Michael Z. Williamson is many things. He's a multiple Locus Bestseller in science fiction, with Freehold and The Hero (co-written with John Ringo).  Freehold was also a finalist for both the Prometheus and Compton Crook awards. He is the author of fourteen books in SF and contemporary fiction, hundreds of short pieces and articles, which appear in over 60 editions in three languages. His articles have been printed in magazines on three continents.

As Editor-at-Large for Survivalblog, Mike has 300,000 weekly readers following his advice and evaluation reviews on firearms, food sources, outdoor and emergency supplies. Over a dozen manufacturers send products in to be reviewed, tested, and sometimes destroyed.

As a consultant on disaster preparedness and military matters, Mike has advised and appeared on multiple shows on Discovery Channel, Discovery UK and the Outdoor Channel. For Curiosity: Alien Invasion, he also furnished over 100 firearms and a dozen uniforms and armor for human rebels. He has assisted with exercises on several military installations.

As a collector and gunsmith, he owns over 300 firearms from 1865 to the present, has done restorations and preservations, and has manufactured firearms from raw metal. As a bladesmith, he's forged hundreds of period pieces from the Viking Era to the Renaissance, and has a collection that dates back through the Iron Age, the Bronze Age, to Stone Age pieces over 9000 years old.

Born in the UK, raised there and in Canada, Mike moved to the US while a teenager, enlisted in the military just after his 18th birthday, and is now retired after 25 years in the USAF and US Army, with deployments to Operation Guarded Skies and Operation Iraqi Freedom. Primarily a mechanical equipment shop chief, he also served duty as an exercise aggressor, range safety NCO, marksmanship instructor, armorer and weapons courier.

Having successfully outgunned the entire nation of Barbados, he is now in an arms race with Luxembourg.