Kage Baker
Kage Baker (June 10, 1952 – January 31, 2010) was an American science fiction and fantasy writer.
Also recorded as Kate Genevieve Baker
Kage Baker

Stepheng3 · Public domain
- Name
- Kage Baker
- Birth Name
- Mary Kate Genevieve Baker
- Born
- 10 June 1952
- Birthplace
- Hollywood, California, United States
- Died
- 31 January 2010
- Place of death
- Pismo Beach, California, United States
- Occupation
- Writer
- Nationality
- United States.
- Fields
- fantasy.
- Honours
- Nebula Award for Best Novella, Locus Award for Best Novella and Theodore Sturgeon Award.
- Languages
- American English.
VALÉORINE Encyclopedia
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Documentary summary
Kage Baker (June 10, 1952 – January 31, 2010) was an American science fiction and fantasy writer.
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Note VALÉORINE
Kage Baker (1952–2010) was an American director, writer and actress. Born in Hollywood, the director died in San Luis Obispo County.
Genres include fantasy. Awards and honours include Locus Award for Best Novella, Nebula Award for Best Novella and Theodore Sturgeon Award.
Composed from admitted, traceable facts · 02 October 2026
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wikidata · Q259888 · wikipedia · Kage Baker
In this article
Key facts
Key facts
• Name — Kage Baker • Imagesize — 200px • Birth Name — Mary Kate Genevieve Baker • Born — 10 June 1952 • Birthplace — Hollywood, California, United States • Died — 31 January 2010 • Place of death — Pismo Beach, California, United States • Occupation — Writer • Period — 1997–2010 • Genre — Science fiction Fantasy • Website — kagebaker.com (archived)
Biography
Biography
Baker was born and raised in Hollywood, California, and lived in Pismo Beach later in life. Before becoming a professional writer she spent many years in theater, including teaching Elizabethan English as a second language. Baker had Asperger syndrome. She is best known for her "the Company/Dr. Zeus, Inc." series of historical time travel science fiction. Her first stories were published in Asimov's Science Fiction in 1997, and her first novel, In the Garden of Iden, by Hodder & Stoughton in the same year. Other notable works include Mendoza in Hollywood (novel, 2000) and "The Empress of Mars" (novella, 2003), which won the Theodore Sturgeon Award and was nominated for a Hugo Award. In 2008, she donated her archive to the department of Rare Books and Special Collections at Northern Illinois University. In 2009, her short story "Caverns of Mystery" and her novel House of the Stag were both nominated for World Fantasy Awards; neither piece won. In January 2010, it was reported that Baker was seriously ill with cancer. She died from uterine cancer on January 31, 2010, in Pismo Beach, California. In 2010, Baker's The Women of Nell Gwynne's was nominated for a Hugo Award and a World Fantasy Award in the Best Novella categories. On May 15, 2010, that work was awarded the 2009 Nebula Award in the Best Novella category. Kage spent much of the last year of her life watching and reviewing silent films. Many of her reviews were collected posthumously into Ancient Rockets: Treasures and Trainwrecks of the Silent Screen (2011), edited by her sister Kathleen Bartholomew. From the foreword: Baker left an unfinished novel, Nell Gwynne's On Land and At Sea, which was completed by her sister Kathleen Bartholomew based on extensive notes left by Baker, and was published in 2012.
