More feared than the deadly green snakes, the hideous red beetles of that outpost of Earth Empire, was the winged dragon-queen of Jupiter and her white Legions of Doom. Leigh Brackett was the undisputed Queen of Space Opera and the first woman to be nominated for the coveted Hugo Award. She wrote short stories, novels, and scripts for Hollywood. She wrote the first draft of The Empire Strikes Back shortly before her death in 1978.