Q: Can you
tell us how you got started writing?
A: I
started writing because I stories made my imagination explode. Writing horror
began at a young age: I wrote my first story on ruled tablet paper in second
grade. My teacher passed it on to the elementary school principal. He read it
at a meeting of the local Lions Club, of which my father was a member. As
president of the chapter, Principal Sprunger fined my father a dime because the
preacher’s son wrote such a sordid tale full of skeletons, witches and blood.
Some boys
like baseball. My fun was writing stories.
Q: What
motivated you to start publishing?
A: I was
never keen on writing to fit the strict bookstore shelving categories. I began
publishing my work for e-readers because I can write the story I’m inspired to
write and tag it with the terms that suit it best. Anyone with a search engine
can find it.
Although
I’m responsible for the writing, the formatting, the editing, and the promotion,
I no longer have to wait for or depend on others to validate me. If I do a good
job, the potential for profit far surpasses traditional publishing.
Q: Can you
tell us more about your book?
A: When I
first began working on THE SIXTH SEED, I wasn’t planning to write anything other
than a horror tale. And it started out as a story, a short one, way back in
1994.
The idea
invaded my mind during my drive home through rush-hour traffic: A man gets a
vasectomy performed by a doctor in league with the Gray alien race in order to
produce the first human/alien hybrid. The doctor implants a genetically
engineered paraseed in the man’s vas deferens, outside the cauterization point,
that impregnates his wife with their sixth child—the first hybrid to develop
full-term in utero.
The more I
worked with this idea, the bigger it grew. Frustrated with my inability to get
a handle on this tale, I sent it out for review and received a comment that the
idea was too big for a short story; why not develop it into a novel?
When I
wrapped my head around the possibility, I broadened the story arc, developed
the characters, and gave them a backstory. Working on my antagonist revealed
that I needed to represent his world realistically, and this included science
and medicine. (Frankly, without this grounding in reality, the story would be
too farfetched to believe.) So I studied up on urology and obstetrics. I was
lucky to have a friend who had just undergone a vasectomy and was willing to
give me the gritty (intensely portrayed in chapter 1).
My horror
story was mutating into something else, some kind of hybrid… Was it science
fiction? Kind of. Fantasy? That, too, listing toward the dark side. Definitely
paranormal, in the aliens and UFO sense. And what else? Family drama. What a
mish-mash.
I tried to
place this book for a decade, and it couldn’t be categorized. I liked it just
fine the way it turned out, so I refused to rewrite it to make it acceptable
for traditional print publication. I finally decided to produce it myself for
Kindle, and it’s enjoying regular sales.
I bill THE
SIXTH SEED as “a dark paranormal fantasy fraught with suburban Pittsburgh
horror.” But the science fiction is there too, in the medical procedures,
extrapolated to the conception, prenatal care, and delivery of a child half
alien.
Although I
spent the most time with my protagonist in THE SIXTH SEED, my favorite
character is six-year-old Emil, a sweet, starry-eyed boy who can’t get his
father to believe that the bug people are coming to take him away.
Q: Can you
give us a short excerpt?
A:
Melanie had
been virtually comatose since lunch. Late that afternoon, he slipped into the
bedroom to check on her and laid his hand on her warm belly. She didn’t stir.
Faintly, almost imperceptibly, he felt the baby move in her womb. It made him
smile. His smile died when he felt the child trace the outline of his outspread
hand.
Q: Where
can people find your book?
Q: What's
your favorite indie book that you've read recently?
A: I’ve
read a few and enjoyed most of them, but the one that sticks out is Jason Jack
Miller’s THE DEVIL AND PRESTON BLACK—Appalachian gothic at its finest.
Q: What are
some of your favorite authors?
A: I like
Stephen King’s early books. I also appreciate Patrick McGrath and Cormac
McCarthy. A new favorite is Trent Zelazny, who wrote DESTINATION UNKNOWN.
Frank
Herbert’s THE RATS and Thomas Tryon’s THE OTHER were probably the most
influential books during my teen years. I still love reading THE OTHER.
Q: What's next for you?
A: I earned
a master’s in Writing Popular Fiction from Seton Hill University. I’m working
on finally getting my thesis novel, DEATH
PERCEPTION, ready for publication. Here’s the skinny:
Nineteen-year-old
Kennet Singleton lives with his invalid mother in a personal care home, but he
wants out. He operates the crematory at the local funeral home, where he
discovers he has a gift for discerning the cause of death of those he
cremates—by toasting marshmallows over their ashes.
He
thinks his ability is no big deal since his customers are already dead.
However, when what he discerns differs from what’s on the death certificate, he
finds himself in the midst of murderers. To save the residents and avenge the
dead, he must bring the killers to justice.
Supernatural
crime blends my love of horror, crime, and the supernatural. It’s the direction
my fiction is taking.
Q: Can you
tell us some interesting facts about you?
A: I’m kind
of bipolar with my light and dark sides. Besides writing dark fiction, I have a
master’s in biblical studies and was once a pastor before I came out. I’m now a
Spiritualist and a practicing medium. I write about metaphysical issues at http://buildingthebridge.wordpress.com/.
I’m a
technical writer by trade, which is a sub-genre of horror.
I love cashews
and eat them every day.
Sarah J. Cota's Between
Worlds series tells the story of spirits given human bodies in order to
protect the Earth from the malevolent doings of spirits bent on its
destruction. Summer of Indie spoke with Sarah J Cota about the first two books
in the Between Worlds series, The Sisters' Island, and The Realm. 
The Earth is protected by spirits that were
given human bodies in order to protect the human race from natural disasters;
that are not natural. They are made and are intentional by other spirits who
want to destroy Earth and anything that stands in their way. Blair Sinclair is
one of those spirits who has to find her twin sister two hundred years later
after her human body was killed and then reborn in present day. Along the way
other misled spirits and two human friends join her ranks to create their own
unique Court. The Bermuda Triangle does exist and everything that you have
heard is true. Anything that happens across it does not come out. Ever.
A powerful storm is brewing and
Salvador is at the heart of it. Blair is determined to save Lisa and everyone
on The Sisters' Island including Humult, a hunter who has been after her for
two centuries. The only way to survive and to keep the humans safe is to leave
Earth and to find answers in The Realm.
