Jonathan Carroll

Jonathan Carroll

Carroll at a reading in Stacey's Bookstore,
San Francisco, in 2008
Born Jonathan Samuel Carroll
(1949-01-26) January 26, 1949
New York City, US
Occupation Novelist, writer
Nationality American
Genre Magic realism, slipstream, contemporary fantasy
Website
www.jonathancarroll.com

Jonathan Samuel Carroll (born January 26, 1949) is an American fiction writer primarily known for novels that may be labelled magic realism, slipstream or contemporary fantasy. He has lived in Austria since the 1970s.

Life and work

Carroll was born in New York City to Sidney Carroll, a film writer whose credits included The Hustler, and June Carroll (née Sillman), an actress and lyricist who appeared in numerous Broadway shows and two films. He is the half brother of composer Steve Reich and nephew of Broadway producer Leonard Sillman. His parents were Jewish, but Carroll was raised in the Christian Science religion.[1] A self-described "troubled teenager," he finished primary education at the Loomis School in Connecticut and graduated with honors from Rutgers University in 1971, marrying artist Beverly Schreiner in the same year. He relocated to Vienna, Austria a few years later and began teaching literature at the American International School, and has made his home in Austria ever since.

His first novel, The Land of Laughs (1980), is indicative of his general style and subject matter. Told through realistic first person narration, the novel concerns a young schoolteacher, Thomas Abbey, researching the life of a favorite children's book author of his youth, which involves meeting the author's daughter in her and her late father's seemingly idyllic home town of Galen, Missouri. Everything seems fine until a dog in Galen begins talking to Abbey. The line gradually blurs between the fantasy world created by Abbey's research subject and the life of the people in Galen, while the reader begins to wonder just how much trust can be placed in this narrator. Subsequent novels would expand on these themes, but often contain unreliable narrators in a world where magic is viewed as natural. (One commentator claimed in The Times that "if he were a Latin American writer with a three-part name, his books would be described as magical-realist".)[2]

Awards

Carroll's short story, "Friend's Best Man", won the World Fantasy Award.[3] His novel, Outside the Dog Museum won the British Fantasy Award[4] and his collection of short stories won the Bram Stoker Award. The short story "Uh-Oh City" won the French Grand Prix de l'Imaginaire.[5] His short story "Home on the Rain" was chosen as one of the best stories of the year by the Pushcart Prize committee. Carroll has been a runner-up for other World Fantasy Awards, the Hugo, and British Fantasy Awards.

Bibliography

Novels

Novellas and short novels

Short story collections

References

  1. ↑ http://www.jonathancarroll.com/interviews/edge.html
  2. ↑ Unnamed reviewer for The Times, quoted on blurb page of the Futura paperback edition of Outside the Dog Museum, 1991.
  3. ↑ World Fantasy Convention. "Award Winners and Nominees". Retrieved 2011-02-04.
  4. 1 2 "1992 Award Winners & Nominees". Worlds Without End. Retrieved 2009-05-17.
  5. ↑ "Nouvelles étrangères". Grand Prix de l'Imaginaire. Retrieved 2010-09-25.
  6. 1 2 "1989 Award Winners & Nominees". Worlds Without End. Retrieved 2009-06-29.
  7. ↑ "1990 Award Winners & Nominees". Worlds Without End. Retrieved 2009-06-29.
  8. ↑ "1995 Award Winners & Nominees". Worlds Without End. Retrieved 2009-06-29.
  9. ↑ "1999 Award Winners & Nominees". Worlds Without End. Retrieved 2009-06-29.
  10. ↑ "2000 Award Winners & Nominees". Worlds Without End. Retrieved 2009-06-29.
  11. ↑ "2002 Award Winners & Nominees". Worlds Without End. Retrieved 2009-06-29.
  12. ↑ "2003 Award Winners & Nominees". Worlds Without End. Retrieved 2009-06-29.

Interviews

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