Just in: Leading British science-fiction writer Justina Robson to speak at the HF symposium. Biography:
Justina Robson was born in Leeds, and studied philosophy and linguistics at the University of York. She worked in a variety of jobs - including secretary, technical writer, and fitness instructor - until becoming a full-time writer.
Robson attended the Clarion West Writing Workshop and was first published in 1994 in the British small press magazine The Third Alternative, but is best known as a novelist. Her debut novel Silver Screen was shortlisted for both the Arthur C Clarke Award and the BSFA Award in 2000. Her second novel, Mappa Mundi, was also shortlisted for the Arthur C Clarke Award in 2001. It won the 2000 Amazon.co.uk Writer's Bursary. In 2004, Natural History, Robson's third novel, was shortlisted for the BSFA Award, and came second in the John W Campbell Award.
Robson's novels have been noted for sharply-drawn characters, and an intelligent and deeply thought-out approach to the tropes of the genre. She has been described as "one of the very best of the new British hard SF writers"[1].
Living Next-Door to the God of Love is a loose sequel to Natural History, inasmuch as it is set in the same universe. Keeping It Real marks the beginning of a series, the Quantum Gravity Books.
On 27th July 2008 she spoke on BBC Radio 3 about Doctor Who and various other sci-fi shows for 25 minutes during the interval of the Doctor Who Prom.