clio velentza

Dear Reader,

How are you? It's been a while since I was active here, as I took a break from writing for some time. Note to self: it's okay to take breaks, but creativity does and will get rusty.

Little by little we always go back to what's us, and I'm going back to writing like someone trying to build a dry-stone wall out of pebbles. But progress is progress, and the time off made it clear: not writing felt simply Wrong. Doesn't matter who it's for. Doesn't matter if it's going to be seen. All that matters is showing up, no matter how often, but regularly.

Been beavering along at Camp Nanowrimo this July, trying to get 5.000 words down. What are your creativity goals this season? Let's keep each other strong 🌸

Happy summer,

What will you be reading or gifting now that the weather is getting colder?

.

If you or someone you know enjoy books about...

❄️ snowy woods

🕯️ dark deeds

🎼 music

👥 doppelgangers questioning their existence

♟ psychological suspense

👬 lgbtq romance

Have you picked your reading for the spooky season yet? The Piano Room has everything you need for a ghostly night in:

🕯️a deal with the devil

🕯️mysterious apparitions

🕯️gothic mansion

🕯️characters questioning their existence

🕯️bridges in the night

🕯️strange rituals

.

A wonderful review of The Piano Room by Bethan Briggs-Miller is now up on The Folklore Podcast! Bethan writes:

“Clio Velentza's debut novel breathes new life into the familiar Faust myth where a deal with the Devil is not all it seems. [...] Clio has managed to pose some of life’s big questions on what it is that makes us who we are, by making such believable characters with flaws we can relate too.”

Read it here.

But that’s not all...

As the paperback’s release date, March 1st, is around the corner, you can now read a SNEAK PEEK of The Piano Room over at the Fairlight Books website!

Massive thanks to the editors of If There’s Anyone Left, an anthology of F&SF by marginalized authors, for including The Piano Room in their Book Reviews page for contributors’ work!

Today I’ve got some exciting literary treats for you! 

Over at The Folklore Podcast, we talk folklore, The Piano Room, Faust, Frankenstein and writing with Bethan Briggs-Miller. Make a warming mug of tea and join us!

In the final episode of The Folklore Podcast Book Club for 2021, guest reviewer Bethan Briggs-Miller (Eerie Essex podcast) speaks with author Clio Velentza about her modern reworking of the Faust story, "The Piano Room", published by Fairlight Books.

