Apex Book Company

In something as long as a lifetime, it’s difficult to mark beginnings and endings. People who come from families of storytellers have a lot more practice deciding where a tale should start and end — if I spent too much time on back story at the dinner table, I’d get interrupted by someone else’s much more interesting tidbit. But even now, with thirty-three years of sit-up-and-pay-attention under my belt, one of the biggest challenges I had while editing Beauty & Dynamite was deciding how and where to break it up into parts.

My strength lies in composing the events of a day into tidy packages of words; I suddenly had to think on a slightly larger scale. I found myself hunting for similar themes, wishing that I had seeded a few more subplots into my life so that I could use them as story arcs. Sometimes, story arcs jump out at you (“The Life of Hymie”). Sometimes the clues are a bit more subtle and you have to work for it (“Destined for Greatness” and “The Story Magnet”). Sometimes you don’t see them until years later. Such is the way of life. And–like life–sometimes they have to die on you.

I’m excessively lucky (*spitspit*) that I have had very few people die on me so far in my formative years–trust me, it’s something I appreciate every single day. Those that have passed on each in their own way has marked the end of an Era in the Adventures of Princess Lee. In 2005 it was Andre Norton: Grand Dame of science fiction, pioneer of female genre writers, librarian, mentor, correspondent, and friend. In her last letter to me, less than a month before she passed away, Miss Andre told me how proud she was of my achievements and me. In 2006 it was Jim Baen, the man who indirectly set about the series of events that brought me to where I am today. In 2007 it was Hank Reinhardt: the gentle man with the hat, the man who first handed me a sword and taught me what to do with it, and the man to whom Beauty & Dynamite is dedicated.

Today–Thursday July 2, 2009–I mourn the loss of a man also immortalized (at least three different times) in my beloved little book of essays. A man who didn’t even know me. A man named Ken.

The inaugural Hypericon in 2005 was one of those turning points in life where a critical amount of paths meet and cross and form new destinies. For me, it was a time that will live in infamy. That was the year I became a moderator, the year I was asked to write for Apex, the year Tom “Pic” Piccirilli ordered me to submit my first novel. It was the year I went through incredible emotional turmoil, chose a friendship over a boy, and wrote a story based on the events that would change my life forever. So much can be traced back to that one convention…and that party in a room full of guitar players, when an old guy named Ken interrupted our conversation. He scolded me in a thick southern drawl with three words I’m not sure how I ever lived without: “Don’t be stoopid!”

Directly afterward, in that brief moment before Pic and Keene and I and everyone else in our circle melted into a pile of blissful hilarity, there was a perfect silence. I will remember that brief moment–with all of us frozen there in incredulous tableau–for the rest of my life.

To this day, we all quote to each other Ken-isms from that convention, one-liners about meatloaf and a Yankees’ affection for gravy and the ever-infamous “Don’t be stoopid!” True, he was a running joke (and still is), but his antics were the magnet that drew a handful of gifted strangers together. They were the glue that bound us. Each of us had a story about Ken and so he became a common thread, one so pervasive that it wove its way into Beauty & Dynamite’s introduction and its afterward. Whether you believe the version of Ken in Brian’s “Sex and Flying Meat” or Jason’s “Unwarranted Serendipity” or my “These Boots Were Made for Moderatin’,” it doesn’t matter. Ken was all of them. He was a legend.

I found out a little more about Ken after that. His last name was Moore. Turns out he was already a legend in the Southern convention circuit. He’d been around for years, and was even chairman at the last (and ultimately unsuccessful) SF convention in Nashville (Kubla Khan). He’d been the fan guest of honor at four or five conventions over the last 30 years. He’d won both the Rebel Award and the Rubble Award, and he was the founding member of the Nashville Science Fiction Club. (Read more about Ken here: http://www.scifiinc.net/scifiinc/gallery/bio/Moore,_Ken.htm)

Of course, in our circle he was just famous for being “that crazy drunk guy named Ken.” When Brian chose “Sex and Flying Meat” for his reading at Hypericon 5 last month, half of me was scared to death that Ken would accidentally stumble in and discover what an integral part he’d played in our lives. The other half of me hoped he’d pop in and join the fun. Strangely enough, nobody ran into him the whole weekend. Fred Grimm told me later that Ken was at the convention, but was so ill he couldn’t leave his room.

Ken passed away on Tuesday. I just found out this afternoon. I’m not even sure from what, or for how long he was ill. But I can honestly say he was there with us right until the end…in spirit, at least…weaving even more unsuspecting victims into the elaborate tapestry of our adventures.

A sizeable cadre of us took this news to heart more emotionally than we ever thought we would. In more ways than one, a legend among us has died. I’m sure there are many stories like mine that haven’t yet come to light, many other lives that Ken touched in the more than three decades he spent on the southern convention circuit. I wonder if he knew any of their names. I wonder if he knows mine now.

When I got home from work today, I pressed PLAY on my answering machine. There are a few messages on there I’m reluctant to delete: one from Stephan Pastis confirming an interview, one from David Hartwell asking my advice on what eventually became an award-winning matter, and one from my sister–I won’t say which one, so they both think it’s them. But the first message is my favorite. It’s been on there for over four years now, from when Pic hunted me down a few days after Hypericon while I was in the throes of that aforementioned emotional turmoil.

“Are you off being stoopid?” my answering machine asked in a very New York accent. “Ya don’t answer your email, who da hell knows what kind of crisis of faith…” Who, indeed. There was a click, and then a moment of silence before the next message played. In that moment we were all there again, frozen in tableau in a room filled with guitars and laughter and enough conversation to keep us going until five am and four years later. I reserved that moment for Ken. And in his honor I advise you all from the bottom of my heart: Don’t be stoopid.

Alethea Kontis’s first publication was her essay in Apex Digest issue #3. She is now the author of AlphaOops: The Day Z Went First and the official Sherrilyn Kenyon Dark-Hunter Companion, as well as co-editor of the SF all-star anthology Elemental. Find out more about Alethea’s own plans for world domination on her website: www.aletheakontis.com.

In June 2008, Apex Publications released a collection of essays and memoirs from Alethea titled Beauty & Dynamite that includes contributions from Brian Keene, Tom Piccirilli, and John Ringo.

Beauty & Dynamite can be bought in the Apex Shop or along with the rest of Alethea’s books in the Apex aStore.