Arwen Elys Dayton

Arwen Elys Dayton is an American author of science fiction, fantasy and speculative fiction. The author of seven published works, she is best known for her award-winning novel Stronger, Faster, and More Beautiful and for her Seeker trilogy. Her 2012 novel Resurrection was an Amazon.com Kindle best seller, reaching #1 and #2 on national and international sales charts. The rights to her 2015 novel Seeker were purchased by Columbia Pictures in 2013. Her 2018 novel, Stronger, Faster, and More Beautiful, was cited by Tom Shippey of The Wall Street Journal as one of the best science fiction novels of 2018. She is married to tech entrepreneur Sky Dayton and lives in Oregon's Willamette Valley. Background Dayton was named Arwen after an elf in The Lord of the Rings. She began writing around the age of 7 or 8, when her teacher asked her to write a one-page story. As a child she enjoyed reading adventure and fantasy stories, and at the age of 8 envisaged a story about a prince arriving on a spaceship from another planet to rescue his little sister; several elements of her original idea weaved their way into her novel many years later, Resurrection. At the age of 12 she read the book The King Must Die, by Mary Renault, which had a major impact on the budding writer, describing it as "having everything, Greek mythology brought into real life... heroes, gods, humans, love, romance, adventure". After graduating from high school at 16, Dayton worked as a tutor for a year in Europe. She returned to the US to attend Stanford University, but instead took a job as a magazine article writer. Her articles led to being hired as a writer on the PBS show The Eddie Files. Dayton is married to tech entrepreneur, Sky Dayton, and they live on the West Coast with their three children. With her husband she has invested in startups such as digital data studio Fresno in 2017.