Caitlin R Kiernan Popular Books

Caitlin R Kiernan Biography & Facts

Caitlín Rebekah Kiernan (born 26 May 1964) is an Irish-born American paleontologist and writer of science fiction and dark fantasy works, including 10 novels, series of comic books, and more than 250 published short stories, novellas, and vignettes. Kiernan is a two-time recipient of both the World Fantasy and Bram Stoker awards. Early life Kiernan was born in 1964 in Skerries, County Dublin, Ireland. After the death of their father, Kiernan moved to the United States as a young child with their mother Susan Ramey Cleveland and younger sister Mary Angela (Máire Aingeal). Much of their childhood was spent in the small town of Leeds, Alabama, and early interests included herpetology, paleontology, and fiction writing. As a teenager, Kiernan lived in Trussville, Alabama, and, in high school, began doing volunteer work at the Red Mountain Museum in Birmingham, Alabama and spending summers on their first archaeological and paleontological digs. Kiernan attended college at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham–Southern College, and the University of Colorado at Boulder, studying geology and vertebrate paleontology, and held both museum and teaching positions before finally turning to fiction writing in 1992. Career Paleontology In 1984, Kiernan co-founded the Birmingham Paleontological Society. In 1988, they co-authored a paper describing the new genus and species of mosasaur, Selmasaurus russelli. More recent papers include one on the biostratigraphy of Alabama mosasaurs, published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology (2002) and "First record of a velociraptorine theropod (Tetanurae, Dromaeosauridae) from the Eastern Gulf Coastal United States" (2004). As of 2019, Kiernan is a research associate and fossil preparator at McWane Science Center in Birmingham, Alabama, again studying mosasaurs, as well as Cretaceous turtles. In 2020, they coauthored on a paper describing a new large fossil sea turtle, Asmodochelys parhami, from the Demopolis Chalk of Alabama. In 2021, Kiernan also joined the staff of the University of Alabama Museum, Department of Research and Collections, as a Research Associate in Vertebrate Paleontology. In 2022, they coauthored the description of a new giant freshwater turtle from the Late Cretaceous Mooreville Chalk of Alabama, Appalachemys ebersolei, a previously unknown macrobaenid with a shell more than 80 cm.in length. In 2023, they were the senior author on a paper describing two new species of the rare mosasaur Ectenosaurus, E. tlemonectes and E. shannoni, from the Niobrara and Mooreville formations of Kansas and Alabama, respectively. Kiernan has been a member of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology since 1984 and is a member of the Paleontological Society and the American Society of Ichthyologists and Herpetologists. At various times, they have been a member of the Alabama Academy of Science, Sigma Xi, the Society of Sedimentary Geology, and the Paleontological Research Institution. Novels, short fiction, and comics Kiernan's first novel, The Five of Cups, was written between June 1992 and early 1993, though it was not published until 2003. Their first published short story was "Persephone", a dark science fiction tale released in 1995. Their first published novel, Silk, was released in 1998. Kiernan's short fiction was selected for Year's Best Fantasy and Horror series, The Mammoth Book of Best New Horror, and The Year's Best Science Fiction, and their short stories have been collected in several volumes (see Bibliography). To date, Kiernan's work has been translated into German, Italian, Chinese, French, Turkish, Spanish, Portuguese, Finnish, Czech, Polish, Russian, Korean, and Japanese. Kiernan was approached by writer Neil Gaiman and editors at Vertigo Comics to write for The Dreaming, a spin-off from Gaiman's The Sandman, and did so from 1996 until its conclusion in 2001, focusing on both pre-existing characters (the Corinthian, Cain and Abel, Lucien, Nuala, Morpheus, Thessaly, etc.) and creating new characters (Echo, Maddy, the white dream raven Tethys, etc.). They wrote the novelization for the 2007 Beowulf film (scripted by Gaiman and Roger Avary). Kiernan later scripted Alabaster: Wolves (2012) for Dark Horse Comics, continuing with Alabaster: Grimmer Tales (2013) and Alabaster: The Good, the Bad, and the Bird (2014). Film and screenwriting Josh Boone's Mid-World Productions has optioned both The Red Tree and The Drowning Girl to develop into feature films. Kiernan is writing the screenplay for The Red Tree, and Boone will be writing The Drowning Girl. Kiernan stated, "A few people have asked questions about the films and preserving the queerness of the novels. This is something you do not have to worry about. Also, though no details can be released yet and nothing is certain, the hope is that we can cast a transgender actress as Abalyn Armitage." Style and genre Kiernan's blog states: 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. I've never tried to fool anyone. I've said I don't write genre 'horror.' A million, billion times have I said that. It's not that there are not strong elements of horror present in a lot of my writing. It's that horror never predominates those works. You may as well call it psychological fiction or awe fiction. I don't think of horror as a genre. I think of it – to paraphrase Doug Winter – as an emotion, and no one emotion will ever characterize my fiction. Much of Kiernan's earlier work, such as Silk, is set among or alludes to the aesthetics of the goth and punk rock subcultures, elements which are generally absent in their later novels. Kiernan has also stated, regarding the role of plot in creative writing: "anyone can come up with the artifice/conceit of a 'good story.' Story bores me. Which is why critics complain it's the weakest aspect of my work. Because that's essentially purposeful. I have no real interest in plot. Atmosphere, mood, language, character, theme, etc., that's the stuff that fascinates me. Ulysses should have freed writers from plot." In his review of The Red Tree, H. P. Lovecraft scholar S. T. Joshi writes: "Kiernan already ranks with the most distinctive stylists in our field – Edgar Allan Poe, Lord Dunsany, Thomas Ligotti. With Ligotti's regrettable retreat into fictional silence, hers is now the voice of weird fiction." In their introduction to The Weird, Ann and Jeff VanderMeer write that Kiernan has "become perhaps the best weird writer of her generation." Music In 1996 and 1997, Kiernan fronted an Athens, Georgia-based "goth-folk-blues band", Death's Little Sister, named for Neil Gaiman's character Delirium. They were the band's vocalist and lyricist, and the group enjoyed some success on local college radio and played shows in Athens and Atlanta. Other members included Barry Dillard (guitars), Michael Graves (bass), and S.... Discover the Caitlin R Kiernan popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Caitlin R Kiernan books.