authorDiscover the Best Books Written by William Hertling
William Hertling is the author of the award-winning novels Avogadro Corp: The Singularity is Closer than it Appears, A.I. Apocalypse, The Last Firewall, and The Turing Exception. These near-term science-fiction novels explore the emergence of artificial intelligence, coexistence of humans and smart machines, and the impact of social reputation, technological unemployment, and other near-future issues.
His novels have been called “frighteningly plausible,” “tremendous,” and “must read.” Wired called Avogadro Corp “chilling and compelling.” His most recent novel, Kill Process, is a data ownership and privacy technothriller about a computer hacker turned serial killer turned startup founder.
Avogadro Corp won Forewords Review Science Fiction Book of the Year and A.I. Apocalypse, The Last Firewall, and The Turing Exception were all nominated for the Prometheus Award for Best Novel. The Last Firewall was endorsed by tech luminaries including Harper Reed (CTO for Obama Campaign), Ben Huh (CEO Cheezburger), and Brad Feld (managing director Foundry Group), Amber Case (cyborg anthropologist) and Chris Anderson (CEO 3DRobotics, former Editor-in-Chief Wired).
His first novel for children, The Case of the Wilted Broccoli, was published in 2014. A frequent speaker on the future of technology, science fiction, and indie publishing, Hertling has spoken at SXSW Interactive, WebVisions, Defrag, OryCon, University of Colorado at Boulder, Willamette Writers Conference, CIO Platform Nederlands, and other regional conferences.
He’s been influenced by writers such as Cory Doctorow, William Gibson, Charles Stross, and Walter Jon Williams. William Hertling was born in Brooklyn, New York. He grew up a digital native in the early days of bulletin board systems. His first experiences with net culture occurred when he wired seven phone lines into the back of his Apple //e to build an online chat system.
A computer programmer and web strategist, he graduated from the University of Arizona Graduate Computer Science program, cofounded Tripwire with Gene Kim, and worked at Hewlett-Packard, where he led social media strategy and developed multiple web services. He currently resides in Portland, Oregon.
