In your story “Speech Lessons,” words are a conduit for the narrator’s healing from a broken relationship through the act of teaching, yet words are also a reminder of that loss, representing those unforgettable “small truthful darts” of pain. This is such a natural tie-in between the subject of the piece (the literal speech lessons) and its deeper themes (grief, healing, and the complexity of relationships). From a craft perspective, how do you approach interweaving story elements like these?

Thanks for this very insightful question! In many ways, I think developing a good story idea is like rolling a snowball in how it accrues meaning: it often begins with just one element, detail, scene fragment, or something that compels us to keep exploring, and eventually other stuff sticks to it, and it grows. In the case of “Speech Lessons,” I began with a challenge to myself to incorporate tongue twisters (which I’ve always loved) into a story, and I had fun trying to make that work, while the deeper meanings and parallels revealed themselves as the story grew. I find that’s often the case: if the premise is clear and well-set up and has some legs, different threads come naturally.

I admire how specific your writing is at the sentence-level. In “Speech Lessons,” there’s that beautiful specificity of the pennies and the exactness of the instructional phrases; in “Men,” it’s the details of the pink banana seat bikes and the “chit chit chit sound” used to speak with the chickadees; in “Box of Ghosts,” it’s the visceral, bizarre, and lovely image of the turtle’s “shell, orange and black” as the narrator gazes down into the box. How do you come to these incredibly vivid, specific details, and how do you decide which ones are necessary as you revise your writing?

That’s a great question, and one that I’d say has a two-part answer: In any first (or early) draft, the way I choose (or happen upon) details feels a bit amorphous and has a lot to do with surrendering to the early draft process, to how ideas flow, and what might emerge. At this point, I’m not fully assessing each detail, but more so open to seeing what bubbles up, what wants to come through. I’m often surprised by the aptness of some of these early-draft details, and actually, all the ones you mentioned are first-draft details that made it through to the final draft. Though moving into later drafts, once the overall shape of the story is in place, every detail needs to be doing some heavy lifting, and at that point I will scrutinize each detail and “audition” them, so to speak (i.e. make sure they are the best fit out of all possibilities available). This is especially important for short and flash fiction, where space is so limited, and where each detail is often doing multiple things at once.

I keep returning to “Box of Ghosts” and the full-circle moment at the end of the story—the realization as to why the box is passed on, the implication that perhaps we cannot look too closely at grief and loss. I think this was brilliantly developed, and I’d love to hear about your writing process for a story’s ending. When do you know you’ve found the finale of a story?

For me, an exciting story idea is one where the concept—specifically, what’s at the heart of the story—feels clear as well as complex, with multiple branches and leaves, and where I often feel the DNA of the ending embedded, too—in the initial concept. In this way, I often have a sense of the shape the ending might take even from my first sketches of the story. I’m not a very linear writer, and different parts of the story come to me separately, sometimes all bunched up together, in a very rough, impressionistic form. And, of course, getting a sense of the shape of the story, or the shape the ending might take, still leaves lots of possibilities open. The best endings I’ve written didn’t come about through planning or an overly analytical approach, but more intuitively. George Saunders also makes a wonderful point about endings in his essay “Rise, Baby, Rise!” where he discusses Donald Barthelme’s “The School”: That the work of the ending happens in the middle, and if a story does the work it needs to by the middle, it can have almost any ending it wants. I’ve always loved that and find it hopeful and true.

You’re currently writing two novels—can you tell us anything about this? How do you balance projects? How do you shift from short-form fiction to long-form?

Yes, two novels both in-progress, and both for a number of years now. How to Survive on Land is about two half-mermaid sisters, based on one of my first published short stories of the same name (in the New Ohio Review). And The House of Love is a haunted, gothic, ghost story about art and mortality. I definitely would rather not have two novels in the works at once like this, yet both have insisted on their existence to me over the last several years, and I’m honestly so excited about both that there doesn’t seem to be another way. I have the distinct sense of needing to capture these long-form stories before the excitement I feel for each dries up, or changes significantly.

