Merle Haggard

The closer I get to retirement, the more I feel it will be a huge change, a shock, because athletics has been the core of my whole life. I know I'll miss the feeling of running fast, the adrenaline rush, and hearing the crowd cheering me on.

The historical novelist has to consider what has actually happened, while the SF writer is dealing in possibilities, but they are both in the business of imagining a world unlike our own and yet connected to it.