Harry Turtledove was born in Los Angeles, California on June 14, 1949. He received a Ph.D. in Byzantine history from UCLA in 1977. From the late 1970's to the early 1980's, he worked as a technical writer for the Los Angeles County Office of Education. He left in 1991 to become full-time writer. His first two novels, Wereblood and Werenight, were published in 1979 under the pseudonym Eric G. Iverson because his editor did not think people would believe that Turtledove was his real name. He used this name until 1985 when he published Herbig-Haro and And So to Bed under his real name. He has received numerous awards including the Homer Award for Short Story for Designated Hitter in 1990, the… John Esthen Cook Award for Southern Fiction for Guns of the Southand in 1993, and the Hugo Award for Novella for Down in the Bottomlands in 1994.
George R. R. Martin was born on September 20, 1948 in Bayonne, New Jersey. He began writing at an early age, selling monster stories for pennies to neighborhood children. He received B.S. and M.S. degrees in Journalism from Northwestern University. In 1986, he worked as a story editor for the CBS series The Twilight Zone. He was also an executive story consultant, producer and co-supervising producer for CBS's Beauty and the Beast. In 1970, he sold the story The Hero to Galaxy magazine. Since becoming a full-time writer in 1979, he has written many novels, stories, and series including A Song for Lya, Portraits of His Children, The Pear-Shaped Man, and the Song of Ice and Fire series. He… has won numerous awards including five Locus Awards, three Hugo Awards and two Nebula awards. In 2013 he made The New York Times Best Seller List with his titles A Dance with Dragons and A Game of Thrones: a Clash of Kings, a Storm of Swords, a Feast for Crows. His title's Rogues and The Ice Dragon made the New York Times List in 2014.
Anne McCaffrey was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts on April 1, 1926. She received a degree in Slavonic languages from Radcliffe College. She worked in advertising for Helena Rubenstein from 1947 to 1952. Her first publication was a short story in Science Fiction Magazine, and her first novel, Restoree, was published in 1967. She is a well-known author of over 100 books, mostly science fiction, including the Dragonriders of Pern series, the Crystal Singer series, Acorna's Children series, The Twins of Petaybee series, and Barque Cats series. She won numerous awards including the Hugo Award for Best Novella for the short story Weyr Search in 1968 and the Nebula Award for Best Novella for… Dragonrider in 1969. In 2006, she was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame. She has also written books under the pseudonym Jody Lynn. She died of a stroke on November 21, 2011 at the age of 85.