Kelly Link (original) (raw)

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American editor and author

Kelly Link
Kelly Link and Gavin Grant
Born	(1969-07-19) July 19, 1969 (age 55)Miami, Florida, U.S.[1]
Occupation	Writer
Education	Columbia University (BA)University of North Carolina, Greensboro (MFA)
Genre	Fantasy, horror, magical realism
Spouse	Gavin Grant
Children	1[2]

Kelly Link (born July 19, 1969) is an American editor and writer. Mainly known as an author of short stories, she published her first novel, The Book of Love in 2024.[3][4] While some of her fiction falls more clearly within genre categories, many of her stories might be described as slipstream or magic realism: a combination of science fiction, fantasy, horror, mystery, and literary fiction. Among other honors, she has won a Hugo Award, three Nebula Awards, and a World Fantasy Award for her fiction, and she was one of the recipients of the 2018 MacArthur "Genius" Grant.[5]

Link is a graduate of Columbia University in New York and the MFA program of UNC Greensboro. In 1995, she attended the Clarion East Writing Workshop.

Link and husband Gavin Grant manage Small Beer Press, based in Northampton, Massachusetts. The couple's imprint of Small Beer Press for intermediate readers is called Big Mouth House. They also co-edited St. Martin's Press's The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror anthology series with Ellen Datlow for five years, ending in 2008. (The couple inherited the "fantasy" side from Terri Windling in 2004.) In 2019, Link and Grant opened Book Moon, a new and used bookstore in Easthampton, Massachusetts.[6] Link also co-edits the literary magazine Lady Churchill’s Rosebud Wristlet,[7] and was the slush reader for Sci Fiction, edited by Datlow.

Link taught at Lenoir–Rhyne University in Hickory, North Carolina, with the Visiting Writers Series for spring semester 2006. She has taught or visited at a number of schools and workshops including:

• Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York;
• Brookdale Community College of Lincroft, New Jersey;
• the Imagination Workshop at Cleveland State University;
• New England Institute of Art & Communications, Brookline, Massachusetts;
• Clarion East at Michigan State University, Lansing;
• Clarion West in Seattle, Washington; and
• Smith College, near her home in Northampton.

She has participated in the Juniper Summer Writing Institute at the University of Massachusetts Amherst's MFA Program for Poets & Writers.

Awards for Kelly Link

• 2018: MacArthur Fellowship[21]
• 2023: Honorary degree from Smith College.[22]
• Stranger Things Happen: 2001 Salon Book of the Year, The Village Voice favorite (available here [1] as a free download, under a Creative Commons license)
• Magic for Beginners: 2006 Locus Award for Best Short Story Collection
• Pretty Monsters: 2008 World Fantasy[23] and Locus Award finalist.
• Get in Trouble: 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction finalist.
• White Cat, Black Dog: Stories (Random House, 2023)
• The Book of Love: 2024[24][25][26][27]

Selected stories (award winners)

[edit]

• "The Game of Smash and Recovery": 2016 Theodore Sturgeon Award
• "The Summer People": 2011 Shirley Jackson Award for Best Novelette, 2013 The O. Henry Prize Stories
• "Pretty Monsters": 2009 Locus Award for Best Novella
• "Magic for Beginners": 2005 Nebula Award for Best Novella
• "The Faery Handbag": 2005 Hugo and Nebula Award for Best Novelette, Locus Award winner
• "Stone Animals": 2005 The Best American Short Stories
• "Louise's Ghost": 2001 Nebula Award for Best Novelette
• "The Specialist's Hat": 1999 World Fantasy Award
• "Travels with the Snow Queen": 1997 James Tiptree, Jr. Award
• 4 Stories (chapbook), Small Beer Press, 2000
• Stranger Things Happen, Small Beer Press, 2001
• Magic for Beginners, Small Beer Press, 2005 (reprinted by Harcourt, 2005)
• Catskin: a swaddled zine, Jelly Ink Press, date unknown
• Pretty Monsters: Stories, Viking Juvenile, 2008
• The Wrong Grave, 2009
• Get in Trouble: Stories, Random House, 2015
• White Cat, Black Dog: Stories, Random House, 2023[28]
• The Book of Love, Random House, 2024[29][30][31][32]
• Trampoline Small Beer Press, 2003
• The Year's Best Fantasy & Horror, Volumes 17 - 21 (from 2004-2008) (with Ellen Datlow and Gavin J. Grant)
• Steampunk! An Anthology of Fantastically Rich and Strange Stories (2011) (with Gavin J. Grant)
• Monstrous Affections: An Anthology of Beastly Tales (2014) (with Gavin J. Grant)

In addition, Link and Grant have edited a semiannual small press fantasy magazine: Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet (or LCRW) since 1997. An anthology, The Best of Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet, was published by Del Rey Books in 2007.

