About the Author

Tanith Lee was born in North London (UK) in 1947 and died on 24th May 2015 at the age of 67. Because her parents were professional dancers (ballroom, Latin American) and had to live where the work was, she attended a number of truly terrible schools, and didn't learn to read - she was also dyslectic - until almost age 8. And then only because her father taught her. This opened the world of books to Lee, and by 9 she was writing. After much better education at a grammar school, Lee went on to work in a library. This was followed by various other jobs - shop assistant, waitress, clerk - plus a year at art college when she was 25-26. In 1974 this mosaic ended when DAW Books of America, under the leadership of Donald A Wollheim, bought and published Lee's The Birthgrave, and thereafter 26 of her novels and collections. Since then Lee wrote over 90 books, and approaching 300 short stories. 4 of her radio plays have been broadcast by the BBC; she also wrote 2 episodes (Sarcophagus and Sand) for the TV series Blake's 7. Some of her stories regularly feature on Radio 7. Lee wrote in many styles in and across many genres, including Horror, SF and Fantasy, Historical, Detective, Contemporary-Psychological, Children and Young Adult. Her preoccupation, though, was always people. In 1992 she married the writer-artist-photographer John Kaiine, her companion since 1987. They lived and worked together on the Sussex Weald, near the sea, in a house full of books and plants, with two black and white overlords called cats.