C. J. Cherryh (born Carolyn Janice Cherry on September 1, 1942) is a renowned American writer of speculative fiction.

Cherryh has penned over 80 books since the mid-1970s, including the Hugo Award-winning novels Downbelow Station (1981) and Cyteen (1988), both set in her Alliance–Union universe, as well as her well-regarded Foreigner series.

She is celebrated for her worldbuilding skills, crafting fictional realms with incredible realism backed by extensive research in history, language, psychology, and archeology.

Cherryh added a silent "h" to her real surname due to her editor's suggestion to avoid sounding like a romance author, and used only her initials to mask her gender at a time when the science fiction genre was dominated by male authors.

The asteroid 77185 Cherryh is named in her honor, with its discoverers commending her ability to challenge us to aspire for the stars through her imaginative storytelling.

She currently resides in Spokane, Washington. She has won four Hugo Awards and is one of the best-selling and most critically acclaimed authors in her field.

Her interests are diverse and include travel, photography, reef culture, Mariners baseball, and figure skating. She also enjoys sketching, cooking, and geology. Cherryh is particularly fascinated by dinosaurs and has academic specialties in Roman constitutional law and Bronze Age Greek ethnography.