David D. Levine Books In Order

Publication Order of Space Magic Collections

Publication Order of Space Magic Short Stories/Novellas

Publication Order of Adventures of Arabella Ashby Books

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Short Stories/Novellas

Publication Order of infinity plus singles Books

Publication Order of Wild Cards Books

Publication Order of Anthologies

David D. Levine is a fantasy fiction writer best known for the novel Arabella of Mars, and over fifty fantasy and science fiction narratives. Born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Levine grew in up in Milwaukee after his family moved to Wisconsin when he was six. He attended Washington University in St Louis, Missouri where he graduated with a bachelor’s in architecture. Unlike other writers, Levine’s path to become a professional writer was not a conventional one. Unable to get any meaningful work in his architectural field of study, he became a technical writer for a time, before he got a job at Intel as a user interface designer and software engineer. He would go on to work in high technology for nearly one and a half decades, before he decided to pursue a professional writing career in 2007. The author has been an active member of fandom since 1980, serving on different committees or as staff for the different conventions. His first ever science fiction story was the The Worldcon That Wasn’t, which he published in 1996. The story was included in Again, Alternate Worldcons anthology. After publishing his first short fiction, Wind from a Dying Star he has gone on to publish more than forty stories in anthologies and magazines. He currently lives in Portland Oregon with his wife.

David D. Levine has won many awards and accolades over the years. He was the finalist for Best New Writer in the John W. Campbell Memorial Award in 2003 and 2004. In 2003, he was on the shortlist for the Hugo and Sturgeon Memorial Award. He would also make the shortlist for the Nebula Award in 2007. His 2005 novel Tk’tk’tk won the Hugo Award in 2005, while Nucleon won the prestigious James White Award in 2001. Many of his best stories were featured in Space Magic, the Endeavor Award winning anthology published by Wheatland Press. His stories have been featured in five Year’s Best anthologies, F&SF, Analog, and Asimovs. David D. Levine is a regular guest contributor on Wild Cards, George R. R. Martins highly popular shared world series. He is a distinguished member of the nonprofit Oregon Science Fiction Conventions Incorporated and of Book View Café, a publishing cooperative. He has made numerous podcasts some of which have been on StarShipSofa, PodCastle, and Escape Pod, the most prominent of which was the Parsec Award finalist video, Dr. Talon’s Letter to the Editor. In addition to his writing, he coedits Bento, a science fiction fanzine with Kate Yule his wife.

Levine’s has asserted that most of his work was influenced by the work of the 20th century writer Patrick O’Brian, who wrote narratives involving the Royal Navy during the Napoleonic Wars. Levine’s Arabella of Mars is more of a Horatio Horn-blower novel rather than a Jane Austen type. Nonetheless, one of his biggest advisors is Robi-nette Kowal who is influenced to a greater degree by Austen. Nonetheless, the works also involve a lot of research as while it is easy for him to get the sailing technology right, he needs help with getting societal mores and relationships right. Research and consultation ensures that his work accurately depicts the characters and settings of the novels that are most of the time set in earlier times. While he draws his inspiration from authors such as O’Brian, his experiences are also an important source for some of his narratives. In January 2010, he was invited to the Mars Desert Research Station, where he spent two week in the Utah desert in Mars simulated conditions. Levine has documented his experiences of the crews’ blogs in a self-published book, The Mars Diaries.

One of the central aspects of Levine’s stories that have made his novels such a fan favorite is his tendency to follow structures that have been proven to work. In a recent interview, the author asserts that for the most part, stories tend to come out of the biology of our brains and our culture, even if they will tend to fall into cliché by doing this. As such, while most of his stories have a unique structure, voice, and space, they will cater to reader expectations. While he does employ a lot of imagination and defiance of expectations, he does not go overboard as that would make the reader lose interest. A good example of this concept is his protagonists who always seem to have a quality that sets them apart from the other characters. The protagonist is the one person that makes things move given that if they did not, there would be no one to do it. In this regard, his protagonist has to be self-driven and self-reliant, which is what the readers expect.

In Arabella of Mars, Levine introduces Arabella Ashby a tomboy that inherited her father’s gift for tinkling with automatons. A century after William III of England commissioned the first Mars expedition, a British colony has been established on the Red Planet. Arabella lives on the flourishing colony with a Martian nanny, though she tends to take more after her father in being more of a wild child rather than a lady. Her mother intends to move her to London, England a place she has never set foot on. She hope that the sophistication on Earth could rub off on headstrong daughter. Arabella is soon navigating an unfamiliar world on Earth, and just when she is getting used to it, she is forced to go back to Mars and save the family plantation and her brother. To go back home, she needs to disguise herself as a boy on the Diana, a space ship plying the Earth Mars route. What she never counted on is that the Indian captain of the ship would be so intrigued by her expertise with automatons, that he would soon be too close for comfort. Moreover, she would also need to weather the age-old naval war between France and Britain, learn how to steer the ship, and control a rebellious crew if she hopes to reach home and snatch her brother from the jaws of death.

Space Magic is David D. Levine’s award winning collection of his most popular short stories. The fifteen critically acclaimed science fiction narratives will take the reader on a rollercoaster of stories that range from a space flight to the very ends of the universe, a doomsday America, an ancient China that is radically different from what is portrayed in history, and a Technicolor cartoon kingdom. The novels include some fan favorites such as The Tale of the Golden Eagle, Nucleon, and Tk’Tk’Tk of the Hugo Award winning fame. These and other stories on the anthology highlight Levine’s proficiency as a powerful storyteller and gifted writer, which not only explores our conceptions of space, but also the depths of human emotions.