The USA is 250 years old this month, and in honor of the occasion LibraryThing sat down with authors Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie, who recently collaborated on A Founding Mother, a historical novel about Abigail Adams published by William Morrow in May 2026. A bestselling author of historical fiction, Dray earned her undergraduate degree in Government from Smith College, and her law degree from Northwestern University School of Law, and has worked as a lawyer, game designer and teacher. Her many works include the Cleopatra’s Daughter trilogy, about the life of Cleopatra Selene II, and stand-alone novels like The Women of Chateau Lafayette (2021). Kamoie, also a bestselling author of historical fiction, is a historian who earned her undergraduate degree from Dickinson College and her MA and PhD in early American history from the College of William and Mary. She has published two nonfiction works on early America—Neabsco and Occoquan: The Tayloe Family Iron Plantations, 1730-1830 (2003) and Irons in the Fire: The Business History of the Tayloe Family and Virginia’s Gentry, 1700-1860 (2007)—and has worked as a history professor at the university level, most recently at the US Naval Academy. Before their most recent collaboration, Dray and Kamoie also wrote America’s First Daughter (2016) and My Dear Hamilton (2018) together. They sat down with Abigail this month to discuss their new book.

In your previous novels you’ve explored the lives of Martha “Patsy” Jefferson Randolph and Eliza Schuyler Hamilton. What made you decide to write about Abigail Adams next?

Readers had been asking us to write about Abigail for a long time, but when we realized that our next book was going to come out in 2026, the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, the choice was a no brainer. Abigail was so far ahead of her time, so direct and unflinching, and so modern in her sentiments, that she was the perfect voice from the founding generation to speak to Americans today.

Tell us a little bit about Abigail Adams and her life, and what makes her such an interesting figure. (Full disclosure: as a bicentennial baby, I was named after Abigail Adams, so I already find Adams a fascinating figure!).

Love that! Abigail was in many ways an ordinary farm wife of Braintree, Massachusetts, at the outbreak of the revolutionary war. She lived in a modest home. She was raising four children. She didn’t have a formal education. But in other ways, she had always been extraordinary. We’ve read a lot of letters from 18th-century women at this point in our career, and none of them display the sense of self-possession of Abigail Adams. She seems to have been a smart, rebellious, independent girl from the get go. She chose a husband who would let her become more than an ordinary farm wife. She became an entrepreneur. A diplomat. A canny political operator. And much, much more.

Adams is well known for her writing, including her famous “Remember the Ladies” letter. How much did you rely on her letters or other work, in writing A Founding Mother? Were there other sources–specific biographies or histories—that were helpful?

While always relying heavily on the original letters, and in this case there were many by Abigail and her family and friends, as much as possible, we use the figures’ own words from their letters in their dialogue and internal monologue. We were also guided by one extraordinary biography by Woody Holton and spent a lot of time with David McCullough’s book on John Adams.

What were some of the most interesting things you learned about Adams, in the course of your research for the book?

The most surprising thing we learned was that although Abigail and John Adams shared one of America’s greatest love stories, it was not a fairy tale. Their marriage was under strain when he was away in Europe—there was a forgotten founding father who is probably better off forgotten who crossed the line with Abigail in inappropriate ways—and that Abigail definitely kept some secrets from John.

All three of your books so far have focused on women who were related to more famous men—in the case of Abigail Adams, her husband John Adams. Why is it important to tell their stories? Which other historical women would you like to highlight?

First of all, the irony is that Abigail may be better remembered than John at this point! But to your point, it’s important to tell the stories of the women who stood behind, alongside, and sometimes even ahead of the men who are said to have founded this country. They didn’t do it alone. Women built this country too and deserve the credit. Because when we don’t acknowledge their contributions, people end up deluded into thinking that “traditional” women were fundamentally dependent and happy about it. That wasn’t true for any of the founding mothers we have written about, and especially not Abigail Adams, who was socially conservative in a number of ways while still being an absolute firecracker when it came to women’s rights and the role they could and should play in government. So if the women who founded this country aren’t “traditional” then who is?

As for other women we would like to highlight, so many! We always have to figure out the venn diagram between what we’re both passionate about, what readers want, and what our publisher thinks will be most marketable. But it really is our mission to do as Abigail said and “Remember the Ladies.”

Tell us about your writing process, when working together. How does that work? Are there specific challenges to writing as a team, or specific pleasures?

We have no set process! Sometimes we alternate chapters. Sometimes we assign whole chunks. One specific challenge is technology. Frequently, we break Google Docs or Microsoft Word because we have so many comments or footnotes. Sometimes we are forced to sit at a table together over one manuscript and shift the keyboard back and forth as we make decisions. But that’s just a good excuse to get together. We enjoy each other’s company and there is a certain magic in our collaboration born of deep respect for each other’s talents and writing judgments. We really do make each other better. And we love sharing little insights and research nuggets and nerding out together at historical sites.

What comes next for you two? Do you have further collaborations in mind, or individual projects in the offing?

We do have another collaboration in mind, and we can’t tell you what it is yet, but we’re excited! We’re both also working on solo novels, so there’s much more to come!

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

We both have our own books on our shelves, of course. That gives you a nice pick-me-up when you’re having a bad day. Then there are all the books written by friends and other great writers we admire. Laura has a prime spot for The Alice Network by Kate Quinn on her shelf while Stephanie favors Kate’s The Rose Code. Then there are all the research books. So many.

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

Stephanie’s two most recent—both of which she recommends highly—are Allison Pataki’s It Girl, and Madeline Martin’s The Secret Book Society. Laura recently read and loved Olesya Gilmore’s The Fortune Tellers of Rue Daru and David McCullough’s The Johnstown Flood.

LibraryThing is pleased to sit down this month with groundbreaking author and poet Cynthia Pelayo, who in 2022 became the first Puerto Rican and first Latina to win a Bram Stoker Award after her Crime Scene took the prize in the Poetry Collection category. Her Into The Forest And All The Way Through was a 2020 nominee, also in the Poetry Collection category, while her Children of Chicago was a 2021 nominee in the Novel category. Pelayo earned a BA in Journalism from Columbia College Chicago, a MS from Roosevelt University, and a MFA in Writing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She is currently pursuing a PhD in English. Her MFA writing thesis, Lotería, was republished in 2023, winning an International Latino Book Award Silver Medal in the Best Collection of Short Stories category. A co-publisher of Burial Day Books, which focuses on horror writing, she is the author of numerous other books, stories and poems, including novels such as The Shoemaker’s Magician (2023), Forgotten Sisters (2024), and Vanishing Daughters (2025). Her new novel, It Came from Neverland, a work of horror inspired by the classic Peter Pan, was published by Crooked Lane Books earlier this month. Pelayo sat down with Abigail this month to discuss her new book.

Tell us a little bit about It Came from Neverland. How did the idea for the story first come to you?

Like many people, I grew up watching the Disney version of Peter Pan, and then I remember watching Hook with Robin Williams and being captivated, seeing Peter Pan as an adult who had to remember who he was. There was an older Wendy in that film, and that always stayed with me because I really wanted to know what Wendy’s story looked like aged into young adulthood.

When I went back to J.M. Barrie’s Peter and Wendy and the original play, I worked out that Wendy would be in her early twenties at the start of the First World War. And then I learned that many young men at that time lied about their age to enlist, some of them were barely more than boys. It all felt like a perfect juxtaposition, these boys going off to war and Wendy’s trauma round caring for the Lost Boys from Neverland.

A woman of that time period would certainly not be believed if she tried to tell the truth about what she experienced as a child in Neverland, and so that certainly played into her experience. Then I thought well, Wendy at this age would certainly be in a position that reflected her character, and schoolteacher fit perfectly. The story wrote itself, because I knew that Wendy would do all that she could to protect those children and I also knew Peter Pan would surely return to whisk more children away to Neverland. So this story is that tale, what does she do to stop Peter Pan.

What drew you to Peter Pan, and what made you feel it was horror?

Peter Pan without Wendy Darling is just a boy screaming into the dark. The story only works because Wendy agrees to go with him to Neverland, and she goes because she is sweet and kind and she believes him. Wendy’s only failure here was that she had a good heart, which is just so sad because her being nice is why she was taken advantage of. She trusted someone who was manipulating her. Peter told her she was special, but what he really meant was that she was useful. She was given the role of mother to the Lost Boys, not because she was truly loved or valued, but because someone needed to do the mending. This is not fantasy. This is a domestic horror story dressed in fairy dusty.

In Peter and Wendy we’re also essentially told that growing up is a curse, but I push back on that. Growing up is the adventure, becoming yourself, and gaining autonomy is the gift.

Peter’s entire pitch was stay here, never change, never leave me. Shrink. Lost yourself to praise me. That’s not love. That’s control.

The horror was always there. I just removed the glitter.

What is it about fairy tales that speaks to you?

Fairy tales were the very first stories I was told as a child. “Little Red Riding Hood,” “Hansel and Gretel,” “Cinderella,” more. I hold all of them dear, even though many of them have a thread of terror, but I suppose that’s why I’m the writer I am today.

What I’ve come to understand is that fairy tales are an early societal warning system, in a way. They prepared us for danger, and that’s why they still work. Little Red Riding Hood is everyone who has been told not to talk to strangers on their way home. Bluebeard is everyone who has been warned to be cautious with suitors. Snow White is every person who has fallen victim to the cruelty of jealousy. These stories survived centuries because beneath them there is some truth that can be applied to many of our experiences today. They encode the things that we should say out loud, but don’t because of all of those strange polite society rules, things like – don’t trust the stranger who flatters you, the beautiful thing is likely the trap, or even, the person who promises you forever can very well be the one who seeks to destroy you.

When looking at all of these through a horror lens, they echo to the horror writer what is our job – and that is to tell the truth. Horror is the genre of truth, to highlight the danger, to be a witness to survival, more. So much of what fairy tales do speak to this.

Are there other classic works you’re interested in transforming?

Yes, and the one upcoming is a Frankenstein retelling titled Everina from Union Square & Co. I have more, but I can’t mention those quite yet.

Tell us a little bit about your writing process.

I generally write in the early morning. In the evenings that’s when I tend to answer email or work on lectures for any workshops I’m teaching or work on any of my own homework.

