This imaginative female writer established herself as a novelist, writing in genres from fantasy to detective fiction to Westerns before segueing to creating mostly male-oriented films. Leigh Brackett often collaborated with Howard Hawks, notably on the superb film noir "The Big Sleep" (1946) and the cycle of excellent Westerns that began with "Rio Bravo" (1958) and ended with "Rio Lobo" (1970). Although her first released film was "The Vampire's Ghost" (1945), for which she provided the story and screenplay, Brackett received her first real notice for "The Big Sleep", adapted from Raymond