TBNT S06E11 | Talking to THE Samantha Shannon

Hello booknerds!

We took a short break after all the Aesop Women's Library excitement and we're back!

We got to speak to THE Samantha Shannon, author of The Priory of the Orange Tree, about her latest book, A Day of Fallen Night.

A Day of Fallen Night is the prequel to Priory and it’s set just shy of five centuries before Priory and covers the period known as the Great Sorrow, or Grief of Ages. We had such a great time talking to Samantha and we feel that it has come full circle. In case you didn't know, we actually have a podcast episode on Priory in Season 2 so you can check that out of you have not heard that episode.

We really geeked out talking to Samantha cause we're both huge fans of fantasy books (especially Diana) and we hope that you enjoy this chat.

Cheers!

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Hello, friends and book lovers.After the Fantastic eesat Women's Library event,
we took a tiny break and herewe are again bringing to you great interviews
and hopefully your future reads. Andtoday we have a real treat for you
because Samantha Shannon, she of theFantastical fantasies that involved dragons and magic worlds,

(00:21):
popped on the TVNT wagon for anatter on her latest home, The
Day of Fallen Night. And forthose of you who have been listening to
our show, we actually did areview of book The Priority the Orange Tree,
and that was in season two,episode four, so check that out
if you haven't yet, because inthis interview we will be touching on that

(00:44):
a little bit because of obviously becausethe Day of Allen Night's in the same
world and it's actually a prequel toThe Priority the Orange Tree. So people
who are saying, right, whichone should be reversed? And yeah,
I mean like, it's nice weasked the question. She sorted. So
that's a good thing to know aswell, if you're going to go into
this book and you're not sure whichyou want to begin with. Absolutely,

(01:07):
and honestly, this interview is prettycomprehensive. So I think we're putting the
whole thing in. It's about anhour long, and we've asked all the
questions you always wanted to ask heron her world, building, on her
favorite characters, extensive research the SaintGeorge and Dragon myth. I mean,
the world of historical fantasy is probablyone of Mind and Dianah's favorite worlds,
and especially if it's grounded in culturesthat you actually recognize and love, so

(01:30):
she does that. Yeah, Ireally like the fact that you're actually learning
some history as you go along,so like you can like you get a
double webby you get entertainment and youalso get educated. So that great.
So yeah, if you haven't heardof The Day of All Night in a
Nutshell, it's it roughly follows fourcharacters, all in different parts of the

(01:53):
Roots of Chaos world, and youget to meet historical figures mentioned in Priory
of the Orange Tree sort of.I guess if you want to compare to
something from our part of the world, it's like meeting Hungtua or Parasara and
seeing what all the decisions they hadto make in order to change the course
of history. Again, I'm tellingall writers out there, please write this.

(02:14):
I would like to know. Imean, see Hungtua just being that
noble kind of light warrior, right, I would like to know the kinds
of decisions he had to make whenhe was, you know, the admiral
of the fleet and having to kindof manage Malacca during those heydays. Anyway,
let's get into the interview. Justa note, it is set within

(02:34):
a terrible time to be a life, this novel, and where people have
to somehow unite to go against auniversal terror. There's that sound familiar,
Dina. Essentially, this is abook that delves into choices and the tenacity
of characters to basically survive a worldwidedisaster. Okay, so let's get into
it. Here's our interview and we'llcome back to you after their degree.

(03:08):
It's wonderful to have you with ushere today. Samantha, thank you so
much for joining us on two bookthat's talking. Can you please start by
briefly introducing yourself. Of course,Hi, I'm Samantha Shannon. I am
the author of the Bone Season series, which currently has four out of seven
books published, and I'm also theauthor of the Priory of the Orange Tree

(03:30):
and more. Recently. It's standaloneprequel, A Day of Fallen Night.
Do you know that we actually dida show under Priory of the Orange Tree
in our second season? Oh?Really, no, I did it.
Yes, we both loved We bothloved the book, so we actually did
a show on it, which iswhy when the Times came to talk to
you, I'm like, yeah,and Diana, let's talk to her.

(03:51):
Yes, yes, we've definitely.That's awesome. Thank you so much.
Would you please describe for people whomay not have heard of the book,
that you please describe A Day offall Night in a nutshell? Absolutely?
So, A Day of Fallen Night, like I said, is a standalone
prequel, so you can read itbefore or after Priory. It doesn't really
matter. I might perhaps recommend readingA Day of Fallen Night first, but

(04:14):
it doesn't. Like I said,it doesn't really matter. You understand them
both either way. A Day ofFallen Night is set five hundred years before
the Priory of the Orange Tree andit is about a war between five breathing
dragons and humans and the humans dragoncompanions who do not breath fire, and
it doesn't go particularly well for thehumans, as you can imagine against large
scaly, fire breathing creatures. Butyeah, it's kind of an exploration of

(04:39):
motherhood particularly and war, and it'sa tragedy in some ways. It covers
the period of history where it wasarguably the worst time to be alive during
the world of the Roots of Chaos. But yeah, that's that's pretty much
it in a nutshell. It isreally cool because I think we read The
Bride of Orange Tree probably about twoyears ago, Dinah, so was kind

(05:00):
of cool to come back into theworld and remember trying to remember, Like
you know, a lot of thecharacters in the Day of Fallen Night has
sort of let been mentioned as historicalfigures in Priory of the Orange Tree,
so it was kind of cool ina way to see their story, right,
So maybe you can tell us alittle bit of the themes of the
Day of Fallen Knight. I mean, you've talked about motherhood, but how

(05:23):
does the story tie in with thePriorate of Orange Tree because prior to Orange
Tree concentrates on a lot of thethings that happened around the priory. In
a way, well, this oneis like a bigger world in some ways.
Yeah, the two are, likeI said, they're five hundred days
apart, which gave me quite alot of creative freedom in terms of I
was going to the same world,but I was also able to explore it

(05:46):
at a very very different period inhistory. And I also got to go
a little bit bigger with this one, because you know, Bloomsbury, my
UK publisher, they were very obviouslythrilled with the success of the Priory of
the Orange Tree, and I feltlike I could go even bigger this time
and go to even more places interms of the connection. Yes, like
you said, some of the charactersare mentioned in the Priory of the Orange

(06:08):
Tree, so perhaps the main onethat we hear about in Priory is Queen
Glorian the Third, also known asGlorian shield Heart, and in the Priory
of the Orange Tree, she's referencedas this incredibly young woman who came to
power when she was still a teenager. And I thought it would be fascinating,
first of all, to look ather mindset, her kind of interior

(06:29):
thoughts, because in the first bookwe do see one of the queens of
her bloodline, but we never actuallysee into her head, so I thought
that would be fascinating, and alsoto explore how Glorian's legend is different from
the person who she really was.So again, like I said, by
the time of Priory, Glorian isheld up as this woman who made immense
sacrifices for the queendom of Innis,which is the country that she's from,

(06:54):
and her story is almost used tocontrol some of her descendants, like Sabrand
from the first book, who say, you know, why can't you be
more like Glorian shield her She wasthis model of a great queep. But
at the same time, I thought, well, she was a teenager and
it can't have been particularly easy forher to rule at such a young age.
So that was one of the thingsI wanted to look at, the
difference between the legacy and the realityof a person, and we did look

(07:17):
at that a little bit. AndPriory obviously there's the founding story of the
Night Galli and Barrethnet, and onereligion believes that he killed a dragon and
the other side believes that he wasa deceiver who lied about the situation.
So that is something that really intriguesme in this series and something that A
Day of All the Knight looks atpretty intensely. The first time Glorian saw

(07:44):
her own blood, she was twelveyears old. It was Julane who had
spotted the smere stark on her ivoryshift. So splendid were the stories of
Brethnet blood, Glorian had almost expectedit to be molten gold, for her
blood kept a great worm shackled indarkness. Instead, it had been a

(08:05):
dull, rusty brown. It isless than I thought, she had remarked,
and less had carried a few meanings. Julane had left to fetch a
clout and tell the queen. Thesecond time Glorian saw her own blood,
she was fifteen and a half andthe end of a bone had knifed through

(08:28):
her skin, between the shoulder andthe elbow. This time, Julane Crest
was less composed fetched the royal surgeon. She shouted at the guards. Two
went running quickly. Quickly. Glorianstared down at her bone. It was
a small piece that PopEd through,not much longer than a tooth, and