Though in general, I do work on many projects at once: these two novels, as well as a number of short stories, and I cycle between them all, giving space to the ones that need it, and working on the ones where I feel the strongest pull and excitement that day, for as long as I can. Sometimes I’ll spend longer stretches on a certain piece. If I sit down to work on my novel that day, that’s pretty much what I’ll work on, possibly the next day too. Though when I get stuck, rather than trying to force it, I’ll switch to working on something else, and come back to the other project when something shifts, which it very frequently does. I find it’s never the wrong choice to follow these currents of inspiration, as that tends to lead me to my best work. However, in the final stages of a story, I go into an almost fevered, obsessive state of revision where I live and breathe that story.

As for switching between short-form and long-form fiction: This isn’t that challenging for me, as I tend to hold my novels in mind via smaller story chunks, so even though pacing can feel different between short- and long-form writing, it just takes getting into the flow of that particular project to make that switch.

I greatly admire your work as the founder of the Pioneer Valley Writers’ Workshop. This is a great educational and community-building organization, providing writers with a valuable environment for literary growth. How do you think your involvement in this project has helped shape or define your own writing or aesthetics?

It’s pretty amazing to me what I’ve learned throughout the whole process of PVWW’s growth, from just me to a full-fledged organization with so many talented instructors, students, and communities involved, and I’m continually grateful. I think more than anything, being surrounded by a writing community like this—writers of every style, genre, background, all working on their projects and bringing them to life—feels incredibly motivating and inspiring and makes me want to write more and keep growing as a writer. Of course, time and solitude are important so that we can actually write, but I think what PVWW has helped me be aware of, too, is that if you nurture the social side of your writing, the communal aspect, you’re often more inspired and mentally able to sustain the work that’s required. 

Many years ago, you published a story with F(r)iction. Has your approach to speculative fiction changed since then, and if so, how? What does speculative fiction mean to you now?

One of the most important things about speculative fiction, that I’ve come to understand more deeply over the years, is that the best speculative stories are never first and foremost about the magic itself, even though that can be what initially draws us in. When I look at some of the truly fantastic fabulist and speculative writers who’ve inspired me—Aimee Bender, Karen Russell, Angela Carter, I’ll even add Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and Hans Christian Andersen—the magic, the unreal element, is always in service of some deeper, emotional struggle, some truth about our existence, the world, suffering, etc., that is actually made more poignant and powerful because of a metaphorical approach. Speculative fiction, then, is about the power of metaphor; the power of giving tangible form to something that feels otherwise inexpressible, emotional, immense, and that somehow, by stepping slightly outside of the real, we can better give voice to these truths.

I’d also say that what’s changed over the years for me is a deepening of my understanding of narrative in general, and a sense that I can better develop a story idea and move through all parts of the process, simply because I’ve done it more times at this point, and I recognize the different stages of the process and struggles at each one. Yet each story is still very much its own puzzle, its own paradox, with its own set of problems and eventual solutions. I would also say that I make less of a distinction between speculative and realism than I once did, and my focus is more on if a story is accomplishing what it’s setting out to do, and that may involve magical and fantastic happenings, or not.

I’d love to hear about your recent experiences at writing residencies such as The Kerouac Project and the Ragdale Foundation—and also your guidance for writers hoping to attend residencies.

In a word, both were incredible. The Kerouac Project was unique in that I was the sole writer-in-residence at that time, yet it also has a warm, eager community of writers and literary folks that orbit around it, and I really enjoyed being a part of that. I absolutely loved living in Orlando, and it actually became the setting for the novel I was working on while there (a mermaid story, so water was very central). Ragdale was an equally surreal experience. Between the hundreds-of-years-old estate, hours of writing time, the delicious dinners, protected prairies and trails, and the small group of other writers and artists, it was pretty close to writer heaven.

I encourage everyone who might need more focused writing time (and community with other writers)—and who is able to take the time away—to research and apply for residencies! There are a lot out there—different lengths of time, different living arrangements, some with costs involved, yet the fully-funded opportunities of course are the more competitive ones, and the ones I’d recommend trying for. With almost all writing-related applications, the work sample is most important, so make sure you’re showcasing strong work that has been revised and honed, not the newest, roughest chapter or story you just wrote. Also, it’s helpful to include work samples that hook readers quickly, that pop a little, or that have some movement or action early on. Remember, readers are reading through many applications at once. Make sure you’re making it clear why you and your work need this opportunity; if there’s anything timely or of-the-moment about your work; and also that you’re being as flexible as possible with the dates of your availability. My Substack (Alone in a Room) will go into more detail and recommendations about applying for residencies and other opportunities soon, so find me there if you’re interested in hearing more on all of this!

