Patricia "Patty" Aakhus (May 17, 1952 – May 16, 2012), also known by her maiden name and pseudonym Patricia McDowell, was an American novelist and director of International Studies at the

University of Southern Indiana The University of Southern Indiana (USI) is a public university just outside of Evansville, Indiana. Founded in 1965, USI enrolls 9,750 dual credit, undergraduate, graduate and doctoral students in more than 130 areas of study. USI offers program ...

.University of Southern Indiana
She specialized in Irish themes and won

Readercon Readercon is an annual science fiction convention, held every July in the Boston, Massachusetts area, in Burlington, Massachusetts. It was founded by Bob Colby and Eric Van in 1987 with the goal of focusing almost exclusively on science fiction/ ...

's Best Imaginative Literature Award in 1990 and the Cahill Award for ''The Voyage of Mael Duin's Curragh''.

Early life and education

McDowell was born in Los Angeles in 1952 to Lowell and Betsy (née Nichols) McDowell, both of whom preceded her in death, as did a brother, Mark. She earned a BA from the

University of California, Santa Cruz The University of California, Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz or UCSC) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Santa Cruz, California. It is one of the ten campuses in the University of California syste ...

, and an MFA from

Norwich University Norwich University – The Military College of Vermont is a private senior military college in Northfield, Vermont. It is the oldest private and senior military college in the United States and offers bachelor's and master's degrees on-campus ...

Career

Her debut novel, '' The Voyage of Mael Duin's Curragh,'' is a retelling of the Irish legend of ''

The Voyage of Máel Dúin ''The Voyage of Máel Dúin'' (Old Irish: ''Immram Maele Dúin'') is the tale of a sea voyage written in Old Irish around the end of the 1st millennium AD. The protagonist is Máel Dúin, the son of Ailill Edge-of-Battle, whose murder provides ...

''. Other publications include ''Astral Magic in the Renaissance: Gems, Poetry and Patronage of Lorenzo de' Medici.'' ''Magic, Ritual and Witchcraft'' and the short story ''The Spy''.

As educator

Aakhus was the Director of the Center for Interdisciplinary Studies and program director of International Studies at the

. She also taught classes on classical and world mythology, the history of magic, and international studies.

Death

She died from cancer in

Evansville, Indiana Evansville is a city in, and the county seat of, Vanderburgh County, Indiana, United States. The population was 118,414 at the 2020 census, making it the state's third-most populous city after Indianapolis and Fort Wayne, the largest city in ...

on May 16, 2012, the day before her 60th birthday. She was survived by her husband, two children, three siblings, and other members of her extended family. At that time, she was working on a contemporary novel, ''Dogtown''.

Bibliography

*''The Voyage of Mael Duin's Curragh'' (1990); *''Daughter of the Boyne'' (1992); *''The Sorrows of Tara'' (1995);

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Aakhus, Patricia 1952 births 2012 deaths University of California, Santa Cruz alumni University of Southern Indiana faculty Writers from Los Angeles 20th-century American novelists American humanities academics Norwich University alumni Deaths from cancer in Indiana American women novelists 20th-century American women writers Novelists from Indiana American women academics 21st-century American women writers