(08:54):
yet it was somehow looed naked whenit ought to be covered. The night
before, while the fire burned low, hellacentth had shared a tail from the
north. People there believed that oakgaulls growths like apples on those trees used
in the making of ink could holdsigns of the future. If a bumblebee

(09:18):
had nudged inside, the next yearwould be joyful. If a gaullfly was
there, caught in a thing ofits own making, the year would be
stagnant or riddled with blunders. Whateverwas inside, there was some fate attached
heathen talk. Adela had muttered suchtails stemmed from the days before the Saint,

(09:43):
but Glorian had found it both charmingand harmless. At sunrise, she
and her ladies had ridden out insearch of fallen gauls, only for her
horse to take a sudden fright andthrow her. There's a couple of other
characters who are mentioned in the firstone, so Princess Dumai is mentioned very

(10:07):
very briefly in the Priory of theOrange Tree. She gets just like the
tiniest mentioned, but we get tosee who she was again in this one
and how her legend is different fromthe reality. And then as a couple
of characters like Tanuva, who werenot mentioned in the Priory of the Orange
Tree, but who are part ofthe societies that were talked about in the
first book. So in this one, for example, I got to delve
really deeply into the priory itself,because even though the first one is called

(10:31):
The Priority of the Orange Tree,we don't actually get to spend a whole
lot of time in this secret societyof dragon slayers. So that was really
interesting. And then you see placesthat were mentioned in priory, like the
Republic of Carmentum, so it wasit was definitely interesting thinking of how much
a relationship I wanted the two booksto have, and how similar they were
going to be, and how muchit made sense for me to mention things

(10:56):
that were centuries apart, you know, which things would have survived to be
talked about Iran, which Wooden.That's interesting, right because history is kind
of written by the victor's, isn'tit. Yes, very much, Yes
exactly so, Yeah, especially abouthistory, because you know, you have
this really rich tapestry of history thatyou've you've woven into first the Priory of

(11:16):
the Orange Tree, and then andnow that you've actually expanded that history so
much more so. I think it'sfascinating to think about how much history plays
into into the making of the worldwhen you when you create a fantasy story,
So, okay, you talk alittle bit abou about that. How
much you know that you think aboutthe history of a world when you're creating
it. Well, I had tothink a lot about history when I was

(11:39):
creating the first book, which isin a way what led to me writing
A Day of Fallen Night, becauseI knew that the founding, the kind
of key event that was going tohappen in the Priory of the Orange Tree,
was the defeat of this dragon calledthe Nameless One, and that was
going to be a fundament of thehistory and legends in the book. But
I knew that I want to thatto have happened quite a long time ago,

(12:01):
so it happens a thousand years beforethe events of the Priority of the
Orange Stream, which therefore meant thatI was going to have to find ways
to fill that thousand year gaps.So I had to create a lot of
history. Each of the countries inthe stories had to have its own timeline
of events, and I had tothink about how those countries might have changed
over centuries, you know, howreligions would have changed, a different people

(12:24):
who would have risen to prominence duringeach period. So that was why,
in a way, the story isso much about history because I had to
fill that gap, and also becauseI wanted to reflect, like you say,
on the fact, who writes historyand with what purpose do they do
that? And yeah, I reallyreally enjoyed the process of doing that.
And while I was working on thattimeline, I came up with the idea

(12:48):
of this world changing event called theGrief of Ages or the Great Sorrow,
which was the second eruption of thedreadmount which is this huge volcano in the
book that produce uses the fire breathingdragons, and I thought, well,
we know about the Nameless One,but he was defeated quite quickly in the
book. You know, he cameout of the mountain. I was slain
immediately, essentially. I thought,well, in order to establish the stakes

(13:13):
of this series, to know howmuch danger the characters are in, there
should have been a period where thefire breathing dragons were allowed to just run
rampant, essentially, and it wasa period of complete devastation. There was
this plague, which I didn't imaginebeing so relevant when I wrote the first
book. And yeah, so thatbecame a really key event that the priory

(13:35):
of the Orange Tree characters remember,because they're still feeling the effects of it
in various ways. And when Iwas writing about it, I thought,
what, actually, that would bea really interesting and challenging period for me
to write a novel about. AndI was a little bit nervous about doing
it because this isn't a spoiler becauseit's mentioned in the first book, but
the Grief of Ages or great Sorrow, depending on where or from it was

(14:00):
ended by the arrival of a cometcalled the long Head Star, and that
was quite difficult for me as anauthor because it meant that the characters could
not affect the outcome in a waybecause they can't bring this comet any faster.
And I thought that might be aproblem because it's a bit of a
Dayo Sex Machina situation where something justdrops out of nowhere and solves all of

(14:20):
the characters problems. And in away, again, like I say,
in terms of the war between dragonsand humans, it's pretty unlikely the humans
are going to be able to winany major battles. They do have some
victories in a Day of Fallen Night, but overall, this is a threat
that human kind cannot defeat. AndI was thinking about the ways I could
made that into an interesting, intriguingnovel, and although it was a challenge,

(14:43):
I decided to just go through it. I thought, Okay, well,
if it's not a classic fantasy,and perhaps the way priory was where
you had them gathering different items todefeat the nameless one, which is pretty
classic trope of quest fantasies. Thiswas going to be a book about survival
and endurance and not defeating the enemy, but outlasting it. Yeah. I

(15:09):
read somewhere that you said that thisis about people surviving events out out of
your control, and there's also aplague in this book, and I was
like, wow, you know ina way, right, I was wondering
whether, you know, like livingto an a pandemic kept something that kind
of informed a little bit of yourwriting. Was this your pandemic book?
To a certain extent? It wasmy pandemic book. Yes, it.

(15:33):
It's always fascinating to see the kindof books that it came out of the
pandemic. In my case, itgenuinely wasn't inspired by COVID. In the
priory of the orangetry, it talksabout this draconic plague that happened during the
same time as The Grief of Ages, and I was sitting there writing it,
and of course COVID nineteen arrived,and I thought, oh my god,
there's no way that this book isnot going to be connected with COVID,

(15:54):
and it was. So it wasso exasperating because it was mostly inspired
by the Black Death of NSA.But it just goes to show that writers
can sometimes be unintentional oracles. Andwe don't know what kind of world our
books are going to be released into, because normally we work on our books,
you know, at least a coupleof years before they're actually published.

(16:14):
Often they're finished months before readers getthem. So similarly, the US obviously
overturned Row versus Wade at the sametime this was happening, and that too,
I think that will provide a contextfor the book that I did not
necessarily intend at the time. Idid want to reflect on the theme of
bodily or autonomy, and I wasaware of the sustained attack on Roe versus

(16:37):
Wade, but I genuinely didn't knowit would be overturned by the time Priory
sorry, a day before The Nightcame out. So yeah, we never
know what kind of world our booksare going to be released into, and
the framework that readers are going tobe approaching them within. I always find
sorry, Diana, we find itwas the nextquitter. I always find it
kind of interesting that there are certainbooks that you in different parts of your

(17:00):
life, Like every ten years orso, if you pick up the same
book, you get something different fromit depending on the time you live in
or depending on the age you're in. Right, So, so I thought
I was kind of interesting that whenyou were saying things about sometimes things just
happen to level everything up, andthen people move on and then newer better

(17:22):
better, a newer better race,or people would come up from it.
Right, We're like like like youknow, like the comment that destroyed all
the dinosaurs and then you have theplague, you know, things like that.
So I thought I was kind ofvery prescient in a way when I
was reading it. Yeah, thankyou. It's it's yeah, it's very
strange when you yeah, like yousay, are unintentionally prescient, And it's

(17:44):
it's another reason when people say tome, what message did you intend for
this book? I tend to notanswer that question because you don't know what
personal experiences, For example, readersare bringing to it. Again, you
don't know what time they're reading in. So many different things can affect the
way a reader perceives a book.I for example, one of the messages
that I took away was that youknow how people have all these uh nations

(18:11):
back then were all pretty much isolatedfrom each other, and they grow,
They have their own world building,and they have their own mythology, they
have their own legends and all ofthat. It's fascinating to think about how
myth and legend it's passed down andit's it changes how people look at the
world, and it changes how peopleperceive what's going on around them. Can

