It has come to my attention that many Traveller fans have not been exposed to the True Word
. I have taken it upon myself to spread the Good News about The Writer which has had such an enormous impact on my Traveller GM-ing. 
His name is Mike Resnick, and he's one of the most prolific writers in the genre. He's done an amazing job of creating a "Universe" of his own, and backed it up with more than 25 separate books in that setting. Yep...he's penned 28 separate novels set in one Universe.
His work is definitely NOT for the pure "hard" science-fiction grognard, but rather takes a soft-science approach - exploring excellent themes of sociology, cultural anthropology, psychology, and often presenting them in a frontiersy, "tall-tale" kind of format.
With a cast that includes revolutionaries, bounty-hunters, big-game hunters, theives, writers, and explorers, I've been given an entire universe full of colorful NPC's and adventure seeds. His work prompted me to write an entire chargen on circuses and carnivals, and his treatment of an interstellar house of ill-repute has me thinking of doing the same thing for a "courtesan" class (Read his "Velvet Comet" series...).
The flavor, flair, and mood of his pieces has helped me to make my campaigns seem MUCH more "real" to my players. AND it's made an excellent bridge for newbies who've played only fantasy games to still feel relatively "at home" in a science-fiction setting.
Read Resnick. You'll thank yourself, later.
I'm climbing off the soapbox now...
His name is Mike Resnick, and he's one of the most prolific writers in the genre. He's done an amazing job of creating a "Universe" of his own, and backed it up with more than 25 separate books in that setting. Yep...he's penned 28 separate novels set in one Universe.
His work is definitely NOT for the pure "hard" science-fiction grognard, but rather takes a soft-science approach - exploring excellent themes of sociology, cultural anthropology, psychology, and often presenting them in a frontiersy, "tall-tale" kind of format.
With a cast that includes revolutionaries, bounty-hunters, big-game hunters, theives, writers, and explorers, I've been given an entire universe full of colorful NPC's and adventure seeds. His work prompted me to write an entire chargen on circuses and carnivals, and his treatment of an interstellar house of ill-repute has me thinking of doing the same thing for a "courtesan" class (Read his "Velvet Comet" series...).
The flavor, flair, and mood of his pieces has helped me to make my campaigns seem MUCH more "real" to my players. AND it's made an excellent bridge for newbies who've played only fantasy games to still feel relatively "at home" in a science-fiction setting.
Read Resnick. You'll thank yourself, later.
I'm climbing off the soapbox now...
