Bridgehead
BRIDGEHEAD was my first attempt to write what I think of as mainstream SF: a novel about a scientific experiment without any tanks or legions or swordsmen or spies. The genesis of the plot was a friend telling me about a non-sanctioned Psi experiment that was once run in the basement of the Engineering Building at Duke University. It went badly wrong, leading to the retirement of the department head.
The novel was part of my first three-book contract, back in 1982. I’d written The Dragon Lord on spec, and I’d done the additional wordage for Hammer’s Slammers for Jim Baen at Ace. I’d then done Time Safari, an expansion of a novella, for Jim after he’d followed Ace publisher Tom Doherty to Tor, the new company he founded; and when I turned that in, Jim asked for and I wrote a technothriller (Skyripper). continue reading…