GASKELL, Jane

   Working name of UK writer Jane Gaskell Lynch (1941-), whose dozen books include Strange Evil (1957), herfirst, written when she was 14; it features fairies from another world, claustrophobic conflicts in that world, and an aura of Gothic pubescence throughout. King's Daughter (1958) is set in ancient ATLANTIS, where a cache of even more ancient nerve gas is discovered; the book is remotely connected, through a shared character, with the Cija sequence of Atlantean tales - The Serpent (1963; vt in 2 vols The Serpent 1975 and The Dragon 1975), Atlan (1965), The City (1966) and Some Summer Lands (1977). The non-Atlantean Princess Cija is involved, via forced marriage, in complex conflicts between northern forces and the quasihuman dwellers of the island state. As things fall apart, sex and sorcery abound, but the princess eventually reaches home again. In genre terms the series uneasily marries sf and the popular romance; it is full of vigorous and exuberant invention and occasionally overheated prose. The Shiny Narrow Grin (1964) is a comedy about vampires. A Sweet Sweet Summer(1969) scathingly exposes an anarchic NEAR FUTURE England to the gaze of invading extraterrestrials. Sun Bubble (1990) has elements of fantasy.

   JC