Vanna Bonta facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Vanna Bonta
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Bonta (left) with her husband in 2008
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| Born | 3 April 1953 Clarksville, Tennessee, United States |
| Died | 8 July 2014 (aged 61) |
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| Language | English, Italian |
| Genre | Fiction, poetry, essay, philosophical literature, social commentary, teleplay |
| Literary movement | Quantum fiction |
| Notable works | Flight: a quantum fiction novel |
| Relatives | James Cecil bonta (father), Maria Luisa Ugolini Bonta (mother), Peter Bonta (brother), Luigi Ugolini (grandfather), Lydia Ugolini (aunt) |
Vanna Bonta (April 3, 1953 – July 8, 2014) was an Italian-American writer, actress, and inventor. She wrote Flight: A Quantum Fiction Novel. As an actress, Bonta played "Zed's Queen" in The Beastmaster. She performed primarily as a voice talent on a roster of feature films, such as Disney's Beauty and the Beast, as well as on television.
On 13 November 2013, a haiku by Bonta was one of 1,100 haiku launched from Cape Canaveral on the NASA spacecraft MAVEN to Mars.
Early life and family
Bonta was born in the United States to Maria Luisa Bonta (née Ugolini), an artist from Florence, Italy, and James Cecil Bonta, a military officer from Kentucky. Her mother's elder sister was Italian children's author Lidia Ugolini.
Literary career
In 1995, Bonta's first novel, Flight: A Quantum Fiction Novel was published. Flight has been characterized as "inter-genre" (belonging to more than one genre simultaneously) by the American Library Association, which reviewed it an "auspicious, genre-bending parable". Publishers Weekly described the debut work as running the gamut of particularly moving to quirky and hilarious satire, with "asides about bathtub books, self-doubt tapes and other foibles."
In 2013, a haiku Bonta wrote was one of over 1100 that was launched to Mars on the NASA spacecraft MAVEN. The haiku for the Mars trip were chosen by popular vote from a total 12,530 submissions. Bonta's submission was ranked in the top five.
Inventions
The 2suit
In 2006, Bonta gave talks about an invention she called the 2suit, a flight garment that can be attached to another 2suit to allow two or more people to stay in proximity to one another in low-gravity environments. Producers of the History Channel television series The Universe approached Bonta in 2008, offering to manufacture a prototype of the 2suit and send Bonta into zero gravity to test it. She accepted. The documentary concluded that the "2Suit is one small step for humankind colonizing the universe."
Lunar Lander Challenge
From 2007-09, she participated in the annual Lunar Lander Challenge, a competition sponsored by NASA and Northrop Grumman to commercially build a lightweight spacecraft for landing on the moon. Bonta was a team member of BonNovA. As creative director, Bonta designed a pressure-release device for high-combustion engines.
See also
In Spanish: Vanna Bonta para niños
