Baker was born and raised in Hollywood, California, and lived in Pismo Beach later in life. Before becoming a professional writer she spent many years in theater, including teaching Elizabethan English as a second language.[4] Her unusual first name (pronounced like the word cage) is a combination of the names of her two grandmothers, Kate and Genevieve.[citation needed] Baker had Asperger syndrome.[5]
In 2008, she donated her archive to the department of Rare Books and Special Collections at Northern Illinois University.[8]
In 2009, her short story "Caverns of Mystery" and her novel House of the Stag were both nominated for World Fantasy Awards, but neither piece won.[9]
In January 2010, it was reported that Baker was seriously ill with cancer.[10] She died from uterine cancer at approximately 1:00 a.m. on January 31, 2010, in Pismo Beach, California.[3] She was survived by five younger siblings, mostly located in southern and central California.
Kage spent much of the last year of her life watching and reviewing silent films. Many of her reviews were collected posthumously into Ancient Rockets: Treasures and Trainwrecks of the Silent Screen (2011), edited by her sister Kathleen Bartholomew.[14] From the foreword:
All these reviews were written during the last year of Kage's life. I don't think that affected her view much—sometimes she was so tired that watching films and composing reviews was all she could manage, so they got her nearly undivided attention. As the year wore on, more and more of them were composed ex tempore and dictated to me; I think there is a more conversational style in those, as we argued out the reviews. One she recited in a single long soliloquy in her hospital room; it was written that evening, as I doggedly transferred Kage's voice from my head to paper.
The last one is dated December 21, 2009. Three days later, we discovered her cancer had metastasized to her brain. A month later, she was gone.[15]
Baker left an unfinished novel, Nell Gwynne's On Land and At Sea, which has been completed by her sister Kathleen Bartholomew based on extensive notes left by Baker, and was published in 2012.[16]
^Standlee, Kevin (May 15, 2010). "Nebula Awards Results". Science Fiction Awards Watch. Archived from the original on May 25, 2010. Retrieved May 15, 2010.
^Bartholomew, Kate. "Writing". Kate Baker. Archived from the original on December 6, 2017. Retrieved March 15, 2022.
^Ancient Rockets: Treasures and Trainwrecks of the Silent Screen, ed. Kathleen Bartholomew (2011)
