Rick Derringer

And what makes me happy now has changed as well... Its one thing to play in a bar or at a biker festival, and hear a guy who's been drinking beer all day come up and tell you how good you are. For a long time in your life that will make you happy.

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.