Author GoH: Jay Lake

Artist GoH: Myles Pinkney (mylespinkney.com)

Gaming GoH: James Ernest (cheapass.com)

James Ernest has been living for many years under a small rock named Charlie. He is easily confused, and he likes food, getting stuff, and people who are not screaming.

Once he had a friend, a nameless talking mouse in a blue hat, who quelled his fears and taught him to make tacos.

When the nameless talking mouse in the blue hat left, there was nothing to do but smash things with a hammer. James has smashed many things with a hammer. Big things, little things, red things. Steeled by his wild-eyed lust for power, James has single-handedly destroyed some of the greatest fragile objects of our time.

In 1996 he started a small game company called Cheapass Games, where he now lives with his wife and young daughter. Surrounded by dust and paper, the family enjoys pleasant games of Bitin' Off Hedz and yearns for another, less-expensive trip to Disneyland.

Soon, James Ernest will be stripped of all his worldly possessions and forced to fight his way out of Tibet armed with a straight razor and an unregistered copy of Windows ME. It will be through this rite of passage that James Ernest becomes what we all want him to be: a withered old man with an oxygen tank making sweet love to a penny slot machine.

Attending Pro: Chuck Bordell (highanxietystudios.com)

Chuck was born a poor transistor farmer in the rust belt of western Pennsylvania. His childhood was filled with polluted rivers that he fell in love with anyway, the sound of railroad cars crashing together, and dreams of lusty women of dubious reputation. Eventually, he tired of all things iron and decided to trade rust for heavy metals, moving to Missoula, MT in 1987.

Despite a decided lack of tree cover (comparatively speaking) he found Missoula to his liking and, after earning a degree in Archaeology in 1991, decided to stay and continue his quest for the world record two-headed trout. In the meantime, he discovered that he had some skill in telling stories through sequential art and has since worked for numerous comic book publishers, including Malibu Comics, Caliber Comics, Alpha Productions and Silverline Comics. He also fell in with rabid fantasy and war gamers (fell in = was hijacked by) and eventually produced artwork for Steve Jackson Games and Dungeon Magazine, along with various illustrations for the Neverworld RPG and the Superdeck Superhero Card Game.

His most recent graphic novel is called Witness to War and recent gaming books include GURPS: Traveller and Earthdawn: Dragons. The Ministry of Wolves, a military fantasy novel inspired by his love of history and magic, is an entry in our writers workshop.

Attending Pro: Patty Briggs (hurog.com)

Patty was born in Montana, and lived here until she learned to read. Then she lived in many places including Regency England, the land of faerie and interplanetary space; although her parents insist that her body remained peacefully at home.

Books have been her most faithful companions and stalwart friends, with the possible exception of a small number of horses, dogs, and cats. This is reflected in an interior decor which looks vaguely like a bookstore clashed with a tornado.

She attended Montana State University, not far from her hometown. While there, she married her high school sweetheart, had a baby and graduated with honors and two degrees. Having earned degrees in German and History, her career future was as bleak as education could insure, but her skill in Trivial Pursuit became legendary.

Following her aquatic biologist husband, she moved to the TriCity desert shortly before STEAL THE DRAGON came out from Ace in 1995.

While in the Tri-Cities she was introduced to conventions (RadCon 2 being her first). She was delighted with the entire event. Make a point of saying hello, she is one of the most friendly and outgoing people you are likely to meet.

Attending Pro: C. J. Cherryh (cherryh.com)

Resident of the Pacific NW. BA in Latin in 1964, U of Okla; MA in Classics at Johns Hopkins U. in Maryland, 1965; and additional language course at OU in 1967.

Academic awards and Honors: American Classical League Scholarship 1960; Alpha Lambda Delta; Phi Beta Kappa; Woodrow Wilson Fellow 1964-5 in Classics. Guest of Honor at Bucconeer, the 1998 World Science Fiction Convention, in Baltimore, MD.

Academic specializations and areas of reasonable competency: Latin, Greek, bronze age myth as related to archaeology; field archaeology (qualified but never practiced); law of early Roman Empire; history of engineering; French (professional translator); Italian and other languages in which I can at least get a drink of water and directions to the train station; was once classroom teacher.