Based on your experience, what advice do you have for writers seeking publication for their short fiction and/or writers who are querying agents?

Before submitting short fiction to literary magazines, make sure the piece is ready, the absolute strongest it can be. You only get one shot to send X piece of writing to Y journal, so you owe it to yourself and the piece (which you’ve likely labored over for a while) to make sure it’s the strongest version of itself. Make sure the piece has gone through many drafts, with space in between so your critical eye can reset. Read the piece aloud and listen for what jars your ear. When it passes all your tests, send it to a handful of your dream journals (do this research before submitting!) and wait to hear back from these before sending to others. Go down your list from there. My experience on both sides of the writer/editor divide is that good work will get noticed, eventually, with persistence. So, the focus should always be on the work, and publishing will follow when the work is ready.

As far as increasing your chances and standing out in the slush, as a former lit mag editor and admissions board reader, I’ve been struck by how much initial grounding and clarity (or lack of it) plays a role in whether or not I want to continue reading. Do not make a reader struggle to find out what’s going on, who the characters are, where we are, especially when the story hasn’t yet hooked us. Don’t confuse the kind of mystery that pulls us in and makes us turn pages with the kind where we are unmoored and trying to figure out what’s going on. The first paragraph is always about seduction: You want to make it hard for readers to look away, while also demonstrating a command of the basic tools of storytelling. As probably expected, these are connected. It’s also important that the opening of a piece, to a certain degree, makes clear to the reader what’s at stake and why they should keep reading. Stories that do this convince us of their authority, and we want to keep turning pages and feel that if we do, it will be worth it.

Regarding agents: My agent found me from a story in a lit mag, so I’ve never directly queried, although I do know a lot about it and frequently coach other writers through that process. Though before querying, I’d recommend meeting and talking with agents at conferences, such as Bread Loaf or Sewanee or Tin House, where you can connect as people and readers, and where—if there is a connection—it may be more than a flat yes or no.

Lastly, what are you currently reading (or watching, or generally consuming with excitement)?

Like pretty much all writers, I am behind on the reading I want to do, with multiple books waiting on my nightstand and writing table. At the moment, I’m rereading Faith Shearin’s incredible Lost River, 1918, a novel about a family on the edge of a haunted woods where the dead come back to life. I met Faith at Yaddo right before the pandemic—we were neighbors on a reputedly haunted hallway—and have been in awe of her writing and poetry since then. This is her first novel, and every sentence is masterful.

As the author of four novels, how has your approach to writing fiction evolved since your debut? Is there anything you know now—about writing, publishing, or life—you wish you could tell your younger self?

My writing approach hasn’t changed too much—I’m always trying to write something original, something that isn’t just more noise. A piece of practical advice that I wish I knew myself back when I first started is that it’s better to have no agent than the wrong agent.

As a horror fan, I’d love to hear your thoughts on the genre; why do you gravitate to writing horror? When is horror the right choice for a story or a message? And what role does social commentary play in your approach to writing a horror novel?

I suspect the reason I gravitate towards writing horror is simply that I love reading it. It’s a genre that lends itself particularly well to social commentary because of how flexible you can be with reality—it’s easier to make a message hit harder when you have that much play in the story’s world.

Your most recent books, Normal Women and Motherthing, seem to draw on 1950s aesthetics in both cover design and domestic themes. What inspires you about the 1950s? What does the 1950s lens reveal about our modern era?

The 1950s was the dawn of the advertising boom. Ideas about gender and society were suddenly defined by what could be sold to people, and products became a kind of language to describe complex biological/cultural/socioeconomic narratives. We tend to look at that era as a curiosity, as something far removed from our lives today, but those capitalist prototypes are more like our early ancestors—we live every day with the traces of their vestigial roots.

Much of Motherthing hinges on the role of food in social relationships, from the recipe book promising to “save your family” to the coworkers at the communal fridge. What fascinates you about food? How does it fit into contemporary society, particularly with regards to women? And have you ever really tried jellied salmon?

