William Nicholson – April 2010 Guest Editor remembers Foundation by Isaac Asimov: The first of the Foundation trilogy, which gripped me as a teenager. Fully thought-through, intellectually compelling science fiction - idea fiction, more like, built round the genius notion of a band of scientists who have taken control of history.
Foundation is the first in the series of science fiction books by Isaac Asimov which covers a span of about 500 years. It consists of seven volumes that are closely linked to each other, although they can be read separately. The term "Foundation Series" is often used more generally to include the Robot Series and Empire Series, which are set in the same fictional universe, but in earlier time periods. In total, there are fifteen novels and dozens of short stories written by Asimov, and six novels written by other authors after his death, expanding the time spanned by more than twenty thousand years. The series is highly acclaimed, winning the one-time Hugo Award for "Best All-Time Series" in 1966.
Isaac Asimov was born in Russia in 1920 and grew up in the USA. His fantastic career as a science fiction writer began in 1939 with the appearence of a short story 'Marooned Off Vesta', in Amazing Stories. He won the Hugo Award four times and the Nebula Award once. With nearly five hundred books to his name and several hundred articles, Asimov's output was prolific by any standards. He died in 1992 at the age of 72.
