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This chapter begins with an overview of Greg Egan's fiction. It centers his work in the context of the “radical hard SF” promoted by the magazine Interzone in the mid-to-late 1980s and provides an overview of his work to date, including his rise to prominence (and subsequent diminishment). It traces a loose “future history” that his stories follow, moving from biomedical advances in the near future to digital immortality in the far future. It also gives a summary of some of his reception by critics to date, including the focus on his perceived lack of characterization and the various attacks and defenses that have been mounted over his work. In discussing his approach to character, the chapter also covers the diverse range of characters that he portrays in his fiction.

This chapter addresses the scientific underpinnings of several of Greg Egan's novels. It first considers the “subjective cosmology” of the universes depicted in Quarantine, Permutation City, and Distress, with their attendant quantum mechanical weirdness. Next, it tackles theories about how our own universe works as seen in the novels Diaspora, Schild's Ladder, and Incandescence. Finally, the chapter provides a rough overview of the alternate-world physics shown in the Orthogonal trilogy, with a particular focus on Clockwork Rocket and Eternal Flame, the two volumes published at the time of writing. It concludes with a section on Egan's use of scientific principles as metaphors for larger philosophical points.

This introductory chapter provides an overview of the book's main themes. This book focuses on the work of Australian science fiction (SF) author Greg Egan. At the time of this writing Egan has published twelve novels and sixty shorter stories. Over time we can chart a clear career trajectory that any author could be proud of: an early mix of successes and rejections, slowly finding his core themes and audience, getting published regularly, showing up in Year's Best anthologies, getting award nominations, moving from short stories to novels, and winning major awards. There is no doubt that what Egan writes is near the heart of contemporary SF and hard SF. More than any other contemporary science fiction writer, he has set himself a project of raising science's profile through art—to convince people that science is as important and critical to the human condition as romance or religion.

The vast majority of Greg Egan's writings concern science and the scientific process. Even when pointing out all the ways things can be unfair or go wrong, his fiction reflects a shining optimism that through the advancement of science the human race can achieve wonders. This chapter sets Egan's work in the context of some broader clashes between science and society at large. Several of his stories address the conflict between science and religion, and others look at the conflict between the humanities and scientific fields in academia. The chapter applies some criticisms of pure science to various Egan stories and then ends with a defense of science and science fiction as meaningful elements of human experience.

Throughout Greg Egan's career, some of his strongest stories have focused on the theme of identity. This chapter first looks at stories that highlight how malleable our brains are in terms of our neurochemistry. Next, it highlights stories where our consciousness is digitized, eventually becoming immortal. It uses information theory as a lens to examine some of the future consciousnesses proposed in Egan's stories and to consider what it means to divorce consciousness from physical embodiment so strictly. When Egan's fiction takes up the question of identity it generally looks under the skin at the neural system of the brain. There are many questions about neurons and consciousness that science is only now beginning to answer—and the answers provided so far diverge wildly from our day-to-day perceptions of being.

This chapter examines Greg Egan's view of ethics, which can be seen from his earliest breakout story, “The Cutie” (1989). It looks at several facets of ethical concerns, including medical ethics as seen in “Blood Sisters” (1991) and “Cocoon” (1994). It also covers the uneven distribution of technological benefits, best illustrated by “Yeyuka” (1997) and the genetic engineering piracy shown in Distress (1995). Finally, it focuses on our ethical responsibilities to life that we create and to alien life that we may find out in the universe.

This chapter presents an extensive interview with Greg Egan. Topics discussed include the kind of science fiction and nonfiction books that he read growing up; why he was initially attracted writing horror stories; sources that he uses when doing research for his books; whether he had ever been tempted to go into academia and formally study physics; cyberpunk authors that he has read; how he became interested in neuroscience; his thoughts on the way we construct identity given the organic influences of our brains and the potential for fine control of computerized brains; his take on the science of quantum mechanics as it relates to human minds; and if he would choose to upload himself if scanning technology were currently available.

Parallel to the emergence of cyberpunk in the USA there was a determined change in sf in the United Kingdom thanks primarily to David Pringle, editor of INTERZONE. This had started as a more literary sf magazine influenced by the New Wave of the 1960s but Pringle called for more hard-edged, radical technical science fiction and this saw the emergence of a new generation of writers including Stephen Baxter, Alastair Reynolds, Greg Egan, Geoff Ryman and Eric Brown. The success of INTERZONE saw a revival in sf magazines in Britain ranging from the extremist BACK BROWN RECLUSE to the more traditional DREAM.