In terms of my actual writing sessions, I read before I write, generally I will read some poetry and then start writing. If you’re asking about the big questions regarding how do I create something, I think I’m a pretty methodical writer in that yes, I allow discovery to happen, but as of recent, there is a lot of researching, planning, and pre-writing that goes into my actual writing. Then there is editing, and that is an entirely different process. I tell writers to think of these processes as three separate demands, research and preparation requires one aspect of your brain, editing requires a different aspect of your brain and the actual writing, which is a completely different process. When you are writing you are creating, allow yourself to have fun and explore when you’re actually writing.

What comes next for you?

Something Followed Us Home: Tales of Latiné Horror comes out September 29 from Simon & Schuster. It’s an anthology I edited that features Mariana Enríquez, Agustina Bazterrica, Mónica Ojeda, Isabel Cañas, Daniel José Older, Zoraida Córdova, and others, with a foreword by Brenda Lozano. Latiné horror isn’t a subgenre, it’s a tradition that I’m grateful to have had the opportunity to share with readers.

After that, Everina, which is my Frankenstein retelling.

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

I read a lot of poetry and classics. My bookshelves reflect that, so we have Lorca, Vallejo, Pizarnik, Anne Sexton, Gwendolyn Brooks, Adrienne Rich, Dickens, Dostoevsky, Homer, Steinbeck, Tolstoy, more. Yes, there’s horror as well, Shirley Jackson, Angela Carter, Mariana Enríquez, Carmen Maria Machado, Daphne du Maurier. And, of course fairy tales, so many fairy tales and non-fiction texts analyzing fairy tales.

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

I am reading Piranesi by Susanna Clarke. I love world building, and here, we have a world that operates on its own logic, the architecture of the space, and the feelings it evokes. Clarke gives us infinite halls that become both prison and sanctuary, and it’s this tension that I’m drawn to as both a reader and writer.

LibraryThing is pleased to sit down this month with author and romance enthusiast Katie Holt, whose 2024 debut, Not In My Book, follows the stormy relationship between a romance novelist and a literary author who are forced to work together on a book. A New York City resident and Tennessee native, Holt earned her degree in English and Creative Writing at NYU, while working at famed Manhattan bookstore, The Strand. When not writing, she works at St. Martin’s Press as an assistant editor. Her second novel, The Last Page, about the romance between a bookseller who dreams of running the bookstore where she works and the owner’s oblivious grandson who has inherited everything, is due out from Alcove Press later in May. Holt sat down with Abigail this month to discuss her new book.

How did the idea for The Last Page first come to you? Were you inspired by your own time as a bookseller? (Full disclosure: I also worked at The Strand for a number of years). Were other bookstore romances, like the one in You’ve Got Mail, an influence?

A fellow Strand-er!! That’s so cool! We’ll definitely have to see if we crossed paths with any of the same booksellers.

I was definitely inspired by my time there. I think it’d be impossible not to be! The Strand has a rich history and while I worked there, lots of the booksellers told me stories about Ben McFall. They had nothing but wonderful things to say about them and it was obvious he left such a deep mark on The Strand. I thought a lot about what it meant to leave behind a legacy in a bookstore. To be surrounded by books and for him to really be the most talked. I never met him, of course, so Leo was really inspired by my late grandfather. He was the coolest person I’ve ever met in my entire life and was a huge reader and supporter of literature.

I’m sure you know that the group of booksellers at The Strand were opinionated and eclectic and I loved it. I’m still friends with so many booksellers there and adore them. The bookseller relationships and dynamics were inspired by them for sure.

Nora Ephron is one of my greatest inspirations, so totally! You’ve Got Mail also has such a fun crew that are all different from each other, but they come together to create some hilarious scenes. I’ve always loved Notting Hill, too, and how that small shop just seems to be bursting with books. The Last Page has plenty of room in their store, but in my mind, books are just spilling over every edge of every surface.

You’ve been a romance advocate in both your professional and academic life, arguing to your college professors that the genre was worthy of consideration. What makes romance so special to you, and why should readers pay attention to it?

Oh goodness, I could wax poetic for days. I always say my favorite part of the romance genre is the HEA (happily ever after). That readers are guaranteed a safety net and it allows writers to explore some really heavy topics! The Last Page discusses grief throughout—what it means to different people, how it can ebb and flow, and how it doesn’t always make sense. Henry is also someone who suffers from depression and feels really embarrassed about it. I loved that I could discuss these topics the way I wanted to and tell the reader, “Don’t worry. They’re safe and you are, too.”

A lot of the time in college, I was told that these character arcs or plots I wrote were devalued by interweaving a love story that ends happily. I had one professor who always said, “I don’t buy it. I don’t buy that all the characters you write end up together.” Well, they do! It always blew my mind. Why would love decrease the value of anything? Isn’t it beautiful that you can evolve and change and grow and fall in love with someone who’s watched all of that happen? Who loves you before, after, and throughout?

There’s also something really special about how the romance genre varies so much within the genre. To me, it demonstrates how everyone views love differently and how everyone loves differently. I just think it’s beautiful and something special and worthy of celebrating.

The Last Page features a bookseller from New York City and a bookstore owner from Tennessee—a profession and two places that have been important to you personally. Are there specific spots or incidents in Ella and Henry’s tale that were inspired by your own life story?

I’m definitely inspired by my life in the city, and it’s impossible for me to not write about the things happening around me. (However, I unfortunately didn’t fall in love with a hot, shy, nerdy former football player while working at The Strand). New York is such a romantic city and I work hard to make the city feel like a character in the book. A reader
tagged me in a NOT IN MY BOOK book tour they did across NYC when they were visiting and I burst into tears. Those pictures of them at Peculiar Pub and Washington Square Park were exactly why I include real restaurants and locations. Specifically in this book, Ella and Henry go to Kingston Hall, which is one of my favorite places. It’s buy one get one free beer on the weekends!! And there’s a great pool table and such interesting interior design. I’ve brought my laptop there plenty of times to get some writing done and thought it was such a cool place for them to stumble into.

Although I loved being a bookseller, I did have the quintessential yet frustrating “I saw a book with a black cover here three weeks ago. Can you help me find it?” which I include in The Last Page. Bill Clinton also did come in and sift through American History. There wasn’t a naked man that ran through the store—he had on a speedo in real life.

Something that was really inspired by my life was Leo. Like I said, he was based on my grandfather who I was really close to. He had been pretty sick for a few years and every time I saw him, I braced myself because it could’ve been the last. The thought of losing him haunted me and I think I wrote this in a place of nearly preemptive grief? I kind of think of it like a letter from my past self telling me that I’ll survive losing him, even if it hurts like hell sometimes. He never got to hold a copy of The Last Page, though, I know he would’ve been proud and read every single word (as he mortifyingly told me he did with Not In My Book).

Tell us a little bit about your writing process—how and where you like to write, and how you construct your stories. Are you a plotter or a pantser?

I have to plot. I recently finished writing a book that I tried to pants and it was horrible. I hated every single second of it, deleted everything, and started over.

My process has evolved as my life has! For Not In My Book, I was home for the pandemic and wrote the first draft in my childhood bed and my parent’s kitchen table. I had to have my Beats on and a bag of BBQ chips and Kombucha by my side (in my head they counteracted each other??).

Nowadays, though, I love to write in cafes or bars in the city. I’ve always thought it was very Cool Girl when I saw people writing or reading at bars. Recently, I’ve been grabbing my notebook and physically writing out scenes or chapters. I also love to listen to music while I write (mostly Taylor Swift) and think about how the characters fit that song or if they ever have. Because Rosie definitely listened to “Welcome to New York” for a month straight when she moved to New York and Ella definitely had “Honey” on a constant loop.

What advice would you give to up-and-coming authors, particularly up-and-coming romance authors?

When I was in high school, I took a writing course with Rachel Carter and it completely transformed the way I wrote and my perspective on it. She told me to write as much as I read and read a lot. The only way to know the mechanics of the genre or even a book is to completely entrench yourself in it. Read lots and lots of books and write every day. Even if it’s just a sentence! Writing is a muscle and if you don’t exercise it, it’ll weaken.

I also think it’s important to give yourself grace. No one is publishing their very first draft. It’s okay for your writing to be terrible and make sense to no one else but you. Sometimes it’s all in the revisions! But don’t be too hard on yourself.

What’s next for you? Do you have any books currently in the works?

I have a couple of things in the works!! I’m working on two books right now that are very different from each other. I don’t want to reveal too much just yet, but these really feel like the stories I’ve been waiting to tell for sometime, so I’m super excited about them!

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

All kinds of romance! I really don’t shy away from any of the subgenres. I’ve been into speculative and dark recently, but I’m hoping historical makes a resurgence, especially now that Lisa Kleypas is back!

It’s really rare I read outside of romance, but that’s my small goal for this year. I’ve always been a physical reader, but I’m dabbling in some book club fiction and nonfiction through my audiobooks.

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

I just finished Tessa Bailey’s new time travel romance, Broken Rival, and I feel like I’m having a parasocial relationship with them. Like…it’s that serious. A Little Buzzed by Alys Murray was so intensely sexy that my Apple Watch asked if I was working out because my heartbeat was so high. That is a MUST read! I also read The Heartbreak Hotel by Ellen O’Clover recently and was stunned by it and the musings on love and life after a breakup. The characters are so well drawn and she strikes the exact right balance of emotionally intense and absolute yearning. Secret Nights and Northern Lights by Megan Oliver is also what second chance romance dreams are made of. I cannot wait to read more from her.

LibraryThing is pleased to sit down this month with best-selling author Shelley Noble, whose many novels run the gamut from historical fiction to mystery to contemporary women’s fiction. A former professional dancer, Noble toured with Twyla Tharp Dance and American Ballroom Theater, and has worked as a choreographer for film and theater productions. She earned her BFA and MFA at the University of Utah, and taught at California State University in Fresno. A former president of Sisters-in-Crime, Noble is a member of Mystery Writers of America, Romance Writers of America, and Liberty States Fiction Writers, and currently lives in New Jersey. Her newest novel, The Sisters of Book Row, was published by William Morrow in March 2026 and tells the story of three sisters and bookstore proprietors who confront the Comstock laws in 1915 Manhattan. Noble sat down with Abigail this month to discuss the book.

