About the Book

They say home is where the heart is. Now that Sleepwater’s on the run, home is just another place to hide.

Wyoming’s Sleepwater chapter is on the run, hunted for their ability to spin a beat. With little time to mourn the members they’ve lost, Bernadette Manney takes the group to the one place she swore she’d never see again: the cabin in Hollywood, South Carolina. It’s remote enough to lay low and catch a break, but not for long.

Their beats are condemned as mutations, radical terrorist tactics, and felonies punishable both by and outside the law. Bernadette thought Sleepwater would be safe here, but returning to her Southern roots unleashes more demons than she left behind. Her past, her love, and even her own flesh and blood won’t let her move on through a venomous society intent on rooting out her people. Now, to bring a mother’s first child safely into an unsafe world, Bernadette must face her own shame from before Sleepwater itself was born. But redemption and forgiveness may be too much to ask, and it may just be too late.

Interview

What is your ideal writing setting (outside, at a desk, etc.)?

I used to be able to write absolutely anywhere when I was in high school and college—at my desk at home, out in a field, on a plane, at a coffee shop or the library or during my classes (not something I recommend, unless one can also ace said classes at the same time…). These days, though, I’ve become particularly attached to my home office. It’s not so much the specific room in a specific house that makes the ideal writing setting (the longest I’ve ever lived somewhere is in our current house now for almost two and a half years, and we’re moving again soon anyway). But I definitely need a dedicated writing space to “get in the zone”, with a closed door and privacy and where no one else walks in to disturb me unless it’s an emergency. Plus, I can admit I struggle with anxiety when I’m out in public, and if I’m not completely focused on enjoying myself in public (as opposed to trying to focus on writing), nothing works out the way I want it to. So I have my standing desk in my office, my bookshelves and cabinets full of books and my own writing (physical books are still just such a comfort and inspiration), all my tools around me, my fancy “sometimes I sit down for 9 hours a day and need back support” pillow, and I’m good to go. That’s when the day flies by, and the only commutes I have to worry about are my trips to the bathroom and the kitchen! Seeing as writing fiction is my full-time 9-5, this is incredibly helpful. 

How do you deal with writer’s block?

These days, when I hit a bout of writer’s block (and it doesn’t happen very often, but it definitely does happen), I just keep pushing through. I have deadlines to meet and word-count quotas to reach every day, which definitely helps push me through those moments of, “I have no idea what I’m writing right now.” So the days I experience writer’s block are, admittedly, lower word-count days. 

The fact that I write all day in sprints helps tremendously! Even if I’m feeling stuck on something, I know that when my timer goes off (my sprints are anywhere between 20 and 30 minutes long), I’ll get a little break to stand up, stretch my body, and focus my brain on something else for five minutes before getting right back to it. The solution I’ve found that works for me personally is to just keep going, even if I’m writing slowly or writing something that will need to be revised in the future. Because writing something is better than writing nothing at all, and eventually, I get back into the zone and pick up the speed, and the “block” passes. 

What authors/books inspired your writing?

My top favorite authors are: Stephen King, Jacqueline Carey, William Gibson, John Irving, and Neil Gaiman, Quite a range, I suppose. A few of their books have directly inspired some of my own characters and storylines, and most of their work I just love for the sake of reading and enjoying them. I’m not sure if I’d say that any authors inspire my writing per se, because I can’t remember a point of trying to emulate the way other authors write or to “be like so and so”. But I do have my favorites, and I supposed that good stories and great writing are a form of inspiration all on their own. There’s nothing like cracking open a favorite book that I’ve already read many times and knowing that I’m going to enjoy it all over again (I’m currently reading Stephen King’s The Dark Tower series for the 10th time).

What are some of your favorite writing tropes that people usually hate?

One of my favorite things to do with writing tropes is to use them to the fullest extent that they benefit the plot and then flip it on its head completely. Is the main character fighting for love? Great. Let’s make it an obsession or a compulsion, where the main character and the reader can’t quite figure out if that love is real or worth fighting for, but they’re doing it anyway. Is this character “the chosen one”? Awesome. Let’s make the “chosen one’s” goal as vague as possible and give them absolutely no control over how to “fulfill that destiny”. Not so chosen anymore, are you? 

