Hans Joachim Alpers

Who was Hans Joachim Alpers?

Hans Joachim Alpers was a German writer and editor of science fiction and fantasy. Together with Werner Fuchs and Ulrich Kiesow he founded Fantasy Productions, which became one of the premier German RPG- and board game producers and retailers. He was born in Bremerhaven.

As an editor he co-founded the highly successful German-language role-playing game The Dark Eye and the Science Fiction Times and as a critic he was a contributor to Science Fiction Studies. As a writer he used several pseudonyms including Jürgen Andreas, Thorn Forrester, Daniel Herbst, Gregory Kern, Mischa Morrison, P.T. Vieton, and Jörn de Vries. He won the Kurd-Laßwitz-Preis for the novels Das zerrissene Land and Die graue Eminenz. He also co-wrote a six-volume series of young-adult SF with Ronald M. Hahn Das Raumschiff der Kinder.

He edited anthologies, annual publications, and reference works. Anthologies included Science Fiction aus Deutschland: 24 stories von 20 Autoren. Annual publications included the Science-fiction-Almanach and Science-fiction-Jahrbuch. Reference works included Reclams Science-fiction-Führer, Lexikon der Science-fiction-Literatur, Lexikon der Horrorliteratur, and Lexikon der Fantasy-Literatur.