The following piece is the poetry winner of F(r)iction’s Spring 2023 literary contest.

for Ba (Dec. 10, 1927 – Aug. 22, 2021)

Though it’s hard to take them 
through a grocery store – or 

on a plane – or even ride
them into a conference

panel – or across your cubicle, second
home which is sometimes your first

– horses 

are an excellent emotional		support animal.

          Watch their ears as you prattle on – attunement as if your mouth were a prairie opening– 
          as if your tongue were the grass of their fondest memories. In the 90s, as we traveled hills 
          of Kashmir on horseback, an army lathi jangled. The horse, sensitive. My father’s horse: 
          sensed. Horse reared & swept forth, as if it could suddenly fly, nostrils 

as wings. After flying, it clattered on
          the mountainside, my father –

sensitive to the rock next 
          to his head, sensitive 
to what memories he might

have missed in mountains

                          to come, sensitive to this new desire
for sensation. In 2007, my grandfather burbled, a lack

of oxygen to his brain. I stroked his face as if it were

wet rock, whispered into his sensitive ears, Shanti, Shanti, Shanti.

Perhaps these sounds reminded him of his own 	     mouth, morning
                                                                              mala japa. His burbling

receded. Some years later, I discovered in truly old
Vedic rituals, priests used to repeat Shanti before 

sacrificing horses. Horses are 	         sensitive, you
know, and must be calmed before slaughter. Rituals

today must not be too sensitive. My Dada

survived. Until four years later when
he died. Two weeks ago, I asked

my father how

my 93-year-old Ba
            is. “Ghoda 

jevi,” he says. Today,
we are all the horses

crossing rituals as if they were 	    nations – or 
loved ones – we could visit with visas – with

visas – we too could somehow 	        visit.

Creative Nonfiction winner of the Spring 2023 F(r)iction Literary Contest.

Because no one did anything, it became something I had to deal with.

During the spring of my fourth grade, arise with the bright seven o’clock sun, when I turned on this little asphalt road between an overgrown lot and an office building, I would see the body. When it started decomposing, it became a home, a colony, a system. It became breakfast. As I rode my bicycle closer, I couldn’t look away from the vibrating surface that was made of maggots moving in and out of its wound.

The first morning went like this: when I saw an animal lying in the middle of the road, I gasped. As I rode my bike closer to it, I saw that it was a fat hedgehog, the size of a soccer ball, marks of a car tire neatly printed on its flattened belly. Dark blood and body insides tumbled out from a hole torn on the side. The blood was dark and shimmered under the morning sun.

Later in life, I would study artists who were drawn to a single subject seen during different times of the day. Like Monet with Rouen Cathedral, which the artist painted in elegant violet in the morning, transparent white in midday, and suffocating orange in the half-light of the afternoon, never missing the fragments of shadows in its rose window and the ornate indentations all along its facade. Each day, each hour, each time the artist looked, the subject in question appeared minutely transformed, forever departing from the previous moment. And that’s how I felt about the body, each time I looked it turned, transcending its own time of death.

I just learned to ride a bicycle the year before, after I transferred to a new school as a second grader. I’ve been getting used to this route, after moving into a new housing complex with my parents. We lived a few years at my grandmother’s apartment, while she stayed in America with my aunt, all the while the place we lived in since I was born was demolished by the city for being structurally impermanent. I was told that the new housing complex we moved into was built on top of the place we used to live in. So it’s really like living in the same place as before.

Where we used to live was called a farm. I didn’t know whether there were many places like ours in Tianjin back then in the ‘90s, but I knew that they were all gone by the time I was in middle school. It was a loosely connected camp made of tiny brick row houses. Hundreds of people lived there; the trash that heaped in the entrance of the neighborhood proved our existence. Before you saw the people, you saw our things: formula cartons, beer bottles, menstrual pads. You smelled our shit, collecting in the bottom of the dark little brick building, a latrine that served everyone, old and young. As the children of this place, we played with dirt, we ran around with no shirt on, we stole garlic from thick garlic braids that hung on people’s doors. I loved living at the farm. I never thought I would stop living at the farm. One day, I thought, someone would help us build a bathroom in every house, and we would get some tiles on our floors, and plant flowers in our yards, and our lives would be better and better.

So I was shocked, when my parents came home one day and told me that we were going to move. That the entire farm was slated for demolition. They would tear down the houses, fill up the pond we used to play in, and turn this land into a new district. I was only five, and I thought that a home was forever.

The day after I first saw the hedgehog, I rode to school and turned on the same road. It was still there, round and plump, its blood still moist, dark, and flowing. The hole in its side was still open. A few flies buzzed above it, but besides them I was the only one here to gawk.

When I entered the road on the third day, another car had run over the hedgehog’s corpse, this time across its entire body, flattening out the other side that used to be plump. More blood gushed out and coagulated on the asphalt. The fourth day, another car drove over it with its dirty tires. By the end of the fifth day, the fuzzy skin started to lose its animal color and turned into a generic gray; the hedgehog spikes dried up and looked like pine needles in the winter. The blood had finally stopped flowing.

I rode past the body every morning, tried to look without staring, never holding my gaze for long on the gaping holes, the intestines, and the now small family of flies. I took a big gulp of air before I turned onto this road and held my breath, because I thought if I let down my guard, I would know how it smelled.

I used to wake up to my mother still sleeping in the bed in our old house. It would be a Saturday, and I would stay in bed with her for an hour, just talking. Want to go to grandma’s? She would say, her voice rose like a song. We always went to grandma’s on Saturday. My grandpa did not have cancer yet, and while my mother chatted with grandma he would chase me around the apartment like the bad guy on TV because I asked him to. He kept one nail long on his pinkie.

My mother let me ride on the back of her bike back then. The roads were unpaved and bumpy; I looked down to watch my feet hover above the ground, quickly fleeing underneath as we went forward. Sometimes we saw other kids riding on the backs of their parents’ bikes. Look, that kid’s too old to be carried around like that, my mother would point out, when we saw a student wearing an elementary school uniform with his arms around his mother’s waist.

One time when we rode to grandma’s, my mother rammed the bike over a step newly installed at the end of an unpaved road, and with one bump I fell off the back. I remember tumbling on the ground, landing face first, and felt a sore pang in my nose. Sitting up and feeling a sharp sting starting to spread on my face, I saw my mother still on the bike, both her feet on the ground to steady herself. The melons we bought for grandma rolled towards me, and the last time I had fallen felt like a long time ago. You should learn to ride a bike yourself soon, my mother said, after checking my face to see the big red hole in my skin where the ground had taken a lick.

I hadn’t thought about how soft hedgehogs were on the side that wasn’t covered with needles. They were like water balloons, filled with the good stuff they find in trash heaps like the construction lots near my new home.

The body of the dead hedgehog swelled. It was even more plump than when it was freshly dead. It looked like a bouncing castle, the kind you would find at a fair when they’ve just started inflating it. Its dirt-colored fur hardened with dried blood.

Each day, I rode my bike to school. On Mondays, we saluted the flag and sang the national anthem. On Fridays, we were let out half a day early. We were already given the sex talk, and the girls got free sanitary napkins. Everyone was given free toothpaste. I didn’t have a crush, not yet. Each day, more cars ran over the body. The blood turned maroon, then a bluish-maroon, then black, then white. The flies swarmed like when someone’s thinking really hard, their thoughts were zooming around in their head. The cars couldn’t kill them. Maggot bodies were elastic; I have seen them in the public latrine. They could become flat when pressures were applied to their boneless body, and bounce back. They moved slowly, but they lived.

All these different cars—the yellow minivan taxis, the 1997 Santanas, three-wheeled motorbikes—they all turned onto this narrow, badly-paved road, bouncing left and right over its ditches and hills, over the body. No one said anything, did anything, no one took it away or covered it up.

