Explore our new BookBrowse Community Forum!

Steven Barnes Biography, Books, and Similar Authors

Author Biography  | Interview  | Books by this Author  | Read-Alikes

Steven Barnes

Steven Barnes

Steven Barnes Biography

Steven Barnes is an American science fiction writer, lecturer, creative consultant, and human performance technician.

He has written several novels and teleplays. He has written several episodes of The Outer Limits and Baywatch. He has also written the episode "Brief Candle" for Stargate SG-1 and the Andromeda episode "The Sum of Its Parts."

Barnes's first published piece of fiction, the 1979 novelette The Locusts, was written with Larry Niven, and was a Hugo Award nominee.

Barnes is also an avid practitioner of martial and physical arts. He is a black belt in Kenpo Karate (Aikka style), and Kodokan Judo. He holds an instructor certificate in Wu Ming Ta, and has an instructor candidate ranking in Filipino Kali stick and knife fighting. He is an advanced student in Jun Fan kickboxing (Bruce Lee method under Dan Inosanto), and is an instructor in Wu-style t'ai chi ch'uan under Hawkins Cheung.

He is an intermediate student in self-defense pistol shooting (preferring the Turnipseed modified Weaver method). He holds a brown belt in Shorenji Jiu Jitsu, and intermediate rankings in Tae Kwon Do and Aikido. He completed the Yoga Works basic Hatha Yoga instructor program; is presently studying Pentjak Silat (an Indonesian fighting system) with Guru Stevan Plinck, and Ashtanga Yoga, an aerobic form of yoga.

He lives Los Angeles.

Steven Barnes's website

This bio was last updated on 08/05/2014. In a perfect world, we would like to keep all of BookBrowse's biographies up to date, but with many thousands of lives to keep track of it's simply impossible to do. So, if the date of this bio is not recent, you may wish to do an internet search for a more current source, such as the author's website or social media presence. If you are the author or publisher and would like us to update this biography, send the complete text and we will replace the old with the new.

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Interview

Steven Barnes talks about how the talented songwriter Heather Alexander was able to create Irish slave songs to accompany his bestselling book Lion's Blood, and how this helped him while writing the book.



The Music of Lion's Blood by Steven Barnes


February 18, 2003


About three years ago, I was deeply occupied with the writing of Lion's Blood. I came to feel that the basic concept behind it was almost outrageously controversial, and that I would be able to use every ounce of creativity I could muster to increase verisimilitude, to overcome a reader's natural tendency to say "It's only a book, its only a book..." which would severely compromise my goals for the project. It occurred to me that one way to do this would be the deeping on the slave culture, to give the reader the sense that they had existed before the book began, and would continue to live after the covers were closed. What if, I thought, I could create some Irish slave songs: spirituals, work songs, etc., that would carry their culture and express their emotions in a way similar to the way such songs did in the American South?


I had been introduced to Heather Alexander by a mutual friend, Sonia Lyris, and thought that Heather might be absolutely ideal—she was talented, a dynamite performer, a songwriter, and we had made, I thought, a good personal connection. This was essential, because Lion's Blood is an ...

Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Books by this Author

Books by Steven Barnes at BookBrowse
Devil's Wake jacket Shadow Valley jacket Zulu Heart jacket Lion's Blood jacket
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Read-Alikes

All the books below are recommended as read-alikes for Steven Barnes but some maybe more relevant to you than others depending on which books by the author you have read and enjoyed. So look for the suggested read-alikes by title linked on the right.
How we choose read-alikes

  • Greg Bear

    Greg Bear

    Greg Bear was born in San Diego, California, on August 20th, 1951, to Wilma M. and Dale F. Bear. His father was in the navy so as a child he had traveled extensively to Japan, the Philippines and Alaska, as well as touring... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    Lion's Blood

    Try:
    Darwin's Children
    by Greg Bear

  • Austin Clarke

    Austin Clarke

    Austin Clarke was a professor of literature and taught at Yale, Brandeis, Williams, Duke, and the Universities of Texas and Indiana. He assisted in setting up a Black Studies program at Yale in 1968, after which he became the... (more)

    If you enjoyed:
    Lion's Blood

    Try:
    The Polished Hoe
    by Austin Clarke

We recommend 7 similar authors

View all 7 Read-Alikes

Non-members can see 2 results. Become a member
Membership Advantages
  • Reviews
  • "Beyond the Book" articles
  • Free books to read and review (US only)
  • Find books by time period, setting & theme
  • Read-alike suggestions by book and author
  • Book club discussions
  • and much more!
  • Just $45 for 12 months or $15 for 3 months.
  • More about membership!

Top Picks

  • Book Jacket: Our Evenings
    Our Evenings
    by Alan Hollinghurst
    Alan Hollinghurst's novel Our Evenings is the fictional autobiography of Dave Win, a British ...
  • Book Jacket: Graveyard Shift
    Graveyard Shift
    by M. L. Rio
    Following the success of her debut novel, If We Were Villains, M. L. Rio's latest book is the quasi-...
  • Book Jacket: The Sisters K
    The Sisters K
    by Maureen Sun
    The Kim sisters—Minah, Sarah, and Esther—have just learned their father is dying of ...
  • Book Jacket: Linguaphile
    Linguaphile
    by Julie Sedivy
    From an infant's first attempts to connect with the world around them to the final words shared with...

Members Recommend

  • Book Jacket

    Pony Confidential
    by Christina Lynch

    In this whimsical mystery, a grumpy pony must clear his beloved human's name from a murder accusation.

Who Said...

A library, to modify the famous metaphor of Socrates, should be the delivery room for the birth of ideas--a place ...

Click Here to find out who said this, as well as discovering other famous literary quotes!

Wordplay

Solve this clue:

F the M

and be entered to win..

Your guide toexceptional          books

BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.