About Me

I’m a freelance writer and performer in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada. I’m the award-winning author of more than 60 books of science fiction, fantasy, and nonfiction for readers of all ages. I also host The Worldshapers podcast, featuring interviews with science fiction and fantasy authors about their creative process.

On the science fiction and fantasy side, for DAW Books in New York, I’ve written twelve novels: five science fiction novels under my own name (Lost in Translation, Marseguro, and Terra Insegura–the latter two reissued in an omnibus edition called The Helix WarThe Cityborn, and The Tangled Stars (fall 2022), and three novels in the fantasy/science fiction series Worldshapers (Worldshaper, Master of the World, and The Moonlit World). As Lee Arthur Chane, I’m the author of the epic steampunkish fantasy novel Magebane, and as E.C. Blake, I’m the author of the Masks of Aygrima trilogy: Masks, Shadows, and Faces. Marseguro won the 2009 Aurora Award, honouring Canadian science fiction and fantasy, for Best Long-Form Work in English. Terra Insegura was a finalist for the same award the following year.

Although not published as YA, the Masks of Aygrima books have YA appeal: Masks was shortlisted for the Saskatchewan Book Award for Best Young Adult Novel as well as the Regina Book Award for best novel by a Regina author. I’ve also written a five-book YA fantasy series, The Shards of Excalibur: Song of the Sword, Twist of the Blade, Lake in the Clouds, Cave Beneath the Sea, and Door into Faerie. (Both Twist of the Blade and Door into Faerie were finalists for the Aurora Award for Best Young Adult Novel.) My most recent YA novel is Star Song, a finalist for the Aurora Award for Best Young Adult Novel in 2022.

My first published novel was also YA: Soulworm, which was shortlisted for the Best First Novel Award at the Saskatchewan Book Awards. My second novel, The Dark Unicorn, was shortlisted for best children’s book. Andy Nebula: Interstellar Rock Star won an Our Choice Award from the Canadian Children’s Book Centre, and Spirit Singer won the 2002 Regina Book Award for best book by a Regina author. Another recent YA novel, Blue Fire, appears under my E.C. Blake psuedonym.

In 2013 Bundoran Press published my science fiction novel Right to Know; a sequel, Falcon’s Egg, came out in 2015.

In 2018, I started my own small publishing company, Shadowpaw Press: the first book was Paths to the Stars: Twenty-Two Fantastical Tales of Imagination, a collection of my short fiction. It was shortlisted in two categories of the Saskatchewan Book Awards. Several of the books mentioned above are now available in through Shadowpaw Press, the original publishers no longer being with us, including the Shards of Excalibur series, Blue Fire, Right to Know, Falcon’s Egg, Spirit Singer, and Andy Nebula: Interstellar Rock Star. Shadowpaw Press is also publishing new editions of other authors’ previously published work, and beginning to publish more original work by other authors. Among those titles are the Shapers of Worlds anthology series, featuring short fiction by authors who were guests on my podcast, including numerous international best-sellers and major award winners. Shapers of Worlds came out in 2020 after a successful Kickstarter campaign; Shapers of Worlds Volume II was successfully Kickstarted in 2021, and Shapers of Worlds Volume III will be out in fall 2022.

I also write non-fiction, with dozens of titles on diverse topics: the history of engineering and geoscience in Saskatchewan, the Mutiny on the Bounty, the Iran-Iraq War, genetics, Ebola, Jimi Hendrix, J.R.R. Tolkien, and many more.

In addition, I occasionally write plays: Circle the Crops, a science fiction comedy, was performed by Crocus 80 Theatre in Weyburn, Saskatchewan, for that city’s centennial celebrations, and As Time Goes By: A Love Story with Music and Ghosts and The Music Shoppe, plays with music, were produced by Regina Lyric Musical Theatre (I also directed them). Playwriting comes naturally, since in addition to being a writer, I’m a professional actor and singer who has performed in dozens of plays, musicals and operas in and around Saskatchewan, hosted local television programs, and emceed numerous public events.

I wrote a weekly newspaper science column for almost twenty years, and was also a weekly guest on CBC Radio’s Afternoon Edition talking about science for 17 of those years.  Currently I write a bimonthly column on science fiction and fantasy, “The Space-Time Continuum,” for Freelance, the magazine of the Saskatchewan Writers Guild. At various times I’ve written other columns. Most are archived on this site.

I’m married to Margaret Anne Hodges, a telecommunications engineer and a past president of the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Saskatchewan. We have one daughter, Alice, and a much younger black Siberian cat, Shadowpaw, who happens to be the nephew of the Siberian owned by Betsy Wollheim, co-owner-and-publisher of DAW books.

My literary agent is Ethan Ellenberg.

Permanent link to this article: https://edwardwillett.com/about-me/

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