One day, as if they decided in a collective meeting that the body was not suitable for a home anymore, all the flies disappeared. There were a few lone stragglers picking over the body, now like a half-open felt hat, nestled on the ground, as if its owner would come back to pick it up any moment. No longer a home for maggots, now small troops of ants took the stage, busily forming a pattern around this monument of what flesh there was left.

After my mother dropped me from the bike, my face took a month to heal. Don’t pick at it, you’ll leave a scar, she reprimanded every time I fingered the edge of the itching, purple scab. When I peeled off its last morsel, I looked at my new, raw skin in the mirror hanging above the washing machine in our bedroom. I still remembered standing in the green machine’s open-top cavity when it doubled as a bathtub, but now I was so tall. The fresh skin was a slightly different color, but nothing other people would be able to detect.

It was around then that we had to move out. This was my home, I wanted to say to someone, but no one was a good audience for that sentence. Not even my parents. Why do you want to live in this garbage dump your whole life? We will move into a building, with hot water and heating, and electricity that stays on all year long. When it’s all built you can come back to visit, when this neighborhood is even better. You won’t remember anything, you are still so young.

So many other things happened around that time; my grandfather died. I was drawing in the next room at grandma’s when it happened. Then at the funeral, my mother and my grandma lifted a corner of the cushion on the bed and revealed a big wedding photo, and told me that the man in the suit was my real grandfather. When I was a little older than you, my mother said, he committed suicide. You know what that is? He died in the Cultural Revolution. You know what that is?

After the funeral, my parents, my aunt, and grandma sawed to pieces the old couch grandpa slept on when he was sick and tossed the parts out from the window, because it was too big to carry down the three flights of stairs.

Sometime after that, my aunt got married and went to America. Then after that, grandma went to America also.

I will remember, I thought in our old house, I will remember everything about this place: every blade of grass, every hole in the ground, every baby tooth my mother tossed on the roof for good luck.

I would never forget the grease that stained the ground. Morning, bike ride, dead hedgehog, main road, school. During that spring in my fourth grade, seeing the hedgehog eventually became a routine. I felt like I had transformed every time I saw it and left it behind, only to be greeted again with a new chapter of its decay. Months later, it was still lying in the same spot, only now much flatter, as if a photo of the hedgehog was pasted on the surface of the road. I tried to recall my memory of the freshly dead animal with flowing blood, and questioned whether it could have all been a dream.

My parents taught me to hide my key, to tell people I was going to the deli and my parents were at home waiting for me when in fact I was going to school and coming back home by myself. Our new home was really clean, there was no more trash, and everything was painted white, but I could not understand how it was built on top of where we used to live. My mother and I did a fun project where we recorded the temperature and weather of a city in the south everyday for a month, then at the end of the month she asked me if I would be okay if she went to that city, just for a few years, to get her doctorate. She told me to be strong, you’re not a kid anymore.

On the road, the photo became a shadow, and the shadow oozed fat from its edges. It once again shimmered, a small dark patch of liquid pooled around its blurry contour. The cars that drove over it left dark tracks further down the road.

By the time my fourth grade was almost over, the grass in the lot on the side of the road was just as tall as the kind I used to run around in, but now it suddenly felt too deep for me to explore. I never knew that hedgehogs could live inside a city like this, until I saw one die. All there was left of the body was an oil stain on the asphalt the size of a dinner plate. I could still see it even when I was in fifth grade, even though no one else would know what it was once before.

Published on February 1, 2024 by University of Notre Dame Press.

Upon discovering Jordan Pérez’s award-winning poem “Santa Tarantula,” my immediate instinct was to share it with every poetry-enthusiast I know. Pérez’s command of hypnotic alliteration and masterful weaving of technical language from the fields of arachnology, religion, and capital punishment create a haunting statement on womanhood. Her debut collection, Santa Tarantula, mirrors the themes encapsulated in its eponymous poem: the connection between women and the natural world; the oppression that occurs in Biblical narratives, patriarchal governments, and intimate relationships; and the urgent need to dismantle the legacy of silence.

Divided into three sections—”Smallmouth,” “Dissent,” and “Gospel”—Santa Tarantula guides readers on a journey of healing alongside the speaker’s search for autonomy and self-love. In the collection’s opening poem, “Smallmouth,” Pérez asserts that what is left unsaid “demands to be / known.” This becomes the central motif of Santa Tarantula, urging readers to confront uncomfortable realities. Pérez’s award-winning poem “Deadgirl” does this brilliantly through the speaker’s observation of how a brown mushroom sprouting from the soil looks like the knee of a dead girl. The rain comes and mushrooms sprout everywhere, impossible to ignore, but eventually, the mushrooms disintegrate back into the earth. Indeed, the dark underbelly haunting this collection is the way violence committed against girls is suppressed. The speaker is left with lingering silence and feels dangerously unsafe in her own girlhood, “the [same] way [she] couldn’t be sure / which house in the neighborhood held the man // who touched little girls, and so in every house / is the man who touches little girls.” The omnipresence of femicide and sexual abuse is spine-chilling and heartbreaking, yet real—this tangled web of suppressed cultural and generational trauma is the reality Pérez “demands to be / known.”

With these wounds left unhealed, the collection moves into Part II: Dissent. Women align themselves with hissing tarantulas as they warp an ode to a Cuban government that sends dissidents and marginalized citizens to work camps. Biblical women start finding ways to escape their objectified existence as fruit, “swell[ed] with sugar, / [resting] heavy in [the] unloved palms” of their God. Women starve, left empty not only due to lack of food, but by the lack of justice. However, a woman’s desire to quell her hunger does not come without consequence; in “Santa Tarantula,” women ally themselves with the tarantula once again, and both are exalted to sainthood: “Praise / the tarantula woman still alive at forty.” But sainthood rarely comes with respect during one’s lifetime: the speaker swiftly shifts from praising tarantulas to a bone-chilling directive for men who long to domesticate them: “This is how you kill a tarantula. / Cover her, and hope to God she suffocates.” Reading this line for the first time felt like a punch to the gut, and a painful reminder that women are always in danger. However, Pérez leaves a glimmer of hope in the final line: if the tarantula survives, its assailant will face consequences. Still, the speaker persists, and the final poems in this section consider different ways women successfully voice their dissent, like taking communion with open eyes.

This hope bleed into the collection’s final section, Gospel. In addition to extending the Biblical allusions, the word “gospel” urges us to think about what truths need to be shared, or even worshipped. Though an undercurrent of danger remains bubbling beneath the surface of this section, the poems overall are lighter in tone, carrying the radical power of healing, love, and freedom. In “Asymptote,” the speaker’s mother reminds her that the body is a temple, but all the speaker can think of is when “a man / is burning [a temple] in the news.” Despite this, when a man asks the speaker how she can be touched after everything she’s been through, she poignantly asserts, “I refuse / to die having not been pressed to someone / else’s heart, having not come into the fullness of myself, / having not said this is my blood. This, my body. Saying no / or yes, and liking it.” Pérez’s masterful use of enjambment in this section amplifies the speaker’s longing for autonomy: whether she refuses or accepts to be touched, the choice is hers, and hers alone.

The speaker also finds power in herself in the ghazal “I Was Named for the River of Blessings.” The ghazal, a musical form that often contemplates love, spirituality, and loss, is one of my favorite forms of poetry. Pérez chooses the words “halleluiah” and variations of the word “name” as refrains to contemplate the speaker’s origin, struggles with gendered violence, and desire to sing hymns of her female loved ones. The last couplet of a ghazal typically includes a name, usually that of the poet. Instead of explicitly providing a name, Pérez links the speaker’s growth to the Jordan River—a symbol of freedom to the Israelites escaping slavery in Egypt, and the site of many Biblical miracles and baptisms: “Bigger than I am, he touches each growing blackberry, naming / even the greenest ones. Oh, river of blessings. Oh, halleluiah, halleluiah.” These lines gorgeously portray the pure joy of healing, as the speaker experiences a symbolic baptism and flourishing rebirth.

There is much more to write about Pérez’s incredible debut, like her precise execution of form, including a subversive mixed-up sestina, a haunting reverse diminishing verse, poignant prose poems; her feminist reinterpretation of Biblical stories; and her recurring references to insect and reptilian eggs to represent the simultaneous fragility and regenerative power of womanhood. My only wish is that there were more poems in this collection exploring how the legacy of Cuban labor camps lives on in survivors, or that the poems already exploring this were more seamlessly woven into the collection. As with any themed collection, many poems explored the same motif using different forms and language, so it’s natural for the lasting impression to feel like a blended collage. Because Pérez compellingly links predominant narratives (such as those from the Bible) to the intimate struggles of women, I found myself longing for the specter of cultural trauma to linger more in my final impression of Santa Tarantula. Poems like “Mixed-Up Sestina,” “O God of Cuba,” and “Dissent,” which explore the haunting impact of an unjust government on its subjects, were some of Perez’s strongest, adding more nuance to Santa Tarantula’s project to weave a web between historical and personal traumas.

Overall, what most impressed me about Santa Tarantula is its unflinching honesty and urgency to shake its readers out of complacency. It’s a collection that not only conveys the importance of looking at the dark history humanity pushes into the shadows, but also compels us to imagine possibilities for rebirth that are grounded in radical compassion. I am surprised that Santa Tarantula is Pérez’s debut; her poetic finesse, unique use of language, and thought-provoking metaphors make this debut a poignant and unforgettable exploration of societal injustices and the resilience required to overcome them. I will never forget these poems, and I am so excited to follow Pérez’s career as a poet.

Skater Boy is your debut novel—congratulations! What was your biggest struggle when writing this story, and how did you overcome it?

Thanks so much! After a lifetime of writing (and perhaps a borderline unhealthy dose of wishful thinking), it is very surreal to know this story is now out in the world.

My biggest struggle in writing Skater Boy was creating a believable angry character that people could relate to, and maybe even want to root for, by the end of the story. When readers first meet my main character, Wesley “Big Mac” Mackenzie, he is quite literally confronting another character on the page, which I’m sure will elicit a visceral response in many. So, the main question quickly becomes­­—how do you take this person you’re supposed to hate and craft a story around them that leaves readers feeling satisfied? In Wes, I wanted to bring a character to life who doesn’t often get their story told—a gay kid on the outskirts who is conflicted and confused and maybe even operates in unhealthy ways—and show that there is so much more to them than how they present themselves to the world. To overcome this as a writer, I kept asking myself, what would I like to see Wes do to come to terms with himself? And sure enough, the answer ended up being a lot easier than I anticipated. It meant showing Wes interacting with the world and putting him up against situations and people he wouldn’t normally come across. In watching him break down his own barriers throughout the novel, I hope readers learn to love Wes—faults and all.

I’m seeing more and more queer YA books being published! However, the industry still has a way to go. Were there any challenges you’ve faced with this story?

Right from the start, I knew Wes’s story would be a hard sell. In an industry that historically only published young adult books that featured palatable gay characters—ones who always made the right choices, only ever expressed happiness, and never mentioned anything even remotely associated with sex—where exactly does Skater Boy fit? So, unsurprisingly, when it came to being on submission, I faced rejection after rejection for nearly two years from editors who couldn’t connect with Wes or didn’t have an editorial vision for the story. And I can’t fault them for that; when we’re constantly fed only one side of a story, it’s difficult to imagine what to do when confronted with the other. That is why I am so thankful for Soho Teen, and specifically my editor, Alexa Wejko, for taking a chance on me. Right from the start, Alexa inherently understood what Wes was about and loved him anyway.

What did your writing process look like for Skater Boy? Did you outline? Do you just go for it? Will you do the same for your future novels?

When it comes to writing, I am a chronic plotter (though in the editing stages I tend to write by the seat of my pants and will randomly throw in scenes or dialogue I make up on the fly). Typically, though, the overarching storyline comes to me first, so I like to jot down all the major plot points on cue cards and organize them on a corkboard so I can visually see what my story looks like. Of course, when it comes to character development, that usually throws a wrench in my plans, but for the most part, laying out every chapter helps me stay organized and on task.

Skater Boy touches on some extremely important topics—the idea of being labeled, the BLM movement, harmful stereotypes. What made you think, “This is something I have to write. Something I must put out there?”

I don’t think I necessarily went into this story knowing I would touch on such large/important topics, but as I got to know my characters more, I knew I couldn’t ignore them. I touch on this briefly in the Author Note at the beginning of Skater Boy, but I originally set out to write a light-hearted romantic comedy that paid tribute to its namesake. However, it was only after better understanding Wes’s internal motivations, that I realized that wasn’t the story I had to tell. Even with Tristan—Wes’s love interest—I couldn’t write a Black secondary character, at the height of the BLM movement, without acknowledging (even as an outsider) how being a Black male teenager in the United States would inform his own lived experience. In many ways, throughout the length of this story, Wes is exposed to several different lived experiences outside the narrow reaches of his own life, and it’s through them that he learns more about the world around him and grows. Whether we like it or not, everyone has dealt with labels or harmful stereotypes in some way (especially in high school), so making sure I touched on these topics become paramount to the story and helped inform many of Wes’s actions throughout it.

Are there any books coming out in 2024 that you’re looking forward to, and why?

Where do I even begin? I’ve had the absolute pleasure of beta-reading some incredible young adult novels coming out in 2024 and am so excited for readers to experience this new wave of queer stories filled to the brim with messy “gray” characters like Wes.

Some recent favorites include: Teenage Dirtbags by James Acker, The Last Boyfriends Rules for Revenge by Matthew Hubbard, and Cursed Boys and Broken Hearts by Adam Sass.

I always say, when I begin reading a story and immediately think “Wes would probably be great friends with this character,” I know I’m in for a real treat!

What are you working on now? Can we expect them to be the same genres as Skater Boy (YA, queer) or are you branching out into something different?

I am always ideating and brainstorming— my Notes app in my phone is a true testament to the chaos of my imagination, haha— so when it comes to branching out into something different, I never say never! For now, though, I have a few more contemporary/romance stories in the pipeline including a dual POV contemporary set in Los Angeles amongst the real-world events surrounding the L.A. Dodgers/Pride Night controversy that happened this past summer. I like to think of it as What If It’s Us by Becky Albertalli and Adam Silvera meets This Is Why They Hate Us by Aaron H. Aceves, with a focus on queer activism and joy as anti-LGBTQIA+ hate crimes are at an all-time high. It has similar, underlining themes that are present in Skater Boy, while also looking at what it means to be a queer teenager in the spotlight.

If you could give one, general piece of advice to aspiring authors out there, something that they should follow to the ends of the earth, what would it be?

This may sound cliché, and it’s said time and time again for a reason, but just keep writing. I was in the querying trenches for ten years before I landed my first agent and then spent two years on submission with Skater Boy. It would have been so easy just to give up, but instead of focusing on every rejection, I continued to write, I read and absorbed as much as I could, and I honed my craft. Every time you put pen to paper, or fingers to a keyboard, you are expanding your horizons and improving your skills as a writer, so don’t give up! It just takes one yes to make all your dreams come true.

You left a very meaningful message at the beginning of your novel. To those of your readers who can see themselves in Wes, those who have lost sight of who they are, what are you hoping they can find by the end of Skater Boy?

That really means a lot to me. It’s funny you should mention that because the Author Note at the beginning of Skater Boy was only ever meant to be in the advanced reader copies (ARCs). But after some initial feedback from early readers on the importance and resonating impact of that message, we decided to keep it in.

I wrote Skater Boy as much for myself as for all the queer kids out there who feel they don’t belong— because the reality is that being queer is not a monolith, it’s up to you to decide what that looks like for you. By the end of the story, I hope readers understand that no matter where they are in their journey of self-discovery, no matter how the world sees them, it is never too late to embrace the person they were always meant to be. Labels and expectations be damned!

*SPOILER ALERT *This review contains plot details of Hope Blaze.

Published February 2024 by Wednesday Books.

“I am a pent up ball of energy / I will find my escape like a cosmic explosion / all starry rays before darkness claims me, / hope ablaze.”

For Nida, a young Muslim teen, poetry is an outlet for her deepest feelings and experiences. But after her poem about being illegally frisked at a Democratic candidate’s rally accidentally wins a national poetry competition, Nida becomes embroiled in the center of a political scandal. Hope Ablaze is a young adult novel by Sarah Mughal Rana that deftly criticizes the bigotry and hate facing Muslim people in America today and empowers teens to find their own voice in a country aiming to silence them.

Books confronting social and systemic issues can be difficult to write and even more difficult to publish. What I love about this novel is its unflinching exploration of American culture and politics and how these systems continue to harm Islamic people and communities. In Hope Ablaze, neither of the two featured politicians support Muslim people, yet Nida and her community still choose to vote in hopes of creating a path towards a future that supports their people in America. In doing so, Rana highlights how the bipartisan system in America doesn’t work when both parties are against one’s very existence. I’m sure it’s difficult to write a novel like this, and I hope this story helps to pave the path for more Muslim authors to write with the support of the mainstream.

In a story that deals with heavy, topical themes, Rana did an excellent job of creating balance between the pain that comes with bigotry and systemic oppression—especially when in the public eye—and the unconditional love and support that pours in from your communities. There are numerous small moments when this support becomes evident—through characters like Aunty Farooqi and Rayan—but there are also significant moments when the power of community and solidarity becomes starkly evident. After Nida receives public backlash for her poem, especially after it is reported her uncle is in jail due to “terrorist activity,” her mother’s catering business is hit hard: customers cancel their orders, and it becomes difficult for her family to sustain themselves financially. Soon enough, however, the Muslim community bands together to support Nida’s family, and they begin receiving new orders.

The characterization and dynamics of the characters surrounding Nida were wonderfully executed. Relationships never felt forced and characters, for the most part, felt fully fleshed out. However, I did have a little trouble with Nida’s characterization throughout the novel. To me, the heart of Nida’s conflict is not that she doesn’t know how to use her voice, it’s that when she does use her voice, she is silenced.

In the beginning of the novel, Nida channels her feelings about injustice and her desire for change into her poetry. We learn that she didn’t understand her mother’s paranoia until her uncle was imprisoned for performing his poetry, which occurs prior to the start of this book. Because of this fear, Nida doesn’t voice any of her thoughts about her faith or her politics outside of her immediate community. But after she wins the poetry competition and her words are twisted in the media, Nida attempts to deal with the situation in good faith—going on news shows to share her side or meeting up with politician Mitchell Wilson to find a solution—only to realize these people are exploiting her for their own narratives. I don’t quite understand why she trusted them to begin with, especially after everything she went through with her uncle. Nida is also caught between the expectations of her mother and uncle. Nida’s mother wants Nida to stay silent to prioritize her and her community’s safety, while her uncle wants her to speak up, use her voice, and preserve her poetry as an act of creativity and tradition. All of these people talking over Nida causes her to feel silenced.

The introduction of the blue thread , which silences Nida and prevents her from writing poetry, makes sense with this context. But rather than helping her find her voice and allowing it to thrive without being twisted by others, it reveals her family’s history—something she’s already connected to—and helps her understand the importance of poetry in her family. This knowledge of family history allows Nida to understand her mother and reclaim her authentic voice.

The ending worked, because the heart of the story is about Nida finding her voice—one way or another—but the way we got to the ending felt unfocused and tangential from the conflict that existed in the beginning.

On a craft and narrative level, I also felt that there were numerous opportunities to strengthen the power of the novel even further. For example, I really enjoyed the way the narrative moves between prose and poetry. I thought it was a fun and interesting way to play with structure and a great opportunity to explore Nida’s interiority and the complex, powerful emotions she had: “Eyes cast black as crow feathers. / The British weren’t knights but hawks, / circling above / ready to pounce. // These colonial regimes / live on through history,”

Yet, other poems felt lackadaisical at times. Some seemed like they were included for the sake of narrating through scene transitions and moving the plot forward rather than being used to explore Nida’s interiority: “Mr. Wilson’s attorney sat to the right, / in an identical crisp black suit. / A costume of diplomacy. / After Zaynab’s email, Mr. Wilson’s attorney wanted to discuss our options,”

However, all these technical aspects develop with time and experience. This is Rana’s debut novel, and I have confidence this is something that will only improve with her subsequent publications. I love the vision she had for Hope Ablaze, and I’m looking forward to seeing what Rana delivers to us next.

Congratulations on releasing your latest book, The Road Trip Agreement! What did your writing process look like for this story compared to your other series’?

Thank you! This story was inspired by a road trip I took along the Oregon coast, so the process kicked off with some real-life setting research—which is obviously quite different from writing fantasy books. I began the draft while on the trip and finished it fairly quickly while the setting was fresh in my mind. Compared to writing fantasy, I find contemporary romances to be quicker because you don’t have to spend time creating or researching the fictional world(s) and magic rules.

As a bisexual woman writing and publishing much needed sapphic stories, what are the struggles that you’ve faced within the industry?

When I first started publishing, there weren’t a lot of LGBTQ+ publishers or even that many LGBTQ+ novels, so I remember being unsure whether there would be space for my trilogy about a girl who falls in love with a mermaid. Now, there are more options than ever for sapphic literature, which is amazing! It’s lovely to see the genre grow and become more mainstream. I’m lucky in that I haven’t had serious struggles within the industry, other than the occasional bigoted one-star review. But those people don’t deserve my mental energy. Overall, the book community is a wonderful and accepting place, and I’ve definitely felt the love.

Do you think there are differences between writing adult sapphic romances and YA sapphic stories?

The only real difference is in the age of the protagonist. YA protagonists are teenagers, and adult books have adult protagonists—simple as that. For my stories, there is also a difference in the heat level of the romantic scenes, but that’s not necessarily a rule. There are lots of adult stories with closed-door romantic scenes and YA stories with more graphic scenes. Same with violence levels and the intensity of the subject matter.

Staying on the topic of genres, do you have a preference between writing adult sapphic novels or fantastical mermaid and valkyrie stories? Is there a new genre you’d like to try out?

I alternate between writing contemporary adult romance novels and YA Fantasy novels, and I love being able to do both. Fantasy novels are so fun to write but take a lot longer and are more mentally draining because of all the worldbuilding involved, so it’s nice to break those up with something that takes place here and now. Both genres are equally fun to write and have their unique challenges! As for trying out a new genre, I’ve always wanted to write a psychological thriller (à la Gone Girl, my favorite book), but I haven’t gotten around to it yet. One day!

Are there any books coming out in 2024 that you’re looking forward to, and why?

Oh, Ylva Publishing has a lot of sapphic romances launching next year that I can’t wait to read. I’m also always excited for whatever Kate Quinn’s next book is—she’s one of my favorite authors. She has a new one coming out in February that I can’t wait to get my hands on.

I noticed that you’ve had books optioned for film—that’s amazing. Which of your stories would you like to see on the big screen?

I’m still trying to pitch my Mermaids of Eriana Kwai trilogy to Hollywood! The world needs this story in cinematic form, and I know the audience is there—I just need to convince the studios. Really, as a writer, seeing any of your work on the big screen would be a dream come true.

If you could give one, general piece of advice to aspiring authors out there, something that they should follow to the ends of the earth, what would it be?

Being an author is super tough and a solitary career, so connect with other writers! I have a critique group that I owe my sanity to. I met them through a local writing group on Meetup.com, and we’ve been friends ever since. We meet in person once in a while to read excerpts and get feedback, and generally are just there for each other in a group chat. It’s nice to have people who are going through the same struggles, who you can go to conferences with, exchange drafts with, talk about the industry, and celebrate your successes together. Try checking out local writer conferences or joining various online spaces.

What can we look forward to from you in the future? Do you have any other stories you’re working on right now? Any other projects?

2024 will see the launch of my next adult sapphic romance, Snowed in with Summer, which is inspired by a dog-sledding trip I took in the Yukon. There’s also the third and final book in my Sigrid and the Valkyries trilogy, a young adult sapphic fantasy that takes place in the nine Norse realms. I’m also drafting several other stories in the meantime! I invite readers to sign up for my newsletter and/or follow me on Instagram to stay up to date with all of my new releases.

Getting stuck as you’re writing your speculative fiction story? It’s happened to all of us at some point—a story feels unoriginal, struck by a rash of clichés, and its otherworldly narrative elements give off a whiff of staleness. Here, I present six writing exercises that can help revive your speculative writing impulse. 

Carmen Maria Machado—bestselling speculative fiction author—said in an interview that her approach to writing comes in the form of “liminal fantasy, where you have a recognizable world, a recognizable situation, and then there are these holes punctured in reality.” Drawing inspiration from Machado’s inventive approach to storytelling, I encourage you to let yourself find the holes in reality that only you can see. Fixate on small details; dive deep into weirdness, exaggerate it, and get lost in it. To practice this, consider the following freewriting prompts:

Prompt #1: Texture

Take a photo of a textured wall or surface, then zoom in as much as you can without the image becoming blurry. Study the texture, the shadows of it, the peaks and troughs of the material. Let your mind sit with the image—what is this now? Is it a fantasy world, a map of a kingdom? Is it a biome, with strange plant growth? Is it a sinister but important building? Is it the body of some living thing? Write down whatever comes to you, then repeat this exercise with the following objects: a body of water, part of a plant, and asphalt. 

Prompt #2: Sound

Have somebody make a noise or play a clip of some repetitive sound, without knowing what exactly it is. Close your eyes and listen for a few minutes. Don’t worry too much about what the sound might be in real life but think about what it is in the speculative world you’re building and describe it. Describe the shape of the sound and how it makes you feel and what role you imagine it playing in your story. 

Prompt #3: Perspective

Lie down somewhere and look at your surroundings sideways. What does this vantage point offer you? Let the familiar furnishings and/or landmarks surrounding you grow fuzzy as you focus in on them from a new angle. Let your world become new—what does the underside of a bed become, for example, now that you are viewing it from a new perspective? What does a doorway become when it is tilted on its axis? How can you use these new objects or landscapes in your writing?

Prompt #4: Emotion

Think of the most recent intense emotion you’ve felt. It can be good or bad (or anything in-between those two extremes), as long as it’s vivid. Free write about the emotion, disregarding the situation that led up to it. Think about how you can describe the emotion in unexpected ways—are there any startling metaphors you could use to describe it? How would someone normally describe an emotion like this one, and how can you invert that; how can you change the way we conceptualize emotion? 

For example, feeling anger is stereotypically described as seeing the color red—but what if instead of seeing red, anger manifests in the suctioning black circle of a vacuum’s nozzle, pulling everything into it, livid with obliteration and consumption? Aim to shock your reader with your descriptions of your chosen emotion while still remaining true to its feeling and intensity.

Prompt #5: Memory

Choose a memory in which there is another person or living being. Then, rewrite the memory from the perspective of that other person or creature. How do they see that version of you? How do they see the world in their memory? How do they see the action or conflict of the memory playing out? What do they notice about their world that perhaps you did not? What do they feel? Pay attention to how this shift in point of view warps the memory and your understanding of what is “true” to a memory. 

Prompt #6: Lighting

Shut yourself away into a room where there is no light—shut the door, close the blinds, and turn off the lamps. Then, using a flashlight, create a focused circle of light on a random section of the room. Write your description of this lighted clip of your world, either on paper or by dictating the words to a voice recording application if it’s too dark to write by hand. Ignore your knowledge of what the room looks like when fully lit and focus solely on the lighted section. Let it become the sole focus, the sole world, of your writing. Think about what you see in this piece of the room, and how they become the defining characteristics of your new world. For example, if you can see the corner of a chair in your lit-up circle, what does this corner become in the world you’re writing? If it is no longer a piece of a chair, what is it? Repeat this exercise with two other random selections from the room.

Feel free to return to these prompts as many times as you’d like as you write, or to re-invent them on your own with new concepts! As always, don’t be afraid to let your writing become wonderfully strange. If this exercise leads you to finish some writing projects, think about submitting them to F(r)iction to be considered for publication. Happy writing!

Picture this: It’s a Friday night, and you’re buried beneath a mountain of sheets. The bright screen of your laptop is the only source of light as your fingers fly furiously over the keyboard. You tell yourself that once you’re published, things will be different: you won’t have to do this alone.  

Sometimes, it feels like we chase writing as though it is an exclusive club—a published book or an MFA to prove that you’re serious, otherwise your membership will not be accepted.  

In this day and age, though, that’s not true. Published or not, the writing community is at your fingertips. You just have to put yourself out there.  

Read on for three ways to get involved with the writing community, from least to most effort.  

1. Watch the #AuthorTube Community  

Level of effort required: 1/5 

It can feel enormously intimidating to put yourself out there. After all, the act of writing is an act of vulnerability—to allow your thoughts to spill out across the page. If you’re not ready to share your work with others yet, that’s completely okay!  

Sometimes it helps to simply see that you’re not on this journey alone. Fortunately, the good ol’ internet is a great way to find and connect with other writers wherever you live.

Not sure where to start? Here are some of my favorite AuthorTube writers and creators:  

• Lynn D. Jung. She’s a Korean-American speculative fiction writer who shares writing advice and documents her writing journey.  
• Sincerely Vee is your resident romance writer and vlogger. She’ll take you along her writing journey as she navigates the writing process while also being a full-time university student.  
• Kris MF and Liselle Sambury. Kris, a newly agented author, is currently revising her book to go on submission and taking you along on her journey. Meanwhile, Liselle is the author of Delicious Monsters and the Blood Like Magic duology and has a lot of fun (and informational) content about her life as an author.  
• Kate Cavanaugh runs regular word sprints and book-related livestreams over on her Youtube channel.  

2. Take Classes at Local Writing and Literary Arts Organizations  

Level of effort required: 3/5 

When I was a kid, I thought that the only way to get a great writing education was through an MFA program. Little did I know that there’s a world of writing organizations that offer educational writing programs and community resources for writers of all ages and levels!  

Though many of these organizations are based in cities like Denver, Seattle, and Boston, you don’t need to live in a city to join their community. Here are some great organizations to get your search started: 

• Perhaps the most famous North American writing nonprofit is the Office of Letters and Light, which hosts the official National Novel Writing Month challenge. Hop into the NaNoWriMo forums to meet other writers and attend member-hosted meet ups.  
• Over on the east coast, check out The Writer’s Center for their calendar of excellent events. While some events require attendees to purchase tickets, there’s a slew of free events, like their craft talk series, to explore!  
• No money? No problem! Grubstreet has an especially robust fellowship program, which allows three emerging writers per year to access a slew of paid classes for free. 
• In Colorado, check out Lighthouse Writers wonderful writing classes. Lighthouse even has focused community programs for BIPOC writers, queer writers, writers with cancer, and writers with veteran status. The organization also hosts quiet writing hours (both in person and on Zoom) every weekday for writers who want to write in community. 
• Of the speculative fiction persuasion? Clarion West has your back!
• Want to write kidlit? The Society of Children’s Books Writers & Illustrators has a great list of offerings to get you started. The list goes on!  

(And of course, what do you do with all this wonderful writing? Well, you submit it to F(r)iction, of course!) 

3. Start on Social Media 

 

Level of effort required: 5 

Accessibility: 2.5/5 

It’s quite easy to make a social media account. (In fact, you’d be hard-pressed to find someone who doesn’t have any social media at all.) But in this day and age, a time when social media is heavily commodified, the barrier for entry seems impossibly high—high enough to make you want to quit before you’ve even begun.  

Deciding whether to engage with social media or not is a decision that you should make for yourself, and it’s okay to say no, especially if you find it harmful to your mental health. But for those who do like being on social media, it can be a great hub for finding inspiration, starting conversations, and making new writer friends.  

When starting out, pick one platform—Twitter, Instagram, Discord, TikTok—and stick to it. If you like texting, try Twitter, Threads, or Bluesky. If you’d like to share about your own writing journey with video or pictures, try Instagram, TikTok, or even Youtube. If you like your community to be a little more limited, try Discord. There are many great public servers that you can join.  

Social media can be a bit more difficult because there are no rules. If you want to meet other writers, you are responsible for putting yourself out there and making opportunities for yourself. 

Whatever path you choose to pursue, here are a couple of tenants to hold yourself to while you’re first starting out:  

1. Give as much as you receive.  

The foundation of any lasting relationship is reciprocity, and the most fulfilling community is one where everyone pitches in. If someone comments on your post, try to respond! If someone offers to read your work, offer to read something of theirs, too! Do unto others as you want others to do unto you. 

2. Put yourself out there, even when it feels uncomfortable.  

The hard truth is that not everyone will want to be friends with you. Rejection is natural; and oftentimes, it’s less about you and more about where the other person is at—and that’s completely okay! Don’t be afraid to reply to someone’s Instagram story or comment on their post. Email your classmate and ask them to get coffee sometime, or—if you’ve got time—ask them if they’d like to be critique buddies. If you continue to stay authentic, you will eventually find the right people. 

In a world that is rapidly becoming more and more interconnected, opportunities to bond are more abundant than ever; you just need to know where to look. So go forth: experiment, explore, and don’t be afraid to put yourself out there! Write on, writers.

Spoiler Alert—The following review contains plot details about Monstrilio.

What was the origin of the idea behind Monstrilio? Is there a particular experience or event that influenced your decision to write this book?

There isn’t a specific event, but rather a question we all have, particularly queer people: Am I going to be loved no matter what? I wanted to see how far love could be stretched. I wondered if it could break. I decided to explore a family’s love if they had to love something monstrous.

How did you manage to strike a balance between infusing elements of horror and the supernatural with themes of tragedy and grief in your novel?

I think horror is the potential of tragedy. What if the worst thing that could happen happens? How do we react? Do we survive? Horror deals a lot with grief—grief as cause and consequence. Grief is so powerful; death so alarming for us mortals that horror finds fertile ground here, as does the supernatural, attempting to explain things that perhaps we humans will never understand.

Monstrilio also explores themes of queerness, not just for young M but for almost every character in the novel. How important was it for you to write a story so representative of queer identities?

Extremely important. I had two goals: one, to have queer characters exist in a world without prejudice, acceptance, or the need for explanation; two, to tell a story in a queer way, challenging what we think traditional narrative should be.

Using multiple narrators isn’t a conventional storytelling method, especially in the context of horror. What was your intent behind featuring four distinct narrators in Monstrilio? How did their voices evolve during the writing process?

I wanted to capture a family’s experience of loving each other—how it changes. Does it vanish? Strengthen? Shape-shift? It was crucial that I get each member’s individual perspectives, each with their unique take on Monstrilio, while still having their own goals and dreams. It was interesting to me how the individual informs the collective and vice versa.

In addition to Monstrilio, you write a lot of short stories. How did writing a novel differ from your experiences in crafting shorter fiction? What challenges and creative opportunities did you encounter in making the transition from short stories to a full-length novel?

Short stories, by virtue of their shortness, have the agility to shift and experiment before they take their final shape. You can write several versions of the same short story without (usually) spending decades on it. Novels cannot shape-shift as effectively. I learned commitment while writing my novel. I couldn’t write a whole new novel every time I got anxious and wanted to scrap the whole thing! I was forced to seek the beauty and awesomeness in what I already had, and trust that even if it was only a paragraph, a sentence, or a funny phrase, it would carry me through.

Why did you feel it was important to separate the identities of Santiago and Monstrilio from M while keeping him connected through shared memories? Was it always your intention for Monstrilio to evolve into M or did this decision come about as you drafted and edited the book?

A lot (MOST) of the book evolved through drafts and edits. But this one thing, the decision to have Monstrilio evolve into M, I always had in mind. I didn’t want the book to simply be a long metaphor for grief. I wanted the metaphor to fight back and say, “I’m not a metaphor. I breathe, talk, and eat,” and see what happened. I wanted the book’s initial conceit to evolve, just like Monstrilio turns into M, hopefully leaving the reader with a more layered and nuanced (or at least more interesting) story.

Monstrilio has received acclaim for its successful blend of horror with elements like folklore and family drama. What tips would you offer to aspiring authors interested in experimenting with the blending of multiple genres in their writing?

Do it! Genres are not set in stone. Play. Create. Art should experiment, question, challenge. Take a trope you love and twist it in a new way, maybe pile others onto it. The more you play around, the better you’ll be at the game.

Are there any books and/or authors that have been fundamental in crafting your own voice as a writer?

So many. Every book I read leaves a little crumb in me. At any given time, I’ll have a few hovering around me that I can’t stop thinking about (although if you ask me in a month, these may have changed):

• Our Share of Night by Mariana Enriquez
• Sexing the Cherry by Jeanette Winterson
• After the Sun by Jonas Eika
• Uranians by Theodore McCombs
• El baile y el incendio by Daniel Saldaña París

The process of getting a book published can often feel more challenging than the writing itself. Could you share your experience with the publishing process and offer some advice to emerging authors who are either just starting or currently navigating this stage?

It is challenging! I’m extremely fortunate to have the amazing Jenni Ferrari-Adler as my agent. She’s been with me since the first drafts of the novel, helping me through the revision process, the publishing process, and everything that comes before, during, and after it’s bought. As harrowing as the process is (you don’t know if your book will be bought!), my advice is to surround yourself with people you trust and who are knowledgeable in the process. Ask a lot of questions. Also, understand that this process will be unique to each writer.

There’s something oddly addictive about reality dating shows. Watchers root for or against couples, forming emotional connections with them, and living vicariously through their experiences, all from the comfort of their own couches. And there’s always the anticipation that the couples formed won’t survive beyond the screen. 

In shows like Love Is Blind, commitment is taken to a whole new level as participants get engaged before ever seeing each other, elevating the stakes and emotions in a way that other dating shows can’t compare to. While it’s entertaining to watch love stories between strangers unfold, these shows also serve to reflect modern-day anxieties about marriage and underscore the enduring societal pressure to tie the knot. Consider how these narratives parallel timeless tales of courtship about navigating the societal expectations to marry. 

When it comes to marriage plots, Jane Austen is an undisputed master, and Persuasion distinguishes itself with its mature and level-headed protagonist, Anne Elliot, who seeks to rekindle romance at a later stage of life while facing mounting expectations to marry. Anne’s struggle between love and societal conformity mirrors the dilemmas that weigh heavily on the women in Love Is Blind. Exploring Persuasion to gain insight into how to navigate the pressures of meeting societal expectations while following one’s heart begs the question: What would Anne Elliot do? 

Marrying for Financial Security 

In Love Is Blind, the central question revolves around the authenticity of love transcending both physical appearances and the material world. However, when reality sets in, financial disparities become a significant challenge. In a recent season, the father of the bride expressed concern about her fiancé’s lower financial status, claiming that love sometimes prefers to “fly first class.” The revelation of a bad credit score ultimately led to the relationship’s demise, resulting in a dramatic wedding day abandonment. 

This situation is reminiscent of Anne and Captain Wentworth’s first failed engagement. Anne fell in love with Captain Wentworth despite his lack of fortune and lower social status, but love was not enough. Sir Walter, Anne’s father, viewed it as a “degrading alliance.” And Lady Russell believed Anne would be throwing herself away to a man who “had no hopes of attaining affluence.” Their opinions, especially Lady Russell’s, deeply affected Anne and caused her to call off the engagement. 

During the Regency Era, Georgian women’s marriages often hinged on securing husbands with substantial fortunes, as they had no separate legal identities and could not own property. Only if a wife outlived her husband could she gain a degree of financial independence through a marriage settlement, inheriting her husband’s fortune. However, Anne refuses to rush into another engagement at age twenty-two with Charles Musgrove out of financial interest, reflecting her strong character and values.

In fact, Anne believes marrying solely for money reflects bad character, while Mrs. Smith simply brushes it off with, “When one lives in the world, a man or woman’s marrying for money is too common to strike one as it ought.” Anne, like many modern women, recognizes the importance of both love and financial compatibility in a partnership. Later, she regrets calling off her engagement at the behest of others as Captain Wentworth goes on to acquire his own fortune. 

In our modern day, women are no longer financially dependent on men, so what we can learn from Anne’s experience is to build trust in a relationship and support one another to achieve individual goals, ensuring both partners are prepared for a shared future. With this perspective, Anne would understand the decision of individuals in Love Is Blind to prioritize financial stability. 

Biological Clock Ticking 

Women in shows like Love Is Blind often join with the desire to start a family, fearing that waiting to meet the right person organically might jeopardize their chances of having children. Similarly, the unmarried women in Persuasion face the pressure to marry and start families while they’re still young, which is mirrored by Sir Walter’s fixation on youth and the Baronetage, a record of noble families. 

The recurrence of women’s names in the Baronetage is due to their success in marrying and multiplying; therefore, Sir Walter values his daughters based on their perceived attractiveness and marriage prospects. He favors Anne’s sister Elizabeth the most because he believes she is still beautiful at twenty-nine and will soon marry suitably. But even Elizabeth feels “the years of danger” toward spinsterhood approaching and averts her eyes when she sees the Baronetage. Austen writes, “Always to be presented with the date of her own birth and see no marriage follow but that of a youngest sister, made the book an evil.” 

Meanwhile, Sir Walter values Anne least of all because he always “had found little to admire in her.” At twenty-seven years of age, her father finds her “faded and thin” and even “haggard.” Austen writes, “He had never indulged much hope, he had now none, of ever, reading her name in any other page of his favourite work.” Despite her father’s disappointment, Anne isn’t swayed by the pressure to rush into marriage while still young to add more names to the Baronetage. 

Austen’s novel shows the promise and beauty of discovering love in later stages of life, emphasizing the development of genuine connections without the urgency of starting a family. Anne’s experience serves as a reminder that women should not succumb to the notion that their time is running out, but instead, value themselves as individuals first. 

Marrying for Love 

Every participant on Love Is Blind shares the common desire to find authentic love based on inner qualities, rather than superficial attributes like appearance, age, or financial status. Yet these programs impose the pressure of falling in love, getting engaged, and marrying in just a few weeks. 

Similarly, Anne and Captain Wentworth first fall in love and get engaged within the span of a few months. Despite Anne’s initial regret when she calls off the engagement at nineteen, as time passes, she doesn’t blame herself or others for influencing her decision. By the age of twenty-seven, she realizes she made the right choice given the circumstances at the time, while her unwavering love for Captain Wentworth proves it was more than a fling. 

Time apart from each other not only sees Captain Wentworth become a more suitable match for Anne, but it also allows Anne to emotionally mature. Austen writes, “She had been forced into prudence in her youth, she learned romance as she grew older: the natural sequel of an unnatural beginning.” When they reconnect, they are able to build a stronger relationship based on their merits as equals and respect for their differences. Above all, Anne and Captain Wentworth’s love story illustrates that marriage results from a culmination of both romantic and realistic elements, and that it cannot be rushed if it is to last. 

Jane Austen’s Persuasion and shows like Love Is Blind reveal the complexities of love and marriage that transcend time. The pursuit of genuine connections, the tension between love and practicality, and the weight of societal expectations all echo through these narratives. Anne Elliot’s journey serves as a timeless reminder that women should prioritize their individual worth and not yield to societal pressure, while also valuing love and financial compatibility in a partnership. For more of Austen’s love advice, read Jerakah Greene’s article “A Study in Classics: Dating Tips from Jane Austen” right here on F(r)iction. 

If you watch current Marvel movies, you haven’t seen The Thing mixing it up with the Avengers on the big screen. The Thing (Benjamin J. Grimm) mainly appears in comics and cartoons as a core member of The Fantastic Four. In 1961, writer, Stan Lee, and artist, Jack Kirby, launched four explorers into space in the first issue of The Fantastic Four. Once in outer space, Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Johnny Storm, and Ben Grimm are exposed to cosmic rays and gain superpowers. The twist: each of their subconsciouses affects their powers. Reed, always stretching himself too thin, became the elastic Mr. Fantastic. Sue, who felt unseen by people, became The Invisible Girl. Johnny, a hot head, became The Human Torch. And Ben, who felt like a working-class lug, became super-strong golem, The Thing. The combination of their relationships and amazing adventures laid the groundwork for the Marvel universe as we now know it. And what’s more, the series introduced a way for me to connect The Thing’s self-loathing to similar patterns in myself. 

Depression isn’t just feeling sad. It’s normal to experience the whole emotional spectrum, but for myself, I found that sadness extended to a holding pattern of self-loathing. I’d find myself asking tough questions: Why am I sleeping all the time? Why am I pulling away from family and friends who only wish to check in? Though I recognized signs of depression, the stigma of asking for help kept me from turning to mental health professionals. It took not a rocket crash but a breakdown to learn I wasn’t a freak but someone with bipolar depression. Most importantly, I learned I was functional with the right medication and talk therapy. Ben’s own journey of self-discovery established his character as an icon for myself and my mental health.

Unlike Reed, Sue, and Johnny, who could switch their powers on and off, Ben was permanently turned into The Thing. Because of that permanence, Ben viewed his new powers and form as a curse rather than something that made him a superhero. He physically embodied depression. Whenever Ben left the Fantastic Four’s high-rise headquarters, he wore an oversized trench coat, shades, and pulled-down fedora. This wasn’t to avoid paparazzi but prevent him being seen as a spectacle. My own depression can often feel like stones piled on top of me, each stone representing a regret to be reviewed before I’m able to get out of bed and face the day. When my depression ramps up, I go around with my hoodie pulled low and headphones in to cut out the world. This is my way of disengaging and blocking stimuli, to stop negative thoughts avalanching in on me.

