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Caitlín R. Kiernan

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Caitlín R. Kiernan
Kiernan in 2001
Kiernan in 2001
Occupationauthor, paleontologist
NationalityU.S.
Periodpresent
GenreScience fiction, dark fantasy
Notable worksSilk; To Charles Fort, With Love
Website
http://www.caitlinrkiernan.com/

Caitlín Rebekah Kiernan (born May 26, 1964 in Skerries, Dublin, Ireland) is the author of many science fiction and dark fantasy works, including six novels, many comic books, more than one hundred published short stories, novellas, and vignettes, and numerous scientific papers.

Overview

As a small child, she moved to the United States with her mother. Much of her childhood was spent in the small town of Leeds, Alabama, and her early interests included herpetology, paleontology, and fiction writing. As a teenager, she lived in Trussville, Alabama, and, in high school, began doing volunteer work at the Red Mountain Museum in Birmingham, Alabama and spending summers on her first archaeological and paleontological digs. Kiernan attended college at the University of Alabama at Birmingham and the University of Colorado at Boulder, studying geology and vertebrate paleontology, and she held both museum and teaching positions before finally turning to fiction writing in 1992. In 1988, she co-authored a paper describing the new genus and species of mosasaur, Selmasaurus russelli.[1] Her first novel, The Five of Cups, was written between June '92 and early '93, though it wasn't published until 2003. Her first published short story was "Persephone," a dark science-fiction tale, released in 1995. Her most recent scientific publication is a paper on the biostratigraphy of Alabama mosasaurs, published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology (2002).

Kiernan has had short fiction selected for Year's Best Fantasy and Horror series, The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror, and The Year's Best Science Fiction, and her short stories have been collected in several volumes (see Bibliography). To date, her work has been translated into German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Finnish, Czech, Polish, Russian, Korean, and Japanese. In May 1996, Kiernan was approached by Neil Gaiman and editors at DC/Vertigo Comics to begin writing for The Dreaming, a spin-off from Gaiman's very successful title, The Sandman. Kiernan wrote for the title from 1996 until its conclusion in 2001, working closely with Gaiman and focusing not only on preexisting characters (The Corinthian, Cain and Abel, Lucien, Nuala, Morpheus, Thessaly, etc.), but also on new characters (Echo, Maddy, the white dream raven Tethys, etc.).[1] According to an entry in Neil Gaiman's blog[2], Kiernan was hired to write the novelization for the Beowulf film (scripted by Gaiman and Roger Avary).

Kiernan has often been categorized as a "horror writer," though she has repeatedly and adamantly rejected that categorization. For example, in her blog (2/3/02) she writes: "I'm getting tired of telling people that I'm not a 'horror' writer. I'm getting tired of them not listening, or not believing. Most of them seem suspicious of my motives."[3]

In 2005, she began publishing the monthly Sirenia Digest[4] (otherwise known as MerViSS) consisting of vignettes and short stories : "The MerViSS Project is a continuation of Caitlín’s exploration of the fusion of erotic literature with elements of dark fantasy and science fiction, creating brief, dreamlike fictions." It is currently illustrated by Vince Locke. The digest includes the occasional collaboration with Sonya Taaffe.

Kiernan identifies as lesbian and Wiccan and lives in Providence, Rhode Island, U.S. with her partner, photographer Kathryn A. Pollnac.[5]

Music

Between 1996 and 1997, Kiernan also fronted an Athens, Georgia-based "goth-folk-blues" band," Death's Little Sister,[6] named for Neil Gaiman's character, Delirium. She was the band's vocalist and lyricist, and the group enjoyed some success on local college radio and played shows in Athens and Atlanta. Kiernan has said in interviews that she left the band in February 1997 because of her increased responsibilities writing for DC Comics and because her novel Silk had recently sold. She was briefly involved in Crimson Stain Mystery, a studio project, two years later. CSM produced one EP to accompany a special limited edition of Silk, illustrated by Clive Barker (Gauntlet Press, 2000).

