Isabel J. Kim


Isabel J. Kim is an American speculative fiction writer. For her short stories she has won the annual Shirley Jackson Award and been nominated for the Astounding Award for Best New Writer. Her short fiction has appeared in Clarkesworld Magazine, [Lightspeed (magazine)|Lightspeed], Apex Magazine, Strange Horizons, Fantasy Magazine, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Cast of Wonders, and khōréō.
Her work has been collected in The Year's Best Fantasy Volume 2 and The Best American [Science Fiction and Fantasy|The Best American Science Fiction and Fantasy 2023].
In April 2024, Universal International Studios acquired the rights to her planned debut novel Sublimation. The novel is part of a three-book deal.

Background and career

Kim attended the University of Pennsylvania, majoring in Creative Writing and Fine Arts. Kim attended law school at the University of Pennsylvania and now works as a lawyer in New York.
Kim started publishing speculative fiction in 2021 and won the Shirley Jackson Award for You'll Understand When You're a Mom Someday, her second published story. She won the Clarkesworld reader poll in the Best Short Story category for "Calf Cleaving in the Benthic Black" in 2022.
She was nominated for the Astounding Award for Best New Writer in 2023 in her second year of eligibility for the award. Her work has appeared on the Locus Recommended Reading List for 2021, 2022, and 2023. Her story Why Don't We Just Kill the Kid In the Omelas Hole won the Nebula Award for Best Short Story in 2025. It is a finalist for the 2025 Hugo Award for Best Short Story and 2025 Theodore Sturgeon Award.
She co-hosts the internet culture podcast Wow If True with journalist Amanda Silberling.

Novel

Sublimation, Tor Books

Short fiction

  • "Homecoming is Just Another Word for the Sublimation of the Self", Clarkesworld
  • "You'll Understand When You're a Mom Someday" khōréō
  • "AP Practical Literary Theory Suggests This Is a Quest", Cast of Wonders
  • "Clay", Beneath Ceaseless Skies
  • "The Massage Lady at Munjeong Road Bathhouse", Clarkesworld
  • "Plausible Realities, Improbable Dreams", Lightspeed
  • "Christopher Mills, Return to Sender", Fantasy Magazine
  • "You, Me, Her, You, Her, I", Strange Horizons
  • "Termination Stories for the Cyberpunk Dystopia Protagonist", Clarkesworld, July 2022
  • "Calf Cleaving in the Benthic Black", Clarkesworld, November 2022
  • "The Big Glass Box and the Boys Inside", Apex Magazine
  • "The Narrative Implications of Your Untimely Death", Lightspeed
  • "Zeta-Epsilon", Clarkesworld
  • "Day Ten Thousand", Clarkesworld
  • "The Labyrinth Loop", Assemble Artifacts
  • "You Will Not Live to See M/M Horrors Beyond Your Comprehension", Lightspeed
  • "Why Don't We Just Kill the Kid in the Omelas Hole", Clarkesworld
  • "Freediver," Reactor
  • "Human Voices", Lightspeed
  • "Wire Mother", ''Clarkesworld''