Lucy A. Snyder is an American science fiction, fantasy, horror, and nonfiction author of 15 books and over 100 published short stories. She is the Shirley Jackson Award-nominated and five-time Bram Stoker Award winner.
Lucy Snyder was born in South Carolina and raised in San Angelo, Texas. A significant influence on her passion for science fiction and fantasy was the United States Space & Rocket Center at the Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville, Alabama, where her father's aunt and mother lived.
"I grew up in a house full of books. My parents read to me every night when I was little — mostly fairy tales and children’s fantasy like the Oz books and Alice in Wonderland — and taught me to treat books as something special. This more than anything inspired me to become a writer," Snyder says.
She received her BS in biology from Angelo State University before pursuing graduate studies in environmental science and journalism at Indiana University in Bloomington. Lucy Snyder also has an MFA in creative writing from Goddard College.
In 1995, she attended the Clarion Workshop, where her classmates were among the authors Nalo Hopkinson and Kelly Link.
Before becoming a full-time writer, Lucy Snyder worked as a mainframe operator, science writer, biology tutor, researcher, software reviewer, radio news editor, nature center attendant, and bassoon instructor.
It was Madeline L'Engle's A Wrinkle In Time that captured Snyder's attention, hooked her as a lifelong science fiction/fantasy reader, and fixed her on the idea of writing fantasy and science fiction instead of mainstream work.
Over 100 of her short stories have appeared in various magazines, anthologies, and collections, including Asimov’s Science Fiction, Apex Magazine, Nightmare Magazine, Pseudopod, Strange Horizons, and Best Horror of the Year.
Lucy Snyder received her first Bram Stoker Award in 2010 for her poetry collection Chimeric Machines! She later won four more Bram Stoker Awards for fiction and nonfiction works.
Her writing has been translated into French, Russian, Italian, Spanish, Czech, and Japanese editions.
Lucy A. Snyder currently lives near Columbus, Ohio, with her husband and coauthor Gary A. Braunbeck.
Photo credit: Amelia Moss (www.lucysnyder.com).
