What would a world look like in which words had even more power than the people who wielded them? Leo Tieffler has always had the ability to make people believe anything she says—really believe. This is the driving force of the Amazon and Kobo international bestseller and 2019 International Book Awards Finalist, Sleepwater Beat, a fast-paced, near-future dystopian sci-fi novel, by local Vermont author Kathrin Hutson.
We had the pleasure of chatting to author Kathrin Hutson about her novel, Sleepwater Beat, including the inspiration behind it and the challenges Kathrin faced, along with advice for aspiring writers, book recommendations, and more!
Hi Kathrin! Tell us a little about yourself!
Hi! I’m Kathrin Hutson, obviously. I write Dark/Grimdark Fantasy and Dystopian Sci-Fi. More recently, I’ve been writing LGBTQ characters in these genres after a) my latest book, Sleepwater Beat, was so well-received as an LGBTQ Dystopian Sci-Fi (and made me an International Bestselling Author), and b) I came to realize there is still a huge need for good speculative fiction with queer characters that isn’t romance or erotica or based on a romantic plotline. And I’m having a blast as one more author trying to provide these characters within these genres.
When did you know you wanted to be a writer?
I knew I wanted to be a writer on my tenth birthday. I’d been having this reoccurring nightmare about my favorite movie at the time, which was Fern Gully. I hated the ending of that movie, and my dreams kept revolving around knowing I was dreaming and wanting to change the end to that movie, and I still couldn’t. Literally on my tenth birthday, I woke up feeling just as aggravated and hopeless, and then I realized I could just write the ending the way I wanted. It was so simple, and I vividly remember the moment where that lightbulb flashed and I realized I could write anything I wanted in order to make it happen.
I didn’t actually rewrite the ending to Fern Gulley, but I did start writing. For the most part, I haven’t really stopped.
If you could only use five words to describe your novel, Sleepwater Beat, what would they be?
Gritty. Raw. Relevant. Warning. Super-powered.
Now let’s hear a little more! What can readers expect?
I really love sharing this story, because it just nailed things on the head (and helps to narrow down the readers who will enjoy my work for the very same reasons). A few months ago, I found a 2-star review of Sleepwater Beat on Amazon UK. I know, not really making my case by leading this with a 2-star review, right? Except… this was the review (and I’m applying the relevant points here, because this reviewer had quite a lot to say):
“Got over a third of the way through and liked the present day gritty writing and an interesting concept. Unfortunately though, the author kept going back to the past in alternate chapters and it became all so depressing and hard going. Realised I was only reading a chapter or two and then putting the book down to find something else to do… not a good sign.
Could have been good and some will like the way it deals with the seedier side of some people, but it wasn’t happy enough for me and I shall be deleting the book and not buying the sequel(s)”
So why am I super excited to share this story? 1) “present-day, gritty writing and an interesting concept”. So the reader loved it, and yes, Sleepwater Beat borders on Noir. 2) “it became all so depressing and hard-going” The reviewer had to put down the book multiple times because the emotion and the darkness was so real, they couldn’t quite handle it. 3) “some will like the way it deals with the seedier side of some people” Yes. Sleepwater Beat does in fact deal with all the seedier sides of people, which I’ve actually seen quite a bit of in my relatively short life, including within myself. This is dark. It’s Dystopian. It’s mean to pick apart a few social and economic institutions we’re facing today, both in the US and really all over the world. As another reviewer put it: “ a timely comment on the crisis of late capitalism–like the opioid epidemic, the pressure of the 24-hour news cycle, and the destructive aspects of the tech and social media industries all rolled into one.” I love this.
4) “it wasn’t happy enough” When I read this, I did my own little happy dance. That’s the point. I don’t write “happy” fiction. My publishing imprint is Exquisite Darkness Press. All of my work is dark, brutal, intense, sometimes “depressing”, and it’s very much for a purpose. There is no light without darkness, no hope without despair, no creation without destruction. The fact that Sleepwater Beat isn’t “happy enough” is a badge of honor I wear with pride, to be perfectly honest.
