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Guests of Honor
Writer Guest of Honor
Vernor Vinge
 Science
fiction author Vernor Vinge has won Hugo awards for his novels
A
Fire Upon the Deep (1992),
A Deepness in the Sky (1996)
and Rainbows End (2006). A published story writer since the
1960s, Vinge is known in the sci-fi world as the author most closely
associated with the theme of "technological singularity." It's the
idea that an event or
sequence of events (the "singularity") will occur when technology
surpasses human intelligence and society ceases to be recognizable
to today's humans. Vinge began using the terminology in the 1980s,
and in the 1990s went so far as to say he expected such an event to
occur between 2005 and 2030. A computer scientist and mathematician,
he was a teacher at San Diego State University in California
(1972-2000) before becoming a full-time writer of the "hard" science
fiction novels that made him famous. He has also won Hugo awards for
his novellas "Fast Times at Fairmont High" (2002) and "The Cookie
Monster" (2003). - Courtesy of
infoplease.com
Click here for Norwescon’s
October 2009 interview with Vernor Vinge.
Click here for more information about Vernor Vinge.
Artist Guest of Honor
John Jude Palencar
 Artist
and illustrator, John Jude Palencar, is known throughout the world
for his distinctive, ethereal style and unique conceptualization.
For more than 20 years he has received honors for his contributions
to the field of illustration including Gold and Silver Medals from
the Society of Illustrators, two Gold Book Awards from Spectrum, and
Best Hardcover and two Best Paperback Awards from the Association of
Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists for three consecutive years.
Besides being an active artist and illustrator, he has served on the
juries of several international art competitions.
His work has appeared on hundreds of book covers in over thirty
countries. Renowned authors, H.P. Lovecraft, Ursula LeGuin,
Marion Zimmer Bradley, Octavia Butler, Stephen King, Charles deLint
and Christopher Paolini are but a few. TIME Magazine,
Smithsonian Magazine, National Geographic Magazine and Television
and the Philadelphia Opera have
employed his artistic talents for their publication and productions.
Most recently, his cover paintings for Eragon and Eldest, by
Christopher Paolini, have appeared on the New York Times Children’s
Best Seller List for the past year. An influence on the young
prolific author, Christopher Paolini named Eragon’s birthplace: “Palancar
Valley” after John Jude (see chapter three – Eragon).
He has been a featured artist in IDEA Magazine in Japan and enjoys
an on-going artist-in- residence
program in County Kerry, Ireland. There, his paintings were included
in a special exhibit entitled, “Images of Ireland”, held at the
National Museum in Dublin. He also donated his work to raise
money for the Cill Rialaig Project at the 6th Annual
Ambassador’s Golf Classic held in Waterville, County Kerry, Ireland.
His work was featured in an exhibition entitled, “As Seen From Ohio:
Nine Illustrators”, at the Centro Cultural Recoleta in Argentina as
well as The Spectrum Retrospective Exhibition held at The Society of
Illustrators Museum of American Illustration in New York City.
John Jude also has participated in dozens of group exhibitions at
colleges and universities throughout the country.
His paintings are in numerous corporate and private collections in
the United States and abroad.
– Courtesy of
johnjudepalencar.com
For more information about John Jude Palancar, visit his
website.
Special Guest
Cory Doctorow
 Cory
Doctorow (craphound.com)
is a science fiction novelist, blogger and technology activist. He
is the co-editor of the popular weblog Boing Boing (boingboing.net),
and a contributor to Wired, Popular Science, Make, the New York
Times, and many other newspapers, magazines and websites. He was
formerly Director of European Affairs for the Electronic Frontier
Foundation (eff.org), a
non-profit civil liberties group that defends freedom in technology
law, policy, standards and treaties. In 2007, he served as the
Fulbright Chair at the Annenberg Center for Public Diplomacy at the
University of Southern California.
His novels are published by Tor Books and simultaneously released
on the Internet under
Creative Commons licenses that encourage their re-use and sharing, a
move that increases his sales by enlisting his readers to help
promote his work. He has won the Locus and Sunburst Awards, and been
nominated for the Hugo, Nebula and British Science Fiction Awards.
His latest novel, New York Times Bestseller LITTLE BROTHER, was
published in May 2008, and his latest short story collection is
OVERCLOCKED: STORIES OF THE FUTURE PRESENT. In 2008, Tachyon Books
published a collection of his essays, called CONTENT: SELECTED
ESSAYS ON TECHNOLOGY, CREATIVITY, COPYRIGHT AND THE FUTURE OF THE
FUTURE (with an introduction by John Perry Barlow) and IDW published
a collection of comic books inspired by his short fiction called
CORY DOCTOROW'S FUTURISTIC TALES OF THE HERE AND NOW. His next novel
is MAKERS, due from Tor Books in October, 2009.
