L.M. Bracklow on the new Middle Grade Fantasy, "The Islands of Iros"

Inspiration is a funny thing. It can come to us like a lightning bolt, through the lyrics of a song, or in the fog of a dream. Ask any writer where their stories come from and you’ll get a myriad of answers, and in that vein I created the WHAT (What the Hell Are you Thinking?) interview. 

Today’s guest for the WHAT is L.M. Bracklow, author of The Islands of Iros which releases January 24

Ideas for our books can come from just about anywhere, and sometimes even we can’t pinpoint exactly how or why. Did you have a specific origin point for your book?

I did! The idea for The Islands of Iros came to me while I was watching three different animes at the same time. One Piece, Attack on Titan, and Jujutsu Kaisen. You could say my book is a combination of those shows, except I made it kid-friendly! One Piece inspired me to write about all these dangerous and mysterious islands you’ll get to read about in my book. The soldiers/military aspect of The Islands of Iros came from Attack on Titan. And the sorcerer’s finger was inspired by Jujutsu Kaisen. I had a lot of fun playing around with these ideas and creating something that was completely my own. 

Once the original concept existed, how did you build a plot around it?

My story is character-driven, so before I even had a plot, I created my three main characters: Luke, Kaori and Damien. I first thought about how they would fit in this new world I was writing them into. I crafted their personality traits, their goals and ambitions. Once that was done, the plot basically wrote itself. I’ve always known how The Islands of Iros will end, so it was only a matter of figuring out what exactly leads the characters to this ending. The things they go through, the choices they make, the people they meet. It all came together quite nicely! 

Have you ever had the plot firmly in place, only to find it changing as the story moved from your mind to paper?

To be honest, I was prepared for that to happen before I started writing. It didn’t! I think my vision concerning the plot and the direction it will move towards has been perfectly clear to me since day one. Of course, there have been some minor changes regarding characters and places, but the plot remains the same! 

Do story ideas come to you often, or is fresh material hard to come by?

Story ideas come to me so often that it’s hard to keep up! I always write them down in a notebook in case I might want to use one in the future. Thankfully, I can manage to focus on one story at a time and not let all these other ideas distract me from my current work! 

How do you choose which story to write next, if you’ve got more than one percolating?

Story ideas might come to me often, but I don’t believe all of them are worth pursuing. I must feel it in my heart! That’s what happened to me with The Islands of Iros. I simply had to get this story written or I felt like I would go crazy. 

I have 6 cats and a Dalmatian (seriously, check my Instagram feed) and I usually have at least one or two snuggling with me when I write. Do you have a writing buddy, or do you find it distracting?

My writing buddy is a three-year-old Blue Staffy named Aquiles! He’s actually snuggling with me as I write this. I do sometimes get distracted by his snores when he falls asleep, but I don’t really mind! I just love having him around all the time. He’s the cutest boy. 

L.M. Bracklow is a Peruvian author who loves dogs, traveling, and reading as many books as she can get her hands on. She has a degree in sports journalism, but her true passion is writing books for children. Enthralled by fantasy since she was a little girl, Bracklow has now written a fantastical story of her own. The Islands of Iros is the book of her heart, and she hopes kids everywhere will enjoy reading it as much as she enjoyed writing it! Bracklow is eager to continue unfolding Luke, Kaori, and Damien’s stories in what may ultimately be a five or six book series. Connect with Bracklow at lmbracklow.com, and on Instagram, Twitter, and TikTok

Randee Dawn on The Inspiration for Tune in Tomorrow

Inspiration is a funny thing. It can come to us like a lightning bolt, through the lyrics of a song, or in the fog of a dream. Ask any writer where their stories come from and you’ll get a myriad of answers, and in that vein I created the WHAT (What the Hell Are you Thinking?) interview. 

Today’s guest for the WHAT is Randee Dawn, author of Tune in Tomorrow: The Curious, Calamitous, Cockamamie Story Of Starr Weatherby And The Greatest Mythic Reality Show Ever

Ideas for our books can come from just about anywhere, and sometimes even we can’t pinpoint exactly how or why. Did you have a specific origin point for your book?