Awards

Cover art by Ryan Obermeyer

Won

  • International Horror Guild Award, Best First Novel 1998 (Silk)
  • Barnes and Noble Maiden Voyage Award, Best First Novel 1998 (Silk)
  • International Horror Guild Award, Best Novel 2001 (Threshold)
  • International Horror Guild Award, Best Short Story 2001 ("Onion")
  • International Horror Guild Award, Best Mid-Length Fiction 2005 ("La Peau Verte")

Nominated (partial list)

  • Bram Stoker Award 1995, Best Short Story ("Persephone")
  • Bram Stoker Award, Best First Novel 1998 (Silk)
  • British Fantasy Award, Best First Novel 1998 (Silk)
  • Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation Award, Best Graphic Novel 1998 (The Girl Who Would Be Death)
  • International Horror Guild Award, Best Collection (Tales of Pain and Wonder)
  • Bram Stoker Award, Best Graphic Novel 2001 (The Dreaming #56, "The First Adventure of Miss Caterina Poe")
  • International Horror Guild Award, Best Graphic Novel 2001 (The Dreaming #56, "The First Adventure of Miss Caterina Poe")
  • International Horror Guild Award, Best Short Form 2002 ("The Road of Pins")
  • International Horror Guild Award, Best Collection 2005 (To Charles Fort, With Love)
  • World Fantasy Award 2006, Best Collection 2005 (To Charles Fort, With Love)
  • World Fantasy Award 2006, Best Short Fiction 2005 ("La Peau Verte")
  • International Horror Guild Award, Best Mid-Length Fiction 2006 ("Bainbridge")

Bibliography

Novels

File:Silk cover Kiernan.jpg
Cover of Silk
  • Silk (1998; Penguin-Putnam)
  • Threshold (2001; Penguin-Putnam)
  • The Five of Cups (2003; Subterranean Press)
  • Low Red Moon (2003; Penguin-Putnam)
  • Murder of Angels (2004; Penguin-Putnam)
  • Daughter of Hounds (2007; Penguin-Putnam)
  • Beowulf (2007; HarperCollins; film novelization)
  • The Red Tree (forthcoming; Penguin-Putnam)

Short fiction collections

Chapbooks

  • Candles for Elizabeth (1998; Meisha Merlin Publishing)
  • A Study for "Estate" (2000; Gauntlet Press)
  • On the Road to Jefferson (2002; Subterranean Press)
  • Waycross (2002; Subterranean Press)
  • Trilobite: The Writing of Threshold (2003; Subterranean Press)
  • Embrace the Mutation (with J. K. Potter; 2003; Subterranean Press)
  • Alabaster (2003; Camelot Books)
  • Mercury (2004; Subterranean Press)
  • The Worm in My Mind's Eye (2004; Subterranean Press)
  • False Starts (2005; Subterranean Press)
  • A Little Damned Book of Days (2005; Subterranean Press)
  • The Merewife: A Prologue (2005; Subterranean Press)
  • Highway 97 (2006; Subterranean Press)
  • The Black Alphabet: A Primer (2007; Subterranean Press)
  • Tails of Tales of Pain and Wonder (2008; Subterranean Press)
  • B is for Beginnings (2009; Subterranean Press)

Short hardbacks

  • In the Garden of Poisonous Flowers (2002; Subterranean Press)
  • The Dry Salvages (2004; Subterranean Press)
  • Frog Toes and Tentacles (2005; Subterranean Press; illustrations by Vince Locke)
    • "Pages Found Among the Effects of Miss Edith Teller"
    • "Untitled 4"
    • "Untitled 7"
    • "Flicker"
    • "Pump Excursion"
    • "Untitled 11"
    • "Untitled 12" (reprinted in The Mammoth Book of Vampire Romance, Running Press, 2008)
    • "'Ode' to Katan Amano"
    • Afterword
    • "Los Angeles, 2162 (December)"
  • Tales from the Woeful Platypus (2007; Subterranean Press; illustrations by Vince Locke)
    • "Untitled 17"
    • "Pony"
    • "Forests of the Night"
    • "Daughter of Man, Mother of Wyrm"
    • "Untitled 20"
    • "Still Life"
    • "pas-en-arríere"
    • "The Garden of Living Flowers"
    • "Excerpt from Memoirs of a Martian Demirep"