Informal training and areas of personal interest: human genetics, astronomy, space science and aeronautics, astrophysics, botany, geology, climatology (some of this formal education, where it crosses my archaeological studies); cosmology, anthropology; technology in general with practical and anthropological considerations.

Professional experience: teaching Latin, Greek, Ancient History; writing; semiprofessional in archaeological photography

Hobbies: travel, weaving, aquariums, dinosaurs, art.

I write full time; I travel; I try out things. The list includes, both past tense: fencing, riding, archery, firearms, ancient weapons, donkeys, elephants, camels, butterflies, frogs, wasps, turtles, bees, ants, falconry, exotic swamp plants and tropicals, wilderness survival, fishing, sailing, mechanics, carpentry, wiring, painting (canvas), painting (house), painting (interior), sculpture, needlepoint, refinishing furntiture, video games, archaeology, Roman, Greek civ, Crete, Celts, caves.

I've traveled from New York to Istanbul and Troy; outrun a dog pack, and seen Columbia lift on her first flight. I've fallen down a cave, nearly drowned, broken an arm, been kicked by horses, fended off an amorous merchant in a tent bazaar, fought fires, slept on deck in the Adriatic, and driven Picadilly Circus at rush hour. I've waded in two oceans and four of the seven seas, and I want to visit the Amazon, the Serengeti, and see the volcano in Antarctica.

I see this planet as part of the whole universe: I'm stuck on it a while, and until I get the chance to get off it- --I want to do a flyby of Mars and take a look at Nix Olympica and the Vallis Marinaris, personally; and I want to see Titan and Saturn's rings and the Red Spot on Jupiter---but til that day I don't plan to neglect where I am either, and keeping a constantly updated list of wonders this planet has to see.

Attending Pro: John Dalmas (sfwa.org/members/dalmas)

John has had several careers (not counting military service, 1944 -46). The first was itinerant laborer, primarily merchant seaman and logger, and lasted only a few years. After college came 2+ years as a district forester in charge of timber sale preparation and appraisal , and forest planting. He returned to grad school for a Ph.D. in ecology, and worked for 17 years as a research ecologist, mostly in high elevation forests of Colorado and the Southwest. After that came several years as a casual laborer and free-lance editor in L.A., while trying to break into screenplay writing. Finally he settled into writing SF, mainly novels.

New in 2004 is The Helverti Invation, a sequel to The Lizard War, and The Second Coming. The Second Coming looks at what it might be like if a Second Coming actually happened in our time.

Jim Baen is producing a hardcover megabook, The Regiment: A Trilogy, that contains the three core novels of the series: The Regiment, The White Regiment, and The Regiment's War. It is scheduled to be in stores in the beginning of May, 2004.

I have several book projects I work on from time to time. One is Armfelta historical novel of the Great Northern War. In 1969 or 70, I received a Christmas present from Bengt Ocklind, a friend in Swedena (then) newly published history of the 1718 Swedish invasion of Trndelag, in Norway. This story is as exotic and strange to most Americans as a lot of science fiction.

The second is non-fiction, making use of my education and varied job-related experience with American forests. A lot of people have written about the forest controversies. Few have had my scope of professional experience and observation, and most are zealots pitching a polarized point of view. Mine has the working title The War for the Woods.

The third is Of Time and Place: Tea River Stories. Science fiction readers tend to read a lot more than science fiction, notably history. But history books tend to treat with major figures, eras, and events, and generally skimp on the details of life, as insignificant. Ive had the privilege of being close to a period and place which most historians know nothing about: the pioneer settlements of the early 1900s in the region that surrounds Lake Superior and stretches far westward across Minnesotas Lake Agassiz country. It was a colorful period and process, which many Americans would find interesting and exotic.          

Attending Pro: Jane Fancher (sff.net/people/jsfancher)

I was born In Renton, Washington, In the shadow of Mt. Rainier.  I was raised around a flight school, but when we moved to the country I had to choose between planes and horses. I chose the horses and have (almost) never regretted it.  Besides horses, I enjoy art, music, dance of all kinds, travel, a variety of sports, and making furniture. Mostly I enjoy DOING as opposed to observing.

I have virtual degrees in Physics and Anthropology from Washington State University and training in computer programming, psychology, philosophy, and history. I have paid my bills with such diverse activities as lecturing on dolphins, troubleshooting computer programs, art and training horses, and I have a particular talent for cleaning stables.

