[[quoteright:200:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/dianeduane_9307.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:200:"I write."]]
->''"There is a rule for fantasy writers: The more truth you mix in with a lie, the stronger it gets."''

[[http://www.dianeduane.com/ Diane Duane]] (born May 18, 1952) is an American fantasy and science-fiction author now living in UsefulNotes/{{Ireland}}. She was born in 1952, was first published in 1979, and has been writing sci-fi and speculative fiction almost continuously ever since. She has written in a ''lot'' of different universes.

[[folder:Works]]
* The ''Literature/YoungWizards'' multiverse. Set in the modern-day, the series details the adventures of Nita Callahan and Kit Rodigruez, who are chosen by the PowersThatBe to become wizards and to help fight the Lone Power, creator of entropy, death, and most of the evil in the multiverse. Spells are worked through [[LanguageOfMagic the Speech]], which is essentially the language in which the multiverse is "programmed". Heavily influenced by real world science and science fiction; spells, for example [[FunctionalMagic have to obey various scientific principles]], most notably the laws of thermodynamics. Due to its multi-universal nature, the Young Wizards 'verse has connections to many of Duane's other works. Infamous in its fandom for a tendency to grab you by the heart and ''squeeze''.
** Feline Wizards trilogy (including ''The Book of Night With Moon'', ''To Visit The Queen'' (A.K.A ''On Her Majesty's Wizardly Service'' in the U.K.) and ''The Big Meow'' (e-book only)). Same 'verse, different protagonists. Centers around a team of cats who maintain the worldgates (wizardly mass transit system).
* ''Stealing the Elf-King's Roses'': Series/{{CSI}} meets UrbanFantasy. In an alternate-universe Los Angeles, psychic forensics expert Lee Enfield and her feyhound partner Gelert are called in to investigate the murder of an elf and find themselves pulled into a multi-national, multi-universe conspiracy involving the secrets of the Elven realm, Alfheim.
* ''Omnitopia Dawn'': First in a projected series, this book describes a financial and electronic war against the perfect MMORPG.
* ''Literature/TheTaleOfTheFive'': Duane's first series, still unfinished. A fantasy series with unconventional ideas about human relationships and sexuality.
* ''Franchise/StarTrek'': In addition to writing several comics and part of a ''[[Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration TNG]]'' episode, Duane has written a number of Star Trek novels; these are generally regarded as among the best of the best by fans, although they occasionally contradict canon established in later books and films.
** ''The Wounded Sky'', an exploration of what happens when time no longer exists and a hole is ripped in the fabric of the universe. So, pretty much business as usual. What really put it on the map is that it also explores the true essence of the ''Enterprise'' crew.
** ''Literature/SpocksWorld'', about the history of Vulcan and its possible secession from the Federation. Also, [=McCoy=] giving the entire Vulcan race a verbal spanking.
** ''Doctor's Orders'': what happens when [=McCoy=] is left in command of the Enterprise. (Answer: [[HilarityEnsues hilarity]]. And a little bit of heartwarming.)
** The ''Literature/{{Rihannsu}}'' series, which delves even more in-depth into Romulan and Vulcan culture, and is generally the foundation for fanon concerning said species.
** ''Dark Mirror'', in which the ''Enterprise''-D is abducted by the MirrorUniverse. Later contradicted by Deep Space Nine which established that the Terran Empire had fallen after Mirror-Spock tried to reform it.
** ''Intellivore'', regarding a mobile soul-eating planet which is even more terrifying than it sounds.
* The ''Harbinger'' trilogy, for the ''TabletopGame/StarDrive'' RPG 'verse.
* ''Spider-Man: The Venom Factor'', a trilogy of ''ComicBook/SpiderMan'' books.
* Three ''Space Cops'' books, written with her husband, Peter Morwood.
* Seven ''Literature/NetForce'' books, co-authored with Creator/TomClancy.
* And finally, a hefty pile of short stories, comic books, TV episodes, and one-off novels.
