Rick Wilber

Richard Arnold Wilber (born 1948) is an American author, poet, editor and professor. His novel, Alien Morning (Tor, 2016), was a finalist for the John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel of 2017. His other novels include The Cold Road (Tor 2003, ebook New Word City, 2017) and Rum Point (McFarland, 2010). He has published more than fifty short stories, novelettes or novellas in magazines including Asimov's Science Fiction, Analog Science Fiction and Fact, The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Stonecoast Review, Gulf Stream Review and Pulphouse and in numerous anthologies. His other works include the memoir, My Father's Game: Life, Death, Baseball (McFarland, 2008), several college textbooks, including Media Matters, (Kendall Hunt, 2018), Modern Media Writing (Thomson/Wadsworth, 2003, with Randy Miller), Magazine Feature Writing (Bedford/St. Martin's 1994) and "The Writer's Handbook for Editing and Revision" (NTC, 1997) and the collections Rambunctious: Nine Tales of Determination (WordFire Press, 2020), The Wandering Warriors (with Alan Smale, WordFire Press, 2020), Where Garagiola Waits (University of Tampa Press, 1999), To Leuchars (Wildside Press, 2003) and The Secret Skater (Winning Readers, University of Tampa Press, 1996, as Robin Aran).

Wilber is the editor of several anthologies including Field of Fantasies: Baseball Stories of the Strange and Supernatural (Night Shade Books, 2014), Subtropical Speculations: An Anthology of Florida Science Fiction (1991), Future Media (Tachyon Books, 2011) and Making History: Classic Alternate History Stories (New Word City, 2018).

His short fiction includes "Something Real" won the 2012 Sidewise Award for Alternate History, Short Form.[1]

He is currently Visiting Assistant Professor of Creative Writing and Thesis Coordinator in the low-residency MFA program at Western Colorado University. He was previously an adjunct instructor in creative writing at Florida Gulf Coast University, and variously a director, instructor, and assistant professor at the University of South Florida. Prior to that he was an assistant professor at Florida Southern College and Southern Illinois University Edwardsville.

His journalism background includes part-time copy editing in the 1970s and 1980s for The Ledger in Lakeland, Florida and The Tampa Tribune in Tampa, Florida. He served as wire editor of the Belleville News-Democrat and as pop music critic for the St. Louis Globe-Democrat.

Wilber's father was baseball player Del Wilber, which has influenced much of his writing, both fictional ("Where Garagiola Waits") and non-fictional (My Father's Game). One of his children has Down syndrome, and this has also influenced much of his writing.