Ceridwen is an Australian fiction writer, creative non-fiction writer, science writer and filmmaker. Born in South Africa, she grew up between South Africa and Australia, went to Harvard University on scholarship as an undergraduate, and did her postgraduate studies in social anthropology at New York University, and a Doctorate of Creative Arts at Western Sydney University.

Her debut novel, Blood Kin, was shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Award and selected for the U.S. National Book Foundation’s "5 Under 35" honours list. Her second book, Only the Animals, won the inaugural 2014 Readings New Australian Writing Award, and was selected to be on the VCE (Victoria) Literature curriculum. 

Her most recent book of stories is Only the Astronauts (Penguin Random House 2024), which was selected for the Grattan Institute's Prime Minister's Summer Reading List 2024. She is also the author of Blood Kin; In the Garden of the Fugitives; On J.M. Coetzee: Writers on Writers; Life After Truth; Inner Worlds Outer Spaces; and Mothertongues (with co-writer Eliza Bell and original songs by Keppie Coutts). Ceridwen is the author of the bestselling Audible Original audio-novel Once More With Feeling, and writes feel-good romance fiction for Audible as Adeline Knight.    

Ceridwen's science writing has been recognised with an Australian Museum Eureka Award and two UNSW Press Bragg Prizes for Science Writing. Her essays have been included in several The Best Australian Science Writing collections, as well as The Best Australian Essays (2015).

She has written extensively for The New Yorker, WIRED, Smithsonian Magazine, Vogue, n+1, Granta, The Paris Review, The Southern Review, Alexander, The Monthly, Kill Your Darlings, The Saturday Paper, Good Weekend (Sydney Morning Herald), Griffith Review, and Sydney Review of Books. Her work on outer space ethics and space environmentalism has been included in the U.S. Center for Humans and Nature's groundbreaking series Kinship: Belonging in a World of Relations, edited by Gavin Van Horn, Robin Wall Kimmerer and John Hausdoerffer.

With Rowena Potts, Ceridwen is the co-founder of the Archival Futures Collective, which is dedicated to making experimental archival films about emotions and ethics in outer space. The films in their Archival Futures of Outer Space Film Quartet have been officially selected for film festivals in Australia and around the world, including the Pariscience International Science Film Festival in Paris, Imagine Science Film Festival in New York City, Mimesis Documentary Festival in Colorado, St Kilda Film Festival in Melbourne, Perth Revelation International Film Festival, Down Under Berlin Film Festival, SXSW Sydney Film Festival, and the Antenna Documentary Festival, among many others.

She has been the lead writer for the Survival Stories climate change storytelling project at the Australian Museum, co-created by Jenny Newell (Climate Change Curator) and Zoë Sadokierski (Associate Professor of Design at UTS). Ceridwen and Zoë also collaborate creatively as Animal Allegories. Ceridwen is an Artistic Associate at the Powerhouse Museum.

The Tree of Light (a play based on a short story commissioned from Ceridwen by Adelaide theatre company Slingsby) will premiere at the Adelaide Festival in 2026.

She is currently a Research Fellow at Macquarie University, where her research explores the science and art of exoplanets.

www.ceridwendovey.com