Ernest Cline

Ernest Cline (born March 29, 1972) is an American science fiction novelist, screenwriter, and former slam poet best known for his Ready Player series, which blends nostalgic pop culture references with dystopian themes. Born in Ashland, Ohio , Cline grew up immersed in 1980s video games, films, and music, influences that permeate his writing.

Cline first gained recognition in the late 1990s as a spoken-word artist, winning the Austin Poetry Slam championship in 1998 and 2001. He transitioned to screenwriting with the cult comedy Fanboys (2009), a film celebrating Star Wars fandom, and later co-wrote the screenplay for the 2018 adaptation of his debut novel Ready Player One , directed by Steven Spielberg . His breakthrough as a novelist came with Ready Player One (2011), a New York Times bestseller that sold in a heated auction and has been translated into more than 20 languages, spending more than 100 weeks on bestseller lists.

Subsequent works include the standalone novel Armada (2015), another pop culture-infused sci-fi tale about alien invasion video games, and the sequel Ready Player Two (2020), continuing the virtual reality adventures of protagonist Wade Watts. In 2024, Cline ventured into middle-grade fiction with Bridge to Bat City , a whimsical story inspired by Austin's bat colonies, marking his debut in children's literature. Residing in Austin, Texas, with his family and an extensive collection of vintage arcade games and a replica DeLorean, Cline embodies the geek culture he chronicles, often drawing from personal passions for retro media.

Ernest Christy Cline was born on March 29, 1972, in Ashland, Ohio, to teenage parents Ernest Cline and Faye Imogene Cline. As the older of two sons, Cline and his younger brother Eric were primarily raised and adopted by their biological grandparents in rural Ashland after their parents' early challenges. The family experienced hardship early on, including a 1973 tornado that struck when Cline was an infant, ripping him from his mother's arms and depositing him unharmed on a lumber pile; his mother suffered a ruptured disc in the incident.

Growing up in the 1970s and 1980s in this small Midwestern town, Cline described a "weird childhood" marked by social awkwardness and immersion in emerging pop culture, though not without restrictions from his religious family. At age five, he became obsessed with Star Wars upon its 1977 release, building makeshift X-wing cockpits from couch cushions to simulate space battles. His grandparents allowed access to early video games, including an Atari console acquired in 1979, where he played titles like Space Invaders and Asteroids , viewing them as extensions of his Star Wars fascination. Despite warnings from family and church materials that games would "rot" his brain, Cline sneaked Dungeons & Dragons materials home, defying prohibitions against role-playing games perceived as satanic. These experiences in rural Ohio , surrounded by trailer parks and limited outlets, fostered his lifelong geek identity and love for arcade simulations and sci-fi escapism .

During his elementary school years, Cline began experimenting with writing, creating short stories for class assignments and skits for Boy Scout troop activities that highlighted his humor. In his teenage years, his passion deepened through video games, 1980s films like The Goonies and Iron Eagle , and broader sci-fi fandom, elements that would later permeate his creative output.

Cline graduated from Ashland High School in Ashland, Ohio , in 1990.

Following high school, Cline briefly attended the University of Akron for one semester, studying toward a degree in film and screenwriting . He dropped out in 1990 to pursue work in the Alaskan fishing industry, citing a desire to gain real-world experience over formal education.