About Us
Currently "us" consists of me (Joe Stech), and several great editors and advisers, who read prospective stories and evaluate them based on both our guidelines and their own fields of expertise. We all believe that science fiction is important -- it expands the mind and drives progress through inspiration. Our goal is to find and deliver great science fiction stories that are entertaining, inspiring, and extremely well thought out. We prefer stories that are self-consistent, scientifically plausible, and technically detailed when necessary. If our goals resonate with you, please join us in whatever capacity you can, whether it be reader, writer, evangelist, or all of the above!
Joe Stech
Publisher/editor-in-chief
This magazine is a passion project of mine; I've always been a great believer in the power of science fiction to inspire and drive progress in the world. I want to support the creation of great science fiction, and I also want to promote readership of science fiction everywhere. By day I'm a data scientist, and I have a background in physics, biochemistry, and software engineering. Feel free to email me at 'joe@compellingsciencefiction.com'.
Emily Goodin
Editor
Emily owes her love of science fiction to her early exposure to Star Trek - and to her indulgent mom who let her stay up until 11pm to watch it when Emily was only seven years old. If there had been a science fiction literature major in college at the time, maybe that would have been her choice instead of International Studies. Emily became a technical writer after graduating and has been steadily at it pretty much ever since. Writing user guides and developer documentation by day and reading Compelling Science Fiction stories by night are her favorite activities, along with mountain biking, trail running, watching sci-fi movies with her family, and playing hide & seek with her three cats.
Ryan Harris
First Reader
Ryan harbors a lifelong affinity for science fiction. He is a biomedical tech by day, and a writer by night. When not writing, he is usually reading, spending time with his son, or watching cartoons. Ryan's fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in Terraform, Galaxy's Edge, and Liquid Imagination.
David Baur
Computational adviser
David Baur holds a master's degree in computer science and works as a data scientist. He believes that good science fiction should introduce a novel concept and explore its outcome in a convincing and internally consistent way through the lens of human experience. He also has a soft spot for time travel.
R Deno Stelter
Astrophysics adviser
Mr Stelter is finishing up his PhD in astrophysics at the University of Florida, where he studies black holes, neutron stars, and their progenitors, high mass stars. He is an expert in cryogenic infrared optical design and opto-mechanical design; in other words, he designs and builds cameras and spectrographs that 'see' infrared light. He is pictured (striped shirt) with CIRCE, one of several UF-built instruments for the Gran Telescopio Canarias, which is currently the world's largest optical/infrared telescope. In his spare time he brews mead and beer, fights D&D baddies with swords and spears, and nurtures his love of hard SF by reading to his two cats, Herbig-Haro (named after a class of young stars) and Vela (named after a pulsar).
Roy Murdock
Macroeconomics adviser
Roy has a passion for tightly-woven short stories. He likes to play with the often-ingenious economics exhibited (or implied) by the technology that fuels great works of science fiction. He researches, reads, and writes reports as an embedded software analyst by day.
Heather Kristjanson
Anatomy/paleontology adviser
Heather is a PhD candidate in Functional Anatomy and Evolution at the Johns Hopkins University, where she studies diets of fossil stem primates. To do this, she dissects chewing muscles in tree shrews (pictured) and primitive primates. She enjoys short stories that make you ponder humanity’s place in the universe, especially if they come with a good twist ending. She collects books, loves to travel, and thinks it’s always a good time for ice cream.
Zach Feldman
Technology adviser
Zach Feldman is a consummate technologist and has been a tinkerer from childhood. He is currently VP of Technology at getaway.house, enabling an exciting suite of camping and experiences through technology. He develops websites and applications using WordPress (PHP), Ruby on Rails, and plain old HTML, CSS, and Javascript. He also has a huge interest in the future of space, robots, and space-robots.
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