(18:34):
you can you expand a little bitof whether whether or not you were planning
on using myth and legend to shapehow people think about the world around them.
Oh very much so. Yeah.And it's interesting what you say about
the isolation because that was even moretrue in a Day of Fallen Night,
because in the priory the Orange Trythe characters have. You know, they've

(18:56):
got a fairly advanced degree of shipbuilding. It's sort of based on the
seventy centuries, so you know theyhad they had pretty decent sea travel at
that time obviously not as safe astoday, but they could explore and you
know, cross continents with ships,so there is a lot more communication between
the different countries in the Priory ofthe Orange Tree. When I thought of
five hundred years previously, I thought, well, there's there's no way that

(19:18):
ship building is going to be quiteas advanced. So you're right in that
the countries are quite isolated. Imean, the closer countries obviously have a
fair amount of communication with each other. There's quite a lot of cultural exchange,
not so much with the countries thatare physically very far apart, because
especially in the world of the Rootsof Chaos, there is this huge sea
called the Abyss that is very verydifficult to cross, you know, even

(19:41):
for the modern ships of priory.So there just isn't you know, the
people on both sides of the worldjust really don't know a lot about each
other. Having said that, Idid want the myths and legends of each
of those countries to have a certainresonance and a little seed of truth at
least in each one, And theway I did this was by base most
of the religions on the magic systemof the books. So the magic system

(20:03):
in the Roots of Chaos is prettysimple. You know, there's one kind
of magic that comes from under theearth, which is fire magic. There's
one kind that comes from a periodof comet, which is star magic.
And to keep one another imbalance,except when they don't when something goes terribly
wrong. So in this case,the fire magic is currently out of control.
It's what causes the dreadmount to eruptand produce these fire breathing works.

(20:27):
But I thought, okay, well, how would each country integrate this magic
system into their beliefs somehow, becauseyou know, most religions and beliefs they
do have some kind of truth orsome kind of genuine observation in them.
So I mentioned, for example thatat this time period the series, they
believe in this religion that promotes theidea of balance and just balance in all

(20:49):
things. That makes sense because again, the whole magic system of the world
is is defined by balance or lackof it. So that made sense to
me, And yeah, that washow I did it. Really, I
just thought various ways in which eachcountry would interpret this fundamental truth at the
heart of their world. In hertwentieth year death came to the settlement the

(21:22):
drought lasted for months that year.The field workers pinned their hopes on their
well, but something had tainted thewater. As her old nursemaid vomited,
Unora stayed at her side, tellingher stories, stories of Pagetti, the
god. They all willed to return. The villagers took the body away.

(21:48):
They were the next to die.By the sixth day, only Unora was
left. She lay in the stubbleof the crop two, thirsty to fight,
and waited for the end. Andthen the sky opened. Rain touched
the ground that had long been adeathbed, a patter that became a downpour,

(22:15):
turning the dry earth dark and sweet. Unorda blinked away droplets. She
sat up and cut the rain inher hands, and as she drank she
laughed for joy. The storm leftas suddenly as it had come. Unorda
stumbled towards the creaking forest, soakedin mud from head to foot. For

(22:41):
days, she sipped from leaves andpuddles, finding little she could eat.
Though her legs shook and an oldbear stalked her, she kept on following
the stars. At last she cameto the right place, behind the trick
remains of a waterfall. The whitedragon. Pagatti slumbered, Pagatti, guardian

(23:07):
of AffA, who had once grantedwishes to those who paid a price.
Deep was their slumber. In thoseyears most had withdrawn into undersea caverns beyond
human reach, but some had goneto sleep on land. Though Zaki grieved
their absence, Disturbing them was thehighest of crimes. Only the Imperial family

(23:33):
had that right. I deserved tolive. The thought came like a thundercap.
She had known her worth since theday she was born. Exile had
beaten her into the dust, butshe would not stay there, not one
day more. She struck the bell. After centuries of silence, it told

(24:00):
the night into Pagati answered, it'scool, as you know. I watched
the god emerged from the cave,all the many coils of him. I
mean, what I really loved aboutThe original priority to Orangestry was the dragon

(24:22):
mythology, because you have the Westernmythology in all, like Saint George,
I mean, we all I've notnoticed even now when I was growing up.
And then the Asian dragons, whichare the ones that I had not
winged, the water dragons right,which is very much Asian. I mean
nagas. We call them nagas inright, And can you tell us a
little bit about your research into that, like how you kind of integrated some

(24:45):
of the Eastern and Western mythology intoyour countries as well. Sure, yeah,
absolutely so when I started with thelegend of Saint George and the Dragon,
like you say, and I wasreally fascinated when I looked into the
origins of that store. I've talkedabout it extensively. It's quite I'd probably
be able to talk about it foran hour. But essentially, the Saint

(25:06):
George that I grew up with,I grew up Christian, I went,
I was in the Church of England, and Saint George was this figure of
heroism and tolerance, and you know, his triumph over the dragon is portrayed
as this kind of ultimate act ofselfless heroism. So I knew that I
wanted to examine this legend, andthe more I looked into it, the
more I learned that the Saint Georgein the older stories is not a particularly

(25:30):
nice guy. His whole especially onestory I read, which was an Elizabethan
novel called The Renowned History of theSeven Champions of Christendom, he is actually
presented for me as quite an evilperson, and he's very intolerant of anyone
who essentially isn't a white Christian man. So I felt that in order to

(25:52):
properly deconstruct this story, I wantedto write something that celebrated all kinds of
people, that was a really diversestory about the kind of the merits of
cooperation. And I felt that ifthis was not a diverse well with lots
of diverse beliefs, and it wouldbe of failed reimagining of this legend that
I was trying to challenge. SoI decided, okay, I will have

(26:15):
the fire breathing dragons, and withthat I integrated a lot of kind of
their mythology that I grew up with, including biblical mythology where the dragon is
often represented as like a Satanic figure. I found it interesting the fact that
broadly speaking, like you say,in the West dragons tend to be fire
breathing and winged. Again, inthe East, it's the kind of wingless

(26:37):
water dragons who are mostly associated withbenevolence and luck, often or imperial,
the sort of the emperor, AndI just thought it would be interesting to
integrate that into a binary magic systemand think, okay, well, why
would that be two different kinds ofdragon than this world? And yeah,
it was. It was a reallyinteresting challenge thinking of the ways. For
example, why would the one kindof dragon and be more violent and breathe

(27:00):
fire, Why would the others bemore broadly peaceful. It's not it's not
something that it will necessarily apply acrossthe whole series, but I just I
thought, okay, well, whatif one of the magic systems was out
of control hence the fire magic,and so the dragons born of that magic
are destructive and chaotic by nature,whereas the water dragons are in harmony with

(27:22):
nature. And it was interesting exploringthat. In a Day of Fallen Night,
there's a conversation between Princess Dumai andan alchemist and they talk about whether
the water dragons are good or justkind of like neutral and balanced. So,
yeah, I really enjoy integrating mythologiesinto a magic system and trying to
make it make sense within that worldas well as our world. It's fascinating

(27:45):
to see the way that you've actuallyintegrated not just history. You've taken a
lot of history and you've you've actuallyinfused it in magic, and it really
brings to mind the way that youknow, the ancient world tended to think
of things I didn't understand as magic, right, So it's it's in a
way it makes sense that most ofthe things that we will be thinking about,

(28:07):
if you're talking about world events inhistorical terms, they might present it
as magic. Right. So ina way it makes sense that we write
historical fantasy because you know, itmight have been the way that people saw
the world at that time to bemagical. So can you talk a little
bit about how you bring the magicinto your stories. Do you start with

(28:27):
the magic system or do you startwith the history first? Yeah, so
the both of the books do integratea lot of real history. Actually,
like I love I think one dayI would like to write historical fiction,
but I'm such a perfectionist that Ifeel I would just be agonizing over it
for so long. I will doit at some point. But what I
love about fantasy is you can interactwith history without necessarily being one hundred percent

(28:51):
faithful to it. You can viewhistory through the lens of a magical world.
In terms of building the magic system, I say I started with this
pretty early, so obviously Like Isaid, it started with the legend of
Saint George, and I suppose theseed of the magic system was that story
I mentioned earlier, the Elizabethans storyby Richard Johnson, and there was a