I haven’t tried jellied salmon! But I certainly would. Honestly, I just love food. I love eating. I’m very fascinated by people’s relationships to food, how food is branded and marketed, and all the ways we can read food now—a person’s cupboards can really tell us something about them, or so we think. Before, all a person’s cupboard told us was that they had a human body.

A common theme in your work is keeping up appearances—not just in terms of physical beauty, but female characters hiding their distress from their husbands and the world around them. What is the appeal of writing these kinds of characters?

I just think that that’s what a lot of women do. I’m a mega fan of the Real Housewives franchises, and each series inevitably becomes a kind of endurance test for who can make their life seem the most enviable for the longest stretch of time—essentially, who can hide their distress most convincingly. Eventually the bell tolls for them all, of course—but oh man, what a ride.

In Normal Women, on face value “The Temple” yoga studio feels like spot-on satire of contemporary mommy culture. Where did the inspiration for “The Temple” come from?

I drew inspiration for The Temple from a few different places—the connection between sexual and spiritual healing has a long, well-recorded history—but in particular, Gwyneth Paltrow’s lifestyle brand GOOP’s white-and-wealthy coded umbrella of wellness really focused it for me. With “The Temple,” I wanted to explore wellness and all the slippery ways people, even well-intentioned people, use the term for themselves.

One of my favorite things about your work is your fearlessness in satirizing the good, the bad, and the ugly about womanhood and femininity, bringing us wonderfully complex and neurotic characters like Abby and Dani. How do you approach writing about womanhood, femininity, and motherhood? In your opinion, what constitutes “good representation” for women in fiction? How do you grapple with that question when writing “dark fiction”?

This is a great question. As a woman writer, it’s hard to get around this idea that you have to be SAYING SOMETHING—in that grand, all-caps way. Good representation, to me, is when a character or a story subverts that expectation, when a character feels truly real enough that they transcend any message. I had a bad review once where someone said my book was so feminist that it circled back into misogyny, and I felt very proud of that!

What is the biggest takeaway you hope readers have after reading Normal Women?

What I really, really hope is readers come away thinking about the divisions of labor in their own relationships. Normal Women is a kind of speculative origin story about women in heteronormative relationships coming to be paid for the labor they’re already doing for free—caretaking labor, emotional labor, sexual labor—but it’s also a study of the uncomfortable hypocrisies inherent in commodifying any service or resource. It’s a challenging book, which demands self-reflection, so I’m not surprised it has been polarizing, but I hope that even people who didn’t like it were still able to take something away from it.

Do you have any advice for all the aspiring writers out there?

Keep at it, despite the rejections and disappointments. That’s all you can do. I’d been at this for almost ten years before Motherthing hit. There aren’t a lot of ways an artist should model themselves after Kanye West, but cultivating a near-psychotic confidence in your own talent is definitely one of them.

What’s next for you?

Next up I’m working on another book that, like Motherthing and Normal Women, doesn’t really fit into any specific genre. My agent pitched it as Notes on an Execution meets Creature from the Black Lagoon!

Spoiler Alert—The following review contains plot details about The Most Precious Substance on Earth.

What made you want to start writing?

I was always a reader when I was a kid, and the books that impacted me the most were short story collections or anthologies: Budge Wilson’s The Leaving and 21 Great Stories are ones that still stand out in my mind. I read those books over and over. There’s always been something about short stories that grabs me—their compression; how what’s off the page matters as much as what’s on it; how they can end with a kind of suspension or irresolution.

I wrote what I consider my first short story in Grade 8, when we had a unit in English class on “surprise ending stories.” Those surprise endings seemed like such a cool trick to pull off, and so impressive in how they earned it with foreshadowing. My own story was very bizarre and murderous, involving a unreliable narrator who may or not have stabbed his jerk brother with part of his Halloween costume.

The Most Precious Substance on Earth is such an empowering and moving coming-of-age story. I was intrigued by the title, which is also the third chapter title, in which the school band Nina is a part of argues whether platinum, the band’s namesake, is indeed the most precious substance on earth. As the narrative continues, it becomes clear that the most precious substance is something far less tangible. When writing this book, did you immediately know The Most Precious Substance on Earth would be its title?

