Julian May was born on July 10, 1931. She writes under her own name and several pseudonyms including Lee N. Falconer and Ian Thorne. Her first published work, a short story entitled Dune Roller, appeared in 1951 under the name J. C. May. She sold one more short story entitled Star of Wonder in 1953 before taking a break from the science fiction field. Starting in 1954, she wrote thousands of science encyclopedia articles for Consolidated Book Publishers. After finishing that project, she wrote similar articles for two other encyclopedia publishers.
In 1957, she and her husband founded Publication Associates, a production and editorial service for small publishers. During this time, she wrote and edited two episodes of the Buck Rogers comic strip and a new Catholic catechism for Franciscan Herald Press. Between 1956 and 1981, she wrote more than 250 books for children and young adults. They were mostly non-fiction works dealing with the subjects of science, history, and short biographies of modern-day celebrities. She returned to the world of science fiction in the 1980s with such works as the Saga of Pliocene Exile and Galactic Milieu series.
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