Cirrus@Austlit

Born on the South Island of New Zealand and now living Canberra, Australia, Simon Petrie is a research scientist and writer who specialises in speculative-fiction genres: science fiction, fantasy, and occasionally horror. Since 2007, his stories have appeared in magazines such as Andromeda Spaceways Inflight Magazine, Aurealis, Borderlands, Kaleidotrope, Sybil's Garage, and Yog's Notebook, webzines such as AntipodeanSF, Ticon4, and Semaphore, and anthologies such as Masques, Destination: Future, and Belong. His first collection of short fiction, Rare Unsigned Copy: Tales of Rocketry, Ineptitude, and Giant Mutant Vegetables, was published by Peggy Bright Books in March 2010.

Petrie is an active member of the Andromeda Spaceways Publishing Co-operative, the Canberra Speculative Fiction Guild, and the SpecFicNZ core collective. He has also served on three different judging panels for the Aurealis Awards: the SF Novel, Anthology & Collection, and Fantasy Short Story categories. In August 2010, he was awarded Best New Talent in the Sir Julius Vogel awards.

As Dr Simon Petrie, he is employed as a research officer in the Computational Chemistry Group at the Australian National University and lectures in Practical Aspects of Computational Chemistry. He is also a Chief Investigator in the Australia-China Joint Research Centre for Functional Molecular Materials.