Shortly after the publication of a handful of short stories in 1985, Karen Joy Fowler emerged as one of the most acclaimed authors of her generation. She has won numerous awards including PEN/Faulkner (We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves [2014]), World Fantasy for Best Collection (Black Glass [1999] and What I Didn’t See and Other Stories [2011]), World Fantasy for Best Short Fiction (”Pelican Bar” [2010]), Shirley Jackson for Best Short Fiction (”Pelican Bar”), Nebula for Best Short Story (“What I Didn’t See” [2004] and “Always” [2008]), and Astounding (formerly John W. Campbell) Award for Best New Writer (1987). Fowler received the World Fantasy Life Achievement Award in 2020.

She has seven novels to her credit: Sarah Canary (1991), The Sweetheart Season (1996), Sister Noon (2001), The Jane Austen Book Club (2004), Wit’s End (2008), We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves (2013), and Booth (2022). Fowler’s numerous short stories have been collected in Artificial Things (1985), Peripheral Vision (1990), Black Glass (1998), What I Didn’t See and Other Stories (2010), The Science of Herself plus … (2013), and Comme ce monde est joli [French] (2021).

In 1991, Fowler, alongside Pat Murphy, founded the James Tiptree, Jr. Award (now Otherwise Award), a science fiction/fantasy literary prize for science fiction or fantasy that “expands or explores our understanding of gender.” Fowler and Murphy joined Debbie Notkin and Jeffrey D. Smith to edit three volumes of THE JAMES TIPTREE AWARD ANTHOLOGY (2005-2007). She also edited MOTA 3: Courage (2003), 80!: Memories and Reflections on Ursula Le Guin (with Notkin, 2010), and The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2016.

All of us at Tachyon wish the amazing Karen a happy birthday. May you always see the world a bit different than the rest of us!