books in order

Karen Joy Fowler Books In Order

Standalone Novels In Publication Order

  1. Sarah Canary (1991)
  2. The War of the Roses (1991)
  3. The Sweetheart Season (1996)
  4. Sister Noon (2001)
  5. The Jane Austen Book Club (2004)
  6. Wit’s End / The Case of the Imaginary Detective (2008)
  7. We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves (2013)
  8. Booth (2022)

Collections In Publication Order

  1. Artificial Things (1986)
  2. Black Glass (1998)
  3. What I Didn’t See (2002)

Non-Fiction Books In Publication Order

  1. The Science of Herself (2013)

Snow White, Blood Red Anthology Books In Publication Order

  1. Snow White, Blood Red (1993)
  2. Black Thorn, White Rose (1994)
  3. Ruby Slippers, Golden Tears (1995)
  4. Black Swan, White Raven (1997)
  5. Silver Birch, Blood Moon (1999)
  6. Black Heart, Ivory Bones (2000)

Anthologies In Publication Order

  1. The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror: Eleventh Annual Collection (1998)
  2. Vanishing Acts: A Science Fiction Anthology (2000)
  3. Crucified Dreams (2011)
  4. Ghosts: Recent Hauntings (2012)
  5. Field of Fantasies: Baseball Stories of the Strange and Supernatural (2014)
  6. The Mammoth Book of SF Stories by Women (2014)

Standalone Novels Book Covers

Collections Book Covers

Non-Fiction Book Covers

Snow White, Blood Red Anthology Book Covers

Anthologies Book Covers

Karen Joy Fowler Books Overview

Sarah Canary

When an enigmatic woman cloaked in black wanders into a Chinese labor camp in the Pacific Northwest of 1873, one man is chosen to lead her out into the woods. But soon, he becomes the enchanted follower. Thus begins a magical journey…
.

The Sweetheart Season

As a rebellious daughter of the sixties recalls the year her mother played baseball in 1947, two luminous stories begin to unfold in America’s heartland, one lived and one imagined…
.

Sister Noon

Lizzie Hayes, a member of the San Francisco elite, is a seemingly docile, middle aged spinster praised for her volunteer work with the Ladies Relief and Protection Society Home, or ‘The Brown Ark’. All she needs is the spark that will liberate her from the ruling conventions. When the wealthy and well connected, but ill reputed Mary Ellen Pleasant shows up at the Brown Ark, Lizzie is drawn to her. It is the beautiful, but mysterious Mary Ellen, an outcast among the women of the elite because of her notorious past and her involvement in voodoo, who will eventually hold the key to unlocking Lizzie’s rebellious nature. Loosely based in historical fact, Sister Noon is a wryly funny, playfully mysterious, and totally subversive novel from this ‘fine writer’ whose ‘language dazzles’ San Francisco Chronicle. ‘Sister Noon is funny, lyrical, spooky, inspired…
A work of enchanting rumination and one of the year’s best reads.’ Michael Upchurch, The Seattle Times

The Jane Austen Book Club

A sublime comedy of contemporary manners, this is the novel Jane Austen might well have written had she lived in twenty first century California. Nothing ever moves in a straight line in Karen Joy Fowler’s fiction, and in her latest, the complex dance of modern love has never been so devious or so much fun. Six Californians join to discuss Jane Austen’s novels. Over the six months they meet, marriages are tested, affairs begin, unsuitable arrangements become suitable, and love happens. With her finely sighted eye for the frailties of human behavior and her finely tuned ear for the absurdities of social intercourse, Fowler has never been wittier nor her characters more appealing. The result is a delicious dissection of modern relationships. Dedicated Austenites will delight in unearthing the echoes of Austen that run through the novel, but most readers will simply enjoy the vision and voice that, despite two centuries of separation, unite two great writers of brilliant social comedy.

