CHARLES STROSS is the author of the Merchant Princes series of books, including The Revolution Business and Trade of Queens, and has worked as a pharmacist, software engineer, and freelance journalist, but now writes full-time. Stross has won two Hugo Awards and been nominated twelve times; additionally, he's won the Locus Award for Best Novel, the Locus Award for Best Novella, and was shortlisted for the Arthur C. Clarke and Nebula Awards. He lives in Edinburgh, Scotland, with his wife Feorag, a couple of cats, several thousand books, and an ever-changing herd of obsolescent computers. .