An Interview With Ian Benke
Center the characters. We remember stories about people. Action and adventure, fantastic creatures, and other worlds are enjoyable aspects of fantasy but when it comes down to it, we remember the characters most. What did they care about? Whom do they love (or hate)? What decisions do they make? The answers to those questions are what will drive the plot and also keep readers invested in the story.
Science Fiction and Fantasy are hugely popular genres. What does it take for a writer today, to write compelling and successful Science Fiction and Fantasy stories? Authority Magazine started a new series called “How To Write Compelling Science Fiction and Fantasy Stories”. In this series we are talking to anyone who is a Science Fiction or Fantasy author, or an authority or expert on how to write compelling Science Fiction and Fantasy.
As a part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Lisa Stringfellow.
Lisa Stringfellow writes middle grade fiction and has a not-so-secret fondness for fantasy with a dark twist. Growing up, she was a voracious reader, and books took her to places where her imagination could thrive. She writes for her twelve-year-old self, the kid waiting to be the brown-skinned hero of an adventure, off saving the world. Her debut fantasy A Comb of Wishes will be published on February 8, 2022 by HarperCollins/Quill Tree Books. It was selected as an ABA Indies Introduce title for Winter/Spring 2022 and Lisa received the inaugural Kweli Color of Children’s Literature Manuscript Award in 2019 for the novel manuscript. Her work often reflects her West Indian and Black southern heritage. Lisa is a middle school teacher and lives in Boston, Massachusetts, with her children and two bossy cats.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive into the main focus of our interview, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you share a story about what first drew you to writing over other forms of storytelling?
I come from a creative family. When he was young, my father painted beautiful landscapes and portraits in oil and also wrote songs. My brother inherited my dad’s artistic talent and has a degree in illustration. In middle school, kids used to pay him twenty-five cents apiece for his comic drawings and he had a little art business. My mom put a stop to it when she found out, but I was always a bit jealous!
I’m certainly not a visual artist like my dad or brother, but eventually, I discovered that my creativity shone through words. I’ve always loved to read and enjoyed writing poetry and stories growing up. The support and encouragement I received from my teachers and others helped me realize that the things my brother could do with ink and paper, I could do with words and sentences. It was then that I began to think of myself as a writer.
You are a successful author. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?
Patience, persistence, and curiosity. As a teacher, I would say these traits are important for any learner, and I definitely see myself as an active learner in my journey to publication.
Patience is a trait that anyone who wishes to be traditionally published has to acquire early on. Not only is publishing a slow industry but before you even become entrenched in it, there is work to be done that requires patience. When I first decided to pursue publication, I had to learn how it worked and develop my craft as a writer. Even though I was a reader and an English teacher, I soon learned that there were skills that I needed to develop. I sought out knowledge through workshops, conferences, and professional organizations. I joined critique groups and learned how to give and receive feedback. Patience helped me slow down and make sure my work was ready for professional consideration so that I did not waste opportunities by being overeager.
Persistence helps you keep going when those inevitable rejections appear. The first time I submitted my work for critique in a workshop I received harsh feedback from the instructor that included, “I simply mean to share some insight you’ll never get from a form rejection, though you might get it from a reviewer, and I’d like to save you from that public torment.” Ouch! It really stung and made me reevaluate whether I had the skills to become a published author someday. Fortunately, a kind classmate encouraged me to shake that feedback off and keep working, and I pushed on.
Lastly, curiosity and a willingness to learn are essential. As I tell my students, we need to learn to read like a writer. When I look at a passage that I love in someone else’s writing, I ask questions. How did the writer make me feel the emotions that I did? What craft moves are they making? We learn from experience and by study. Reading and asking questions about the books we read can help us grow as writers.
Can you tell us a bit about the interesting or exciting projects you are working on or wish to create? What are your goals for these projects?
I’m currently working on my second middle grade book which will be another stand-alone fantasy novel. I like to call it my “princess in a tower” story, but it won’t be like other fairy tales readers might imagine.
My hope is that it will be an exciting book and one that empowers young readers to be brave and stand up for what is right.
Wonderful. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. Let’s begin with a basic definition so that all of us are on the same page. How do you define sci-fi or fantasy? How is it different from speculative fiction?
Speculative fiction is an umbrella term that covers stories that include an imagined reality that differs from our own. It is broad and encompasses many sub-genres.
Science fiction and fantasy fall within speculative fiction. I see science fiction as a genre that blends science facts and imagined worlds and/or time periods, whereas fantasy may rely more on magic, creatures, and other or alternate realities.
It seems that despite countless changes in media and communication technologies, novels and written fiction always survive, and as the rate of change increases with technology, written sci-fi becomes more popular. Why do you think that is?
Fiction helps us understand ourselves and the world around us. Science fiction has been around for hundreds of years. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, recognized by many as the first science fiction novel, is a book that details man’s quest to recreate life through science. I’m not sure that sci-fi and fantasy are more popular than it has been in the past–I think it has always been popular–but I do think it is more important.
Science fiction and fantasy help readers explore deep issues in meaningful ways. They can stretch the imagination and take us to fantastic worlds or alternate times, but they also ground us in what is real and what makes us human. For the middle grade and young adult audiences, they can help young people ask questions about society and consider the world they want to live in. An example is Internment by Samira Ahmed, a near-future novel that considers what the United States might be like if a Muslim ban were to be imposed. The novel reflects on the history of government-sanctioned internment camps for Japanese Americans during WWII and poses an alternate future in which that history is repeated.
The imaginative leaps that speculative fiction allows give readers glimpses into other worlds that often have much to say about our own.