(29:14):
detail in that that really fascinated me, which was that when George fights the
dragon, he does so underneath anenchanted orange tree. And I had not
come across this detail before in mysort of the more simplistic version of the
story. I knew, so Iknew I wanted to challenge Johnson, particularly
because I have various reasons that Idid not like the story he was telling,

(29:37):
and I thought, okay, well, why don't I take some aspects
from this story and again interpret itthrough a fantasy lens. So I had
to think, why would an orangetree protect a man from a dragon's fire?
That was when I came up withthe idea of the roots of the
tree going really deep into the worldand drawing up fire from the core,
creating some kind of magic, andthen the kind of acting like when you

(30:02):
put two of the same ends ofa magnet together. They are the same,
but they repel each other. Sothat's where I got the first seed
of the magic system. From andthen I suppose I built the history around
the magic system because it was suchan The magic system was what came first,
and then everything else followed. Characters, right, because this book is
very sprawling. That's like it's verythe Dickensian almost. There's so so many

(30:25):
different characters that you're following, andthere's a lot of unrequited love in this
book, I mean, and there'salso a lot of like you know,
like how people find extraordinary connection inmoments of great strife or great challenge.
Right, yea, So maybe tellus about some of your favorite characters in

(30:48):
this book and what would readers beable to anticipate. Okay, well,
yes, like you said, there'sa lot of characters in this book.
There are probably more characters than thereare in the Priory the Orange Tree,
because I knew this world so muchbetter and I just wanted to explore so
much of it, so I hadto have a lot more characters in order
to do that, and also tocreate the sense of scale of a tragedy

(31:11):
like The Great Sorrow, I neededto have a lot of people involved in
that. So there's very and alsothere is a character list for anyone who's
reading it. There is a characterlist at the back. It helps you
keep track, so some of myfavorites. Well us talk about the four
main characters first. So there aretechnically eight perspective voices in the Priory of
the Orange Tree, but four ofthe characters only tell the epilogue and the

(31:33):
prologue. The main bulk of thestory, like with Priory, is told
just by four characters, So inorder of age. The youngest character is
Glorian, who I've talked about earlier, but she is the young Princess of
Innis. She's fifteen at the startof the story, and I loved writing
Glorian because it allowed me to reconnectwith my fifteen year old self. I've

(31:56):
never written a young adult fiction,so I haven't actually written the character that
young before, and it was justlovely because Glorian has a lot of the
same feelings that I had when Iwas her age, Like I didn't want
to get married or have children.I still don't, but at the time,
you know, all my friends weresuddenly talking about boys and I just
wasn't feeling those things, and sobeing able to express those feelings through Glorian

(32:19):
just meant a huge amount to me. The next oldest character is Wolf,
who thinks he's about seventeen or eighteenat the start of the story, and
there's a reason that he doesn't knowexactly how old he is. I'm not
like Wolf at all. We're notsimilar people. But he was great fun
because I engaged a lot with folkloreand legends through Wolve's characters. So he

(32:39):
was inspired first of all by thisAnglo Saxon folk tale called the Green Children
of Wolpit, which was in anutshell. It was about these two children
that were found in a town calledWolpit. They claimed to have come from
this magical land under the ground,and they were just this huge mystery at

(32:59):
the time, and Wolf has alot of that mystery in him. Third
oldest character is Domi, who startsoff life as a god singer on a
mountain and say a key. Iloved writing Do My because she's very close
to me in age. I thinkI think I was actually the same age
as her when I started writing ADay of Fallen Night. She's twenty seven

(33:20):
at the beginning, and I lovethat because, first of all, I
don't think we see enough characters intheir late twenties and early thirties, like
now I'm thirty one, I'm reallyseeing like a sudden drop in the characters
who are the same age as me. And she has this discovery of her
sexuality at quite a late point inher twenties that I also had so a
lot of that I felt very connectedto her. And then the oldest character

(33:43):
of the four is Tanuva, whois fifty at the start. Tanuva,
for me, was, first ofall, I loved her so much because
she's she came into my head andI knew that she was both the happiest
and the saddest character that I'd evercreated, and I just loved having so
much of her life to draw on. I think I feel that older characters

(34:05):
who have a few decades behind themactually incredibly under used in fiction because you
have so much life experience to drawfrom, and it's like, you know,
you have decades that you can talkabout. And she's been in a
relationship with her partner esba of forthirty years and that was great and it
made for such fruitful ground for arelationship because you know, they can remember
things that happened, you know,fifteen twenty years ago, so that was

(34:27):
just wonderful, And again, Ido think that there is a really serious
lack of women over forty in fictionparticularly, And Tanuva was born of a
lot of conversations with my mum,who felt like she was just disappearing from
TV and books as she got older. And I use Tanuva to also talk
about things like menopause, which Idon't think get enough for tension in fiction.

(34:50):
And yeah, I just I hadenormous fun with the characters in this
book. I think it is quitea character driven book, perhaps even more
of a plot to more of acharacter than a plot driven book. In
some ways, I almost feel likePriory was more plot driven, but this
time I really delved into the charactersbecause again, the characters cannot really defeat

(35:10):
this enemy in the way they couldin Priory, which meant that alongside this
epic conflict, I had to createstakes and challenges within each of their lives
that weren't related to that ball that'sgoing on in the background, which meant
I had to do a lot morepersonal work with the characters. Each of
them has these unique hurdles that theyhave to overcome in their lives, various

(35:32):
complications in their relationships, you know, like you say, there's various instances
of unrequited love. There's the threatof whether anything is going to pull to
nuver and as far apart when theyhave this established relationship, you know,
glory, and it's fighting this factthat she doesn't want to get married.
And so yeah, I ended upfocusing a lot on their personal lives in

(35:54):
the conflict in the background in someways. No, yeah, because now
that you mentioned it right, itis actually following women in different stages of
their life, and even if you'rein your fifties, you still haven't gotten
all figured out. And I completelyagree with you. There are not enough
narratives out there that deals with womenat specific ages, Like there wasn't less

(36:15):
a lot of white a books aboutfirst love, and there's suddenly somewhere along
the line there will be like somebooks on motherhood and things like that.
But then as you get it abit older, and then you almost have
a coming of age, a secondcoming of age, you never have that.
No, I completely agree, andthat was why it was so important
to me to have so many womenof different ages and so many different perspectives

(36:37):
on motherhood. Like I have somecharacters who want to be mothers a lot,
some who are who don't want tobe mothers but are coerced into it,
some who don't want to be mothersand successfully never become mothers. I
was fascinated by that subject firstly becauseof personal experience, you know, as
I mentioned with Gloria, and I'venever wanted to get married or have kids,

(36:58):
and that's something I've really wrestled with, especially in my early twenties,
when it felt like there was alot of pressure on me to find a
partner, and people would say,oh, you know, what are you
going to do when you're old,and you know, what would you do
if you don't have kids? CZIwas just considered this enormously odd thing.
And I do think we're getting betteraccepting people who are of the same opinion

(37:20):
as me now, But it wasjust something I wanted to process. I
suppose I do a lot of personalcusthasis through my writing. At the same
time, I know a lot ofwomen who are amazing mothers, and I
wanted to celebrate them as well.I feel like society sometimes judges women whatever
our choice in the matter, soI just I wanted to vote that celebrated
all choices and presented them all asbeing valid, especially when he comes to

(37:45):
historically, women were considered, youknow, you had to do your duty
right to have the children, andthat was basically your main function in life,
you know, And that's something thatI thought there was explored very well
in this story as well. Andyou know, I think I think one
of the reasons is why people talkabout Priory before this and also A Day
for All the Night as feminist fictionis because you focus so much on the

(38:08):
different experiences of women, and differentwomen have different ways of handling different things.
It's we're not all the same people, are we And that's one of
the greatest things I think that youknow, we don't see enough of in
fiction. Just because you're a womandoesn't mean everyone has to identify everything you
do, and that that is tome, that is the most feminist thing

(38:30):
you can do, to say thatwomen can do whatever they want. They
don't have to be the right kindof woman. Can you talk a little
bit about how, you know,people say that, for example, Priory
was considered to be a very feministbook, and you know, it was,
and so I guess in a way, it's always day of Fallow Night
and that to me, maybe thatsays something about the industry, about how

