Science-fiction enthusiasts know James Tiptree, Jr. as a remarkable, energetic, and inventive storyteller who burst onto the scene in the late '60s with a series of stories that helped define the genre. His tales explored the role of sexuality and gender, and although told from a man's point of view, they were often sympathetic to women. Tiptree carried on lengthy correspondences with editors, as well as other sci-fi heavyweights (notably Philip K. Dick and Ursula K. LeGuin), none of whom had ever met Tiptree in person. Then, in 1976, James Tiptree, Jr. was revealed to be a 61-year-old woman named Alice B. Sheldon who lived in rural Virginia.

Julie Phillips' new book, James Tiptree, Jr.: The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon, is a thoroughly engaging look at the life of this remarkable woman. This compelling biography follows Sheldon's long and meandering life and searches for the psychological roots of the Tiptree persona that she created. Phillips tells how Sheldon was waltzed around Africa and India by her explorer parents at the age of six, and then had a briefly successful career as a painter before joining the military, during World War II, in one of the few female brigades. She worked for the CIA, married an older operative, quit to run a chicken farm, received a Ph.D. in psychology, and finally began writing under the pseudonym James Tiptree, Jr. — a name she stole off a jam jar.

Through all of her many careers and identities, it is clear (from Phillips' telling) that Sheldon suffered some degree of manic depression and quite a bit of frustration about her role as an intelligent, beautiful, and sexual woman in mid-20th-century America. Sheldon clearly struggled against the societal constraints on what it meant to be a woman, and Phillips suggests that, in another era, Sheldon might have been a lesbian or a transsexual. It is also possible she would have eventually received medication for her bipolar disorder, had she not killed herself, at the age of 72, in a murder-suicide pact with her husband.

The beauty of The Double Life is that Phillips doesn't presume to answer any of the questions about what Alice Sheldon may or may not have been. Instead, the author lets Sheldon speak for herself, giving readers space to draw their own conclusions. With obvious love and respect, and ample genius of her own, Julie Philips has produced a definitive biography that honors its subject in every way.

-Sage Van Wing