Wit’s End / The Case of the Imaginary Detective

‘ A delightful and eccentric new tale’The Boston Globe from the author of the runaway bestseller The Jane Austen Book Club In Karen Joy Fowler’s newest novel, the bestselling author of The Jane Austen Book Club once again delivers top notch storytelling, creating characters both oddball and endearing in a voice that is utterly and memorably her own. Wit’s End is a clever, playful novel about finally allowing oneself to grow up with a dash of mystery thrown in. At loose ends and weary from her recent losses the deaths of an inventive if at times irritating father and her beloved brother Rima Lansill comes to Wit’s End, the home of her legendary godmother, bestselling mystery writer Addison Early, to regroup…
and in search of answers. For starters, why did Addison name one of her characters a murderer after Rima’s father? But Addison is secretive and feisty, so consumed with protecting her famous fictional detective, Maxwell Lane, from the vagaries of the Internet that rumor has it she has writer’s block. As one woman searches for truth, the other struggles to control the reality of her fiction. Rima soon becomes enmeshed in Addison’s household of eccentrics: a formerly alcoholic cook and her irksome son, two quirky dog walkers, a mysterious stalker, the tiny characters that populate Addison’s dollhouse crime scene replicas, and even Maxwell Lane himself. But, wrapped up in a mystery that may or may not be of her own creation, Rima discovers to her surprise that the ultimate solution to this puzzle is the new family she has found at the house called Wit’s End. Playfully exploring the blurred boundaries between reality and virtual reality, fiction and fact, Karen Joy Fowler subverts the whodunit and gives us a thoroughly modern meta mystery with wit, warmth, and heart.

Black Glass

Carry Nation is on the loose again, breaking up discos, smashing topless bars, preaching clean living to men more intent on booze and babes. And what of Tonto, ever faithful companion of the Lone Ranger, turning 40 without so much as a birthday call from the masked man? In these and 13 other short fictions, Fowler once again demonstrates the imaginative virtuosity that is fast winning her critical acclaim Author readings .

What I Didn’t See

2011 World Fantasy Award Winner for Best CollectionPraise for Karen Joy Fowler:’No contemporary writer creates characters more appealing, or examines them with greater acuity and forgiveness.’ Michael Chabon’Fowler’s witty writing is a joy to read.’ USA TodayIn her moving and elegant new collection, New York Times bestseller Karen Joy Fowler writes about John Wilkes Booth’s younger brother, a one winged man, a California cult, and a pair of twins, and she digs into our past, present, and future in the quiet, witty, and incisive way only she can. The sinister and the magical are always lurking just below the surface: for a mother who invents a fairy tale world for her son in ‘Halfway People’; for Edwin Booth in ‘Edwin’s Ghost,’ haunted by his fame as ‘America’s Hamlet’ and his brother’s terrible actions; for Norah, a rebellious teenager facing torture in ‘The Pelican Bar’ as she confronts Mama Strong, the sad*istic boss of a rehabilitation facility; for the narrator recounting her descent in ‘What I Didn’t See.’With clear and insightful prose, Fowler’s stories measure the human capacities for hope and despair, brutality and kindness. This collection, which includes two Nebula Award winners, is sure to delight readers, even as it pulls the rug out from underneath them. Karen Joy Fowler karenjoyfowler. com is the author of five novels, including Wit’s End, PEN/Faulkner finalist Sister Noon, and New York Times bestseller The Jane Austen Book Club. Her collection Black Glass won the World Fantasy Award. Fowler and her husband, who have two grown children, live in Santa Cruz, California.

Snow White, Blood Red

Once upon a time, fairy tales were for children…
But no longer. You hold in your hands a volume of wonders magical tales of trolls and ogres, of bewitched princesses and kingdoms accursed, penned by some of the most acclaimed fantasists of our day. But these are not bedtime stories designed to usher an innocent child gently into a realm of dreams. These are stories that bite lush and erotic, often dark and disturbing mystical journeys through a phantasmagoric landscape of distinctly adult sensibilities…
where there is no such thing as ‘happily ever after.’