I think my favorite trope to work with is the epic journey, which I know some readers can get pretty sick of seeing over and over. But 99% of the time, my heroes’ epic journeys aren’t necessarily to reach the end of the quest and fulfill some massive responsibility that defeats the villain and saves the world. My heroes’ epic journeys are within themselves, and more often than not, I don’t have cut-and-dry villains in my work. I’ll slap a main character into a quest and give them nothing in return, so what they get out of it is personal growth, or not dying, or an understanding/epiphany that what they thought they wanted wasn’t actually what they were chasing all along. That, to me, is far more interesting than “saving the day”. I love to write tons of action, suspense, and violence within character-driven stories, just to make things interesting. 

Has the coronavirus impacted your writing in any way? 

It has in the sense that my three-year-old is now home every single day instead of being in preschool. My husband is a stay-at-home dad, so we’ve been remarkably fortunate in that we haven’t had to change our schedules much in order to accommodate a lack of childcare during this time. So while my husband and our kid are doing their thing during the day, I just keep writing away in my office. And I bought myself a better set of headphones so I can drown out the noise!

The biggest change for me personally, which I probably wouldn’t have discovered without this current situation in the world, is that I do actually “recharge” myself, on occasion, by getting out and interacting with other people. As a severe introvert working from home, I normally don’t get out much anyway. And it took me a little over six weeks through this pandemic to start feeling a desire to get out and enjoy time with friends and family. Most of that, I think, comes from the fact that I know my husband and daughter thrive when they’re surrounded by people. Going through these unprecedented times with social isolation and stay-at-home orders during the end of Vermont’s very long, very dark and cold winter didn’t help much either. We love to hike and get out in the sunshine and nature, and that’s been a lot harder to do this year. Thankfully, things are starting to clear up, and it’s been hugely beneficial for us to get out of the house and out in nature where we’re not freezing on the trail. 

Any advice for aspiring authors?

Just keep writing. It’s said so many times by so many different authors, but I wholeheartedly believe this is the number-one thing an aspiring author can do to improve their craft, to learn about themselves and how they write, and to develop their strengths in writing. Just keep going, don’t give up, and get those words down on the page, even if they’re awful and will never be seen by the light of day. Trust me, I have whole piles of writing that will never get picked up or even repurposed into something else. But they got me to where I am today. 

 

About the Author – Kathrin Hutson

International Bestselling Author Kathrin Hutson has been writing Dark Fantasy, Sci-Fi, and LGBTQ Speculative Fiction since 2000. With her wildly messed-up heroes, excruciating circumstances, impossible decisions, and Happily Never Afters, she’s a firm believer in piling on the intense action, showing a little character skin, and never skimping on violent means to bloody ends. Kathrin is an active member of SFWA and HWA and lives in Vermont with her husband, daughter, and two dogs.

For updates on new releases, exclusive deals, and dark surprises you won’t find anywhere else, sign up to Kathrin’s newsletter at kathrinhutsonfiction.com/subscribe

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About Tainted Lionheart

For far too long, I let my ego get the best of me every time it would convince me that I’d never be a writer. Despite my longing desire to establish my career while interweaving my greatest passion for words, I found myself consumed with self-doubt. Second guessing my ability to use my voice, I put the idea of becoming a writer on the shelf. Telling myself that though I’d always have the creative outlet, I just couldn’t see myself writing on a larger platform.

And then circumstances of life experience hit me like a thunderbolt during the most vulnerable time in my adult life. I went through something- as we all have been through things- and those things left me with an overload of emotions and feelings I just did not know where to channel. But I knew I needed to put them somewhere. At the time, my situation was personal to me, as I had not confided in the ones I loved about what was happening. So, I did the only thing I knew how to do instead. I wrote.

And I wrote. And I wrote. And after that, I wrote some more. I started to realize that through the words that flowed, I was learning more about who I was than I ever had before. Not to mention, I began to see that writing poetry was the least destructive way for me to wrap my head around my circumstances to understand what had landed me where I was.

I would sit in my little potted garden in a section of my driveway in the late hours of the night while my baby girl slept and let whatever was in my mind spill out into my notes. I’d cry, and I’d ponder, and I’d question my own words when they’d hit me with the truth I didn’t realize I had in me. Before I knew it, a spring into summer had gone by and 400 poems were sitting in my phone. Poems that I would often go back to and read and feel a sense of placement in my own world.

