Collaborated with Larry Nivenīetween 19 Barnes published stories in small magazines and began networking with successful science-fiction writers. Barnes and Toni Annelle Young lived together for 12 years before marrying in 1985 (they later divorced). Although college did not teach him how to become a financially successful writer, he continued to take courses at Pepperdine and the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) over the next two decades. Barnes graduated from Los Angeles High School in 1969.īetween 19 Barnes attended several Los Angeles-area colleges, including Los Angeles City College and Pepperdine University, where he majored in communication arts. Ironically his own first stories featured white heroes. At 16 he decided to become a writer, so as to stop getting in trouble for telling elaborate lies. He was raised in the Episcopal Church and told Publishers Weekly: "I kind of consider myself to be a Zen Christian."īarnes absorbed the popular culture of the late 1950s and 1960s-comic books, pulp fiction, science fiction and fantasy, television, and low-budget films-but he questioned the lack of black heroes in popular media. He began studying martial arts at the age of ten.
As a small, biracial child, Barnes was a frequent victim of bullying. His father left the family when Steve was eight. Learned Martial Arts for Self-Protectionīorn on March 1, 1952, in south-central Los Angeles, Steven Emory Barnes was the son of Emory Flake Barnes, an employment counselor, and Eva Mae Reeves Barnes, a real-estate broker. He is known for his strong black characters, both male and female, and his work frequently reflects his devotion to the martial arts. His science fiction/fantasy novels incorporate elements from the occult, horror, detective, and spy genres and are considered "page-turners." Barnes has been part of a movement of black writers seeking to cultivate new black readers. His more recent work has garnered excellent reviews as well researched, intelligent, and thought provoking. He has become increasingly popular over the years, however, with two best-selling novels. As with so many black writers, Barnes's early work was overlooked by critics. One of only a handful of successful black science-fiction writers, Barnes jump-started his career by collaborating with science-fiction superstar Larry Niven. The author of more than 20 books of speculative fiction, as well as screenplays, teleplays, and short stories, Steven Barnes also has been a lecturer and creative consultant, a martial artist, and a self-declared expert on human performance.
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