Marion
Zimmer Bradley
1930-1999
Marion Zimmer was born in Albany, NY, on June 3, 1930, and married Robert
Alden Bradley in 1949. Mrs. Bradley received her B.A. in 1964 from Hardin
Simmons University in Abilene, Texas, then did graduate work at the University
of California, Berkeley, from 1965-67.
She
was a science fiction/fantasy fan from her middle teens, and made her first
sale as an adjunct to an amateur fiction contest in FANTASTIC/AMAZING STORIES
in 1949. She had written as long as she could remember, but wrote only for
school magazines and fanzines until 1952, when she sold her first professional
short story to VORTEX SCIENCE FICTION. She wrote everything from science
fiction to Gothics, but is probably best known for her Darkover novels.
In addition
to her novels, Mrs. Bradley edited many magazines, amateur and professional,
including Marion Zimmer Bradley's FANTASY Magazine, which she started in
1988. She also edited an annual anthology called SWORD AND SORCERESS for
DAW Books.
Over
the years she turned more to fantasy; THE HOUSE BETWEEN THE WORLDS, although
a selection of the Science Fiction Book Club, was "fantasy undiluted". She
wrote a novel of the women in the Arthurian legends -- Morgan Le Fay, the
Lady of the Lake, and others -- entitled MISTS OF AVALON, which made the
NY Times best seller list both in hardcover and trade paperback, and she
also wrote THE FIREBRAND, a novel about the women of the Trojan War. Her
historical fantasy novels, THE FOREST HOUSE and LADY OF AVALON are prequels
to MISTS OF AVALON.
She
died in Berkeley, California on September 25, 1999, four days after suffering
a major heart attack. She was survived by her brother, Leslie Zimmer; her
sons, David Bradley and Patrick Breen; her daughter, Moira Stern; and her
grandchildren.
Fiction Series
Atlantean
Web of Light |
Web of Darkness
Victoria Poyser
|
Web of Light (1983)
Black
and white magic were at war. Domaris, disciple of the Temple of Light
was wrenched from her peaceful life by the arrival of Micon, the Atlantean
prince, whose powers are covetd by the sorcerers of the dark. Soon, out of
a tender, earthly passion, would rise forces that might decide the final
victory.
Web of
Darkness (1983)
When
young priestess Deoris abandons her family, religion, and pride to follow
the dark sorcerer Riveda, their union unleashes powerful forces that threaten
the foundations of Atlantis.
Web of
Darkness (1985)/ The Fall of Atlantis (1987)
Avalon
The Mists of Avalon
Doug Beekman
|
The Forest House
Stephen Bradbury
|
Lady of Avalon
John Jude Palencar
|
Priestess of Avalon w/ Diana L. Paxson
Kinuko K Craft
|
Ancestors of Avalon w/ Diana L. Paxson
Dominic Harmon
|
Marion Zimmer Bradley's Ravens of Avalon w/ Diana L. Paxson |
The Mists of Avalon
(1983)
Morgaine,
gifted with the Sight and fated with her brother-lover's doom, recounts the
glorious tragedy of Camelot's brief flowering - not as a tale of knightly
deeds, but as a woman's rounded view of society in the crucible of change.
The Forest House (1994)
Inside
the walls of the Forest House, in a remote part of Britain, a secret sect
of Druidic priestesses guards the ancient rites of learning, healing, and
magic against the onslaught of invading Romans.
Lady of
Avalon (1997)
Lady
of Avalon tells the story of three remarkable women who alter the fortunes
of Roman Britain as they fight to reclaim the magic and traditions of a once
glorious past.
Priestess
of Avalon (2000) with Diana L. Paxson
Helena.
Beautiful, young, enigmatic. She's a daughter of the Holy Isle who became
a Christian Saint and the heroine of Welsh legend. In 296, the emperor Contantius
come to Britian and falls in love with Princess Eilan, known as Helana to
the Romans. She is also the daughter of King Coel and the high Priestess
of Avalon. Helena see's a chance to marry the bloodlines of ancient royal
families, and their myths and traditions. But she has to contend with the
politics of Rome, the ill fortunes of war and the irresistable rise of a
powerful new religion...
Ancestors of
Avalon (2004) with Diana L. Paxson
The
Ancestors of Avalon is the story of the priests and priestesses - the ancestors
in body and spirit of the characters who reappear in the other Avalon books
- who flee the destruction of Atlantis and take refuge in the mist-shrouded
isle of Britain. But once landed at Belerion the survivors are torn, do they
look north to the midlands and seek to lead the Wessex kings, or do they
explore the mystical Tor and reestablish their magical traditions within
a spiritual kingdom. It is they who teach the Neolithic inhabitants how to
move the mighty stones, and carve the spiral pathway around Glastonbury Tor
but can they survive the battle against each other.
Marion Zimmer Bradley's
Ravens of Avalon (2007) with Diana L. Paxson
Ravens
of Avalon
follows the journey of Boudica, a Celtic princess, and Lhiannon, a priestess
who is Boudica's mentor on the Druid isle. When the Romans conquer Britain,
Lhiannon fights them while Boudica is married to a king who has surrendered.
Theirs is a great love story, but when he dies, the Romans brutalize her
and her daughters. In rage, Boudica raises the British tribes and nearly succeeds
in driving the Romans from Britain, claiming a place in history. Lhiannon
survives and becomes the guardian of the Druid traditions in the new Roman
Britannia as high priestess of the Forest House.
Darkover
