History Creator / RobertJSawyer

* NotActuallyTheUltimateQuestion: A RunningGag in one chapter of ''Rollback'' features Don and Lenore going out to a fancy restaurant while discussing whether to go through with the titular procedure. A waiter repeatedly asks them if they've decided yet, and they repeatedly tell him they haven't. Eventually, the two of them agree to go through with it and tell the waiter they've made their decision, only to realize they don't actually know what they're ordering for lunch yet.

** The orangutan joke in ''Quantum Night''.

** Attorney Dale Rice from ''Illegal Alien'' apparently has his own spinoff TV show in the ''Flashforward'' novel, or at least he did until the lead actor was killed in the titular incident.

His works include:

** Sawyer is a huge fan of ''Franchise/PlanetOfTheApes'' and ''StarTrek'', among other titles, and frequently references them in his work.

Robert James Sawyer (born April 29, 1960) is a Canadian Science Fiction author. His novels mainly deal with the conflict between science and mysticism/religion.

* ReligionIsRight: Though an atheist himself who has shown atheism and religious skepticism positively, Sawyer also portrays religion as being true in some of his books. In ''The Terminal Experiment'', scientific proof of the soul is found, uniting with God at death. ''Calculating God'' shows the universe ''was'' created, but not much about the creator(s).

* BizarreAlienReproduction: The Tosoks in ''Illegal Alien'' have females with four wombs, so that group sex is the norm for them, with four males impregnating each. Half-siblings are also far more common as a result. Occasionally though one male inseminates all four of a female's wombs. Their term for God possibly even reflects that-one human, learning this, reflects how they thought the Tosoks were saying "Foremother" but it may have really been "''Four''mother".

* FalseRapeAccusation: Both {{played straight}} and thoroughly subverted in ''Factoring Humanity''. The main character is accused of molesting his daughter, and he is known to the reader (but not the other characters) to be innocent. A major plotline involves him striking up a friendship with a teacher who was falsely accused of sexually harassing one of his students. They discuss how the allegations have affected them and the older peer comforts the main character. Near the end of the story though [[spoiler:the older peer admits that he actually did it.]]
* FantasticLegalWeirdness: In ''Mind Scan'', there's a trial over whether or not a character who uploaded her mind to an android body can still be considered the same person, or legally dead, with her property going to her son. ''Illegal Alien'' involves a milder example, with an alien charged in the murder of a human.

* AuthorTract: It becomes pretty obvious what Sawyer thinks about various issues across his novels (e.g. atheism, religion), and this even extends to his pet peeves, such as how January 1, 2000 wasn't the ''real'' new millennium given that there was no year zero-rather, it's January 1, 2001. Quantum Night seems pretty heave-handed against the US right wing too. It's hard to imagine even the most hard-line Republican in the US invading Canada or abolishing illegal aliens' human rights.

* AdHominem: In ''Quantum Night'' the main character is called as an expert in a capital case by the defense, testifying the defendant was a psychopath and couldn't help killing the victim. The prosecutor first uses his views favoring abortion and euthanasia to paint him poorly before the Southern jury, then the fact his grandfather was himself a war criminal, claiming he's inherited psychopathic traits and defends them because of it.

* AluminumChristmasTrees: Much of the Canadian history scattered throughout Sawyer's various novels, at least to American readers. {{Subverted}} by the fact that this is mixed with future predicted Canadian "history" with no indication of which is which.

* BigBrotherIsWatchingYou: Presented as a ''good'' thing in ''Literature/TheNeanderthalParallax'' and the ''[[Literature/WWWTrilogy WWW Trilogy]]''. Sawyer also believes this in RealLife.
** It should be mentioned that in the Neanderthal Parallax, the watching is done automatically; an individual's implanted Companion computer records everything he or she does, sending that recording to a storage facility where only you can access your records, or the authorities if a judge orders it after you've been accused of a crime.

* BrainUploading: The premise of ''Red Planet Blues'', ''Mindscan'' and to a lesser extent ''The Terminal Experiment.''

