{{short description|American novelist}} {{more citations needed|date=July 2015}} {{Use dmy dates|date=January 2020}} {{infobox writer |name=Ann Downer |birth_date={{birth date|1960|11|28}} |birth_place=Arlington, Virginia, U.S. |death_date={{death date and age|2015|11|19|1960|11|28}} |death_place=Boston, Massachusetts, U.S. |occupation=Writer |genre=Fantasy literature }} '''Ann Downer''' (November 28, 1960 – November 19, 2015) was an American writer, principally of fantasy novels for children and young adults, as well as short fiction and poetry.

== Biography ==

Ann Downer was born in Arlington, Virginia in 1960 and grew up in Manila and Bangkok and recalled avidly reading fantasy fiction.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://authors.simonandschuster.com/Ann-Downer/1682683/biography |title=Ann Downer: Biography |accessdate=3 March 2010 |publisher=Simon and Schuster |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20091223132613/http://authors.simonandschuster.com/Ann-Downer/1682683/biography |archivedate=23 December 2009 }}</ref>

Her first published work was a trilogy published in the late 1980s and early 1990s (''The Spellkey'', ''The Glass Salamander'', and ''The Books of the Keepers''), collected in a revised edition in 1995 as ''The Spellkey Trilogy''. A second series for middle-grade readers, begun in 2003 with the novel ''Hatching Magic'', continues with ''The Dragon of Never-Was'' (2006). The Spellkey series is high fantasy, taking place wholly in an invented world and chronicling a good-versus-evil story of two foundlings, a stableboy and an ostracized seer. ''Hatching Magic'' and its sequel, ''The Dragon of Never-Was'', are contemporary fantasies with elements of time travel. The series follows a young girl, Theodora Oglethorpe, as she discovers a world of wizardry and magic. While Downer's books are frequently compared to the work of Patricia A. McKillip and Diana Wynne Jones,{{Citation needed|date=April 2010}} she has cited the influence of Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea books and the Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander in shaping her outlook and prose style.{{Citation needed|date=February 2011}}

She was diagnosed with ALS in 2014 and died on 19 November 2015 in Boston, MA.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/wickedlocal-somerville/obituary.aspx?pid=176716674|title=Ann Downer-Hazell|work=The Somerville Journal}}</ref>

== Bibliography == '''Spellkey series''' *''The Spellkey'' (1987), jacket by Caldecott-medal winner David Wiesner, also a UK paperback edition from Futura/Macmillan. *''The Glass Salamander'' (1989), jacket by Caldecott-medal winner David Wiesner *''The Books of the Keepers'' (1993)

All three books were collected into a paperback omnibus edition, ''The Spellkey Trilogy'', published by Baen Books in 1995.

'''Hatching Magic series''' U.S. edition jackets by Omar Rayyan *''Hatching Magic'' (2003; Scholastic Book Club selection; translated into German, Czech, Dutch, Italian, Portuguese, Polish, Thai, and Spanish; additional languages pending) *''The Dragon of Never-Was'' (2006)

'''Other Fiction''' *"Somnus’s Fair Maid" (short-listed for the James Tiptree Jr. prize), a Regency retelling of the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale, in ''Black Thorn, White Rose'', edited by Terri Windling and Ellen Datlow *Short stories and poetry in Gargoyle Magazine in the late 1980s, including excerpts from an unpublished novel. *"Bread-and-Butterflies" in ''Alice Redux'' (2006), a collection of short fiction inspired by Lewis Carroll and edited by Richard Peabody.

== References == {{Reflist}}

== External links == *[https://web.archive.org/web/20061004082542/http://anndowner.com/ Author blog] *[http://www.fantasticfiction.co.uk/d/ann-downer/ Bibliography on fantasticfiction.co.uk] *{{ISFDB name|id=Ann_Downer|name=Ann Downer}} {{Portal|Children and Young Adult Literature}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Downer, Ann}} Category:1960 births Category:2015 deaths Category:20th-century American novelists Category:21st-century American novelists Category:American fantasy writers Category:American children's writers Category:Smith College alumni Category:Harvard University staff Category:American women children's writers Category:American women science fiction and fantasy writers Category:20th-century American women novelists Category:21st-century American women novelists Category:Deaths from motor neuron disease in Massachusetts