RIP, Mary Rosenblum
I’m sad to learn that Mary Rosenblum has died.
I think she was recently best-known as a mystery writer, under the name Mary Freeman, but I was most familiar with her Drylands series, about a future Pacific Northwest with very little water. I particularly liked the first story in that series, “Water Bringer.” The whole series (three stories and a novel) is available in a single volume as Water Rites (link is to iBooks version).
Her bibliography makes clear that there’s a lot of her sf that I haven’t read. I should rectify that.
I met her once at a convention, sometime in the ’90s. I told her how much I liked the Drylands stories, and asked if it was okay with her if I used the setting in a roleplaying game (not for publication, just for playing with friends). She was gracious and friendly, and said that was fine, and told me that the possibility of the PNW running out of water wasn’t nearly as far-fetched as it might sound. I thought of her when I learned of Washington’s drought a couple years back.
Anyway, I’m sad that she’s gone.