Edna Mayne Hull was a science fiction

Science fiction

Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...

 writer

Writer

A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....

 who published under the name E. Mayne Hull. She was the first wife of A. E. van Vogt

A. E. van Vogt

Alfred Elton van Vogt was a Canadian-born science fiction author regarded by some as one of the most popular and complex science fiction writers of the mid-twentieth century: the "Golden Age" of the genre....

, also a science fiction writer.

She was born in Brandon, Manitoba

Brandon, Manitoba

Brandon is the second largest city in Manitoba, Canada, and is located in the southwestern area of the province. Brandon is the largest city in the Westman region of Manitoba. The city is located along the Assiniboine River. Spruce Woods Provincial Park and CFB Shilo are a relatively short distance...

. After working as a private secretary in Alberta

Alberta

Alberta is a province of Canada. It had an estimated population of 3.7 million in 2010 making it the most populous of Canada's three prairie provinces...

, she moved back to Winnipeg

Winnipeg

Winnipeg is the capital and largest city of Manitoba, Canada, and is the primary municipality of the Winnipeg Capital Region, with more than half of Manitoba's population. It is located near the longitudinal centre of North America, at the confluence of the Red and Assiniboine Rivers .The name...

, where she met her future husband. Hull and van Vogt got married on May 9, 1939, shortly before his first story "Black Destroyer" was published. For most of her husband's writing

Writing

Writing is the representation of language in a textual medium through the use of a set of signs or symbols . It is distinguished from illustration, such as cave drawing and painting, and non-symbolic preservation of language via non-textual media, such as magnetic tape audio.Writing most likely...

 career, Hull was his typist. After typing out many of his stories

Narrative

A narrative is a constructive format that describes a sequence of non-fictional or fictional events. The word derives from the Latin verb narrare, "to recount", and is related to the adjective gnarus, "knowing" or "skilled"...

 in the early 1940s, she began to get ideas for her own. Under her husband's guidance, she wrote several stories and one novel, all of which appeared in Astounding Science Fiction and Unknown Worlds

Unknown (magazine)

Unknown was an American pulp fantasy fiction magazine, published from 1939 to 1943 by Street & Smith, and edited by John W. Campbell. Unknown was a companion to Street & Smith's science fiction pulp, Astounding Science Fiction, which was also edited by Campbell at the time; many authors and...

. It has been claimed, however, that all of her fiction was actually penned by her husband.

Hull died of cancer

Cancer

Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...

on January 20, 1975.

Novels

• Planets for Sale (1954, with A.E. van Vogt)
• The Winged Man (1966, with A.E. van Vogt)

Short fiction

• "Abdication", with A.E. van Vogt
• "Bankruptcy Proceedings"
• "Competition"
• "The Contract"
• "The Debt"
• "Enter the Professor"
• "The Patient"
• "Planets for Sale", with A.E. van Vogt
• "Rebirth: Earth", with A.E. van Vogt
• "The Ultimate Wish"
• "The Wellwisher"
• "The Wishes We Make"

External links