Science Fiction & Fantasy
by Arley Sorg
Sheree Renée Thomas was born in Memphis, TN. The eldest child of an air force vet, she grew up on various military bases. She eventually moved to New York, where she lived for twenty years before returning to live in Memphis. She worked at genre bookstore Forbidden Planet, as well as working full-time in publishing while freelancing on the side, doing everything from writing jacket copy to proofreading and copyediting to editing.
In 2000, Time Warner published Thomas’ groundbreaking anthology
Dark Matter: A Century of Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora under its Aspect imprint, followed by 2004’s
Thomas is best known for her work as an editor, including
Dark Matter: A Century of Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora (2000) and
Dark Matter: Reading the Bones (2004) – both won World Fantasy Awards, and Thomas was the first Black writer to win a WFA. She has also edited genre magazines including Apex and Strange Horizons. She was recently named the new editor of F&SF, taking over from outgoing editor C.C. Finlay starting with the March/April 2021 issue.
Thomas is a prolific author of short fiction and poetry, and began producing work of genre interest with “How Sukie Cross de Big Wata” (2003). Some of her work is collected in