How did the story idea for The Sisters of Book Row first come to you? Were you drawn to the thought of writing about bookstores and booksellers, or perhaps about the Comstock laws?

I’ve had Comstock in the back of my mind for a while, a perfect villain, a vicious zealot, one who I particularly despise. So when my editor suggested I write a book about books, guess who came to mind. And because I write about Manhattan, I knew the perfect place in which to set the story, Book Row, once the mecca of rare and used book buyers from around the world. And like a magnet, this germ of an idea began collecting bits and pieces. An article about the current Cohen sisters of the Argosy Book Store inspired me to create the Applebaum sisters, and Sisters was born.

Tell us about the Comstock laws. What were they, and what effect did they have on the world of books and booksellers, as well as the wider American society of that time?

Anthony Comstock moved to New York in the early 1870s and was appointed special agent to The Society for the Suppression of Vice and the U.S. Post Office to prevent pornography from being sent through the mail. He was given the power to search, seize, arrest and fine, the monies of which he received half. His activities quickly spread to all facets of life, and as his power grew, his ideas of what was “obscene, lewd, or lascivious,” changed, sometimes from week to week. Later in his career, his extreme and outlandish views made him a laughing stock, ridiculed by the newspapers, and dismissed by the courts. The Post Office fired him, but he refused to leave. The NYSPV replaced him, but again he ignored them and continued on his crusade. The Comstock Act, enacted in 1873, included a ban on contraception and was written by Comstock himself. It was never repealed, but Roe v. Wade relegated it to being a zombie law. Unfortunately states had adopted the original law for their own use. And today we see it being used to prevent birth control information, or any reproductive health measures from all women. A zealot, who is said to have destroyed 15 tons of books and four million pictures and other materials, who hated women and died ridiculed and despised, and yet he has managed to rear his ugly head again today.

Your story is set on Book Row, a district in lower Manhattan that contained over three dozen bookstores at its height. Did you have to do any research about the history of the area, and what were some interesting things you learned? If you could visit any bookstore from that period, which would it be? (Disclosure: I worked for the Strand bookstore—the sole survivor of Book Row—for many years).

I used to hang out at the Strand all the time. Many years ago. It was a solace and an adventure away from the chaos of the city and my profession as a young dancer. I hope my Sisters of Book Row can come to life for readers of today. I did loads of research, I always do. It’s one of my favorite parts of writing historical fiction. There’s a lovely book titled Book Row by Marvin Mondlin and Roy Meador. It didn’t have as much information on my particular period 1915 as I hoped, but it was fascinating to read about the continuation of this community, especially post 1930.

Once I get an overview of my time and place and characters, I like to depend mainly on primary sources, newspapers, anecdotes, letters. That way I know what they know, feel what they feel, and try to leave my historical outsider’s knowledge at the door. I mostly learned the neighborhood in bits and pieces since the area has built up so much since then.

Some oddities and coincidences: The Argosy, owned by Louis Cohen, the father of the Cohen sisters who added their inspiration to this story had his own run in with “Comstockery” in the 1930s. When the city began digging the new subway, customers couldn’t get around construction, and many stores had to move uptown, then moved back in when it was completed. After I developed and had lived with my three Applebaum sisters and the Arcadia for weeks and several chapters, I learned that there was actually a Mr. Applebaum who had a bookshop in the Row, named Arcadia. Did I read about it and forgot while it became ingrained in my subconscious? Or was it really a coincidence? I was too attached to my own Applebaums to change their names, so I mentioned the existence of two families in my Author Notes.

Sometimes a story is like a jigsaw puzzle, learning a phrase, a sentence about the inhabitants. The two booksellers, who were constantly arguing, gave me an image that led to the daily morning conversations around the newsstand. They might have argued and complained, but they were neighbors and they were ready to take up a collection to bail one of their own out of jail when Comstock was on the prowl.

The book world has been rocked in recent years by an upsurge of attempts at censorship and book suppression. I chronicle some of that in the Freedom of Expression column of our monthly State of the Thing newsletter. What can your story tell us about our situation today, in this respect?

For our modern selves, I wish The Sisters of Book Row and their withstanding the attacks of what they loved most was so outside of our experience, so unbelievable, that readers might say. “Oh, that would never happen here.” But unfortunately we see it happening throughout our country by those who, like Comstock, denounce books they’ve never even read and bully those who only want to share knowledge. Their attacks sometimes seem so diffuse and widespread that we might think it will never affect us. It will, but I have to believe that we’re more experienced, more aware of the rotten core of the book banning movement, and that if we keep up a constant resistance, we will prevail.

Tell us a little bit about your writing process. Do you have a particular routine—a schedule you keep, or a place you like to write? You write in a number of different genres, does your story-building process differ, depending on the genre?

I do have a routine though it has changed over the years and books. When I wrote two books a year, I had a tighter schedule. Now that I’m writing one historical I can linger in the research, jump down a rabbit hole or two. And I find that writing of the past, I’ve changed from being an early morning writer, to a late night writer. There’s something about the dark and the quiet that I find conducive to delving into the past. Of course the nearer I get to deadline, the more daytime writing I have to do. I have a home office where I write all my books. Each genre requires a different energy and attitude. The contemporaries don’t require as much deep dive research, so I can begin writing sooner than with the historicals. No matter the genre, I depend on a storyboard to keep everything on track. Not a computer screen board but a big gridded Lucite board on the wall with color coded post-its for characters and plot points that can be moved around as the story develops.

What comes next for you? Are there any new books you’re currently working on?

I’m currently working on a story that takes place in 1870 Long Branch, New Jersey, where President Grant has his summer capital and a young woman aspiring to become a lawyer confronts the changes and the scandals that threaten the quiet seaside town she calls home.

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

Lots of history books, mainly early 20th century New York, late 19th American theatre books when the Rialto was Union Square. Dickens, Austen, Mary Stewart. A rotation of women’s historical fiction. Eastern religion. Mystery and science fiction. I’m a pretty eclectic reader.

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

This fall I decided to go on a rereading spree. I started with Fahrenheit 451 followed by 1984 right before the holidays. Yes, they are still as scary as when I read them in school. After that, I immediately pulled out my favorite chapters of The Pickwick Papers. Now I’m re-rereading The Hobbit, and reading A Founding Mother** about Abigail Adams, by Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie. I highly recommend all of these.

**Stay tuned for our interview with Stephanie Dray and Laura Kamoie this coming July, in honor of America’s 250th birthday!

LibraryThing is pleased to sit down this month with internationally best-selling author Lisa Unger, whose many works of thrilling suspense have been translated into thirty-three languages worldwide. Educated at the New School in New York City, she worked for a number of years in publishing, before making her authorial debut in 2002 with Angel Fire, the first of her four-book Lydia Strong series, all published under her maiden name, Lisa Miscione. In 2006 she made her debut as Lisa Unger, with Beautiful Lies, the first of her Ridley Jones series. In 2019 Unger was nominated for two Edgar Awards, for her novel Under My Skin and her short story The Sleep Tight Motel. She has won or been nominated for numerous other awards, including the Hammett Prize, Audie Award, Macavity Award and the Shirley Jackson Award. Her short fiction can be found in anthologies like The Best American Mystery and Suspense 2021 and The Best American Mystery and Suspense 2024, and her non-fiction has appeared in publications such as The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and on NPR. She is the current co-President of the International Thriller Writers organization. Her latest book, Served Him Right, is due out from Park Row Books this month. Unger sat down with Abigail this month to discuss the book.

In Served Him Right the protagonist Ana is the main suspect in her ex-boyfriend’s murder. How did the idea for the story first come to you? Was it the character of Ana herself, the idea of a revenge killing, or something else?

Most of my novels tend to spring from a collision of ideas.

In this case, I had an ongoing obsession with plants and our complicated, troubled relationship to the natural world. I’d been doing a deep dive into this, reading books like Entangled Life: How Fungi Make Our Worlds, Change Our Minds, and Shape Our Futures by Merlin Sheldrake, Most Delicious Poison: The Story of Nature’s Toxins – From Spices to Vices by Noah Whiteman, and The Light Eaters: How the Unseen World of Plant Intelligence Offers a New Understanding of Life on Earth by Zoë Schlanger. These are all deeply moving, fascinating books that will change the way you think about the planet and our relationship to nature.

During this time, I stumbled across a news story about a woman who held a brunch for her family, and several days later two of her guests were dead. And it wasn’t the first such incident in her life. So, it got me to thinking about how the traditional role of women in our culture is to nurture and nourish. And what a woman with a deep knowledge of plants that can harm and heal might do with it, how her role in society might allow her to hide her dark intention in plain sight. And that’s when I started hearing the voice of Ana Blacksmith. She’s wild and unpredictable, she has a dark side. She has a sacred knowledge of plants and their properties, handed down to her from her herbalist aunt. And she has a very bad temper.

As your title makes plain, your murder victim is someone who “had it coming.” Does this change how you tell the story? Does it simply make the “whodunnit” element more complex, from a procedural standpoint, or does it also complicate the emotional and ethical elements of the tale?

It’s complicated, isn’t it? What is the difference between justice and revenge? And to what are we entitled when we have been wronged and conventional justice is not served? Who, if anyone, has the right to be judge, jury, and executioner? Though some would have us believe otherwise, most moral questions are tricky and layered—in life and in fiction. And I love a searing exploration into questions like this, where there are no easy answers. These questions, and their possible answers, offer a complexity and emotional truth to character, plot, and action. I like to get under the skin of my stories and characters, exploring what drives us to act, and how those actions might get us into deep trouble.

The relationship between sisters is an important theme in the book. Can you elaborate on that?

Ana and Vera share a deep bond formed not just by blood but also by trauma. Their relationship is—#complicated. There’s an abiding love and devotion. But there’s also anger and resentment; Vera is not crazy about Ana’s choices, and rightly so. Ana thinks Vera is controlling and rigid. Of course, that’s true, too. Vera tends to think of Ana as one of her children—if only she’d stop acting like one! It is this relationship, the ferocity with which they protect each other no matter what and the strength of their connection, that is the heart of the story. As Vera preaches to her daughter Coraline: Family. Imperfect but indelible.

The book also includes themes of herbalism, witchcraft and folk medicine. Was this an interest of yours before you began the story? Did you have to do any research on the subject, and if so, what were some of the most interesting things you learned?

