Julia Bodwell: Hey reader, welcome back to another episode. I'm your host, Julia Bodwell, and joining me today is Loretta Chefchaouni author of The Lustrous Dark, a sweeping YA fantasy for fans of Sabaa Tahir and Guillermo del Toro, which was inspired by a Moroccan folktale in which a young midwife's apprentice rises up to take back the power that's been stolen from women. Welcome, Loretta. Thank you so much for being here.
loretta: Thank you so much for having me, Julia.
Julia Bodwell: So congratulations on your book. this is your debut. Can you tell us a little bit more about the Lustrous Dark?
loretta: Sure. The Lustrous Dark is a lush fantasy set in a fairy tale world full of monsters and magic and it also tackles real world struggles such as addiction, oppression, and fraught mother daughter relationships. It follows the story of Shay, who is a young midwife's apprentice, and Shay's mother is addicted to snow, which is a drug that temporarily reawakens an ancient magic in women that's believed to have died out. But this drug has devastating side effects. So Shay really wants to get her mom clean. But her mom abandons her in a haunted forest where to survive she has to seek safety with a band of ghouls and from there she begins to learn the truth about how Women's magic was stolen and the powerful men who pose a danger to all of the women in her realm.
Julia Bodwell: It's such an intricate story. There's so many there's so many layers to it. And I also think it's very it would be good for any time of year, but it's especially good for this time of year. I feel like we're we're going into, you know, fall, spooky season, you know, this it has a sort of like dark tinge to it. Where did you come up with this idea?
loretta: I've always loved fairy tales and folklore, so it was no surprise that I stumbled upon this blog post and it was actually a parenting blog of all things, but the post was about
Julia Bodwell: my gosh.
loretta: a Moroccan version of Snow White. So it's a folktale
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: called The Jealous Mother, and it's in a book of folktales, Moroccan folktales by Jalali El Kadori. And I immediately went and checked out this book from the library and devoured it. And all of the tales were are really dark. like European fairy tales, like we don't exactly consider them cozy, but Moroccan folktales, like,
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: put the Grim brothers to shame.
Julia Bodwell: Okay, all right.
loretta: but I kept coming back to the Jealous Mother. There were a few things that drew me to this particular story, so one is that the character is raised by a midwife and that really resonated with me because I have experience with working as a doula and a lactation
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: consultant and I thought that would be something really interesting to incorporate into a novel. And another thing was the creepy elements, such as instead of having seven dwarves, we have seven ghouls. and immediately I was like, that would be really fun. Like I could do a lot with that.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: But I didn't know right away what I wanted to bring to the story on like an emotional and personal level. So I put it on my list of projects that I might work on in the future. And then
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: a while later I was having a peer group discussion with my writing group and it was the consensus of my peers that their real life relationships with their mothers would seep into the their fictional characters' relationships with their mothers. And I I realized that I had been doing the opposite and I had been writing the mother that I wished that I had. So like just at that moment, like on a gut level, I felt like I was ready to interrogate that and Shay's story just clicked into place.
Julia Bodwell: Okay, this is like a light bulb moment for you.
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: that's great. so why did you choose to make it young adult instead of adult? 'Cause like you said, I mean, grim most people are familiar with grim fairy tales and those are they're very grim, they're very dark, and you said this is almost even darker, so what made you decide to make it young adult?
loretta: Well, I'm really drawn to young adult novels, because I feel like more so than other genres, they really focus on the character development. And, you know, teenage years are a time when all of the emotions are like amped up to the nth degree so as a reader, I really read books for that emotional journey that the story is gonna take me on.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: you know, which is to say that I really wanna be devastated. but yeah, my
Julia Bodwell: Who doesn't? It's like who who doesn't want their heart ripped out and stomped all over?
loretta: Right? but yeah, my own teenage years were really difficult and so I think that writing for teens really aligns with my purpose as a writer. And about that, the Left Strasdark is actually the fifth book that I wrote. So I have four manuscripts that are unpublished. So
Julia Bodwell: Okay. Wow. Okay.
loretta: I had written these four books without knowing why I was writing and it was at a writing retreat at Boyd's Mills, which is formerly called the Highlights Foundation in Pennsylvania.
