Olivie Blake (@olivieblake) is the pseudonym of the writer Alexene Farol Follmuth, author of multiple novels, anthologies, graphic novels, and film scripts, many of which involve the fantastic, the paranormal, or the supernatural. Her works revolve around the collective experience, what it means to be human (or not), and the endlessly interesting complexities of life and love. Cult-favorite The Atlas Six was re-released in a revised hardcover edition last month with Tor Books. A sequel in October and a live-action series are forthcoming. Alexene lives and works in Los Angeles with her husband and new baby, where she is generally tolerated by her rescue pit bull.
Read on for Olivie’s favored medeian specialty, lessons learned from writing fanfic, her take on dark academia, and the process of self-publishing books people love.
Not to spoil anything for the three and a half people who maybe haven’t yet read The Atlas Six, but can you tell us a bit about the world of the series?
First of all, I appreciate the wording of this question. Thank you for that. Secondly, The Atlas Six is about the six uniquely talented magicians vying for initiation to the Alexandrian Society, a secret society of caretakers who protect and contribute to the archives of “lost” knowledge from the Library of Alexandria and throughout history. In the book’s contemporary setting, the question of how to combat climate change is answered politically and economically with magic, so the characters exist openly in a world where magicians, called medeians, are university-educated and contribute to a system of capitalism much like ours. These particular six candidates each have a rare magical specialty and a myriad of personal motivations for pursuing the Society’s promise of wealth, power, and knowledge—which drives their tendency to want to kiss or kill any of the others at any given moment. (Two of them already hate each other, and the rest are about to.) And there is obviously a catch to this extraordinary opportunity: only five of the six are guaranteed initiation.
What’s the journey been like writing, self-publishing, and re-releasing The Atlas Six?
This is absolutely the weirdest timeline. I don’t know of any better way to put it. I wrote this book when I was starting to think that publishing wasn’t going to happen for me. I’ve always split myself in two, writing manuscripts to cold query to agents while also self-publishing the stories I wanted to tell that I didn’t feel were a good fit for the market. Basically, I was self-publishing for the handful of beloved weirdos willing to follow me wherever I went. (Find your flock, they say. Good advice.)
I knew from my initial concept that this book wasn’t right for publishing en masse—it was too hard to explain in a quick pitch to an agent without sounding derivative. It was too character-driven for genre standards. It had a familiar setting and hook but with a very unconventional execution. There was no hero or villain. Every character was 100% sexually fluid. It was too quiet for spec fic. I was in a really think-y place, trying to figure out whether it was responsible to bring a baby into a world where it’s impossible to be ethical. In the end, I figured I could just write it for myself, exactly as I wanted to write it, while nobody cared enough about me to say no.
So I wrote it. Released it. People seemed to like it, but it wasn’t doing numbers. Within a few months, I had finished another manuscript and finally gotten an agent for a completely separate project—my young adult rom-com, My Mechanical Romance. I figured, okay, I guess I’m a YA author now, at least until those obligations are fulfilled, so Atlas will have to wait. But, I reasoned, thankfully, only a few people were waiting.
Then I got pregnant. I wrote another YA manuscript. Something weird happened on Twitter. (A very “somehow, Palpatine returned” situation.) People started talking about the book. I gave birth to my son. Something weirder happened on TikTok. A LOT of people started talking about the book. Suddenly my book that had absolutely no commercial appeal was…commercially appealing? I signed with Tor to finish out the trilogy (!). Then…producers wanted to meet with me? So I was like? Okay? In between my baby’s naps, I wrote the sequel and optioned the book for TV. I…got on the NYT bestseller list? I went on tour in two countries? At this point, it all dissolves into a fever dream. Is this real? I really don’t know. I haven’t slept more than two consecutive hours in almost a year.
On a serious note, revising The Atlas Six was such an incredible opportunity. I went from being a one-woman show (with the help of one or two friends and, of course, my beloved collaborator @littlechmura) to suddenly having the resources to actually make the book into what I wanted it to be. I got to stretch out a little, narratively speaking, and take up more space. New illustrations! New cover! New feedback! New ways to reach a new audience! Suddenly the book of my mind became the book of many minds and was all the better for it. It was then, and is now, a product of some kind of magic. For five years, I wrote ten to twelve hours a day, posting millions and millions of words for free, purely because I loved it—loved it to the point where it broke my heart to think of doing anything else. And now?
Well, now I have imposter syndrome, of course. But my god, what a beautiful con.
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