Mary Stewart (1916-2014)

Author Mary Stewart, 97, died May 9, 2014 at home in Loch Awe Scotland.

Stewart is best known for her Merlin series of Arthurian fantasy novels: Mythopoeic Award winners The Crystal Cave (1970) and The Hollow Hills (1973), and The Last Enchantment (1979). Related Arthurian novels include The Wicked Day (1983) and The Prince and the Pilgrim (1995), and other novels with speculative elements include Touch Not the Cat (1976), A Walk in Wolf Wood (1980), and Thornyhold (1988). She was also well known for her suspenseful romance novels, publishing over 20 books in all. Her last novel was Rose Cottage (1997). 

Mary Florence Elinor Rainbow was born September 17, 1916 in Sunderland England, and attended Durham University, graduating in 1938 with a bachelors, and earning a MA in 1941. She went on to teach English there through 1956. She was predeceased by husband Sir Frederick H. Stewart in 2001.

See the June issue of Locus for a complete obituary.