Smith, Stephanie A
Entry updated 12 September 2022. Tagged: Author.
(1959- ) US academic and author who began to publish work of genre interest with "Blue Heart" in Asimov's for November 1982, and whose first novels – the Snow-Eyes sequence comprising Snow-Eyes (1985) and The Boy Who Was Thrown Away (1987) – were Planetary Romances for the Young Adult market. The protagonist of the first undergoes a rite de passage into adulthood that involves the local Goddess; the protagonist of the second gains adulthood in a Space Opera universe, transforming his experiences into bardic music (see Arts).
Smith is also of sf interest for Other Nature (1995), a Ruined Earth tale set in a moderately distant, Ecologically-devastated Near Future along the Pacific Rim, where wise female elders (see Feminism; Women in SF) must attempt to re-create/create an organic community out of the disease-ridden Dystopian past, making some use of Genetic Engineering to preserve and heal their people, though the nature of their access to that science is cloaked in mystery that never lifts. After published other novels outside the genre, the author returned to sf with Asteroidea (2020), which centres on and builds its metaphors from the Regenerative ability of the titular starfish. [JC]
Stephanie Ann Smith
born Oceanside, New York: 30 April 1959
works (selected)
series
Snow-Eyes
- Snow-Eyes (New York: Atheneum/Argo Books, 1985) [Snow-Eyes: hb/]
- The Boy Who Was Thrown Away (New York: Macmillan/Atheneum, 1987) [Snow-Eyes: hb/Michael Mariano]
individual titles
- Other Nature (New York: Tor, 1995) [hb/Shelley Eshkar]
- Asteroidea (New York: Adelaide Books, 2020) [pb/photographic]
works as editor
- Mystery, Magic, Voodoo and the Holy Grail (Sydney, New South Wales: HarperCollins/Voyage, 2000) with Julia Stiles [anth: pb/Vivien Kubbos]
links
previous versions of this entry