After boldly venturing where no one Canadian has gone before, winning all three of science fiction writing’s major literary awards, Robert J. Sawyer said he’s looking forward to discovering the many joys Haliburton County has to offer.
The acclaimed author will meet fans, sign copies of his books and engage in a Q&A session as the featured guest at the sixthannual Bookapalooza in Minden July 12. He’ll be promoting his 25th novel, The Downloaded, published in 2024.
“It’s a very easy read,” Sawyer said. It was originally commissioned as an audio production through Audible, who released it on their platform in 2023, performed by Academy Award winning actor Brendan Fraser.
Saywer said The Downloaded is his response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Like all his books, while set in the future, the primary plot points are formed by keeping up with present-day news headlines.
“Everything I saw while I was writing was focusing on people stopping their real lives to start virtual ones… We all uploaded, metaphorically, but knew at some point we’d have to download, to learn how to be interactively human beings again,” he said, noting the book delves into that transition.
Sawyer prides himself on being able to predict future outcomes – in 2015’s Quantum Night he wrote about a psychopathic U.S. president who wants to annex Canada. That book also tackled the fictional fallout of overturning Roe v Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court bill that established a women’s constitutional right to an abortion in the States, well before it was repealed in 2022.
Most of his books take place in the near future, 20-50 years down the road.
“Any good science fiction writer’s job is to look at what the hell is going on currently and extrapolate. Seeing the beginnings of a trend and figuring out what’s coming next,” he said.
Having already finished his 26th novel, slated for release in 2026, Sawyer said he plans to tackle environmental issues and he collapse of post-secondary education in another upcoming piece.
“The one issue I’ve not addressed head-on is the collapse of our environment. I kept thinking at some point we were going to wake up… but that’s gone out the window,” Sawyer said.
“Our university systems are under attack here in Canada… so the death of higher education, the death of critical thinking, of people being able to know when they’re being lied to by the government, that is disappearing, and I will be engaging with that.”
The author said he has no idea what County-based writer Doug Tindall, a longtime friend, will ask about during the Q&A, saying he hopes that makes for a “real, honest, in-the-moment” discussion.
Reflecting on his 30-year career, Sawyer said his crowning achievement is winning the genre’s three major awards – the Hugo, the Nebula, and the John W. Campbell. He’s one of eight authors to win all three and the only Canadian to do so.
“The Hugo is the equivalent of the People’s Choice Award, voted on by readers; the Nebula is the equivalent of the Academy Award, voted on by fellow writers; and the John W. Campbell is the principal juried award in the field, voted on by a leading panel of academics,” he said. “It’s a rare writer who manages to appeal to [all three].”
His first award, the Nebula, came in 1996 with his third novel The Terminal Experiment. Sawyer attended the California ceremony with little hope of winning – a sentiment shared by his publisher, Harper Collins, who instead backed one of his competitors.
“They were gobsmacked, as was I… they said I went from being a promising newcomer to an established bankable name practically overnight,” he said. “It was one of the greatest nights of my life.”
Bookapalooza, hosted by the Arts Council – Haliburton Highlands, runs 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Minden Community Centre. Sawyer’s meet and greet begins at 2:30 p.m., with a more intimate reception at the Dominion Hotel at 6 p.m.