Uncollected short fiction (excluding chapbooks)

  • "The Drowned Geologist" (Shadows Over Baker Street, 2003; Del Rey)
  • "Riding the White Bull" (Argosy #1, 2004; Coppervale International. Also: The Year's Best Science Fiction: Twenty-Second Annual Collection, 2005; St. Martin's Griffin)
  • "From Cabinet 34, Drawer 6" (Weird Shadows Over Innsmouth, 2005; Fedogan and Bremer)
  • "Faces in Revolving Souls" (Outsiders, 2005; Roc)
  • "The Pearl Diver" (Futureshocks, 2005; Roc)
  • "Bradbury Weather" (Subterranean Magazine #2, 2005; Subterranean Press)
  • "Houses Under the Sea" (Thrillers 2, 2007; Cemetery Dance Publications. Also: The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror, Volume Eighteen, 2007; Carroll & Graf))
  • "The Daughter of the Four of Pentacles" (Thrillers 2, 2007; Cemetery Dance Publications)
  • "Zero Summer" (Subterranean Magazine #6, 2007; Subterranean Press)
  • "The Ape's Wife" [1] (Clarkesworld Magazine #12, September 2007; Wyrm Publishing; reprinted in Realms 2008; Wyrm Publishing; reprinted in The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror 19, Robinson, 2008 )
  • "Little Conversations" (Clarkesworld Magazine #12, September 2007; Wyrm Publishing)

