Greater Than Gods and Trysts in Time

Catherine Lucille Moore (1911 - 1987) was an American science fiction and fantasy writer, who most often used the pen name C. L. Moore. She was among the first women to write in either genre. Moore's work paved the way for many other female speculative fiction writers. She and her first husband Henry Kuttner were prolific co-authors under their own names and several pseudonyms. The Vagabond, a student-run magazine at Indiana University, published three of her stories when she was a student there and her first professional sales appeared in pulp magazines during the mid-1930s, including two significant series in Weird Tales, then edited by Farnsworth Wright. One features the rogue and adventurer Northwest Smith wandering through the Solar System; the other features the swordswoman/warrior Jirel of Joiry, one of the first female protagonists in sword-and-sorcery fiction. Both series are sometimes named for their lead characters. One of the Northwest Smith stories, Nymph of Darkness, was written in collaboration with Forrest J Ackerman. The most famous Northwest Smith story is Shambleau, which was also Moore's first professional sale. It originally appeared in the November 1933 issue of Weird Tales, netting her $100 and later becoming a popular anthology reprint. Her most famous Jirel story is also the first one, Black God's Kiss, which was the cover story in the October 1934 issue of Weird Tales, subtitled the weirdest story ever told. Moore's early stories were notable for their emphasis on the senses and emotions, which was unusual in genre fiction at the time.