Herter, David
Entry updated 12 September 2022. Tagged: Author.
(1963- ) US author who began publishing work of genre interest with "The Late Mr Havel's Apartment" (in Borderlands 4, anth 1994, edited by Thomas F Monteleone), the interest in Czech life and history in this story proving to shape his later career, though his first novel, Ceres Storm (2000), which is a modern Fantastic Voyage tale that follows a young man across the solar system in his search for the Ur-being of whom he – and his AI companion – are avatars. As usual in the Hidden Monarch tale [see The Encyclopedia of Fantasy under links below], Young Adult implications and structuring are here subsumed under the darker implications of any quest for the fount of being. Herter's later work, though Equipoisal, is perhaps best read as fantasy: Evening's Empire (2002), suffusing the story of an attempt to produce an opera based on Jules Verne, does introduce Vernian material. The First Republic Trilogy – On the Overgrown Path (2006), The Luminous Depths (2008) and One Who Disappeared (dated 2011 but 2012) – is a meditation on the relationships between art and history set in interbellum Czechoslovakia, and featuring characters like Karel Čapek and Franz Kafka; in the third volume, the historical composer Pavel [here Paul] Haas (1899-1944) returns via Time Travel from an Alternate History post-World War Two America to confront the darkening circumstances he may only have dreamed he had escaped. [JC]
David Herter
born Denver, Colorado: 26 June 1963
works
series
First Republic Trilogy
- On the Overgrown Path (Hornsea, East Yorkshire: PS Publishing, 2006) [First Republic Trilogy: hb/from St John Everett Millais]
- The Luminous Depths (Hornsea, East Yorkshire: PS Publishing, 2008) [First Republic Trilogy: hb/Vladimir Verano]
- One Who Disappeared (Hornsea, East Yorkshire: PS Publishing, 2012) [book is dated 2011: First Republic Trilogy: hb/Vladimir Verano]
individual titles
- Ceres Storm (New York: Tor, 2000) [hb/Alan Pollack]
- Evening's Empire (New York: Tor, 2002) [hb/Shelley Eshkar]
- October Dark (Northborough, Massachusetts: Earthling Publications, 2010) [hb/]
links
- David Herter
- Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- The Encyclopedia of Fantasy: Hidden Monarch
- Picture Gallery
previous versions of this entry