Seth Dickinson
{{Short description|American fantasy and science fiction writer}}
{{Infobox writer
| name = Seth Dickinson
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| nationality = American
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| alma_mater = University of Chicago
| genre = Hard fantasy
| notableworks = The Traitor Baru Cormorant (2015)
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| website = {{URL|http://www.sethdickinson.com/}}
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Seth Dickinson is an American writer of fantasy and science fiction, best known for the 2015 debut novel The Traitor Baru Cormorant and its sequels The Monster Baru Cormorant and The Tyrant Baru Cormorant.
Career
Dickinson graduated from the University of Chicago, there receiving the Dell Magazines Award for Undergraduate Excellence in Science Fiction and Fantasy Writing in 2011 for the short story "The Immaculate Conception of Private Ritter".{{cite web |title=Past Winners |url=http://dellaward.com/past-honorees/ |website=Dell Award |accessdate=10 October 2015}} Dickinson has published short fiction in Clarkesworld, Strange Horizons, Lightspeed and Beneath Ceaseless Skies, among others.{{cite web |title=Seth Dickinson |url=http://www.beneath-ceaseless-skies.com/authors/seth-dickinson/ |website=Beneath Ceaseless Skies |accessdate=10 October 2015 }} Dickinson also contributed writing to video games, including Destiny: The Taken King (2015).{{cite web |date=16 January 2016 |title=What Seth wrote in 2015! |url=https://www.sethdickinson.com/2016/01/16/what-seth-wrote-in-2015/ |accessdate=13 June 2024 |website=Seth Dickinson}}
Dickinson's debut novel The Traitor Baru Cormorant, a hard fantasy expansion of a 2011 short story, is about a brilliant young woman who, educated in the schools of the imperial power that subjugated her homeland, sets out to gain power to subvert the empire from within. It was published in September 2015 and was well received by critics.{{cite news |title=The Traitor Baru Cormorant |url=http://www.publishersweekly.com/9780765380722 |accessdate=10 October 2015 |work=Publishers Weekly }}{{cite news |last1=El-Mohtar |first1=Amal |authorlink1=Amal El-Mohtar |title=Baru Cormorant Will Catch You Unawares |url=https://www.npr.org/2015/09/27/437287631/baru-cormorant-will-catch-you-unawares |accessdate=10 October 2015 |work=NPR |date=27 September 2015 }} Dickinson has blogged about addressing issues around gender and feminism, race, homosexuality, and imperialism in the world of Baru Cormorant.{{cite web |date=24 November 2015 |title=The secret design of The Traitor Baru Cormorant |url=http://www.sethdickinson.com/2015/11/24/the-secret-design-of-the-traitor-baru-cormorant/ |accessdate=11 December 2015 |website=Seth Dickinson}}
The Traitor Baru Cormorant is the first novel in a series called The Masquerade.{{cite web |title=The Masquerade |url=https://us.macmillan.com/series/themasquerade |website=Macmillan |access-date=14 July 2023}} Dickinson completed the draft of a sequel, The Monster Baru Cormorant, in July 2017,{{Cite tweet |number=881252425654468609 |user=sethjdickinson |title=The rough draft of The Monster Baru Cormorant is done and I'll hit my editor with it on Monday |author=Seth Dickinson |author-link= |date=July 1, 2017 |accessdate=July 1, 2017}}{{Dead link|date=June 2024}} submitting a manuscript of 1,104 pages.{{cite web |last1=Palmieri |first1=Marco |date=8 July 2017 |title=*opens file**skips to last page**face melts**closes file* |url=https://twitter.com/mxpalmieri/status/883824861201739776 |website=@mxpalmieri |publisher=Twitter}}{{dead link|date=May 2024}} The final version, published in 2018, comprised half of this material. The remainder was published in 2020 as The Tyrant Baru Cormorant. While the series was originally planned to be a trilogy, a fourth novel has been announced.{{cite web|last1=Lee|first1=Yoon Ha|authorlink1=Yoon Ha Lee|title=The Monster Baru Cormorant (ARC)|url=https://yhlee.dreamwidth.org/2533013.html|website=yhlee.dreamwidth.org|accessdate=26 April 2018|language=en|date=25 April 2018}}
Exordia, Dickinson's fourth novel, a science fiction story introducing a new setting, was released in January 2024. Publishers Weekly wrote: "With cool alien technology, admirably hopeful heroes, and SFF pop culture references littered throughout, this will have readers hooked".{{Cite web |date= |title=Exordia by Seth Dickinson |url=https://www.publishersweekly.com/9781250233011 |access-date=2024-03-08 |website=www.publishersweekly.com}} In an interview with BookPage magazine, Dickinson said that the book was inspired by the LEGO Bionicle toy line, as well as novels The Andromeda Strain and Sphere by Michael Crichton.{{Cite web |last=Pickens |first=Chris |date=23 January 2024 |title='Exordia' is one of the wildest first-contact novels you'll ever read |url=https://www.bookpage.com/features/seth-dickinsons-exordia-is-one-of-the-wildest-first-contact-novels-youll-ever-read/ |access-date=2024-03-08 |website=BookPage |language=en-US}}
Bibliography
{{Incomplete list|date=July 2022}}
= Novels =
== The Masquerade series ==
- The Traitor Baru Cormorant, 15 September 2015, Tor Books. Published as The Traitor in the UK. Based on the short story "The Traitor Baru Cormorant, Her Field-General, and Their Wounds" (Beneath Ceaseless Skies, 2011).
