Ryk E. Spoor, while earning his master's degree in information science at the University of Pittsburgh, became a playtesting consultant and writer for the Wizards of the Coast, then merely a startup, now the leading publisher of role-playing games, Magic: The Gathering®, and related gaming materials. He now lives in East Greenbush, New York, working as Research and Development Coordinator for International Electronic Machines, and spends his non-writer time with his wife Kathleen, two sons, two daughters, a poodle, and a lot of chickens. Ryk is the coauthor with Eric Flint of five books in the Boundary science fiction series including Boundary, Threshold, Portal, Castaway Planet and Castaway Odyssey. His solo novels for Baen include Grand Central Arena, Spheres of Influence, Paradigms Lost, and Challenges of the Deep, as well as epic fantasies Phoenix Rising, Phoenix in Shadow, and Phoenix Ascendant.

Author's Homepage