Octavia E. Butler (1947-2006) was the author of numerous ground-breaking novels, including Kindred, Wild Seed, and Parable of the Sower. Recipient of the Locus, Hugo and Nebula awards, she became the first science fiction writer to receive the MacArthur Fellowship 'Genius Grant'.

Isaac Asimov, world maestro of science fiction, was born in Russia near Smolensk in 1920 and was brought to the United States by his parents three years later. He grew up in Brooklyn where he went to grammar school and at the age of eight he gained his citizen papers. A remarkable memory helped him finish high school before he was sixteen. He then went on to Columbia University and resolved to become a chemist rather than follow the medical career his father had in mind for him.

He graduated in chemistry and after a short spell in the Army he gained his doctorate in 1949 and qualified as an instructor in biochemistry at Boston University School of Medicine where he became Associate Professor in 1955, doing research in nucleic acid. Increasingly, however, the pressures of chemical research conflicted with his aspirations in the literary field, and in 1958 he retired to full-time authorship while retaining his connection with the University. Asimov's fantastic career as a science fiction writer began in 1939 with the appearance of a short story, `Marooned Off Vesta', in Amazing Stories.

Thereafter he became a regular contributor to the leading SF magazines of the day including Astounding, Astonishing Stories, Super Science Stories and Galaxy. He won the Hugo Award four times and the Nebula Award once. With nearly five hundred books to his credit and several hundred articles, Asimov's output was prolific by any standards.

Apart from his many world-famous science fiction works, Asimov also wrote highly successful detective mystery stories, a four-volume History of North America, a two-volume Guide to the Bible, a biographical dictionary, encyclopaedias, textbooks and an impressive list of books on many aspects of science, as well as two volumes of autobiography. Isaac Asimov died in 1992 at the age of 72.

Tom Easton is the author of over forty books, including books on vampires, pirates, teen girl boxers and teen boy knitters. He lives in Surrey with his wife and three children.

He enjoys cycling, eating pasta and smiling at cats.

Charles Stross is a full-time science fiction writer and resident of Edinburgh, Scotland. The author of seven Hugo-nominated novels and winner of three Hugo awards for best novella, two of which are part of the Laundry Files series, Stross's works have been translated into over twelve languages.

As the owner of degrees in pharmacy and computer science, he graduated as the world's only academically qualified cyberpunk writer just as cyberpunk died. Today he describes his job as telling lies for money and tormenting his imaginary friends.

Pat Cadigan (1953 -)Pat Cadigan was born in Schenectady, NY, and grew up in Fitchburg, MA. Attending the University of Massachusetts on a scholarship, she eventually transferred to the University of Kansas where she received her degree.

Since embarking on her career as a fiction writer in 1987, her Hugo and Nebula Award-nominated short stories have appeared in such magazines as Omni, The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, and Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine as well as numerous anthologies.

Her first collection, Patterns, was honoured the Locus Award in 1990, and she won the Arthur C. Clarke Award in 1992 and 1995 for her novels Synners and Fools. Pat Cadigan moved to the UK in 1996 and now lives in London.

Jules Verne (1828-1905) was a French novelist and playwright best known for his epic adventures, including Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea, Journey to the Center of the Earth, and Around the World in Eighty Days.

A true visionary and master storyteller, Verne foresaw the skyscraper, the submarine, and the airplane, among many other inventions, and he is often regarded as the 'Father of Science Fiction.'

Robert Silverberg has been a professional writer since 1955, widely known for his science fiction and fantasy stories. He is a many-time winner of the Hugo and Nebula awards, was named to the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 1999, and in 2004 was designated as a Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America.

His books and stories have been translated into forty languages. Among his best known titles are Nightwings, Dying Inside, The Book Of Skulls, and the three volumes of the Majipoor Cycle: Lord Valentine's Castle, Majipoor Chronicles and Valentine Pontifex.

His collected short stories, covering nearly sixty years of work, are being published in nine volumes by SF Gateway and Subterranean Press. His most recent book is Tales Of Majipoor (2013), a new collection of stories set on the giant world made famous in Lord Valentine's Castle.

He and his wife Karen and an assorted population of cats, live in the San Francisco Bay Area in a sprawling house surrounded by exotic plants.

Cory Doctorow is a science fiction novelist, blogger and technology activist. He is the co-editor of the popular weblog Boing Boing, and contributor to The Guardian, the New York Times, Wired, and many others.

He has won the Locus and Sunburst Awards, and been nominated for the Hugo, Nebula and British Science Fiction Awards. New York Times bestseller Little Brother was published in 2008.

Joanna Russ was born in New York City and is regarded as one of the leading feminist science fiction writers.

She died in 2011.

Samuel Butler (1835-1902) was the son of a clergyman. Following a disagreement with his father, he left England to beome a sheep farmer in New Zealand, returning to England in 1864.

He published Erewhon anonymously in 1872, and went on to publish several works attacking contemporary scientific ideas, in particular Darwin's theory of natural selection.

Constance Elaine Trimmer Willis has won, among other accolades, ten Hugo Awards and six Nebula Awards for her writing, and was recently named an SFWA Grand Master.

She lives in Greeley, Colorado with her husband Courtney Willis, a professor of physics at the University of Northern Colorado.

Alan Dean Foster has written in a variety of genres, including hard science fiction, fantasy, horror, detective, western, historical, and contemporary fiction.

He is the author of the New York Times bestseller The Approaching Storm and the popular Pip & Flinx novels, as well as novelizations of several films, including Transformers, Star Wars, the first three Aliens films, and Alien Nation.

His novel Cyber Way won the Southwest Book Award for Fiction, the first science fiction work ever to do so. Foster and his wife, JoAnn Oxley, live in Prescott, Arizona.

Richard Matheson was The New York Times bestselling author of I Am Legend, Hell House, Somewhere in Time, The Incredible Shrinking Man, A Stir of Echoes, The Beardless Warriors, The Path, Seven Steps to Midnight, Now You See It…, and What Dreams May Come, among others. He was named a Grand Master of Horror by the World Horror Convention, and received the Bram Stoker Award for Lifetime Achievement.

He has also won the Edgar, the Spur, and the Writer's Guild awards. In 2010, he was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame. In addition to his novels Matheson wrote several screenplays for movies and TV, including "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet," based on his short story, along with several other Twilight Zone episodes.

He was born in New Jersey and raised in Brooklyn, and fought in the infantry in World War II. He earned his bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Missouri.

Matheson died in June, 2013, at the age of eighty-seven.