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: And it was there that I finally had the time and space to put my writing purpose into words. So I remember the exact exercise that we were working on when this happened. And if any writers who are listening, if you get a chance to go to Boyd's Mills, definitely go because it is such
Julia Bodwell: Do it. Okay.
loretta: a magical place and they really make writers feel so nurtured and because of that and because you feel so safe there it really is conducive to exploring deeper emotions and a lot of things tend to come to the surface in an environment like that. So what I real
Julia Bodwell: Okay. So it really helped you kind of pull out everything.
loretta: Yeah, so what I realized was that Books had really been a lifeline for me growing up in what I would call a traumatic environment. And so I want my stories to be that same space, safe space for a young reader who, you know, might be going through a crisis or might just feel alone in whatever it is that they're going through.
Julia Bodwell: I think that's such a it's such a great point, and especially like you were saying, young people they need these stories, you know. So I'm ex as someone who who loves YA, I'm I'm excited that it's YA. I was just curious, you know, why why why why YA?
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Why young adult? So you said you have four manuscripts, unpublished manuscripts. Do you ever see yourself doing anything with them? Or are those kind of just like they live in a drawer and that's where they'll stay? Or is it something that you might revisit any of those?
loretta: I don't know. I mean I have a a couple of them that are really close to my heart. but at the same time I have so many new ideas that I wanna explore as well, so
Julia Bodwell: Yeah. The writer's dilemma is like you have so many ideas and not nearly enough time to write them all down, I'm sure.
loretta: Right.
Julia Bodwell: so you're a Muslim convert and you're also a neurodiverse author with some health issues. So what was it like writing this book through the lens of those identities? Did did they influence the story in any way?
loretta: Yeah, so all of those identities do influence all of my work, but specifically with the lustrous dark, the it's set in a fantasy world, so the characters are never explicitly named as being Muslim. But there is a religion in the world that's Islam adjacent and so those elements are definitely woven into the fabric of the story and For Shay's character in particular, she deals with some mental health issues, she goes through some episodes of depression that I think readers will really relate to. But as far as like as an author, the strongest connection that I have with her character is that we both share the experience of having a mother who struggles with addiction and the trauma surrounding that.
Julia Bodwell: Okay. And I'm sure a lot of readers, you know, young and old can can relate, not only just to that specifically, but like you said, you know, there's there's so much that, you know, young people go through. and and it's important and I'll say this over and over to everyone, so important why books should not be banned and taken away from them is they need to be able to see themselves reflected in these characters and and relate and and see that their experience is it they're not alone. So that's so important.
loretta: Yeah. And writing about such a a personal subject, there were parts of the book where I really had to process things. And so like I couldn't rush through it. I had to like give the story space to to breathe and grow and develop and it was a little bit of a challenge for me as a writer
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: who likes to set, you know, a writing schedule that's somewhat disciplined, which is to say like I set deadlines for myself that are probably unrealistic and then beat myself up when I can't meet them. But I think because I had to learn how to trust the process, the story came out in the end, you know, stronger and more powerful because of that.
Julia Bodwell: Okay. Now this is your debut, so what was that process like from from having the idea to writing the manuscript to getting your agent to publishing it with your publisher? What what was that kind of like?
loretta: Okay, so actually, my fourth book was the book that I got my agent with. And that was the book that got me into a contest called Pitch Wars. It's not around anymore, but it was like a really big deal back in the day. And it got me into the Muslim Storyteller Fellowship at Highlights. and it was really, really hard for me to let that go because we went on sub with it and it got a lot of what I call champagne rejections, which is where you get like a lot for Perfusive praise and a lot of, you know, compliments. It it almost it almost feels like it would hurt less if they just flat out said no, you know? exactly.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah. It's like, well, if you love it so much, why won't you publish it?
loretta: and then I even had an R and R from an editor with it, but it just never worked out. And so when I wrote The Lustre Stark, I wasn't feeling very confident when we went on sub, you know, and I actually wasn't sure if it was as good a book as the one that came before it, you know? But
Julia Bodwell: Okay. Yeah.
loretta: what happened was we went on sub and actually one of the editors that had rejected the book before, she along with complimenting my writing had emphasized that she really wanted to see my next book if I went out on sub again. And sure enough she was the first editor who offered on the book. So what I've really
Julia Bodwell: wow. Okay. So it's a good thing you reach back out, I guess.
