Gordon Zima

Gordon Zima trained as a chemical and mechanical engineer at Stanford and the California Institute of Technology. His engineering career is largely grounded in the defense laboratories of the West Coast of the USA, where he engaged materials problems in nuclear power plants, nuclear devices, and rocket and torpedo propulsion. As an Army Air Force weather officer in the Pacific during World War II, he served in Hawaii and Iwo Jima, and on Okinawa when Japan surrendered. In addition to The Ivan Spruce, he has written Nuk-Chuk Tales for children and young readers, as well as two adult novels: Other Whispers, a partial fiction of an engineer’s life; and The Red Garnet Sky, a story of Hannibal Barca of Carthage. He calls Pasadena, California his hometown and has lived for several years in Santa Fe, New Mexico.