Interview with Alma Alexander

Hello again! I’m back with a new interview! Today, we’re talking to Alma Alexander. Also, known as the Duchess of Fantasy. How cool is that title? I love it. Alma is like the cool kid in school that everyone loved to be around. She’s kind and funny. As she’ll tell you herself, she was pretty much born to be a writer. Her writing captivates readers and launches them into another world. She immerses you in her stories and you’ll come out feeling like a completely different person (hello book hangover!). I really enjoyed getting to know her and I know you will too! As always her work will be linked below!

Have you always dreamt of being a writer?

…not EXACTLY. Did I always known that I was going to BE one? Yes. Is that “dreaming” of it? I didn’t dream – I *was* – I have always written. The earliest extant thing I wrote is a poem I wrote aged 5 – but I taught myself to read at least a year before that and it is entirely possible that writing began at the same time. If there is such a thing I was born with ink in my veins and words waiting in my mind waiting to be threaded together into stories. Two certainties in what is keeping me alive: I breathe; I write. That’s just basic.

Name two of your biggest pet peeves.

The fact that people cannot tell apart it’s and its and use them interchangeably when it really REALLY isn’t rocket science – if you can substitute “it is” then use the apostrophe and if you cannot then don’t – but every time I see it, I twitch. That’s the shallow one. The deeper one is willful ignorance – as in, people who could and should know something don’t do so because it clashes with some preconceived and WRONG idea. Malicious willful ignorance is a step worse – like, for instance, people who wear the pandemic facemasks as chin hammocks.

What is the best writing resource you’ve invested in so far?

Copious supplies of coffee. (you think I’m kidding, don’t you?)

If you could live anywhere in the world, where would you live?

In a thatched cottage that’s 500 years old, somewhere in the English countryside. With a garden full of hollyhocks and overgrown ancient roses, and apple trees in the back. And a tabby cat napping in the sun on the windowsill.

How do you choose titles for your books?

My books choose their titles. Sometimes I literally don’t know what that title is until I write the last line of the book.

What color do you think describes you?

Black. Or if you insist on something a little lighter… I’ll go as far as midnight blue.

What is your writing process like?

…WHAT process? or more specifically, for which book? It is what it needs to be for any particular project. The only common denominator is the answer to your question 3.

What’s the strangest thing you’ve ever done?

Oh my that would be telling. But would jumping off a mountain count? (Okay okay it was a parasail done in tandem with an experienced instructor – but still, I willingly jumped off a mountain…)

Do you have a favorite author?

Too many to mention.

What hobbies do you have?

I take photos, I make tapestries and gold embroidery pieces and knit scarves. And, of course, I read.

What do you hope readers take away from your book?

Anything they choose. Once it’s out there it belongs to the readers – and sometimes they have told me about things they have found in my work that I honestly don’t remember ever putting in there. The only thing I hope for is that they will find the book something that stays with them, that they will remember, that somehow it becomes dear and familiar and that they can, as I do with my favourites, quote stuff from it at random when the appropriate occasion comes round for such a quote. Being held in love and memory like that is the only lasting thing a writer can really hope for.

Do you have any tips for aspiring authors?

Read. Read. Read. When you run out of books (and I admit that is a concept I find difficult to wrap my own head around, but…) then read phone books. And dictionaries. And cereal boxes. Dive into the word ocean and let it close over your head and then learn to breathe under word water. Never stop reading.

Author Bio:

Alma Alexander's life so far has prepared her very well for her chosen

career. She was born in a country which no longer exists on the maps,

has lived and worked in seven countries on four continents (and in

cyberspace!), has climbed mountains, dived in coral reefs, flown small

planes, swum with dolphins, touched two-thousand-year-old tiles in a

gate out of Babylon. She is a novelist, anthologist, and short story

writer who currently shares her life between the Pacific

Northwest of the USA (where she lives with two obligatory writers’

cats) and the wonderful fantasy worlds of her own imagination. You can

find out more about Alma and her books on her website

(www.AlmaAlexander.org), at her Amazon author page

(https://amzn.to/2N6xE9u), on Twitter

(https://twitter.com/AlmaAlexander), at her Facebook page

(https://www.facebook.com/AuthorAlmaAlexander/), or at her Patreon

page (https://www.patreon.com/AlmaAlexander)

Short blurb from The Second Star (finalist in the 2021 Washington State Book Award):

The Parada had been lost for almost two hundred years before they recovered the ship, drifting in stygian interstellar darkness, and brought her home again.

But that was not the miracle. The miracle was that the crew was still alive. That was also the problem.

Six crew members went out in Earth’s first starship. More than seventy fractured personalities came back.

Find it at https://amzn.to/3IqMDTb

(Ebook, paperback, and audio editions)