Alan Smale

Alan Smale is a British-American science fiction and fantasy author, born in Cheadle, England, who moved to the United States in 1988 and later became an American citizen. He worked as a NASA scientist and manager, formerly directing the High Energy Astrophysics Science Archive Research Center at the Goddard Space Flight Center, before retiring with emeritus status. He is best known for the Hesperian Trilogy, beginning with Clash of Eagles (2015), an alternate history in which the Roman Empire never fell and attempts to conquer thirteenth-century North America. Smale's Apollo Rising sequence, starting with Hot Moon (2022), is a technothriller set in an alternate 1979 amid an escalated space-based Cold War. His novella "A Clash of Eagles," which grew into the trilogy, won the Sidewise Award for alternate history in 2010.