Sirenia Digest

  • "Madonna Littoralis" (Sirenia Digest #1, Dec. 2005; reprinted in Fantasy Magazine #2, 2006; Wildside Press)
  • "Untitled 13" (Sirenia Digest #1, Dec. 2005)
  • "Orpheus at Mount Pangeum" (Sirenia Digest #2, Jan. 2006)
  • "Pony" (Sirenia Digest #2, Jan. 2006)
  • "Bridle" (Sirenia Digest #3, Feb. 2006)
  • "Eisoptrophobia - A Sketch" (Sirenia Digest #3, Feb. 2006)
  • "Untitled 17" (Sirenia Digest #3, Feb. 2006)
  • "Untitled 20" (Sirenia Digest #4, March 2006)
  • "pas-en-arriere" (Sirenia Digest #5, April 2006)
  • "For One Who Has Lost Herself" (Sirenia Digest #5, April 2006)
  • "Ode to Edvard Munch" (Sirenia Digest #6, May 2006; reprinted in The Mammoth Book of Vampire Romance, Running Press, 2008)
  • "The Black Alphabet (Part One)" (Sirenia Digest #6, May 2006)
  • "The Black Alphabet (Part Two)" (Sirenia Digest #7, June 2006)
  • "The Cryomancer's Daughter (Murder Ballad No. 3)"[2] (Sirenia Digest #8, July 2006)
  • "Portrait of the Artist as a Young Ghoul" (Sirenia Digest #9, August 2006)
  • "Untitled 23" (Sirenia Digest #10, September 2006)
  • "In the Praying Windows" (with Sonya Taaffe, Sirenia Digest #10, September 2006)
  • "The Ammonite Violin (Murder Ballad No. 4)" (Sirenia Digest #11, October 2006; reprinted in Dark Delicacies II ; Carroll & Graf, 2007)
  • "The Lovesong of Lady Ratteanrufer" (Sirenia Digest #12, November 2006)
  • "Metamorphosis A" (Sirenia Digest #12, November 2006)
  • "The Voyeur in the House of Glass" (Sirenia Digest #13, December 2006)
  • "Metamorphosis B" (Sirenia Digest #13, December 2006)
  • "The Sphinx's Kiss" (Sirenia Digest #14, January 2007)
  • "A Season of Broken Dolls"[3] (Sirenia Digest #15, February 2007)
  • "Skin Game" (Sirenia Digest #15, February 2007)
  • "In View of Nothing" (Sirenia Digest #16, March 2007)
  • "Untitled 26" (Sirenia Digest #16, March 2007)
  • "Night Games in the Crimson Court" (Sirenia Digest #17, April 2007)
  • "Outside the Gates of Eden" (Sirenia Digest #18, May 2007)
  • "The Steam Dancer (1896)" (Sirenia Digest #19, June 2007; reprinted in Subterranean: Tales of Dark Fantasy; Subterranean Press, 2008)
  • "In the Dreamtime of Lady Resurrection" [4] (Sirenia Digest #20, July 2007)
  • "Anamnesis, or the Sleepless Nights of Léon Spilliaert" (Sirenia Digest #20, July 2007)
  • "Scene in the Museum (1896)" (Sirenia Digest #21, August 2007)
  • "Untitled Grotesque" (Sirenia Digest #22, September 2007)
  • "The Madam of the Narrow Houses" (Sirenia Digest #23, October 2007)
  • "The Bed of Appetite" (Sirenia Digest #23, October 2007)
  • "The Wolf Who Cried Girl" (Sirenia Digest #24, November 2007)
  • "Untitled 31" (Sirenia Digest #25, December 2007)
  • "The Crimson Alphabet (Part One)" (Sirenia Digest #25, December 2007)
  • "The Crimson Alphabet (Part Two)" (Sirenia Digest #26, January 2008)
  • "The Collector of Bones" (Sirenia Digest #26, January 2008)
  • "Beatification" (Sirenia Digest #27, February 2008)
  • "Pickman's Other Model" (Sirenia Digest #28, March 2008)
  • "Flotsam" (Sirenia Digest #29, April 2008; reprinted in Not One of Us #40)
  • "Regarding Attrition and Severance" (Sirenia Digest #29, April 2008)
  • "Rappaccini's Dragon" (Sirenia Digest #30, May 2008)
  • "Unter den Augen des Mondes" (Sirenia Digest #31, June 2008)
  • "The Melusine (1898)" (Sirenia Digest #31, June 2008)
  • "Derma Sutra (1891)" (Sirenia Digest #32, July 2008)
  • "The Z Word" (Sirenia Digest #33, August 2008)
  • "Untitled 33" (Sirenia Digest #34, September 2008)
  • "I Am the Abyss and I Am the Light" (Sirenia Digest #35, October 2008)
  • "Dancing With the Eight of Swords" (Sirenia Digest #36, November 2008)
  • "Murder Ballad No. 6" (Sirenia Digest #37, December 2008)
  • "Lullaby of Partition and Reunion" (Sirenia Digest #37, December 2008)
  • "The Thousand-and-Third Tale of Scheherazade" (Sirenia Digest #38, January 2009)
  • "The Belated Burial" (Sirenia Digest #38, January 2009)

