Cerece Rennie Murphy is the national bestselling and award-winning author of ten novels, children’s books, and short stories. She is also the founder of Virtuous Con, an online science fiction and comic culture convention that celebrates the excellence of BIPOC creators in speculative fiction, across the mediums of fiction, comics, film, and visual arts.
Ms. Murphy first fell in love with science fiction at the age of seven, watching Star Wars: Empire Strikes Back at the Uptown Theater in Washington, D.C., with her sister and Mom. It’s a love affair that has grown ever since. As an ardent fan of John Donne, Alice Walker, Kurt Vonnegut, Maya Angelou, and Alexander Pope, Ms. Murphy began exploring her creative writing through poetry at the age of eleven. As an adult, she earned her master’s degrees in social work and international relations at Boston College and Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies, respectively, and has built a rewarding career in program development and fundraising in the community, environment, and international development arenas – all while appreciating the stories of human connection told in science fiction through works like Octavia Butler’s “Wild Seed,” Frank Herbert’s “Dune”, and “The X-Files.”
In 2010, Ms. Murphy experienced her own supernatural event – a vision of her first original science fiction story. Shortly after, she began developing and writing what would become the bestselling Order of the Seers trilogy, which was voted one of the best Kindle Books of 2014 by Digital Book Today. Through the framework of character-driven, action-packed narratives, her work explores essential themes of individual identity, personal power, and how these discoveries can be used to improve our community and our world
Ms. Murphy is the recipient of Black Pearls Magazine’s Author of the Year Award for Children’s Literature, the National Best Sellers designation from the African American Literature Book Club (AALBC), and the Science Fiction Writers of America (SFWA)’s Kate Wilhelm Solstice Award for significant contributions to the science fiction, fantasy, and related genres community. Created in 2008, Ms. Murphy joins the ranks of distinguished previous Solstice Award winners, including Petra Mayer, Carl Sagan, Octavia Butler, and Gardner Dozois.
Ms. Murphy lives and writes just outside her hometown of Washington, DC with her family.
