Nicholas Christopher
Encyclopedia

Background

Christopher graduated from Harvard College
Harvard College
Harvard College, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is one of two schools within Harvard University granting undergraduate degrees...

 with a B.A. He teaches at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

. His work has appeared in The New Yorker, Esquire, The New Republic, The Paris Review, The Nation, and The New York Review of Books. His novels can be considered as magic realist
Magic realism
Magic realism or magical realism is an aesthetic style or genre of fiction in which magical elements blend with the real world. The story explains these magical elements as real occurrences, presented in a straightforward manner that places the "real" and the "fantastic" in the same stream of...

. He was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellowship
Guggenheim Fellowships are American grants that have been awarded annually since 1925 by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the arts." Each year, the foundation makes...

 in 1993 and a National Endowment for the Arts
National Endowment for the Arts
The National Endowment for the Arts is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created by an act of the U.S. Congress in 1965 as an independent agency of the federal government. Its current...

fellowship.

Reviews

If you were looking to write a crossover fantasy novel -- one whose audience extended beyond sci-fi enthusiasts and aging Tolkienistas -- you could hardly do better than to study "A Trip to the Stars." With this zestful riff on an enduring genre, Nicholas Christopher should easily satisfy the admirers of his previous novel, "Veronica." He is also likely to gain new readers, including those who foray reluctantly into so-called imaginative literature.


The Bestiary, Nicholas Christopher's fifth novel, is a book about Xeno Atlas, a young man raised by his grandmother in the wake of his mother's death during birth. Atlas' father is shipman with a murky and often absent influence on the child's life. Xeno, who reports always feeling a close connection to animals first fostered by his grandmother, sets out on a world-wide adventure to find missing texts with mythical creatures. The book is magical, filled with characters you can't help but find sympathy for and mysteries you can't wait to be solved.

Works

  • The Soloist (1986)
  • Veronica (1996) Dial Press ISBN 9780385314718
  • A Trip to the Stars (2000)
  • Franklin Flyer (2002)
  • The Bestiary (2007)

As editor

  • Walk on the wild side: urban American poetry since 1975, (1994) Simon and Schuster, ISBN 9780020427254

External links

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