AletheaKontis.com

The time has come! No other intro necessary, really.
Listen to our hilarious discussion here.

The Zombie Chicks

Want more zombie chick fun? Photos are in my Tea in Space picasa album.

The Harlan County Horrors anthology is now up for preorder on the Apex website. Order now, and save almost 20% off the cover price!

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Here’s an excerpt from my story, "The Witch of Black Mountain":

      Letting Anthony Gentry get her pregnant was the stupidest thing Ennica Jamison had ever done. Hiking to the summit of Black Mountain to see a witch was the second. It had been a warm November afternoon when she’d left her stolen horse on the path at the base of the mountain; now it was cold and dusk. She placed a foot on the first step of the abandoned lookout tower. She’d been walking for hours, slow but determined, sprinkling what sanity she had left behind her like breadcrumbs in the dirt. She grasped the rusted orange railing firmly with a gloved hand. One last thing left to climb. One last moment before she discovered just how stupid she really was.

Want to read the rest? Order your copy today!

The Harlan County Horrors anthology is now up for preorder on the Apex website. Order now, and save almost 20% off the cover price!

Now only $13.00!

Harlan County Horrors is a regional based horror anthology by Apex Magazine submissions editor Mari Adkins. It will feature stories by Alethea Kontis, Debbie Kuhn, Earl Dean, Geoffrey Girard, Jason Sizemore, Jeremy Shipp, Maurice Broaddus, Robby Sparks, Ronald Kelly, Stephanie Lenz, Steven Shrewsbury, and T.L. Trevaskis.

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Here’s an excerpt from my story, “The Witch of Black Mountain“:

Letting Anthony Gentry get her pregnant was the stupidest thing Ennica Jamison had ever done. Hiking to the summit of Black Mountain to see a witch was the second. It had been a warm November afternoon when she’d left her stolen horse on the path at the base of the mountain; now it was cold and dusk. She placed a foot on the first step of the abandoned lookout tower. She’d been walking for hours, slow but determined, sprinkling what sanity she had left behind her like breadcrumbs in the dirt. She grasped the rusted orange railing firmly with a gloved hand. One last thing left to climb. One last moment before she discovered just how stupid she really was.

Want to read the rest? Order your copy today!

I’ve found that in the genre world the friends of my friends are some pretty cool people. And so, based on the compliments of author Jim C. Hines, I liked Charlie Finlay long before I met him. Already a noted historian, C. C. Finlay is taking the speculative fiction world by storm this summer with his Traitor to the Crown trilogy: The Patriot Witch (April), A Spell for the Revolution (May), and The Demon Redcoat (June).

With my Genre Chick hat on, I took Charlie aside and asked him a few questions about his deepest darkest secrets.

Alethea Kontis: Three books coming out, essentially all at once, is pretty gutsy. How did you pull that off?

C. C. Finlay: I crawled into my cave nightly for about 18 months and did nothing else but write.  My beard grew to my knees, my eyes bulged like a deep ocean fish, and I wore all the letters off the keyboard keys.  I feel great about it.  I’m glad people get to read the whole series over one summer if they want.

AK: You’re quite the history buff–if you could live in any time in history, when would that be?

CCF: I’m very happy that I live right now.  If I lived in most other times in history, between childhood diseases and starvation and war, I’d probably be dead.  Plus we’ve got this whole Internet thing these days, which is very cool. The past is a great place to visit, especially in a novel, but I’m not sure I’d want to stay there.

AK: In The Patriot Witch, Proctor Brown has a special relationship with eggs. How do you take your eggs?

CCF: Good eggs are like a good high school midterm, over easy.

AK: On your blog, you recently discussed “genre fiction as the future of serious literature.” What are your thoughts on the subject?

CCF: Genre fiction is about characters who take action to change their circumstances and lives.  We’re coming to a point in history–because of global climate change and resource depletion, to name two things–where we have to take transformative actions individually and as societies to preserve our world.  Genre fiction is a laboratory where we can rethink our relationship to the world, reassess our values, and create models for taking action.

AK: I hear your son has won some pretty prestigious writing awards. How do you feel about that?