Black Thorn, White Rose

Once Upon A Time…
A seduced prince willingly fell prey to a sensuous usurper’s erotic treacheries…
a flesh eating ogre gamboled in the footlights…
a gingerbread man fled in terror from the baking pan to the fire…
The award winning editors of Snow White, Blood Red return us to distinctly adult realms of myth and the fantastic with eighteen wondorous works that cloak the magical fictions we heard at Grandma’s knee in mantles of darkness and dread. From Roger Zelansky’s delightful tale of Death’s disobedient godson to Peter Straub’s blood chilling examination of a gargantuan Cinderella and her terrible twisted ‘art,’ here are stories strange and miraculous remarkable modern storytelling that remold our most cherished childhood fables into things sexier, more sinister…
and more appealing to grown up tastes and sensiblilities.

Ruby Slippers, Golden Tears

‘Once upon a time…
‘ So begin the classic fairy tales that enthralled and terrified us as children. Now, in their third critically acclaimed collection of original fairy tales for adults, World Fantasy Award winning editors Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling bring us twenty one new stories by some of the top names in literature today. Joyce Carol Oates, Gahan Wilson, Gene Wolfe, Tanith Lee, Neil Gaiman these are but a few of the accomplished literary sorcerers who have gathered here to remold our timeless myths into more sensuous and disturbing forms. Like the fabled ruby slippers, there is powerful magic here. Rich witches in trendy resorts cast evil spells…
beautiful princesses age and wither in sleeping worlds…
terrible beasts reside beneath flawless skin. Dark, disturbing, delightful, each story was written expressly for this superb collection of distinctly grown up fantasy a brilliant companion volume to Datlow and Windling’s acclaimed anthologies, Snow White, Blood Red and Black Thorn, White Rose.

Black Swan, White Raven

A stellar assymbly of many of today’s most creative and accomplished storytellers has gathered around the tribal fire to embroider well worn yarns with new golden thread. Black Swan, White Raven revisits the tales that charmed, enthralled, and terrified us in our early youth carrying us aloft into the healthy, beating heart of cherished myth to tell once again the stories of Rumpelstiltskins and sleeping beauties, only this time from an edgy, provocative and distinctly adult perspective. The themes and archetypes of our beloved childhood fiction are reexamined in a darker light by 21 superb teller of tales who deftly uncover the ironic, the outrageous, the enigmatic and the erotic at the core of the world’s best known fables, while revealing the sobering truths and lies behind ‘happily ever after.’

Silver Birch, Blood Moon

The four previous volumes in Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling’s anthology series of fairly tales retold with a distinctively modern edge have been hailded by reviewers as ‘brilliant,’ ‘provocative,’ and ‘disturbing.’ In this triumphant new collection of original fiction, twenty one of today’s leading writers spin the cherished fables of childhood into glittering gold offering magical tales for adults, as seductive as they are sophisticated.A jealous prince plots the destruction of his hated brother’s wedding by inventing a ‘magic’ suit of clothing visible only to the pure at heart…
A young girl’s strange fairy tale obsession results in a brutal murder…
An embittered mother cares for her dying son who is trapped in a thicket that guards a sleeping beauty…
In a bleak and desolate industrial wasteland, a group of violent outcasts lays the tattered myths of one Millenium to rest, and gives terrifying birth to those of the next. Erotic, compelling, witty, and altogether extraordinary, these stories lay bare our innermost demons and desires imaginatively transforming our youthful fantasies into things darker, slyer, and more delightfully subversive.

