Larry Niven was reluctant to write war stories, having no hands-on military experience himself. He knew, however, that leaving a three hundred year period of Known Space history unexplored was a wasted opportunity.
During a car journey with Jim Baen, of Bean Books, Larry and Jim worked out the details for inviting other authors to contribute to Known Space via the Man Kzin War Series. What started with a plot outline for "The Warriors" has now expanded into an eleven volume set of the future history of Known Space.
While the stories are not considered to be "cannon" as the majority have not been written by Larry himself, they are powerful extrapolations of the possibilities of the wonderful playground which Larry has created.
All the stories have received full editing approval by Larry before they were published and Larry enjoyed reading them, looking forward to reading Known Space stories which he didn't have to write himself!
THE AUTHORS
Larry Niven wrote the original "The Warriors" back in 1966 which appeared in the First Man Kzin War story collection. Larry noted in the Introduction to the First Man Kzin War collection, that it wasn't his first Kzinti story: it was the first that he offered for sale. It was dreamed up during a mathematics lecture!
Larry has also written "Madness Has it's Place" "Choosing Names" and "Fly-by-night".
Poul Anderson was seven-time Hugo Award winner, and recipient of the Grand Master Award of the Science Fiction Writers of America for lifetime achievement, has been both popular and prolific for five decades, creating Nicholas van Rijn and Sir Dominic Flandry, two of the most memorable characters in science fiction, and publishing over one hundred books. Paul Anderson died on July 31st, 2001, aged 74.
Poul Anderson wrote the following Man Kzin War series stories: "Iron", "Inconstant Star", and finally "Pele" which was one of his last published stories.
Dean Ing wrote "Cathouse" and it's sequel "The Briar Patch".
Jerry Pournelle is Larry Niven's longest serving and most prolific writing partner. Jerry takes on the Kzin with the with co-author SM Stirling in the short stories "The Children's Hour", "The Asteroid Queen" and "In the Hall of the Mountain King". All three of these stories feature relics and left over Slaver technology.
SM Stirling a Prolific Star Trek author, has corroborated with both Jerry Pournelle and Greg Bear, writhing the Kzin stories "The Children's Hour", "The Asteroid Queen ", "The Man Who Would Be Kzin" and "In the Hall of the Mountain King".
Greg Bear is the author of more than thirty books of science fiction and fantasy, including Blood Music, The Forge Of God, Darwin's Radio, and Quantico. He is married to Astrid Anderson Bear and is the father of Erik and Alexandra. Awarded two Hugos and five Nebulas for his fiction, one of two authors to win a Nebula in every category, Bear has been called the "Best working writer of hard science fiction" by The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. His most recent novel is Quantico, a near-future examination of law enforcement, politics, and terror both domestic and religious. Darwin's Radio and Darwin's Children (1999, 2003) form a sequence about viruses and human evolution and are published by Del Rey and HarperCollins UK. His stories have been collected into an omnibus volume by Tor Books. Bear has served on political and scientific action committees and has advised Microsoft Corporation, the U.S. Army, the CIA, Sandia National Laboratories, Callison Architecture, Inc., Homeland Security, and other groups and agencies. From: www.gregbear.com.
Greg Bear corroborated with SM Stirling to write "The Man Who Would Be Kzin"
Donald Kingsbury was born in 1929 and started writing in 1945. During the last half century he has written a multitude of stories. Check out his website for further information.
Donald wrote "The Survivor" and "The Heroic Myth of Lt. Nora Argamentine" for the Kzin Series.
Thomas T. Thomas is a writer with a career spanning over thirty years in publishing, technical writing, public relations, and popular fiction writing.
Thomas tried his hand at the Kzin in "Hey Diddle Diddle".
Gregory Benford, is the author of "A Darker Geometry" and "The Trojan Cat" both with Mark O Martin,. Gregory Benford does have a day job, as a professor of physics at the University of California. Gregory also writes columns for galaxyonline.com and space.com too. One of his novels "Eater" is currently being made into a Mini Series by the Sci-Fi Channel.
Mark O. Martin, author of "A Darker Geometry" and the "Trojan Cat", both with Gregory Benford, Dr Martin is Assistant Professor of Biology at Occidental College. He has named his son Anson after Robert Anson Heinlein, whose works greatly influence his life and writing.
Hal Colebatch lives in a suburb of Perth, Australia, where he practices law. His recent book, Blair's Britain, was selected by the London Spectator's Taki as a book of the year. In addition to stories in the Man Kzin saga, he has written mainstream fiction, biographies, plays, poetry and several hundred articles. He has a Ph.D in Political Science, and has been an advisor to two Australian Federal Ministers. He is married and has two stepchildren. (from Man Kzin Wars 9)
Hal has been published in all the most recent Man Kzin War collections "The Colonel's Tiger", "Telepath's Dance" and "His Sergeant's Hour " in Man Kzin Wars IX and Man Kzin Wars X is completely devoted to his writing with four separate stories "The Corporal in the Caves", "Music Box", "Peter Robinson" and the novel length "One War For Wunderland".
Hal has continued writing about the Kzinti and currently has two more stories penned and ready "Grossgeister Swamp" and "Three at Table" for MKW XI.
Hal's current literary projects include his father's biography, a history of industrial strikes in World War II and a second volume of Blair's Britain.
Hal's first Niven read was "The Soft Weapon" while he was a student and his other interests include exploring caves, sailing and diving. Hal's photo was printed in his local paper, "The Post". The Article Reproduced here courtesy of POST Newspapers, Subiaco, Western Australia.
Paul Chafe was born in Toronto, Ontario in 1965. Currently he is pursuing graduate studies in Electrical Engineering at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He is an infantry officer in the Canadian Forces Reserve and has served with four regiments. When he isn't writing he devotes his spare time to flying sailplanes, parachuting, cycling and travel. He has one son, Christian who is 8. (from: Man Kzin Wars 9)
Like, Hal Colebatch, Paul Chafe also has stories in the three most recent Kzin collections "Prisoner of War", "Jotok" and "Windows of the Soul".
Jean Lamb's webpage says: "Hi. I'm Jean Lamb, strange being from another planet cleverly disguised as a 42-year-old housewife and small businessperson (ask me about Starburst Media). Physically, I'm about 5'2", mumfle-grumpf pounds (I lie about them on my driver's license. I understand I'm not the only one here). Right now I've got my foot firmly on one of the bottom rungs of the literary food-chain ladder (somewhere below say, the show rated #120 on WB Network).
Jean wrote "Galley Slave".
Warren T. James wrote the well-received story "Slowboat Nightmare". If anyone has any information about this author or you are he- please email the Webmasters
Matthew Joseph Harrington was born in 1960 at the US Naval Base in Yokosuka, Japan. He is 5'11", heavier than he likes, and a slightly-speckled off-pink in hue. He lives in the Glorious People's Republic of California (a division of Lucasfilm Limited) with professional artist Valerie Shoemaker and their six cats. Both he and Valerie suffer from fibromyalgia and fatigue easily, so anyone who drops in suddenly WILL be put to work.
"Teacher's Pet" is a story that has been simmering in his brain since he read the Galileo serialization of The Ringworld Engineers in 1980, and was his first sale. He likens the experience to sending Paul McCartney a poem about John Lennon and receiving the reply, "How do you feel about 6/8 time and B sharp minor?" At present he is writing assorted pieces of SF and fantasy, and trying to find an honest agent who takes short works.