CHELSEA CAIN
Chelsea Cain grew up on a hippie commune in Iowa, and then in Bellingham, WA where she attended Lowell Elementary School. Lowell Elementary is important for two reasons. One, because that’s where Gretchen Lowell’s last name comes from (although in the books it comes from a Lowell Street in St Helens, Oregon). Two, because that was also my mom’s elementary school, ten years earlier. This means nothing, I just think it’s fun.
She studied journalism but had trouble with the talking-to-strangers aspect of it, so she ended up working at a PR firm and writing novels in her spare time. She had always been interested in the macabr, but it wasn’t until she had gotten married and was pregnant that she experienced what she has described as pregnancy cravings. . . for murder! She ate up all the crime shows and books she could find and when she couldn’t find anymore, she wrote one, and that’s how Heartsick came to be.
She now lives in Portland, writing, teaching, and parenting (sometimes at the same time -- her daughter worked with her on the comic series Maneaters). And while obviously I think the Beauty Killer books are the best, she’s written a lot of other good things. Here are a few of them:
Other Works by Chelsea Cain
- Dharma Girl (996)
- Wild Child: Girlhoods in the Counterculture (1999)
- The Hippie Handbook: How to Tie-Dye a T-Shirt, Flash a Peace Sign, and Other Essential Skills for the Carefree Life (2004)
- Confessions of a Teen Sleuth: A Parody (2005)
- Does This Cape Make Me Look Fat? Pop-Psychology for Super Heroes (2006)
- One Kick (2014)
- Mockingbird comics (2015-2016)
- Maneaters comics (2019-2022)
"Here are some of the ways I’ve murdered people. I’ve burned people alive. I’ve drowned them. I’ve poisoned them with the venom of a blue ringed octopus. I’ve filleted, hatcheted, sliced, diced, and shot people. One time, I even blew up a priest."
-Chelsea Cain