I Became a Sci-Fi Writer

Science fiction has been called the literature of ideas. Ideas are wonderful things: it’s amazing what a few open-mouthed “wow” moments can do for a person [“The Books That Made a Difference,” March].

I’m an engineer today because I read science fiction growing up. SF shaped my view that so very much is possible. Robert A. Heinlein taught rocketry and the possibilities of colonizing the solar system. Isaac Asimov taught that computers—then in their infancy—could do much more than fast arithmetic. John W. Campbell, legendary editor of the magazine Astounding (now called Analog), expanded my mind in too many ways to enumerate.

And so I became a physicist and computer scientist. I began an engineering career at Bell Labs in 1973. I’ve also worked for Honeywell, Hughes Aircraft, and Northrop Grumman, at a software start-up during the dot-com bubble, and at a large Internet service provider. I’ve been a senior VP of product development, written professional papers, and gotten a couple of patents. I built systems for disparate uses: telecom, point-of-sale terminals, building automation, data analysis. Sometimes I worked in government contracting, creating or maintaining systems for NASA, the FBI, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the Department of Defense.

I never stopped reading SF. In 1985, I began to write it. My first published story appeared in Analog—a major thrill—in 1991. My first novel appeared a few months later. Shortly thereafter, my writing output dropped precipitously for the ironic reason that I’d gotten involved with NASA, as a contractor. I led development of ever-larger pieces of the Earth Observing System, at one point managing more than 300 professionals. It was a wild ride, but it left little time for hobbies. I did get to fly the space shuttle simulator a few times and met an astronaut—both useful for a budding SF author.

In 1999 I turned 50 and needed a change. My gift to myself was a sabbatical, to do nothing but write. This led to stories in Analog and Artemis magazines, my first SF convention, friendships with long-admired authors—and completion of the novel so reluctantly set aside in 1993.

I returned to conventional employment, but my heart was in writing. A major SF publisher bought the new novel, titled Moonstruck, in 2004. Not long afterward, I knew: it was time to commit myself to a new career.

Where does engineering come in? Science fiction, like many genres, has its specializations. I’m in the “hard SF” subgenre. Stories can involve speculations about what science does not yet know and engineers cannot yet build; they cannot contradict what we do know.

As engineering careers progress, we tend to get more specialized—and pigeonholed. Not so writing SF: I freely veer off to explore any aspect of science or technology that catches my interest. It may suggest a story. It may be my subconscious hinting at a story it already has percolating.

Writing SF has been amazingly fulfilling. I’m currently collaborating on two novels with Larry Niven, one of SF’s best-known authors. His imaginative “Known Space” setting has made liberal use of teleportation. I wrote a functional spec for the teleportation system. It spelled out details like addressing schemes, access controls, safety features, user interface, and emergency modes—and they all have great story implications. I could never have predicted this collaboration or, for that matter, expected to see a film made from one of my stories (http://www.redheadproductions.com/grand_page.html).

It’s all about the “wow” moment. It’s nice to imagine new young readers being inspired to become engineers and scientists by the literature of ideas.

Edward M. Lerner

IEEE Member

Winchester, Va.

In the Wastelands

The final solution to nuclear waste disposal, before humanity can arrive at the science of clean nuclear fusion or some other such clean energy source, is to shoot this nuclear waste into the sun! Both the technology for constructing such giant rockets for carrying the payloads as well as the materials required to ensure fail-safe containers for carrying the lethal cargo are readily available.

Jamshed K. Fozdar

IEEE Life Senior Member

Singapore