A great deal of research goes into every novel, even if what I learn never winds up on the page. It was no different for Served Him Right, though a lot of my knowledge came before I started writing, which is often the case. In my reading, I learned so many interesting things about plants, how they harm, how they heal. Here are some of my favorite bits of knowledge: Most modern medicine derives from the plant knowledge of indigenous cultures. Some plants walk the razor’s edge of healing and harming; the only difference in some cases between medicine and poison is the dose. The deadliest plant on earth is tobacco, killing more than 500,000 people a year. I could go on!

Tell us about your writing process. Do you have a specific routine you follow, places and times you like to write? Do you know the conclusion to your stories from the beginning, or do they come to you as you go along?

I am an early morning writer. My golden creative hours are from 5 AM to noon. This is when I’m closest to my dream brain, and those morning hours are a space in the world before the business of being an author ramps up. So, I try to honor this as much as possible. Creativity comes first.

I write without an outline. I have no idea who is going to show up day-to-day or what they are going to do. I definitely have no idea how the book will end! I write for the same reason that I read; I want to find out what is going to happen to the people living in my head.

What’s next for you? Do you have more books in the offing? Will there be a sequel to Served Him Right?

Hmm. Never say never. I’m definitely still thinking about Ana and Timothy and what might be next for them. But the 2027 book is complete, and I’m already at work on my 2028 novel. I’m not ready to talk about those yet. But I will say this: They are both psychological suspense. And bad things will certainly happen. Stay tuned!

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

That’s a great question. If I turn around and look at my wall of shelves, I see: my own novels in various formats and international editions; books on craft like On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King, and Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life by Anne Lamott; there are classics like a falling-apart copy of Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë that I’ve had since childhood; The Complete Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and The Temple of My Familiar by Alice Walker—both of which are overworn and much loved; a huge American Heritage Dictionary that belonged to my father who was engineer but loved words and the nuance of their meaning (whenever I look at it, I hear him say: Look it up!); some of my favorite non-fiction titles like Stiff by Mary Roach and Deep Survival by Laurence Gonzalez; a first edition copy of In Cold Blood by Truman Capote, the book that gave me permission to be who I am as writer. I could go on and on! It’s a huge wall of books.

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

I am always reading multiple books at a time. I just finished The Awakened Brain: The New Science of Spirituality and Our Quest for an Inspired Life by Dr. Lisa Miller. I think the title says it all—truly mind-blowing. I just had the pleasure of interviewing Adele Parks on stage. I highly recommend her new novel Our Beautiful Mess to anyone who wants a character-driven thrill ride. Gripping but also emotional and deep. Antihero by my ITW co-president and bestie Gregg Hurwitz is a tour de force. Gregg writes amazing action and cool tech, but he’s also just a beautiful writer, and his characters leap off the page. Other recent faves: The Night of the Storm by Nishita Parekh; City Under One Roof by Iris Yamashita; I Came Back for You by Kate White—all stellar in totally different ways.

LibraryThing is pleased to sit down this month with best-selling Taiwanese Canadian author Janie Chang, whose works of historical fiction draw upon her family history in pre-World War II China. After taking a degree in computer science, and then graduating from the Writer’s Studio Program at Simon Fraser University, Chang made her authorial debut in 2013 with the novel Three Souls, which was shortlisted in the fiction category for the BC and Yukon Book Prizes. Subsequent titles include Dragon Springs Road (2017), longlisted for the International Dublin Literary Award; The Library of Legends (2020), nominated for the Evergreen Award; The Porcelain Moon (2023); and The Phoenix Crown (2024), which was co-written with Kate Quinn. Chang was the founder of the Authors for Indies event, running from 2015-17, which eventually became Canadian Independent Bookstore Day. Her sixth book, The Fourth Princess: A Gothic Novel of Old Shanghai—available this month as an Early Reviewer giveaway—was published earlier in February. Chang sat down with Abigail this month to discuss the book.

How did the idea for The Fourth Princess first come to you? Many of your books are described as being inspired by your family history. Do you have a family connection to this tale as well?

The Fourth Princess came about purely from a desire to challenge myself by writing in the Gothic vein, moving away from historical to a different genre. So alas, there aren’t any fascinating family connections to this tale.

Your story is set in 1911, in “Old Shanghai.” Did you need to do any kind of research about the history of the city during that period? What were some of the most interesting things you learned?

You should never ask a historical novelist about interesting things learned. You’ll end up with a 12-page essay! I knew that Shanghai had entire neighborhoods of Western-style homes, often called “garden villas.” Many of those homes are still there. What I did not realize was that there were also huge estates outside what was then the city center, owned by the wealthiest families, both foreign and Chinese. They occupied properties as large as 10 acres. The mansion that inspired Lennox Manor in the novel was called Dennartt, built in 1898 by a British barrister. It had a huge garden, lawns, a manmade lake, stables for polo ponies and living quarters for the grooms and house servants. Dennartt still stands, surrounded by apartments and houses instead of lawns and rose gardens and tennis courts.

I also learned that there were electric cars back then! For a while, both internal combustion gas engines and electric engine vehicles were available to consumers. Gas engines were difficult and dangerous to crank up, the emissions were dirty, but could drive farther. Electric vehicles were easy to start and clean to drive, and advertisements aimed them at women for city driving. But once a reliable ignition system for gas engines was invented, electric vehicles lost popularity. In the novel, I have an American import a car for his wife, so that’s the reason behind that particular rabbit hole. And in the end, he did not import an electric car.

Many of your earlier novels feature a fantastical element, from the ghost in Three Souls to an animal spirit in Dragon Springs Road. What role does the fantastic play in The Fourth Princess, and how does it help you to tell your story?

There is the possibility of a ghost. As the servants in the story explain to Lisan, one of the main characters, a previous owner committed suicide in Lennox Manor. Chinese superstitions say that the ghost of a suicide is the worst kind there is because they’re trapped in the afterlife, unable to move on to reincarnation unless they find a replacement. They need to drive another person to suicide, usually through madness. In Gothic novels, there’s always a strong element of psychological fear as well as real danger, so when Lisan sees or thinks she sees a woman in red outside in the garden, are her eyes playing tricks on her? When she hears wailing and sobbing at night, is it the supernatural or just the wind funneling down chimneys and cracks?

This new book addresses the meeting of East and West, both through the characters of Lisan Liu and Caroline Stanton, and in the use of a Gothic literary aesthetic more often associated with Europe. Can you expand upon that? What significance does it have?

It’s absolutely true that “traditional” Gothic novels favor European settings in a remote location, preferably with bad weather. The essential elements of Gothic, however, are portable: a setting that oozes menace and unease, a young woman who discovers a terrible secret and finds herself in danger. In transposing classic Gothic tropes to an Asian setting, it was important for me to do so in a way that was plausible and unique to this time and place.

One of the themes in The Fourth Princess is that of identity. Both Caroline and Lisan have a hidden past. Once these are revealed, what do they do, what are they willing to risk, who should they become? For me, a Shanghai setting made it absolutely necessary to have both Chinese and Western heroines because the city was a bizarre mix of East and West.

Tell us a little bit about your writing process. Do you have a particular schedule or routine that you keep to, a specific spot where you like to write? Do you map your story out ahead of time, or discover it as you go along?

First, I have to write out a summary of the story plus the historical events and background that are the setting, just to stay anchored. Over time, I’ve found myself putting more effort into mapping out the story because it helps get over the sagging middle part of a novel. It’s no fun getting stuck in the middle of the story because it makes you doubt whether the story is worth writing at all.

For schedule, I down two cups of coffee and then get to writing. The main thing is to write every day, even if you’re not happy with it. You need to make progress on the story and remember that the next step is revision. One of the best pieces of advice I ever heard was that “revision” is “re-vision.” When you revise, you are re-visioning the story.

It would be nice if the story moved along according to plan, but as a storyteller, you need to be open to opportunities. You run across a tidbit of research that adds authenticity or detail or insight to the story and you make changes. Then there are the times when the characters themselves are a discovery, when they start telling you who they are and their real motivations. Those are the best moments in the writing process, and make up for all the other hours of agony.

What comes next for you? Do you have any new books you’re working on?

I’m currently researching a new book, nothing announced yet. However, I will be co-authoring again with Kate Quinn on a novel that we’ll start working on this summer. It’s working title is The Jade Mirror and we call it an adventure on the high seas, about two women whose nautical achievements have been largely forgotten.

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

I love historical fiction and speculative fiction, and it shows. I also enjoy mystery and crime. There’s one shelf reserved for children’s books that I refuse to throw out. The Narnia series, the Doctor Dolittles, and so on. I have a weakness for cookbooks with nice photos. And I have a section of shelves that hold research books.

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

I’ve been reading the Claire North trilogy The Songs of Penelope: Ithaca, House of Odysseus, The Last Song of Penelope. When Odysseus and all the able bodied men of Ithaca went off to the Trojan War, the only people left on the island were women, children, and old men. As queen, Penelope still had to keep the economy going, maintain the security of her island nation, all the while fending off suitors. This is her story and it’s funny and snarky, intelligent, told from the point of view of the women of Ithaca, and it’s about geopolitics.

I highly recommend this series. In fact, I highly recommend anything by Claire North.

LibraryThing is pleased to sit down this month with Kelly Scarborough, who makes her authorial debut this month with Butterfly Games, a historical novel set in the Swedish royal court during the early 19th century. After working for two decades as a law firm partner and white-collar prosecutor, Scarborough returned to her interest in historical fiction and her love of writing, determined to tell stories about fascinating women who lived through challenging times. Scarborough sat down with Abigail this month to discuss her new book, due out later this month from She Writes Press.

Butterfly Games is based on a true story, and its heroine, Jacquette Gyldenstolpe, on a real person. Tell us a little bit about that story and how you discovered it. What made you feel that it needed to be retold?

Like so many turning points in my life, Butterfly Games began with a book. As a teenager, I fell in love with Désirée, Annemarie Selinko’s novel about Désirée Clary—the silk merchant’s daughter who was once engaged to Napoleon and later became Queen of Sweden. I read it over and over, fascinated by how a woman could be swept into history by forces she never chose.

Years later, during a difficult period in my life, that novel came back to me. I began researching Désirée’s descendants—the Bernadotte dynasty, which still reigns in Sweden today—and uncovered a world of political upheaval, fragile alliances, and private heartbreak. That’s when I stumbled across Jacquette Gyldenstolpe.

