rising, is in progress.
His first novel, Desolation Road, came out in 1988. Other well-known works include the Hugo-nominated River of Gods, Brasyl, and The Dervish House. He won a Hugo Award in 2007 for the novelette The Djinn’s Wife, available in the collection Cyberabad Days.
He’s been nominated for almost every major award in the genre, and even won a few.
Ian worked for sixteen years in television program development (‘Development Hell’) in everything from documentary to factual to animation to children’s TV, where he learned how to write a proposal and how to pitch.
Artist Guests of Honor:
Cory & Catska Ench
COURTESY OF CORY & CATSKA ENCH
Cory and Catska Ench are artists who often choose to work together. Their collaborative work spans a wide range of genres — from fantasy & science fiction cover art (Fantasy & Science Fiction Magazine, electricstory.com, etc.), poster artwork for Burning Man and other major festivals, fractal and visionary art, as well as nature and wildlife illustration. Cory and Catska received the Chesley Award for Best Magazine Cover (F&SF, March 2007), as well as inclusion in Spectrum: The Best in Contemporary Fantastic Art, 2007, 2008, and 2009. Their work can be seen at their website: www.enchgallery.com.
Science Guest of Honor:
Ethan Siegel
COURTESY OF ETHAN SIEGEL
Ethan Siegel is a theoretical astrophysicist who loves writing long, glorious, illustrated articles that tell what we know about the Universe and how we know it. He’s been writing the blog Starts With A Bang since 2008, currently at Forbes. If you’re into astronomy, he writes a monthly column for NASA’s Space Place that appears in over 200 astronomy club newsletters worldwide. His very first book, Beyond the Galaxy, is available from World Scientific. If you ever wanted to know the entire story of what the Universe is made of, how big it is, where it came from and what its fate is, told in plain English with no equations, you’ll definitely want to get yourself a copy. When he’s not writing, Ethan can be found appearing on TV and radio spots, teaching at Lewis & Clark college, broadcasting the Starts With A Bang podcast on SoundCloud, working with various science museums and, in general, sharing what we know about the Universe with anyone willing to listen. Look for him — and his award-winning beard and mustache — in costume at Norwescon 40!
Toastmaster:
Nancy Kress
COURTESY OF NANCY KRESS
Nancy Kress is the author of thirty-three books, including twenty-six novels, four collections of short stories, and three books on writing. Her work has won six Nebula Awards, (for Out of All Them Bright Stars, Beggars in Spain, The Flowers of Aulit Prison, Fountain of Age, After the Fall, Before the Fall, During the Fall, and Yesterday’s Kin), two Hugo Awards (for Beggars in Spain and The Erdmann Nexus), a Sturgeon Award, and the John W. Campbell Memorial Award (for Probability Space). Her most recent works are the Nebula-winning Yesterday’s Kin (Tachyon, 2014) and The Best of Nancy Kress (Subterranean, 2015). Her work has been translated into Swedish, Danish, French, Italian, German, Spanish, Polish, Croatian, Chinese, Lithuanian, Romanian, Japanese, Korean, Hebrew, Russian, and Klingon, none of which she can read.
In addition to writing, Kress often teaches at various venues around the country and abroad, including Clarion; in 2008 she was the Picador visiting lecturer at the University of Leipzig. Kress lives in Seattle with her husband, writer Jack Skillingstead, and Cosette, the world’s most spoiled toy poodle.
Spotlight Publisher:
Angry Robot Books
COURTESY OF ANGRY ROBOT BOOKS
Angry Robot is a global imprint dedicated to the best in modern adult science fiction, fantasy and everything in-between. Our book line launched in July 2009, with physical books across a wide variety of formats, e-books as standard, and with all frontlist titles as audiobooks from October 2011.
British-based but selling worldwide with the help of partners such as Penguin Random House (US/Canada), Nationwide (New Zealand) and Capricorn Link (Australia), our mission is to produce books that appeal to everyone, from post-Doctor Who and Xbox fans to long-time genre enthusiasts. We are a part of Watkins Media Ltd, an ever-expanding group of media companies who work with new ways of delivering entertainment to readers, viewers, and players.
In April 2011, Lauren Beukes’ novel Zoo City won the Arthur C. Clarke Award, the highest honour in British science fiction. October 2011 saw founder and publisher Marc Gascoigne honoured with a World Fantasy Award for Angry Robot. More recently, our authors and/or novels have won the Hugo Award, the Philip K. Dick Award, the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer, the Prometheus Award, the Aurealis and Ditmar (Australia), the Sir Julius Vogel Award (NZ), and many more.