Thursday, April 30, 2015

Meet Mark Conte

The following is all about a fellow author at CCP:
How old were you when you discovered you had a passion for putting thought to page?

    I was eight years old and telling stories to the neighborhood women every Saturday night.   However, I did not start writing it down on paper until I was 40 years old.

 

Do you have a muse? If so, who (if you want to share) if not what gets you in the seat to start the process?  

  No, I just have myself.  Sometimes the ideas come so fast I can hardly keep up with the typing, but that is the best part.

 

How many hours a day do you write?

  Usually three hours in the morning.  Near the end of a book I write all through the day getting to the end.

 

 If you get blocked, what techniques do you use to clear your mind?

  I never get blocked.  If I sit at the computer I am ready to write.  Sometimes I’m not sure what I want to do at a certain point, then I work on another story till the solution comes to me.

 

Of all time, who are your very favorite authors?

James Hilton, Edwin O;Connor, Don Delillo, Ernest Hemmingwasy, Bosis Pasternak and John Steinbeck.

 

What do you like to do for fun?      

    I used to go on my boat and fish for large mouth bass in the mornings when I lived on Lake Bradford but I’m getting to od for that.  I do enjoy Going to a great restaurant and having a wonderful lunch or dinner with a cocktail or two.. 

 

What is your book about
It's the story of an Italian family who buy a live lamb on Good Friday and fatten it up all day Friday and Saturday, then slaughter it and have it for Easter dinner.  However, this year, the children devise a plan to save the lamb from its fate.


 I have had fiction, poetry, articles and guest columns in 67 publications, including Yankee magazine, Crazy Horse, Southern Poetry Review, Poetry International, Potomac Review, Piladelphia Daily News and New York Times.  I Won Honorable Mention in the PEN American award for short fiction, First Prize in poetry in the Barbwire Theater in San Francisco, California and first prize in the Packard Poetry Awards in the New York Quarterly magazine. I was director of the Florida State University Poet series and appointed Master Poet by the Florida Arts Council. My recent books are The Ghost, 2013 and The Easter Lamb, due April 2015.  I am a member of the Authors Guild and the Academy of American Poets.

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