loretta: Yeah. And what I've really learned is that rejection, really isn't a reflection of of if a book is good enough. A lot of times it's really just about having the right book at the right time.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah. It really it really is a a good point to make for any aspiring writer, I think, you know, is in in this field, you know, and and and we see it on the bookselling side too, is like I see plenty of books that that get published and and all of this praise and it it's really truly about Write book work time, you know, do you get your agent? Again, it's like it's t it's a lot of timing. So it doesn't mean it's a bad story. but I love that. I thank you for sharing that experience. Cause it's yeah, it's always interesting to see, especially with a debut, you know, what the process was like for the author to to get it published, you know. and and this is a junior library guild gold standard selection. That's a mouthful. so what does that mean exactly? It sounds very impressive. but I have no idea what it means.
loretta: I didn't either. So
Julia Bodwell: It sounds like a very prestigious award or or you know, acclaim to to to stick on your cover. So can you tell us little bit about what that means?
loretta: Sure. So the Junior Library Guild receives submissions of thousands of books every year and th they read them when they're very, very early in the publication stage. and they choose
Julia Bodwell: So is this before it actually releases to the general public that they're reading and reviewing them?
loretta: Yeah, I I think that it's even before ARCs come out, if I'm not mistaken, it's very early days.
Julia Bodwell: Okay, okay, okay.
loretta: so they select the ones that they feel have very high quality writing and are very engaging for young readers. And they have a pretty good track record because they say that the statistic is something like ninety-five percent of the books that they select go on to receive other awards or earn
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: other alkalades. And it's really helpful for an author with it's kind of a stamp of approval that earns the trust of librarians and teachers, so it increases your chances of getting your book into schools and libraries. And then another benefit is that they do a guaranteed bulk purchase and they feature
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: your novel in their catalogue for their monthly curated book box.
Julia Bodwell: wow. Well well congratulations, 'cause that sounds like
loretta: Thank you.
Julia Bodwell: such an honor, and I guess we'll we'll be looking out for more awards coming soon for the book. Right?
loretta: I hope so.
Julia Bodwell: so what has been your favorite part so far of releasing this book into the world?
loretta: definitely hearing from readers, like getting a message from a reader that Shay's story really resonated with them, or you know, I got one message that was from a teenager who is an aspiring writer saying, you know, that she hopes that one day she writes a book like mine and you know, so if you're
Julia Bodwell: that's gotta feel like the highest praise, you know.
loretta: really so like if you're a reader and you ever wondered if you should send an author a message if you loved their book, you definitely should because I don't know
Julia Bodwell: Absolutely.
loretta: any author who doesn't like to hear those things and those messages really, like you said, they mean as much, if not more, to me than, you know, other like industry alkalades.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah. Because it's coming right from the reader, you know, like they read the book
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: and it and it resonated with them and and they felt moved enough to reach out to you to let you know, Hey, this this meant something to me, you know?
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: has there an been anything that sort of was surprising or unexpected about the whole process?
loretta: Okay, so two things. The first one is like the pleasant surprise, which
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: is how gorgeous my book is. Like I
Julia Bodwell: my gosh, it's stunning. Those edges, those sprayed the sprayed edges, they did a really nice job.
loretta: Yeah, so I always dreamed of having a beautiful cover, but I honestly never even dreamed about having the sprayed edges and the
Julia Bodwell: Did you know that they were gonna do that whole like like give it that whole treatment? Was that something
loretta: I mean
Julia Bodwell: that courta kinda came, later in the process
loretta: it it was around the time when we were designing the cover that I got an email from my editor and she mentioned, you know, that it was approved that we were gonna have sprayed edges and custom end papers and as a debut author I definitely didn't expect that and I I just I love the way my book looks. So Yes.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah, it's beautiful. What a what a pleasant surprise, you know.
loretta: And for the more challenging, shall we say, surprise
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: I really didn't expect like how much control you give away. Like when you sign that publishing contract, yes it's still your book, but in a lot of ways it isn't. There's just so many things that are going on behind the scenes and you don't a lot of them are probably really good, but you just don't
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: hear about them. It's kind of like a need to know basis. Like if somebody deems that that's information that you really need, then you'll hear about it. But besides that, you know, you have to either ask questions and, you know, in order to do that, you have to know what questions to ask, or otherwise
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: you'll just have to accept that you're really gonna be out of the loop on a lot of things. So as somebody who overthinks everything,
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: that was hard for me to adjust to. And that's why, you know, you'll find me regularly Googling my book to try to get scraps of information.
