As Above, So Below (Paperback)

One of the founding figures in the cyberpunk movement, Rudy Rucker arrived at science fiction writing as a second career. He attended Swarthmore College, graduating with a degree in mathematics in 1967, and married Sylvia Bogsch the same year. Two years later, the couple's first child was born. Rucker received a Master's and Ph.D, also in mathematics, from Rutgers University in 1972. That same year, Sylvia gave birth to their second child. Moving to New York, Rucker taught mathematics at the college level for six years, during which time the couple's third child was born. His first published book was a series of lectures about the fourth dimension, which he wrote during that tenure. The family then moved to Germany, where Rucker taught at the University of Heidelberg from 1978 to 1980. While there, he wrote another work of nonfiction before selling WHITE LIGHT, SOFTWARE, and SPACETIME DONUTS, all science fiction novels, to various publishers. Rucker took a job at a college in Virginia in 1980, and two years later, SOFTWARE won the Philip K. Dick Award. When its sequel, WETWARE, won the same award in 1988, Rucker decided to try writing full-time. His subsequent fiction was instrumental in giving definition to the science fiction sub-genre called cyberpunk. Grouped with cyberpunk writers like Bruce Sterling and William Gibson, Rucker refers to his own novels as "transrealism," the essence of which, he says, "is to write about one's real life in fantastic terms." In 1986, Rucker returned to teaching, moving to San Jose State University, where he formally entered the world of computer science. Largely though this, he hooked up with the founders of the influential magazine Mondo 2000, a kind of barometer of cyberculture, and became one of its guiding lights. Around this time, Rucker was commissioned to work for a software development company, and this experience lead to another novel, THE HACKER AND THE ANTS. Continuing his interest in software, Rucker has been involved with the development of a CD version of his lecture notes. He continues to teach and write both fiction and nonfiction, finding that writing is a helpful way of thinking through the scientific and mathematical questions that those fields constantly pose.