Aliya Whiteley's Blog, page 16

A shiny invite dipped in blood

It has been a huge and welcome surprise to find The Loosening Skin on the shortlist for the John W Campbell Memorial Award, along with works by some of my favourite writers.  The winner will be announced at the end of June, but I’ll just enjoy these few weeks of being on the list, and going over to the site to look at it in wonderment every now and again.

I’ve reached the 40,000 word mark of the new thing I’m writing, and I know from experience that this is the bit where I decide it’s a terrible novel. Because I know this I’m going to push on through, simply because I’ve come this far and I can’t stop thinking about it until I finish it, so I’ll keep wading. This is a mentality that’s worked well for me in finishing the last four books, anyway. It makes me feel a bit like Macbeth, which is the only time I can say that:

I am in blood
Stepped in so far that, should I wade no more,
Returning were as tedious as go o’er.
Strange things I have in head, that will to hand,
Which must be acted ere they may be scanned.

Yep, it is a little bit of a horror novel.

Luckily I can still write short stories in between, which offer short-term validation when I get it right, and to that end I’ve agreed to write a story for Calque Press’ anthology An Invite to Eternity. It’s currently crowdfunding and needs to raise a little more to reach my stretch goal. It promises to be a great anthology whether I’m in it or not, to be honest, with an introduction by Helen Marshall and stories from writers such as Tim Jarvis, Naomi Booth, Camilla Grudova, and Malcolm Devlin amongst many others, so definitely worth signing up for as its already reached its target and will go ahead. I’m keen to get a copy. Here’s the link.  

Best Witch Party

The Best of British Fantasy 2019 (NewCon Press) is now available, and there’s a launch event coming up for celebration purposes. It’ll be a great excuse to pick up a copy of the book and get lots of writers to sign it, and I hear a rumour that there will be free drinks and nibbles there too.

Here are the details:

Best of British Fantasy Launch Party

Saturday 1 June, from 1pm

The Star of Kings, near Kings Cross, London 

I wish I could attend and get my copy signed by lots of other brilliant writers in the book, but I’m afraid I won’t be there. I am planning to get to Edge-Lit in Derby in July, though. I should be talking and reading at a Shadow Booth event with Tim Major and Dan Coxon at 2pm, and I’m really looking forward to that.

I’ve just noticed – an article I wrote for the Best of British Fantasy website is available to read. I wanted to write about a fantasy novel that had a huge impact on me as a child – Eva Ibbotson’s Which Witch? I’ve still got my original copy and when I came to write the article I opened the first page to discover I had written, ‘This is one of my favourite books. If you have borrowed it from me please treat it with care and respect.’

It sounds like the child-version of me, but I’m surprised I even considered lending it to anyone. That’s how much I loved it.

Short and Sweet (Understatement)

The Loosening Skin is on the shortlist for the Arthur C Clarke award this year: I have proof.

Congratulations to the other shortlistees (amazing company to be in!) – and thanks to everyone who has taken the time to congratulate me; I very much appreciate it, and the support for my short novel of hunting answers, shedding skin, and losing love along the way.

I’ve been reading books from the shortlist of the Arthur C Clarke Award since I first became interested in science fiction, and I’m just beginning to get my head around the idea that people might now read The Loosening Skin because it’s on that very list.

 

 

 

 

I’ll Be SF Dreaming

Here’s the cover for the Best of British SF 2018 (published by NewCon Press) and there’s my name on it!

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Territory: Blank, a story that first appeared in Interzone last year, will be included among stories by some incredible writers. I’ll let you know once the book is out there. I think the official launch is going to be at Worldcon in Dublin this August.

Speaking of great writers, the Shirley Jackson Awards shortlists have been announced and there are some cracking books on it. Here’s the list and I’ll just give a quick shout out to This Dreaming Isle in the Best Anthology section, because I’ve got a story in that one and also because I read all the other stories and they were brilliant, and I felt very lucky to be part of that book. Fingers crossed for editor Dan Coxon and publisher Unsung Stories.

 

Cover Love

Just a quick pitstop to show off the new cover for The Best of British Fantasy 2018. Isn’t it great? It’s the work of Matty Long.

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Apparently all the stories are represented on the cover somewhere. I’m looking forward to reading them all and trying to place which image belongs to what story. (I think I’ve worked out which one refers to my story…)

Brave New Escapes

A bit of news that made me drink wine and dance around the kitchen last night – here’s The Loosening Skin on a very exciting shortlist:

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Starburst’s Brave New Words Award is for someone who produces break-out literature that is new and bold. We are looking to highlight exciting work that breaks new ground in the field of Cult Entertainment.  

The nominees are:

Aliya Whiteley – The Loosening Skin (Unsung Stories)

Tasha Suri – Empire of Sand (Orbit / Little Brown)

Rachel Armstrong – Origamy  (NewCon Press )

Claire North – 84K (Orbit / Little Brown)

Micah Yongo- Lost Gods  (Angry Robot)

Tade Thompson – Rosewater (Orbit / Little Brown)

I think the awards ceremony takes place at Edge-Lit 8 on Saturday 13th July in Derby. Edge-Lit has some great guests lined up this year as well. I’m hoping to be able to get there.

If I’m not at Edge-Lit, though, I’ll be writing instead and that means I’ll be in a nearby cafe doodling. Recently the writer Georgina Bruce (her new book of short stories is wonderful) asked me to write a bit about my method for her Escape Room series of interviews and here it is. I didn’t mention in the piece that toasted teacakes play a large part, too. Anything I write is at least twelve per cent tea cake-powered.

