© Bruce Sterling
Native Texan Bruce Sterling sold his first science fiction story in 1976. His
solo novels include Schismatrix
(1985), Islands
In The Net (1988), Heavy
Weather (1994), and Holy
Fire (1996). In 1986 he edited a genre-defining collection of cyberpunk
short stories entitled Mirrorshades:
The Cyberpunk Anthology. His three collections of short stories are
Crystal
Express (1989), Globalhead
(1992), and A
Good Old-Fashioned Future (1999). In 1990 he and William Gibson published
their collaborative 'steampunk' novel The
Difference Engine.
1992 saw the appearance of Sterling's first nonfiction book, The
Hacker Crackdown: Law And Disorder On The Electronic Frontier, a work
of investigative journalism exploring issues in computer crime and civil liberties.
Sterling released the entire text of the book on the Internet as non-commercial
"literary freeware," and maintains a long-term interest in electronic user rights
and free expression. Other nonfiction work by Sterling has appeared in The
New York Times, Newsday, Whole Earth Review, Details,
Mondo 2000, bOING bOING, and Wired. December 2002 will
see the publicaiton of his latest non-fiction title, Tomorrow Now: Envisioning
the Next Fifty Years.
In addition to these activities, Sterling
also founded the Dead
Media Project, a mailing list and discussion group dedicated to studying
the "life and death" of now-defunct media. In 1999, he began the Viridian
design movement, which advances environmental consciousness through
revolutionary art and design.
His latest novel is Zeitgeist.
Originally published in 1989, "We See Things Differently" reads less like a
science fiction story and more like a political thriller. This story aptly demonstrates
why Sterling is highly regarded as a futurist as well as a science ficiton writer.
Illustrations are © Jaxon Renick.