Julia Bodwell: Just get any little bit of info you can get, any intel that's out there for you. So were there any concessions that you kind of had to make that you maybe weren't expecting that you would have had to you know, give up or or like any pushback that you had for certain things that you really wanted that didn't that didn't make it into the book or or didn't come out the way you wanted?
loretta: Okay, so there is a character in the book and it's not the main villain, but it's someone who is definitely villainous.
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: and in the first version of the book and the first many versions, this person is unalived in the last third of the book. And, you know, even in early days I got mixed feedback from, you know, early readers about that and I don't know why. It's kinda like one of those characters that you love to hate and
Julia Bodwell: Mm-hmm.
loretta: like people just didn't want to like see him go. And
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: it wasn't until, you know, when I was doing edit developmental edits with my editor that she was like, I never beg my authors for anything, but I'm begging you to let this character live to be in the second
Julia Bodwell: Just has to. Yeah.
loretta: to be in the second book because it's a duology and you know she said he's gonna bring such good juicy conflict to the second book and now yeah,
Julia Bodwell: We need him.
loretta: so now having drafted the second book I have to say she was right. Yes.
Julia Bodwell: Okay, alright. So so your editors do know some things. I love that. so what are you working on next? Other than the the second part of the story, you know, since it's a duology. Are you working on that actively? Are you working on other projects? Are you are you a multi project writer?
loretta: So I'm mainly working on book two, which
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: will come out in fall of twenty seven. But I all yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Okay. So next year, yeah, soon.
loretta: And I also have started working on something new, but it's in really early stages, so I'm not gonna say much about it, but I will
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: say that it has Time Crossed Lovers, A Sentient Tree,
Julia Bodwell: Ooh.
loretta: it has Wear Hyenas.
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: And it's partly set in a fantasy world that is inspired by the inventions of the thirteenth century engineer Ismail El Jazari, who is really known for his ingenious mechanical devices.
Julia Bodwell: Wow. Will that be another young adult? Okay. That's ex that's very exciting. Hey, you know, you could you can do whatever you want. You're the author. You call the
loretta: Yes, of course. I mean I say of course, but you never know what the future holds. Yeah?
Julia Bodwell: shots. I always like to to ask our guests what they're currently reading. So what what's something that you're either in the middle of reading or you might have just finished that you really loved that you can recommend?
loretta: Okay, so right now I am about halfway through two books, one that I'm reading on the ebook and one that I'm listening to with the audiobook. So the
Julia Bodwell: Okay. Okay.
loretta: audiobook that I'm listening to is A Dead Thing Like Me by E. G. Young. Yeah, it's delightful. I was Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: so good. Yep, she was on the show she was on the show earlier this year, so that was great.
loretta: So I was in the kitchen. unloading the dishwasher this morning and I'm listening to it and my son walks in and I'm like, hi and smiling and he's like, You're in a good mood and I'm like, Yeah,
Julia Bodwell: Ha ha.
loretta: I'm listening to this book that's about a ghost named hot dog
Julia Bodwell: Mm.
loretta: and a demon who has a a pet snake named Horse who drinks margaritas on Fridays
Julia Bodwell: He was great. I loved his character. He was probably my favorite character. Okay, so that's the audiobook. So then what's the ebook?
loretta: I'm reading Natural Selection by Claire Edge. Have you heard of that one? No,
Julia Bodwell: Okay. I don't know that one. Is that I haven't. No, is that one a fantasy?
loretta: it's not one of the family. It's w it you know, it has some speculative elements in it, but it's mostly a thriller. So it's,
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: you know, about how do I even describe this book? Okay, so it's a ch
Julia Bodwell: I don't know, I've never heard of it.
loretta: It's a choose the bear book. It's about the this group of teenage girls who are it involved in a situation in a small town where the men who have done bad things are getting attacked by this bear,
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: vengeful bear And they're not sure if they're causing this to happen or not. So they're trying to figure
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: out how they're related to it because it's, you know, specifically boys who have done something to them. So yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Okay. So it so it's like, I can see where that would be sort of like the speculative, you know, aspect is like this this bears like, are we causing this bear to to do this? Okay. It was called natural selection. N
loretta: Right. Yes.
