Two time Prometheus Award winner James P. Hogan died suddenly on July 12, 2010 at his home in Ireland. I admit to being stunned when I read the tweet late on July 12. Various SF news sites (Locus, io9, SFF Site, etc) posted announcements on July 13, and cause of death currently is unknown. The first Hogan bookI ever read was either Code of the Lifemaker or The Gentle Giants of Ganymede, when I “earned” a massive box of sf books from helping a friend paint his house in 1986. I remember reading virtually all his books in the 1980’s and 1990’s, but I stopped reading widely in sf starting in the 2000’s and did not keep up with his most recent novels. I interviewed Hogan for Prometheus in the late 1990’s and spoke with him at several conventions. He was 69, and from what I can tell was planning trips to at least two conventions later this year, including ArmadilloCon 32 in Austin next month. I am planning a longer obituary for the Fall issue of Prometheus, as the summer issue is done and shortly off to the printer.

This weekend I received a massive review copy of a book, Sic Semper Tyranis. A novel by Seamus Branaugh subtitled “A novel of liberty and the future of America” this appears to be the first fiction publication from Silver Lake Publishing. Their web site currently does not have any information that I can find about the book, but as I have yet to crack the shrinkwrap, I know fairly little about the novel at the moment. I intend to review the novel for Prometheus, but its fairly long so I am not sure when the review will appear, though it should be sometime this year.