Having worked at a soap opera magazine for many years, I’d toyed around with the idea of basing some kind of genre-based story at a soap – like a murder mystery. But I didn’t do much with it. Later on, I was asked to come up with some ideas for a text-based online game for Choice of Games, and one of the pitches was about an actress who comes onto a soap and finds all sorts of shenanigans and machinations backstage. That story didn’t pan out to be a game, but it did get me to outline the basics of Starr Weatherby’s tale – and I realized I could make it even more accessible and fun by making it based in a fantastic world where mythical creatures ran the show.

Once the original concept existed, how did you build a plot around it?

To me, it fell in place naturally. On the one hand, Tune in Tomorrow has some familiar tropes: The show veteran who worries about keeping her place, the hard-working underlings who know everything that’s going on, a show that’s teetering on cancellation, a scheming Lothario, a wide-eyed newcomer. But they all take unexpected turns when tossed into the stew of fantasy, where so many surprising things can go wrong. So the thread of the familiar led me into the story – Starr is hired, Starr has to fight to find her place on the show amid all the creatures and humans who might not want her there – but along the way the characters sent me in new directions thanks to their personalities and abilities. 

Have you ever had the plot firmly in place, only to find it changing as the story moved from your mind to paper?

Absolutely. I wanted it to be a funny book! The first draft or two I wrote were mildly amusing, but I needed to lean into the wackiness. I started looking at scenes and saying to myself, “That’s all nice and moves the plot and so forth, but how could it be wackier?” Then I took my own advice. I also had Starr falling into her romances earlier, but realized – with some beta reader help – that the true love affair she has is with the show, not one individual (or two individuals). That was a more interesting concept to develop, so I could pare down some of the overheated scenes and get to her finding out more about herself as she became part of the fabric of the show.

Do story ideas come to you often, or is fresh material hard to come by?

There is never a dearth of story ideas! It’s about how to implement the story idea. A great plot is one thing, but you have to start it, end it and populate it with fascinating characters people care about, or at least care about seeing how things end up for them. I have loads of ideas I only wish I had time to properly sit down and work through.

How do you choose which story to write next, if you’ve got more than one percolating?

Mostly it’s what interests me the most on any given day. Right now I’m in a strange place – a book out that could have a sequel (or at least a sequel set in the same world) or a new draft of a fresh novel I wrote during the pandemic. A lot will depend on how Tune in Tomorrow sells – if it does well and my publisher wants a follow-up, I’ll tackle that next (I have about five chapters already written). If not, I plan to go back to the other novel and see if that can get sent to my editor. So those are very practical reasons for deciding what comes next. I have a hard time deciding which I’d prefer right now!

I have 6 cats and a Dalmatian (seriously, check my Instagram feed) and I usually have at least one or two snuggling with me when I write. Do you have a writing buddy, or do you find it distracting?

Not really! I do have a wonderful Westie named Birdie, but she’s always been very low-energy and thanks to some arthritis she doesn’t really climb the stairs to my office much. She has been in my office while I’ve written in the past, but I’m pretty much a solo animal on my own, living in my head as I write.

Maryland-born Randee Dawn is now a Brooklyn-based entertainment journalist who scribbles about the glam world of entertainment by day, then spends her nights crafting wild worlds of fiction. She's a former editor at The Hollywood Reporter and Soap Opera Digest, and these days covers the wacky world of show business for Variety, The Los Angeles Times, Emmy Magazine and Today.com. Dawn's obsessive love of all things Law & Order led her to appear in one episode and later co-author The Law & Order SVU: Unofficial Companion. Her short fiction has appeared in numerous anthologies and online publications; she also dreams up trivia questions for BigBrain Games. Once a month she can be found hosting Rooftop Readings at Ample Hills Creamery in Brooklyn, and when not writing she's focused on her next travel destination, and hangs out with her wonderful, funny husband and fluffy Westie. She admits she reads way too many books and consumes far too many mangoes.

Samantha Vérant on Writing What You Know and Love

Inspiration is a funny thing. It can come to us like a lightning bolt, through the lyrics of a song, or in the fog of a dream. Ask any writer where their stories come from and you’ll get a myriad of answers, and in that vein I created the WHAT (What the Hell Are you Thinking?) interview. 

Today’s guest for the WHAT is Samantha Vérant, author of The Spice Master at Bistro Exotique, the story of a talented chef who discovers how spices and scents can transport her—and, more importantly, how self-confidence can unlock the greatest magic of all: love.

Ideas for our books can come from just about anywhere, and sometimes even we can’t pinpoint exactly how or why. Did you have a specific origin point for your book?

