"Diana Wynne Jones has been writing speculative fiction for children for more than thirty years. A clear influence on more recent writers such as J.K. Rowling, her humorous and exciting stories of wizards' academies, dragons, and griffins - many published for children but read by all ages - are also complexly structured and thought provoking critiques of the fantasy tradition. This book is the first sustained study of Jones's work. Here, renowned science fiction critic and historian Farah Mendlesohn provides a comprehensive overview of Jones's oeuvre and examines her important critiques of the fantastic tradition's ideas about childhood and adolescence. This is essential reading for Jones's many admirers and a long overdue critical companion for students and scholars of children's literature."--Jacket.