[[/folder]]

Diane Duane has edited this wiki several times and is very kind to fans (whom she will answer personally). She's also a member of fandom herself, particularly ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'', for which she has written the occasional fanfic. She has even written [[http://dduane.tumblr.com/youngwizards-30-day-otp-challenge a series of fanfics]] of her ''Young Wizards'' series, wherein she appears as herself and converses about its canonicity with the characters. She [[LineToGod can be found on]] [[http://twitter.com/dduane Twitter]], [[http://dduane.tumblr.com Tumblr]], [[https://dianeduane.dreamwidth.org/ Dreamwidth]], and on [[https://www.youngwizardsforums.com/member/129-diane-duane the Young Wizards forums]], among other places.

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!!Works by Diane Duane with their own trope pages include:
[[index]]
* ''Literature/DoctorsOrders''
* ''Literature/{{Rihannsu}}''
* ''Literature/SpiderManTheVenomTrilogy''
* ''Literature/SpocksWorld''
* Recap/StarTrekTheNextGenerationS1E5WhereNoOneHasGoneBefore
* ''Literature/TheTaleOfTheFive''
* ''VideoGame/WingCommanderPrivateer'': She wrote the screenplay for Privateer 2.
* ''Literature/TheWoundedSky''
* ''Literature/YoungWizards''
** ''Literature/FelineWizards''
[[/index]]
!!Tropes included in her Franchise/StarTrek novels:
* AbstractEater: The antagonists in ''Intellivore'', the Iruhe, eat the minds of sentient beings, leaving only breathing but mindless bodies. The Iruhe also ate the crews of several of the Romulan ships that left Vulcan in ''Literature/{{Rihannsu}}''.
* AgonyBeam: ''Dark Mirror'' has the TNG crew encounter the MirrorUniverse from the Original Series episode "Mirror, Mirror", along with the agony booth and agonizers the mirror-Federation used to keep people in line. In the mirror universe, Troi's role as "ship's counselor" involves her using the agony booth a lot and the crew's agonizers take the place of combadges. It's even pointed out how the "old" agonizers were inefficient, brute instruments while the modern version is specifically designed to attack the wearer's most sensitive nerves.
* [[TheAllegedCar The Alleged Starship]]: Klingons build good guns, but their main interest in starships is in blowing them up...
* AuthorAppeal: She seems to have something of a soft spot for [=McCoy=].
* TheCameo: The [[Series/DoctorWho Fifth Doctor]].
* CoolStarship: The Mirror Enterprise-D may be an overweaponed galactic atrocity machine, but you have to admit it's seriously badass. Even prime-Geordi has a small {{Nerdgasm}} when he checks out their gigantic Main Engineering.
* DeadlyDoctor: Mirror-Crusher's specialty is CruelAndUnusualDeath by time-released viruses.
* TheDreaded: Bad enough that Mirror-Troi is ThePoliticalOfficer of the Terran Empire, but then there's the MindRape...
* EarWorm: Exploited example in ''Dark Mirror''. Songs that stick in your head are the perfect PsychicStatic defense against evil nosy Betazoids...
* EatDirtCheap: Naraht, the Horta.
* EvilCannotComprehendGood: A major factor in the foiling of the Imperials' plans in ''Dark Mirror''. Lampshaded in their final exchange with each other:
-->The [[MirrorUniverse other Picard]] did not rage or fume or anything else: he sat coolly and looked at his counterpart. "I don't understand you, Captain. I am offering you a chance to survive."\\
"There are more important things than survival," Picard said very softly. "And no, you do not understand us.\\
"May we never so change that you do."
* GeniusLoci: The planet in ''Intellivore''.
* {{Jossed}}: As published novels, Duane's books are considered "soft canon", but elements of them have been discredited by later onscreen revelations. Notably, her deep and nuanced portrayal of the Romulans was very popular among readers, but was disliked by [[WordOfGod Gene Roddenberry]], who felt she had strayed too far from his original vision. ''Dark Mirror'' was completely jossed from the foundational level as soon as the Mirror Universe was brought back in ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine.''[[note]]Duane wrote ''Dark Mirror'' with Mirror Spock's attempted reforms completely failing and only succeeding in delaying the collapse of the Empire, while [=DS9=] was based on the concept that his reforms actually caused the entire Empire to be conquered by its former slaves- who were then just as bad.[[/note]]
* HeavyWorlder: The various [[StarfishAliens Denebian species]] are all built short and so massive that Starfleet builds special supersized ships for them - notably, the USS ''Inaieu''.
