R. Scott Bakker
R. Scott Bakker | |
---|---|
Born | Simcoe, Ontario, Canada | February 2, 1967
Occupation | Novelist |
Genre | Fantasy |
Website | |
rsbakker |
Richard Scott Bakker (born February 2, 1967, Simcoe, Ontario) is a Canadian fantasy author. He grew up on a tobacco farm in the Simcoe area. In 1986 he attended the University of Western Ontario to pursue a degree in literature and later an MA in theory and criticism. After nearly completing, but ultimately abandoning, a PhD in philosophy at Vanderbilt University he moved to London, Ontario, where he now lives with his wife.
Works
R. Scott Bakker's work is dominated by a sprawling series informally known as The Second Apocalypse which he began developing while in college in the 1980s. The series was originally planned to be a trilogy with the first two books entitled The Prince of Nothing and The Aspect-Emperor. The third book has been referred to as The Book That Shall Not Be Named by Bakker, since the title of this book is considered to be a spoiler for the preceding volumes.
When Bakker began writing the series in the early 2000s, however, he found it necessary to split each of the three novels into its own sub-series to incorporate all of the characters, themes and ideas he wished to explore. Bakker originally conceived of seven books: a trilogy and two duologies. This later shifted to two trilogies and one duology, with the acknowledgment that the third series may also expand to a trilogy.
The Prince of Nothing trilogy was published between 2003 and 2006. It depicts the story of the Holy War launched by the Inrithi kingdoms against the heathen Fanim of the south to recover the holy city of Shimeh for the faithful. During the war, a man named Anasûrimbor Kellhus emerges from obscurity to become an exceptionally powerful and influential figure, and it is discovered that the Consult, an alliance of forces united in their worship of the legendary No-God, a nihilistic force of destruction, are manipulating events to pave the way for the No-God's return to the mortal world.
The sequel series, the Aspect-Emperor trilogy, picks up the story twenty years later with Kellhus leading the Inrithi kingdoms in directly seeking out and confronting the Consult. The first novel in this new series, The Judging Eye, was published in January 2009.
While working on the Prince of Nothing series, Bakker was given a challenge by his wife to write a thriller. In response he produced a science fiction suspense novel involving a serial killer who can influence and control the human mind. This book is called Neuropath and was published in 2008. A second thriller, titled Disciple of the Dog, was published in November 2010.
Bibliography
The Second Apocalypse
- The Darkness That Comes Before (2004)
- The Warrior-Prophet (2005)
- The Thousandfold Thought (2006)
- The Judging Eye (2009) ISBN 978-0-14-305160-2
- The White-Luck Warrior (2011) ISBN 978-0-14-305162-6
- The Unholy Consult (TBC)
Short Stories
- Light, Time, and Gravity, Three Pound Brain,[1]
- The False Sun (A Second Apocalypse Story), Three Pound Brain[2]
- The Four Revelations of Cinial'jin (A Second Apocalypse Story), Three Pound Brain[3]
- The Knife of Many Hands (A Second Apocalypse Story), Part 1 of 2, Grimdark Magazine Issue #2, 1 January 2015[4]
- The Knife of Many Hands (A Second Apocalypse Story), Part 2 of 2, Grimdark Magazine Issue #3, 25 March 2015[5]
- The Long Held Breath, Three Pound Brain,[6]
- Reinstalling Eden, Nature, 27 November 2013[7]
- What Was...And What Will Never Be, Three Pound Brain,[8]
Disciple Manning novels
- Disciple of the Dog (2010)
- The Enlightened Dead (forthcoming)
Stand-alone novels
- Neuropath (2008)
References
External links
- Official R. Scott Bakker website
- Second Apocalypse Forum Independently maintained fan forum endorsed by R. Scott Bakker.
- R. Scott Bakker's old SFF Forum at SFFWorld
- R. Scott Bakker at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- The Skeptical Fantasist: In Defense of an Oxymoron an essay by R. Scott Bakker for Heliotrope Magazine
- Bakker's blog
- Bakker Subreddit
Interviews
- early Interview with Jay Tomio, 1 April 2006
- [Interview with R. Scott Bakker at SFFWorld
- Addendum to the Bakker Interview: The Monkey Question (wotmania.com)
- 1st Q&A on wotmania.com
- 2nd Q&A on wotmania.com
- Interview at Blogcritics, 12 June 2008
- Presentation and Responses – minus discussion – at the Centre for the Study of Theory and Criticism, London (uwo.ca/theory)
- Video interview for Fantasy Hrvatska
- Interview with Grimdark Magazine