Walter Jon Williams (photo ©Catriona Sparks) was born on October 15, 1953, in Duluth, Minnesota, USA.

After earning a bachelor of arts in 1975 at the University of New Mexico, Walter Jon Williams decided to pursue a career as a writer. Initially, he wrote the series of naval adventures Privateers and Gentlemen in 1981: “The Privateer” (later reissued as “Arise To Glory”), “The Yankee” (later reissued as “The Tern Schooner”), “The Raider” (later reissued as “Brig of War”), “The Macedonian” and “Cat Island”. This series is the basis of the role-playing game “Privateers and Gentlemen”, of which he created the rules.

Walter Jon Williams made ​​his debut in the field of science fiction with the novel “Ambassador of Progress” in 1984. In the following years, he published other science fiction and fantasy novels more or less inspired by Roger Zelazny, beginning with “Knight Moves” in 1985. In 1990 he wrote “Elegy for Angels and Dogs”, a sequel to Zelazny’s novel “The Graveyard Heart”.

At the beginning of his career, Walter Jon Williams wrote some cyberpunk novels such as “Hardwired” in 1986 and “Voice of the Whirlwind” in 1987. The author reinterpreted elements of this sub-genre in his own way, adding more themes. Not surprisingly, already with “Angel Station” (1989) he went beyond cyberpunk writing a space opera that contains elements of cyberpunk.

Not anchored to a sub-genre in particular, Walter Jon Williams wrote the trilogy dedicated to Drake Maijstral, a sort of gentleman thief of the future protagonist of what can be considered sci-fi comedies: “The Crown Jewels” (1987), “House of Shards” (1988) and “Rock of Ages” (1995).

In 1991, Walter Jon Williams published a police procedural novel “Days of Atonement”, an exception even for an author who has proven to be really eclectic.

In 1992, Walter Jon Williams published “Aristoi”, which is perhaps his most famous novel. It goes far beyond cyberpunk because it’s set in a future of transhumans who have incredibly developed technologies but whose society is decadent. In this novel, you can still see the inspiration to Zelazny but also to Jack Vance.

In 1995, Walter Jon Williams started his science fantasy mini-cycle with “Metropolitan”, followed in 1997 by “City on Fire”, set in the distant future and mixing classic science fiction elements with other fantasy.

After another exception with the catastrophic novel “The Rift” (1999), Walter Jon Williams returned to science fiction with the Dread Empire’s Fall trilogy: “The Praxis” (2002), “The Sundering” (2003), and “Conventions of War” (2005).

In recent years, Walter Jon Williams published the space opera “Implied Spaces”, which explores themes such as transhumanism and artificial intelligence, and the series of Dagmar Shaw, fundamentally thrillers set in the near future: “This Is Not a Game” (2009), “Deep State” (2011) and “The Fourth Wall” (2012).

Walter Jon Williams has widely proven he’s an eclectic writer capable of handling himself among different genres and mixing elements from different genres. We can therefore expect more surprises in the contents of its forthcoming works.