What a long and prolific life

Jack Vance, prolific, prize-winning pulp author, dies at 96

Jack Vance, prolific author of science fiction, mystery and epic fantasy, died Sunday at 96, his son John told the Associated Press. He had written more than 60 books during his long life.

Vance, whose real name was John Holbrook, also published under the names John Holbrook Vance, Alan Wade, Peter Held, John van See and Jay Kavanse, and he wrote three Ellery Queen novels. His best-known series, "The Dying Earth," was set in a future in which the sun is slowly dying out, and a world where technology and the supernatural exist side-by-side.

I bought Jack Vance's Tales of the Dying Earth at the suggestion of YKWIA, who thought I would like them a great deal, but haven't read them yet. I assumed that Vance, like many classic science fiction/fantasy writers, had already died. So I was surprised to see his name in the obituaries in our paper today. I will definitely move his stories to the top of my reading list.