Nancy Kress

Nancy Kress (born Nancy Anne Koningisor in Buffalo, New York on January 20, 1948) is a science fiction writer. She began writing in 1976 but has achieved her greatest notice since the publication of her Hugo and Nebula-winning novella "Beggars in Spain" in 1990.

Related Topics:
Buffalo, New York - January 20 - 1948 - Science fiction - 1976 - Hugo - Nebula - 1990

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She grew up in East Aurora, New York and attended college at SUNY Plattsburgh. In 1973, she moved to Rochester to marry Michael Joseph Kress. They had two sons, and divorced in 1984. At that time, she went to work at Stanton and Hucko, an advertising agency. In 1998, she married Charles Sheffield, who died in 2002 of a brain tumor. Kress moved back to Rochester, New York, to be near her grown children.

Related Topics:
East Aurora - New York - SUNY Plattsburgh - Charles Sheffield - Rochester

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She tends to write technically realistic stories set in a fairly near future that has a plausible connection to the present. Her fiction often involves genetic engineering, and, to a lesser degree, artificial intelligence.

Related Topics:
Genetic engineering - Artificial intelligence

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In this encyclopedia, she shows up in lists of both hard and soft science fiction authors. This perhaps indicates the futility of such categorizations, but she does occupy something of a middle ground. She shows an interest in the internal lives of her characters that may be lacking in, say, Larry Niven or Greg Egan, and the areas of science and technology in which she is most interested are "softer" than the hard SF favorites of physics and space flight. On the other hand, she is much more interested in the technical details of her imagined science than, say, Ursula LeGuin. And some of her stories are quite suspenseful and plot-driven, which many associate to the "hard" side of the spectrum.

Related Topics:
Hard - Soft - Larry Niven - Greg Egan - Physics - Ursula LeGuin

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She loves ballet, and has written stories around it.

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