Janie Kim

Janie Kim is the author of We Carry the Sea In Our Hands, out with Alcove Press (Penguin Random House) July 9, 2024. Applauded as “beautifully composed [and] original” by New York Times-bestselling author Joyce Carol Oates, the debut novel employs poetic prose and an imaginative voice to explore family, trauma, and belonging through one woman’s journey to reconnect with her roots.

Janie grew up in San Diego, California, and studied molecular biology at Princeton University. She is currently a biology PhD student at Stanford University and is studying RNA in the symbiosis between V. fischeri, a bioluminescent bacterium, and the bobtail squid, a very charismatic little creature. She likes ocean critters that are fun-sized, or, better yet, microscopic (funner-sized). As an undergraduate, she worked with bacteria that live inside algae and make toxins to deter hungry sea slugs. During her Fulbright research grant to Denmark, she spent time with some tag-team marine bacteria and microalgae.

She writes about these and other topics in microbiology for Small Things Considered.