About the Authors

L. Ron Hubbard

BORN IN A RUGGED and adventurous Montana, L. Ron Hubbard lived a life of truly legendary proportions. Before the age of ten, he had already broken his first bronco and earned that rare status of blood brother to the Blackfeet Indians. By age eighteen, he had logged more than a quarter of a million miles, twice crossing the Pacific—before the advent of commercial aviation—to a then still mysterious Asia. Returning to the United States in 1928, he entered The George Washington University where, drawing from far-flung experience, he began to shape some of this century’s most enduring tales.

By the mid-1930s the name L. Ron Hubbard had graced the pages of some two hundred classic publications of the day, including Argosy, Top-Notch and Thrilling Adventures. Among his more than fifteen million words of pre–1950 fiction were tales spanning all primary genres: action, suspense, mystery, westerns, and even the occasional romance. Enlisted to “humanize” a machine-dominated science fiction, the name L. Ron Hubbard next became synonymous with such utterly  classics as Final Blackout and To the Stars—rightfully described as among the most defining works in the whole of the genre. No less memorable were his fantasies of the era, including the perennially applauded Fear, described as a pillar of all modern horror.

After the founding of Dianetics and Scientology (the fruition of research actually financed through those fifteen million words of fiction), Ron returned to the world of popular fiction with two monumental blockbusters: the internationally bestselling Battlefield Earth and the ten-volume Mission earth series—each volume likewise topping international bestseller lists in what amounted to an unprecedented publishing event. His screenplays, now being turned into novels, continued this tradition, when in 1998, Ai! Pedrito!—When Intelligence Goes Wrong (novelized by Kevin J. Anderson) became his fourteenth fiction New York Times bestseller.

In 1983, and in what has been described as the culmination of a lifetime commitment to fellow authors, L. Ron Hubbard directed the founding of the Writers of the Future Contest. Dedicated to the discovery and encouragement of new talent within the realms of speculative fiction, the Contest has since proven both an integral part of the greater L. Ron Hubbard literary legacy and the most successful competition of its kind. Accordingly, Contest judges have comprised the most celebrated names of the genre, including Frederik Pohl, Orson Scott Card and Frank Herbert. To date, the Contest has helped place some 250 novels from new authors on worldwide bookshelves.

For more information on L. Ron Hubbard and his many works of fiction visit www.GalaxyPress.com and www.LRonHubbard.org

Kevin J. Anderson

BORN IN 1962, and raised in the small town of Oregon, Wisconsin, Kevin J. Anderson truly represents a rising star of speculative fiction. Entering the Writers of the Future Contest for eleven consecutive quarters, he eventually broke into professional ranks with Resurrection before the age of twenty-five. Within the last four years, twenty-three of his subsequent novels have appeared on national bestseller lists, including Lifeline (coauthored with Doug Beason) and his Star Wars "Jedi Academy" trilogy--all three New York Times bestsellers and top-selling science fiction titles of 1994. Kevin J. Anderson is further the author of three novels based on the X-Files television series--all likewise international bestsellers. Kevin J. Anderson has also established a very unique writing relationship with his wife, Rebecca Moesta. Together they have authored no less than fourteen volumes of the "Young Jedi Knights" series.

By way of research for his novelization of L. Ron Hubbard's Ai! Pedrito! Kevin I. Anderson traveled extensively through the Andean mountains of Ecuador, tropical rain forests and Amazonian tributaries. He is currently at work on three prequels to Frank Herbert's Dune series--to be authored in conjunction with the late author's son, Brian Herbert.