Ken Liu is one of my very favorite authors. I “met” him years ago when he was on the Shock Totem board, and he wrote the most amazing flash fiction stories. Cut to now, where his complex, rich worlds have garnered him a slew of well-deserved awards. I was over the moon when Ken allowed me to publish his story “In the Loop.” I adore the cold brutality of this shockingly timely tale.

When Kyra was nine, her father turned into a monster. -“In the Loop” by Ken Liu.

Ken Liu (http://kenliu.name) is an American author of speculative fiction. He has won the Nebula, Hugo, and World Fantasy awards, as well as top genre honors in Japan, Spain, and France, among other countries.

Liu’s debut novel, The Grace of Kings, is the first volume in a silkpunk epic fantasy series, The Dandelion Dynasty, in which engineers play the role of wizards. His debut collection, The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories, has been published in more than a dozen languages. A second collection, The Hidden Girl and Other Stories, followed. He also wrote the Star Wars novel, The Legends of Luke Skywalker.

He has been involved in multiple media adaptations of his work. The most recent projects include “The Message,” under development by 21 Laps and FilmNation Entertainment; “Good Hunting,” adapted as an episode in season one of Netflix’s breakout adult animated series Love, Death + Robots; and AMC’s Pantheon, which Craig Silverstein will executive produce, adapted from an interconnected series of short stories by Liu. “The Hidden Girl” and The Grace of Kings have also been optioned for development.

Prior to becoming a full-time writer, Liu worked as a software engineer, corporate lawyer, and litigation consultant. He frequently speaks at conferences and universities on a variety of topics, including futurism, cryptocurrency, history of technology, bookmaking, the mathematics of origami, and other subjects of his expertise.

Liu is also the translator for Liu Cixin’s The Three-Body Problem, Hao Jingfang’s “Folding Beijing” and Vagabonds, Chen Qiufan’s Waste Tide, as well as the editor of Invisible Planetsand Broken Stars, anthologies of contemporary Chinese science fiction.

Liu lives with his family near Boston, Massachusetts.