He co-founded the open source peer-to-peer software company OpenCola,
sold to OpenText, Inc in 2003, and presently serves on the boards
and advisory boards of the Participatory Culture Foundation, the
MetaBrainz Foundation, Technorati, Inc, the Organization for
Transformative Works, Areae, the Annenberg Center for the Study of
Online Communities, and Onion Networks, Inc.
In 2007, Entertainment Weekly called him, "The William Gibson of his
generation." He was also named one of Forbes Magazine's 2007/8 Web
Celebrities, and one of the World Economic Forum's Young Global
Leaders for 2007.
He is presently working on a new young adult novel, FOR THE WIN
(about union organizing in video games).
On February 3, 2008, he became a father. The little girl is called
Poesy Emmeline Fibonacci Nautilus Taylor Doctorow, and is a marvel
that puts all the works of technology and artifice to shame.
–
Courtesy of
craphound.com
For more information about Cory Doctorow, visit his
website.
Science Guest of Honor
John G.
Cramer - Bio by Pauline B. Cramer
(January 23, 2010)
 John
Cramer is a Professor Emeritus of Physics at the
University of Washington
in
Seattle. Although he
formally retired in January 2010, he will continue teaching part
time and continue his usual physics research in ultra-relativistic
heavy ion physics, participating in the STAR experiment at the RHIC
facility of Brookhaven National Laboratory (Long Island, NY).
He is also currently working on a popular-level book about the
transactional interpretation of QM, as well as a third hard SF
novel.
John is an experimental
physicist. He has published over 200 physics research papers
in peer-reviewed physics journals. As an experimental
physicist, John approaches theoretical physics from an
experimentalist viewpoint, writing physics papers on Foundations of
Quantum Mechanics, Bose-Einstein Interferometry, etc. He is
known as the originator of the Transactional Interpretation of
Quantum Mechanics, which he considers to be a superior alternative
to the orthodox Copenhagen Interpretation. See
http://faculty.washington.edu/jcramer/TI/tiqm_1986.pdf
John is actively pursuing a UW-based experiment in quantum optics
that tests for the possibility that quantum nonlocality can be used
for communication. He has received considerable media
attention for the “time travel” aspects of this work. This
experiment, if successful, would imply that entanglement can be used
to send a superluminal signal between two distant locations (or
backwards in time from the apparatus to itself).
John writes “hard” SF and is the author of two novels: Twistor,
[William
Morrow, Mar ’89;
AvoNova, Nov
’91; Jun ’97] and Einstein’s Bridge [Avon
Jun 97;
Avon Eos May 98]
John is also a science writer, and writes the bimonthly science-fact
column "The Alternate View", for
Analog Science Fiction and Fact
magazine. John has written over 150 columns, available on the
web at
http://www.npl.washington.edu/av
John G. Cramer was born and grew up in Houston, Texas. He was
educated at Rice University in Houston (Ph D.1961). John and
his wife Pauline have three children and six grandchildren.
Their daughter Kathryn Cramer Hartwell is a writer, critic, and
SF/Fantasy editor/anthologist. John and Pauline have
three Shetland Sheepdogs, and John and his dogs compete in AKC
agility trials.
Recent Talks and Presentations
http://faculty.washington.edu/jcramer/talks.html
Norwescon 33 Power Point Presentation
http://faculty.washington.edu/jcramer/PowerPoint/Norwescon_20100403.ppt
For more information about
John G. Cramer, visit his
website.
Spotlight Publisher
Tor Books
 Tor
Books is home to an internationally-renowned, multiple award-winning
science fiction, fantasy, and horror publishing program. Tor also
publishes paranormal romances; mysteries; thrillers and suspense
novels; other types of speculative fiction; movie, television, and
computer game tie-in novels; and, through Tor Kids, a range of
fiction and nonfiction targeted for readers in grade 4 and up. For
more information about Tor, visit
www.tor.com
 David
Hartwell
David G. Hartwell is an American editor of science fiction and
fantasy. He has worked for Signet (1971-1973), Berkley Putnam
(1973-1978), Pocket (where he founded the Timescape imprint,
1978-1983, and created the Pocket Books Star Trek publishing line),
and Tor (where he spearheaded Tor's Canadian publishing initiative,
and was also influential in bringing many Australian writers to the
US
market, 1984-date), and has published numerous anthologies. Since
1995, his title at Tor/Forge Books has been "Senior Editor." He
chairs
the board of directors of the World Fantasy Convention and, with
Gordon Van Gelder, is the administrator of the Philip K. Dick Award.
He holds a Ph.D. in comparative medieval literature.
David
Hartwell's Website
 Jim
Frenkel
Jim Frenkel is a science fiction book editor for Tor Books. He has
edited numerous award-winning authors such as Vernor Vinge, Joan D.
Vinge, and Frederik Pohl (all winners of the Hugo award), Andre
Norton, Loren D. Estleman, Dan Simmons and Greg Bear.
Jim Frenkel's Website
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