(38:52):
we need to have strong women infiction and that, and you know,
having a book that has something likethat, it's just so celebrated. What
do you think it says about theindustry. Yeah, it's interesting, and
I think some of the reaction toit comes from the fact that if you
if you look at earlier books likeI don't Know The Lord of the Rings,
for example, you tend to getjust a few token females. You

(39:14):
know, it's never completely centered onjust female stories and lots of different female
voices, and it has been reallyinteresting to see some of the reactions to
priory. I don't usually look atreviews because you know, once you've published
a book, there's nothing you cangenerally do about it, so it doesn't
always help to look at negative reviewsof the book. But occasionally I've seen

(39:35):
men, particularly say things like,oh, you know, she's pandering to
women by writing this. There's toomany female characters. Where are the men?
But it's weird, like nobody saidthat about say, The Lord of
the Rings. You know, thefilms that the whole fellowship was made up
of men, and nobody batted aneyelid at that, because men are considered
the default person I feel by somepeople, and women are so kind of

(40:00):
you know, if you include toomany women, then you must be trying
to make a point or a statement, or it becomes inherently political in some
way. And I think this appliesto other groups as well. You know,
if you have a book that's focusedon gay people, for example,
people will immediately say, oh,you know, you're trying to write something
political here. It's like certain people'sexistence and presence makes something inherently political,

(40:22):
which I find really bizarre, butit's definitely something that's still going on.
I feel. So for me,writing a novel that is unapologetically focused on
women first of all, like yousay, allows me to show many different
perspectives, many different ways of beinga woman. And I just feel this
sense of defiance when when people speaklike this, because yeah, it doesn't

(40:46):
mean I'm trying to be political orwoke or make some kind of point if
I include lots of women in mybooks. I am a woman, so
in a way, my default narrativevoice is female. It's just what I
go to first. I do writemale characters, but it comes more naturally
to write from a female perspective,And yeah, I just I think that

(41:07):
there should be a place for thatin fantasy. I remember when I was
a kid and I was constantly lookingfor, you know, the woman in
the book or the film or thegame or I was playing or whatever,
and it was tended to be asmall number of female characters. And I
just think it's great to celebrate womenby writing books that are just focused on
our experience and the various you know, like you say, the different ways

(41:30):
that we experienced womanhood. Do youthink that is why? I mean lately,
especially in the last maybe decade orso, there's been a lot of
retellings or mythology, but from afeminine point of view, do you think
it's because finally, right like peopleare realizing that they're completely ignoring half of
the population and that we want toknow the story of the woman that is

(41:52):
behind Odysseus or you know that that'ssort of like idea that before it was
very much about the epic adventure thatmen go to, and there was very
few I remembered me and Dinavis,is that the reason why we probably love
Little as a prairie or we sortof are so much why we're younger.
It's because it followed a girl exploring, right, I mean, is this

(42:13):
do do you yourself find yourself wantingto retell certain mythologies like is there anything
you're eating to retell? Or theyare going to be fantasy based, like
how you're doing it? Well,you know, like O fame. Technically
Priori is a retelling. It is. It's a retelling of the legend of
George and the Dragon. And likeyou say, women are often sidelined in
fiction. We are the footnotes inour own stories a lot of the time.

(42:37):
And I think it's so fantastic thatthere has been this trend of writers
who are working to reclaim women's stories. I mean, I read the most
troubling statistic ones. I'm not surehow true it is, but I read
that women only occupy something like zeropoint five percent of all recorded history,
despite being half of the population,because our stories have not been considered worthy

(43:00):
of remembrance. And again, Icould write, you know, whole essays
on this subject. But I thinkit's great now that we are looking at
broadening women's stories from history and mythologyand giving them these whole novels that are
just dedicated to them, trying tofill the gaps in their stories. A
lot of the time, their storiesare filtered through the attitudes of the time,

(43:22):
you know, like Greek mythology,for example, has quite a lot
of misogyny in it that was reflectiveof the ancient Greek attitude towards women.
And yeah, it's it just isa really great movement. I have a
collection of these books at home thatI call my Library of Women, and
I just love looking at them.I feel like we have this this shared
heritage that we're working together to reclaim. So for me, my contribution so

(43:45):
far has been trying to dismantle thelegend of George and the Dragon and ask
the question, who was the Damoselthat Saint George rescued, Who is the
damosel in distress? And to tryto give her a story, because when
I read all these versions of SaintGeorge, you know, very really the
Damosel is given a name, butshe's not given much of a story beyond
that. And she is the reasonthat Saint George in some ways fights the

(44:07):
dragon, but she just doesn't reallyhave a story of her home. I'm
not sure if there's so I've I'vesigned with my publisher to write a story
that's influenced by the Greek goddess Iris, So that will be my first formal
kind of mythological retelling in some waysthat's actually set during that time. So

(44:29):
I was very like rainbows. Yes, I do like rainbows, yes,
and yes, it's guess it's alsokind of reflective of the queer content of
my books in some ways. Butyeah, it's very much is and I
love I love iridescence as well,so I'm really hoping that the cover is

(44:49):
going to be some kind of beautifuliridescent masterpiece, which I'm sure it will
be. But yeah, I was. I was just I'm not someone who's
gonna, you know, write tonsof Greek goddess retellings. I think this
is probably going to the only one. But I was really interested in Iris
when I read the Iliad because shedoesn't appear very much, but whenever she
does, she was always doing somethingthat really fascinated me, and I thought
she would be an interesting, unexpectedwindow to examine some of the other goddesses.

(45:15):
So I'm really looking forward to doingthat. I'm a little bit nervous
because I haven't you know, delvedinto Greek mythology at length before, and
it's a myth you know, it'sa body of mythology that's so many people
love and feel really passionately about.But yeah, for now, there's that,
and there's the roots of Chaos,which will keep you know, examining
the Saint George legend in various ways. That's awesome. First of all,

(45:38):
we've of course realized that you youare coming at it from a Western and
an Eastern mythology framework. But whatelse? What other cultures? I as
a reader, you're really this bookand you're thinking, hang on, do
I see hints of this culture?Here? Am I reading this? Am
I seeing this? Is this meantto be Japanese? Is is mest to

(46:00):
be Chinese? That's the kind ofthing that you're doing while you're really so,
can you, baby go into alittle bit about that. Which of
these cultures have you based on reallife examples? Yeah? Of course.
So what I do is each ofthe countries in the book has what I
call a touchstone, which is thereal life country that I loosely base the
country on. So Ini is basedon England, Isklin is kind of mostly

(46:27):
Spain, I would say Mentendon isa bit of a mix of the Dutch
Republic with some just various other influences, as like a little bit of the
Roman Empire with POMPEII. For example, the Eartha is mostly Iran, the
Lacier is the Kingdom of Congo,the pre colonial kingdom of Congo, Sepple

(46:49):
is Korea, Empire of the TwelveLakes is China, and Sayaki is Japan.
So the main references, and Iuse that for things like food and
clothing, language particularly as well.So the naming system of the books is
something that takes me quite a longtime. So when I was thinking about
how I was going to name thecharacters, I wanted to pay some kind

(47:10):
of homage to the countries that Iwas modeling each one on. But at
the same time, it felt abit odd to use real languages because this
is not the real world. SoI had to find some kind of balance
between those two things. So Iactually studied English language at literature at university,
and during my studies I looked atOld and Middle English, and the

(47:31):
chasm between Old English and modern Englishis huge. I mean, if you
put an Old English text in frontof a modern English speaker, they're these
incomprehensible. It's very, very difficultto understand. So I thought, okay,
well, why don't I base thenames of the places and people on
older forms of existing languages. Sothat's what I ended up doing. So

(47:51):
for example, Cross is Lucy basedon kind of Iceland Scandinavia, So I
use Old Norse for those names,Old English and Middle English that initial names
forgive me Old Japanese for the Sakenesenames. So that's yeah, that's how
I do it. I'm very carefulthat I have to think if I do
use something from the real world,it has to make sense in the context

(48:14):
of the roots of chaos world.I can't just take random things from each
country and plant them in there.There has to be a reason that that
could have organically happened or had apresence in this world. But yeah,
it was my way of I supposefighting just the attitude in the original Saint
George's story, which was just thiskind of aggressive, nationalistic, kind of

