John Boyd (author)

John Boyd is the primary pen-name of Boyd Bradfield Upchurch (born October 3, 1919, Atlanta, Georgia) a science fiction author. His best known work is his first science fiction novel, The Last Starship from Earth, published in 1968. Boyd has written eleven science fiction novels, five novels and one biography. His earlier science fiction novels were initially published by US publisher Weybright & Talley, with subsequent US and UK reprints from mainstream SF publishers.

Novels

• The Slave Stealer (as Boyd Upchurch) (1968, Weybright & Talley) historical novel set during the US slavery period.
• The Last Starship from Earth (1968, Weybright & Talley)
• The Pollinators of Eden (1969, Weybright & Talley. 1971, France: as La Planète Fleur, published by Denoël, series: Présence du Futur #140)
• The Rakehells of Heaven (1969) Weybright & Talley, Gollancz, Bantam, Pan, Penguin [Edition adds Preface]
• Sex and the High Command (1970) Weybright & Talley, Bantam
• The Organ Bank Farm (1970) Weybright & Talley, Bantam
• The Doomsday Gene (1972) Weybright & Talley
• The I Q Merchant (1972) Weybright & Talley
• The Gorgon Festival (1972) Weybright & Talley, Bantam
• Andromeda Gun (1974) Berkley Putnam, Berkley
• Barnard's Planet (1975) Berkley Putnam, Berkley
• Scarborough Hall (1976) [as Boyd Upchurch] Berkley. ghost story involving the slavery period.
• The Girl with the Jade Green Eyes (1978) Viking, Penguin

Short Fiction

• "The Girl and the Dolphin" (Galaxy March-April 1973)

Non-fiction books

• Behind Every Bush: Treason or Patriotirms? (1979) [as Boyd Upchurch, with Senator Richard H Ichord] a look at the House Committee on Un-American Activities, of which Ichord served as chair (1969-1975) after its change of name to the House Internal Security Committee

Non-fiction

• "What It Means To Write Science Fiction" (in Science Fiction: The Academic Awakening (ed. Willis E. McNelly) (College English Association, 1974)

Definition of science fiction

Boyd has written on science fiction, giving a definition of the genre as "... storytelling, usually imaginative as distinct from realistic fiction, which poses the effects of current or extrapolated scientific discoveries, or a single discovery, on the behavior of individuals [or] society."

External links

• John Boyd at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database