Joseph Paul Haines was born in Canton, Ohio in 1966, the fourth son and sixth of seven children of Robert William Haines and Sarah (Sally) Mae Haines.  After his father died when Joseph was three, he and six siblings were raised by their mother in a variety of different locations, including Deming, New Mexico, Bradford, PA, Beaufort, SC, Grantsville, WV, and Oxnard/Ventura, CA.  The greatest number of his early years were spent in West Virginia, including a few years in a house with no running water, a well, and an outhouse with a splintered, wooden seat.

Joseph attended a number of schools over the years, finally graduating from Buena High School in Ventura, CA, where English was his worst subject.  Having read in limited quantities to this point, a remedial English teacher put Jack London’s The Sea Wolf into his hands, starting a lifelong passion with literature.

After dubious flirtations with both the military and law enforcement, Joseph started writing fiction in 1993 and attended the Clarion West Science Fiction Writer’s Workshop in Seattle in 1995.

He married Catherine Coffey-Haines in 2000, meeting her through her frequent stops into the gas station at which he worked (she sure seemed to go through an awful lot of gas, coincidentally running out about the time he started his shift).  The two of them lived a meager existence on the income of a gas-station attendant until Joseph fell into the title insurance profession, where he has been ever since.

His first story sold to Neverary Magazine, in January of 2003 and started an avalanche of short-story sales throughout the next few years including sales to Interzone, Aeon Magazine and Abyss & Apex.
His stories have been voted into the top echelons of reader’s choice polls and two have received honorable mentions in Year’s Best anthologies.  Together with Samantha Henderson, he edited the anthology, From the Trenches, from which a number of stories also received Year’s Best honorable mentions.

In addition to writing, Joseph spends his spare time playing the drums, writing music, and brewing beer at home, which is one part cooking, one part chemistry, and you get to drink it when you’re done.  Now that’s a hobby.

Joseph has also performed in a number of stage plays and directed Assassins, by Stephen Sondheim for Bellevue Community College.

Joseph currently resides in Aurora, Colorado with his wife Catherine and his dog Buddy.  He is currently at work on a novel and several short stories.