Pat Cadigan

Pat Cadigan is an American-born science fiction author, who broke through as a major writer as part of the cyberpunk movement. Her early novels and stories all shared a common theme, exploring the relationship between the human mind and technology. Her first novel, Mindplayers, introduced what became a common theme to all her works. Her stories blurred the line between reality and perception by making the human mind a real and explorable place. Her second novel, Synners, expanded upon the same theme, and featured a future where direct access to the mind via technology was in fact possible. She has won a number of awards, including the prestigious Arthur C. Clarke Award twice, in 1992 and 1995, for her novels Synners and Fools. Cadigan had successful surgery to remove cancer in 2013, but announced in December 2014: "My cancer is back. The form I have can't be eradicated or cured but only held at bay for a while by chemo. The specialist I saw today at the Macmillan Cancer Centre said 'a while' is usually about two years."