Anne McCaffrey (Handout)

Sci-fi author Anne McCaffrey has passed away. She was 85.

The celebrated writer died at her home in County Wicklow, Ireland on Monday after suffering a stroke.

McCaffrey, born in Massachusetts, trained as an actress and a singer before she started writing science fiction for adults.

Her biggest work came in 1968 when she wrote Dragonflight, which kickstarted a series of books under the Dragonriders mantle, which were written over four decades and comprised of more than 20 novels.

She won several awards for the works, with The White Dragon book becoming one of the first sci-fi novels to appear on the New York Times Best Seller List. She was made a Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America in 2005 and was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2006.