Julia Bodwell: natural selection. Okay, I'll have to look for that. That sounds really interesting. Do you tend to read like, you know, you write YA fantasy, is that tend to be your go to genre for reading? Are you kind of all over the place with what you read?
loretta: I do read fantasy, but my like my comfort read is thrillers. but I can't I can't write them because it just gives me a headache, but
Julia Bodwell: Okay, I love thrillers too. They're very difficult to do well. Like I mean I I that's what I read a lot of as thrillers and it's like you really have to string the the the reader along. You have to have enough twists and turns where they don't know where you're going, but not too many to overwhelm them. So it's it's difficult to write, you know.
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: I I commend anyone who can sort of like plot out a really good thriller and and you know I get to the end, I'm like, I didn't see that coming, so get me with that twist ending.
loretta: Yeah. And you know, it's harder and harder to surprise me now that I'm a writer. So
Julia Bodwell: Mm-hmm.
loretta: I've become better able to predict what's gonna happen. But still, I love
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: thrillers just for that, you know, like it's like popcorn, like y you Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah, you just keep keep consuming it. Do you have any favorite thriller authors or your your top thriller book that you always come back to, like that you'll reread or you'll recommend?
loretta: I really like Tiffany Jackson's books. Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Okay. Yeah, she's great. I've I think I've read one or two of hers, but yeah, I've I've heard really good things about all of her books. Is there anything that you want to leave our our listeners with before we go?
loretta: Sure. I just wanted to do a a a plug if I can for
Julia Bodwell: Yeah, of course.
loretta: I have I contributed a short story to an anthology that just came out in September. It's called A Thousand Nights. And it has short stories from fifteen Muslim women authors embedded in a frame story written by two Muslim authors. So the editors who wrote the frame story are Nafiza Azad and Intissar Kanani. And The frame story is in the vein of A Thousand and One Knights and it follows
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: this group of teens who are they're refugees and so they're traveling across this dangerous desert trying to get to a land of safety and along the way they tell each other these stories to keep their hopes alive. So the stories come from the various cultures of the authors and they all have like folklore and fantasy elements, there's magic and threads of resistance and hope. And so that just came out on September eighth. And I I also thank you.
Julia Bodwell: Excellent. It sounds great. So you said it's a it's a f there's a frame story, so it's like like the the stories are within the larger story. Is that how that works? Okay. All right. that sounds awesome.
loretta: Yes, exactly. Yeah. And also for any writers who are listening, I wanted to plug an organization that I recently became a board member of, which is called Right to Empower and it supports authors who are writing on or through topics of trauma and grief. We're right now in the midst of our first ever mentorship program that's going on this fall. And we hope in the future to offer more programs like workshops and retreats. So if you're interested in that you can follow us on Instagram and sign up for our Substack. And if you're interested in writing a guest article, we would love to hear from you. And that's called Right
Julia Bodwell: Excellent.
loretta: to Empower.
Julia Bodwell: Right to empower. Okay. And you you're a board member now.
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Excellent. Well, thank you for both of those plugs. I'm gonna plug you as well. for those that are local to the Gilded Page here in Tarpon Springs, Florida, Loretta will be joining us for a meet and greet signing on Saturday, November 14th from eleven to two PM. And of course, if you're not local, you can follow her and learn more about her at Lorchefrights.com. Loretta, thank you so much for joining me. this has been lovely and I I can't wait to to meet you in person soon at the Gilded Page. And and readers,
loretta: Me too Me too, thank you.
Julia Bodwell: we'll see you next time.
loretta: Thank you so much for having me, Julia.
Julia Bodwell: So congratulations on your book. this is your debut. Can you tell us a little bit more about the Lustrous Dark?
loretta: Sure. The Lustrous Dark is a lush fantasy set in a fairy tale world full of monsters and magic and it also tackles real world struggles such as addiction, oppression, and fraught mother daughter relationships. It follows the story of Shay, who is a young midwife's apprentice, and Shay's mother is addicted to snow, which is a drug that temporarily reawakens an ancient magic in women that's believed to have died out. But this drug has devastating side effects. So Shay really wants to get her mom clean. But her mom abandons her in a haunted forest where to survive she has to seek safety with a band of ghouls and from there she begins to learn the truth about how Women's magic was stolen and the powerful men who pose a danger to all of the women in her realm.