* HumansThroughAlienEyes
* InstantAIJustAddWater: Spock boosted the ''Enterprise'' Rec Room computer with a few too many upgrades, and now she's fully sentient. [[AIIsACrapshoot Thank God]] [[AvertedTrope she's lovely.]]
* NeverWasThisUniverse: In ''Dark Mirror'', Captain Picard studies his counterpart's library in an attempt to find a divergence point between their universes. After finding some truly horrifying variations on Shakespeare[[note]]Portia's line in ''Theatre/TheMerchantOfVenice'' was changed to "The quality of mercy must be '''earned'''", and Shylock gets his pound of flesh because she says the blood can be considered interest[[/note]] and Homer, he considers taking a look at the Bible... and decides it's better left alone. Turns out the universe has been dark from the beginning.
** Also doubles as DifferentWorldDifferentMovies.
* OverlyLongName: Commander [[SapientCetaceans Hwiii ih'iie-uUlak!ha']]. Mercifully, he shortens it to "Hwiii".
* PlanetKiller: What Geordi whipped up in ''Intellivore'' to kill the mind-eating planet (natch)
* PsychicStatic:
** Used by Picard to hide things from Mirror Troi in ''Dark Mirror''
** Also used twice over in ''Intellivore'', by Picard and another captain on their quest to destroy the Intellivore. One involves the conventional kind of static, while the other involves hooking Data up to the ''Enterprise'' computer and [[ItMakesSenseInContext putting everyone else on the ship to sleep]].
* SapientCetaceans: ''Dark Mirror'' involves an alien race that's essentially dolphins [-IN SPACE!-] (They're not related to the whales [-IN SPACE-] from ''Star Trek IV''.) ''Literature/YoungWizards'' also features Cetacean wizards (the Trek novel contains a ShoutOut to them). Of course, pretty much everyone and everything with more brains than a sponge has Wizarding potential in this setting.
* ShownTheirWork: It's truly surprising how much a reader can learn about astronomy from her books, not to mention various [[InfoDump fictional treatises]] on the histories of Vulcan, the Romulan Star Empire, and the Alpha Quadrant, just to name a few.
* SleptThroughTheApocalypse: In ''Intellivore'', the titular being eats the minds of everyone on the starship ''Oraidhe''... except for one guy who was in a coma, and thus couldn't be eaten. This is key to the ''Enterprise''[='=]s plan to destroy it.
* SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism: Generally far into Idealism territory, but she justifies it with unflinching exploration of death, redemption, and the cost of doing good.
* SignatureStyle: Aliens with unpronounceable names, PlanetOfHats being subverted with cheerful abandon, and [=McCoy=] being ''awesome''.
* SomeCallMeTim: In ''Dark Mirror'', the [[SapientCetaceans Delphine]] scientist Hwiii ie'ee u-Ulak! ha'. It's pronounced "Wheee!"
* StarfishAliens: A number of examples, most of whom are in the ''Enterprise'' crew. And the Denebian starship ''Inaeiu'', which is a supersized ''Constitution''-class ship with four warp engines crewed entirely by StarfishAliens.
* {{Stripperiffic}}: MirrorUniverse officer uniforms. Geordi and Deanna are less than impressed (although O'Brien, who doesn't have to wear one, is amused).

!!Tropes in her other novels include:

* AdmiringTheAbomination: In Diane Duane's ''VideoGame/XCOMUFODefense'' novel, one of the base scientists talks admiringly about the biology of the Ethereal aliens, to the point of suggesting that humans could modify their own genetics in similar ways.
