The staff and board of the North Carolina Writers’ Network join the great many others mourning the loss of Michael Malone.
Michael was the author of 14 novels, a short-story collection, two nonfiction books, and numerous plays, musicals, and screenplays. He won the Edgar Allan Poe Award, the O. Henry Award, and an Emmy as the head writer for the soap opera One Life to Live.
He also was a generous and active member of the North Carolina literary community. He delivered the keynote addresses at several NCWN conferences, including the 2010 Fall Conference in Charlotte, and in 2005 hosted a gala fundraiser for the Network at his home in Hillsborough. For many years he and his Hillsborough neighbor Allan Gurganus performed a two-man adaption of A Christmas Carol whose every show sold out.
“Michael was one of the few people you could describe as ‘delightful,’ without it being an empty cliche,” NCWN Executive Director Ed Southern said. “Quite simply and literally, he was full of delight, and he never stinted to share it with others.”
According to his obituary, he asked that in lieu of flowers, donations be made in his name to the Southern Poverty Law Center, to which he was a donor for more than 40 years. A public viewing will be held this Sunday, August 28, in Hillsborough.