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Larry Bond

Author Guest of Honor

Larry Bond is 50 and lives with his wife Jeanne and daughters Katie and Julia in Virginia outside Washington DC. After co-authoring Red Storm Rising with Tom Clancy, he has written five novels under his own name: Red Phoenix, Vortex, Cauldron, The Enemy Within, and Day of Wrath, all were published by Warner Books.

He has also co-designed the Admiralty Trilogy series games, which include Harpoon, Command at Sea, and Fear God & Dread Nought. The first two have both won industry awards, while the third will be published in late 2001.

Larry's writing career started by collaborating with Tom Clancy on Red Storm Rising, a runaway New York Times bestseller that has was one of the best-selling books of the 1980s. It depicted a hypothetical conflict between NATO and the Warsaw Pact, drawing heavily on expert analysis of what such a conflict would be like. It has been used as a text at the Naval War College and similar institutions.

Since then, Larry's books have depicted military and political crises, emphasizing accuracy and fast-paced action. Red Phoenix, Vortex, and Cauldron were all New York Times bestsellers.

Red Phoenix was set in South Korea and depicted an invasion of the south by a decaying North Korean government. Vortex told the story of a reactionary Afrikaner government trying to roll back the clock in South Africa. Cauldron showed a financial crisis in Europe that grew out of control, leading to a military confrontation between France and the United States. The Enemy Within depicted a terror campaign launched against the United States. Day of Wrath followed the same characters as The Enemy Within, but had them facing a large-scale nuclear weapons conspiracy.

Larry's Harpoon gaming system was first published in 1980. Designed as a general-purpose air, surface, and submarine naval simulation, it combines playability with a wealth of information on modern naval weapons systems. Designed for the entry-level player, it has found acceptance in both the commercial market and the professional naval community. It is used at the Naval Academy, several ROTC installations, and on several surface ships as a training aid. (Larry recently published an article detailing a Godzilla Harpoon game, which re ran at InConJunction 2002).

Now in its fourth edition, Harpoon has won the H.G. Wells Award, a trade association honor, in 1981, 1987, and 1997 as the best miniatures game of the year. It is the only game to win the award more than once.

The computer version of the game first appeared in 1990, and won the 1990 Wargame of the Year award from Computer Gaming World, an industry journal. An updated version of the single-player game, as well as a multi-player version, have all been published. A new version of the computer game is now in development, with release planned for late 2000.

Command at Sea is the second game of the Admiralty Trilogy, and is an adaptation of Harpoon to the WW II era. Like Harpoon, it emphasizes both playability and historical accuracy, drawing on many contemporary sources.

Fear God & Dread Nought extends the game system back to World War I, allowing players familiar with the system model any naval battle of the Twentieth Century. Emphasizing playability as well as scrupulous historical accuracy, research for the game has involved many of the best naval historians in the world.

Graduating from St. Thomas College, St. Paul, Minnesota in 1973 with a degree in Quantitative Methods, Larry worked first as a computer programmer for two years before being selected for Officer Candidate School in Newport, Rhode Island. He was sworn into the Navy in 1975 and graduated from OCS the following year.

Larry was in the Navy for six years, serving four on a destroyer and two on shore duty in the Washington DC area. He served in the reserves for two years with the Naval Reserve Intelligence Program. After leaving the Navy he worked as a naval analyst for defense consulting firms in the Washington, DC area. He now writes and designs games full-time.

Larry is an avid wargamer and modeler.

Published Works

1. Harpoon First Edition, 1981, Adventure Games Incorporated.
2. Resolution 502, 1982, Adventure Games Incorporated.
3. Harpoon Second Edition, 1983, Adventure Games Incorporated.
4. Red Storm Rising, with Tom Clancy, 1985, Putnam
5. Harpoon Third Edition, 1987, Game Designer's Workshop
6. Battles From the Third World War, 1987, Game Designer's Workshop
7. Red Phoenix, with Pat Larkin, 1989, Warner Books
8. Computer Harpoon, 1990, Three-Sixty Pacific, Inc.
9. The Harpoon SITREP (20 issues - 1989 to 1994)
10. Harpoon Data Annex 3.2, 1990, Game Designer's Workshop
11. Harpoon Captain's Edition, 1990, Game Designer's Workshop
12. Vortex, with Pat Larkin, 1991, Warner Books
13. Cauldron, with Pat Larkin, 1993, Warner Books
14. Command at Sea, with Chris Carlson and Ed Kettler, 1994, Clash of Arms
15. The Naval SITREP (14 issues - 1995 and continuing)
16. Command at Sea Player's Handbook, with Chris Carlson and Ed Kettler, 1995, Clash of Arms
17. Command at Sea Second Edition, with Chris Carlson and Ed Kettler, 1995, Clash of Arms
18. Harpoon4, with Chris Carlson, 1996, Clash of Arms
19. Day of Wrath, with Pat Larkin, 1998, Warner Books
20. Command at Sea Third Edition, with Chris Carlson and Ed Kettler, 1998, Clash of Arms
21. Lash-Up, in Steve Coonts' anthology Combat, Putnam, 2000
22. Fear God and Dread Nought, with Chris Carlson, Ed Kettler, and Michael W. harris, 2001, Clash of Arms

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