How all this led to working on a Graphic Novel adaptation of C. J. Cherryh's Gate of Ivrel, I'm not quite certain.  Stranger still, that career move somehow led to writing my own stories. My first novel (Groundties from Warner/Questar) came out In October, 1991. The sequel, Uplink, was released in March, 1992 and the third, Harmonies of the 'Net, in October, 1992.

More recently, I have written the Dance of The Rings series (Ring of Lightning, released in June, 1995, Ring of Intrigue, released in January, 1997, and Ring of Destiny, released in December, 1999).  My prequel to the to the Groundties series is at my agent, along with the "extended versions" of those three books. I'm currently working on the next "Ring" book, which might best be described as "Tesla meets Godzilla".  I've got a few short stories out, including on in the upcoming Thieve's World anthology.

I'm fascinated with things technological for what they can do, but mostly for how they do it and the effects on people of what they do. Although my current Interests are In Virtual Reality and Science  Education, mostly I'm a gestaltist.

I'm also fascinated by what makes things tick—things from computers to people to galaxies—I think the Native American philosophies are a good beginning, and Biosphere 2 a welcome western extrapolation.  In the twenty-first century, I look for humanity to extend that working model to Include the universe at large, and In some way, shape or form, I want to be part of that process.

Formerly surrounded by horses and fish in Oklahoma City, I'm now back in my native Washington State, with a black cat named Efanor (in his current incarnation, at least), and in honor of my half century mark, I've taken up figure skating, a life long passion.

Attending Pro: James Glass (sff.net/people/jglass)

Jim was the Grand Prize winner in Writers of the Future in 1990. Since then he's sold five novels and thirty-some short stories, appearing in magazines such as ABORIGINAL S.F., and ANALOG. His current book THE CREATORS is the third book of the SHANJI trilogy. SHANJI is now out in reprint from ereads.com A collection of his published short fiction "Matrix dreams and other Stories" has just come out from Fairwood Press. A novelet is in the March issue of ANALOG, and two other stories are in press with that magaine. Jim is a retired physics professor and dean at Eastern Washington University. Wife Gail is a costumer, drummer and healing dancer.

Attending Pro: Robin Walker

For all practical purposes, Robin Walker was born in the American Museum of Natural History and Hayden Planetarium in New York City. It was her playhouse of endless worlds and possibilities.  It was a place where she could walk among the stars.  A real Castle of Wonders beats the hell out of imaginary ones.

Early in her career, Robin returned to AMNH as a member of the scientific staff. Since she used art as a default option for entering the sciences, she worked as a scientific and medical illustrator for a salad of institutions and publications.  Robin's odyssey through the sciences included Scientific American and various departments of Harvard and M.I.T.

Robin learned how to draw while in the sciences because basic skills and high standards were rarely taken seriously in art schools-as is still the case today. Art is generally perceived by art schools and the public as therapy or a way to socialize while one's hands are moving. The art trends of the 20th century have been seldom more then the sanctification of the inane.  Do get her started on this topic.

Robin engaged the problem of art education in Seattle by teaching foundation skills, notably to incoming freshmen at Cornish College of the Arts (1980-1993). The little snots didn't get any soft credits either.  So there!

In 1989, Robin graduated from Antioch University Seattle with a B.A. in Liberal Arts, a quarter century after she first started college. After graduation, Robin became adjunct faculty at Antioch and taught art in several departments, including at the 500 level.

In the spring of 2000 she started a new career as a writer and is a correspondent for the Yakima Herald. Robin lives with her husband Gene ("Tornado").

Attending Pro: Parris ja Young

Although Parris has enjoyed a smattering of success with his writing - both in the United States and in Europe - he still struggles to find publishers. "I have all the qualifications," he says, "of an artist - the gift, good works, vision, no money but my stars have not yet lined up, there's a slow fuse on my fame, and a seedling without difficulties grows up spindly."

Actively engaged with the Missoula writer's group, the WordRats, Parris is rewriting a novel, RiverAngels: River Saints, turning the screenplay "Walkaway" into a novel, and writing a third novel titled The Planet and the Pirates.

Economic collapse, asteroid collision, over-population, gratuitous sex*, apocalypse... I write every day. Ya gotta live every life like it is your last."

*. ..get down. Daphne, can't you see I'm busy!