Melanie Tem (1949-2015)

Author Melanie Tem, 65, died February 9, 2015 of cancer.

Tem’s debut novel Prodigal (1991) was the winner of a Bram Stoker Award, and in 1992 she won the Icarus award for most promising newcomer, presented by the British Fantasy Society. Novella “The Man on the Ceiling” (2000), co-written with her husband Steve Rasnic Tem, won a World Fantasy Award, a Bram Stoker Award, and an International Horror Guild Award. They expanded it into a novel in 2008, and in that form it was a finalist for the Shirley Jackson Award. They also collaborated on novel Daughters (2001), numerous works of short fiction, and multimedia collection Imagination Box (2001), a Bram Stoker Award winner and International Horror Guild Award finalist.

Tem’s novel Desmodus (1996) was longlisted for the James Tiptree, Jr. Memorial Award. She wrote over a dozen novels in all, including Blood Moon (1992), The Wilding (1992), Revenant (1994), Tides (1996), Black River (1997), Slain in the Spirit (2002), The Deceiver (2003), and The Yellow Wood (2015). With Nancy Holder she wrote Making Love (1995) and Witch-Light (1996). Some of her solo short work is collected in The Ice Downstream (2001), while her collaborations with her husband are gathered in  In Concert (2010). A new collection, Singularities, is forthcoming this year. Tem was also a published poet, a gifted oral storyteller, and a playwright.

Melanie Kubachko was born April 11, 1949 and grew up in Saegertown PA. She attended Allegheny College as an undergrad, and earned her master’s in social work at the University of Denver in Colorado. When she and Steve Rasnic married, they took the joint surname Tem.

She developed breast cancer in 1997; two years ago it recurred, and metastasized to her bones, bone marrow, and organs. She is survived by Steve, her husband of 35 years; four children; and six grandchildren.

See the March issue of Locus for a complete obituary.