(48:36):
pro English set up. So Ijust really wanted to write something that wasn't
like that. M very cool.So you were saying that there will be
further stories, and there was somechaosk so there'll be more book set as
well. Yes, yes, Ihave actually sold a third book in the

(48:57):
series. Ideally I would I wouldlike to write a series of standalone novels
that can all work together to tella big, intergenerational story that spans several
centuries. So I don't want tosell them several books at a time because
I didn't really want to be tiedinto a deadline schedule for such massive books,
because they do take me a prettylong time to write, given size

(49:20):
and the research. And I alsohave another ongoing series, so I didn't
want to commit to more than oneat a time. But I have sold
a third book in the Roots ofChaos World, pretty likely to be another
prequel to the Priory of the OrangeTree. I'm torn between two different ideas
at the moment, so I'd liketo write them both, but it just
depends when I do them. Soone of them would be focused on the

(49:42):
period after the Great Sorrow, whichwas when the other kind of magic,
the star magic, became chaotic andit caused essentially a mini ice age,
and there was a lot of alot of a different kind of chaos was
produced. That's all I'll say,at the moment, it's kind of hi
to that at the end of aDay of Fallen Night, Glorian's aunt mentions
this legend of something called the WildWinter that's coming, and that would be

(50:07):
what the book would be about,or I would be going back even further
in history and showing how the magicsystem became unbalanced in the first place.
You know, what was the actthat caused that to happen and what were
the immediate consequences. So torn betweenthose two ideas, I think the Wild
Winter one probably makes a little bitmore sense, and that would be set

(50:27):
quite close to a day of FallenNight. So I thought it would be
interesting to learn about the fates ofsome of those characters, because I ended
up falling so deeply in love withthem in a way that I just didn't
expect, and I don't know ifI'm one hundred percent ready to let them
go yet. I think that's whatI liked about Priory and about this,
the fact that they are kind ofstand alone. Yeah, you know,
because because oftentimes you pick up abook and you know that it's going to

(50:49):
be a trilogy, or sometimes it'sa quadrology or quinthology, and always still
dying. Oh my god, there'sgoing to be another book, like a
fourth book, a fifth book,you know. So I think why both
of us love Priory so much isthat it was a stand alone and a
very satisfying stand alone book, youknow, in that sense there was there
was plenty in there to make atrilogy, but it was it was really
welcome that, you know, youput it all out at once, or

(51:12):
we didn't have to wait for thenext one and potentially forget from the story
in between. Right. Yeah,I feel the same as someone who likes
binging TV shows, like I hatewaiting every week for the new episode to
come out. So I did wantto. I thought that in a sea
of fantasies that do tend to beduologies and trilogies right now, it might
be cool to have just a standalone novel where, like you say,

(51:35):
you're not left on a cliffhanger atthe end, you do get the whole
adventure in one go. And therewas something really appealing about that to me.
So I'm yeah, I'm glad thata lot of people have responded well
to that, and it's exciting.I think it's an exciting way to approach
a series, because I also,like I said, have my other ongoing
series, which I also love,but that does go just you know,
consecutively, one book to the other. There's often a cliffhanger you have to

(51:59):
wait to find what happens next.So yeah, it's nice to have the
two series in such they're so differentin that respect, I think. I
think one of the questions I reallyfascinated by is whether or not you actually
had to leave out a lot ofthe book when you've finished writing it,
because you know, like you canimagine that you put so much into this

(52:20):
book that it could have been alot bigger than this. So can you
give us a little bit about whatyou've left out of the book? Yeah,
So the original draft of A Dayof Fall and Night was three hundred
and forty five thousand words, andfor context, the book as it currently
is is two hundred and ninety fivethousand words, so it was a pretty

(52:43):
significant difference. It would have beena huge book if I'd left that much
in. Weirdly, I don't thinkwe actually cut a lot of it.
My editor was very clever and thatshe just did a lot of small cuts,
so every scene would just have likea few sentences trimmed from it,
and that built up to a hugenumber of words. Actually, there was
only one scene that I remember actuallycutting out, which I had a bit

(53:06):
of a dilemma because it's quite hardwith four perspective characters. I have to
keep the timelines roughly together so thatthey're all moving at about the same pace.
Otherwise it gets confusing because you mighthave a character whose weeks ahead of
the others, and that that isjust a bit weird and unsettling for the
reader, I think. So Iwanted to keep them mostly together, and
I had to get Wolf to thisbattlefield at this particular time. The problem

(53:30):
was that he was a significant distancefrom this battlefield and I could not figure
out how to get him there,and it was causing a real issue.
So I ended up writing this slightlyridiculous scene that where Wolf manages to tame
a fire breathing dragon, which hasnever been done in the entire history of
the Roots of Chaos world, andhe rides in from Lacier to Innis,

(53:52):
And as soon as I sent itto my editor, she sent it back
like, what is this? Whatis happening? This is not completely broken
your own law by doing this likehe would be killed immediately, And I
said, I know, but Idon't know how to get him to this
battlefield. He's got to be allthe way in Innis, and I just
don't know how to get him there. Like the ship sound fast enough,

(54:12):
nothing is, but there's you know, he's not going to be able to
get a horse, so how arewe going to get him there? And
eventually I just had to go backto the drawing board and rejake the timeline
a bit. So I think Ijust I amended a couple of tanouvers scenes
and I yeah, I fixed itin the end. But yeah, that
does it does mean that we lostthe ridiculous scene with Wolf writing writing a
worm to Innis. That's that's sointeresting because you know, like we never

(54:37):
think of a we think of thebook as something that's complete and finished,
but that I think that's always afascinating look at how it's actually a work
in evolution, right, So yes, by the time we see the final
product, that's probably gone through alot of different changes. So yeah,
really it really has. And likeI said, like the course of events

(54:58):
was roughly the same. Yeah,there was there were some cuts, probably
unnecessary descriptions most of the time,where I was just lingering on how a
sunset looked or how somebody's gown looksor something. Okay, origin sturry,

(55:24):
then what what was? What wasthe bottle? They mean you want to
be a fantasy right them? Ohwow, great question. I don't think.
I don't think I've ever been askedthat before. I suppose the fantasy
writer I probably Sabriel by Garth Knicks, who's yeah, you've read it?
Okay, great? Um? Yeah, So Garth Knicks for anyone who doesn't

(55:45):
know, as an Australian author,and he's particularly famous for his Aborsen series,
which is you know about this charactercalled Sabriel who can use these bells
to control the dead. And beforethat I'd gone through a period where I
didn't really read fantasy because of thelack of focus on women. Basically,
I went to see The Lord ofthe Rings film. I absolutely loved it.

(56:07):
I was obsessed with the scene whereare when leads the na you know,
she gets Frodo away from the nascool. I went straight out to buy
the book and that scene doesn't happenin the book. It's not our when
who rescues Frodo and that really brokemy heart. I was so upset by
it, and I just didn't readfantasy for a long time. And Sabrielle
was the book that got me backinto that. And even I reread it

(56:30):
quite recently to see if it's stillheld up, and it just it really
does. I think Garth writes Sabrielleso wonderfully. Yeah, she's portrayed as
a really competent, great woman.Everyone just respects her for exactly who she
is. And yeah, so Ireally credit Garth with getting me back into
fantasy reading and therefore into fantasy writing. In terms of dystopian fiction, I

(56:53):
was so probably Margaret Atwood was themain inspiration, and also Mallory black Men,
who's UK author who wrote a bookcalled Nats and Crosses. Those were
the two earliest dystopian novels I read. And also with Margaret her The Handmaid's
Tale was what taught me about feminismin some ways. So yeah, my

(57:13):
own credit those authors as well.That's one on Dina's favorite authors all time.
Margaret. Oh, Yeah, she'sgreat. Yeah, she always said.
Whenever you watch her interviews, shealways sounds that she's she's in on
some kind of secret. Yeah,she's not telling you. She always looks.
She always says it's like a littlesmoked, like yeah, could be
a famous you know, everything isa little bit like like what is the

(57:37):
Injo Margaret? Yeah, I knowyou know she I met her once,
actually, and she she has themost remarkable way of speaking, Like she
never she never fills silences in theway that some people weren't when they're nervous,
Like they'll quickly try to fill hersilence, but she doesn't. She
just pauses and really thinks, andthen she comes up with something completely amazing,

