Tag: YA Fantasy

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Interview with Author Chloe Gong

Chloe Gong is the New York Times bestselling author of These Violent Delights and its sequel, Our Violent Ends. She is a recent graduate of the University of Pennsylvania, where she double-majored in English and international relations. Born in Shanghai and raised in Auckland, New Zealand, Chloe is now located in New York pretending to be a real adult. You can find her on Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok under @TheChloeGong.

First of all, welcome to Geeks OUT! Could you tell us a little about yourself?

Hello! It’s such a pleasure to be here. I’m Chloe Gong, the author of These Violent Delights and Our Violent Ends, which is a Romeo and Juliet retelling duology set in 1920s Shanghai. I’m originally from Auckland, New Zealand and I graduated from the University of Pennsylvania this year, so now I’m a full-time author hopping along in New York City.

Where did you get your start in creative writing? What pulled you to fiction?

I started way, way back, writing my first novel when I was 13! I gave writing a go because books and stories were a form of entertainment and escapism for me, especially because I always complained that I was soooooo bored in suburban Auckland. There were only so many times that my mum could take me to the library in a week, and once I tore through my book pile, I turned to writing stories instead of reading them. Creative writing was this outlet to create worlds for myself—I didn’t even think of myself as a writer until much later in high school.

Where did the impetus to write These Violent Delights come from, besides the obvious Shakespearean source?

I wanted to write a blood feud story mashed with the setting of 1920s Shanghai, so the Shakespearean source genuinely did come later! I was fascinated with the aesthetic of the 20s and Shanghai in the 20s in particular because my parents always talked about it as the city’s golden era in modern history. Then I did some research of my own and learned about the lawlessness and the gangster rule and everything being a result of imperialism after the Opium Wars, and it was just such a fascinating world that I wanted to work with it in fiction.

As an author who wrote These Violent Delights while studying in college, how did you balance your schedule between your classes and writing? Would you say your academic studies have influenced your creative projects?

It was hard! I had to do a lot of planning in advance, looking at my semester as a whole and pinning down which days I had assignments due so that it wasn’t clashing with my book deadlines. I wouldn’t have had it any other way, but it was certainly a lot of intense calendar-managing to make sure I was keeping a good balance. My academic studies influenced what I wrote for sure! Or rather, I would take classes in the sort of things I was interested in anyway, but my Russian Lit professor did get some very bizarre emails from me about duels and how people fought them in history.

How would you describe your crafting style, i.e plotting, pantsing, something in between, or something else entirely? How would you describe your typical writing routine?

I’m a very thorough plotter! I need things outlined before I can dive in, otherwise I find that I flounder a little. My outlines tend to look like Draft Zero too, and by that I mean I dump out everything I’ve imagined in the scene: the sequence of events, the dialogue, the character’s feelings, my behind-the-scenes craft work etc etc. By then, Draft One is the pretty prose run and I can focus on my language because the other heavy lifting has been done.

What’s your favorite cultural (film, book, etc.) adaption of a Shakespearean work, Romeo and Juliet and otherwise? Are you interested in writing any new stories based off the Bard’s work?

I really love the Baz Luhrmann adaptation of Romeo + Juliet. I think I’m going to stay in the Shakespearean retellings niche for some time, there’s definitely a lot to work with! I’ve written an Antony and Cleopatra retelling too, but that’s all I’ll say for now…

Since Geeks OUT is a queer centered website, could you tell us a bit about the LGBTQ+ characters featured in your books?

We have the darling Marshall Seo who is out as queer, described to have a Cheshire cat smile because he’ll be a ray of sunshine if you’re on his good side but he won’t hesitate to smack around anyone on his bad side. He has a budding romance with Benedikt Montagov, who is more hesitant toward embracing his identity because he’s an intense thinker and feeler living in his own head so much. And of course one of my favorite characters to write is Kathleen Lang—she’s a trans girl who is fiercely devoted to her family and will do everything in her power to protect them. I somehow accidentally gave her a line from Taylor Swift’s mirrorball before Taylor Swift even released mirrorball.

The central conflict is between the Scarlet Gang and the White Flowers, Chinese and Russian groups respectively. What was the process like for you, writing about a culture that you were already familiar with versus one that you weren’t?