Jacquette appears in the historical record mostly as a scandal: a young countess who fell in love with Prince Oscar, the heir to the throne. But the more I read—letters, memoirs, court gossip—the more I realized how much of her story had been left untold. She wasn’t just a footnote in someone else’s rise to power. She was a young woman navigating impossible choices in a world where love could threaten a dynasty.

Once I found her, I couldn’t look away. I knew her story needed to be retold.

What kind of research did you need to do, while writing the book, and what were some of the most interesting things you learned in that process?

Can you see me smiling? I don’t think I’m capable of separating the research I needed to do from the research that simply called to me and took over my brain.

Over the course of several years, I spent more than eighty nights in Sweden, translated hundreds of handwritten letters, and built a chronology with more than five thousand entries to track who was where, with whom, and why. Jacquette’s world became a place I loved to inhabit. One day stands out above all others. I was granted special access to Finspång Castle, Jacquette’s childhood home—now a corporate headquarters, a place closed to the public. No photographs were allowed, so I took frantic notes on my phone as we walked through the women’s wing. In a sitting room, I noticed a small mother-of-pearl nécessaire—a sewing and writing box with tiny compartments for her most personal objects. It stopped me cold. My guide, a retired corporate executive who knew the house intimately, leaned in and whispered, “Jacquette’s.”

The box had been a gift from Jacquette’s husband, Carl Löwenhielm. That moment—imagining her hands opening it, choosing a needle or a quill knife—changed the direction of the book.

Suddenly, Jacquette wasn’t a scandal or a symbol. She was real.

Your book has been described as a good fit for admirers of Philippa Gregory and Allison Pataki. Did the work of these authors, or others, influence you when writing your story?

Absolutely—though in different ways. Philippa Gregory is a master of taking a story with a known, often tragic ending and making it feel suspenseful and intimate. I admire how she builds emotional momentum even when readers think they know what’s coming. Two of my favorites are The Kingmaker’s Daughter and her most recent novel, Boleyn Traitor.

Allison Pataki has also been influential, particularly in how she blends rigorous research with accessible storytelling. I love the smart, resourceful heroines she creates from women who otherwise might be lost to history. Her work reminds me that historical fiction can be immersive without being intimidating—and romantic without losing its seriousness. Both my book clubs loved Finding Margaret Fuller, and I did, too.

You’ve had a full career as a lawyer and prosecutor, before turning to writing. How has that work informed your writing and storytelling?

Don’t get me wrong, I had a lot to learn before writing a novel, but some of the things I loved about law proved useful for writing historical fiction. Law trained me to think in terms of evidence, motive, and connections. When you’re preparing a case, you assemble fragments—documents, testimony, inconsistencies—and shape them into a coherent narrative that persuades a jury.

Writing historical fiction isn’t so different. The facts matter deeply, but facts alone don’t tell a story. You have to decide what belongs at the center, what remains in the background, and where the emotional truth lives. My legal background also made me comfortable sitting with ambiguity. History is full of unanswered questions, and I don’t feel the need to resolve every one neatly. Sometimes what’s most compelling is what can’t be proven.

Tell us a little bit about your writing process. Do you have a particular routine—a time and place you like to write, a particular method? Do you plot your stories out ahead of time, or discover how they will unfold as you go along?

When the stars align, I retreat early in the day to the attic office of my nineteenth-century house in Connecticut, take my Shih Tzu upstairs with me, and leave the modern world behind. I wrote Butterfly Games in nine drafts. There was an outline, but I changed the plot in significant ways as I went along. For the sequel, I’m trying to be a little more disciplined. I started with an outline—but found myself getting too granular—so I switched to ninety old-fashioned index cards. Each card holds one scene: chapter number, date, setting, point-of-view character, and the scene’s pivot point. There’s barely room left for anything else, which forces clarity. I transcribed those cards into Scrivener, and now I’m writing. We’ll see how closely I stick to the plan.

What comes next? Are you working on any additional books?

Yes. Butterfly Games is the first novel in a planned series. The second book picks up after the events of the first and follows Jacquette and Oscar into a far more dangerous phase of their lives—when love has consequences, secrets carry weight, and survival requires choices that can’t be undone.

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

My physical library is filled mostly with historical fiction, especially novels with complex, non- linear structures. I return again and again to Hamnet and The Marriage Portrait, as well as The Time Traveler’s Wife and Pure.

On a special shelf, I keep books connected to Jacquette’s world—like Désirée and The Queen’s Fortune—alongside more than a hundred antique Swedish memoirs and histories, many written by people who actually knew Jacquette.

And for bedtime? A Kindle packed with historical romance by Sarah MacLean, Tessa Dare, and Lisa Kleypas.

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

For lovers of royal historical fiction, Boleyn Traitor is a must-read. I was also lucky enough to read an advance copy of It Girl, which I loved.

My favorite read last year was Broken Country—a deeply emotional novel with one of those intricate narrative structures that stays with you. In fact, I want to read it again.

LibraryThing is pleased to sit down this month with Minnesota-based author Loretta Ellsworth, whose published work includes books for both juvenile and adult audiences. A former middle grade Spanish teacher, Ellsworth received her MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Hamline University, and made her authorial debut in 2002 with the young adult novel The Shrouding Woman. She has had three additional young adult novels published, as well as a picture book for younger children, Tangle-Knot, in 2023. These books have won many accolades, including being named as ALA and IRA Notables, and being nominated for prizes such as the Rebecca Caudill Young Readers’ Award. Ellsworth published her first work for adults, the historical novel Stars Over Clear Lake, in 2017, followed in 2024 by The French Winemaker’s Daughter. Her third historical novel for adult readers, The Jilted Countess, which follows the story of a Hungarian countess who makes her way to Minnesota following World War II, in pursuit of her American GI fiancé, is due out from HarperCollins this coming January. Ellsworth sat down with Abigail this month to discuss the book.

The Jilted Countess was apparently inspired by a true story of a Hungarian countess who emigrated to Minnesota after the Second World War. Tell us a little bit about that original story. How did you discover it, and what made you feel you needed to retell it?

In 1948, a penniless Hungarian countess came to Minnesota to marry the GI fiancé she’d met abroad, only to find out he’d recently married someone else. Determined to stay in the U.S., she appealed to newspaperman Cedric Adams to help her find a husband before she’d be deported in two weeks back to Hungary, which was under Communist control. He agreed, using a fake name for her, and putting her picture in the newspaper, citing her circumstances. She received almost 1800 offers of marriage! And in two weeks she narrowed it down, went on a few dates, chose a husband, and was never heard from again. Fast forward to 2015, when someone found an old copy of that article in their attic and asked columnist Curt Brown if he knew what had happened to her. Curt Brown wrote a short article asking if anyone could provide an answer. Unfortunately, no one could. But that article made me wonder how a Hungarian countess could disappear like that, and I also wondered if she ever encountered her former fiancé again. She was, after all, the first Bachelorette, before the show was even a concept.

Did you do any kind of research, historical or cultural, in order to write the book? What were some of the most interesting things you learned?

I spent an exorbitant amount of time at the Minnesota History Center researching old microfiche articles to find anything I could about her. I examined marriage records for Minneapolis and St. Paul for any Hungarian-sounding names, and I searched for clues as to her whereabouts. Without a name, though, it was very difficult, and I never found her. I also had to research Hungary during and after the war, and the life of aristocrats, which I knew little about.

Contemporary readers might be surprised at the idea of a “Bachelorette” dating program taking place in the 1940s. How do you think Roza’s experience would tally with and differ from that of contemporary women seeking a spouse in this way?

After her marriage, she was approached by Look Magazine and other outlets for interviews, all of which she turned down as she wanted a private life. With social media today, there’s no way Roza would have been able to disappear like she did in 1948. And most likely her search would have taken place on social media rather than through the newspaper and mail.

World War II stories remain perennially popular with readers, despite the passage of the years. Why is that? What is it about this period that continues to speak to us?

I think it was such a pivotal time in the world, and one we’re still struggling to understand. And there are so many hidden stories that we’re constantly discovering about that time period that continue to speak to us. Also, the last of WWII veterans are disappearing, and their stories will be gone as well.

Tell us about your writing process. Do you write in a particular place, have a specific schedule you keep to, or any rituals that help you? Do you outline your stories, or discover them as you go along?

Because I worked as a teacher and had four children of my own, I had to learn to write in short intervals and adapt my writing schedule to be flexible. I wrote everywhere: at soccer practices and coffee shops and the library. Now that I no longer teach and my children are grown, I have a more disciplined schedule and usually write in the mornings in my home office, sometimes stretching into the afternoon. I also have learned to outline, whereas I used to write from the seat of my pants before. It’s helped to save me from a great deal of revision, although I still revise, just not as much as before.

What’s next for you? Will you be writing more historical novels for adults, or perhaps returning to the world of young adult books?

I am working on a young adult novel as well as another historical novel, so I hope to keep my foot in both genres as long as I’m able to. I enjoy both and read both.

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

I have one full shelf of books on the craft of writing–I’m still drawn to how others write and am curious about their process. I have a mix of memoir, middle-grade, YA, and a lot of historical fiction. I still buy physical books, and my shelves are always overflowing. I donate a lot of books to our local Friends of the Library group for their annual book sale. And I have so many signed copies of books that I can’t part with. But that’s a good problem to have, isn’t it?

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

I read a great deal–I just finished reading the first two books of the Westfallen series by Ann and Ben Brashares with my grandson, and I’m reading The Correspondent by Virginia Evans, The Ivory City by Emily Bain Murphy, and The Gospel of Salome by Kaethe Schwehn. And I just finished James by Percival Everett. There are so many good books out there!

LibraryThing is pleased to sit down this month with award-winning African Australian author Eugen Bacon, whose Afro-Centered Futurisms in Our Speculative Fiction just won an Ignyte Award, and who won the 2025 Nebula Kate Wilhelm Solstice Award—given by the SFWA to an author who has made “significant contributions to the science fiction, fantasy, and related genres community”—earlier this year. Born in Tanzania, Eugen earned a Master of Science with distinction in distributed computer systems from the University of Greenwich, UK, and a Master of Arts and a doctorate in writing from Swinburne University of Technology, Australia. Before becoming a professional writer full-time, she worked in the information and communication technology field and continued to do so, juggling a day job with motherhood, professional editing and numerous writing projects.

