Kit Reed

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Kit Reed (born Lillian Craig on June 7, 1932 in San Diego , California ; died on September 24, 2017 ) was an American writer best known for her fantastic and speculative stories. She wrote a horror novel under the pseudonym Shelley Hyde and three detective novels as Kit Craig .

Life

Reed was the daughter of John Rich Craig, a US Navy officer , and Lillian Craig, née Hyde. She studied at the College of Notre Dame of Maryland , where she graduated with a bachelor's degree in 1954 . After graduating, she worked as a reporter for the St. Petersburg Times in Florida until 1955 and for the New Haven Register in New Haven , Connecticut from 1956 to 1959 . In 1958 and 1959 she was named New England Newspaperwoman of the Year . In 1955 she married Joseph Wayne Reed, Jr. and had three children with him (born in 1959, 1961 and 1967). Her husband was a professor of English at Wesleyan University in Middletown , Connecticut, where Reed was also a visiting professor of English at times. She changed her married name Lillian Reed to Kit Reed. From 1959 she was a freelance writer and continued to write book reviews for the New Haven Register . From 1964 to 1965 she was a Guggenheim Fellow . In 1965 she received a five-year literary scholarship from the Abraham Woursell Foundation . In 1976 she received a Rockefeller Fellowship from the Aspen Institute .

She published her first short story The Wait in 1958 and was nominated for a Hugo for best new science fiction author the following year . Although she has written a number of novels, she is mainly considered to be the author of short stories, most of which were published in the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction and, beginning with Mister Da V. and Other Stories (1967), appeared in book form. Much of her better-known short stories can be found in The Story Until Now: A Great Big Book of Stories (2013).

Although she published primarily in the science fiction field, she is not necessarily considered a science fiction writer. This is because, on the one hand, she wrote across genre boundaries, in addition to SF, horror and crime novels, she also wrote realistic and impressionistic "mainstream" stories, and on the other hand, that for her SF items such as time travel etc. are only a means to an end, the focus is on the characters. For example, the mechanical tiger in Automatic Tiger (1964) is not of interest as a technical marvel; the focus is rather on how it affects its owner Edward Benedict, how it changes him and what effect the loss of the tiger has on Benedict. Often the focus is on old people; for example in Golden Acres (1967), a futuristic old people's home, in which senior citizens can spend their last days in an inhumane world that is regulated down to the last detail, until their assets are used up and they are disposed of in the “Tower of Sleep”. The volume The Revenge of the Senior Citizens ** Plus (1986) collects some of their stories on this topic. Her last novel Mormama appeared shortly before her death. In 2018 he was nominated for the Locus Award .

She died in September 2017 at the age of 85 after being diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor a few months earlier.

