Rachel Swirsky is a short story writer living in Portland, Oregon.

Her short fiction has been nominated for the Hugo Award, the Locus Award, the World Fantasy Award, and the Sturgeon Award. She’s twice won the Nebula Award, in 2010 for her novella, “The Lady Who Plucked Red Flowers Beneath the Queen’s Window” and in 2014 for her short story, “If You Were a Dinosaur, My Love.” She graduated from the Iowa Writers Workshop in 2008 and Clarion West in 2005.

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Why short stories?

Short stories can strike with rapid, brutal imagery and emotion. A short story can cut into the skin, and into the bone; it can be a visceral knife.

Why science fiction and fantasy?

Speculative fiction delves into the human psyche: our dreams of the future, the not-now, the not-real. In such imaginings, we reveal our desires, our preoccupations, and the filters through which we see the world.