Audrey Niffenegger (born June 13, 1963) is an American writer, artist, and academic. Her debut novel, The Time Traveler's Wife, published in 2003, was a bestseller.
Biography
Audrey Niffenegger was born in 1963 in South Haven, Michigan. At the age of two, she and her family moved to Evanston, Illinois, and she has since spent the majority of her life living in or close to Chicago. Niffenegger started writing books when she was six years old. Niffenegger completed her undergraduate degree at the Art Institute of Chicago where she worked on becoming a visual artist.
She founded Artists Book House. In 2024, Niffenegger announced that the center's home would be built in the Old Irving Park neighborhood.
From June 21 to November 10, 2013, the National Museum of Women in the Arts exhibited Awake in the Dream World: The Art of Audrey Niffenegger, a retrospective of her paintings, drawings, prints, and book art that “reflect her captivating narrative talent and her explorations of life, mortality, and magic.” The catalog was written by Niffenegger with Susan Fisher Sterling, Krystyna Wasserman, and Mark Pascale.
Works
Novels
Niffenegger's debut novel, The Time Traveler's Wife, was published in 2003 and was a bestseller. A film adaptation was released in 2009. Niffenegger has no intention of watching the movie because she stated that the characters are only truly hers in the book, not in the movie. Niffenegger originally conceptualized The Time Traveler's Wife as a graphic novel but realized that the time travel would be difficult to capture in visualizations. In March 2009, Niffenegger sold her second novel, a literary ghost story called Her Fearful Symmetry, to Charles Scribner's Sons for an advance of $5 million. The book was released on October 1, 2009 and is set in London's Highgate Cemetery where, during research for the book, Niffenegger acted as a tour guide. Though not as huge a commercial juggernaut as The Time Traveler's Wife, this book generally garnered more positive critical reviews and clinched Niffenegger's reputation as a leading novelist of ideas and atmosphere.
Niffenegger collaborated with Wayne McGregor on a balletic fable, Raven Girl (2013), performed at the Royal Opera House in London in 2013, 2015.
In 2009, she started working on a novel called The Chinchilla Girl in Exile.
In 2013, it was announced that there would be a sequel to The Time Traveler's Wife and in 2022 it was announced that title is The Other Husband set to be released in 2023.
Another sequel to The Time Traveler's Wife was announced in 2026, titled Life Out of Order, which follows the story of Alba, the child of the original novel's protagonist. It is set to be published October 27, 2026.
Visual books
Niffenegger has degrees from the Art Institute of Chicago and Northwestern University. As an undergraduate student at the Art Institute of Chicago, Niffenegger created her own book arts major combining etching, letterpress arts and bookbinding. Her first project was called The Adventuress, which she self-described as "a novel in pictures". Niffenegger's second novel in pictures was titled The Three Incestuous Sisters which she created while completing her M.F.A. at Northwestern. "The Night Bookmobile" was published on October 1, 2010, by Jonathan Cape. Niffenegger intends "The Night Bookmobile" to be the first installment in a series titled "The Library". She is working on the second installment, called "Moths of the New World", about a stolen book.
Personal life
Niffenegger is married to cartoonist Eddie Campbell. Niffenegger and Campbell collaborated on the visual novel Bizarre Romance to celebrate the Comics Unmasked exhibit at the British Library.
Niffenegger describes herself as "somewhere in the spectrum of agnosticism and atheism" and ascribes her disbelief to her Catholic background.
Bibliography
Novels
- The Time Traveler's Wife (2003) ()
- Her Fearful Symmetry (2009) ()
- Raven Girl (2013) ()
- Life Out of Order (to be published October 2026)
Short stories
- "Jakob Wywialowski and the Angels" (2004, )
- "Prudence: The Cautionary Tale of a Picky Eater" in the book Poisonous Plants at Table (2006, )
Comics
- The Night Bookmobile (2008) (2010 edition )
- Bizarre Romance (with Eddie Campbell, Abrams, 2018) ()
Artist's books
Visual books:
- The Adventuress (1985)
- Spring (1994)