bibliography

Novels
  • Mother Isn't Dead She's Only Sleeping (1961)
  • At War As Children (1964)
  • The Better Part (1967)
  • Armed Camps (1969)
  • Cry of the Daughter (1971)
  • Tiger Rag (1973)
  • Captain Grownup (1976)
  • The Ballad of T. Rantula (1979)
  • Magic Time (1980)
    • German: Magical time. Translated by Edda Petri. Heyne Science-Fiction & Fantasy # 4201, 1985, ISBN 3-453-31175-2 .
  • Fort Privilege (1985)
  • The Revenge of the Senior Citizens (1986)
  • Blood Fever (1986, as Shelley Hyde)
  • Catholic Girls (1987)
  • Gone (1992, as Kit Craig)
    • German: retribution. Translated by Wigand Lange. Krüger, Frankfurt am Main 1994, ISBN 3-8105-0338-X .
  • Twice Burned (1993, as Kit Craig)
  • Little Sisters of the Apocalypse (1994)
  • Strait (1995, as Kit Craig)
  • J. Eden (1996)
  • Closer (1997, as Kit Craig)
  • Some Safe Place (1998, as Kit Craig)
  • Short Fuse (1999, as Kit Craig)
  • @expectations (2000)
  • Thinner Than Thou (2004)
  • Bronze (2005)
  • The Baby Merchant (2006)
  • The Night Children (2008)
  • Enclave (2009)
  • Son of Destruction (2012)
  • Where (2015)
  • Mormama (2017)
Collections
  • Mister Da V. and Other Stories (1967)
  • The Killer Mice (1976)
  • Other Stories and… The Attack of the Giant Baby (1981)
  • The Revenge of the Senior Citizens ** Plus (1986)
  • Thief of Lives (1992)
  • Weird Women, Wired Women (1998)
  • Seven for the Apocalypse (1999)
  • Dogs of Truth: New and Uncollected Stories (2005)
  • What Wolves Know (2011)
  • The Story Until Now: A Great Big Book of Stories (2013)
  • Four Futures by Kit Reed (2017)
Anthology (as editor)
  • Fat (1974)
Short stories
  • The Wait (1958, also as To Be Taken in a Strange Country , 1967)
  • Devotion (1958)
  • The Reign of Tarquin the Tall (1958)
  • Judgment (1959)
  • Here, Kitty Kitty (1959)
  • Empty Nest (1959)
  • Ordeal (1960)
  • The Quest (1960)
  • Two in Homage (1960)
  • Judas Bomb (1961)
    • English: The power of the bomb. In: Walter Ernsting (Ed.): Expedition to Chronos. Heyne Science Fiction & Fantasy # 3056, 1965.
  • Piggy (1961)
  • To Lift a Ship (1962)
  • Mister Da V. (1962)
  • The New You (1962)
  • Tell Me, Doctor - Please (1963)
    • German: The doctor's chief. In: Charlotte Winheller (Ed.): Signals from Pluto. Heyne General Series # 248, 1963.
  • Automatic Tiger (1964)
  • Cynosure (1964)
  • Rescue Mission (1964)
  • On the Orphans' Colony (1964)
  • At Central (1967)
  • Golden Acres (1967)
  • I Am Through with Bus Trips (1967)
  • Janell Harmon's Testament (1967)
  • Sisohpromatem (1967)
  • The Food Farm (1967)
  • The Vine (1967)
  • Thing of Snow (1969)
  • Winter (1969)
  • Winston (1969)
    • German: Winston. In: Damon Knight (Ed.): Damon Knight's Collection 9. Fischer Taschenbuch (Fischer Orbit # 16), 1973, ISBN 3-436-01648-9 .
  • Death of a Monster (1970)
  • Gran (1970)
  • Across the Bar (1971)
  • Underground (1971)
  • In the Squalus (1972)
  • Dog Days (1972)
  • In Behalf of the Product (1973)
  • Great Escape Tours, Inc. (1974)
  • Songs of War (1974)
  • Mr. Rabbit (1975)
  • The Attack of the Giant Baby (1975)
    • English: The attack of the giant baby. In: Michel Parry (ed.): King Kong's rivals. Pabel (Vampire Paperback # 76), 1979.
  • A Mother's Instinct (1976)
  • The Thing at Wedgerley (1976)
  • The Wandering Gentile (1976)
  • The Holdouts (1977)
  • Shan (1978)
  • The Weremother (1979)
  • Chicken Soup (1980)
  • The Visible Partner (1980)
  • Moon (1981)
  • Pilots of the Purple Twilight (1981)
  • Final Tribute (1981)
  • Frontiers (1982)
  • The Bride of Bigfoot (1984)
  • A Unique Service (1986)
  • Alumni Fund (1986)
  • Hubbies: A Note (1986)
  • Into the Parlor (1986)
  • Love Story (1986)
  • The Marriage Bug (1986)
  • The Dog of Truth (1986)
  • The Revenge of the Senior Citizens (1986)
  • Baby (1988)
  • The Protective Pessimist (1988)
  • Mommy (1989)
  • The Jonahs (1989)
  • The Garden Club (1989)
  • A Double (1990)
  • In the Palace of the Dictator (1990)
  • Calling Hours (1991)
  • River (1991)
  • Academic Novel (1992)
  • Clement (1992)
  • Prisoner of War (1992)
  • Queen of the Beach (1992)
  • Thief of Lives (1992)
  • Victory Dreams (1992)
  • Journey to the Center of the Earth (1992)
  • Fourth of July (1992)
  • Tapeworm (1992)
  • The Hall of New Faces (1992)
  • The Boxing Day Specter (1993)
  • Like My Dress (1993)
  • The Last Resort (1993)
  • Opera News for the Dumb (1994)
  • The Singing Marine (1995)
  • Voyager (1996)
  • Whoever (1996)
  • Rajmahal (1997)
    • German: Rajmahal. In: Ronald M. Hahn (Ed.): Death in the Land of Flowers. Heyne Science Fiction & Fantasy # 5980, 1998, ISBN 3-453-14009-5 .
  • Last Fridays (1998)
  • The Mothers of Shark Island (1998)
  • Unlimited (1998)
  • Mommy Nearest (1998)
  • On the Penal Colony (1998)
  • Slumber (1999)
  • Precautions (2000)
  • Captive Kong (2001)
  • Playmate (2001)
  • Old Soldiers (2001)
  • The Last Big Sin (2002)
  • Missing Sam (2002)
  • Visiting the Dead (2003)
  • Into the Jungle (2003)
  • Incursions (2003)
  • Focus Group (2003)
  • No Two Alike (2003)
  • Family Bed (2004, also as Escape from Shark Island )
  • Perpetua (2004)
  • The Zombie Prince (2004)
  • Yard Sale (2004)
  • High Rise High (2004)
  • Song of the Black Dog (2005)
  • Spies (2005)
  • Getting It Back (2005)
  • Grand Opening (2005)
  • The Shop of Little Horrors (2005)
  • Biodad (2006)
  • What Wolves Know (2007)
  • Special (2009)
  • Camp Nowhere (2009)
  • Doing the Butterfly (2009)
  • Denny (2009)
  • The Blight Family Singers (2009)
  • The Chaise (2010)
  • Monkey Do (2010)
  • Akbar (2010)
  • Aunt Lizzie (2011)
  • Baby Brother (2011)
  • Weston Walks (2011)
  • The Outside Event (2011)
  • Tamsin (2012)
  • Results Guaranteed (2012)
  • How It Works (2013)
  • Wherein We Enter the Museum (2013)
  • The Legend of Troop 13 (2013)
  • Sissy (2013)
  • Military Secrets (2015)
  • Kickenders (2015)
  • The Ebony Crucifix (2015)
  • Disturbance in the Produce Aisle (2017)
Non-fiction and miscellaneous
  • When We Dream (1967, children's book)
  • Story First: The Writer as Insider (1982, also as Mastering Fiction , 1991)
  • George Orwell's 1984 (1984)
  • Writer's Workshop: Revision (1989)

literature

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Reed, kit
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Reed, Lillian Craig (married name); Reed, Lilian Craig (alternative spelling of married name); Reed, Lilian (alternative spelling of the maiden name); Craig, Lillian (maiden name); Craig, Kit (pseudonym); Hyde, Shelley (pseudonym)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American writer
DATE OF BIRTH June 7, 1932
PLACE OF BIRTH San Diego , California
DATE OF DEATH September 24, 2017