* FunWithAcronyms: {{Lampshaded}} in ''Starplex''. The human characters do this all the time, but the aliens frequently point out how annoying this is - apparently their languages never had such a concept. One alien character even refuses to call the ship's computer PHANTOM because that too is an acronym.
** The aliens really draw the line at acronyms within acronyms, such as an attempt to [[ToiletHumour name the mobile waste collection machines PHART, short for "PHANTOM ambulatory remote toilet."]]

* NoodleIncident: In the epilogue of ''Frameshift'', set 13 years after the conclusion of the main portion, the USA is said to [[ExpandedStatesOfAmerica have 51 states]]. This has absolutely no bearing on the plot, and what state was added is never mentioned.

* ShoutOut: Sawyer is a huge fan of ''Franchise/PlanetOfTheApes'' and ''StarTrek'', among other titles, and frequently references them in his work.

** Attorney Dale Rice from ''Illegal Alien'' apparently has his own spinoff TV show in the ''FlashForward'' novel, or at least he did until the lead actor was killed in the titular incident.

* ChekovsGun: The Toronto Blue Jays baseball bat in ''Quantum Night''. Jim even refers to it as such shortly before [[spoiler:using it to assault Menno and murder Dominic.]]
* [[CocaPepsiInc Coca-Pepsi, Inc.]]: In ''Rollback'', Coca-Cola and Pepsi merged at some point in the mid-21st century. The protagonist is delighted he never has to hear a waiter apologetically ask "Is Pepsi okay?" ever again.

* CheckovsGun: The Toronto Blue Jays baseball bat in ''Quantum Night''. Jim even refers to it as such shortly before [[spoiler:using it to assault Menno and murder Dominic.]]

Robert J. Sawyer is a Canadian Science Fiction author. His novels mainly deal with the conflict between science and mysticism/religion.

* BizarreAlienReproduction: The Tosoks in ''Illegal Alien'' have females with four wombs, so that group sex is the norm for them, with four males impregnating each. Half-siblings are also far more common as a result. Occasionally though one male inseminates all four of a female's wombs. Their term for God possibly even reflects this-one human, learning this, reflects that they thought the Tosoks were saying "Foremother" but it may have really been "''Four''mother".

* StrawCharacter: Jock, a very conservative former consultant with the RAND Institute in ''Literature/TheNeanderthalParallax'', goes from expressing skepticism over the Neanderthals to [[spoiler: attempting their genocide]]. Meanwhile in ''Quantum Night'', we have a right-wing US President who's quite Islamophobic, [[spoiler: turns out to be a psychopath, and eventually ''invades Canada'']]. Not to mention a Texas governor who passed a law removing all legal rights for illegal aliens (which is actually ridiculously unconstitutional), sparking their mass murders. That, plus the Georgia jury who believe in capital punishment and (even if not everyone agrees on that) reacts in understandable horror after learning the main character (called by the defense to show the defendant is a psychopath, thus he couldn't help killing) favors infanticide for disabled babies. In ''Calculating God'', we have two anti-abortion, creationist fundamentalist terrorists who try to destroy the Burgess Shall for its conflict with their literalist view of the Bible.

* VillainHasAPoint: Willem Van Dyke (in ''Red Planet Blues'') and Original!Jacob (in ''Mindscan'') both use violent and illegal tactics to get what they want, but some readers may feel they have a point in their opposition to BrainUploading on ethical grounds. It's not viewed that way InUniverse, though. This is true of Tyler as well, though at least he uses the legal system to fight the upload version of his mother for her estate.

* HarsherInHindsight: A rare InUniverse example in ''Triggers''. After the White House is destroyed by terrorists, a character wonders what will happen to an {{Expy}} of ''Series/TheWestWing'', considering it's set there. It continues filming, at least for the time being, a fact which is critical to the plot.

