Leigh Brackett

(December 7, 1915 -- March 18, 1978)

Leigh Douglass Brackett was a SF author and a Hollywood screenwriter, known for her work on such films as The Big Sleep (1945), The Long Goodbye (1973), and The Empire Strikes Back (1980).

Her first published SF story was "Martian Quest" in the February, 1940, issue of Astounding. She was known principally for her science-fantasy stories in Planet Stories, Startling Stories, and Thrilling Wonder Stories. Her pulp SF is collected in The Best of Leigh Brackett (1977).

In the trilogy she published in the mid-1970s – The Ginger Star, The Hounds of Skaith, and The Reavers of Skaith -- she tried to recapture the spirit of her earlier pulp genre stories. She also wrote detective and western fiction, and her western novel, Follow the Free Wind, won the Spur Award for Best Novel in 1963.

She was nominated for the 1956 Best Novel Hugo for The Long Tomorrow.

She was GoH at Pacificon II, the 1964 Worldcon, and won the 1981 Best Dramatic Presentation Hugo for her The Empire Strikes Back screenplay.

She was a close friend of Ray Bradbury, and was married to Edmond Hamilton, from 1946 until his death in 1977.

The Hamilton-Brackett Award was named in their honor.

Recording of Pacificon II Hugos & Leigh Brackett, Edmond Hamilton GoH speeches

Awards, Honors and GoHships:

• 1941 -- Best Short Story Retro Hugo nominee
• 1944 -- Best Novelette Retro Hugo nominee
• 1954 -- Metrocon 1
• 1964 -- Pacificon II
• 1969 -- 1969 Detroit Triple Fan Fair
• 1972 -- Pulpcon 1972
• 1976 -- Minicon 11
• 1977 -- Penulticon, Rovacon II
• 1978 -- Forry Award
• 1981 -- Best Dramatic Presentation Hugo
• 1998 -- Readercon 10 (Memorial Guest)
• 2005 -- Cordwainer Smith Rediscovery Award
• 2020 -- 1945 Best Related Work Retro Hugo, 1945 Best Novel Retro Hugo, 1945 Best Novella Retro Hugo nominee

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Person

1915—1978

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