Most of the cultures I wrote about in These Violent Delights I’m actually quite familiar with! I included these groups because of Shanghai’s true history and I’m in Shanghai often (at least, in our pre-pandemic days), where the remnants of the 1920s immigrant groups are still around in what I hear about from my relatives or in the shops and areas I go to. I did a bit more nosing around on Russian words as opposed to Chinese words I already knew, but ultimately I just approached all cultures with a lot of respect and wrote on what I’ve researched and soaked in about Shanghai. In general, I actually read more translated Russian literature than I read translated Chinese literature!

In various interviews, you’ve discussed how intense the research process was behind writing These Violent Delights and Our Violent Ends? Could you describe that for us?

I flipped through soooo many textbooks. I spent a lot of time very early in the process only absorbing information so that I could properly imagine the world as it was in history. That meant it came a lot easier once I was working on Our Violent Ends or on the spin-off duology that’s coming after that, because I already had the base work from all my heavy researching pre-These Violent Delights. 

What’s an interview question you haven’t been asked yet, but wish you were?

If I could fight any animal which one would I fight—and I would answer a salmon fish. I don’t know why, I just think it would be kind of funny.

What advice would you give to other aspiring writers?

To keep writing and writing! Craft can only develop with practice—it’s truly impossible to get something right off the bat or in one go. Don’t get discouraged if it doesn’t happen immediately as you want it to, and don’t buy into people who say they can teach you something fast. Writing is something that gets honed with time and effort.

Are there any other projects or ideas you are currently nursing and would be at liberty to say?

In Fall 2022, I have a spin-off duology coming! Set after the events of Our Violent Ends, Foul Lady Fortune follows a character who we’ve already met in the previous duology, but we can’t reveal who until Our Violent Ends is out so that we’re not spoiling anything! But I always pitch Foul Lady Fortune as a political C-Drama meets a Marvel movie as it’s about two fake married spies infiltrating a corporate workplace to uncover an imperialist scheme, and I’m very excited to reveal more eventually.

Finally, what are some LGBTQ+ books or authors you would recommend to the readers of Geeks OUT?

Ophelia After All by Racquel Marie is releasing February 2022 and it’s described as a coming-of-age/coming-out story as Ophelia navigates the end of high school and contemporary lovers absolutely have to scramble to pick it up. And for SFF lovers, Gearbreakers by Zoe Hana Mikuta is the most wild ride of found family and giant mechas in truly the best possible way so read it before the sequel Godslayers releases in June 2022!

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Interview with Author Nafiza Azada

Nafiza Azad is a self-identified island girl. She has hurricanes in her blood and dreams of a time she can exist solely on mangoes and pineapple.

Born in Lautoka, Fiji, she currently resides in British Columbia, Canada where she reads too many books, watches too many K-dramas, and writes stories about girls taking over the world.

Her debut YA fantasy was the Morris Award–nominated The Candle and the Flame. The Wild Ones is her second novel.

First of all, welcome to Geeks OUT!. Could you tell us a little about yourself?

Hello! My name is Nafiza Azad and I’m still navigating my many identities. I like to call myself an Indo-Fijian Canadian Muslim. I was born and grew up in Fiji and immigrated to Canada with a whole lot of emotional baggage when I was 17, along with my parents and a very tattered copy of Anne of Green Gables. I write female-centric books that celebrate life in all its messy (and often violent) glory. In the times when I’m not plotting or daydreaming, I watch Kdramas, embroider, and read.

How did you find yourself getting into writing fiction, particularly Young Adult? 

As I often tell people, writing isn’t something I choose to do. It’s more of a calling than a carefully chosen career. I have been writing (not very well) for as long as I can remember. I started with these particularly atrocious poems when I was still living on a sugarcane farm in Fiji and hadn’t begun school. For a long while, I thought I wouldn’t be able to write anything but poetry. I have taken many writing classes that have, whether intentionally or accidentally, shaped my writing, but almost all the professors who taught them told me that I had no future in writing. So, of course, I had to prove them wrong. I write YA because when I was a young adult, I never could find the books that I saw myself in. I want to change that for other young adults like me who are searching for reflections not just of their faces and persons but of their lives. I want to write a book that is a friend, a home, for someone who might not be welcomed elsewhere.

Where did the inspiration for your latest book, The Wild Ones, come from?

The Wild Ones is fueled by anger. It came from the girl in the mirror who was determined to take the awful experience she had gone through and create something out of it that would render her more than just a victim. THE WILD ONES is a scream out in this world where women are considered expendable, dismissed, an afterthought. Women, especially POC women, are constantly fighting to be heard, to be respected; we put our dignity on the line, we put our lives on the line, every time we step out of the door. The Wild Ones is an explicit call to arms and also an invitation to a sisterhood. A sisterhood that’s often denied and denigrated. 

How would you describe your writing process? Are there any methods you use to help better your concentration or progress?

The first thing I learned after writing my first book is that no, writing one book does not automatically mean you know how to write books. Every project is a different beast and often requires a different set of processes. However, there are certain ones that work for me. I start with a question and then elaborate on that question. I do a lot of work before I start writing the novel. A notebook accompanies me as I write and I fill it with character profiles, book aesthetics, research, plot, questions so that at the end, I end up with two books instead of one: the actual novel and a book that documents the journey that led to the novel. Drafting is the most difficult step in the process for me. Every word feels like it’s torn from me so when I’m drafting, I write a maximum of 2k words per day every day. It’s the longest process and the most painful one. I like to work in complete silence so I end up working late nights. I only work on one book at a time because I immerse myself completely in the world to the point that I feel like I miss entire seasons and months when I’m writing.

What do you wish you had known at the beginning of your writing journey? 

This might sound odd but for all writers looking to write professionally, understand that writing is a business. Yes, it is art but it is also a product to be consumed. Don’t be too attached to your way of doing things. Your way of doing things might make artistic sense but if it doesn’t make retail sense, you will be in for a lot of heartache. I wish I had understood that at the beginning. Sometimes success does not depend on the quality of your prose but on how saleable your story is. 

As a writer, who or what you say are some of your greatest creative influences and/or sources of inspiration?

There are so many. I gravitate toward female writers like Kate Elliott, G. Willow Wilson, Alison Croggon, Stephanie Burgis, Sylvia Plath and poets like Pablo Neruda, Warsan Shire, Safia Elhillo, Fatimah Ashgar. I am also inspired by my fellow writers like London Shah, Julian Winters, Adib Khorram, Axie Oh, Kat Cho, Karuna Riazi amongst many others. Their passion for their stories, for their works, inspires mine.

Aside from writing, what do you enjoy doing in your free time? 

I read webtoons! Korean webtoons are a whole new level! I watch dramas, accompany my mom while she gardens (I have a cherry tree I call Gerard). I returned to embroidering during the pandemic and I enjoy creating explosions of colour on fabric. I bake cakes and play with my niece and nephew who think that like them I’m also under ten. I take pictures of flowers and dream up more stories I want to tell.

Are there any projects you are currently working on and at liberty to speak about?

I just finished a draft of my second novel for S&S and all I  can say about it is that it’s a faery tale. I’m also working on an adult fantasy which is a whole new ball game as I’m discovering. I have many more stories planned. Hopefully I get to write a good lot of them.

What’s a question you haven’t been asked yet, but that you wish you were asked (as well as the answer to that question)? 

“Is there really a sugar festival in Lautoka (the first city the Wild Ones visit)?” Answer: Yes, there is! I was born in a village a few km from Lautoka and the sugar festival which takes place in August (or took place in this Covid-fested world) was one of the highlights of the year. I have many fond memories of attending the festival. 

What advice would you have to give to aspiring writers? 

You’ve already made the decision to be a writer and it’s probably because writing is in your blood. The bad news is: success the way it traditionally looks doesn’t come to everyone. The good news: we live in a new world and you define what success is. So the only thing between you and success is your grit and your willpower. Write every single day. Read everything, even books that don’t speak to you because those are the ones you will remember longest. Share your work with people whose criticism won’t cripple your creativity but also know that writing as a craft is one you will be working on forever. Learn to do close reading. Write in different styles. Be bold but also be respectful. Some stories you can tell, others you don’t have a right to. Respect that.

Finally, what LGBTQ books/authors would you recommend to the readers of Geeks OUT?

Instead of books, I will recommend authors whose books are lovely in their exploration of romance. Mason Deaver, Julian Winters, Adib Khorram, Zen Cho, Benjamin Alire Saenz.Tasha Suri‘s newest book is amazing in its representation. Ace of Spades by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé is also great. 

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Interview with Author Tara Sim

Tara Sim is a YA fantasy author who can typically be found wandering the wilds of the Bay Area, California. She is the author of the Timekeeper trilogy, which has been featured on Entertainment Weekly, Bustle, and various media outlets, and the Scavenge the Stars duology. When she’s not chasing cats or lurking in bookstores, she writes books about magic, murder, and explosives. I had the opportunity to interview Tara, which you can read below.

First of all, how did you get into writing? What drew you to the Young Adult genre specifically?

My dad loved telling people about how I would dictate poems and stories to him when I was 6. I dabbled in writing random stories (especially when I learned how to type) and I loved fantasy books, which eventually led to me writing my first novel at 15 (which was very long, and very bad). Some of those first fantasy books I loved were young adult, so I’ve always had a soft spot for those types of stories.

As a Young Adult writer, how would you describe your writing process? Would you describe yourself as a pantser, a plotter, etc…?

Solidly in-between. I like to plan out the big moments in a story, such as plot twists, and let the rest come to me while drafting. That way I have somewhat of a roadmap while discovering important landmarks on the way I wouldn’t have been able to see ahead of time.

According to the fact that both your series, The Timekeeper trilogy and the Scavenge the Stars duology, are speculative fiction, you seem to be a big fan of those mediums? What draws you to fantasy/science fiction?

I was basically raised on it, though unintentionally on my parents’ part. I think Disney movies had a part to play, as well as the discovery of certain fantasy books that were popular when I was younger. By the time I was in high school I was reading thick door stopper adult fantasy books, watching anime, and playing Final Fantasy video games. There’s just something about magic and different worlds that really compels me.

As a writer you have featured both LGBT/BIPOC characters in your books, creating a diverse, fantastic world? Would you say your own experiences as a queer author of Desi descent motivated this, and have you ever incorporated your own experiences into your stories?

Absolutely. I never found myself in books growing up, and I wanted to change that for readers like myself who feel left out. I like creating safe spaces in my work (even if my characters are undoing harrowing circumstances).

What are some of the challenges of writing historical fiction, fantasy or otherwise? What are some of the joys?

The research. I never thought I’d end up writing historical fantasy as my debut, and I’ll probably never do it again, but it was as fun as it was aggravating. I could play with an alternate timeline even as my editor forced me to become BFFs with etymology and realizing a phrase I wanted to use wasn’t invented yet.

What’s a question you haven’t been asked before or wish you were asked more often?

I wish I was asked more goofy questions! I love talking about my characters and how they’d react to weird situations.

What advice would you have to give to authors, especially those struggling to finish their first stories?

I would tell them that a first draft is supposed to be bad, and you can’t make it better until you finish it. That, and to not be afraid to write what you specifically love, not what you think others will love.

Are there any other projects or story ideas you are currently nursing and could tell us about?

My adult fantasy debut, THE CITY OF DUSK, comes out April 2022 from Orbit! I’ll also have more YA news on the horizon.

Finally, what are some LGBTQ+ stories you would recommend to the readers of Geeks OUT?

I’m a big fan of GIDEON THE NINTH, WILDER GIRLS, THE LUMINOUS DEAD, and STRANGE GRACE.

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Interview with Author Mara Fitzgerald

Mara Fitzgerald writes YA fantasy about unlikable female characters who ruin everything. She is a biologist by day and spends entirely too much time looking at insects under a microscope. She was born near Disney World and now lives near Graceland, which is almost as good. She is the author of the Beyond the Ruby Veil duology.

When did you realize you wanted to become a writer? At what point did you realize you actually were a writer?

I’ve always been a writer. For me, the transition from “writer” to “author” was the one that felt like more of a change. My books were no longer a series of words on my computer that I wrote to entertain myself—they were products. In many ways, this comes with a lot of pressure, because “products” have expectations and cold, hard sales numbers. In other ways, it’s been fascinating to know that my creative work is now out there for anyone to access and interpret. As a great supporter of fanfiction, one of the most striking moments for me was when I realized that I’m now on the other side of the fanfiction equation—that is, I’m the one making the thing that people might create fan work about. 

In the realm of queer media and fiction, there’s often this unspoken pressure to present the LGBTQIA+ community within the best (i.e. moral) light, given the history of queer coding in villains and other cultural factors. What made you develop this obvious queer anti-hero, and how did she come to be?

I just think villains are neat. 

In all seriousness, most of my favorite fictional characters are the ones who are causing the most problems in the story, because they’re the most interesting to me. I didn’t set out to write Emanuela as an anti-heroine. Rather, the process of writing was a discovery, as it often is with characters. Sometimes it feels like they live in your head, and it’s your job to get them out onto the page as honestly as you can. This is, of course, a lot easier said than done. For a long time, I resisted letting Emanuela’s arc get so dark and messy. Even though other queer authors have already paved the way with amazing literature that’s way more complex than mine, I do still feel that pressure to create characters who are “role models.” I felt like centering the story around a lesbian who was very obviously flawed meant that she had to learn and become not only better, but perfect, and I struggled a lot with trying to fit her into an arc she clearly didn’t belong in. 

A big part of fiction for me is escapism, and there’s more than one way to escape. I have never had a reader say that they literally want to be Emanuela—and if I had, I would be very concerned—but there is something escapist about her. I do not endorse being rude to everyone in your life, behaving in increasingly unhinged ways, leaving a trail of destruction in your wake, and refusing to grow as a person. But sometimes…it’s fun to read about.

What are some of your favorite examples of queer anti-heroes, villains, and heroes?

Radu from the And I Darken series by Kiersten White (definitely a hero). Villanelle from Killing Eve (definitely not a hero). And everyone in Gideon the Ninth.

Beyond the Ruby Veil seems to be set in this glamorous, alternative deadly Italy. What comes first in your writing, the world-building or characters? 

They usually arrive together. I tend to write worlds that are like ours, except for one wild, highly unlikely change that actually ends up being a lot of changes. When I start with a fantasy version of Earth where something is making the way people live drastically different, the rest of the world starts to fill itself in. The characters also fill themselves in, too, because I naturally find myself gravitating towards characters who would interact with that world in the most interesting way. For instance, Beyond the Ruby Veil is about a world where one immortal, irreplaceable woman who can make water is keeping the whole city alive. Because of how my morbid mind works, my next question is: what would happen if that woman died? What if somebody killed her—and what if I wrote a story about that killer? 

Would you say there’s a difference between the anti-hero and villain? What are the similarities?

My general understanding is that with an anti-hero, you as the reader ultimately want them to win. You can love a villain as a character, but you still don’t want them to win. What makes this so fascinating to me is that the lines can get blurred. A character can start out as the unambiguous villain and ultimately end up as someone who’s still very much themselves, rough around the edges and all, but who we find ourselves rooting for. Alternatively, we can start out supporting a character, knowing that they’re messy, but then things start getting messier and messier and one day we realize…we don’t want this character to win anymore.  

This was my goal with Emanuela. The first time she murders somebody (not a spoiler: it’s in Chapter 3), it’s certainly messy, but there’s something there to root for. As the story goes on, she makes it more and more challenging to support her. There’s a point in the book where Emanuela says that she doesn’t care if people like her or think she’s a good person—she just wants, in essence, to be perceived. That’s how I try to write all my characters, not just ones who are crossing the line into villainous. I try to just portray them as they are, whatever that may end up looking like.  

Are there any other projects or ideas you are currently nursing and would be at liberty to say?

The sequel to Beyond the Ruby Veil, which is called Into the Midnight Void, will be out in January 2022. This is the conclusion to the duology, where we will find out exactly how Emanuela’s quest for power ends. Writing it was certainly an experience, so I hope reading it will be, too! 

What’s an interview question you haven’t been asked yet, but wish you were?

“How would you adapt Beyond the Ruby Veil: The Musical?” I’m so glad you asked. First, and most importantly, there would be a splash zone for all the inevitable blood coming off the stage. The story itself would be a condensed version of the entire duology—somebody much smarter than me is doing the condensing, to be clear. A lot of musicals have a very clear Event happen at the end of Act 1, and then Act 2 begins in a different place, with a different mood, and without spoiling anything, I think the transition between book 1 and book 2 lends itself well to that. The beginning would have a little bit of evil Wizard of Oz vibes, and early Wicked vibes as Emanuela sings about what she wants and how ambitious she is, but as the audience, we get the sneaking feeling this isn’t going to turn out well for her. Anyways, I’m open to all thoughts on this. I just think there’s potential! 

Finally, what are some LGBTQ+ books or authors you would recommend to the readers of Geeks OUT?

Honey Girl by Morgan Rogers is an adult coming-of-age novel about a PhD student who accidentally marries another woman while in Vegas. Felix Ever After by Kacen Callender is a delightful YA contemporary about a transgender teen at a competitive arts school. And I just read an advanced copy of A Dark and Starless Forest by Sarah Hollowell, which is about a big queer family that lives in a spooky house in the spooky woods!