Thank you! I had written that third chapter as a stand-alone short story before I realized it was going to be part of a novel. Originally, I plucked the phrase from that scene and made it the short story title, because I liked its enigmatic quality. I had the sense that it represented what the narrator loses at the end of that story, where there’s a fairly tragic coming-of-age moment. Once I had the full novel written, out of all the chapter titles, that one struck me the most as applying to the whole book. The “most precious substance” is this nebulous mix of all the things a girl loses when she comes of age—innocence, confidence, faith, a feeling of safety and certainty.

The first chapter ends with Nina experiencing something unspeakably traumatic at the hands of her favorite teacher, Mr. Mackenzie. Compared to books like My Dark Vanessa, The Most Precious Substance on Earth doesn’t focus on the continued predation of a teacher upon their student. How important was it for you to portray Nina’s trauma and struggle to come of age through the physical absence yet otherwise looming presence of Mr. Mackenzie?

I don’t think I would have felt comfortable writing a book that was, from start to finish, about a predatory teacher. It was less the abuse itself that interested me than its aftermath. It was important to me that the actual event remain offscreen and not be depicted graphically, but that readers still feel the weight of its impact. I’m a little obsessed with how a single incident or action or moment can cause a permanent shift and lasting trauma. I wanted to explore the subtle but still devastating effects of such an experience and how they follow Nina even when the event is over, the teacher has left, and her life has moved on.

Some readers were confused or disappointed that there wasn’t a big confrontation scene later in the book, or that the abuse didn’t get reported or go to trial and so on. I wanted to write something that felt true to real-life experiences of sexual abuse and assault—a kind of ongoing silencing. But I can certainly also understand the desire for justice and catharsis!

Despite the dark subject matters this book handles, Nina has a memorably humorous voice; there were moments that had me laughing out loud, and then feeling immediately empathetic for her. Was it difficult to strike the right balance between serious and humorous?

I’m so glad this made you laugh! Initially I wrote the first chapter of this book for a reading I gave at a bar in 2007, and I was trying to write something that was accessible, easy to follow while listening, would get an audience reaction, and had tonal range. I wanted to write something that had a breathlessness to it, in the sudden emotional turn of the ending—an ending that aimed to pull the rug out from under the reader. Because the subject matter and emotions of this story are so dark, it needed some lightness to balance it out. A big part of revision was considering and calibrating the tonal balance; I didn’t want people to think I was ever joking about what happens to Nina, but I also didn’t want the book to be joyless.

The bits of pop culture weaved throughout the narrative flavored the text and made Nina’s adolescence feel so relatable and grounded. How did you go about researching or recalling these pop culture factoids?

I was a teenager in the suburbs of Toronto in the ‘90s, so even though the book is set in Halifax, a lot of the pop culture references were just the TV and music I listened to back then. While writing, I listened to music by Our Lady Peace, The Smashing Pumpkins, and Radiohead (my favorite bands in high school), and the soundtracks to The Craft and Romeo + Juliet, both of which came out around that time.

I also had to do a lot of googling to avoid anachronisms. I kept a spreadsheet of the chapters and what years they occurred in, then looked up each reference and tracked it on the spreadsheet. While revising I had to change some of them, like if I had a reference to a TV show that was released in 2006 but the chapter was set in 2002. And it was not for only pop culture, but also things like whether there was a dollar store in a certain mall in Halifax in 1998, what thrift stores were most popular in the city then, or whether my characters would have needed to take a bus to get to Tim Hortons. It was painstaking but also very fun. I enjoyed all the nostalgia.

I appreciated how Nina’s growth continued well into her adulthood. It makes sense that going through something so traumatic would take years to heal from. Part of this is explored through Nina’s decision to become a teacher and the struggles she faced in this line of work. As a professor yourself, did you experience any struggles when you first started teaching that influenced Nina’s story? Can you tell us a little more about the role of a teacher to not only educate students but to protect and inspire them?

