Born in Alaska in 1952, Robert Temple grew up a military brat across the United States. After a three-year hitch in the 82nd Airborne, he received a B.S. in journalism from the University of Florida and an M.A. in English from Florida State University and then taught creative writing, composition, and literature at several Florida colleges. While teaching, he and his wife also raised and bred Suri alpacas for eighteen years. Throughout his teaching career, Robert kept writing, publishing the novel The Strange Courtship of Kathleen O'Dwyer and numerous short stories, winning several awards for fiction. Today, he and his wife, Sheila, reside in Talking Rock, Georgia in the Appalachian Mountains.