Eugen has published numerous short stories and novels in various speculative fiction genres, and is particularly known for her Afrofuturism and exploration of gender. She was twice a finalist for the World Fantasy Award, Shirley Jackson Award, Aurealis Award, and in 2023 she won a British Fantasy Award in the Non-Fiction category for her An Earnest Blackness. The latter was also a finalist for a 2023 Locus Award, which she won this year in the Non-Fiction category for her Afro-Centered Futurisms in Our Speculative Fiction. She has won or been nominated for numerous other awards, and also has served as a judge for various Australian book prizes, as well as for global awards, including chairing various jury categories of the Bram Stoker Awards. She is currently the chair of the jury for the Otherwise Awards that encourage the exploration and expansion of gender. This past September a new novelette, Novic, a standalone prequel to Claiming T-Mo, the debut title in her Outbreeds series, was published by Meerkat Press. Also in September, The Nga’phandileh Whisperer, a novella in The Sauútiverse, was published by Star and Saberse Publishing. Eugen sat down with Abigail this month to discuss these stories, and her work in general.

Your fictional work is often described as Afrofuturist. You have explored this genre in your scholarly work as well, in titles like Afro-Centered Futurisms in Our Speculative Fiction. What is Afrofuturism, what does it entail, and what is its significance, both to you personally, and in a wider, global sense?

Actually, Abigail, my work is more than Afrofuturist. I like to think of it as Afrosurreal, or Afro-irreal—fantastical literature that demands the reader to trust and find immersion in the story’s impossibility. The irreal story stays unpredictable and believable in all its unbelievability. The reader finds immersion in the illusion, entranced in the satire or symbolism, cementing even while challenging realism. I use this type of fiction as an allegory for somber themes of belonging, social in/justice, climate action, “Othering”… in the real world. I hero Black people stories, giving voice in sometimes dystopian futurisms, to the woman in the village, the little orphan girl, little lost boy in the village—people who have seen much, suffered much, and need to find the hero/ine within.

In terms of Afrofuturism itself, there’s much discord about this term. It is for me, simply, Afrocentric representation in a kind of fiction that engages with difference. Afrofuturism is to reimagine Africa in all its diversity, to expand and extrapolate it through literature, music, the visual arts, religion, even philosophy. It is that which haunts imagination and transmutes itself into a craving for revolution.

What is the Sauútiverse, and The Sauúti Collective? How did it first get going, who’s involved, and what are its purpose and goals?

I am part of an Afrocentric collection of writers from across Africa—Ghana, Tanzania, Nigeria, South Africa, and the diaspora (Haitian American)… We came together in 2021 with a vision of Afrocentric-based collaboration, support and creativity. Together, we have invented a world deeply rooted in African culture, language and mythology. We’re like-minded creatives who came together for a shared cause in giving voice and space for Afrocentric literature. The Sauútiverse comprises five planets, two suns, two moons and is enmeshed with sound magic. The name of each planet, Ekwukwe, Órino-Rin, Zezépfeni, Wiimb-ó and Mahwé is derived from an African word meaning song. There is also an inhabited moon, Pinaa. You can find out more about the Sauútiverse in our FAQs.

There’s much potential in this Afrocentric universe, and we have a new anthology coming out, Sauúti Terrors, published by Flame Tree Publishing and distributed by Simon and Schuster. I co-edited this anthology with Cheryl S. Ntumy and Stephen Embleton, out in January 2026.

Tell us a little bit about The Nga’phandileh Whisperer specifically. Where does this story fit into the wider universe in which you have set it? Do readers need to be familiar with that universe beforehand, to fully appreciate the story?

Readers can approach The Nga’phandileh Whisperer blind without being familiar with the Sauútiverse. Each Sauútiverse story out there is standalone, self-sufficient and boasting a richness in unique and robust worldbuilding. I’ve written several short stories in this world, the first one “Sina, the Child with no Echo”, published in our first anthology, Mothersound: A Sauútiverse Anthology. “Sina” is set in Ekwukwe, the hollow planet, where having a magical echo is important. Sina’s neurodivergence is perceived a curse but turns out to be a gift. Another playful tale is “The Mystery of the Vanishing Echoes”, published in Sherlock is a Girl’s Name. In this multiverse story, sleuth Shaalok Ho-ohmsi and her ward Wa’watison are summoned to the planet Ekwukwe to solve a mystery of vanishing echoes.

I wanted to write a longer Sauútiverse story with a strong female protagonist, and found this in Chant’L—a young Guardian with an affinity to hive-minded beasts, unaware that she has more magic than she knows how to use. Hence The Nga’phandileh Whisperer.

The novella is a second-person ‘you’ narrative, addressing the protagonist. I am at home with this voice, a personal connection with the protagonist, seeing as they see, feeling as they feel, yet omniscient—knowing just a little more outside them.

Novic is the origin story for one of the characters in Claiming T-Mo. What is the Outbreeds series all about, and why was it important for you to go back and write a prequel to explain this specific character’s beginnings?

The Outbreeds series by Meerkat Press is about a breed of others. It engages with difference, tackling the unbelonging individual’s experience—even today in our polarized world, and especially in the current US environment, for being different. Novic is the father who broke tradition in my first novel Claiming T-Mo, with devastating consequences. I thought about why did he do that? What makes this immortal priest who and what he is? What makes him tick? Hence Novic, the story before the story. It’s a moment in time in Grovea, the made-up planet. I wanted to reconnect with Claiming T-Mo, to revive the versatility of a character’s light and shade. I scrutinized Novic’s story arc—a wandering anti-hero seeking to comprehend his incarnations, and had fun with this novelette that demystifies death.

You’re a very prolific author. Can you describe your writing process? Do you devote a certain amount of time daily to writing, do you write in a specific place, or have certain rituals? How do you plan your stories—do they unfold as you go along, or do you outline them?

I’m a very experimental writer! I write to explore. My writing is a curiosity, a response to a trigger or an incipient question troubling my mind. I write to find an answer, or a better question. I’m a very immersive writer and an immersive reader. I need to feel the story. All my stories, irrespective of genre, explore a character’s relationship with others, with themselves, and with the world around them. I feel their yearning and my quest begins.

Because my life is very busy, I’ve taught myself to write in the moment. I call it Sudden: writing on the go. Chunking in bits and pieces, scraps and notes to self, spurting in bite size. I jot down points that are little triggers, simple word or phrase prompts—mini scenes that don’t have to be perfect. Later, when I have time, I have all the minis to develop into robust scenes.

What’s next for you? Will you be writing more stories set in Sauútiverse, or more entries in the Outbreeds series? Do you have other forthcoming titles and projects?

In 2026, I have a Sauútiverse novel, Crimson in Quietus, an Afrocentric novel by Meerkat Press, Muntu, a novella by Bad Hand Books (you can pre-order it already, comes with a signed bookplate!), and a collection of short stories, Black Dingo, by Flame Tree and distributed by Simon and Schuster. In 2027, I have another collection of short stories, The Rawness of You, half of which comprises Sauútiverse stories—this is also by Meerkat Press. Let’s just say I am very prolific. Find my works on my website: eugenbacon.com.

Gosh, I newly joined TikTok—it’s scary as hell. What a minefield! Find me @EugenBacon. Also @genni.bsky.social.

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

Toni Morrison’s Sula, Song of Solomon, Tar Baby, The Bluest Eye, Beloved… um… everything. Michael Ondaatje’s Divisadero, love it to bits. Peter Temple’s Truth, The Broken Shore—an Aussie literary crime writer who writes the best dialogue I’ve ever read. Octavia E. Butler, Anthony Doerr, Chinua Achebe, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o, Ray Bradbury, N.K. Jemisin, Eugen Bacon, Eugen Bacon, Eugen Bacon…

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

I’m currently reading books as a juror (chair) for the Otherwise Awards 2025. Can’t reveal my favourites yet!

But this year, I’d recommend other readers to check out Kathe Koja’s Dark Factory and Dark Matter, and Tavia Nyong’o’s Black Apocalypse: Afrofuturism at the End of the World—it’s a nonfiction that embraces differentiation and survivalist self-invention in the speculative estrangement that Afrofuturism affords in an apocalyptic era.

LibraryThing is pleased to sit down this month with British mystery novelist S.J. Bennett, whose Her Majesty the Queen Investigates series, casting Queen Elizabeth II as a secret detective, has sold more than half a million copies worldwide, across more than twenty countries. Educated at London University and Cambridge University, where she earned a PhD in Italian Literature, she has worked as a lobbyist and management consultant, as well as a creative writing instructor. As Sophia Bennet she made her authorial debut with the young adult novel Threads, which won the Times Chicken House Children’s Fiction Competition in 2009, going on to publish a number of other young adult and romance novels under that name. In 2017 her Love Song was named Romantic Novel of the Year by the RNA (Romantic Novelists’ Association). She made her debut as S.J. Bennett in 2020 with The Windsor Knot, the first of five books in the Her Majesty the Queen Investigates series. The fifth and final title thus far, The Queen Who Came In From the Cold is due out next month from Crooked Lane Books. Bennett sat down with Abigail this month to discuss the book.

The Queen Who Came In From the Cold is the latest entry in your series depicting Queen Elizabeth II’s secret life as a detective. How did the idea for the series first come to you? What is it about the Queen that made you think of her as a likely sleuth?

The Queen was alive and well when I first had the idea to incorporate her into fiction. She was someone who fascinated people around the world, and she was getting a lot of attention because of The Crown.

I was looking for inspiration for a new series, and I suddenly thought that she would fit well into the mold of a classic Golden Age detective, because she lived in a very specific, self-contained world and she had a strong sense of public service, which I wanted to explore. Her family didn’t always live up to it, but she tried! What’s great for a novelist is that everyone thinks they know her, but she didn’t give interviews, so it leaves a lot of room to imagine what she was really thinking and doing behind the scenes.

I often get asked if I was worried about including her as a real figure, and I was a bit, to start with. But then I realized that she has inspired a long line of novelists and playwrights – from Alan Bennett’s The Uncommon Reader, and A Question of Attribution, to Peter Morgan’s The Queen, The Crown and The Audience, Sue Townsend’s The Queen and I. I think they were also attracted by that combination of familiarity and mystery, along with the extraordinary life she led, in which she encountered most of the great figures of the twentieth century.