Black Heart, Ivory Bones

Hair bright as gold…
Lips red as blood…
Heart black as sin…
Truth sharp as bone…
As in their previous critically acclaimed volumes of reconsidered fairy tales, award winning editors Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling have gathered together remarkable stories that illuminate the more sinister, sensual, and sophisticated aspects of the tales we cherished in childhood; the fables of witches and princes and lost children that we once imagined we knew.’ Black Heart, Ivory Bones‘ showcases twenty beguiling tales for the child that was and the adult that is, penned by twenty of the most creative artists in contemporary American literature. Here dissected are the darker anatomies of the timeless, seemingly simple stories we have long loved. Here wonder and truth have serious bite.’ A lovelorn prince seeking his father’s blessing concocts a fantastic tale of a witch, a tower, and lustrous long hair…
A pair of accursed red boots punishes a beautiful dancer for her pride…
A troll killing, princess rescuing warrior is compelled to consider events from his adversaries’ point of view…
In a blistering tell all memoir, Goldilocks reveals the sordid truth about her brutal foster parent, Papa Bear…
‘Rich, surprising, funny, erotic, and unsettling, these twenty new yarns and poems offer exceptional anew treasures as they brilliantly reveal lusts and jealousies, foibles, hatreds and dangerous obsessions, the things that slyly lurk in the midnight interior of oft told tales. As in their previous critically acclaimed volumes of reconsidered fairy tales, award winning editors Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling have gathered together remarkable stories that illuminate the more sinister, sensual,and sophisticated aspects of the tales we cherished in childhood; the fables of witches and princes and lost children that we once imagined we knew. Black Heart, Ivory Bones showcases twenty beguiling tales for the child that was and the adult that is, penned by twenty of the most creative artists in contemporary American literature. Here dissected are the darker anatomies of the timeless, seemingly simple stories we have long loved. Here wonder and truth have serious bite.’A lovelorn prince seeking his father’s blessing concocts a fantastic tale of a witch, a tower, and lustrous long hair…
A pair of accursed red boots punishes a beautiful dancer for her pride…
A troll killing, princess rescuing warrior is compelled to consider events from his adversaries’ point of view…
In a blistering tell all memoir, Goldilocks reveals the sordid truth about her brutal foster parent, Papa Bear…
Rich, surprising, funny, erotic, and unsettling, these twenty new yarns and poems offer exceptional new treasures as they brilliantly reveal lusts and jealousies, foibles, hatreds, and dangerous obsessions, the things that slyly lurk in the midnight interior of oft told tales. As in their previous critically acclaimed volumes of reconsidered fairy tales, award winning editors Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling have gathered together remarkable stories that illuminate the more sinister, sensual, and sophisticated aspects of the tales we cherished in childhood; the fables of witches and princes and lost children that we once imagined we knew. Black Heart, Ivory Bones showcases twenty beguiling tales for the child that was and the adult that is, penned by twenty of the most creative artists incontemporary American literature. Here dissected are the darker anatomies of the timeless, seemingly simple stories we have long loved. Here wonder and truth have serious bite.’A lovelorn prince seeking his father’s blessing concocts a fantastic tale of a witch, a tower, and lustrous long hair…
A pair of accursed red boots punishes a beautiful dancer for her pride…
A troll killing, princess rescuing warrior is compelled to consider events from his adversaries’ point of view…
In a blistering tell all memoir, Goldilocks reveals the sordid truth about her brutal foster parent, Papa Bear…
Rich, surprising, funny, erotic, and unsettling, these twenty new yarns and poems offer exceptional new treasures as they brilliantly reveal lusts and jealousies, foibles, hatreds, and dangerous obsessions, the things that slyly lurk in the midnight interior of oft told tales.

The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror: Eleventh Annual Collection

Culled from the best of a wide variety of sources, this eleventh annual collection of fantasy fiction features contributions by Kim Newman, Joyce Carol Oates, Ellen Kushner, Jack Womack, Karen Joy Fowler, and others.

Vanishing Acts: A Science Fiction Anthology

Stories by Suzy McKee Charnas, Ted Chiang, Avram Davidson, Karen Joy Fowler, Paul McAuley, Brian Stableford, and others. The theme of this anthology is ‘endangered species’, loosely interpreted to include in some cases the human race. The contents are four excellent reprints and a dozen new stories, including a new novella from Ted Chiang, one of the hottest young story writers in SF. This is a distinguished original anthology fit to put on the shelf beside Starlight.

Related Authors

Leave a Comment