Author

Frank Herbert, Bill Ransom

Frank Hebert (1920-1986)

Frank Herbert was born in Tacoma, Washington in 1920 and worked as a reporter, and later editor, of a number of West Coast newspapers before becoming a full-time writer. His first Science Fiction story was published in 1952 but he achieved fame more than ten years later with the publication in Analog of Dune World and The Prophet of Dune, which were amalgamated into the novel Dune in 1965. Winner of both the Nebula and the Hugo awards, it is the best selling SF novel of all time.

Bill Ransom (1945- )

Bill Ransom, born in Puyallup, Washington, began full-time employment at the age of eleven as an agricultural worker. He has also worked as a firefighter, medic and mechanic. He received his BA in Sociology and English Education from the University of Washington in 1970 and MA in English from Utah State University in 1997. As a writer, Ransom began with poetry but launched his sf career with "Songs of a Sentient Flute" for Analog in 1979 as by Frank Herbert, a story which eventually became part of Medea: Harlan's World (1985) edited by Harlan Ellison. Ransom is best known for the Pandora sequence with Frank Herbert, comprising The Jesus Incident (1979), The Lazarus Effect (1983) and The Ascension Factor (1988).