(57:58):
and it was like it was bothvery unsettling as a nervous kind of
debut, but also inspiring, likeI aspire to speak the way she does.
What are some of the books you'recurrently reading? Let me see.
I recently read A Convenience Store Womanby Sayaka Morata, which I loved so
much. Is just such a funcelebration of being unusual and embracing yourself for

(58:22):
exactly who you are. It's areally short read. I'm sure a lot
of people listening have heard of it. You know, it's been an international
bestseller, rightfully, so I reallyreally loved that. I think. The
most recent book I read was TheLast Smile in sunder City by Luke Arnold,
which is a mix of urban fantasyand noir. And the main reason

(58:44):
I read that was because I didan event with Luke while I was in
Australia and he's also an actor inmy favorite TV show of all time,
Black Sales, so that it wasreally cool to get to do a panel
with him. Else I read recently, I feel like I've read a lot
of books recently. I did.Oh. I read The Battle Drum,
which is the sequel to The FinalStrife by Sarah La Refee, which is

(59:06):
a great epic fantasy about a worldwhere people are divided by the color of
their blood. Really enjoyed that.It's got a lot of amazing twists and
yeah, it really kept me onmy toes the whole time. What I
mean either then, let maybe theauthors you mentioned. Is there a book
that is there any book that youalways push into people's heads, that you
always got that you have to readthis book which change your life. There's

(59:30):
quite a few. Actually. Ispend a lot of time recommending books.
My Instagram is probably like fifty percentbook recommendations. At this point. A
book, a recent book I'm pushingon everyone is called Bitterthorn by Kat Done,
which is coming out in May,and it's a sapphic reimagining of Beauty
and the Beast, which is solyrically written, and it Kat writes about

(59:55):
nature in such an exquisite way inthe book, like there's so many beautiful
descriptions of forest and plants, andI really love that one. What else
do I really really love? There'sso many books in my head, and
whenever someone asked me this question islike, I forget every book I've ever
read in my life. I'm thesame when I still asked this question of

(01:00:15):
our office. Yeah, it's it'sfunny, I think, yeah, just
because I've read so many. Ithink a real master class in fantasy.
Actually is the fifth season my inkge Emison, which Yeah, it's so
wonderful I was. I loved itso much that I haven't read the sequels
yet because I don't want it tobe over, so I'm just gearing up

(01:00:37):
to read the next one. Butit's it's such a it's just so brilliantly
done in terms of every single layerof the world has been really carefully considered,
just from you know, the societyto the language to the map.
It's is just also perfectly done.It's I find it. It's one of
those fantasies that are really challenging,yes, to read as well, right

(01:00:59):
and like it, I mean,as you see, like something that keeps
you on your doors, Like ifyou don't be attention, you just like,
oh, why what happened there?Yeah, because it's it's the way
that it's told in terms of theperspective is so interesting. So yeah,
it is. It's definitely a bookthat requires an intense amount of concentration.
And it did take me a littlewhile to get into it initially because there's

(01:01:20):
so much information to absorb at thebeginning. But once I was into it,
I just couldn't stop reading. Ithink it's magnificent. What genres do
you most enjoy reading and which doyou avoid? Weirdly, the answer to
both of those questions is fantasy.So I love reading fantasy so much,
and it is the genre I primarilyread. I do tend to avoid fantasies

(01:01:44):
that cover similar themes to mind,so you know, I don't read anything
really about clairvoyance, for example,because that's support the Bone season is about.
I'm a little bit wary of dragonfiction because of priory is. I
mean, I will read them sometimes, but I get nervous that something in
there might be similar to something inone of my books, and therefore I'll

(01:02:05):
feel like maybe I can't write aboutthat anyway. It's a bit complicated.
It's like this very specific author paranoiathat I know quite a lot of us
feel like. It's just this fearof finding something that's similar to an idea
that you have. So yeah,it's but I can't not read fantasy because
I love it so much. Ilike historical fiction as well. I mean,
I'll pretty much pick up anything ifif it comes with a great recommendation,

(01:02:28):
you know, Like like I say, I just read Convenience Store Woman,
which is like contemporary humor, sothat's quite different from what I would
normally read. But I you know, I saw it in the store and
I thought it looked interesting, andI picked it up and I loved it.
So I don't limit myself in termsof genre as I read. Yeah,
like Morata is a very interesting writethem. Yeah, some of the

(01:02:50):
other books really good to places thatyou don't expect them to go to read
more. Yeah, yeah, yeah, which is why I kind of like
Japanese fiction sometimes because the point ofview is so so different. Yeah,
but it's very much there, youknow, and they never know where where
a story is going to go.Um okay. So you know, like
I think recently because maybe because thereare a lot more TV seriess, a

(01:03:15):
lot more movies there are. Imean when I was growing up, there
are very few fantasy movies. Youknow, maybe because of CGI and all
that, and in some ways fantasyhas become a bit more mainstream, but
there is still that kind of ideathat if you want to win a huge
prize, I mean, either thanthe Hugo Hugo and Nebula and all that,
you're writing something that is more literary. It's like how they don't really

(01:03:38):
see fantasy as something necessarily literally likesci fi or speculative fiction. Right,
Yeah, that's true. But Imean for yourself as a fantasy right then,
I'm always intrigued to find out,like, um, what what does
fantasy speak to you? And whydo you think it's very important as people
in a culture to actually probably pickup a fantasy book. Yeah, it's

(01:04:00):
a great question. And I thinkit is a shame that there is still
a bit of a stigma around fantasy. I mean, for example, we
have like the Women's Prize in theUK, and I've I don't think I've
ever seen a fantasy novel or evenshortlisted for that. It does seem that
it's not considered serious fiction still insome circles, which I think is very
odd, because fantasy can be veryliterary. I mean, I'm lucky.
You know, my UK publisher hasthe priory. The Orange Tree is published

(01:04:25):
under their literary fiction imprint, BloomsburyCircus, so they have always treated my
work as being of that literary fiber, I suppose, which I've always been
very grateful for. I'm so sorry. What was the question I focused on?
I focused on the prize part andI forgot the rest. I mean,
why do you think somebody who readsa lot of literary refeature, why

(01:04:46):
should they pick up a fantasy?Why? Why did dust us speak to
us as a people and culture likewhy is it import? Then? Now,
well, it's interesting. I mean, arguably the first stories we ever
wrote as a society were fantasy becauseit's mythology and a lot of the times
mythology has fantastical elements to it,so it is something that clearly speaks very
deeply to the human race as awhole. I think fantasy for me is

(01:05:10):
great because, like I said earlier, you can use it to reflect on
real world issues and to engage withhistory, to engage with real life,
and I think that's it's great thatthe genre is so malleable like that,
and often you can talk about thingsthat you might not feel comfortable talking about
if they were in the real world, or they might feel a bit overly

(01:05:33):
preachy, for example, if youtalked about them directly. And I think
fantasy is useful as providing a mirroron the real world without actually being real
world fiction. At the same time, fantasy is the genre of possibility,
and I love that about it,because only your imagination is the limit.

(01:05:55):
And I think there's something really wonderfulabout that, Like the wildest concepts that
the human imagination can come up withis where fantasy. Each where fantasies,
it's expressed in the genre of fantasy, and I think there's something just really
unique and wonderful about the fact thatfantasy combines both of those qualities. You
can have a fantasy that's incredibly closeto the real world, that's virtually identical

(01:06:15):
to the real world. There's somethinglike my Bone season series, which is
certain the real world that just hasa few key differences, or you can
go completely the other way and createan entirely different world. And the fact
that it is such a wide ranginggenre, I feel that if people read
it, perhaps there would be abroadening of imagination, and we can also
think about how the world could be. So, for example, in a

(01:06:39):
fantasy novel, you could present aworld where there is no sexism, for
example, And I think there's somethinggreat about that. It's you know,
do we have a responsibility even asfantasy writers, instead of just showing how
the world is? Can we presentpossibilities of what the world could be?
I love that answer. That wasbrilliant, especially when it comes to fantasy.