CCF: You’re talking about the Scholastic Books Kids Are Authors competition that he won with his classmates in 5th Grade.  They took first place out of something like 3,000 entries and had their picture book published by Scholastic.  It’s been three years, and he still reminds me that he will always have published his first book at a younger age than I did.  Aside from the smack talk, I’m very proud of him and his friends.

AK: You’ve taught various writing workshops across the country. What do you think is the most important lesson a budding writer should know?

CCF: There are a collection of traits that are important to writing.  Love writing–take joy in the process. Read all the time. Be persistent in the face of discouragement. Be committed to your own self-improvement.  Different traits come naturally to different budding writers, and then they have to pick up the rest.  It’s a matter of helping each writer find which piece of their puzzle is missing.

AK: According to your Web site, there are quite a few famous Charles Finlays out there. Has this challenged you to stand out from the crowd?

CCF: When I started writing, the most famous Charlie Finlays out there were baseball owner Charles O. Finley–the man who invented night games, the designated hitter, and donkeys in the outfield–and Dr. Charles Finlay, who found a cure for yellow fever and made the Panama Canal possible.  Those are pretty tough acts to follow.  Fortunately, neither one of them blogs or uses twitter, so between that and writing fiction I’ve slowly been able to climb up the google rankings over the past view years.

AK: Andre Norton, the late SF Grand Dame, was a local Murfreesboro gal and her memory is very dear to us. You’ve previously co-chaired the jury for the Andre Norton Award. Can you tell us a little bit about that award?

CCF: The Andre Norton Award is for best young adult fantasy or science fiction novel.  When I was growing up as a reader, the line between adult and young adult fiction wasn’t so clearly drawn.  On the one hand you might have Nancy Drew or Trixie Belden, and on the other hand you had the Gor books, but on the whole, the distinctions were much less clearly drawn.  But more recently, I had come to take the different categories for granted.

The year before I served on the Norton jury, I was on the jury for the Phillip K. Dick Award for best science fiction paperback.  Doing the two juries back to back was enlightening.  On the whole, I found the YA novels better: they were more engaging, with more vivid characters, and more fun to read.  Many of the themes were just as important and complex.  So now I’ve come to the conclusion that some of the best books being written right now for any age are being marketed as YA.  Even putting aside J.K. Rowling, who is a phenomenon unto herself, I find that many YA writers can be equally enjoyed by adults: Scott Westerfield, Maureen Johnson, John Green.  And other people seem to think the same thing.  Explicitly YA novels are finalists for both the Nebula and Hugo awards this year.

With that said, I think it’s fantastic that there is an award meant to draw attention to YA books.  I loved serving on that jury and would do it again if time ever allowed me to, just for the chance to find new authors.

Click here to download a free copy of The Patriot Witch.

Welcome to Lauderdale-by-the-sea.

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

Around the dinner table at Nana’s house. You wish you were here!

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

Yup, I said iPhone. Got any good suggestions for free apps?

Wheeeeee!!!!!

Posted via LiveJournal.app.

RIP Dom Deluise.
Jeremy was always one of my favorite characters. Who were yours?

Due to some technical difficulties, the Fantasy magazine con reports didn’t go up as immediately as we sent them. Day Two is live now. I’ll let you know when Day Three hits newsstands.

If you’re jonesing for more, "The Still & the Storm" — my new Beauty & Dynamite essay –  is now up, along with the latest issue of Apex magazine. Yes, it’s true that the online mag is going on hiatus, but I’m still commissioned to put a few tricks up Jason’s sleeve, so be sure to keep watching the skies.

And here it is, your Lee Pic of the Day:

Proof that hanging out with me at conventions really is *THIS* much fun. (Miss you, Kit!)

Due to some technical difficulties, the Fantasy magazine con reports didn’t go up as immediately as we sent them. Day Two is live now. I’ll let you know when Day Three hits newsstands.

If you’re jonesing for more, “The Still & the Storm” — my new Beauty & Dynamite essay — is now up, along with the latest issue of Apex magazine. Yes, it’s true that the online mag is going on hiatus, but I’m still commissioned to put a few tricks up Jason’s sleeve, so be sure to keep watching the skies.

And here it is, your Lee Pic of the Day:

Proof that hanging out with me at conventions really is *THIS* much fun. (Miss you, Kit!)