Norma Hemming
| Fan | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Norma Kathleen Hemming |
| Alias(es): | |
| Type: | fan writer, cosplayer, author |
| Fandoms: | science fiction |
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Norma Hemming (September 1928[note 1] - 4 July 1960) was a British-Australian science fiction fan and author of science fiction and romance novels.[1]
Hemming was born in Essex, England, and she migrated to Sydney with her family in October 1949. Researcher David Medlen (p. 3) speculates that she may have made her first professional writing sale before leaving England: "Loser Take All", published in Science Fantasy (Vol 1 No 3) in Winter 1951/52. [2]
Medlen also reports on the non-conventional nature of that story:
The first five pages of this story filled me with dread, not of the aliens, but of the hoary old chestnuts of science fiction being trotted out, of which Mike's "love talk" to the spaceship is especially nauseating. Hemming then turns this on its head. Within a few pages, assumed main character Mike has killed himself whilst destroying an alien base. Jane is revealed not to be the neglected love interest but the real heroine as the scientists race to create a weapon that will drive the aliens mad...The traditional triumphant ending to the Earth invasion story is discarded: there is no clear victory and the professor has prostituted his daughter for technology. (pp.3 & 4)[2]
Hemming "outed" herself as a female writer at the first Australian Science Fiction Convention in March 1952 (Medlen p. 4) and she later became heavily involved in fandom, fan politics, social events and publishing; even writing plays for science fiction conventions (Medlen p. 5).[2]
Under the name of N K Hemming, she published twenty science fiction stories during the 1950s, and under the name Nerina Hilliard, she wrote 8 romance stories for Mills & Boon.[3]
By the late 1950s she was suffering from breast cancer, which spread to her bones and lymph nodes. She died in the Peter MacCallum Clinic in Melbourne on 4 July 1960, at the age of 31. Five novels were published posthumously.[1]
The Norma K Hemming Award was named in her honour, first awarded in Aussiecon 4 in 2010.
Notes
- ^ David Medlen (p. 3) reports that she was born in 1927.