Obituaries

Publisher, entrepreneur, and showman Robert “Bob” Self, 55, died August 3, 2022, as the result of an accident at Mono Lake in California.

Born August 5, 1966, Bob had a background in the entertainment industry and worked behind-the-scenes with a number of magicians, comedians, and illusionists. In 2003 he and his wife Rani — a professional costume designer for various TV series including The Orville — formed Baby Tattoo, Inc., ...Read More

SF writer Eric Flint, 75, died July 17, 2022, according to his longtime publisher Baen Books.

Flint was best known for his Assiti Shards Universe, starting with 1632 (2000), in which a modern small town and all its inhabitants are transported back in time. Flint built the series into a sprawling shared universe with books and stories by many authors, including numerous anthologies and the magazine Grantville Gazette. He later ...Read More

Writer Geoffrey H. Goodwin, 50, died of heart failure on June 15, 2022 at home in Fly Creek NY. Goodwin was a prolific freelance writer, publishing essays, interviews, fiction, and poetry. His first story of genre interest was “Stoddy Awchaw” in Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet (2002), and he published several other stories in anthologies and ‘zines in the decade that followed.

Geoffrey Harrison Goodwin was born December 30, 1971 in ...Read More

SF writer Dorothy J. Heydt, 80, died June 28, 2022.

Heydt was the author of novels The Interior Life (1990, as Katherine Blake) and A Point of Honor (1998), and published over 30 stories. The Witch of Syracuse (2017) collects her stories in the Cynthia, Daughter of Euelpides series, and Stories You Never Heard Of (2020) gathers several out-of-print tales.

Dorothy Jones Heydt was born June 6, 1942, and lived ...Read More

Barbara Haldeman, 69, who wrote as Barbara Delaplace, died July 7, 2022.

She was a prolific author of short fiction, starting with “Legends Never Die” in 1991 and producing at least 25 stories, among them “Modern Mansions”, a Homer Award finalist in 1994. She collaborated with Mike Resnick on “Trading Up” (1992) and with her husband Jack C. Haldeman II on “That’ll Be the Day” (1996).

Barbara Mona Delaplace Haldeman ...Read More

Artist Ken Kelly, 76, died June 3, 2022. While best known for his album art (including famous covers for rock band Kiss), Kelly was also a prolific SF/F artist who did work for numerous publishers starting in the ’70s.

Kenneth William Kelly was born May 19, 1946 in New London CO. He served in the Marines until 1968, and soon after became a professional artist. He got his start doing ...Read More

LYGIA FAGUNDES TELLES, the grand dame of Brazilian mainstream fiction and a feminist icon, died April 3, 2022 in São Paulo, Brazil. Her story “A Caçada” was in the third Brazilian science fiction anthology, Além do Tempo e do Espaço (1965), and her 1977 story ‘‘Seminário dos Ratos’’ [Rat Seminar] is a mordant allegory of a popular uprising against the violent Brazil­ian military dictatorship of that time. She was ...Read More

Brazilian author, poet, culture activist, and edi­tor CARLOS EMÍLIO C. LIMA, 65, died on April 2, 2022, in Fortaleza, Ceará (in the North­east Brazil), from an infection following surgery. Carlos Emílio Barreto Corrêa Lima was born in Fortaleza in 1956, and published first book So­lário: Contos Infantis para Adultos [Solarium: Child Stories for Adults] in 1970, when he was 13. In that decade he wrote reviews for major news­papers ...Read More

French writer JOËL HOUSSIN, 68, died March 23, 2022 in Paris after a long battle with MS.

Houssin was born in Paris on August 29, 1953. His first genre novel, Locomotive Rictus, was published by Editions OPTA in 1975. Soon after, he joined the famous ‘‘Anticipation’’ imprint of Editions Fleuve Noir, where he published no fewer than ten novels between 1981 and 1983. One, Blue, became the ...Read More

Italian SF, fantasy, and horror writer VALERIO EVANGELISTI, 69, died April 18, 2022. He was best known for his bestselling Nicolas Eymerich series and the Nostradamus trilogy. Born June 20, 1952 in Bologna, Italy, he earned a political science degree in 1976. He worked as an academic and for the Italian ministry of finance before turning to fiction writing in the 1990s. Debut novel Nicolas Eymerich, inquisitore (1993) won the ...Read More

Author ROBERT C. CORNETT, 69, died April 1, 2022 at home in Albuquerque NM. Cornett was a prolific author of SF, military, and adventure fiction.