The Company universe
The Company universe
• Novels • In the Garden of Iden (1997) • Sky Coyote (1999) • Mendoza in Hollywood (2000) (published in the UK as At the Edge of the West) • The Graveyard Game (2001) • The Life of the World to Come (2004) • The Children of the Company (2005) • The Machine's Child (2006) • The Sons of Heaven (2007) • The Empress of Mars (2009) (novel version) • Not Less than Gods (2010) • Nell Gwynne's On Land and At Sea (2012) • Short story collections • Black Projects, White Knights: The Company Dossiers (2002) • Gods and Pawns (2007) • In the Company of Thieves (2013) • Short stories and novellas • The Empress of Mars (2003) (novella version) • The Angel in the Darkness (limited edition chapbook, 2003) • Where the Golden Apples Grow (2006) (novella) • Rude Mechanicals (2007) • The Women of Nell Gwynne's (limited edition, 2009) (Also released as 'Nell Gwynne's Scarlet Spy')
Novels
Novels
• The Hotel Under the Sand (2009) (juvenile) Tachyon Publications • The Anvil of the World • The Anvil of the World (2003) • The House of the Stag (2008) (Prequel to The Anvil of the World) • The Bird of the River (2010)
Short fiction
Short fiction
• Collections • Mother Ægypt and Other Stories (2004) (title story takes place in the Company universe) • Dark Mondays (2006) • The Best of Kage Baker (2012) (includes stories set in and out of the Company universe) • Stories • Title — |Year — |First published — |Reprinted/collected — |Notes • Or Else My Lady Keeps the Key — 2008 — Novella • Pareidolia — 2015 — Novelette
Non-fiction
Non-fiction
• Ancient Rockets: Treasures and Trainwrecks of the Silent Screen, ed. Kathleen Bartholomew (2011) Tachyon Publications
Identity
Identity
Kage Baker is recorded as novelist, writer, graphic artist, actress and director.
Life and career
Dated record
Life and career
The full dated record · 1 entries
2010
Kage Baker died at San Luis Obispo County.
Places
Named by the record
Places
Only places the record itself states, plotted where the house gazetteer settles their coordinates. Nothing is inferred from a name or a nationality.
Hollywood.
Birth place
San Luis Obispo County.
Death place
Holdings and surviving copies
Where the work is held
Holdings and surviving copies
Where material relating to Kage Baker is held.
Documents and archives
Primary material
Documents and archives
Institutional database
- Wikidata, structured authority record Q259888: Kage Baker
Scholarly · Wikimedia Foundation
reference work
- “Kage Baker”, English Wikipedia, consulted as further reading
Reputable secondary · Wikipedia
Notes from the source article
Cited by Wikipedia
Notes from the source article
These works are cited by the source article, in its own numbering. They are recorded as its citations, not as sources VALÉORINE has verified.
- 1.ISFDB name id=Kage_Baker Kage Baker
- 2.Kage Baker. Bio.
- 3."Obituary: Kage Baker ", SF Site, January 31, 2010
- 4.Elizabethan English as a Second Language.
- 5.Bartholomew, Kathleen. Hath not an Aspie hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions?. Kathleen, Kage and the Company. May 10, 2019.
- 6.Broderick, Damien. The Time Machine Hypothesis: Extreme Science Meets Science Fiction. Springer. 155. 2019. 978-3-030-16177-4.
- 7.Theodore Sturgeon Award.
- 8.Kage Baker Papers, Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA) Collection, Northern Illinois University
- 9.World Fantasy Awards Home Page.
- 10.Kage Baker Health Update.
- 11.AussieCon 4. The 2010 Hugo and John W. Campbell Award Nominees. April 4, 2010.
- 12.2009 World Fantasy Awards Nominees. Locus Online News. August 24, 2010.
- 13.Standlee, Kevin. Nebula Awards Results. Science Fiction Awards Watch. May 15, 2010.
- 14.Bartholomew, Kate. Writing. Kate Baker.
- 15.Ancient Rockets: Treasures and Trainwrecks of the Silent Screen, ed. Kathleen Bartholomew (2011)
- 16.Upcoming4.me. Final novel by Kage Baker, Nell Gwynne's On Land and At Sea to be released.
Bibliography printed in the source article · 5
- Eldridge, Cat. An Interview with Kage Baker. The Green Man Review. June 1, 2005.
- Gevers, Nick. Interview: Of Mars and the Spanish Main: An Interview with Kage Baker by Nick Gevers. Subterranean Press. Winter 2009.
- Hartwell, David. On Kage Baker. Tor.com. Macmillan. September 7, 2010.
- Martini, Adrienne. An Interview with Kage Baker. Bookslut. June 2004.
- VanderMeer, Jeff. An Interview with Kage Baker. Clarkesworld Magazine. March 2007.
References
Citations
References
Each reference names the institution holding it, so a reader may go to the document itself.
Institutional database
Wikidata, structured authority record Q259888: Kage BakerWikimedia Foundation
Institutional witnessreference work
Secondary witness
The Encyclopedia exists whether or not anything is for sale. Corrections are recorded rather than overwritten, and every version of this record is kept. Published 14 August 2026.
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