So this is what readers can expect from my work, especially Sleepwater Beat and the entire Blue Helix series (Book 2 is scheduled for release May, 2020). There’s also lots of gunfire, explosions, fistfights, cigarettes, and foul language. I know that may turn some readers off, and I know it may seriously attract others, and I’m happy with all of it.
On a more story-centric level, this book is about Leo’s search for a place within a chaotic society that spurns who she is and what she can do—her “beat”, making everyone who hears her speak a certain way believe absolutely whatever she says. There are “super powers” in this book, though those who possess them are really just trying to survive in a world that fears everything about them. Leo was never able to trust the people closest to her as a child, so she struggles with trusting the people who can do what she does by “spinning a beat”, and she has to find within herself the means with which to accept being accepted, no matter what the consequences may be.
Where did the inspiration for your novel come from?
I don’t think I can pin this down to just one answer. But it comes down to two things, really. The first was just one scene that popped into my head in 2014, I think, about a woman punching a man so hard in the face that he falls to his death over the edge of a frozen waterfall. (Again, not particularly happy. My mind can be a dark place…) This scene spawned what quickly became “Sleepwater Beat” the long short story of around 30,000 words. That in and of itself was an experiment. I wanted to see how well I could create a story where every scene was out of order, where none of them were presented next to another scene either directly before or after it in a chronological sequence. So the scenes popped all over the place. I took it to my writing group when I lived in Charleston, South Carolina, and while they loved the writing and the characters and the grittiness of the short story, my experiment failed in that it was “incomplete”. This writing group asked so many questions, and their enthusiasm for the story I hadn’t yet written was so contagious, I realized the short story had so much more to say. So I began the long, gruelling process of turning “Sleepwater Beat” of 30,000 words into Sleepwater Beat, Book 1 of the Blue Helix series, a novel of 102,000 words. Obviously, it was a lot more successful, as this book became an International Bestseller in April 2019 and was a Sci-Fi Finalist in the 2019 International Book Awards.
The second bit of inspiration for this book was… well, just my life. I had no idea when I started turning the short story into the novel that Leo would reflect more of myself and my experiences than any other character I’ve written to date. It was very close to home and a little terrifying in that way. But the more I filled in the pieces of her story, the more I realized it just felt right. The characters Carlos and Alex were modelled after very real people in my own life in very much the same relationship to me as they have in the story with Leo. I could go on and on about the similarities, but it’s better to just read the book and enjoy it for what it is.
I will say that the “woman punching a man in the face” scene from the original short story was one of many that didn’t make it into the book. But they all served their purpose.
Do you have a favourite line or scene from Sleepwater Beat?
So after all this time I’ve spent talking about the darkness of my novels and the fiction I write, it may seem a bit contradictory that the first line that comes to mind isn’t really very dark at all. But I think it shows very well the point that I try to make by writing intensely dark fiction—that even when we’re surrounded by so much pain, devastation, regret, shame, hopeless, there are always moments where the light can trickle back in. And it’s just a matter of whether or not we (mostly the characters) are prepared enough to let it do so.
This line comes from Chapter 17. Leo’s father just passed away days after she turned eighteen, and in her shock, she called the only person she really had to turn to. Alex plays a huge part in Leo’s past (and a bit again in her future at the end of the book), and at this point in the story, they hadn’t spoken in months and were “on the rocks” after various poor choices Leo made. But none of that mattered at the moment when Leo needed Alex the most. So it’s a few lines, but still short:
Leo felt like she’d break if she moved; the kiss was that fragile. It seemed to say everything all at once—It’s okay. I love you. I’m sorry. I’m here.
Were there any particular parts that challenged you while writing?
Am I allowed to say all of it? Ha! It was hard enough to salvage what was necessary from 30,000 words and fill in an entire story and life and message to bring it to 102,000 words. To be honest, though, I’d have to say that the most challenging parts of this were writing the “romantic scenes”.
Yes, there is a romantic vein throughout Sleepwater Beat, and Leo has two “love interests”—Alex from her past and Kaylee during her time with the organization called Sleepwater. I’m not saying that the “romance scenes” were difficult to write because they were “romance” (and I hesitate to call it that, because I really don’t write Romance for its own sake. But yes, there are relationships and moments of intimacy). The most difficult thing for me was whether or not to write these scenes into the book in the first place.
