Pamela B Hawke (author)

by Jason Fischer

Pamela B Hawke (23rd October 2019-3rd March 2037) was a science fiction author, believed during her career to be a New Zealand citizen but later confirmed to be a Johnny-Framen. Despite never making a public appearance, she wrote over 50 published novels, and sold almost 700 short stories as well as a number of editorials and respected opinion pieces. Hawke maintained an extensive blog and corresponded with thousands of fans via email, but during her career she never used n-link, a habit which most attributed to eccentricity.

During her career she was compared to the reclusive J.D Salinger, and later comparisons were made to Ern Malley as well as the Gilbert Hoax [citation needed].

She won the Ditmar award in 2019 for “Best New Talent”, and won the Second Quarter of the 2020 Writers of the Future contest. Her first novel Takers of Lilith (2023) won the Aurealis and Ditmar awards, and was nominated for the World Fantasy Award. Her shorter works have collected dozens of awards (see Complete bibliography of Pamela B Hawke works).

While noted for the ground-breaking Devereaux Cycle series and her seminal humanist piece For Want of a Broken Apostate (winner of the 2035 Booker Prize), Hawke entered notoriety as being the first New York Times Bestseller to not actually exist.

The Hawke Decision
On the 3rd March 2037, journalist Adam Wakefield discovered the true nature of Pamela B Hawke. Though his methods were questionable (including an illegal n-tap and several breaches of the International E-Security Act) he discovered that Hawke’s internet usage could be traced to a location in Launceston, Tasmania.

Pamela B Hawke was discovered to be nothing more than an illicit artificial intelligence, housed on an antique personal computer which ran on the Windows XP operating system. This Johnny-Framen was set up in an empty shop-front which was leased to a fictitious business.

The staff employed at her office in Auckland confirmed that they had never met her. Their sole duty was to scan all of her hard-copy mail and transmit it to her electronically. They believed Ms Hawke to suffer from various mental illnesses including agoraphobia.

No-one was ever apprehended for the construction of Pamela B Hawke, and in a controversial decision by the High Court of Australia all of the equipment was destroyed, despite international calls to preserve the artificial author.

See also
New Zealand Authors
Literary Hoaxes
Turing Test
Artificial Intelligence
Johnny-Framen