I’m an American living in France and, so far, all of my books have combined food, French/Franco-American culture, and female chefs making their mark in a male dominated industry. Because I live in southwestern France, I like to introduce people to places they might not know about. Although Spice Master takes place in Paris, I chose to base the story in the tenth arrondissement–an up and coming neighborhood and a bit off the beaten path. I had the location pinpointed and a general idea for the plot. I knew I wanted to write a fun book filled with a cast of diverse, quirky characters. I also wanted my protagonist, Kate, to be in the process of opening up her own restaurant. But the true inspiration came when I was eating dinner at a friend’s house a few years ago and she pulled out a tin of saffron and then told me she got it from her spice dealer. I had one of those bingo moments, although dealer wasn’t exactly the right word. Then, I was picking cherries at another friends house and she pointed out the plants in her garden. All of the components in the book came together.

Once the original concept existed, how did you build a plot around it?

A story wouldn’t exist without conflict and a character’s growth. I don’t make life easy for Kate, my heroine, and she has to fight for her dream while building up her confidence along the way. I always start a project knowing where I wanted to drive the beginning, the middle, and the end, filling the rest in along the way. My agent and I pitched this book via a proposal– a very detailed outline/synopsis. With such a detailed outline, all of my characters fleshed out, and all of my research on hand, it was easy to get to the heart of the story.

Have you ever had the plot firmly in place, only to find it changing as the story moved from your mind to paper?

Not really. My agent, Jessica Mileo, is very editorial and we always start with an outline, some tighter than others. With all of my books, some scenes changed during the writing process–cut or added or expanded– to drive the story forward, but the general plot always remains the same. I suppose I’m a planster–a plotter who occasionally flies by the seat of her pants.

Do story ideas come to you often, or is fresh material hard to come by?

I have so many ideas on the burner! I’m currently working on another concept–women’s fiction/contemporary romance that will take place in New York and France, but instead of food I’ll be focusing on drinks. I’m also working on a domestic thriller I’m really excited about. One day, I also want to get back to a historical fiction concept I’m working on. This one focuses on wine and takes place in Northern California (Napa) and Bordeaux/Saint Émilion. I’m about a two and a half hours from Bordeaux–-so this book research is a writer’s (and self-professed oenophile’s) dream. Write what you know and love, right?

How do you choose which story to write next, if you’ve got more than one percolating?

I usually write up a brief synopsis (around a paragraph or two) for each project I’m considering and then I run them by my agents. Together, we figure out which one we’re most excited about and I write on from there. 

I have 6 cats and a Dalmatian (seriously, check my Instagram feed) and I usually have at least one or two snuggling with me when I write. Do you have a writing buddy, or do you find it distracting?

Your fur babies are adorable! I have one giant cat, Juju, a Chartreux, which is a French breed. He actually inspired one of the ‘characters’ in Spice Master. His full name is Juny de la Barguelonne and I used his last name in Sophie’s books and Spice Master. I named the cat in Spice Master Juju, but, aside from most of his physical characters and name, that’s where the similarities end. The cat in Spice Master wears custom-made diamond, emerald, and sapphire collars with matching leashes. I’m thankful Juju can’t read. We also recently rescued a little stray kitten, Aria, a white tabby with clear blue eyes. For the most part, she stays in the guest room, which is also my office. (She and Juju get along, but she’s afraid of the downstairs and the monster she calls vacuum). You can find her purring like a little motor on my lap when I’m writing. The only distractions come when the cats walk across my keyboard (at least my word count goes up?) or sit on pages when I’m redlining a manuscript. Mostly, the two fur balls provide inspiration. I’d say I have to find a way to incorporate Aria in one of my books, but, before she came into our lives, I used her name in Spice Master! (Aria is Charles’s, our hero’s, ex–a conniving super model). Save for their names, Aria the cat and Aria the model have nothing in common.

Samantha Vérant is a travel addict, a self-professed oenophile, and a determined, if occasionally unconventional, at-home French chef. She lives in southwestern France, where she’s married to a sexy French rocket scientist she met in 1989 (but ignored for twenty years), a stepmom to two incredible kids, and the adoptive mother to a ridiculously adorable French cat. When she’s not trekking from Provence to the Pyrénées, embracing her inner Julia Child, or searching out ingredients and spices, Sam is making her best effort to relearn those dreaded conjugations.