Opus 5

Sandra Fitzpatrick provided the idea for Opus 5 when she wondered what impact Reetion cats would have on the Gelack court after Horth scores a bunch of them, in trade, at the end of Part 5: Far Arena, in the Okal Rel Saga. Cats have long been extinct in the Sevolite Empire, so the new arrivals would be high status possessions. But as prospective authors discussed possibilities, variations from other times began to arise. There have always been cats on the empire side of the universe after all, just tightly controlled by the Lorels who would sell only non-breeding specimens. The resulting anthology is a romp through history by authors Hal Friesen, Jennifer Lott, Christina Rundle and Elizabeth Woods, connected by the presence in the story of a cat. Meoww.

Opus 5 includes stories by:

Hal Friesen
Jennifer Lott
Christina Rundle
Elizabeth Woods

About the Editors:

Lynda Williams is the author of the Okal Rel Saga, the ten-novel series that establishes the setting of the Okal Rel Universe. Lynda has worked as a journalist, a technologist, computer science instructor, project manager and other roles in the field of education. She is currently employed as an instructional designer at the British Columbia Institute of Technology. Lynda holds two masters degrees and a small collection of awards for innovation in internet-based social developments during the 1990s and 2000s. She is married to David Lott with three daughters.

Sandra Fitzpatrick lives in Calgary, Alberta, where she met Lynda Williams at Conversion Science Fiction conventions and got onboard with editing the Opus 5 anthology. A member of the Imaginative Fiction Writer’s Association, she contributed the story “Return” to Opus 2. A former biochemistry technician, Sandra now works in financial advising. She was born in Rhode Island and moved to Calgaqry in 1981 after meeting her best friend and future husband, Gary Renshaw, at the 1980 World Con in Boston.