His work of genre interest includes the Time Mercenaries series with Kevin D. Randle: Remember the Alamo! (1980), Remember Gettysburg! (1988), and Remember the Little Bighorn! (1990), and the Fifty Million Years War series, also written with Randle: Seeds of War (1986), The Aldebaran ...Read More

Author Patricia A. McKillip, 74, died May 6, 2022. She was best known for her fantasy novels for children and young adults, including the Riddle-Master trilogy.

Patricia Anne McKillip was born February 29, 1948 in Salem OR. She attended the College of Notre Dame, Belmont, and San Jose State University in California, receiving a BA in 1971 and an MA in English in 1972.

Her first publications were short children’s ...Read More

Russian-Ukrainian SF writer Sergey Dyachenko, 77, died May 5, 2022 in California. Dyachenko was best known for co-authoring over 30 titles with his wife, Marina Dyachenko (née Shirshova), notably Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire winner Vita Nostra (2007), translated into English in 2018.

Sergey Sergeyevich Dyachenko was born  April 14, 1945 in Kyiv, Ukraine, then part of the USSR. He earned a master’s in biology, then a medical degree, and worked ...Read More

PRISCILLA TOLKIEN, 92, died February 28, 2022 after a brief illness. She was the youngest, and last surviving, child of author J.R.R. Tolkien’s, and was vice president of the Tolkien Society from 1986.

Priscilla Mary Anne Reuel Tolkien was born June 18, 1929 in Oxford, England, where her father taught. She had a stuffed teddy bear named Bingo as a child, and in early drafts of The Lord of ...Read More

SF writer Bill Johnson, 65, died March 17, 2022. He had Marfan syndrome.

Johnson attended the Clarion workshop in 1975, and his first publication was “Stormfall” in 1977. He published around 30 stories in all, including Hugo Award winner and Nebula Award finalist “We Will Drink a Fish Together” (1997). Some of his work is collected in Dakota Dreamin’ (1999). He co-wrote “Three Can Keep a Secret” with his college ...Read More

Author and artist Shirley Hughes, 94, died February 25, 2022. She was a prolific writer and illustrator of children’s books, with a career that spanned more than six decades. She wrote more 50 books for children, and illustrated over 200,

Hughes was born July 16, 1927 and grew up in West Kirby, Wirral, England. She attended Liverpool College of Art, then worked as a set builder and costume designer for ...Read More

SF writer Andy Remic, 50, died February 26, 2022 of cancer. Remic was a prolific author of SF and fantasy novels.

His debut novel Spiral (2003) launched the Spiral series, which includes Quake (2004) and Warhead (2005). The Combat-K sequence is War Machine (2007), BioHell (2008), Hardcore (2010) and Cloneworld (2011). His Clockwork Vampire Chronicles has Keli’s Legend (2009), Soul Stealers (2010), and Vampire Warlords (2011). The Books of the ...Read More

Agent and editor CHUCK VERRILL died Janu­ary 9, 2022 after a long illness. Charles Verrill was an editor at Viking Penguin for ten years before joining Liz Darhansoff’s agency and becoming a literary agent in 1989. In 1991, he became a partner at Darhansoff & Verrill. He was best known as the longtime agent for Stephen King. ...Read More

Author SALLY GWYLAN, 67, died October 8, 2021 in a traffic accident in Albuquerque NM. Gwylan at­tended the Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers’ Workshop in 1985, and her debut SF story, ‘‘Salt’’, appeared in The Infinite Matrix in 2002.

Other published stories include “In the Icehouse” in Asimov’s (2003) and ‘‘Rapture, Parts 1 & 2’’ in Strange Horizons (2004). Her final story was “Fleeing Oslyge” in Clarkesworld (2018). ...Read More

Brazilian pulp magazine and adventure fiction expert ATHOS EICHLER CARDOSO, 87, died December 19, 2021, during a flight on his way to a meeting of retired Brazilian Army officers. He was 87.

