Bio
Olivie Blake, the pen name of Alexene Farol Follmuth, is the author of bestselling fantasy and sci-fi crossover titles for adults. She is a lover and writer of stories, many of which involve the fantastic, the paranormal, or the supernatural, but not always. More often, her works revolve around the collective experience, what it means to be human (or not), and the endlessly interesting complexities of life and love.
Olivie tripped and fell into writing after abandoning her long-premeditated track for Optimum Life Achievement while attending law school, and now focuses primarily on the craft and occasional headache of creating fiction. Her New York Times and Sunday Times bestselling The Atlas Six released 2022 from Tor Books, rounding out the bestselling trilogy with The Atlas Paradox and The Atlas Complex in 2024. The re-release of her viral literary romance Alone With You in the Ether was followed by backlist titles One for My Enemy and New York Times bestselling Masters of Death, with brand new titles forthcoming in 2025. She has also been published as the writer for the graphic series Clara and the Devil and a variety of other adult SFF books. As Alexene, she is the author of young adult fiction (alexenefarolfollmuth.com).
Olivie lives and works in Los Angeles with her husband and goblin prince/toddler.
Represented by
Amelia Appel, Triada US
Keep in touch
Currently . . .
Writing
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KISS YOUR DEVILS IN LOS ANGELES, previously UNTITLED HOLLYWOOD GOTHIC, a Gothic romance inspired by the Black Dahlia featuring extended immigrant families, the noble sport of pigeon seduction, and some demonic Santa Ana winds.
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NEWPHORIA, a standalone SFF set three generations into the future of Western technocracy about an archivist, a pop star, a survivalist cult, and clicktivism in the digital dark age.
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STARGAZING IS NECROPHILIA, an Alone with You in the Ether-esque romantic narrative about life, disappointment, desire, and the way love shapes us.
Reading
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THE PRACTICE, THE HORIZON, AND THE CHAIN by Sofia Samatar. This is another recommendation that comes from my close personal friend Alix E. Harrow, who as I've mentioned I trust for these things because she has a great appreciation for the weird. Which is not to say this one is necessarily weird—I don't yet know, I'm sorry, reading is really a mess for me right now with the exception of certain things, which we'll get into—but maybe it is! I am promised a transformative journey and a revolutionary space adventure, both of which I am up for, and it is a novella, which is promising for my current dearth of time.
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GONE GIRL by Gillian Flynn. I hinted there would be something weird on this list and this is it, not in that choosing to read GONE GIRL is weird, but in that it reminds me of the Ted Lasso episode where Roy Kent is reading THE DA VINCI CODE a solid twenty years after its moment of ubiquity in pop culture. I spent a week of November on tour with Melissa Albert in Buenos Aires and Santiago, and she convinced me I should read this book despite knowing the 50% plot twist (I did not, however, know the ending). Certainly there was an element of intrigue lost along the way, what with my awareness of Diary Amy, but it was an excellent airplane read and I agree with Anne Hathaway that it's a wonderful romcom. These two deserve each other.
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A SORCERESS COMES TO CALL by T. Kingfisher. I really like T. Kingfisher but for whatever reason I found her horror stuff to be my preferred entry point, can't honestly explain that, being not really a horror person, except maybe that I always enter fairytale retellings with a sense of trepidation, because they are often not as far off from the source material as I would like them to be. But I genuinely do not know where this "The Goose Girl" retelling is going, because the elements of the story are enticingly unfamiliar. My first thought was that it felt a bit like a body horror take on an aspect of ELLA ENCHANTED, which is rightfully a formative book, but it goes without saying that the originality of the T. Kingfisher fingerprint runs deep. I look forward to wherever she takes me, with no guesses as to where it will be.
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RED TEAM BLUES by Cory Doctorow. Cory Doctorow has been in my echo chamber of media a lot lately because of his recent comments on his self-coined "enshittification" theory, which is the process of online services becoming worse over time once users are established. Recently he said that because of the enshittification of Twitter, "I will never again devote my energies to building up an audience on a platform whose management can sever my relationship to that audience at will." Now, listen. I am not really a tech person. I never have been in the past. But. Circumstances change. I don't know if you've heard me ranting about technocracy over the past year, but needless to say this is extremely my bag at present. I know of Cory Doctorow because he is also a Tor author and his books are often near mine, visually speaking, but I previously understood his work to be sci-fi of an entirely different lean, which I shall now remedy. Onward to the Doctorowverse!
Listening
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Through Moonshot Eyes by The Rare Occasions. I try not to give things like this away early, but the song "Darling, The Planets" is one I associate very closely with a particular relationship in GIFTED AND TALENTED. I recently noticed The Rare Occasions had come out with a full album and got very excited to listen. This is more rock-leaning than I usually go, so that's fun! To me there is a slightly retro feel, kind of like my beloved White Reaper, though they also remind me a little bit of a local band I loved when I was in college that I assume no longer exists (?) called The Miracals.
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Fruitcake by Sabrina Carpenter. I think we can all agree that this has been Sabrina Carpenter's year (okay, a tie with Chappell Roan) and I guess now is as good a time as any to listen to her Christmas album! I think Christmas albums can be kind of a mixed bag—I wouldn't say I particularly love any of them (sonically speaking "Christmas Tree Farm" has so many ideas going on, I truly find it overwhelming) and tend toward "the classics," internal eye roll, from a place of nostalgia. My most Boomer quality, one might say. But who can say no to "Nonsense" with Christmas puns! Sabrina Carpenter's gift for innuendo is truly unparalleled.
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A Minute... by Myles Smith. I really enjoy Myles Smith as an artist even though I do feel like he falls somewhere around the Ed Sheeran corner of the market (read: sometimes the listening is so easy I wonder if it's also a touch saccharine). My favorite thing he's done, as I believe I've mentioned before, is a cover of Billie Eilish's
"Birds of a Feather" that's only available on Apple Music—Myles Smith under acoustic conditions is perfection, but he can obviously write a great hook. I love "Stargazing" and "Nice to Meet You."
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Doom Days by Bastille. Sometimes when I'm lonely while I travel I end up going back to something tried and true—earlier this year, on tour for THE ATLAS COMPLEX, it was Lorde's Pure Heroine, and this time on the plane it was Bastille. The opening track here is so perfect for that vague feeling of being lost in the universe a little, and it felt right to follow this album up with its successor, Give Me the Future—an outlook to take into the literal future of 2025. Also, if I had to pick one song for JANUARIES, I would choose Bastille's "Blue Sky & The Painter," which is also the one song I would leave you with for the year, if I could leave you with a feeling.