![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lfs.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Wil-McCarthy-close-up.jpg?ssl=1\")
<\/a>And yet, McCarthy has never been recognized or nominated for a Prometheus Award \u2013 until this year.<\/p>\n
McCarthy was nominated for the first time for Rich Man\u2019s Sky<\/em>, recently named by Libertarian Futurist Society judges one of five Best Novel finalists. The fast-paced 2021 novel dramatizes a near-future space race led by a group of four quite different billionaires.<\/p>\n One factor that informs his fiction is his strong background in engineering, science, rockets and robotics.<\/p>\n McCarthy, 55, is president and co-founder of RavenBrick, a solar technology company; a science columnist for the SyFy channel and chief technology officer for Galileo Shipyards, an aerospace research company. He previously worked as a flight controller for Lockheed Martin Space Launch Systems and later an engineering manager for Omnitech Robotics.<\/p>\n Based in Dallas, McCarthy writes patents for a top law firm in Dallas and holds patents of his own in seven countries, including 31 issued U.S. patents in the field of nanostructure optical materials.<\/p>\n A RETURN TO WRITING FICTION “It’s nice to see people actually taking notice,” he said, referring to LFS recognition of Rich Man’s Sky<\/em> as a 2022 Prometheus Best Novel finalist.<\/p>\n “It’s a nice way to ease back in,” he said.<\/p>\n OTHER RECOGNITION<\/strong> Intriguingly, if you visit McCarthy\u2019s own home page at wilmccarthy.com<\/a>, and check out his page of \u201clinks\u201d to areas and subjects he finds relevant, you\u2019ll find one described with these words: \u201cAn introduction to Libertarianism, because it\u2019s good for you.\u201d<\/p>\n In short, this up-and-coming sf author seems to operate and brainstorm on that exciting frontier where science and fiction meet \u2013 with a laudable openness to new ideas and positive visions of the future.<\/p>\n His Queendom of Sol series encompasses the Nebula-Award-nominee The<\/em>\u00a0Collapsium <\/em>and its sequels The\u00a0Wellstone, Lost in Transition\u00a0<\/em>and To Crush the Moon. <\/em>(One of his niftiest sf ideasis developed in Wellstone,\u00a0<\/em>which popularized the concept of wellstone or \u201cprogrammable matter.\u201d)<\/p>\n He’s also published a short-story anthology Once Upon a Galaxy <\/em>and a non-fiction book\u00a0Hacking Matter.<\/em><\/p>\n McCarthy has also written several stories for Analog\u00a0<\/em>and Aboriginal Science Fiction, <\/em>among other magazines.<\/p>\n Rich Man\u2019s Sky<\/em>, set in an exciting space-faring and somewhat capitalistic (albeit government-threatened) future, offers a far-flung story with multiple locales and many diverse characters on Earth, the Moon, Mars, and on space stations orbiting Earth and close to the Sun.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s a capsule-review LFS description of this 2022 Best Novel finalist:<\/p>\n \u2022 Rich Man\u2019s Sky<\/em><\/strong>, by Wil McCarthy (Baen Books) \u2013 This imaginative sf adventure explores human expansion throughout the solar system, propelled by four billionaires.<\/p>\n McCarthy weaves a suspenseful mosaic of epic conflicts and maneuvers between governments and markets as a team of elite military women infiltrate and aim to violently undercut the billionaires\u2019 visionary space projects before they change the world for good or ill.<\/p>\n Some of the \u201cFour Horseman\u201d are revealed to be admirable, and some decidedly not, but McCarthy but McCarthy makes all four real and human as they spearhead game-changing private-enterprise projects that governments aren\u2019t capable or willing to do.<\/p>\n Overall, this Heinlein-esque tale of State-threatened market innovations persuasively counters stereotypes from what free-market economist Ludwig von Mises dubbed \u201cthe anti-capitalist mentality.\u201d<\/p>\n Note: This Prometheus Blog post is part of a series of Meet the Author postings about\u00a0this year\u2019s slate of Best Novel finalists.<\/a><\/p>\n An upcoming post will focus on Best Novel finalist\u00a0Lionel Shriver, author of\u00a0Should We Stay Or Should We Go.<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n Previous Meet the Author posts<\/strong> introduced Kazuo\u00a0Ishiguro, a Nobel Prize-winner for literature whose novel Klara and the Sun<\/em>\u00a0also has been selected as a 2022 Prometheus Best Novel finalist; and Karl K. Gallagher, a two-time finalist for Between Home and Ruin<\/em> and Seize What’s Held Dear<\/em>, both part of his Fall of the Censor series.<\/p>\n For more information, see the LFS press release announcing the five 2022 Best Novel finalists.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n * Read\u00a0\u201cThe Libertarian History of Science Fiction,\u201d<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0an essay in the international magazine\u00a0Quillette<\/em>\u00a0that favorably highlights the Prometheus Awards, the Libertarian Futurist Society and the significant element of libertarian sf\/fantasy in the evolution of the modern genre.