Vernor Vinge has won five Hugo Awards, two of them for novels in the Zones of Thought series, A Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky. Known for his rigorous hard-science approach to science fiction, he became an iconic figure among cybernetic scientists with the publication in 1981 of his novella “True Names,” which is considered a seminal, visionary work of Internet fiction. His many novels also include Marooned in Realtime, Rainbows End and The Peace War.