WPS Author Interview Day 30: Alek L. Cristea
Welcome to day 30 of the Wonderland Pride Spotlight author interviews! Today I am interviewing Alek L. Cristea. To see all of the spotlight posts created by my lovely community, head over to the hashtag #wonderlandpridespotlight over on Instagram!
Alek's Books
The Interview
1. Are you LGBTQ+? If so, how?
"I'm a trans gay man who recently discovered I'm aromantic, proving that the queer journey of self-discovery never truly ends!"
2. What books of yours have LGBTQ+ representation, and what rep do they have?
"All of them! Cornucopia features an achillean couple as two of the main characters. Homogeny includes achillean, trans, and sapphic pov characters. Breakout has a large cast with three main pov characters, and every major character is queer. The three protagonists are Malek, who is pansexual and panromantic; Làhn, who is gay and still exploring his identity; and Trystan, a trans boy who identifies as gay."
3. Why do you think LGBTQ+ rep in books is important?
"My go-to answer is that growing up without representation meant taking decades to work through my own queerness, and I'd rather those coming after us don't have to go through that. But there's another crucial reason for representation that isn't discussed enough: non-queer folks need to see queerness simply existing in media. That way, our existence is normalised, and not something that needs justification, or for our stories to be only centered on the queer experience to exist. Queer media isn’t a niche or a genre."
4. What got you into writing?
"To be honest, I can't really pinpoint it. I've been 'telling myself stories' - as my parents would say – since I was a kid. It started with dolls and action figures, before stories started living rent-free in my imagination, and finally those stories started to make their way onto paper."
5. Who is a queer figure you look up to?
"If I had to pick the person I've looked up to for the longest, it's probably Stephanie Sterling of Jimquisition fame (if you're into video games). I've followed them for a long time, and they've always been openly political with views I strongly agree with. When they came out as nonbinary some years back, watching them blossom into their true self while becoming even more outspoken about their opinions was inspiring. It made me more confident that I should never silence my political views out of fear of others' reactions."
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