Author Introduction: David Williams

Yet another Author Introduction! We met David Williams at about this time last year when his debut novel Mirrored Heavens hit the shelf. I bought the book at Balticon and started reading it on the drive home . . . and everything else I was currently reading went back on the shelf until I finished it. Basically, it explodes off the page on page one and never gives you a chance to breathe. I'm not typically into SF all that much, preferring the non-mathematical world of fantasy when I'm not doing my day job, but this book sucked me right in. (And as an aside, I've been trying a few other SF books since then as well.)

Now we have the second book from David, called Burning Skies. I haven't received my copy yet (*frown* I should have just waited and bought it at Balticon), but expect to have it within the week and will likely dive right into it. Anyway, I highly recommend you try his books out. Now, I'll hand it over to him so he can plug his own book. *grin*





Thanks to the inimitable jpsorrow for the space and hi to everyone!
Although BURNING SKIES is the second book of the Autumn Rain trilogy, I've
designed it so that it can be used as the entry-point on the series; it
opens with a conversation between the rogue hacker Claire Haskell and her
imprisoned spymaster Matthew Sinclair that quickly catches us up on what we
need to know about MIRRORED HEAVENS, in addition to telling us what was
really going on in that book . . . .

BURNING SKIES itself centers on the space station/O'Neill cylinder known as
the Europa Platform, the site of the secret summit conference between the
U.S. president and the leaders of the Eastern bloc. (See the cool
map/illustrations on my website!) In reality, the conference is a cover for
the president's real objective: luring the elite terrorist group Autumn
Rain into a trap. Of course, Autumn Rain is also trying to draw the
president into a snare of their own, so things get complicated quickly. And
I'm going to go on record as saying that the book features one of the
craziest space battles to ever appear in science fiction . . . (hey, a guy
has to have ambition. . . )

But for me, one of the most interesting things about the book was writing
about the U.S. president (aka "the Throne"). Andrew Harrison is at the helm
of state at a time of national crisis, and I wanted to make him as complex
as any historical figure. In studying how other authors approach fictional
presidents, one thing I noticed is that usually the writer's politics are
pretty transparent. Larry Niven's FOOTFALL has the Weak Liberal President;
the Judge Dredd universe has the Evil Right-Wing Warmonger, etc., etc. I
wanted to deny the reader such easy labels; we see very little of Harrison's
interior life, but we get a good sense of his policies and machination, and
whether they're merely expedient or utterly necessary is something that
everyone has to decide on their own. And we've also got a bit of a career
mobility dynamic for the rest of the characters; they were second-tier
players in the first book, but now they're operating at the side of the
president. And of course, the higher up you get, the more dangerous your
missions become . . . .

--
THE MIRRORED HEAVENS (May 2008)
THE BURNING SKIES (May 2009)
THE MACHINERY OF LIGHT (May 2010)

www.autumnrain2110.com

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