** Apparently, several of Sawyer's novels exist InUniverse in other novels. For instance, in ''Triggers'', one character quotes ''Calculating God'', while in ''Literature/TheNeanderthalParallax'', one character recalls reading a serialized version of ''Illegal Alien'' and notes how the situation there is different than what is going on at that moment. In ''Quantum Night'', a story about a biomedical engineer finding scientific proof of the human soul is mentioned-i.e. the plot of his ''The Terminal Experiment''.

* TuringTest: Subverted in the WWW Trilogy, where an AI emergent from mutant web packets with a damaged time-to-life counter is proven to be intelligent on account of how it ''fails'' the Turing test.
** More accurately, it proved that it/he actually was an AI rather than a human with a really good internet connection who was up to something. The AI in ''The Terminal Experiment'', ''Mindscan'' and ''Red Planet Blues'' pass automatically, since they are [[BrainUploading copies of human minds]].

* BizarreAlienBiology: Sawyer is known for making his aliens truly ''alien''. Tosoks in ''Illegal Alien'' have a different bodily structure from most Earth beings, with radial symmetry, for instance-they have one arm at the ''back''. Plus their females have four uteruses, and usually are impregnated by an equal number of males in turn. It's thus much more common to have half siblings.
* BizarreAlienPsychology: In ''Illegal Alien'', the Tosok race has no sense of privacy in regards to sexual matters, since with them this usually involves group sex (four males impregnating one female). Their internal anatomy, however, is viewed as sacred and not to be discussed in public except when absolutely necessary. Also, they don't have a concept of “right” in terms of morals, believing all things are predestined. One character speculates this is due to the fact they don't have right and left sides to their anatomy, but three, with one (an arm in the back) being inherently strongest. They therefore have no concept of crime, although dangerous people are restrained. In his ''Literature/TheNeanderthalParallax'' books, the Neanderthals are incapable of religious and mystical beliefs due to having a different brain structure.

* OutgrownSuchSillySuperstitions: {{Subverted}} with the Neanderthals in ''Literature/TheNeanderthalParallax'' books, who never had a concept of an afterlife or gods to begin with due to different brain structures [[spoiler: (though played straight with the finale of the trilogy, when a magnetic pole reversal affects humans' minds by first stimulating then later eliminating paranormal, mystical or religious beliefs. With them gone, peace breaks out in the Middle East, among other improvements)]].

* StrawmanPolitical: Jock, a conservative former consultant with the RAND Institute in ''Literature/TheNeanderthalParallax'', goes from expressing skepticism over the Neanderthals to [[spoiler: attempting their genocide]]. Meanwhile in ''Quantum Night'', we have a right-wing US President who's quite Islamophobic, [[spoiler: turns out to be a psychopath, and eventually ''invades Canada'']]. Not to mention a Texas governor who passed a law removing all legal rights for illegal aliens (which is ridiculously unconstitutional), sparking their mass murders. That, plus the Georgia jury who believe in capital punishment and (even if not everyone agrees on that) reacts in understandable horror after learning the main character (called by the defense to show the defendant is a psychopath, thus he couldn't help killing) favors infanticide for disabled babies.

* HarsherInHindsight: A rare InUniverse example in ''Triggers''. After the White House is destroyed by terrorists, a character wonders what will happen to an {{Expy}} of ''TheWestWing'', considering it's set there. It continues filming, at least for the time being, a fact which is critical to the plot.

* OutgrownSuchSillySuperstitions: {{Subverted}} with the Neanderthals in ''Literature/TheNeanderthalParallax'' books, who never had a concept of an afterlife or gods to begin with due to different brain structures [[spoiler: (though played straight with the finale of the trilogy, when a magnetic pole reversal affects humans' minds by first stimulating then eliminating paranormal, mystical or religious beliefs. With them gone, peace breaks out in the Middle East, among other improvements)]].

* GoodGirlsAvoidAbortion: {{Discussed}} in ''The Terminal Experiment'' and ''Mind Scan''. The former has proof of the human soul weigh into the debate (especially given it happens after abortion's allowed in the US). In the latter, ''Roe vs. Wade'' is overturned by the US Supreme Court.