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Williams, Gordon

Entry updated 28 October 2024. Tagged: Author.

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(1934-2017) Scottish journalist and author best known for the nonfantastic The Siege of Trencher's Farm (1969), filmed by Sam Peckinpah as Straw Dogs (1971), and for the Hazell detective novels with UK footballer and football manager Terry Venables (1943-2023), the two writing together as P B Yuill. This series began with Hazell Plays Solomon (1974), with all three volumes being later televised. A marginally sf football novel written with Venables under their own names is They Used to Play on Grass (1971), set in a very Near Future where the game (see Games and Sports) is played on something like Astroturf; genre content is otherwise minimal. Also preceding the Hazell collaborations, The Bornless Keeper (1974) as by P B Yuill (but solely by Williams) is a seemingly supernatural thriller with a Gothic flavour, set on an isolated Island whose murderous guardian – suggested in the title and by local legend – proves after much slaughter to be a deranged, bizarrely costumed serial killer.

Of direct sf interest is Williams's solo Micronauts sequence – The Micronauts (1977), The Microcolony (1979; vt Micronaut World 1981) and Revolt of the Micronauts (1981) – a series of thrillers about government agents miniaturized (see Great and Small; Miniaturization) to perform intricate assignments. [JC/DRL]

Gordon MacLean Williams

born Paisley, Renfrewshire, Scotland: 20 June 1934

died 20 August 2017

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Micronauts

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