In your opinion, what are the benefits to reading sci-fi, and how do they compare to watching sci-fi on film and television?
Print and film are different mediums, and we relate to them in particular ways. I love the ability to use my imagination when reading a work of science fiction or fantasy and to immerse myself in the author’s created world. When reading, we must suspend our disbelief and accept the truth of the text based on the craft of the writer.
Film requires another type of effort. Our eyes and ears take in what has been imagined for us, but other storytelling decisions help keep us in the story, particularly if done well. Film is simply a different kind of storytelling, one that is mediated by the choices of a director, cast, and crew.
I love both books and movies based on science fiction and fantasy, but I will always appreciate the freedom inherent in reading a story. The picture in my head is under my control and my imagination is shaped by the past knowledge and experience that I bring to the page.
What authors and artists, dead or alive, inspired you to write?
I love rereading the work of Virginia Hamilton. She is a respected elder of African American storytelling and the first African American to win the Newbery Medal. The stories she collected and retold in books like The People Could Fly sparked my imagination. As a teacher, I later read The House of Dies Drear and admired her ability to weave the past and present into a ghostly mystery.
If you could ask your favorite Science Fiction and Fantasy author a question, what would it be?
I’d love to ask someone like Neil Gaiman a question about worldbuilding, such as “What is the most important aspect of creating a believable imagined world for readers?”
We’d like to learn more about your writing. How would you describe yourself as an author? Can you please share a specific passage that you think exemplifies your style?
In my writing, I often use sensory details to get close to my character’s emotions. Sights, sounds, tastes, smells, all help the reader to feel what is real and important at the moment.
In A Comb of Wishes, the protagonist Kela has been struggling with the recent death of her mother. In this scene, an orange shard of sea glass has mysteriously appeared on her dresser. Orange is a rare sea glass color and one that completes the “rainbow” that Kela and her mother had been collecting before her mother’s death.
“A sparkle of orange blinked from the dresser.
Ophidia’s sea glass necklace peeked over the edge. Proof that everything she remembered had happened. Her doubts about the nighttime vanished but not her unease.
The final piece of her mother’s rainbow.
The sea glass burned in Kela’s hand. An ember she couldn’t let go. She rubbed her fingers along its uneven surface, memorizing every translucent ridge and edge. When she was small, she did this to Mum’s face. Tracing her fingers over mouth and nose, cheekbones and eyes.”
Based on your own experience and success, what are the “Five Things You Need To Write Compelling Science Fiction and Fantasy Stories?” If you can, please share a story or example for each.
Ask big questions. Many science fiction and fantasy stories are based on the question, “What if?” It could be a question that changes the mechanics of our current world, such as, “What if humans could fly?” or it might be something philosophical, such as, “What if we were born knowing when we will die?” When writing, consider how the “big question” impacts all elements of storytelling, from the characters and setting to the dialogue and plot.
In my novel A Comb of Wishes, the big question is “What if you had the chance to wish for anything?” My character Kela grieves the loss of her mother, and her wish to bring her mother back from the dead is inevitable. The reality of that choice and the possibility of such magic existing ripple throughout the story.
Center the characters. We remember stories about people. Action and adventure, fantastic creatures, and other worlds are enjoyable aspects of fantasy but when it comes down to it, we remember the characters most. What did they care about? Whom do they love (or hate)? What decisions do they make? The answers to those questions are what will drive the plot and also keep readers invested in the story.
My novel is a fantasy about a girl making a wish on a mermaid’s comb, but at a deeper level, it’s about what the girl and the mermaid learn about each other and themselves.
Make the setting essential. Setting should not be a backdrop to a story. The place and time in which your characters live should feel essential and operate in support of the rest of your cast, almost as another character.
A Comb of Wishes is set in the Caribbean and could not be set anywhere else. The history of the place, the vibrancy of West Indian culture, and the oral storytelling traditions are integral to the story. If I tried to relocate my characters and recreate the plot in another world, it would all unravel. The setting scaffolds and connects each element in an interdependent relationship.
Decide the rules of your world. Whatever truths you decide about your created world, make sure you are consistent. If magic exists, consider who can wield it and why? What costs does it have?
In my book, mermaids may grant wishes to humans. That is an idea handed down through folklore, but I wanted to give structure to the relationship. In A Comb of Wishes, wishes are a necessary exchange–granting them is payment for something important the seafolk have taken.
Deciding on these rules and then thinking about the conflicts that can arise when they are broken add depth and suspense to a story.
Be willing to experiment. Writing craft is rife with adages. “Write what you know,” “Show don’t tell,” “Write every day.” Most of those come from solid experience but writers eventually learn that there are no “rules” when it comes to writing.
In middle grade, one of the “rules” is not to have adults as point of view characters. A Comb of Wishes is told in the dual points of view of twelve-year-old Kela and Ophidia, a 300-year-old mermaid. I went back and forth on whether to include the scenes from the mermaid’s point of view but eventually realized that those scenes were what the story needed.
We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Entertainment, Business, VC funding, and Sports read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US, with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this, especially if we both tag them 🙂
As a debut author, I’d love to talk with some of the masters of Black speculative fiction about how they develop stories and build their craft. Someone like N.K. Jemison would be a dream to talk to and learn from.
How can our readers further follow your work online?
Readers can follow me on Twitter and Instagram @EngageReaders and can visit my website http://lisastringfellow.com
Thank you for these excellent insights, and we greatly appreciate the time you spent. We wish you continued success.
Author Lisa Stringfellow On How To Write Compelling Science Fiction and Fantasy Stories was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.