Free to listen here.

~~~~~

In Mr. Bear’s Violet Hour Saloon, Mr Bear reads an excerpt from the first chapter of The Piano Room, along with my creepy flash fiction Bone Dice.

Mr. Bear reads from Clio Velentza’s dark and shimmering debut novel THE PIANO ROOM and other beautifully unsettling work.

Listen here!

My favorite books of 2021✨

📚 You know it's been a lucky reading year when you have trouble whittling your list down to seven titles! All these books took me to places I'd never imagined, offering moments of laughter, violence, adventure, tenderness and longing, and, of course, the delicious feeling of looking for questions instead of answers.

Have you ever taken part in the National Novel Writing Month? Do you, like me, love writing by hand and swoon over a beautiful notebook?

I’m over the moon to announce the publication of my novel, The Piano Room!

Those of you who had been following me for a while now may remember this story which began as a NaNoWriMo 2013 project, and has stuck with me ever since. After many years of work, The Piano Room has found a welcoming home in Fairlight Books, an indie Oxford-based publisher of literary fiction.

A slow-burn, character-driven gothic read with LGBTQA+ characters, dark and perfect for the season, The Piano Room will keep you company during the cold months as you curl up with a cup of tea.

The book’s synopsis:

Sandor Esterhazy is descended from a long line of talented pianists, but has no desire to play. So, one snowy afternoon, he promises his soul to the devil in exchange for a life of his own choosing. Afterwards, he laughs it off as a joke, but that night the devil arrives dragging someone – or something – with him.

Uncertain what to do with the bewildered creature, Sandor locks it in the basement, allowing it out only once a night to visit the piano room – the creature, who he names Ferdi, is desperate to play. Sandor slips easily into his new role of captor, but as Ferdi learns what it is to be human, tensions between the two escalate, and Ferdi escapes into the world…

And here is a review of the book by LoveReading, where it was voted ebook of the month:

“Fabulously inventive, and laced with evocative detail and intrigue, Clio Velentza’s The Piano Room boasts bite and a beautifully crafted plot.”

You can read more about the book and find links to buy it here, and here you can read an in-depth interview where I talk about writing. An excerpt of the interview:

What do you hope people take away from reading your book?

That they will take their time with the book and enjoy returning to its world; that tenderness is as able to change us as violence; that life may leave questions unanswered but what matters is what we do, what we hope, and how we relate to each other.

You can follow me on twitter and instagram, where I regularly hang out and share many book news (and occasionally photos of my coffee).

Thank you for being a part of this extraordinary journey!

I hope that the book will find readers who will enjoy and love it, and, even more, I hope that this reader might be you.

Love,

Dear Reader,

If you enjoy my work, consider buying me a coffee!

I’ve been writing and publishing for more than a decade now, and most of my stories are available to read online for free. (See my Publications page!) Writing takes up a lot of time and dedication, and support is always needed and appreciated.

Thank you for stopping by!

Dear Reader,

How are you? It has been a whirlwind of a year, and I hope the new one will be kinder. But 2020 also brought good things - some of which I’m excited to share with you later in the year. Stay tuned!

I’m happy to report that I managed to write new stories, some of which found a home in 2020, and some will be coming along in the following months. So here is a little something for every taste, flashes and micros, to entertain you:

~If you like stories about mysterious people who gamble away souls, then Bone Dice is for you:

The healer woman tells Ágota that cursed dice is man-business, book-business, and that she can do nothing for her.

~High Summer is a micro about lost friends and charred animal bones:

How well his clever hands arrayed the bulbs, the herbs, the frail errant petals. How well he spoke their sing-song names.

~If you are in the mood for something a bit more minimal and experimental, Automat is a piece about two women stuck in an abandoned automat:

Do you think they’ll write about us too? “Two young women died in a crumbling automat at L–strasse.”

~Little Goats deals with some unexpected consequences of melting ice caps:

Old Man Proteus looked at the girls. Water dripped from all their pockets.

*

Make yourself a nice cup of tea or coffee, and happy reading!

There’s more news coming along so watch this blog, as well as my twitter and instagram accounts, for exciting updates!

Thank you for stopping by,

Dear Reader,

It’s been a while! I hope you’re well. I seem to have fallen into a hole called “I wrote my first play and it took so much out of me that I shut down creatively”. It was an exciting and rewarding experience to write and edit it in the space of a few months. In January 2020 I had the luck to participate with my group in a stage reading at the National Theatre, where the full play got its first audience. A whirlwind!

There has been some wonderful news that I haven’t yet shared here (although I keep my honors and publications pages regularly updated):

my microfiction  “Anatomical Venus Girl”, (first published in Milk Candy Review in April 2019) has been a Best Microfiction 2020 winner! 

my flash fiction “A Catalogue of Temporary Objects” (first published in X–R-A-Y Literary Magazine in September 2018) was included in The Wigleaf Top50 Very Short Fictions 2019!

also, my flash fiction “Endling” (first published in Flapperhouse in March 2018) was in the same longlist!

I’m thankful to the magazine editors for nominating me! You can read the stories in the links above.

There is always more coming up, so watch this space!

Thank you for visiting,

I was honored to have an interview with writer Tommy Dean, as part of his series of Mini Interviews with writers! We talk writing and flash fiction,and here’s an excerpt:

Why do you write flash? What makes it different for you?

Spring is already here, but winter has been busy. I’m four months into the playwriting workshop I’m attending at the Greek National Theatre, which is intense and very new to me. At the same time I’m also working hard on editing the second draft of the novel - can you believe it made it this far?

All these have taken up a lot of my writing energy, so naturally new stories are a bit slower to come lately. But not too much! Here’s two new ones:

The Largest Place in the World was up in Easy Street Magazine, a short, lyrical piece about inner places.

We like how water is all that we don’t know.

In Wandering Mazes Lost found its perfect home in Coffin Bell Journal, and it’s a flash fiction about someone (or something) who lives in a labyrinth...

The third one doesn’t arrive by chance. She will come looking for him, and call him by names long forgotten.

There are more stories, and more news coming up!