I did take inspiration from my teaching experiences, though I imagine teaching high school students requires a more intense level of personal responsibility. A teaching workload can be very high in terms of grading, class prep, and admin work, and there are the many hours of public speaking every week. My first few years teaching full-time were overwhelming, particularly because I was a young female minority teaching mostly white students. My teaching evaluations were full of microaggressions. I felt a lot of pressure to prove myself. I had Nina share those pressures.

Now I teach in a much more diverse environment, but any teaching comes with frequent and unexpected ethical and emotional dilemmas that we’re not always prepared for. I teach creative writing, and it’s not uncommon for students to write about very personal things, like eating disorders, gender identity, relationships, assaults, and abuse. Many students are also dealing with physical and mental health issues and have pressures outside of the classroom. Most instructors I know have had students cry in class or in office hours or have had students become very angry or send cruel or inappropriate emails. That being said, my students are engaged and brilliant and funny; they’re good writers and hard workers and sharp critics; they encourage each other. My creative writing workshops are often really fun, but I’m always aware that I’m only responsible for a small part of that—that I’m a facilitator, that the dynamic is very fragile, and that how a class goes depends so much on the mix of personalities in the room.

Before going into teaching, Nina attends an MFA program for Creative Writing in the U.S. and immediately feels alienated as the only person of color in the program. At the beginning of the narrative, when Nina imagines reading Beowulf by the fireplace with her teacher, she imagines herself with blonde hair, even though she’s Indian. This alienation is, unfortunately, a common experience for so many women of color. Did you set out to portray this heavily when you started writing this novel, or did it organically come up as you continued writing? 

It did come up organically, based on my own experiences. I didn’t put a South Asian character in any of my stories until I was 23 or so, probably because I didn’t encounter any South Asian American characters until I read Jhumpa Lahiri’s Interpreter of Maladies. Even now, in my students’ writing, it’s rare to see someone put their cultural identity in their work, or to identify a character’s race (white still seeming to be the default, even when the writer isn’t white). On the other hand, it’s very common to see them set their stories in a kind of vague American setting (though we’re in Canada). They also love setting stories in New York, which most of them have never been to! I find this last bit very charming and interesting, but I have introduced a “write what you know” assignment, partly to suggest that their own experiences—including the places they live in and the people they know—are valid to explore in fiction.

I loved how central Nina’s cultural identity was to her growing up and her relationship with her family. One example that comes to mind is how normally it’s presented that Nina lives with her parents as an adult. While this is normal in many cultures, it’s still seen as unusual in Western society. During the publishing process, did you ever face resistance or confusion toward your portrayal of Nina’s heritage?

I was very lucky to work with agents and editors who didn’t question the way I depicted Nina’s cultural background. When McClelland & Stewart made an offer, they sent a letter with kind quotes from their editors and staff responding to the manuscript. I remember one editor who referred to a moment when Nina describes having dinner at the house of a white friend as having a hidden choreography she couldn’t follow, and the editor said that, as a Korean-Canadian, that was something he had felt, too. That comment meant a lot to me. I appreciated hearing from people who could understand what those small moments are like.

Silence and power play such important roles in The Most Precious Substance on Earth. We see this clearly when Nina joins a local Toastmasters group to improve her public speaking skills. The intersection of race and gender, and the way silence is imposed on marginalized individuals, is especially present in these sections. How do you think the solidarity between Nina and the women of color in Toastmasters played a role in her growth?

I wanted Nina to find some like-minded people, and her friendship with Jules makes the story a more hopeful ending than it would be otherwise. I wrote Jules as basically Nina’s ideal friend. Like Nina, she struggles with speaking up, but she’s also sharp and funny, and Nina witnesses her stand up for the other woman of color in the Toastmaster’s group. Jules is someone who has goals and works toward achieving them. She’s a good influence on Nina, and there’s no toxicity between them; it’s a much more calm, mature friendship than what Nina has with Amy in high school.

The publishing industry can be difficult for emerging authors to navigate. If you could give your past self one piece of advice about the publishing industry or process, what would it be? 

I would tell myself to write what I wanted to, and not what I was expected to.

Part of our mission here at Brink Literacy Project is to bring the revolutionary magic of storytelling to underserved communities. Do you have any advice for aspiring authors from marginalized communities? 

My advice is the same as it is for my past self, and perhaps for all aspiring writers: write what you can’t stop thinking about.

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.