My name is Sharon Joss and I write fiction. I am the author of eight novels and dozens of short stories.
I was born in Oregon and raised in central California. At an early age, the novels of Rudyard Kipling, Andre Norton, and Ray Bradbury inspired my life-long love of speculative fiction.
My earliest aspirations were to be either an illustrator or a veterinarian, but I ended up in high-tech, writing operating systems software for aerospace. Eventually, I became a technical program manager for Xerox and Hewlett-Packard. In my job, I travelled across much of Europe, to South America, Mexico, China, and Japan. I’ve also worked as a waitress, a bartender, and been a nationally ranked competitor in obedience and agility with my dogs. I’ve learned the art of falconry, ceramics, and taxidermy; and on more than one occasion, assisted in dead whale autopsies. I can ride a horse, navigate a sailboat, and clean my own fish. I like maps and puns. Next to dogs, I love pangolins best. My superpower is that I am a feather-finder.
I’m a big music fan, and eclectic in my tastes. I listen to jazz mostly, especially when I write. I like also like blues, rock and world music. Bob Seger, Joe Bonamassa, Loreena McKennit, and Pink Martini are always playing somewhere in my house. Favorite films and directors are Time Bandits, anything directed by Ridley Scott (Blade Runner, Gladiator, The Martian) or Guillermo del Toro (Pan’s Labyrinth, Shape of Water), and Peter Jackson’s Tolkien films.
After a layoff in 2009, I decided to write full-time. Rather than go back to school for an academic degree, I took classes and workshops offered by bestselling authors. I read a lot. Wrote a lot. Submitted a lot. And heard ‘no’ every time.
Four years later, I sold my first story, Love in the Time of Dust and Venom. Two years after that, I won the 2015 Writers of the Future Golden Pen Award, was a two-time Campbell Award nominee and finalist for the Canopus Award for Science Fiction. I’m not a New York Times bestseller yet, but just watch me.
I returned to Oregon in 2012, where I now live and write amid a thicket of blackberry vines.
Here are some ways you can talk to me:
TWITTER: www.twitter.com/@josswrites
WEBSITE: www.sharonjoss.com
EMAIL: sharonjoss DOT author @ gmail DOT com (no spam, please)
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