My own books are about how a very human public figure, with heavy expectations on her, juggles her job, her beliefs, her interests and her natural quest for justice. The twist is, she can’t be seen to do it, so she has to get someone else to take the credit for her Miss Marple-like genius.

Unlike many other detectives, yours is based on a real-life person. Does this influence how you tell your stories? Do you feel a responsibility to get things right, given the importance of your real-world inspiration, and what does that mean, in this context?

I do feel that responsibility. I chose Elizabeth partly because I admired her steady, reliable leadership, in a world where our political leaders often take us by surprise, and not always in a good way. So, I wanted to do justice to that.

The Queen’s circumstances are so interesting, combining the constraints of a constitutional monarch who can’t ever step out of line with the glamour of living in a series of castles and palaces. Weaving those contrasts into the book keeps me pretty busy, in a fun way. Plus, of course, there’s a murder, and only her experience and intelligence can solve it.

I made the decision at the start that I wouldn’t make any of the royals say or do anything we couldn’t imagine them saying or doing in real life. Anyone who has to behave oddly or outrageously to fit my plots is an invented character. But it helps that the royal family contained some big characters who leap off the page anyway. Prince Philip, Princess Margaret and the Queen Mother have lots of scenes that make me giggle, but that I hope are still true to how they really were. I would honestly find it much harder to write about the current generations, because their lives are more normal in many ways, and also, because we already know about their inner lives, because they tell us. The Queen and Prince Philip were the last of the ‘mythical’ royals, I think.

With a murder seen from a train, and the title The Queen Who Came In From the Cold, your book suggests both Agatha Christie and John le Carré. Are there other authors and works of mystery and espionage fiction that influenced your story?

I love referencing other writers, and someone on the train in this novel is reading Thunderball, by Ian Fleming, which came out in 1961 and deals with one of the themes that’s present in my book too, namely the threat of nuclear war. At that point, The Queen Who Came In From the Cold is very much still in the Agatha Christie mold, where a murder is supposedly seen from the train, but Fleming’s book hints at the more modern spy story that the book will become in the second half.

As well as Fleming and John le Carré, whose debut novel came out that year, I read a lot of Len Deighton when I was growing up, so I hope some of his sense of adventure is in there too. But another big influence was film. I love the comedy and graphic design of The Pink Panther, and the London-centered louche photography of Blow-Up. I asked if the jacket designer (a brilliant Spanish illustrator called Iker Ayesteran) could bring some of that Sixties magic to the cover, and I like to think he has done … even if the lady in the tiara isn’t an exact replica of the Queen.

Unlike the earlier books in your series, which were contemporaneous, your latest is set during the Cold War. Did you have to do a great deal of additional research to write the story? What are some of the most interesting things you learned?

I hadn’t realized there were quite so many Russian spy rings on the go in and around London at the time! One of my characters is based on a real-life Russian agent called Kolon Molody, who embedded himself in British culture as an entrepreneur (set up by the KGB) selling jukeboxes and vending machines. According to his own account, he became a millionaire out of it before he was caught. His world was a classic one of microdots and dead-letter drops.

As a teenager, I lived in Berlin in the 1980s, when the Berlin Wall literally ran around the edge of our back garden. We were at the heart of the Cold War, but by then it was obvious the West was winning, so I didn’t personally feel under threat – although people were still dying trying to escape from East Germany to the West. I hadn’t fully realized
how much more unsafe people must have felt a generation earlier. I don’t think the western world has felt so unstable since those days … until now, perhaps.

It fascinates me that Peter Sellers, who was so entertaining as Inspector Clouseau in the Pink Panther films, was also the star in Dr Stangelove, which was based on an early thriller about the threat of nuclear annihilation called Red Alert, by Peter George. That dichotomy between fear and fun seemed to characterize the early 19§0s, and is exactly what I’m trying to capture in the book.

On a different note, it was a surprise to see how well Russia was doing in the Space Race. At that time, the Soviet Union was always a step ahead. Yuri Gagarin was the first person to go into orbit, and the Queen and Prince Philip were as awestruck as anyone else. When Gagarin visited the UK in the summer of 1961, they invited him to lunch at the palace and afterwards, it was Elizabeth who asked for a picture with him, not the other way around.

The Soviet success was largely down to the brilliance of the man they called the Chief Designer. His real name was Sergei Korolev, but the West didn’t find this out for years, because the Soviets kept his identity a closely-guarded secret. He was an extraordinary figure – imprisoned in the gulags by Stalin, and then brought out to run their most important space program. I’d call that pretty forgiving! Their space program never recovered after he died. I’m a big fan of his ingenuity, and he has a place in the book.

Tell us a little bit about your writing process. Do you have a particular writing spot and routine? Do you know the solution to your mysteries from the beginning? Do you outline your story, or does it come to you as you go along?

I went to an event recently, where Richard Osman and Mick Herron – both British writers whose work I enjoy – talked about how they are ‘pantsers’, who are driven purely by the relationships between the characters they create. I tried that early in my writing life and found I usually ran out of steam after about five thousand words, so now I plot in a reasonable amount of detail before I start.

I always know who did it and how, and I’ve given myself the challenge of fitting the murder mystery alongside everything the Queen was really doing at the time, so I need a spreadsheet to keep track of it all. Nevertheless, red herrings will occur to me during the writing process, and I adapt the plot to fit. I find if I know too much detail, then the act of writing each chapter loses its fun. I need to leave room for discoveries along the way.

If in doubt, I get Prince Philip on the scene to be furious or reassuring about something. He’s always a joy to write. So is the Queen Mother, as I mentioned. It’s the naughty characters who always give the books their bounce.

Her Majesty the Queen Investigates was published as part of a five-book deal. Will there be more books? Do you have any other projects in the offing?

I was very lucky to get that first deal from Bonnier in the UK. My editor had never done a five-book deal before, and I’m not sure he’s done one since! I always knew I wanted the series to be longer, though. I’ve just persuaded him to let me write two more, so book six, set in the Caribbean in 1966, will be out next year, and another one, set in Balmoral back in 2017, will hopefully be out the year after. I miss Captain Rozie Oshodi, the Queen’s sidekick in the first three books, and so do lots of readers, so it’ll be great to be in her company again for one last outing.

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

My bookshelves are scattered around the house and my writing shed, wherever they’ll fit. I studied French and Italian at university, so there are a lot of twentieth century books from both countries. I love the fact that French spines read bottom up, whereas English ones read top down. I bought really cool blue and white editions of my favourite authors from Editions de Minuit in the 1990s and it’s lovely to have them on my shelves.

I’ve always loved classical literature, so there are plenty of Everyman editions of Jane Austen, George Eliot and Henry James, but equally, the books that got me through stressful times like exams were Jilly Cooper and Jackie Collins, so they have their place. These are the books that inspired the kind of literature I wanted to write: escapist, absorbing and fun. They’re near the travel guides, for all the real-life escaping I love to do.

I have two bookcases dedicated to crime fiction, packed with Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Ngaio Marsh, P.D. James, Rex Stout (Nero Wolfe was a big inspiration for the way I write the Queen and her sidekicks), Donna Leon and Chris Brookmyre. I inherited my love of the mystery genre from my mother, who has a library full of books I’ve also loved, by other authors such as Robert B. Parker and Sue Grafton, as well as her own shelf of Le Carrés. She decided to start clearing them out recently, but I begged her not to: I still love seeing them there.

Finally, my bedroom is awash with overfull shelves and teetering piles of contemporary novels and non-fiction that I really must sort out one day. Highlights include Golden Hill by Francis Spufford, which someone at my book club recommended, A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan and Where’d You Go Bernadette by Maria Semple. They’re all books whose inventiveness inspires me.

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

Thanks to my book club, I’ve been re-reading Jane Austen, and am reminded of what a fabulous stylist she was. But in terms of new writers, I’ve recently enjoyed The Art of a Lie by Laura Shepherd-Robinson, set in Georgian London, and A Case of Mice and Murder by Sally Smith, set in the heart of legal London at the turn of the twentieth century. Both Laura and Sally write vivid characters with aplomb, and create satisfying, twisty plots that are a joy to follow. I definitely recommend them both.

LibraryThing is pleased to sit down this month with bestselling author Rhys Bowen, whose books have sold over ten million copies in thirty languages. Educated at London University, Bowen initially worked for the drama departments of the BBC and the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, as well as a drama teacher and dance instructor. As Janet Quin-Harkin she has written picture books and young adult novels, making her debut as Rhys Bowen in 1997 with Evans Above, the first of her ten-volume Constable Evans mystery series. Other ongoing mystery series include The Lady Georgiana books, about an English aristocrat in the 1930s; and the Molly Murphy books, now being co-written with her daughter Clare Broyles, about an Irish immigrant woman in New York City at the turn of the 20th century. Historical stand-alone novels such as Where the Sky Begins (2022) and The Rose Arbor (2024) have also been very successful. Bowen has been nominated for the Edgar Award three times, and has won multiple Agatha, Anthony, and Macavity Awards, including an Agatha Award for Best Historical Novel for In Farleigh Field and Naughty in Nice, and a Macavity Award for Best Historical Mystery for Oh Danny Boy. Her latest novel, Mrs. Endicott’s Splendid Adventure, released in early August by Lake Union Publishing, follows the eponymous heroine as she escapes to the South of France, after her husband makes the shocking announcement that he wants a divorce, after thirty years of marriage. Bowen sat down with Abigail this month to discuss the book.

Your book follows Mrs. Endicott as she sets out to make a new life for herself just before and during World War II. How did the idea for the story first come to you? Did the character appear first? Did you always know it was going to have a WWII setting?

The inspiration was twofold. A few years ago I was on an Italian lake and I saw an abandoned villa. It had once been glorious but now was covered in ivy, shutters hanging off, etc. Being me, a tad impulsive and definitely romantic, I said to my husband, “We should buy this and restore it.” Husband, practical one, “There’s no way we’re doing that.” But the image of that villa stayed in my mind and I thought I’d like to restore it in one of my books. But the other driving force behind the book was invisible women. When women reach a certain age they become invisible. I’ve experienced this myself. So I wanted to write a book that championed women, gave them second chances, showed that life wasn’t over at fifty but a whole new chapter could begin. I think I knew Ellie Endicott from the first page onward. She has lived her husband’s life and never had a chance to find out the person she could be. I gave her that chance.