I’ve mentioned the fact that I’ve seen a massive lack of LGBTQ characters represented in speculative fiction, particularly Fantasy and Sci-Fi, without those works being focused more on romance and/or erotica than the story itself and the characters who make it unique. Sleepwater Beat has so many messages in it and touches on so many different topics about which I feel very strongly, and while these intimate scenes were screaming at me to be written, I was terrified that including them in this book would downplay all the other things I wanted readers to see. I did not want this to turn into a romance or something that read like these “romance” scenes had been added just for gratuitous effect. And they are very different from each other—as different as Alex and Kaylee are as characters. As different as Leo is when she’s eighteen versus twenty-two. So I struggled a lot with whether or not to keep these scenes in the book, because I also knew how powerful they were for Leo’s story and where she was headed.
As it turns out, very few people have commented on the “romance” aspect of this book. And those who have have had nothing but wonderful things to say about it, like the review that came from Grady Harp with the San Francisco Review of Books: “Mystery, adventure, extraordinarily unique unveiling of human powers, and a very fine LGBTQ romance all combine in Kathrin’s skilled hands to create a very powerful and satisfying novel…” So I guess I did them all justice, in the end.
Do you have any advice for aspiring writers?
The most oft-repeated advice—and still the most important, in my opinion—for any aspiring writer is to just keep writing. Yes, it sounds cliché, but I’ve learned over the years just how true it is. There is no improvement, no development of your craft, no failures to be had or successes to be attained if you’re not writing anything. I will gladly raise my hand and admit that not everything I’ve written is perfect (and those pieces will never see the light of day!).
There was a period of time during my own “darkest days” where I didn’t write a single word of fiction for four years. And it killed me. I had to learn through a lot of soul-searching and forgiveness of myself, quite honestly, that I did still “deserve to write” and that I could still do something great with my words on paper. But until I made the decision to just keep writing, nothing ever changed. I never learned more. I never stretched myself or challenged my abilities or further honed my craft. Every writer struggles with that “fear of not being good enough”. The best remedy for that—the very definition of courage—is to do it anyway.
What’s next for you?
So many exciting things! First up on the agenda (and it’s almost upon us!) is the release of my novella The Summoner Thief, which is exclusive to the Playing with Fire boxed set releasing on October 8th by Fire Quill Publishing. This boxed set has stories from twelve USA Today and International Bestselling Authors, all of which are centered around the theme of Forbidden Love. The Summoner Thief is a prequel to my new LGBTQ Dark Fantasy series, Vessel Broken. Like I said, I don’t do romance, so my contribution to this boxed set is rather dark. Definitely “forbidden”, but it doesn’t have a Happily Ever After (which I also don’t do). Still, anyone who likes terrifyingly powerful, independent, unstoppable, brutal female characters and a little bit of an LGBTQ power struggle—in and out of the bedroom—will definitely enjoy The Summoner Thief.
After that, the next big thing coming up is Sleepwater Beat’s sequel, Sleepwater Static. This is Book 2 in the Blue Helix series, and as I mentioned before, it’s scheduled for release in May of 2020. I didn’t intend for Sleepwater Beat to have a sequel or be part of a series at all, which is what makes it such a great standalone novel. But once I finished it, I realized there is still so much more to be told. So I’m really looking forward to bringing the sequel to all my readers who prefer stories that “just aren’t happy enough.”
Lastly, do you have any book recommendations for us?
Always, always, always, forever on the top of my list is Stephen King’s The Dark Tower series. Seven books, an epic saga of an adventure, and it’s Dark Fantasy. I know, from the Master of Horror himself, if people haven’t read The Dark Tower, it seems a bit odd. But it’s brilliant. I’m actually currently reading the series for the tenth time as I write this.
My other favorites are Jacqueline Carey’s Kushiel’s Legacy series. Also Dark Fantasy. Also LGBTQ. A few of the characters and the intensity of their relationships in my Vessel Broken series were actually inspired by this series, which is so brilliantly, eloquently written in such a wide scope of a world that looks so much like ours and is entirely its own. These books are incredible.
You can find Kathrin on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and at her website.
