Daniel Verastiqui studied Computer Science and English at the University of Texas at Austin. This in no way qualifies him to write Science Fiction and charge you money for it, but he does so anyway. Just be thankful he doesn’t do the same thing with his music.

With the release of Veneer in 2011, he will have written two full(y awesome) novels and a ton of short stories, many of which were mercilessly rejected by the likes of Asimov’s and Analog. Not that he’s bitter. Some people just aren’t ready for pedophile grasshoppers or EMTs who steal the memories of the people they’re supposed to be saving.

Daniel lives in Austin, TX and works in high-tech where he corrects the grammar and spelling of software developers and sales people. This has been unanimously regarded as a much better idea than working at McDonald’s to pay the bills.

Jack flipped the burger; some of the grease popped off the grill and hit him in the eye. Damn, he thought. It would be the fifth time he replaced that eye this month.

If you’re looking to contact Daniel, he has a Facebook page that he will bribe you to like, a tumblr blog that disappears and reappears at random, and a twitter account that he very rarely uses. If that fails, his email address is his first name @ his last name followed by a dot and a com.

Favorite authors include:

• William Gibson for Neuromancer.
• Richard K. Morgan for the Takeshi Kovacs novels.
• Philip K. Dick for almost everything, including Ubik.
• Sergei Lukyanenko for the Night Watch series.
• Octavia Butler for the Patternmaster series.
• Bret Easton Ellis for a change of pace.

Personal trivia:

• Considers the cancellation of Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse to be the greatest travesty of the modern age.
• When pulling into traffic, accelerates quickly to the speed limit but doesn’t go more than 3 mph over.
• Has read Replay at least thirty times despite the irony.
• Still likes Metallica even after St. Anger.
  
• Has an enemies list that includes Liquid Snake.
  
• Brainstorms in a Moleskine notebook.
  
• Writes in Scrivener on a Macbook Air.
  
• Revises and polishes in Microsoft Word on a real computer.