Charles Sheffield

Charles Sheffield (25 June 1935 – 2 November 2002), was an English-born mathematician, physicist, and science-fiction writer who served as a President of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America and of the American Astronautical Society.

His novel The Web Between the Worlds, featuring the construction of a space elevator, was published almost simultaneously with Arthur C. Clarke's novel on the subject, The Fountains of Paradise - a coincidence that amused them both. Excerpts from both Sheffield's The Web Between the Worlds and Clarke's The Fountains of Paradise have appeared recently in a space-elevator anthology, Towering Yarns.

Sheffield served as Chief Scientist of Earth Satellite Corporation, a company that processed remote-sensing satellite data. The association gave rise to many technical papers and two popular non-fiction books, Earthwatch (1981) and Man on Earth (1983), both collections of false-colour and enhanced images of Earth from space.

He won the Nebula and Hugo awards for his 1993 novelette "Georgia on My Mind" and the 1992 John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel for his 1992 novel Brother to Dragons.

Sheffield was Toastmaster at BucConeer, the 1998 World Science Fiction Convention in Baltimore. He was also a former President of Science Fiction and Fantasy Writes of America.

Before he died, he was writing a column for the Baen Books web-site; his last column concerned the discovery of the brain tumor that led to his death.

Personal life

Charles Sheffield attended St John's College, Cambridge, where he graduated with a Double First in Mathematics and Physics. During his studies he met and later married his first wife, Sarah Sanderson, whose death in 1977 became the catalyst for his writing career. They had a son, Charles Christopher ("Kit"), and a daughter, Ann Elizabeth. The family soon after moved to the United States, where Sheffield began working in the field of practical physics, a career that would lead him to a consultancy with NASA and the role of chief scientist at the Earth Satellite Corporation in Washington.

In response to the traumatic grief from the death of his wife Sarah to cancer (in 1977), Sheffield began a second career as a science fiction author, winning both the prestigious Nebula and Hugo awards and serving as President of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (1984–1986). He maintained two successful careers, consulting for various scientific corporations while earning fame for his hard science fiction. During this period he lived in Washington, DC, and met and married Linda Zall, a fellow scientist, and had two daughters, Elizabeth Rose and Victoria Jane.

At the time of his death, he was married to writer Nancy Kress, and lived with his children in Silver Spring, Maryland.

Fiction

Behrooz Wolf

Sight of Proteus, Ace September 1978; revised, NEL January 1989 – book version of the following linked stories:

"Sight of Proteus", Amazing May 1978

"Legacy", Galaxy June 1977

"The Grooves of Change", reprinted in Amazing Feb. 1979

Proteus Unbound, Analog August 1988 / NEL Jan. 1989 / Ballantine Del Rey March 1989

Proteus in the Underworld, Baen May 1995

Volumes 1 and 2 were reprinted in omnibus version Proteus Manifest (SFBC July 1989) and later in a revised omnibus version Proteus Combined (Baen May 1994)

The Heritage Universe

Summertide, Ballantine Del Rey Feb. 1990 – loosely based on

"Summertide", Destinies, August 1981

Divergence, Ballantine Del Rey, February 1991

Transcendence, Ballantine Del Rey, April 1992

Convergence, Baen April 1997

Resurgence, Baen November 2002

Volumes 1, 2 and 3 were reprinted in omnibus version The Heritage Universe (SFBC October 1992); Volumes 1 and 2 were reprinted in revised omnibus version Convergent Series (Baen October 1998); Volumes 3 and 4 were reprinted in revised omnibus version Transvergence (Baen November 1999)

Cold as Ice

Cold as Ice, Tor June 1992

The Ganymede Club, Tor December 1995

Dark as Day, Tor March 2002

Chan Dalton

The Mind Pool, Baen, April 1993 – revised and expanded from an earlier version:

The Nimrod Hunt, Baen, August 1986

The Spheres of Heaven, Baen, February 2001

Jupiter (Young Adult Novels)

Higher Education (with Jerry Pournelle), Analog February 1996 / Tor June 1996 – revised and expanded from

"Higher Education", Charles Sheffield & Jerry Pournelle, Future Quartet: Earth in the Year 2042: A Four-Part Invention, Ben Bova, Frederik Pohl, Jerry Pournelle and Charles Sheffield, AvoNova 1994

The Billion Dollar Boy, Tor April 1997

Putting Up Roots, Tor September 1997

The Cyborg from Earth, Tor March 1998

Supernova Alpha

Aftermath, Bantam Spectra Aug. 1998

Starfire, Bantam Spectra October 1999

Arthur Morton McAndrew

The Compleat McAndrew, Baen April 2000 – a collection of linked stories:

"Killing Vector", Galaxy March 1978; read online

"Moment of Inertia", Analog October 1980; read online

"All the Colors of the Vacuum", Analog 2 February 1981

"Manna Hunt", Analog September 1982

"The Hidden Matter of McAndrew", Analog June 1992

"The Invariants of Nature", Analog April 1993

"Rogueworld", F&SF May 1983

"With McAndrew, Out of Focus", Science Fiction Age March 1999

"McAndrew and the Fifth Commandment", Analog September 1999

The Compleat McAndrew was preceded by two earlier versions: The McAndrew Chronicles, (Tor, June 1983) and One Man’s Universe (Tor, December 1993); also, Sheffield later wrote an additional McAndrew story:

"McAndrew and THE LAW", Cosmic Tales: Adventures in Sol System, ed. T. K. F. Weisskopf, Baen June 2004; read online

Waldo Burmeister and Henry Carver, Space Attorneys

Sheffield wrote about this series: