She began publishing work of genre interest with "The" "Betrothed" (1968), a short story privately printed by a friend, but started her career proper with several Children's Fantasies. Of these, The Dragon Hoard (1971), her first novel, is a comic fantasy, in which an affronted Enchantress compels the Quest-ridden protagonist to shapeshift humiliatingly into a raven at unpredictable moments. Princess Hynchatti & Some Other Surprises (collection of linked stories in 1972) puts its cast through various travails. In Companions on the Road (1975) the Companions are the Villains, a trio of hellish Revenants who kill through their control of Dreams as they search for the holders of a magic chalice. The Winter Players (1976) – assembled with the previous book as "Companions on the Road and The Winter Players: Two Novellas" (1977) – dramatizes the interaction between a young woman and the Accursed Wanderer whom she ultimately redeems. Even in these early works, several characteristic motifs dominate: the Rite of Passage whereby a young protagonist comes to terms – often via Metamorphosis – with his or her extraordinary nature, and strives for Balance in a riven world; vivid, but indeterminate, landscapes serving as almost interchangeable backdrops for psychic dramas; and a fine indifference to any moralistic settling of scores, her tales tending to close with Good and Evil characters settling into uneasy equipoise.