Gene Wolfe (1931-2019) Gene Wolfe was born in New York in 1931 and raised in Texas. After serving in the Korean War he graduated in mechanical engineering from the University of Houston and worked in engineering until becoming an editor of a trade periodical, Plant Engineering, in 1972. Following his retirement in 1984, he wrote full-time. The author of over three dozen award-wining novels and story collections, he is regarded as one of modern fantasy's most important writers. His best-known work, the four volume far-future Book of the New Sun, won the World Fantasy, BSFA, Nebula, British Fantasy and John W. Campbell memorial Awards. He won the World Fantasy Award four times for his novels and collections and the World Fantasy Life Achievement Award for his extraordinary body of work. Gene Wolfe lived in Illinois with his wife, Rosemary, until he passed away in April 2019.

A subtle, ingenious, poetic, and picturesque book...Wolfe is so good he leaves me speechless. - Ursula Le Guin.A truly extraordinary work. One of the most cunningly wrought narratives in the whole of modern SF, a masterpiece of misdirection, subtle clues and apparently casual revelations. - Science Fiction: 100 Best Novels.