Today Courtney is celebrating her upcoming debut – The Dead and the Dark – being added on Goodreads for a nice round number of 300 times. Which, by the way, I assume y’all all have already done… She shared her playlist for the book for this occasion and it’s amazing! You can check it out here.
And of course, we encourage you to follow Courtney on twitter.
Before we start, thanks again for agreeing to talk with us!
Yes! Thank you so much for having me. I seriously love your blog.
That’s always amazing to hear! First things first: how did you first get into writing?
I feel like I’ve wanted to write forever. I wrote all the time as a little kid. I actually used to write this superhero story that I would burn onto a CD and give to my friend so she could continue the story on her computer. It was great. I didn’t start writing seriously until college, though.
What kind of collaboration, what a labour of love…
I know, it was amazing. I think it was mostly just a plagiarism of Teen Titans, but we were VERY proud of it!
It’s the thought that counts and the emotions the process of writing itself awakes in you, I would say.
Definitely!
So what are your favourite genres to read and write?
I love to write contemporary fantasy. Especially anything with a horror twist to it. Thrillers, mysteries, etc. Reading-wise, I’ll read pretty much anything. It’s so nice to read things that are totally outside what I write. I love a fluffy romance.
Does that mean it’s not likely for you to write a fluffy romance? Any other genres or tropes you wouldn’t write?
I do have a couple fluffy romances I’d love to write eventually but I always struggle to keep them fun for some reason. I always accidentally throw a murder in there and ruin the whole thing haha.
Oh my God.
The other one I struggle with is sci-fi. The logistics always confuse me. I love to read it, but the minute I try to plan it out my brain gets tired.
Yeah, a lot of people we talked with are wary of that genre for some reason or other.
It’s very intimidating. I have so much respect for people who write it. The planning and worldbuilding involved is so intense!
Given how dark you say most your stories turn, wow do you get inspiration for them?
My stories actually usually start with a setting. I love a weird location. From there it’s just thinking, what kind of weird stuff could happen here?
That’s interesting! Nina Varela also told us it’s the location that comes to her first. It’s cool how every writer works in different, mysterious ways but y;all also have stuff in common.
Ah, that’s amazing. I loved Crier’s War!
God yeah it’s so amazing.
So gay, so good. And enemies-to-lovers is my weakness.
Speaking of which, if you create the world first, do you also take that opportunity to make it a one without homophobia or is that something you don’t consciously think about?
I do think about it! I think, for me, it depends on the story and what I want to say. I’ve seen this conversation so much online. In The Dead and the Dark, homophobia definitely plays a role in the story. It takes place in a small town and I wanted to talk about the impact homophobia has on queer people raised in hostile settings. But the new one I’m working on, I made the decision to not have it factor in at all. It’s complicated. I feel like, for queer writers, deciding between being realistic about your experience and imagining a better world is hard. I feel like this is why publishing LOTS of queer fiction is important. Readers should get to choose what type of world they want to read for themselves.
Like you say, it honestly depends on the kind of story you wanna tell.
I’ve found comfort in both types of stories for sure.
Going back to inspirations, though. Do you have a writing playlist? And if you do, does it focus more on the lyrics or melodies, vibe of the songs?
I do! I actually have two for each story. One is always atmospheric and based on the melodies. I use those while I’m writing. My second one is always more for inspiration and focused on the lyrics, even if the sound doesn’t match.
Are the melodic ones like movies OSTs or classic pieces or some mix of everything?
They’re usually scores from TV shows. TDATD had a healthy mix of Westworld and Hill House.
Sweet, I love that. Tell us about your writing process. At what point do you let other people read your drafts and who are they?
Definitely. I’m a big outliner. I have to have a full scene-by-scene Excel outline before I write anything. Usually, once I have that, I can draft pretty quickly in a few months. I have a group chat with a few CPs where we post snippets of our work as we go for encouragement, but I don’t send the book to anyone for feedback until I’m revising.
Would you say the feedback before you’re done with the basic draft is distracting then?
For me, encouraging feedback while I’m still writing is nice. I feel like I get so nervous and panicked about how good the book is as I’m writing and start doubting if I should even finish. Getting compliments as I go gives me the boost I need to finish.
Kind of like publishing fics in chapters, as you go, right?
