Mildred Downey Broxon

US writer, raised in Brazil, who began publishing work of fantasy interest with "Asclepius Has Paws" for Clarion III (anth 1973) ed Robin Scott Wilson. Her first novel, Eric Brighteyes 2: A Witch's Welcome * (1979) as by Sigfridur Skaldaspillir, is a sequel to H Rider Haggard's Eric Brighteyes (1891), and carries on from the doom-laden concluding passages of that book: the Witch who has caused the deaths of the cast carries them off in a longboat towards outcomes MDB saw a chance to explicate. The Demon of Scattery (1979) with Poul Anderson is minor--a Dragon is called upon to save 9th-century Ireland from Vikings--but Too Long a Sacrifice (1981) more ambitiously attempts to universalize the conflict between Protestant and Catholic in Ireland in a tale whose 6th-century protagonists have been transformed into Sleepers Under the Hill, and who awaken in Ireland in the current time of Troubles. They have Talents, and are Avatars of figures from Celtic mythology, the woman "representing" the Goddess of summer and the man Herne the Hunter. The present age is shown in terms of Thinning; and the female protagonist becomes an agent of the Healing necessary for the world to survive. MDB rarely fails of seriousness of purpose, but has demonstrated only a modest capacity at the crafting of storylines capable of bearing her intentions. From SFE