AletheaKontis.com

I love sunsets. And Halloween.

Here’s the best of both worlds. Enjoy!

Congrats to fellow author Tony Frazier (click here to see his superfantastic “They Stole Frazier’s Brain!” blog!) — Tony commented on my latest Genre Chick Interview with author Barry Lyga and won the signed ARC of Archvillain. Hooray, Tony!

I’ve had a few contests this month — don’t forget about the one on Goodreads that will be up for a couple more days. (click here to enter).

And today is the last day to enter the AlphaOops Scavenger Hunt contest! If you have those pictures, email them in now!

I kind of like this whole “having contests” thing. I may have to do it again soon. What do you guys think?

Another gem of a website brought to my attention by Google: AlphaOops: H is for Halloween has been mentioned on Anthea Bailie’s “Fishing for Anthea” site.

Her blog is a list of children’s books that she has enjoyed (or not) and recommends to readers. The books are tagged for age level and other characteristics that make the site a searchable tool.

Click on over and check it out!

Thanks to Scripps news for a great review on their Halloween-themed Children’s Corner:

– Those crazy alphabet letters are at it again. A few years after their first adventure, detailed in “AlphaOops!: The Day Z Went First,” the letters are now trying to put on a Halloween show in their latest volume, “AlphaOops: H is for Halloween” (both books Candlewick Press, $15.99 each). But it isn’t easy when each of the letters has its own idea of which of them should show up on stage next. Should it be “N is for Nightmare”? What about “V is for Vampire”? Poor B is the only letter that doesn’t seem to be able to shine, until he finally discovers a side he never knew he had. Author Alethea Kontis’ text is a riot of energy and humor, while artist Bob Kolar’s illustrations bring the letters to raucous life. (Ages 5-8).

Click on over to find some other great Halloween books for kids!

Cool.

I’ve been going back and forth between all these cool Library-type sites online. I have an account at Library Thing (see the widget on my homepage), but lately I’ve been spending more time on Goodreads.

Let’s be honest — unless I hire someone, there’s no way in the world I’m ever going to electronically catalog my entire book collection. But Goodreads makes it really easy to say what you’re reading and rate it, whether you give a review or not.

They also have author pages, and once can petition to be given “Librarian” status, which means you can do things like upload book covers and title information. (I did so with They Call Me Boober Fraggle, because it was a crime to not have that book cover up there.)

They also have a nifty little prgram that allows authors to have a giveaway of one or more books. They advertise the giveaway and make it really easy to sign up. You choose the start and end date, and at the end date they choose one name from random and send you their contact information. THAT’S IT. How easy, right?

And so, since Halloween is fast approaching, I put up a copy of AlphaOops: H is for Halloween to giveaway to one lucky winner.  You have to be a member of Goodreads to enter…but most of you bibliophiles already are, I know.

Click this link to enter — and good luck!

Another lovely review from Kids Lit:

The mixed up alphabet antics continue in this second Alpha Oops book.  A isn’t ready to go on, but H has to start a Halloween book anyway.  H starts with Halloween, and the other letters join in for a Halloween-themed alphabet that is not in any particular order.  As the letters reveal themselves, poor B keeps on trying to get his word in but is upstaged each time.  He tries to be a buccaneer, but P is wearing the same costume for pirate.  X has trouble finding the perfect word too, but S is there with a great idea.  Keep an eye on the bottom of the page as the alphabet fills in with pumpkins bearing the letters that are in alphabetical order.  You will just have to wait until the end of the book to find out what B has in store for you!

Read the rest of the review here!

I hate waiting.
–Inigo Montoya

**********************

I have some really really really super fantastic terrific news that I can’t share yet. I have to wait for someone else to spill the beans first.

COME ON, BEANS!!!!!!!!

*taps foot*

Wanna guess while we’re waiting?

Our newest addition to the AlphaOops Family Album:

For the story of reading AlphaOops: H is for Halloween to Claire (and a few more gorgeous pictures like this), click here. Thanks, Claire! I’m so glad you enjoyed the book. Keep reading!

GLAAD, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, requested that people wear purple October 20 to raise awareness of the dangers of anti-gay bullying.  The issue was brought to light last month after the suicide of Tyler Clementi, who killed himself after roommates outed him online.

I have my own issues with suicide — for lack of a more appropriate phrase, it was the “trendy” thing to do in my high school. At least three of my very good friends all attempted suicide as a cry for help. That “Teenage Suicide” song from Pump Up The Volume? Not so much a joke in the early 90s.

But we’re taking today from a different side.

Also in the early 90s–about a year after I graduated high school, so I was still 17–one of my uncles decided to come out of the closet. In my immediate mixed-race family (if you don’t think Greeks and People Of Any Other Descent are mixed-race, you need to watch My Big Fat Greek Wedding again), the homosexuality itself was really no big deal. What I hated most was that he felt he had to lie–both to us and to himself–for so many years. He was suddenly a different person to me–one that I didn’t know at all, but I was willing to make the effort.

I was going through my own emotional quagmire (as young teenagers do when they’re trying not to fail their first semester of college), and so I expressed my-emo-self the best way I knew how at the time: through poetry.

I had a dream about a monk who wrote a beautiful poem about a cloud at sunset. At the beginning of the poem, the cloud was an eagle. By the end of the poem, the cloud had transformed into an angel. I woke up desperate to write the poem…but I worried that–in some way–it would be plagiarism. Ultimately deciding it would be pretty tough to be sued by my own subconscious,  I wrote the poem anyway. (My penance is that the poem in my dream was far more elegant.) It is also inspired by TS Eliot’s The Hollow Men.

I’m not vain enough to try and submit my teenage poetry for professional publication, so here it is for your enjoyment. I dedicated it to my uncle. I’d be interested to know what it means to you.

***

Tears of the Hollow Men

Blue clouds at sunset
With silver-pink lining
Free as an eagle
On the wind shining
Real as each second
Soft as a dove
Hard as the truth
False as your love
Some woman said all the real men are dying
All I can see are the hollow men crying

Clouds are a-changing
The eagle is now
A heaven-bound angel
Taking a bow
To the powers before him
Which shower him gold
I cannot believe
The stories I’m told
Harsh white light
Showed the red-blooded taint
I cannot listen
To keep you a saint
I cannot hear
How perfection is fake
I cannot stand
The apologies you make
I cannot look
So I look away
What kind of madness
Has made you this way?
Some woman said
All the real men are dying
All I can hear
Are the hollow men crying

I don’t deserve
For you to forgive
Me for my feelings
About how you live
Your life is your own
Independence, be proud
I look up to you for that
As I look to you now
An eagle, an angel
High up in the sky
An eagle, an angel
How high can you fly?
Some woman said
All the real men are dying
All I can feel
Are the tears that I’m crying

–A. Kontis, 1994