“I don’t think of myself as writing dystopias. To me, a dystopia is a deliberately designed society which is superficially perfected, but which is hell for the depicted individuals. That’s not what I do. I describe places where society has broken down or collapsed. I write about poor people. I write about places where technology [...]

Continue reading about Nebula Awards Interview – Paolo Bacigalupi

“I’d had four novels rejected previously, and was pretty determined to only write short stories, ever after. So I took the most interesting aspect of the world and wrote a different story (one that really was a short story) called “The Calorie Man.” That story utilized some of the ideas about peak oil and agribusiness [...]

Continue reading about Orbit Interview With – Paolo Bacigalupi

“One of the things you think about reading is that you want books to be worthwhile—you want them to have lots of interesting ideas, you want them to be socializing influences, all those kinds of things. But on some other level, you’re just—and this is more from my wife’s perspective—as a school teacher she just [...]

Continue reading about The Redemption of – Paolo Bacigalupi

“AV: Ursula K. Heise states in “From Extinction to Electronics: Dead Frogs, Live Dinosaurs, and Electric Sheep,” that there is “the possibility of a different relationship between species: one that no longer privileges the right of humans—feminine or masculine—over those of all other life forms of life, but that recognizes the value and rights of [...]

Continue reading about The Author with the Unpronounceable Name an Interview with – Paolo Bacigalupi

“Lev: Less of an emphasis on prostitution and sexual slavery I’m assuming? Paolo: Yeah, they made me take out all the child prostitution. Or most of it. I was allowed to leave just a whiff of it in. But mostly they said, if we can de-emphasize this, and emphasize things like selling kidneys, that’s better. [...]

Continue reading about This is What It Takes to Write a Novel – Paolo Bacigalupi

“In many ways, though, it’s not just a science-fiction novel, right? Most of the technology you describe, at least in terms of non-biological technology, is older than what we have now. Yeah, it’s more like throwback technologies. When I say science fiction, I think of classic Foundation, I think of rocket ships. But there’s this [...]

Continue reading about Interview: talks about The Windup Girl – Paolo Bacigalupi

A radio interview. 4 out of 5 http://archive.wbai.org/files/mp3/100703_050001hotwolf.MP3

Continue reading about Hour of the Wolf Interview – Paolo Bacigalupi

“PB: If you’re in a closed society, you’ve got a tiny little spigot of relevant information. Everything else is state-run media trash. That’s the stuff that tells you how the children sang for the general or how much the factory has produced, and those are the kind of toothless headlines that fill the newspapers in [...]

Continue reading about Shareable: Earning the Future: A Q and A with – Paolo Bacigalupi

“GB: I know you and I have talked about this before, but you see a real void in the marketplace of books for teen boys. Do you want to talk a little bit about that and how it inspired Ship Breaker? PB: It was actually my wife who made me aware of this. She’s a [...]

Continue reading about SBBT Stop – Paolo Bacigalupi

“And that’s where Ship Breaker comes in. I wanted to write a story for young people set inside the consequences of our present. Life when the bill comes due, so to speak. But beyond all that disaster stuff, I also wanted to write an adventure story, because, if you can’t tell by now, I’m sort [...]

Continue reading about The Big Idea – Paolo Bacigalupi