Women Who Rock the World: Lois McMaster Bujold

Meet Lois McMaster Bujold
Science Fiction Writer
Writers and Readers

Karen: Who are some of your role models as a writer?

Lois: Some writers get into the groove in their early 20's and they're off and writing. I always found it very reassuring to find that Robert Heinlein didn't start till he was 40. He already had a career behind him as a Naval officer. He was mustered out of the Navy on a medical discharge for tuberculosis which, at that time, had no drugs to cure it. You just had to go rest until you got better, which is why he took up his career as a science fiction writer. He was blocked from doing what he wanted to do in the first place which was a military career. So, I thought, okay, I'm 33. Already, I've got a seven year start on Heinlein.

Karen: Any other role models?

Lois: Poul Anderson, James H. Schmitz who was an early writer who had a lot of women characters

-- strong female characters, at least they seemed so at the time in contrast to what else was being offered in the early '60's. Andre Norton. I don't know when I found out Andre Norton was a woman. It was fairly early on. Zenna Henderson was another woman writer that I noticed at the time although I do not write like her. She was an early influence. I read up all her stuff. So, there were enough women so it didn't seem like that was a barrier. Anne McCaffrey. Later, C.J. (the C stands for Carolyn) Cherryh.

Eric Frank Russell was another writer I liked in my early days, though again he's very dated now. A lot of what first attracted me to science fiction was the humor. The very first science fiction story I ever read was a satire, a humorous story. So, there was that, it was a cheerful or humorous or ironic, joyful aspect of it that make it a literature that I went back to and back to and back to. A [gloom-and-doom] sub-group of science fiction has proliferated since but, in the golden age of science fiction, when I was 12, it all seemed much more optimistic.

Karen: A nice thing about being a writer seems to be that you have a chance to impact other people. Have you had fans come to you and tell you stories about how you've touched their lives? Do you have some favorites?

Lois: Let's see... there was one young lady who wrote me that mine were the books that she took out when they were living in the backyard after the California earthquake 'cause they couldn't go back in their house for the aftershocks. Mine were the books that sort of got her through that week.

I've gotten all kinds of notes from people who are either physically handicapped themselves or have children who are physically or have other handicaps. Miles [the character in some of my books], is an example that helps them to go back the next day and try again. So that's pretty cool. I've gotten interesting letters from blind fans and others. They keep asking me what my handicap is? How do you know all this stuff? I don't know how I know all this stuff. It's just there.

I got a wonderful letter from a lady who was reading "Shards of Honor" while waiting in line to do her banking. She got up to the teller and the teller said, "I'm sorry. I can't take care of your banking. The robber just took all of my money." Turned out that while she was standing in line reading, an armed robber had come in, held up the bank, and made his escape, and she hadn't noticed. They asked her if she could help identify the man and she said, Sorry, I don't think I can. Now, that was a fully-engaged reader!

Karen: The book was too good!?!

Lois: Yeah, so that was cool. Some of my books have been recommended for the supplemental reading for the military ethics course at the Canadian Air Force Academy. So, they get around in interesting places.

I've gotten letters from Australia, the Philippines, from Spain, Russia, and all over the world. My books are in 13 languages now and it's just astonishing to think how far my ideas have traveled. Had I known, back when I was writing in 1983 in Marion, Ohio, I would probably have been paralyzed with stage fright!

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Meet Lois McMaster Bujold Science Fiction Writer Writers and Readers

Meet Lois McMaster Bujold
Science Fiction Writer
Writers and Readers