Author Interview: Allison Saft

As you are (hopefully) aware, Allison Saft’s debut, Down Comes the Night, released yesterday (finally, I say, having made the glorious mistake of reading it last August and been suffering since then) so today, we have for you the interview she so kindly answered for us…just a few months back now I guess.

Down Comes the Night is a gothic fantasy mystery, featuring a maybe-haunted house and some good old-fashioned enemies to lovers — basically the book of all our dreams. And trust me when I say, if you pick this up, make sure you’re prepared to be glued to the sofa/bed/other such seating arrangement of your desire until you’ve put it down. It’s one of those.

So, get yourself comfortable, and have a read of this. And don’t forget to follow her on Twitter!

And then promise me you’ll go read the book.

Let’s start at the beginning. How did you first get into writing?

As a kid, I cut my teeth on roleplay forums, first on Neopets, then on proboards. It was an escape for me, to inhabit worlds happier and less lonely than my own. I’ve always been a hopeless romantic, so mostly, my friends and I wrote about our characters falling in love. Incidentally, that was the catalyst for my epiphany at age fifteen. I think it went something like: “isn’t constantly describing intense yearning for women & roleplaying romance with another girl…. kind of gay? oh.”

What are your favourite genres to read and write, and are there any genres or tropes you wouldn’t write?

My favorite genre to read and write is romantic fantasy, although lately I’ve been delving into lit fic, horror, and historical. I also love to write genre-blending fantasy; it’s a fun exercise to think about which genre would be complicated by adding magic. As for things I wouldn’t write… I don’t see myself writing anything without speculative elements, and while I desperately want to write a fantasy romcom (and have tried!), everything I touch turns moody.

How do you get inspiration for your books and what’s your writing process? At what point do you let other people read your drafts and who are they?

I always start with a romantic dynamic: imagining how and why two characters fall in love and grow together. What kind of situation would challenge them most? What kind of world would produce people like them? What do they both need to learn? I pull inspiration from nature, history, old wounds I feel like picking open, my hobbies and passing interests, etc… Then, naturally, I make a Pinterest board.

Once I have characters, the setting, and the magic system, I can start plotting. I put together a scene-by-scene outline and send it to my agents for feedback. When we’re all happy with the plot, I do a fast draft or “draft zero,” where I write a bare-bones book as quickly as possible. By the time I’m finished, the book is basically a bad screenplay. There is little theme, description, emotion, or character development. I despair of myself. Then, I go back through and fill it out with the details that’ll make it come to life. That, I call my true first draft.

I send my first drafts to 2-3 of my closest critique partners for feedback. From there, it depends on everyone’s deadlines. I’ll send a draft (usually after my editor’s first round of notes) to a few good friends who haven’t heard me talk about it literally every day. The fresh perspective is helpful when you’re down to the nitty-gritty stage of revisions. I always feel like I’m looking at my books through a funhouse mirror by the time I’m preparing to turn them in.

Which three authors would you say influenced your writing the most?

Margaret Rogerson and Melissa Barshardoust made me fall in love with YA again and showed me what kinds of books I wanted to write. Apart from them, the third influence is probably an unholy amalgamation of all my school reading… If I had to choose one, maybe A.S. Byatt? I read Possession in high school, and it spoke directly to my aesthetic sensibility. Water and silver imagery galore!

And for 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?

Ownvoices LGBT rep is so important, especially in YA. I joked earlier about my epiphany, and I consider myself lucky to have figured out my identity in my mid-teens. At the same time, I grew up in a conservative household, lived in Texas, and went to Catholic school. The queer online spaces I’d found couldn’t entirely shield me from the rejection I experienced when I came out in my ‘real’ life.

The increased push for diverse books, particularly ownvoices books, has made them easier than ever to find. It would’ve been incredible if teen-me had seen more characters working through their identities on the page–and maybe just as importantly, living their lives and being happy. I think I would’ve felt less alone. Storytelling is a strange, intimate thing. You offer the tenderest, sometimes darkest, parts of yourself to strangers and ask, “Do you see the world this way, too? Have you felt this?”

And when they do, that moment of connection is magic. It can feel like healing.

What’s one piece of advice you would like to give your younger self?

“Sensitive” isn’t the worst thing in the world to be. And keep writing! It’s going to keep bringing good people into your life–and someday, it’ll give you clarity.

Summarise your most recent/next book in up to 5 words and a meme.

Healer’s new job goes disastrously.

Here’s a meme my friend made that about sums up DCTN:

If (when!) your books were to be made into movies, who would you like to direct them?

Guillermo del Toro! Imagining a Down Comes the Night adaptation as visually stunning, smart, and terrifying as Crimson Peak or Pan’s Labyrinth… I’d simply perish.

If you could have dinner with one member of the LGBT community, dead or alive, who would it be?

Um…. Probably fellow disaster bi Lord Byron. I unironically love him, and he may or may not have loosely inspired a character in Down Comes the Night.

Which of your characters would you most want to fight a zombie apocalypse with?

Oh, Una hands down. She’s got a sword and no compunctions. Hal’s a close second, but I don’t know that I could handle the combined force of our brooding.

Is there a famous franchise or simply a movie/TV show you’d like to be able to write for?

Definitely Fullmetal Alchemist. It is my DREAM to write a post-war, pre-canon Roy Mustang novel. I’m a sucker for scrappy, tortured idealists.

Do you have any secret non canon ships in your books you wish people would write fics for?

Oh god….. I can guess at which non-canon ships people might like, and most of them fill me with a mixture of glee and horror.

I do hope people ship Wren and Una, even if they’re terrible for each other in so many ways. There is a Down Comes the Night AU in my head where they work through their differences–thus preventing the main plot from ever happening–and live happily ever after. Hal Cavendish who?

Rec us some great LGBT books you’ve read recently!

I’m currently living in the future with ARCs, but I’ve loved The Dead and the Dark by Courtney Gould, Beyond the Ruby Veil by Mara Fitzgerald, Sweet & Bitter Magic by Adrienne Tooley, and These Feathered Flames by Alexandra Overy. For some 2020 books that are already out, I adored The Deck of Omens by Christine Lynn Herman and Girl, Serpent, Thorn by Melissa Bashardoust.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Allison Saft was born in a Philadelphia blizzard and has been chasing the sun ever since. After receiving her MA in English Literature from Tulane University, she moved from the Gulf Coast to the West Coast, where she spends her time hiking the redwoods and practicing aerial silks. Down Comes the Night is her debut novel.

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