1. ^ "About Kelly". Kelly Link. Archived from the original on March 15, 2013. Retrieved May 1, 2013.
2. ^ Grant, Gavin (May 20, 2009). "Small Beer, little baby". Small Beer Press. Retrieved August 12, 2011.
3. ^ Miller, Laura (November 19, 2001). "An interview with Kelly Link". Salon. Archived from the original on March 7, 2008.
4. ^ Miller, Laura (February 4, 2015). ""Get in Trouble": Going back inside the weird and wonderful world of Kelly Link". Salon.
5. ^ Charles, Ron (October 4, 2018). "Short-story writer Kelly Link wins MacArthur 'genius' grant". The Washington Post. Retrieved October 4, 2018.
6. ^ "Book Moon". Book Moon. Retrieved February 29, 2024.
7. ^ About Kelly. (January 7, 2020). Retrieved July 31, 2020, from https://kellylink.net/about-kelly
8. ^ https://www.librarything.com/award/228/Salon-Book-Award
9. ^ https://www.sfadb.com/SF_Site_Readers_Poll_2002
10. ^ https://www.sfadb.com/Locus_Awards
11. ^ https://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ay.cgi?41+2005
12. ^ https://www.sfadb.com/SF_Site_Readers_Poll_2006
13. ^ https://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ay.cgi?41+2006
14. ^ https://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ay.cgi?25+2008
15. ^ https://horroraward.org/prevrec.html
16. ^ https://www.librarything.com/award/228/Salon-Book-Award
17. ^ https://www.sfadb.com/Shirley_Jackson_Awards_2013
18. ^ https://www.sfadb.com/Shirley_Jackson_Awards_2016
19. ^ https://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ay.cgi?28+2016
20. ^ https://www.librarything.com/award/1412.2.0.2025/Compton-Crook-Award-Nominee-2025
21. ^ "Kelly Link - MacArthur Foundation". www.macfound.org.
22. ^ "Speakers & Honorary Degrees | Smith College". www.smith.edu. Retrieved May 22, 2024.
23. ^ World Fantasy Convention (2010). "Award Winners and Nominees". Archived from the original on December 1, 2010. Retrieved February 4, 2011.
24. ^ Garrett, Yvonne C. (July 29, 2024). "Kelly Link's The Book of Love | The Brooklyn Rail". brooklynrail.org. Retrieved September 17, 2024.
25. ^ Gould, Emily (February 22, 2024). "How Kelly Link Wrote a Very Good First Novel". The Cut. Retrieved September 17, 2024.
26. ^ Iglesias, Gabino (February 15, 2024). "Kelly Link's debut novel 'The Book of Love' is magical, confusing, heartfelt, strange". NPR. Retrieved September 17, 2024.
27. ^ El-Mohtar, Amal (February 12, 2024). "Book Review: 'The Book of Love,' by Kelly Link". The New York Times. Retrieved September 17, 2024.
28. ^ "White Cat, Black Dog by Kelly Link". Penguin Random House. Retrieved February 21, 2023.
29. ^ "The Book of Love by Kelly Link". Penguin Random House. Retrieved October 11, 2023.
30. ^ El-Mohtar, Amal (February 12, 2024). "Kelly Link Returns with a Dreamlike, Profoundly Beautiful Novel". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved March 18, 2024.
31. ^ Link, Kelly (February 16, 2024). "Novelist Kelly Link: 'I was drawn to the monsters and half-naked women on fantasy covers'". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved March 18, 2024.
32. ^ Iglesias, Gabino (February 15, 2024). "Kelly Link's debut novel 'The Book of Love' is magical, confusing, heartfelt, strange". NPR.

• Official website
• Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet
• Kelly Link at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database
• Kelly Link's awards and nominations at the Science Fiction Awards Database
• Essay on Link's story "Lull" at Fantastic Metropolis
• RealAudio Interview from KCRW's Bookworm show
• An excerpt from Origin Story from the magazine A Public Space
• Reading by Kelly from the Stonecoast MFA program's Winter 2008 residency Archived September 24, 2018, at the Wayback Machine