Melanie Tem

Melanie Tem (née Kubachko; April 11, 1949 – February 9, 2015) was an American horror and dark fantasy author.

Melanie Kubachko grew up in Saegertown, Pennsylvania. She attended Allegheny College as an undergrad, and earned her master’s in social work at the University of Denver in Colorado.

She married Steve Rasnic and the couple took the joint surname Tem. She developed breast cancer in 1997. In 2013, it recurred, and metastasized to her bones, bone marrow, and organs. She died at age 65 on February 9, 2015. She is survived by her husband, Steve Rasnic Tem, four children and six grandchildren.

Personal Life

Melanie Tem met her husband, Steve Rasnic Tem, at a writer’s workshop and they were married for 35 years . Tem also mentored students through critiquing and private workshops . When Tem wasn’t writing, she worked as a social worker and administrator with the elderly, disabled, and children .

Melanie and her husband have collaborated on several novels such as Daughters (2001), and The Man on the Ceiling (2008). On collaborating with her husband, Melanie stated, “Steve and I have been each other’s first editor for more than thirty-four years now. Nothing leaves the house until the other has read and commented on it” .

Inspiration

Tem has been featured in numerous essays and anthologies . Tem said that she prefers the term “dark fantasy” instead of being described as a horror author because she wants to disturb people, not scare them. Tem also has a theme of transformation in her writings. In a 1993 interview with Cemetery Dance Publications, Tem elaborated on this stating “one of the things that interests me is how dark, disturbing experiences in our lives can transform us for the better, how we can come through those things . . . I like the idea of how we confront things” . Tem often used traditional horror and supernatural motifs to express psychological truth (i.e. using a werewolf to symbolize anger). Tem found inspiration working as a social worker and has explained how it has impacted her writing. When connecting her writing and social work, Tem said, “I went into social work probably for one of the same reasons why I write. And that is, again, to try to understand somebody whose life experience I don't have. Another is that social work brings one into contact with all kinds of stories that can be told. I have never written whole cloth about a particular client, but very often I will come into contact with someone, and something in my mind will say, "'There's a story in that'".

The grieving process following the passing of her son inspired Melanie Tem’s short story, Lightning Rod . Tem described the writing process for Lightning Rod as therapeutic and how she felt the responsibility to protect her family from “feeling the pain” .

Bibliography

Novels

• Prodigal (1991)
• Blood Moon (1992)
• Wilding (1992)
• Making Love (1993) (with Nancy Holder)
• Revenant (1994)
• Desmodus (1995)
• Witch-Light (1996) (with Nancy Holder)
• The Tides (1996)
• Black River (1997)
• Daughters (2001) (with Steve Rasnic Tem)
• Slain in the Spirit (2002)
• The Deceiver (2003)
• The Man on the Ceiling (2008) (with Steve Rasnic Tem)
• What You Remember I Did (2011) (with Janet Berliner)
• The Yellow Wood (2015)

Collections

• Daddy's Side (1991)
• Beautiful Stranger (1992) (with Steve Rasnic Tem)
• The Ice Downstream: A Short Story Collection (2001)
• In Concert (2010) (with Steve Rasnic Tem)
• The Devil's Coattails: More Dispatches From the Dark Frontier (2011)

Short stories

• "Aspen Graffiti" (1988)
• "The Better Half" (1989)
• "Lightning Rod" (1990)
• "The Co-Op" (1990)
• "Daddy's Sid" (1991)
• "Fry Day" (1991)
• "Trail of Crumbs" (1992)
• "Jenny" (1993)
• "The Changelings" (1993)
• "Half Grandma" (1995)
• "Wife of Fifty Years" (1995)
• "Pandorette's Mother" (1996)
• "Aunt Libby's Grave" (1997)
• "Hagoday" (1998)
• "The Lonely Gorilla" (1999)
• "Alicia" (2000)
• "Piano Bar Blues" (2001)
• "Visits" (2004)
• "Dhost" (2007)
• "Monster" (2008)
• "The Shoes" (2010)
• "Corn Teeth" (2011)
• "Dahlias" (2012)
• "Timbrel and Pipe" (2014)

Anthologies featuring Melanie Tem

• Skin of the Soul (1990)
• Best New Horror 2 (1991)
• Dark Voices 3 (1991)
• The Mammoth Book of Vampires (1992)
• The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror Fifth Annual Collection (1992)
• Dark Voices 5 (1992)
• Nursery Crimes (1993)
• The Best of Whispers (1994)
• Little Deaths (1994)
• Love in Vein (1994)
• Peter S Beagle's Immortal Unicorn 2 (1995)
• The Best New Horror 5 (1995)
• Xanadu 3 (1995)
• Splatterpunks II (1995)
• Great Writers and Kids Write Spooky Stories (1995)
• Desire Burn (1995)
• Peter S Beagle's Immortal Unicorn (1995)
• Sisters of the Night (1995)
• 100 Tiny Tales of Terror (1996)
• Dark Terrors 3 (1997)
• Going Postal (1998)
• In the Shadow of the Gargoyle (1998)
• 100 Twisted Little Tales of Torment (1998)
• Silver Birch, Blood Moon (1999)
• Isaac Asimov's Mother's Day (2000)
• Dark Terrors 5 (2000)

Awards

Prodigal

• Bram Stoker Award for First Novel

The Man on the Ceiling (with Steve Rasnic Tem)

• Bram Stoker Award for Best Long Fiction
• World Fantasy Award for Best Novella
• International Horror Guild Award for Best Long Story
• British Fantasy Award – Icarus Award (1992)

See also

• List of horror fiction authors

External links

• Steve Rasnic Tem & Melanie Tem Official Website
• Bibliography
• Melanie Tem at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database