This Colorado Writer Is Hitting the Heights of Horror

Centennial horror writer Steve Rasnic Tem has been writing for 45 years and has completed more than 500 published short stories, seventeen collections, eight novels, various poems and plays, and even a handbook on writing. During that long career, he's won numerous honors, among them the World Fantasy, Bram Stoker, International Horror Guild and British Fantasy awards. And now he can add another to the shelf: The Horror Writers Association (HWA) is giving him its Lifetime Achievement Award.

The HWA Awards will be presented on Saturday, June 1, during the Bram Stoker Awards Presentation at StokerCon 2024 in San Diego. There are two other recipients of this year’s award: Illinois writer/editor Mort Castle and actress Cassandra Peterson, otherwise known as Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. The prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award is presented periodically to an individual whose work has substantially influenced the horror genre. The award has, in past years, been given to some of the biggest names in literature, and not just horror, such as Ray Bradbury, Edward Gorey, Anne Rice, Stephen King and more. The list is long and undeniably impressive.

Tem says the win came as a surprise to him. "It wasn’t something I ever imagined receiving," he says. "I’m not a famous or best-selling author, but I have been consistent. I've won awards in my past, but awards were never my goal. This one certainly caught me off guard."

The recognition is especially significant to him because it's coming from the HWA. "The Horror Writers Association does important work promoting horror literature and the interests of those who write it since the late 1980s," Tem says. "It has close to 2,000 members around the world." He lists a number of the accomplishments and continued work of the organization: mentoring new writers, lobbying publishers for better contracts and pay rates, promoting diversity, hosting an annual Librarians Day, and, in partnership with United for Libraries and other organizations, sponsoring a Summer Scares reading program for readers of all ages.
Still, Tem insists that while "most writing awards don’t have a career-changing effect on sales," they are important.

"Awards do bring some immediate attention to your work, which enables new readers to discover you, which is always good," he notes. "Writing, for the most part, is a lonely, thankless occupation, performed by yourself sitting at a desk. Hours spent writing means putting aside television, internet, family time, all your favorite recreational activities, so you can focus on putting meaningful words on the page. Feedback is usually intermittent, at best, and you find yourself wondering who is reading your words or if anyone is reading them at all. So awards can give you a much-needed boost. It’s positive validation that people are noticing your hard work."

And hard work it is, despite Tem's affection and satisfaction with his body of work. "I love writing short stories, especially stories about themes I care about: family, love, aging," he says. "I work on one or two each day. After a couple of months of writing and rewriting — it varies from story to story — finding the emotional center, making the prose as good as I can make it, I submit it somewhere. If a story is rejected, I submit it somewhere else the same day. There’s no secret to this. You just have to keep plugging away. The difference between now and the beginning of my career is that most of my submissions sell after one or two tries. That’s how I measure success."

Tem's planning to travel to StokerCon in San Diego to personally receive the award alongside co-honorees Castle and Peterson. "I’ve met Mort Castle a few times at conventions," Tem says. "Mort is an amiable fellow with a long and varied career, writing even longer than I have." But Tem says he's never met Cassandra Peterson and is looking forward to it. "She’s one of the most prominent media personalities in the horror genre," he effuses. "She has been an important ambassador for the horror genre in popular culture."

This will only be Tem's third appearance at StokerCon. "I don’t attend as many conventions as I used to," he admits. "They’re expensive, and I’m aging — I don’t have the stamina I once had." But Tem says the trip will be well worth it, and not just for the award. "The best thing about fan gatherings is that you get to meet your readers," he says. "There’s no feeling quite like when a reader approaches you and tells you how important a story you wrote twenty, thirty years ago was to them. I often hear from adults who read my stories in horror anthologies as teenagers during the ’80s and ’90s. The most challenging part for me is simply dealing with the crowds. I’m a fairly private person with a quiet life. Meeting and talking to large groups of people is still a stretch for me."

As for potential future winners of this award, Tem suggests that there is — happily for the legions of the genre's fans — quite the list. "There are so many!" hesays. "Horror fiction is experiencing a renaissance, and some of the newer writers are among the finest authors of dark fantasy and horror the genre has ever seen. I’d certainly put Paul Tremblay, Nathan Ballingrud and Colorado writer Stephen Graham Jones at the top of that list, along with Laird Barron and John Langan. Also, African-Australian author Eugen Bacon, with her sumptuous prose and surprising blends of science fiction and horror."

Tem may be laconic when he's talking about his own oeuvre, in contrast to the ebullient manner in which he talks about the work and promise of his colleagues. But on June 1 at StokerCon, it'll be all about a lifetime of words, of mastery of the horror form and Steve Rasnic Tem, rightfully celebrating a Colorado author who's made — and continues to make — his literary mark.