Kayti Nika Raet

 

 

 

 

I recently had the opportunity to talk to a very talented author after reading her book Niko, and asked her a few questions. Here is a transcript of what she had to say.

 

 

 

Q. Can you tell us a little about your book?

Kayti.  The short answer (AKA “the elevator pitch”) is that Niko is a YA dystopian featuring a badass girl with a baseball bat, set in a world where the rain burns like acid and flesh eating monsters roam.

The long answer (AKA “the elevator is broken. . . and now you’re trapped with me and my book. Mwa ha ha!”) Niko is about a girl struggling to survive and provide for what’s left of her family in this post-apocalyptic world. She’s doing pretty well until one night her house burns down with her brother inside and the other goes missing. . .

She’s taken into the city by the Rose Circle, a group who kills Slithers (the aforementioned flesh eating monsters) but she doesn’t exactly trust them (smart) and it’s only when she’s in the city that she realizes how much those are who live outside are deprived and must do something to change that.

Also, genetic modification.

And romance.

And fight scenes… tons of them.

And humor!

(Well, whaddaya know! The elevator’s moving again! Weird how it suddenly decided to stop like that… *innocent eyes*)

 

Q. What is it that inspired you to write?

Kayti.  I’ve always liked to write (horror short stories, and Sailor Moon fan-fic), but I didn’t think of it as something I actually wanted to DO until after I read In The Forest of the Night by Amelia Atwater Rhodes and was determined to become a teen author like she was. I started to consider self-publishing after I read Tiger’s Curse by Colleen Houck and learned that she had originally gone indie before becoming traditionally published.

I guess you can say I always was a writer, but it was reading books that made me want to become a published author.

 

Q. What is in the future for you and your work?

Kayti.   Lots of good things I hope! 🙂

My ultimate writing goal is to have completed a series, trilogy, and a standalone before I’m thirty, but right now, I’m working on the fourth book in The Outsider Chronicles. It’s called Monster, and I’m hoping to release it in 2015. I also plan on having the previous books, Niko, Harm, and Outsider, finally available in paperback. Yay!

I also want to write a book that has a twelve year old tattoo artist in it, but we’ll see what happens. 🙂

 

Q. What drives you, what are you most passionate about?

Kayti. This is going to sound like the most generic answer ever. But I’m really passionate about… writing. I love creating stories for people to dive into, the kind that make people lose track of time, the kind of stories that helps them discover themselves, or makes them want to craft tales of their own.

Stories are powerful. They inspire people, scare people, and have the ability to hold a mirror to society and encourages us to really look at ourselves and what we’re doing.

Being a writer is awesome. It’s life. 🙂

 

Fun fact: In 388 B.C. Plato had urged Athens to exile its writers and poets (yeah, that dude…) because he felt that the pervasive power of a good story had the ability to change the way a person thought. He felt a storyteller’s ability to compel new ideas into peoples head made them dangerous.

History has proven him right.

 

Q. Tell us a little something about who you are?

Kayti. I’m 25 (quarter of a century! 75 more years to go!) I’m rather chatty, bossy, and full of random facts. I like helping people out, and I have a dry and rather morbid sense of humor. I moved down to Georgia when I was 11, and I have yet to acquire a Southern accent.

Though I love to write, English was never my best subject (honestly, I kind of hated it).

My 5 favorite musicians are: LIGHTS, Miyavi, Natalia Kills, Big Bang, and Evanescence.

 

And since you said you think Niko would make for a great anime series my 5 favorite animes are: Nana, Black Butler, Attack on Titan, Lucky Star, and Samurai Champloo.

 

Q. Where can we find everything YOU on the net? Links to books, websites, Facebook, Twitter and any other you might have.

Website: http://kaytinikaraet.com

On Facebook

On Twitter

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvfWBNXRH8nKQJRR6k8mb8w