As the Fantastic Four’s story unfolded, it became clear that The Thing’s greatest power wasn’t his physical strength, but his perseverance. His catchphrase “It’s Clobberin’ Time!” signaled to villains he could take a licking and keep coming back for more. I found that perseverance inspirational but soon realized the flip side of it was a mental holding pattern—Ben couldn’t accept his current reality, which in turn, brought on his depression. 

To try and explain why I didn’t feel connected to my present self, I searched for my own rocket crash or cosmic rays. My depression often felt as though one event could veer me off course—I was unaware that the period of joy in my life I chased was the manic cycle of bipolar depression. But, shortly after that period ended, I’d find myself sitting in the debris of the metaphoric crash site, waiting for a change to make things better without doing any of the work. Instead of rebuilding and relaunching, I reviewed my past trajectory for mistakes to relive, much like Ben wishing to be his former self. Ben and I both faced the stigma that men shouldn’t ask for help. With Ben’s depression, he saw only his monstrous form rather than the hero inside himself—with my depression, I was staying in my head, which kept me from being present in my current life. 

When I first noticed my depression, I thought it best to live with my parents. But, whenever I ran into parents of childhood friends I felt shame for “living at home at my age.” Family told me those opinions didn’t matter, but my false perception led to career decisions that sped up moving out of their home. In turn, these choices took me away from a support system best for my mental health in the long run.

Ben made similar, rash decisions. There are storylines in which Ben felt better off leaving the Fantastic Four. But it was through the Fantastic Four’s growth as a family that Ben began to connect to his present self as The Thing. In the series, Sue and Reed marry and have two kids. These kids only know Uncle Ben in his Thing form. Seeing himself in this form as an uncle helped Ben embrace himself. When Ben first held his nephew, he said, “Now… All of a sudden… I feel like a part of a family… ’stead of a freak show!” 

When you see Ben in the Marvel Universe relaunch of Fantastic Four, he’s not covering up his rocky orange self. Ben is in casual clothes tailored to his frame with his wife, Alicia, on his arm, helping people together. I like to think my version of a personal relaunch is talking honestly about mental health with all generations of my family, trusting their understanding, and being open about living with bipolar depression. I had my biggest breakthrough when I stopped looking for one specific event—or metaphorical rocket crash—to point to where things may have gone wrong. Instead, I started experiencing the present and utilizing tools from therapy to engage with the world rather than pull away. The Fantastic Four are known as explorers of the Marvel Universe—seeing similar patterns between my own mental health and in Ben’s expression of himself as The Thing, I began exploring my life again. Benjamin J. Grimm does not turn into The Thing at a whim, just as I don’t turn into someone with bipolar depression. Instead, it is who we are every day. It turns out that, after all, we aren’t the freaks we thought we were—instead, we are the heroes of our own stories.

The Book Eaters explores the lives and world of people who, well… they literally eat books to survive. A rare breed of people indeed! Where did the concept for The Book Eaters come from?

I want to give a fancy answer but the truthful answer is that Book Eaters was written during a time when I was extremely exhausted and more than a little burnt out. In essence, it’s a story which only made sense when I was quite sleep deprived, and which I somehow finished even though it was more or less total chaos.

Later, when I was feeling better, I had to somehow edit that mess into a narrative that made sense, and even then, my editor had to swoop in after acquiring the book to help me hammer it into better shape!

Your book takes advantage of two timelines: exploring Devon’s childhood and her present-day dilemmas. How did you decide to tell the story by jumping back and forth rather than a linear approach? Did the early drafts do this as well?

It was something I decided on very early! I build my novels around a structure I call “reader’s journey”, which is a sort of spin on hero’s journey. In short, rather than focusing on the journey that the protagonist undergoes, it focuses on the reader’s experience of their story, and prioritizes dramatic information reveals in structure.

In thriller novels, nonlinear or dual timeline narratives are fairly common for this reason: the center around controlling what information the reader has access to, in order to constantly subvert what the reader thinks they know about the plot, world, and characters.

The Book Eaters mixes genres from fantasy, to horror, to thriller, to fairy tale, to literary. What pushed you to blend these genres together? What were some books that inspired you to do so, if any?

I would probably just class it as speculative fiction! Fantasy is defined only by setting elements, so any kind of plot structure can fit inside it.

All that said, I love spec fic books with a thriller structure particularly, so The Library at Mount Char by Scott Hawkins, Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer, The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North, and The Echo Wife by Sarah Gailey were big influences.

You’ve opened up before about being a mother and a neurodivergent writer. How much of yourself do you put into your novels? What advice do you have for diverse writers?

I try to put in whatever I can—anything of myself that I think will be relevant or interesting to readers. I know that’s a vague answer, sorry!

Advice wise, I’m always cautious handing that out, but among the autistic writing community, I often see folks worried that their writing will be too “weird” or unusual for commercial tastes. I understand that fear, because it’s protective in a way; it gives us a psychological “out” when rejections roll in.

But that mentality also is an insidious form of self-rejection, and can nurture a sense of bitterness—neither of which are good for authors in the long term. Don’t worry about being weird! Write what you enjoy, but with your practical hat on, and it’ll be fine.

You currently have a podcast, Publishing Rodeo, where you share insights on publishing and writing. What would you like to share with aspiring writers who are considering traditional publication right now?

I would be upfront with them that trade publishing is a very tiered industry. By tiered, I mean that authors are generally acquired in certain advance brackets, which in turn largely determine the marketing and support their books get, which in turn tend to define how well the book sells on launch. There’s some variation in those equations, but by and large, advance size is linked to sales, and that aspect—which define your career—is not only decided early on behind closed doors, but is almost entirely out of your control.

Please do check us out if you get the chance! We don’t do the podcast for money or to build platform, but just to offer up free resources and information (lots of links on the website, and lots of show notes for every episode!) We go heavy on the facts, details, and stark realities—good, bad, and everything in between.

What have been some of the surprising differences or similarities of your book coming out in multiple countries/markets (i.e. the UK and US editions of The Book Eaters)?

I wrote TBE for the UK market, even though it is a smaller market than the USA, and put in things that I thought UK folk would appreciate. I was surprised and pleased to get an American publisher as well, but in hindsight there were sections that left Americans confused, which could perhaps have been explained, if I’d thought about it more. For example, at one point Devon interacts with someone who speaks Polish, which doesn’t need an explanation for UK readers, but some Americans didn’t understand why there would be so many EU immigrants in the UK and thought it was bizarre.

On the flip side, the American copy edits changed a lot of UK terms, and I regret not keeping more of them (all of them?) as written. UK readers did pick up on those changes, and I’m afraid I now look very foolish / very Americanized to some folks as a result!

Tell us more about your next novel, working title: Sea Sister (out 2024!)!

Tentative title keeps changing but I think at the moment we are using The Night We Drown (check back in a few weeks though, and it may yet be different again…! Argh!)

The next book is a “Chinese gothic” historical fantasy, set in Hong Kong. The narrative appears to follow two women: the first is a triad-employed exorcist living and working in Kowloon Walled City, circa 1965. The second is a young lady who moves to a ghost-infested island in 1942, where she hopes to hide from the Japanese invasion. Neither story is what it appears, and the links between these tales gradually reveal themselves as the novel progresses.

What book(s) do you want people to be aware of this coming year and why?

I have read advanced reader copies of quite a few books this year! Some I’d recommend:

• The West Passage, a weird absurdist fantasy by Jared Pechaček;
• The Surviving Sky, a science-fantasy novel by Kritika H. Rao;
• The Night Guest, a wonderful surreal horror-novella by Hildur Knútsdóttir
• Ascension, a brilliant sci-fi-thriller by Nick Binge.