appeared as a series of chapbooks, starting with
Cat Wings (1988) and ending with Wonderful
Alexander and the Cat Wings(1994). The cats have
the power to fly in these light fairy tales. More sig-
nificant is “Buffalo Gals, Won’t You Come Out
Tonight?” which won both the Hugo Award and
the World Fantasy Award, and “The Poacher”
(1993), an ingenious variation of the story of
Sleeping Beauty. Other notable short fantasies in-
clude “The Word of Unbinding” (1964), “Son of
the Dragon’s Daughter” (1981), “Gwilan’s Harp”
(1981), “A Ride on the Red Mare’s Back” (1992),
“In the Drought” (1994), and “Dragonfly” (1998).
Other than those listed above, Le Guin’s fantasy
and science fiction stories are not collected sepa-
rately, so almost all of her collections contain at
least a few of each. Le Guin is generally accepted
as one of the major contemporary science fiction
writers. Her influence in fantasy has been nearly as
strong, and she has established herself as a signifi-
cant voice in both fields.
Leiber, Fritz (1910–1992)
Fritz Leiber was one of the few writers who had sig-
nificant careers in science fiction, fantasy, and hor-
ror fiction and whose work remains popular in all
three. His fantasy is dominated by the FAFHRD AND
THE GRAY MOUSER SERIES, light-hearted sword and
sorcery stories featuring a pair of good-natured,
roguish thieves who battle evil men and evil magic.
The series is the only sword and sorcery fiction to
rival the popularity of the work of Robert E.
HOWARD, and it is certainly the most literate entry
in that subgenre.
Leiber wrote very little fantasy with other
characters, but his supernatural fiction is far more
varied. One of his favorite devices was to couple
his supernatural events with an ordinary, prosaic
object or activity. In “SMOKE GHOST” (1941), for
example, an evil entity takes its form from smog
and air pollution and hovers near smokestacks and
similar venues. Criminals are menaced by a
haunted pistol in “The Automatic Pistol” (1940).
Other superior early stories include “The Hound”
(1942), “Spider Mansion” (1942), “The Man Who
Never Grew Young” (1947), and “THE GIRL WITH
THE HUNGRY EYES” (1947). “A Bit of the Dark
World” (1962) is reminiscent of H. P. LOVECRAFT,
the story of an unexplained, alien intelligence that
manifests itself in our world. “The Man Who
Made Friends with Electricity” (1962), which title
literally describes what happens in the story, is a
sardonic fantasy whose prejudiced protagonist gets
his just deserts.
Many of Leiber’s stories read very much like
dark fairy tales. In “Gonna Roll the Bones” (1967)
a man addicted to gambling finds himself in a
deadly game with the devil himself. It won both
the Hugo and Nebula Awards. Although most of
Leiber’s collections mix horror with other genres,
several of them are predominantly supernatural,
including the classic Night’s Black Agents(1947),
Night Monsters(1969), Ghost Light(1984), and The
Black Gondolier and Other Stories(2001).
Leiber was also the author of one of the very
best novels about contemporary witchcraft, Con-
jure Wife(1952), which has been filmed at least
three times as Weird Woman(1944), Burn Witch
Burn(1961) and Witches’ Brew(1980). The novel
also juxtaposes magic with the mundane and famil-
iar. A successful college professor learns that his
wife has been guarding his life and career by means
of a number of magical spells. Although she insists
that she is a good witch and not a devil worshipper,
he forces her to give up what he considers a silly
superstition. Unfortunately, she turns out to be
right, and now that the elaborate balance of power
has been disrupted, all the rival witches married to
other members of the faculty begin to exact their
revenge, until he finally accepts the inevitable.
Our Lady of Darkness (1978) is a modern
ghost story. An ordinary businessman catches fleet-
ing glimpses of a ghastly apparition, an inhuman
creature dogging his footsteps, waiting in the shad-
ows and revealing itself only briefly before disap-
pearing. Since no one else can see it, everyone else
thinks he is hallucinating or losing his mind, and at
times the protagonist shares their opinion. Al-
though not as significant as Conjure Wife, the
novel is an unusually innovative and effective
ghost story. These two novels were published in a
single volume as Dark Ladies(1999). An early un-
published novel also appeared posthumously but is
well below Leiber’s usual standards. The Dealings of
Daniel Kesserich(1996) involves a semirationalized212 Leiber, Fritz