Mrs. Endicott’s Splendid Adventure follows the story of someone who makes a major change in her life, taking a few others along with her. What is it about this story type that is so appealing?

I’ve already had feedback from so many women because the theme speaks to them. Second chances, vindication for unappreciated women and the power of female bonding… those are what appeal to my readers (and to me when I wrote it).

This is your seventh novel set during World War II. You’ve also written a novel set during World War I, as well as two mystery series set in different historical periods. What draws you to writing historical fiction? Are there periods of interest to you? Are there any particular challenges, when setting your story in a historical period?

I’ve always been a keen traveler and thus enjoyed being taken to another time and place in books. When I write historical mysteries I like the fact that there is very little CSI. My characters have to rely on their powers of observation and deduction. Also there are so many delicious motives for murder in the past: I love another but I am not free! Of course the challenge is always that I can’t go and visit to do my research. I can’t interview people from that time period. However I write about the first half of the twentieth century and there is plenty of material, photographs, diaries, newspapers. And I always go to the place I’m writing about to notice the small details, the sights, smells, sounds that bring a setting to life. If it’s in Europe then very little has changed!

I started writing about WWII (In Farleigh Field) because there were so many stories showing how brave the men were but at that time very few that championed women and their bravery. Also I felt the generation that knew about this war was soon to be lost and there were so many stories to be told. Each one of my books is a different aspect of WWII, a different setting and group of people. We no longer know what it’s like to live with that level of stress and danger. I often wonder whether I would have been brave enough to act if I had been called upon, like the women in my books. So I want to champion the heroes of the war before they are forgotten forever.

Also as I write more books I can’t help seeing the parallels between the time leading up to WWII and what we are experiencing in our country and in the world right now. I find it alarming and hope that readers will see the parallels before it is too late.

Did you need to do any research before writing Mrs. Endicott’s Splendid Adventure? If so, what are some of the most interesting and memorable things you learned?

I always do lots of research. First background reading about the time period. Timeline of the war, when Germany invaded, etc. Then I went to Cassis, on which St. Benet is based. Noticed everything about it. Tried all the local foods and drinks. I wanted my heroine to help the resistance smuggle Jewish men out to an island and found during my research that there really was a resistance cell in Marseille that did just this.

Tell us about your writing process. Do you have a particular routine? Do you plan your non-mysteries out differently than you do your mysteries? Do you know where your stories are going ahead of time, or do you discover that as you go along?

I think for all my books the process is the same. I do my background reading on time and place. I travel to the setting before I start to write. I know the broad theme of the story. I know what my character will be like. In my mysteries I know who will be murdered and why. I usually know the murderer and his motive but then I start writing. I put my characters in their physical setting and let them interact. I just follow along. Sometimes they do things that surprise me. I couldn’t work from an outline. I need to be free to do what my characters want to do. So I start, plunging blindly ahead, always in panic mode, and let the story take shape. By page 100 I see where I’m going. I try to write 1,500 words a day of a first draft, edit, polish, give it to first readers, polish again.

What’s next for you? Do you have any specific books in the pipeline?

As you know I write two plus books a year. My next Royal Spyness book comes out in November 2025 and is called From Cradle to Grave. Georgie ends up with the nanny from hell and at the same time young aristocrats are dying in suspicious accidents.

I now write my Molly Murphy series with my daughter, Clare Broyles. The next Molly book, Vanished in the Crowd, comes out in March 2026 and features women scientists and the suffrage movement during a big parade. And I’ve just turned in my next stand alone. It’s set in Scotland on the Isle of Skye, and is called, at the moment, From Sea to Skye. It’s about a famous writer who has dementia and can’t finish her last book. A young writer is hired to finish it for her. She goes to Skye to research and comes to believe the story is not fiction but the woman’s own story… which is impossible as the writer is Australian.

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

Too many books. Every now and then we have a purge. I own every Agatha Christie, a whole bookcase of reference materials, signed copies of fellow writers’ books and a few old favorites. Apart from those we have donated hundreds. Most books one does not want to read a second time.

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

I just did a podcast with Adriana Trigiani and read her new book, The View From Lake Como.** It was brilliant. The most authentic voice and sense of place. I relished every moment. Before that it was Louise Penny’s The Grey Wolf which I had to read before The Black Wolf comes out. Oh, and The Midnight Library, which I must be the last person to read but which I LOVED!

**Note: We talked to Adriana Trigiani about The View From Lake Como in a previous month’s author interview. Read that HERE.

LibraryThing is pleased to sit down this month with bestselling Anglo-French author Joanne Harris, whose 1999 novel, Chocolat—shortlisted for the Whitbread Award—was made into a popular film of the same name. The author of over twenty novels, including three sequels to Chocolat—as well as novellas, short stories, game scripts, screenplays, the libretti for two operas, a stage musical, and three cookbooks, her work has been published in over fifty countries, and has won numerous awards. She was named a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in 2013 and an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2022, for services to literature. A former teacher, Harris is deeply involved in issues of author rights, serving two terms as Chair of the UK’s Society of Authors (SOA) from 2018 to 2024. She is a patron of the charity Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders), to which she donated the proceeds from sales of her cookbooks. Cooking and food are consistent themes in her work, and she returns to the story of her most famous culinary character in her newest novel, Vianne, a prequel to Chocolat that is due out from Pegasus Books in early September. Harris sat down with Abigail this month to discuss this new book.

Set six years before the events of Chocolat, your new book is actually the fifth novel about Vianne Rocher to be released. What made you decide you needed to write a prequel? Did any of the ideas for the story come to you as you were writing the other books about Vianne, or was it all fresh and new as you wrote?

Vianne and I have travelled together for over 25 years, and although we’re different in many ways, I think we have some things in common. When I wrote Chocolat, I was the mother of a small child, and wrote Vianne’s character from a similar perspective. I left her in 2021 as the mother of two children, both young adults, and I realized that both Vianne and I needed to look back in order to move forward. Hence Vianne, my protagonist’s origin story, which answers a number of questions left unanswered at the end of Chocolat, and hopefully gives some insights into her journey. Most of it was new; I found a few references in Chocolat to work from, but until now I’ve had very little idea of what Vianne’s past might have been, which made the writing of this book such an interesting challenge.

Food and cooking are important themes in your work. Why is that? What significance do they have for you, and what can they tell us about the characters in your stories, and the world in which they live?

Food is a universal theme. We all need it, we all relate to it in different, important ways. It’s a gateway to culture; to the past; to the emotions. In Vianne it’s also a kind of domestic magic, involving all the senses, and with the capacity to transport, transform and touch the lives of those who engage with it.

Talk to us about chocolate! Given its importance in some of your best-known fiction, as well as the fact that you published The Little Book of Chocolat (2014), I think we can assume you enjoy this treat. What are your favorite kinds? Are there real life chocolatiers you would recommend, or recipes you like to make yourself? (Note: the best chocolate confections I myself ever tasted came from Kee’s Chocolates in Manhattan).

As far as chocolate is concerned, my journey has been rather like Vianne’s. I really didn’t know much about it when I wrote Chocolat, but since then I’ve been involved with many artisanal chocolatiers, and I’ve travelled to many chocolate producing countries. Some of my favourites are Schoc in New Zealand, and Claudio Corallo in Principe, who makes single-origin bean to bar chocolate on location from his half-ruined villa in the rainforest. And David Greenwood-Haigh, a chef who incorporates chocolate into his recipes much as Vianne does in the book (and who created the “chocolate spice” to which I refer in the story.)

Like its predecessors (or successors, chronologically speaking), Vianne is set in France. As the daughter of an English father and French mother, what insight do you feel you bring to your stories, from a cultural perspective? Do you feel you are writing as an insider, an outsider, perhaps both— and does it matter?

I think that as a dual national, there’s always a part of me that feels slightly foreign, which is why Vianne, too, is a perpetual outsider. But I do know enough about France to write with authority and affection – and maybe a little nostalgia, too. The France of my books is a selective portrait, based on the places and people I love, some of which have disappeared. These books are a way of making them live again.

Tell us a little bit about your writing process. Are you someone who maps out your story beforehand, or do you like to discover where things are going as you write? Do you have a particular writing routine? What advice would you give young writers who are just getting started?

My process varies according to the book, but as a rule I don’t map out the story in its entirety: I usually start with a voice, and a mission, and a number of pivotal scenes, and I see where that takes me. I write where I can: if I’m at home, I prefer my shed in the garden, but I can make do with any quiet space. My process involves reading aloud, so it’s best if I’m alone. And I use scent as a trigger to get me into the zone: a trick borrowed from Stanislasky’s An Actor Prepares, which I’ve been using for 30 years. In the case of Vianne I used Chanel’s Coromandel, partly because it’s an olfactory relative of Chanel No. 5, which I used when I was writing Chocolat. (And on the same theme, I’ve created a scent of my own with the help of perfumier Sarah McCantrey of 4160 Tuesdays): it’s called Vianne’s Confession, and it illustrates a passage from the book.)

As for my advice to young writers; just write. You get better that way. And if you are indeed just getting started, don’t be in a hurry to publish or to share your work if you don’t feel ready. You have as long as you like to write your first book, and only one chance at making a first impression. So take it slow, let yourself grow, and enjoy the process, because if you don’t enjoy what you do, why should anyone else?

What’s next for you? Do you have further books in the pipeline? Do you think Vianne, or any of the sequels to Chocolat, will also be made into a film?

I always have more books in the pipeline: the next one is very different; it’s a kind of quiet folk-horror novel called Sleepers in the Snow. As for films, it’s too early to say, but it would be nice to see something on screen again – though preferably as a series, as I really think these books, with their episodic structure, would probably work better that way.

Tell us about your library. What’s on your own shelves?

At least 10,000 books in French, English, German. I find it hard to give books away, so I’ve accumulated quite a library of all kinds of things, in many different genres.

What have you been reading lately, and what would you recommend to other readers?

Right now I’m reading a proof of Catriona Ward’s new book, Nowhere Burning, which is terrific: so well-written, and like all her books, quite astonishingly creepy.