Those poems contained the most intricate, vulnerable pieces of me at the time- but they were my truth. And, not to toot my own horn, but they were by far the best works I had ever composed in my life. Every piece I wrote was one  step towards validation that there was, in fact, a voice to be heard here. With each stanza, I felt my mind get louder in its tone with me, reassuring me that what I was putting out there was important.

I vividly remember the moment I knew these poems were more than just my therapy. I was playing with the concept of a lionheart. This idea that despite having been hurt that I was still a courageous person. I came to see that in actuality it was what had happened to me that turned me into the lionheart I had believed I was. I was tainted. But I was strong.

So, I wrote a letter to my tainted lionheart. I told her everything I thought she needed to know. I read it back and while tears streamed, so did the epiphany that this was it. This was my story. This was my first manuscript. Tainted Lionheart. That is me. And I needed to be unashamed to show this to the world.

I knew I couldn’t have been the only one who had fallen upon the journey I had endured, and even if I was, that there were other women out there who also felt alone in whatever it was they were going through. I started thinking about how sad it was, that so many of us felt we had to sweep the unsightly sights of our lives under the rug for the sake of carrying a shame that wasn’t ours to begin with. In that instance, I felt it was more of my duty than my choice to put this story out there. If I could be one more woman who refused to carry that shame, then that’s who I’d be.

I compacted Tainted Lionheart from 400 pieces down to about 120 of what I felt told the story best. Broken up into three sections- bruising, brooding, breathing- I wanted to be sure it was displayed in a way that took readers through the journey with me. The part where I was hurt, the part where I felt down, and the part where I rose from ashes. It was important for me to portray the concept that it was okay to hurt, and it was okay to want to revel in your sadness for a while, but it is absolutely imperative that you end up standing taller than you ever had before.

But it was when I began shopping around for publishers, that the true voice of Tainted Lionheart came to light. Despite having made some connections to publish on a more mainstream platform, I began fearing that the personal connection I wanted to make to the women who read this book may have been lost when I gave up most of the control to my work.

I toyed with the fear of losing my integrity to not wanting to become a famous author, but just be
a pillar to this idea that women can share their stories with grace and without abashment. In spite of this worry, I was no longer second guessing the ability I had to publish my work, and that was the most significant part.

Then one day, shortly after I had completed my BA in Creative Writing & English and had turned down an offer by a small publishing house, I sat with my best friend of twenty years and expressed to her the concerns I had. I expressed to her that in this process I had learned so much about the publishing world, and about constructing a manuscript. I wanted to do it on my own. Stick it to the man and create my own platform for this story to be published on. A platform where women like me, women who felt their voice was irrelevant, could find a place to speak it loudly.

So, that’s what we did. Our Galaxy Publishing was established in August of 2019, and from the moment we began using the space to speak about my story- our whole worlds changed. I found myself engrossed in countless women who had reached out to me after they found out I was about to be publishing a collection regarding this type of story. Women who related to me, who were inspired by me, women who validated that what I had to say mattered.

Tainted Lionheart was released on November 13, 2019, and I am so proud to say that it sold over 100 copies in its first week of sales. Having had no audience prior to publishing this, I have never felt more accomplished as I do knowing that this book has reached and resonated with people. It has been just four months since publication, and as its audience continues to grow, so do I.

This book was not just about a scorned woman’s cold heart warmed up again. This book was not just about putting work out there and being able to say I was a published author. This book was my freedom. This book was my way of saying that I did not have to live with what had happened to me as if I were a caravan for its weight. This book was my way of establishing myself not as a writer, but as a vessel for others like me.

I am anxious to see where else this book takes me, and even more excited to see where the next one goes. But above all, I am full of gratitude for the opportunity to help other women find their place among the stars. The chance to show them that, they too, are tainted lionhearts.

Christine Weimer is a native New York City Writer, Publisher, Editor, and Co-founder of Our Galaxy Publishing. Her passion for wordplay began at eight-years-old when she explored writing as an outlet of self-expression. The craft has flourished with her through all phases of life- both simple and complex.

After obtaining her BA in Creative Writing & English, Weimer sought a way to professionally, and creatively, express her voice to promote fresh conversation and thought through open interpretation. She currently lives with her daughter where she writes and runs her businesses from home. She prides herself on family values and thrives on learning and observing those around her.

Tainted Lionheart is her debut collection.

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