Sterling, Bruce

(US, 1954– )

Born in Brownsville, Texas, Sterling was educated at the University of Texas and, with William Gibson, is regarded as an originator of ‘cy-fi’. Begin with Islands in the Net (1988), the story of a world free of ecological or political crises in which computer telecommunications generate a global sense of community. Data piracy takes the heroine into remote corners of the world where obsolete capitalist economies still exist. Involution Ocean (1978) is an extravagant fantasy in which a young man finds himself on a whaling-ship crossing a dust ocean on a planet without water. Global warming has finally wrecked the atmosphere in Heavy Weather (1994). A group of hedonistic scientists styling themselves ‘The Storm Troupers’ travel in search of extreme meteorological events. A tornado of unprecedented power gives more than they bargain for as it tears across North America.

Christopher Priest, William Gibson, Brian Aldiss  DH