<\/p>\n * Read the\u00a0introductory essay<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0of the LFS\u2019 40th\u00a0<\/sup>anniversary retrospective series of Appreciations of past Prometheus Awards winners, with an overview of the awards\u2019 four-decade-plus history, that was launched in 2019 on the 40th<\/sup>anniversary of the awards and continues today.<\/p>\n *\u00a0Join us<\/strong>! To help sustain the Prometheus Awards,\u00a0join\u00a0<\/strong><\/a>the Libertarian Futurist Society (LFS), a non-profit all-volunteer association of freedom-loving sf\/fantasy fans.<\/p>\n Libertarian futurists believe that culture matters! We understand that the arts and literature can be vital, and in some ways even more powerful than politics in the long run, by sparking innovation, better ideas, positive social change, and mutual respect for each other\u2019s rights and differences.<\/p>\n Through recognizing the literature of liberty and the many different visions of a free future via the Prometheus Awards, the LFS hopes to help spread better visions of the future that help humanity achieve universal liberty and human rights and a better world (perhaps eventually, worlds) for all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Wil McCarthy has developed a reputation as one of today\u2019s most imaginative, zestful, pro-science and realistic science-fiction writers. His 11 novels and additional stories blend a Heinlein-esque flair for action and adventure with hard-science extrapolations, plausible futuristic scenarios and interesting characters. And yet, McCarthy has never been recognized or nominated for a Prometheus Award \u2013 … Continue reading Meet the author: Wil McCarthy, a Best Novel finalist for Rich Man\u2019s Sky<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[32,31,10],"tags":[1519,1513,1517,1514,1518,1516,1543,1515,1544,46,1520,1487,1541,1542,1512,1484],"class_list":["post-4362","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-author-updates","category-awards-news","category-news","tag-aggressor-six","tag-antedeluvian","tag-best-novel-finalist","tag-bloom","tag-flies-from-the-amber","tag-hacking-matter","tag-lockheed-martin","tag-murder-in-the-solid-state","tag-nanostructure","tag-prometheus-awards","tag-queendom-of-sol-series","tag-rich-mans-sky","tag-robotics","tag-rockets","tag-wellstone","tag-wil-mccarthy"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pe8nGl-18m","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4362"}],"version-history":[{"count":22,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4362\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4466,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4362\/revisions\/4466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lfs.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nThe positive Publisher\u2019s Weekly\u00a0<\/em>review<\/a> hailed the novel as a thought-provoking and convincing view of space exploration with \u201cnuanced ruminations on the merits of government vs. privately controlled enterprises.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/a>
\n<\/strong>With so many real-world scientific and commercial interests competing for his attention, McCarthy a few years ago took a “long hiatus,” from writing fiction to run a tech start-up, “among other things,” he said in a recent email.<\/p>\n<\/a>When he returned to writing fiction, McCarthy wrote two novellas (the second of which won the AnLab award) and then wrote two novels: Antediluvian<\/em> and Rich Man’s Sky.<\/em><\/p>\n
\nA former contributing editor to Wired<\/em> magazine and a lifetime member of the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, McCarthy has been nominated for the Nebula, Locus, Seiun, Theodore Sturgeon and Philip K. Dick awards, and contributed to projects that won a Webbie, an Eppie, a Game Developers’ Choice Award and a General Excellence National Magazine Award. His imaginary world of “P2\/Sorrw” was named one of the 10 best science-fiction planets of all time by Discover<\/em> magazine.<\/p>\n<\/a>OTHER MCCARTHY NOVELS<\/strong>
\nMcCarthy\u2019s first novels\u00a0Aggressor Six <\/em>and its sequel\u00a0The Fall of Sirius <\/em>encompass The Waisters series, in which he imagines truly alien aliens whose behavior seems incomprehensible until their very different biological and social drives are understood.<\/p>\n<\/a>Among McCarthy\u2019s other novels: Bloom, Flies From the Amber, and Murder in the Solid State.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>Today, many vilify the super-rich while State aggression, assassination, spying, sabotage and other abuses \u201cthrowing muscle around\u201d are often excused, minimized, hidden or ignored.<\/p>\n<\/a>
\n* Prometheus winners:\u00a0For a full list of winners \u2013 for the annual Best Novel and Best Classic Fiction (Hall of Fame) categories and occasional Special Awards \u2013 visit the enhanced\u00a0Prometheus Awards page\u00a0<\/strong><\/a>on the LFS website, which now includes convenient links to the full set of published appreciation-reviews of past winners.<\/p>\n