(01:07:00):
It feels like, you know,sci fi in a way it has
become more legitimate. Maybe in recentyears people you know, there's there's there's
some value in examining sci fi.But yeah, fantasy still seems to be
out there. It seems to beum to be claimed by more by people
who are who are looking for escapismrather than engaging with the world. And

(01:07:24):
I love that you put all theseelements in there to show that, you
know, it may be a bookthat has dragons in it, but that
doesn't mean it's not something that theywill teach you a little bit about,
you know, the way we lookat the world. And yeah, that's
one of the things I really lovedabout A Day for All and Night thank
you. Yeah, I think itfantasy gives you permission to dream, which
I think is a wonderful thing.And there's a quote from Tolkien. I'm

(01:07:46):
paraphrasing it, but the way hetalked about the attitude towards fantasy was I
think he compared it to people thinkingof escapism as like desertion in the army,
where the soldier runs away and that'sconsidered an act of coward ice,
and the escapism is somehow an actof being cowardly and trying to escape the

(01:08:08):
real world. But he compared itmore to somebody trying to break out of
prison, and jail break is oftenconsidered an admirable form of escape. You
know, if if the hero who'sbreaking out of jail is a good person,
that's considered admirable in the way thatdesertion is not and I think he
thought of fantasy more like breaking outof the prison of the real world rather

(01:08:30):
than trying to flee or hide fromit. That's brilliant, that's just wonderful.
I just want to know what hasbeen a cool or crazy thing a
fan ever did for you. Ialways kind of intrigue on fandom. I'm
trying to think of I think thestrange. The strangest thing I was ever
us to do was asked to signsomebody's underwear, which was a lot of

(01:08:57):
authors had done it, so Idid it too. I didn't want to
be the person who spoiled the fun. But yeah, the more I think
about it, the stranger that actuallywas. Generally it's it's completely lovely.
I get a fan art, whichis wonderful. I've had people get tattoos
of quotes or you know, illustrationsfrom the boat, which is wonderful.
I've had a few people in Australiaactually they asked me if I could draw

(01:09:21):
a doodle for them to get tattooed, and I was desperate for them not
to do this because I am notan artist. I have never claimed to
be an artist, and I thinkI drew the worst flower that anyone has
ever drawn on earth. But yes, so that that was interesting slightly.
Again, I would not advise themto go through with it, but I

(01:09:42):
was very touched that they asked me. Nonetheless, Oh, I mean I
think the Defense as some of themost devoted fens out there. Yes,
no, I think that's true.It's it's it's a really lovely community.
Okay, shall we let Samantha geton her merry wee. Thank you so
much for that, Samantha. Thatwas that. We learned so much from

(01:10:02):
you. It was just lovely.Talking to you my pleasure. And thank
you so much for having me andfor doing your episode on Priory. I
really appreciate it. Thank you.Have a good tour the rest of your
tour. I think you're still doingstuff in Singapore. Yes, I'm doing
Singapore for another two days after this, which is so much fun. I've
never been to Singapore before, soit's really cool to be here. You

(01:10:27):
need to come down to Kale andkl next time. I know. I'm
going to ask them to see ifthey'll send me. I just I would
just love to go to more places. I love traveling, so that'd be
awesome. Oh that's awesome. Yes, think of us next time you come.
If you're in this region. We'dlove to talk to you again.
Oh absolutely, I really hope Ican. Bye bye. Whoa Dare you

(01:10:50):
have it? This is such goodstuff, especially for us fantasy nerds.
Yeah, so we hoped you reallyenjoyed that conversation we had. Oshannon,
What a fantastic mind. Why doyou think of the book, Diana,
What are your personel takeaways from it? You know, I mean, it's
it's really great to get into thehistory and stuff, like you think about

(01:11:13):
what it's like to live in acompletely different world. I mean, when
you talk about fantasy, you're alwaystaken out of the world that we're in
right now, right, But somuch of history feels like a different world,
like an alternative world, because youknow, the things they were facing,
the kind of situations that were in, the environments they were in is

(01:11:33):
so completely different, which is whyI think there is that parallel. You
can use fantasy to reflect back onyour own life. And She's She's situated
in this kind of situation where youhave all these different empires coming together,
and it feels like it was sucha crucial part of history, but we

(01:11:53):
know nothing about it, Like,we have absolutely no idea what it was
like to live through in that time. And that's one of the great things
about authors like this, who bringthat history back to us so that we
can read it and live in it. And that's what's so great about books
like these. Yeah, yeah,I know what you mean. Like,
for instance, I like the partof the interview where she did say the

(01:12:15):
reason this is Sech five hundred yearsprior to the Priory or the Orange Tree,
where by that time, in away, travel is more common,
people are more connected, and she'ssetting it in a time where people don't
really know what's on the other sideof the sea in that sense, because
sea travel is incredibly dangerous. Technologyhas not caught up. I mean,

(01:12:36):
yeah, they have dragons, butbut but it's sort of like the relationship
that they have with dragons is abit tenuous, you know, so you
know, like you can't have youhave air flight, but it's not very
reliable. So I kind of likethat. I kind of like that she
gave these limitations and then she seeswhere the story takes it. And I

(01:12:58):
also feel that the world was verylittle in I guess in a way,
it was coming back into a worldat both you and I have read before.
The only thing about it is thatit took me a while to get
into the book because I guess atthe back of your head you're always trying
to think, should I remember this, Do I know this? You know,
like because you've read Priory, right, and it's been like two or

(01:13:18):
three years since we read Priory.So yeah, so I guess. But
once you really once the story reallypicks up, it really does take you
on a journey. So I wouldrecommend it for people who love fantasy and
love dragons, just love an epickind of sweeping tail. Yeah. Like,
well I did say all that aboutabout history and stuff like that,

(01:13:39):
right, So, but I thinkit's a great escapist read. It really
is. You kind of like youget lost in the situations of these people
and what it's like. You know, like if you were caught up in
all this, you don't realize it'sworth sweeping events at that time, right.
She has kind of like like apandemic going on as well, so

(01:14:00):
you kind of feel that, likeyou know, that sense of urgency as
well, because you get it becausewe just lived through that right, Yeah,
so people yeah, yeah, andthen and then there's this this like
people always say, like, youknow, the thing about fantasy is it's
got dragons in it, it's gotmagic in it, so you know,
it's not real. And that's whysome people dismiss fantasy. They think that,

(01:14:23):
you know, like you know,it's just it's just like, um,
like you're you're, you're, you'rekind of going on with the whole
kind of mythology kind of thing,and we know that that's not real anymore.
But how to think about how weall felt during the pandemic and how
it was like there's so many,so many things of going on that we
didn't understand, and there was thissense, whole sensation of like, you,

(01:14:45):
the world isn't what you think itis. And and you know,
back then people didn't know the differencebetween between like what was real and what
was not because you just hear thingsand you don't have a lot of such
sources of information, you don't havea lot of people experts or anything that
of course you're got to believe instuff like dragons, right, because of

(01:15:08):
course it's gonna feel like magic whenthings happen, when when people heal you
like, so that's the kind ofthing like that, you have to believe
that. U in a different situation, you'd see it as magic as well.
You believe in dragons as well,because otherwise what would be this great
killing force that's going around the world. Yeah. Absolutely. Also I can't

(01:15:31):
wait for her Irish book, youknow, like I like the fact that
she's ticking up a Greek retelling ofsorts of a lesser goddess. Anyway,
I guess let's I think we shouldend this show. Thank you for listening
everybody. There will be more episodescoming up in July and we might finally
finish season six. We're stilling seasonsix. Dina will be interviewing on What

(01:15:56):
When Sarah's Man Come and Books onJuly the fifteenth at eleven am, so
we'll be talking to her about hercollection of stories in My Mother Patu.
So get your tickets if you haven'talready. Thanks to all our patrons for
sticking around, and of course bookAccess for being season six sponsors. Follow
us on all our social media accountsat two bookgets Talking on Facebook, TV

(01:16:18):
and he Books on Instagram and TDNTpot on Twitter. You can also reach
out to us at bookletstalking at gmaildot com. We do on occasion check
our emails on this to God everybody. This episode is produced by Stephanie On
and edited by her and myself HannyAhma and I'm Diana. Y'all. We
leave you with this quote from oura servatory from his book Strings of Silver.

(01:16:41):
No, I would not want tolive in a world without dragons,
as I would not want to livein a world without imagining. But that
is a world without history, andthat is a world without things, which
is very impropriate because I just startedreading his new book. Oh nice special
Thanks to Definitely Book we are hookingu up and Samantha Shannon for spending some

(01:17:02):
time with us. Have a greatone, fols bye m