* BangBangBang: Lampshaded in one of Diane Duane's Spider-Man novels; Spidey comments that real gunfire sounds nothing like it does in the movies, and fills in his own descriptions of the actual sounds, such as "rulers being smacked on a desk."
* CrapsackOnlyByComparison: "Stealing the Elf-King's Roses" has a significant -- but incredibly spoilerish -- example.
* DartboardOfHate: In Diane Duane's ''VideoGame/XCOMUFODefense'' novelization, base commander Jonelle Barrett relieves stress with one of these, featuring her thoroughly incompetent predecessor.
* FantasticDrug: The first book of the ''Space Cops'' series, "Mindblast", is centered around the spread of Hyper 2, an intelligence enhancing (and lethal) drug, complete with full chemical name and a lengthy description of how the drug worked. Cue heartbreak when the heroes discover that the man who created the drug wasn't some sleazy dealer, [[spoiler:he had been trying to research a cure for his mentally retarded daughter]].
* FisherKing: In ''Stealing The Elf-King's Roses'', the position of the Laurin, the King of All Elves, turns out to be something like this. The world of Alfheim has a will of its own, and the title of the Laurin must be held by an Alfen who possesses a strong enough command of "worldmastery" to understand that they are a servant to that will rather than the master of it. A good bit of the plot is set into motion by the current Laurin's fear of what would happen if the people of other worlds succeeded in invading Alfheim and wiping out the Alfen without any understanding of worldmastery, and the resolution of the storyline hings on the fact that, as the Laurin himself states, "As I go, so go my people."
* GeniusSerum: ''Mindblast'' is centered around a FantasticDrug which increases one's intelligence... [[ExplosiveOverclocking until it kills you, that is]].
* KickTheDog: Near the beginning of ''Omnitopia Dawn'', we are introduced to Delia Harrington, an investigative reporter. She's just been assigned to do a story on Dev Logan, another of the book's main characters, and she's certain that the incredibly positive reputation he and his company have acquired must be a sham. ''Okay,'' we think, ''she's a reporter: ferreting out the darker parts of human nature and bringing them to light is part of her job.'' It's not until she rolls down her window and yells ''"Idiot!"'' at someone in traffic that we realize that this is ''not'' intended to be a sympathetic character.
* LandOfFaerie: In ''Stealing the Elf-King's Roses'', it is called Alfheim and an AlternateUniverse version of Earth, but not medieval at all. Actually, of all the seven known parallel universe earths, Alfheim is one of the two most technologically advanced ones next to Xaihon.
* MeaningfulName: Dev Logan (from ''Omnitopia Dawn''). "Dev" in an MMO context usually stands for "Developer".
* MuggingTheMonster: In ''Spider-Man: The Octopus Agenda'', three punks try to assault Venom with switchblades. It doesn't go so well for them.
* NeverMyFault: Zigzagged with Phil Sorensen, the antagonist of ''Omnitopia: Dawn''. He fully acknowledges that the [[WeUsedToBeFriends huge, friendship-ending fight]] between him and Dev was entirely the result of his financial screw-up, and that said financial screw-up was also entirely his own fault. But he's ''convinced'' that he was right in general, and that they haven't made up because Dev refuses to see reason and acknowledge that.
* OutOfCharacterAlert: In the Space Cops novel ''High Moon'', the bad guys fake a message from the protagonists' superior officer to get them out of the way. They're briefly deceived, but then notice that it's signed in a nonstandard way, the routing makes no sense, and most importantly that this message from their cost-focused boss doesn't say a thing about the expensive reward they just authorized.
* PoweredArmor (in the ''Space Cops'' series)
* SlidingScaleOfIdealismVersusCynicism: Invoked in ''Stealing the Elf-King's Roses'', which was written right after 9/11. A major plot point is that [[spoiler:a group of parallel universes discovers ''our'' universe, and we're '''much''' further down the scale than they are. This is incredibly disturbing from their point of view.]]
* {{Tykebomb}}: [[spoiler:Jacob Ricel]] in the ''Harbinger Trilogy''. Just to make things more fun, he's actually [[spoiler:one of several clone siblings raised together by the evil corporate star nation]].
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