ERDMAN, Paul E(mil)

(1932-)

   Canadian writer, formerly consulting economist to the European Coal and Steel Community and a senior banker in Switzerland. Some of his thrillers are genuine NEAR FUTURE sf of an interesting kind. Sf writers usually imagine future changes that are technological or political, seldom ECONOMIC. Like the CYBERPUNK authors, though more "bestseller" than cyberpunk in style, PEE recognizes the supra-national importance of giant cartels in the world of tomorrow (and today). His thrillers involve the manipulation of financial institutions; they portray a financial world of frightening instability in which economic collapse followed by global disorder and war could be catalysed by the actions of only a few unscrupulous persons. After the success of The Billion Dollar Killing (1973) and The Silver Bears (1974), both set more or less in the present, PEE wrote three NEAR FUTURE novels: The Crash of '79 (1976), The Last Days of America (1981) and The Panic of '89 (1986), in each of which world catastrophe is only a year or two ahead. In the first, oil money destabilizes the US banking system and then the world's, and there are prophetic observations about Iran.

   PN

   Other works: The Palace (1987).

   See also: HISTORY OF SF.