Comics/graphic novels

  • The Dreaming (August 1997- May 2001)
    • The Dreaming #17—19, "Souvenirs" (October '97—December '97)
    • The Dreaming #22—24, "An Unkindness of One" (March '98-May '98)
    • The Dreaming #26, "Restitution" (July '98)
    • The Dreaming #27, "Stormy Weather" (July '98)
    • The Dreaming #28, "Dreams the Burning Dream" (August '98)
    • The Dreaming #30, "Temporary Overflow" (September '98)
    • The Dreaming #31, "November Eve" (coauthored with Peter Hogan; December '98)
    • The Dreaming #33, "Dream Below" (February '99)
    • The Dreaming #34, "Ruin" (March '99)
    • The Dreaming #35, "Kaleidoscope" (April '99)
    • The Dreaming #36, "Slow Dying" (May '99)
    • The Dreaming #37, "Pariah" (June '99)
    • The Dreaming #38, "Apostate" (July '99)
    • The Dreaming #39, "The Lost Language of Flowers (August '99)
    • The Dreaming #40, "New Orleans for Free" (September '99)
    • The Dreaming #41, "The Bittersweet Scent of Opium" (October '99)
    • The Dreaming #42, "Detonation Boulevard" (November '99)
    • The Dreaming #43, "The Two Trees" (December '99)
    • The Dreaming #44, "Homesick" (January '00)
    • The Dreaming #45, "Masques & Hedgehogs" (February '00)
    • The Dreaming #46, "Mirror, Mirror" (March '00)
    • The Dreaming #47, "Trinket" (April '00)
    • The Dreaming #48, "Scary Monsters" (May '00)
    • The Dreaming #49, "Shatter" (June '00)
    • The Dreaming #50, "Restoration" (July '00)
    • The Dreaming #51, "Second Sight" (August '00)
    • The Dreaming #52, "Exiles, Part 1" (September '00)
    • The Dreaming #53, "Exiles, Part 2" (October '00)
    • The Dreaming #54, "Exiles, Part 3" (November '00)
    • The Dreaming #56, "The First Adventure of Miss Catterina Poe" (January '01)
    • The Dreaming #57, "Rise, Part 1" (February '01)
    • The Dreaming #58, "Rise, Part 2" (March '01)
    • The Dreaming #59, "Rise, Part 3" (April '01)
    • The Dreaming #60, "Rise, Part 4" (May '01; series finale)
  • Vertigo: Winter's Edge #1, "The Dreaming: Deck the Halls" ('98; coauthored with Peter Hogan)
  • Vertigo: Winter's Edge #2, "The Dreaming: Marble Halls" ('99)
  • Vertigo: Winter's Edge #3, "The Dreaming: Borealis" ('00)

Nonfiction (partial list)

  • "Approximately 2,000 Words About Poppy Z. Brite" (1997 World Horror Convention Program Book).
  • "...And in Closing (For Now)" (afterword for Are You Loathsome Tonight by Poppy Z. Brite; Gauntlet Publications, 1998).
  • "Skin by Kathe Koja" (Horror: Another 100 Best Books; Carroll & Graf, 2005)
  • "Notes on A Damned Life" (Weird Tales #444; April/May 2007)
  • "Awful Things" (Locus #556; May 2007)
  • "The Most Beautiful Music I've Ever Read" (introduction for PS Publishing reprint of Ray Bradbury's The Day It Rained Forever; September, 2008)

Scientific publications (partial list)

  • Kiernan, C. R., and Schwimmer, D. R. 2004. First record of a velociraptorine theropod (Tetanurae, Dromaeosauridae) from the Eastern Gulf Coastal United States. The Mosasaur 7:89-93.
  • Kiernan, C. R. 2002. Stratigraphic distribution and habitat segregation of mosasaurs in the Upper Cretaceous of western and central Alabama, with an historical review of Alabama mosasaur discoveries. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 22(1):91-103. abstract online
  • Schwimmer, D. R. and Kiernan, C.R. 2001. Eastern Late Cretaceous theropods in North America and the crossing of the Interior Seaway. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 21(3):99A.
  • Kiernan, C. R. 1992. Clidastes Cope, 1868 (Reptilia, Sauria): proposed designation of Clidastes propython Cope, 1869 as the type species. Bulletin of Zoological Nomenclature 49:137–139.

Notes

  1. ^ a b Irvine, Alex (2008), "The Dreaming", in Dougall, Alastair (ed.), The Vertigo Encyclopedia, New York: Dorling Kindersley, pp. 64–65, ISBN 0-7566-4122-5, OCLC 213309015
  2. ^ Gaiman, Neil (2006-12-10). "the lure of cheap fiction". Neil Gaiman's blog. Retrieved 2007-05-18.
  3. ^ Kiernan, Caitlín R. (2002-02-03). "Chapter Two proceeds apace". Low Red Moon journal. Retrieved 2007-05-18.
  4. ^ Kiernan, Caitlín R. "sirenia". Retrieved 2007-05-18.
  5. ^ Caitlín R. Kiernan's MySpace page accessed 29 March 2007.
  6. ^ Musical projects

Further reading

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Interviews

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