When It Changed 'Real Science' Science Fiction

Collaborating between leading scientists and literary authors, this unique experiment creates a new strain of science fiction by extending the repertoire of the genre beyond the common places of space travel, time travel, and artificial intelligence. Through the use of diverse, credible, and contemporary research areasfrom Planck length to plankton and virtual conversations between Wittgenstein and Turing to future civilizations torn asunder by differences over particle physicsthese stories reinstate the furnace of scientific endeavor. Comprised of research from practicing scientists at Manchester University and the stories of established authorsincluding Frank Cottrell Boyce, Geoff Ryman, Patricia Dunscker, and Sara Maitlandthis anthology attempts to take science fiction into new, scientifically realistic fields while explaining the theory and technology behind each story.

Geoff Ryman is an author and editor whose work includes Air, Pol Pot’s Beautiful Daughter, and Tesseracts Nine. He is the founder of the Mundane Science Fiction movement and edited the Mundane Special Issue of Interzone magazine in 2008.