Exactly! I feel like writing can be so isolated. Writing without community would be impossible for me. I love encouragement from other writers, and I love giving encouragement to other writers.
Just gotta share the love! Okay. Fun times. Summarise your upcoming book in up to 5 words and a meme.
Oh shoot okay. Girls kiss and solve crimes.
IDEAL.
And for memes, there’s this Tik Tok actually.
Oh my God.
That’s my book in a nutshell.
If I wasn’t already excited about your book, this would definitely do it, yeah.
I’m so glad! I love meme summaries.
They’re the best, honestly. Which three authors would you say influenced your writing the most?
I feel like Maggie Stiefvater was always a huge influence for me. And Madeleine L’Engle with Wrinkle in Time. And it’s probably cheesy, but Harry Potter was SO formative. Things that are a little weird but with a lot of heart.
I think we’re just that generation where HP was formative for a lot of us. And I absolutely love how you summed those three up!
Thank you! I think anything with just a little bit of magic has always drawn me in.
We can always use some magic. If (when!) your books were to be made into movies, who would you like to direct them?
Oh wow. This is kind of niche, but Veronika Franz is a director I love because her movies are so creepy and atmospheric. I love horror that has that sense of dread, but also love at the center. I feel like a horror director would be great. A lot of newer horror directors do such a good job.
You keep mentioning how important of an aspect love is for your writing and it makes me so excited!
I just feel like the best way to make people care about your story is to always have that intense love at the center. People who care about each other so much, even if they mess up, are always the most interesting to me.
It makes total sense! We all want to feel loved and cared for. Since we’re already on the subject of love and feeling safe – and this is something that is also very important to us & what we put a lot of emphasis on when blogging. What does ownvoices LGBT representation mean to you?
Oh yeah. Obviously we all want more representation, but there’s something about fiction written by people who understand first-hand that just fills a void in you. I think, when I was a teen, I didn’t realize there was a difference until I read Cameron Post. There was so much hardship in that book, but the way Emily Danforth wrote it so tenderly. Writing ownvoices representation feels nerve wracking sometimes because you want to do a good job and make sure that your community feels safe with you. But I know how amazing it feels to read LGBT fiction, and for me specifically f/f, and thins “wow, this author gets it. They get me.”
You don’t even need to know beforehand that the book is ownvoices sometimes, it just shines through, that feeling of complete understanding!
Right? Sometimes I start reading a book without looking up the author, and I just know. It feels amazing.
The absolute best feeling! So hey! Rec us some great LGBT books you’ve read recently!
I would LOVE to. I just read Missing, Presumed Dead by Emma Berquist and I loved it. I’m working on Gideon the Ninth right now and having so much fun with it. Oh, and Wilder Girls. God, I’m still reeling from how much I loved that one. Oh, and we mentioned it earlier, but Crier’s War. And Rules for Vanishing, too. I’m looking at my list trying to get everything I’ve read recently. So much good stuff!
There were so many good LGBT books out this year!!
Good romances, too. Tell Me How You Really Feel was so sweet.
And hey, I see what you did there with only recommending sapphic stuff. Nice.
I didn’t even realize! What can I say, I know what I’m about…
I appreciate that, yeah. What’s one piece of advice you would like to give your younger self?
Keep writing, and write characters you’re interested in. Don’t just try to emulate what you read because the stories you want aren’t out there yet. If younger me had known how many sapphic books in every genre she’d be able to get ahold of in 2019, she would’ve flipped. Also, scrap the fantasy book. Worldbuilding is not your forte!
That’s some sound advice, to be honest. Okay, one last question. If you could have dinner with one member of the LGBT community, dead or alive, who would it be?
Okay, I just went through so many names but I think dinner with Dan Levy would be so fun. Schitt’s Creek is everything to me. I would love to talk about creating queer media that brings people so much joy.
I would DIE to be part of that dinner. Schitt’s Creek is hands down the best thing on television right now.
Hard agree. It’s so funny and makes me SO happy.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Courtney Gould writes books about queer girls, ghosts, and things that go bump in the night. She graduated from Pacific Lutheran University in 2016 with a Bachelor’s degree in Creative Writing and Publishing. Born and raised in Salem, OR, she now lives and works as a legal case manager in Tacoma, WA and continues to write love letters to the Pacific Northwest’s inexplicable mysteries.
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