Bio:Gerry Connelly

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This is an ISFDB biography page for Gerry Connelly. It is intended to contain a relatively brief, neutrally-written, biographical sketch of Gerry Connelly. Bibliographic comments and notes about the work of Gerry Connelly should be placed on Author:Gerry Connelly.

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Born Gerard Connelly in Scotland, he later lived in London, Lancashire and Northamptonshire. A writer, editor and musician with a physics degree, he wrote SF between 1984 and 1992 mainly for the Weller Publications magazines Dream and New Moon. His stories were often voted favourites by readers. He was also an assistant editor on New Moon. With the death of Trevor Jones, Weller's publisher, Connelly gave up writing SF.

Connelly's SF was characterised by fast pace with snappy dialogue, often relying on humour, and with an eye for the absurd. He would approach traditional SF subjects like time travel from fresh angles. His subjects were varied, featuring hard science, fringe science, even medieval history. His characters were often social misfits who were mischievous or behaved erratically. His stories included Do Det Ike which featured the Electronic Voice Phenomenon as means of interstellar communication; and Dreamsense, where he created suspense by having characters go off at a tangent at inappropriate moments. Probably his most successful story was The Rzawicki Incident, an unusual UFO abduction story, whose narrator was a soccer hooligan. Its sequel, Zonk! poked fun at UFO clubs and the pretentious middle class.

After 1989, Gerry Connelly ran a fringe science magazine, and wrote several books. These include Errol Flynn in Northampton, and Electronic Voice Phenomenon: the Cinderella Science, a non fiction book about a subject he utilised in Do Det Ike.