- The Monster Baru Cormorant, 30 October 2018, Tor Books.
- The Tyrant Baru Cormorant, 9 June 2020, Tor Books.
- A final novel, forthcoming.{{cite news |date=1 May 2018 |title=Seth Dickinson's Baru Cormorant Series Gets A Fourth Novel |url=https://reactormag.com/baru-cormorant-fourth-novel-seth-dickinson-the-masquerade/ |accessdate=13 June 2024 |work=Reactor |publisher=Tor Books}}
== Other novels ==
- Exordia (2024){{Cite book |last=Dickinson |first=Seth |title=Exordia |publisher=Tordotcom |year=2024 |isbn=9781250233011}}
- Forthcoming novel tied to existing IP {{cite web |title=I finished a novel!|url=https://www.sethdickinson.com/2024/12/23/i-finished-a-novel/ |website= Seth Dickinson |date=23 December 2024 |accessdate=15 June 2025}}
= Short fiction =
| class='wikitable sortable' width='90%' |
| width=25%|Title
!|Year !|First published !|Reprinted/collected !|Notes |
|---|
| "The Traitor Baru Cormorant, Her Field-General, and their Wounds"
|2011 |Beneath Ceaseless Skies, December 2011 | | |
| "Worth of Crows"
|2012 |Beneath Ceaseless Skies, September 2012 | | |
| "Cronus and the Ships"
|2013 |Analog Science Fiction and Fact, July/August 2013 | | |
| "A Plant (Whose Name is Destroyed)"
|2013 |Strange Horizons, August 2013 | |
| "Never Dreaming (In Four Burns)"
|2013 |Clarkesworld, November 2013 | | |
| "Testimony Before an Emergency Session of The Naval Cephalopod Command"
|2013 |Drabblecast, December 2013 | | |
| "Morrigan in the Sunglare"
|2014 |Clarkesworld, March 2014 |The Year's Best Military & Adventure SF & Space Opera, edited by David Afsharirad | |
| "Sekhmet Hunts the Dying Gnosis: A Computation"
|2014 |Beneath Ceaseless Skies, March 2014 | | |
| "Kumara"
|2014 |Escape Pod, March 2014 | | |
| "Our Fire, Given Freely"
|2014 |Beneath Ceaseless Skies, April 2014 | | |
| "A Tank Only Fears Four Things"
|2014 |Lightspeed, May 2014 | | |
| "Anna Saves Them All"
|2014 |Shimmer, September 2014 | | |
| "Economies of Force"
|2014 |Apex Magazine, September 2014 | | |
| "Wizard, Cabalist, Ascendant"
|2014 |Upgraded, edited by Neil Clarke, September 2014 | | |
| "Three Bodies at Mitanni"
|2015 |Analog Science Fiction and Fact, June 2015 |The Best Science Fiction of the Year: Volume 1 (2016), edited by Neil Clarke The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2016, edited by John Joseph Adams The Final Frontier (2018), edited by Neil Clarke | |
| "Please Undo this Hurt"
|2015 |Tor.com, September 2015 | | |
| "Morrigan in Shadow"
|2015 |Clarkesworld, December 2015 |The Year's Best Military & Adventure SF 2015, edited by David Afsharirad | |
| "Laws of Night and Silk"
|2016 |Beneath Ceaseless Skies, May 2016 |The Best Science Fiction and Fantasy: Volume Eleven (2017), edited by Jonathan Strahan | |
| "The Final Order"
|2020 |From a Certain Point of View: The Empire Strikes Back | | |
=Writing for video games=
- FreeSpace 2: Blue Planet (2010)
- Destiny: The Taken King (2015)
- Destiny 2: Forsaken (2018)
- Forthcoming content in the Subnautica franchise {{cite web |title=I am now working on Subnautica |url=https://sethdickinson.com/2022/05/24/i-am-now-working-on-subnautica/ |website= Seth Dickinson |date=22 May 2022 |accessdate=12 October 2024}}
- Forthcoming content for Magic: The Gathering expansion Edge of Eternities {{cite web |title=Magic: The Gathering on X |url=https://bsky.app/profile/magic.wizards.com/post/3ls2uk477om2m |website= Magic: The Gathering on X |date=20 June 2025 |accessdate=20 June 2025}}
External links
- {{Official website|http://www.sethdickinson.com}}
- {{isfdb name}}
References
{{Reflist}}
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Category:Year of birth missing (living people)
Category:21st-century American male writers
Category:21st-century American novelists
Category:American fantasy writers
Category:American male novelists
Category:American science fiction writers