Thomas Frank

Can policy be both wise and aggressively partisan? Ask any Republican worth his salt and the answer will be an unequivocal yes. Ask a Democrat of the respectable Beltway variety and he will twist himself into a pretzel denying it.

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.

I remember the first time Bill Fichtner and I had a scene together. I've seen him in a few movies, from 'Armageddon' to 'The Perfect Storm' and 'Contact,' and suddenly he's on a bunk bed and I'm on a bunk bed and we're doing this scene together. That was a real 'pinch me' moment.