// Workers AI · dad joke modeWho's Claudia Smith? A clause for celebration.

Claudia Smith is an American writer of flash fiction and short stories. She is the author of The Sky Is a Well and Other Shorts (2007), Put Your Head in My Lap (2011), and Quarry Light (2014). Her work has also appeared in literary anthologies including Lone Star Noir (2010) and the Norton anthologies New Sudden Fiction (2007) and New Micro (2018).

Career

Smith published her first chapbook, The Sky Is a Well and Other Shorts, with Rose Metal Press in 2007.

In 2010, Smith's short story "Catgirl" appeared in the anthology Lone Star Noir (Akashic Books, 2010). Kirkus Reviews described "Catgirl" as a "banality-of-evil story" and noted that her prose is "controlled, shrewdly understated," producing an "unsettling and shivery" effect.

Smith published her second book, Put Your Head in My Lap, with Future Tense Books in 2011. This was followed by Quarry Light, published by Magic Helicopter Press in 2014. In a review for American Book Review, Mary Pettice discussed Smith’s use of recurring imagery and thematic treatment of memory and trauma. In Necessary Fiction, Patrick Thomas Henry described her prose as "crisp, cold and biting as an autumn wind."

Smith's story "Mermaid" appeared in New Micro: Exceptionally Short Fiction (W. W. Norton, 2018).

Works

• The Sky Is a Well and Other Shorts. Rose Metal Press, 2007.
• Put Your Head in My Lap. Future Tense Books, 2011.
• Quarry Light. Magic Helicopter Press, 2014.