Bio (~50 words)
Among Izzy Wasserstein’s books are the Lambda Literary finalist short story collection All the Hometowns You Can’t Stay Away From (Neon Hemlock, 2022), and the novella These Fragile Graces, This Fugitive Heart (Tachyon, 2024). A queer and trans woman, she teaches writing and literature at a public university.
Bio (~100 words)
Izzy Wasserstein is the author of dozens of short stories and poems, two poetry collections, the Lambda Literary finalist short story collection All the Hometowns You Can’t Stay Away From (Neon Hemlock, 2022), the novella These Fragile Graces, This Fugitive Heart (Tachyon, 2024) and most recently the fiction chapbook This Next Song is Called Punk Rock Valhalla (Neon Hemlock, 2025). A queer and trans woman, she teaches writing and literature at a public university. A born-and-raised Kansan, she currently lives in Southern California with the writer Nora E. Derrington and their animal companions.
Reviews of These Fragile Graces, This Fugitive Heart
- “The murder case is the best kind of technothriller, getting deeper into the guts of the tech and the skulls in the corporate skullduggery while putting the reader into the heart and soul of an investigator who can’t stop trying to save the day for everybody else.” — Library Journal, Starred Review
- “Izzy Wasserstein succeeds in not only nailing, but also reinventing, the trope of the hard-bitten private detective with a prickly personality, one who is both complex and deeply flawed for thoroughly understandable reasons.” — Analog
- “At one level, These Fragile Graces, This Fugitive Heart works just fine as an efficient and fast-moving thriller in a gritty urban setting, but just as efficient is the manner in which Wasserstein layers in issues of trans acceptance – Dora’s intolerant father is a piece of work to begin with, and only gets worse – as well as corporate malfeasance, fascist militias, economic disparity, and environmental degradation. Dora herself is a wonderful character; despite her fighting skills and amateur-detective insights, she can be impulsive, intemperate, and annoying, but like her hardboiled predecessors, she values loyalty and honor in ways that sometimes put her at risk – or at even greater risk than she already faces trying to survive as a trans woman in the mean streets of a too-credible dystopia.” — Gary K. Wolfe
- “These Fragile Graces, This Fugitive Heart is a fast-paced story with a remarkable group of characters and darkly lovely details in the setting that help flesh out this world. Though the setting is science fiction, it offers a stark look at a very plausible future and its chilling repercussions. To me, it felt like the best possible blend of shows like Orphan Black or Hanna combined with ecofiction elements.” — Dawn Vogel
- “I loved everything about this novella. The characters are complex, and the mystery is sharp. The world is bleak, yet the commune shines as a bright spot. I loved Blue (and who they become). I loved Dora. Read this novella.” — Back Shelf Books
Reviews of All the Hometowns You Can’t Stay Away From
- “Wasserstein’s writing evokes a deep sense of pain, trauma, and healing.” — Maya C. James, Locus
- “…this collection marks her as an author to watch.” — Publishers Weekly
- “I am floored by the intricacy of these stories. They deliver the full plots and backstories of entire novels in a small space of several thousand words. The characters aren’t always loveable, but they are complex. They’re people who are trying, and the stories portray the best efforts, regardless the outcome. There is tenderness, but there is also resilience.” — Jo Writes Fantasy