Kate Story

Kate Story (fluid pronouns) is a genderqueer writer and performer. Born and raised in St. John’s, she is now living and working as an uninvited guest in Treaty 20 territory, in Nogojiwanong/Peterborough, Ontario. Their first novel Blasted received the Sunburst Award’s honourable mention, swiftly followed by Wrecked Upon This Shore. Kate’s short fiction has been shortlisted for the Sunburst Award and CBC literary award, published in World Fantasy-winning and Aurora Award-winning collections, and in Imaginarium 4: The Best Canadian Speculative Writing. Her third novel This Insubstantial Pageant was reviewed by the Toronto Star as a “top science-fiction read… exotic, funny and very sexy.” Her first young adult fantasy novel Antilia: Sword and Song was longlisted for the Sunburst Award. “You know a good book as soon as you start it. It sings to you and makes an immediate connection. That’s what happened to me with Kate Story’s Antilia. I loved everything about the book.” (Charles de Lint). The Antilia duology was selected as Highly Recommended by CM: Canadian Review of Materials.

In 2021 Urchin, a YA historical fantasy novel, came out with Running the Goat Books and Broadsides. “A sprawling, lyrical historical fantasy.” (Kirkus Reviews), it was a finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award.

In 2023 Kate’s debut short fiction collection Ferry Back the Gifts came out with Exile Editions.

“Car crashes and problematic mothers; alluring redheads and prophetic warnings that take physical, often animalistic, form; the abandoned industry and abounding waters of Bell Island… Story continues to mine her signature fusion of contemporary, often urban, realism with a chimerical, ofttimes folkloric, realm.” – Joan Sullivan, Saltwire

Kate also writes plays and devises performance works, often cross-discipline collaborations with other artists. Nearly 30 of their works have been presented in Peterborough, Toronto, and St. John’s, and she was part of the innovative Neighbourhood Dance Works’ exciting New Chapter dance project, bringing together Newfoundland dance artists for an 3-year process with choreographers Christopher House and Anne Troake. Their latest performance “Anxiety” kicks off the 2023 Festival of New Dance in St. John’s, weaving the epic poem Beowulf into a poignant and humourous exploration of growing up the daughter of a Newfoundland lexicographer, the rise of white supremacy, and her own place in a world gone sideways. “Anxiety is a rampage.”

Kate is artistic director of the Precarious Festivals, which explore precarity through innovative arts-community partnerships, and director of Public Energy’s Alternating Currents program, committed to developing the performance practices of regional artists. She is a recipient of the Ontario Arts Foundation’s K.M. Hunter Artist Award for Theatre.