Richard K. Morgan

Richard K. Morgan
Morgan inZagrebatSFeraKon,2008
Born	Richard Kingsley Morgan 24 September 1965(1965-09-24)(age58) London,England
Occupation	Writer
Genre	Hardboiled,postcyberpunk,Science fiction,fantasy
Spouse	Virginia Gema Cottinelli-Herrero
Children	Daniel Morgan Cottinelli
Parents	John Morgan (father), Margaret Morgan (mother)
Website
www.richardkmorgan

Richard Kingsley Morgan,(born 24 September 1965 inNorwich) is a Britishscience fictionandfantasyauthor of books, short stories, and graphic novels. He is the winner of thePhilip K. Dick Awardfor his 2003 bookAltered Carbon,which was adapted intoa Netflix seriesreleased in 2018.His third book,Market Forces,won the John W. Campbell Award in 2005,while his 2008 workThirteengarnered him theArthur C. Clarke Award.

Early life and education

Morgan was born inNorfolk,and brought up in the village ofHethersett,nearNorwich,and had a semi-rural upbringing. He attended private school and later studied modern languages and history atQueens' College, Cambridge.After graduating he startedteaching Englishin order to travel the world. After 14 years and a post at theUniversity of Strathclyde,his first novel was published and he became a full-time writer. He lived inGlasgowuntil 2015, when he moved toSaxlingham Nethergatewith his wife Virginia and their son Daniel.

Literary career

In 2002, Morgan's first novelAltered Carbonwas published, combining elements ofcyberpunkandhardboileddetective fictionand featuring theantiheroTakeshi Kovacs.In 2003 the U.S. edition of Altered Carbon received thePhilip K. Dick Awardand the film rights were sold for a reported figure of $1,000,000 tofilm producerJoel Silver,enabling Morgan to become a full-time writer.The film rights were later acquired byLaeta Kalogridis,but production was trapped indevelopment hellfor a decade, eventually gaining release in 2018 as aNetflix series.

In 2003,Broken Angelswas published, the sequel toAltered Carbon,again featuring Takeshi Kovacs and blending science fiction and war fiction in a similar way to his cross-genre début. The success of this book solidified his literary reputation.

Market Forces,Morgan's first non-Kovacs novel, is set in the near future.It was originally written as a short story, then as a screenplay (both unpublished). After the success of his first two works, it was released as a novel and optioned as a film.

Morgan's third Kovacs novel, intended as the final novel in the series,Woken Furies,was released in the UK in March 2005 and in the U.S. in September 2005. In this novel, the Takeshi Kovacs character comes into his own as a hero, not merely a long-black-coat clad, boilerplate antihero.

Morgan wrote two six-issue miniseries forMarvel Comicsunder theMarvel Knightsimprint. His first story,Black Widow: Homecomingpublished monthly in 2004 was followed by a second,Black Widow: The Things They Say About Herpublished monthly in 2005; both are available in collected editions. According to Morgan's official website the series was "an artefact of limited appeal" and is unlikely to be continued, although he has other comic projects in development.

Black Manwas released in May 2007 in the UK and in June 2007 in the United States (asThirteenorTh1rte3n). Later UK editions were published with theThirteentitle. According to the author, the book is about the constraints of physicality and the idea that people are locked into who they are. These are things he could not deal with in the Kovacs universe, because for Kovacs and people like him mortality is avoidable: they just skip into a new body.The novel won the 2008Arthur C. Clarke Award.

Morgan wrote a fantasy trilogy with a gay protagonist,A Land Fit for Heroes,the first volume of which has the titleThe Steel Remainsand was published in August 2008 in the UKand on 20 January 2009 in the United States.The second volume, titledThe Cold Commandswas published in 2011. The third book in the series is calledThe Dark Defilesand was published on 17 August 2014.

Liber Primus Games is creating a gamebook series based on theA Land Fit For Heroestrilogy. The first game was published for Android, Apple and Amazon Kindle Fire devices on 4 November 2015. The release of the PC game was announced in May 2016.

In 2008, he worked withStarbreezeas a writer forSyndicate,the 2012 re-imagining of the1992 video game.Additionally, Morgan worked withElectronic ArtsandCrytekas lead writer for their 2011 video game,Crysis 2.

In October 2018, Morgan's science fiction novel,Thin Air,was published in the UK by Gollancz.

In an interview before the launch ofThin Air,Morgan described a common feature of his works:

There is a central conceit that I keep — not consciously, I swear! — returning to in my work. It takes different metaphorical guises, but at root it’s always the same sense of something grand and worthwhile being abandoned by vicious and stupid men in favour of short-term profit and tribal hegemony. You see it in the regressive politics of the Protectorate in the Kovacs novels, the way both the Yhelteth Empire and the — so-called — Free Cities fail their duty as civilisations inA Land Fit for Heroes.So also withThin Air — the landscape is littered with the markers of a retreat from the grand scheme of terraforming and building a home for humanity on Mars, in favour of an ultraprofitable corporate stasis and an ongoing lie of highly emotive intangibles sold to the general populace in lieu of actual progress.

A graphic novel titledAltered Carbon: Download Blues,which continues to follow the character Takeshi Kovacs, was released in July 2019.

An animated feature entitledAltered Carbon: Resleevedwas released in 2020 on Netflix.

Morgan's books are generally set in a post-extropianistdystopianworld. Morgan described his "takeaway" of one of his books as:

Society is, always has been and always will be a structure for the exploitation and oppression of the majority through systems of political force dictated by an élite, enforced by thugs, uniformed or not, and upheld by a wilful ignorance and stupidity on the part of the majority whom the system oppresses.

Bibliography

Takeshi Kovacs novels

• Altered Carbon(2002)ISBN0-575-07390-X
• Broken Angels(2003)ISBN0-575-07550-3
• Woken Furies(2005)ISBN0-575-07325-X

A Land Fit For Heroes

• The Steel Remains(2008)ISBN0-575-07792-1
• The Cold Commands(2011)ISBN0-575-07793-X
• The Dark Defiles(2014)ISBN0575088605

Black Man novels

• Black Man(2007)ISBN0-575-07513-9(known asThirteenorTh1rte3nin the United States and in later UK editionsISBN0-345-48525-4)
• Thin Air(2018)ISBN978-0575075146
• Gone Machine(2024)ISBN978-0575077959

Other novels

• Market Forces(2004)ISBN0-575-07584-8

Graphic novels

• Black Widow: Homecoming(2005)ISBN0-7851-1493-9
• Black Widow: The Things They Say About Her(2006)ISBN0-7851-1768-7
• Crysys(2012)ISBN978-16-1377-119-8
• Altered Carbon: Download Blues(2019)ISBN978-1524109677
• Altered Carbon: One Life, One Death(2022)ISBN978-1524119874

Video games

• Crysis 2(2011)
• Syndicate(2012)
• A Land Fit For Heroes(2015)

Music

• "Woken Furies" from the albumDark All DaybyGunship(2018)

External links

• Official website
• Richard Morganat theInternet Speculative Fiction Database

Interviews

• Interview: Richard Morgan -The Sydney Morning Herald
• Science Fiction Weeklyinterview
• Interview with author Richard K. Morgan, "Richard K. Morgan: The New King of Cyberpunk Fiction", Jewels Gallegos Merced 09/19/2005 forJIVE Magazine
• InfinityPlusinterview
• Morgan Week interviews and reviews
• InterviewClarkesworld Magazine2008-9
• Interview on the SciFiDimensions Podcast