Saknussemm, Kris 1962(?)–

PERSONAL: Born c. 1962. Education: Graduated from Dartmouth College; University of Washington, M.A.

ADDRESSES: Home—Fryerstown, Victoria, Australia. Agent—Matthew Bialer, Sanford J. Greenburg and Associates, 55 5th Ave., 15th FL, New York, NY 10013.

CAREER: Writer, painter, sculptor, and advertiser. Worked variously as a factory worker, forklift driver, hospital orderly, counselor at a camp for the blind, and circulation manager for an adult newspaper.

MEMBER: Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America.

AWARDS, HONORS: Boston Review Short Story Contest, for "Unpracticed Fingers Bungle Sadly over Tiny Feathered Bodies"; River Styx Short Fiction Contest; MacDowell Colony fellowship, 2004.

WRITINGS:

Zanesville (novel), Villard Books (New York, NY), 2005

Contributor to publications such as the Antioch Review, Hudson Review, New Letters, ZYZZYVA, Prairie Schooner, Nimrod, Southwest Review, New England Review, Hawaii Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, Kansas Quarterly, and In Posse Review.

WORK IN PROGRESS: Enigmatic Pilot (working title), a second novel in "The Lodemania Testament" series, due 2007.

SIDELIGHTS: In 1984 Kris Saknussemm embarked on what he intended to be a two-year stint in Australia doing research for a Ph.D. project on the Cargo Cult religions. Twenty years later, Saknussemm was still living in Australia, having long ago abandoned his formal anthropological research in favor of a career as a writer, painter, sculptor, and advertiser. A prolific short-story writer, Saknussemm had his first novel, Zanesville, published in 2005, and it garnered considerable critical praise for pushing creative and literary boundaries.

Saknussemm's eclectic list of inspirations for Zanesville included "spirituality and commerce in U.S. history, the Ghost Dance religion, my Cargo Cult research from Vanuatu and Papua, New Guinea, and something about how Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz and Elijah in the Bible both went up into whirlwinds," he told Los Angeles City Beat contributor Anthony Miller. By the summer of 2001, Saknussemm had completed an initial manuscript for the book but was dissatisfied with the overall text and was contemplating abandoning the novel altogether when the terrorist attacks of September 11 occurred. He explained to Your Guide to Fiction Writing author Ginny Wiehardt: "Whether it was the effect of the attacks—or more importantly, the media presentation of them—I was inspired to make the world of the book more extreme while simultaneously making the story simpler and more accessible. It was the combination of these opposing strategies that ultimately led to publication: pulling out the stops in one sphere, while drastically streamlining in another."

Carl Hays, writing for Booklist, called Zanesville "one of the most creative, edgy, and entertaining novels science] f[iction] has spawned in a decade." Library Journal reviewer Andrea Kempf described the book as being "written at a breathless speed with vivid and occasionally frightening imagery." A Kirkus Reviews contributor remarked: "Visually stunning even without a single illustration, but the dense writing in this exuberantly weird, rambling tale calls for ready and willing readers."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, September 15, 2005, Carl Hays, review of Zanesville, p. 38.

Kirkus Reviews, August 15, 2005, review of Zanesville, p. 878.

Library Journal, November 1, 2005, Andrea Kempf, review of Zanesville, p. 70.

ONLINE

Kris Saknussemm Home Page, http://www.saknussemm.com (April 24, 2006).

Los Angeles City Beat Online, http://www.lacitybeat.com/ (March 9, 2006), Anthony Miller, "American Thrill Ride: Lighting Out for Zanesville with Kris Saknussemm."

Your Guide to Fiction Writing, http://fictionwriting.about.com/ (April 24, 2006), Ginny Wiehardt, "An Interview with Kris Saknussemm."