William Shunn
American Science fiction author (born 1967)
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William Shunn (born August 14, 1967) is an American science fiction writer and computer programmer. He was raised in a Latter-day Saint household, the oldest of eight children. In 1986, he served a mission to Canada for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but was arrested for making a false bomb threat, for the purpose of preventing his fellow missionary from returning home.[1]
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August 14, 1967
William Shunn | |
|---|---|
William Shunn at the 2007 World Fantasy Convention | |
| Born | Donald William Shunn II August 14, 1967 Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Occupation | Short story writer |
| Education | University of Utah (BS) |
| Period | 1993–present |
| Genre | Science fiction |
| Website | |
| www | |
Life and career
Shunn received a B.S. in computer science at the University of Utah in 1991.[2] He went to work for WordPerfect Corporation and was part of the team that developed WordPerfect 6.0 for MS-DOS. In 1995, he moved from Utah to New York City. He left the LDS Church at the same time and created one of the earliest ex-Mormon web sites.[3]
Shunn's first professional short story was published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction in 1993.[4] He has been nominated once for the Hugo Award and twice for the Nebula Award.
Shunn is the author of a 2015 memoir, The Accidental Terrorist: Confessions of a Reluctant Missionary.[5]
In the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks, he created what may have been the first online survivor registry.[6][7]
Shunn is also known for creating a web site, Spelling Bee Solver, that offers daily hints to The New York Times Spelling Bee. This tool is commonly used within the community of Spelling Bee players.[8]
Awards and nominations
- 2001: Nominated for Nebula Award for Best Novelette for "Dance of the Yellow-Breasted Luddites" (Vanishing Acts, ed. Ellen Datlow, Tor Books, New York, NY, 2000)
- 2006: Nominated for Hugo Award for Best Novella and Nebula Award for Best Novella for "Inclination" (Asimov's Science Fiction, April/May 2006)
Bibliography
Fiction
- Netherview Station story series:
- The Practical Ramifications of Interstellar Packet Loss (1998)
- Dance of the Yellow-Breasted Luddites (2000)
- Inclination (2006)
- Strong Medicine (2003)
- Love in the Age of Spyware (2003)
- An Alternate History of the 21st Century, chap-book (2007)
Nonfiction
- The Accidental Terrorist: Confessions of a Reluctant Missionary (2015)
In 1993 or 1994, Shunn wrote a style guide for standard manuscript format (the generally accepted method for preparing a fiction manuscript for submission to professional markets), based on advice gathered at the Clarion Workshop and elsewhere.[9] First published to the web in 1995, this guide (and its later revisions),[10] commonly known as "Shunn format"[citation needed], has since been adopted by many magazines including Clarkesworld, Analog, and Interzone as a requirement for submissions.[11][12][13]