Born July 12th, 1934, Cardoso wrote O Que É Aventura (What Is Adventure; 1987). After retiring from the Army as a colonel, he studied Journalism at the University of Brasília and earned a master’s degree in social ...Read More

SF writer Melissa Mead, 54, died February 15, 2022. She began publishing short fiction in 1999, and had more than 80 publications in magazines and anthologies, plus one novel, Between Worlds (2005). Mead was born November 4, 1967. She had cerebral palsy, and was a dedicated advocate for the rights of the disabled. She worked for a time at Clover Patch in New York, a summer camp for individuals with ...Read More

Editor and author Tom Dupree, 72, died February 7, 2022 at home in New York City of cardio-respiratory arrest. Dupree was an editor at Bantam and HarperCollins, and co-editor of anthology Full Spectrum 5 with Jennifer Hershey & Janna Silverstein (1995). He began publishing short fiction with “The Wild Bunch” (1995), and several more stories appeared in anthologies under his own name and as Randall G. Thomas.

Dupree was born ...Read More

Cree author Harold R. Johnson, 68, died February 9, 2022 of lung cancer in Canada. He wrote 11 books, including novels with speculative elements, notably Corvus (2015) and The Björkan Sagas (2021).

Johnson was born in 1954 in Saskatchewan, and was a member of the Montreal Lake Cree Nation. He served in the Royal Canadian Navy and was a trapper, logger, and miner before attending Harvard and becoming a lawyer, ...Read More

Argentinian author Angélica Gorodischer, 93, died February 5, 2022 at home in Rosario, Argentina. Gorodischer was a prolific author of fiction and non-fiction who wrote several important works of SF.

Angélica Beatriz del Rosario Arcal de Gorodischer was born July 28, 1928 in Buenos Aires, but relocated to Rosario with her family at age seven, and settled there.

She is best known for Kalpa Imperial (translated by Ursula K. Le ...Read More

Writer Ron Goulart, 89, died January 14, 2022. Goulart was a prolific author in multiple genres, producing more than 180 titles in his long career.

Ronald Joseph Goulart was born January 13, 1933 in Berkeley CA, and worked in advertising after college. His first SF story, “Letters to the Editor”, appeared in 1952, and he published a number of stories before debut novel The Sword Swallower (1968), first of his ...Read More

SF writer J. Brian Clarke, 93, died January 17, 2022.

James Brian Clarke was born May 23, 1928 in Birmingham, England, but spent most of his life in Canada. He began publishing genre work with “Artifact” in Analog in June 1969, where he continued to publish stories for the rest of his career. Debut novel Expediter (1990) includes material first published there, as does second book Alphanauts (2006), winner of ...Read More

Fan and convention organizer Bill Wright, 84, died January 17, 2022 in the Alfred Hospital in Melbourne, Australia, the day before his 85th birthday.

Wright, born 1937, was a stalwart of Australian fandom since the late 1950s. He was a founding member of both ANZAPA and the Nova Mob; HonSec of the Eighth Australian Science Fiction Convention (the eighth Australian Natcon) in 1969; secretary of Aussiecon in 1975; awards administrator ...Read More

Brazilian illustrator JOSÉ LUIZ BENÍCIO DA FONSECA, who worked as Benício, 84, died De­cember 7, 2021 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Born September 14, 1936 in Rio Pardo, in the Brazilian South, he was a nationwide name in the fields of pulp art, pin-up art, movie posters, and advertisements.

After a stint plying piano for a radio show in Porto Alegre when he was only 15, Benício initially dedicated ...Read More

Writer Dave Wolverton, 64, who also wrote as David Farland, died January 14, 2022 in St. George UT after suffering a severe head injury falling down the stairs the previous day.

He was best known for his Runelords series, written as David Farland: The Sum of All Men (1998; published in the US as The Runelords), Brotherhood of the Wolf (1999), Wizardborn (2000), The Lair of Bones (2003), Sons ...Read More

Author and conrunner Jane E. Hawkins, 70, died January 7, 2022 in Seattle WA. Best known as a convention organizer, she also wrote gaming tie-in novel Quantum Gate (1996).

Jane Emily Hawkins was born March 11, 1951 in Davenport IA and showed an early aptitude for advanced mathematics. She attended Case University as part of the first engineering class to admit women, and worked at Bell Labs in computing. She ...Read More