Jones, Stephen Graham
Entry updated 25 March 2024. Tagged: Author.
(1972- ) US author, a Native American, much of whose work has viewed the world experienced by Native Americans in terms of horror (see Horror in SF); the estranged possibly delusional protagonist of his first novel, The Fast Red Road: A Plainsong (2000), embarks on a Fantastic Voyage through an America that he understands as a Post-Holocaust Weird Western nightmare, but may just be the contemporary world seen unfiltered; eyes opened, he may be able to write a new world. All the Beautiful Sinners (2003) is a more mundane Western, but with edges of immersion in legend. Demon Theory (2006) is a horror story in which the innards of a haunted house and the world of Cinema are woven together. The nineteenth century Indian agent who helped destroy the Blackfeet nation in Ledfeather (2008) is condemned to inhabit the soul of a contemporary man, where he is visited by the consequences of his actions.
Several later novels follow the same pattern. The young protagonist of Mapping the Interior (2017) follows his dead father through a portal deep into the family home, which is larger inside than out [for Little, Big see The Encyclopedia of Fantasy under links below]. The Only Good Indians (2020) returns to Jones's favourite structuring device, in which events decades earlier than the main action are resumed or relived by figures shaped by them; as in most of his best work, these events, and their victims, are seen within the larger context of Native American life in the grips of an Imperialism which has come close to expunging it (see also Race in SF). My Heart Is a Chainsaw (2021), opening the Indian Lake Trilogy, won a Locus Award as best horror novel.
Jones is a prolific story teller, of his several collections, The Faster Redder Road: The Best UnAmerican Stories of Stephen Graham Jones (coll 2015) provides the most compendious view of his career to the date of its publication. [JC]
Stephen Graham Jones
born Midland, Texas: 22 January 1972
works (selected)
series
Indian Lake Trilogy
- My Heart Is a Chainsaw (New York: Saga Press, 2021) [Indian Lake Trilogy: hb/]
- Don't Fear the Reaper (New York: Saga Press, 2023) [Indian Lake Trilogy: hb/]
- The Angel of Indian Lake (New York: Saga Press, 2024) [Indian Lake Trilogy: hb/]
individual titles
- The Fast Red Road: A Plainsong (Normal, Illinois: Fiction Collective Two, 2000) [hb/]
- All the Beautiful Sinners (New York: Rugged Land, 2003) [hb/HSU + Associates, Jason Fulford]
- Demon Theory (San Francisco, California: Cage Publishing/MacAdam, 2006) [hb/Dorothy Carico Smith]
- The Long Trial of Nolan Dugatti (Portland, Oregon: Chiasmus Press, 2008) [pb/]
- Ledfeather (Normal, Illinois: Fiction Collective Two, 2008) [hb/]
- It Came from Del Rio (Lyons, Colorado: Trapdoor Books, 2010) [hb/]
- Zombie Bake-Off (Portland, Oregon: Lazy Fascist Press, 2012) [pb/]
- The Last Final Girl (Portland, Oregon: Lazy Fascist Press, 2012) [pb/Matthew Revert]
- The Least of My Scars (Norman, Oklahoma: Broken River Books, 2013) [pb/Matthew Revert]
- The Gospel of Z (Cincinnati, Ohio: Samhain Publishing, 2014) [pb/]
- Floating Boy and the Girl Who Couldn't Fly (Toronto, Ontario: ChiZine Publications, 2014) with Paul Tremblay writing together as P T Jones [pb/]
- Mapping the Interior (New York: Tor.com, 2017) [pb/Greg Ruth]
- The Only Good Indians (New York: Simon and Schuster/Saga Press/Gallery, 2020) [hb/Ella Laytham]
- Night of the Mannequins (New York: Tor.com, 2020) [pb/]
collections and stories
- The Ones Who Got Away (Rockville, Maryland: Prime Books, 2010) [coll: pb/]
- Three Miles Past (Smyrna, Pennsylvania: Nightscape Press, 2013) [coll: pb/]
- Zombie Sharks with Metal Teeth (Portland, Oregon: Lazy Fascist Press, 2013) [coll: pb/]
- After the People Lights Have Gone Off (Milwaukie, Oregon: Dark House Press, 2014) [coll: pb/George C Cotronis]
- The Elvis Room (no place given: This Is Horror, 2014) [ebook: na/]
- Sterling City (Smyrna, Pennsylvania: Nightscape Press, 2014) [novella: chap: pb/Boden Steiner]
- Chapter Six (New York: Tor.com, 2014) [story: ebook: first appeared 11 June 2014 Tor.com: na/Dave Palumbo]
- The Faster Redder Road: The Best UnAmerican Stories of Stephen Graham Jones (Albuquerque, New Mexico: University of New Mexico Press, 2015) [coll: pb/Theodore C Van Alst]
- The Night Cyclist (New York: Tor.com, 2016) [novelette: ebook: first appeared 21 September 2016 Tor.com: na/Keith Negley]
links
- Stephen Graham Jones
- Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- The Encyclopedia of Fantasy: Little, Big
- Picture Gallery
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