 

A prompt arrival at Beastly Creek

At the end of last year I had a bit of a run of writing short stories for anthologies, and over the past week two of the finished books arrived on my doorstep. They’re beautifully put together, and it’s great to be involved in collections that have had such clear and exciting concepts behind them.

When I first started writing short stories I joined an online group that set challenges, often in the form of prompts. There were pictures or piece of music, or five very different items to choose from (although I used to like trying to get all the items in, which led to some pretty strange stories), and the results would always be very different in style and tone, and so much fun to write and read. I think that’s why I enjoy writing for publications that set one element firmly in place and then encourage the writer’s imagination to take a leap from there. Both Shallow Creek and Disturbing the Beast did that, to great results.

Storgy’s Shallow Creek is a fictional town with a very dark history. I was given a character and a location and told to go write something. The Alteration popped up. It’s about how places can become focal points for terrible stories, the kind that get in your head and change you. I had a blast writing it.

Boudicca Press’ Disturbing the Beast is filled with weird stories written about the experience of being a woman. With that in mind, I ended up writing a mummy’s curse sort of story, which I had always wanted to do. It’s called Wrapped, of course. I thought it was going to be a bit of fun but it took quite a serious turn in the middle and became a story about something that means a lot to me. So that was a surprise, but hopefully it’s a good surprise for the reader.

There are some more stories I’ve written from prompts to be published in anthologies later this year, but I’m not really allowed to say much about them yet. I can say that one of them will be my 100th published short story, which seems unbelievable. I had to go away and count them, but yes, Wrapped is number 98 and The Alteration is number 99. The next short story I have published will be number 100.

I’ll have to celebrate somehow. I’ll have a think about it.

 

Shelled and chaotic fantasies

I wrote Dark Shells, a story about an older woman who tells secrets to the river that runs through her Lincolnshire village, for the Unsung Stories anthology This Dreaming Isle, and I got to read a little bit of it aloud at the launch party at the start of this year, which was a lot of fun. I’m blown away by the thought that it might find a new audience through NewCon Press’ Best of British Fantasy 2019. You can find the full table of staggeringly good contents here. Go look at it.

It’s worth keeping an eye on the Best of British Fantasy website in general because they will also be running a series of articles on the favourite fantasy novels of a number of authors. I wrote a piece about one of my favourites. I’ll put up a link when it’s live, but I’m looking forward to seeing what other people have chosen too.

Hurray for the Subjective Chaos Awards! A group of bloggers with a determination to create strong, thoughtful reviews on current writing have created these awards, and The Loosening Skin is shortlisted for Best Fantasy this year, which is an extremely tough category. Go check out the shortlist if you don’t believe me. There’s more info about the shortlists and timings here – while you’re clicking, I’d recommend looking through the existing reviews on all the sites involved for a good read.

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Cakes and Ale and Skin and Apples

If you’ve read The Loosening Skin and you’ve been wondering what everybody else is thinking about the weirdest bits (including me) then the latest podcast from the Time For Cakes and Ale team might be the right place to go – they’ve had an indepth discussion about it for their Book Club and I popped up to give a short interview as well, mainly about the structural aspects.

Also, I’ve just added a new ‘Contact Me’ tab above which includes a contact form, and a link to my agent’s new website – Max Edwards is now up and running as Apple Tree Literary.

Love apples. Love cakes. Love ale.

I’m off to the kitchen.

 

Catch-up Carryall

I got stuck into the new year. Or in the new year. Help. Either way, I’ve had a couple of ideas in strange directions and have been working away on those on the writing front, and that means I forgot to blog.

Here’s a bit of a catch-up:

The Loosening Skin has had a fine start in life with some strong reviews (phew) and it’s been a joy to come across mentions for it here and there. A high point was this article in The Guardian. Unsung Stories have collected quotes and put them on their website. You can find them here. Thank you so much to everyone who’s read it/reviewed it so far – and if you have, the podcast Time for Cakes and Ale is currently reading Skin as the first book in their new Book Club. They’re looking for people to comment on what they thought of the book, and I think the podcast episode will be available to listen to by the end of February. If you’ve got thoughts about it that you want to share, that’s the place to be.

The Beauty continues to spread like some fungal disease, and I loved finding it on Reedsy’s list of 100 Best Horror Books of All Time. Look at the company it’s in. There are some great newer books on that list, too, and the picture at the top of the article keeps staring at me.

Meanwhile, I see tweets popping up every now and then from my Italian publisher, Carbonio Editore, mentioning lovely reviews for both The Beauty and The Arrival of Missives (La Bellezza and L’Arrivo Delle Missive). They have links on their website here. I think I owe a huge debt to my translator, here: Olimpia Ellero. I haven’t had a chance to meet you, but thank you.

In terms of new stuff, I should have a few short stories making an appearance in anthologies soon – I’ll blog when they’re available, I promise – including the first anthology from Boudicca Press and the Shallow Creek anthology of horror stories. Currently Shallow Creek are running a Choose Your Own Adventure on twitter which has been loads of fun, although I always seem to make the wrong choice and have already put the poor protagonist, Mallum Colt, through more than his fair share of nasty experiences.

And work continues on getting my novel Skein Island into shape for publication by Titan later in the year. I’ve just finished writing a new novelette set on the island to accompany it. Plus Greensmith! My new sci fi novel. That will be making an appearance this year as well. I’m both excited and nervous about that one.

But for now I’m going to crack on with these new ideas, and see where the light leads me. Yeah. Could be anywhere. That’s one of my favourite things about writing. Along with always having something to think about and the freedom to make biscuits every now and again, when the mood takes me.

[image error]Photo by anouar olh on Pexels.com