SCORTIA, Thomas N(icholas)

(1926-1986)

   US writer and chemist, active in solid-propellant research in the aerospace industry during the 1960s before becoming a full-time writer in 1970. He had already been publishing craftsmanlike stories for some time, beginning with "The Prodigy" for Science Fiction Adventures in 1954. He assembled some of his better work in Caution! Inflammable! (coll 1975);a more definitive conspectus is The Best of Thomas N. Scortia (coll 1981) ed George ZEBROWSKI. It has been argued that TNS was at his best in short forms, where his sustained interestingness as a producer of ideas and situations took sometimes bravura shape; and there is little doubt that his first novel, What Mad Oracle?: A Novel of the World as It Is (1961), concerning the aerospace industry, lumbered through its material without much verve. After 1970, however, as his production started to increase, TNS began to seem destined for a very substantial career. Artery of Fire(1960 Original Science Fiction Stories; exp 1972), about the construction of a huge power network, and Earthwreck! (1974), set in space after a nuclear HOLOCAUST has extinguished the human species on its home planet, were both intriguing tales, scientifically numerate and competently commercial.He then shifted, however, into collaborative enterprises, mainly a series of popular TECHNOTHRILLERS with Frank M. ROBINSON; though successful in their own terms, these exhibited little of the creative daring TNS had always threatened to exploit more fully. They are The Glass Inferno (1974) - which along with Richard Martin Stern's The Tower (1973)was filmed as The Towering Inferno (1974) - The Prometheus Crisis (1975), The Nightmare Factor (1978), The Gold Crew (1980) and - completed byRobinson after TNS died - Blow Out! (1987). TNS's death was reported as being from leukemia induced by exposure to radiation as an observer at early nuclear tests, and came just after he had announced new solo projects.

   JC

   As Editor: Strange Bedfellows: Sex and Science Fiction (anth 1972); Two Views of Wonder (anth 1973) with Chelsea Quinn YARBRO; Human-Machines (anth 1975) with Zebrowski.

   See also: CYBORGS; IMMORTALITY; SEX; SPACESHIPS.