author
Pauline Ashwell
1928–2015
A British science fiction writer who began publishing as a teenager, she built a career around witty, idea-rich stories and later returned to the field with a fresh burst of work. Her fiction is especially remembered for the Lizzie Lee stories, gathered in Unwillingly to Earth.
1 Audiobook
The Lost Kafoozalum
by Pauline Ashwell
About the author
Pauline Ashwell was the pen name of British writer Pauline Whitby, who also published as Paul Ashwell and Paul Ash. Sources agree that she was born in Hertfordshire and died on November 23, 2015. Her pen names came from Ashwell, Hertfordshire, near Hatfield, where she was born.
She started early: her first book, Little Red Steamer, appeared in 1941, and her first science fiction story, "Invasion from Venus," was published in 1942 when she was still in her teens. Science fiction editor John W. Campbell Jr. later published her breakthrough story, "Unwillingly to School," in Astounding Science Fiction in 1958, helping introduce one of her best-known characters, Lysistrata "Lizzie" Lee.
Ashwell earned Hugo nominations for Best New Author and for her work in shorter fiction, including "Unwillingly to School" and "The Lost Kafoozalum." After a long quiet period, she returned with new stories in Analog during the 1980s and 1990s, and her Lizzie Lee stories were eventually collected in the 1992 fix-up novel Unwillingly to Earth.