Dirk's Real-Life World

Place of Birth: Offenbach, Germany (near Frankfurt)
Interests: Reading, technology, movies, travelling, swimming, AFL, soccer
Dislikes: Gardening, motor sports
Favourite Colour: Blue
Favourite Book: The Scar by China Miéville
Favourite Film: Groundhog Day (Find out why)
Favourite Food: Malaysian
Favourite Song: Once Upon a Time in the West - Dire Straits
Favourite Music: Reggae
Favourite Word: susurrus (a soft murmuring or rustling sound)
Favourite Animal: Wombat

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Dirk's Bio

Dirk Strasser has won multiple Australian Publisher Association Awards and a Ditmar for Best Professional Achievement. His short stories have been translated into a number of languages, and his acclaimed fantasy trilogy, The Books of Ascension – Zenith, Equinox and Eclipse – has been published in English (Pan Macmillan / Momentum) and German (Heyne). His short story, “The Doppelgänger Effect”, appeared in the World Fantasy Award-winning anthology, Dreaming Down Under (HarperCollins), edited by Jack Dann. His most recent short story publications include “The Mandelbrot Bet” in the anthology Carbide Tipped Pens (Tor), edited by Ben Bova and Eric Choi and “At Dawn’s Speed” in Dimension6 #2, edited by Keith Stevenson. His short story collection "Stories of the Sand" was published in November 2014. His articles have appeared in most of Australia’s major newspapers, he founded the Aurealis Awards and has co-edited and co-published Aurealis for over twenty-five years. He lives in Melbourne, Australia, with his wife, two children and fluffy white dog.  His day jobs have included being a High School teacher of Mathematics and German, a college creative writing and freelance journalism teacher, a textbook author and publisher, Publishing Manager for Pearson Australia, and Consultant and Series Editor for Cengage Learning Australia.