Julia Bodwell: It's such an intricate story. There's so many there's so many layers to it. And I also think it's very it would be good for any time of year, but it's especially good for this time of year. I feel like we're we're going into, you know, fall, spooky season, you know, this it has a sort of like dark tinge to it. Where did you come up with this idea?
loretta: I've always loved fairy tales and folklore, so it was no surprise that I stumbled upon this blog post and it was actually a parenting blog of all things, but the post was about
Julia Bodwell: my gosh.
loretta: a Moroccan version of Snow White. So it's a folktale
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: called The Jealous Mother, and it's in a book of folktales, Moroccan folktales by Jalali El Kadori. And I immediately went and checked out this book from the library and devoured it. And all of the tales were are really dark. like European fairy tales, like we don't exactly consider them cozy, but Moroccan folktales, like,
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: put the Grim brothers to shame.
Julia Bodwell: Okay, all right.
loretta: but I kept coming back to the Jealous Mother. There were a few things that drew me to this particular story, so one is that the character is raised by a midwife and that really resonated with me because I have experience with working as a doula and a lactation
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: consultant and I thought that would be something really interesting to incorporate into a novel. And another thing was the creepy elements, such as instead of having seven dwarves, we have seven ghouls. and immediately I was like, that would be really fun. Like I could do a lot with that.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: But I didn't know right away what I wanted to bring to the story on like an emotional and personal level. So I put it on my list of projects that I might work on in the future. And then
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: a while later I was having a peer group discussion with my writing group and it was the consensus of my peers that their real life relationships with their mothers would seep into the their fictional characters' relationships with their mothers. And I I realized that I had been doing the opposite and I had been writing the mother that I wished that I had. So like just at that moment, like on a gut level, I felt like I was ready to interrogate that and Shay's story just clicked into place.
Julia Bodwell: Okay, this is like a light bulb moment for you.
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: that's great. so why did you choose to make it young adult instead of adult? 'Cause like you said, I mean, grim most people are familiar with grim fairy tales and those are they're very grim, they're very dark, and you said this is almost even darker, so what made you decide to make it young adult?
loretta: Well, I'm really drawn to young adult novels, because I feel like more so than other genres, they really focus on the character development. And, you know, teenage years are a time when all of the emotions are like amped up to the nth degree so as a reader, I really read books for that emotional journey that the story is gonna take me on.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: you know, which is to say that I really wanna be devastated. but yeah, my
Julia Bodwell: Who doesn't? It's like who who doesn't want their heart ripped out and stomped all over?
loretta: Right? but yeah, my own teenage years were really difficult and so I think that writing for teens really aligns with my purpose as a writer. And about that, the Left Strasdark is actually the fifth book that I wrote. So I have four manuscripts that are unpublished. So
Julia Bodwell: Okay. Wow. Okay.
loretta: I had written these four books without knowing why I was writing and it was at a writing retreat at Boyd's Mills, which is formerly called the Highlights Foundation in Pennsylvania.
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: And it was there that I finally had the time and space to put my writing purpose into words. So I remember the exact exercise that we were working on when this happened. And if any writers who are listening, if you get a chance to go to Boyd's Mills, definitely go because it is such
Julia Bodwell: Do it. Okay.
loretta: a magical place and they really make writers feel so nurtured and because of that and because you feel so safe there it really is conducive to exploring deeper emotions and a lot of things tend to come to the surface in an environment like that. So what I real
Julia Bodwell: Okay. So it really helped you kind of pull out everything.
loretta: Yeah, so what I realized was that Books had really been a lifeline for me growing up in what I would call a traumatic environment. And so I want my stories to be that same space, safe space for a young reader who, you know, might be going through a crisis or might just feel alone in whatever it is that they're going through.
Julia Bodwell: I think that's such a it's such a great point, and especially like you were saying, young people they need these stories, you know. So I'm ex as someone who who loves YA, I'm I'm excited that it's YA. I was just curious, you know, why why why why YA?
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Why young adult? So you said you have four manuscripts, unpublished manuscripts. Do you ever see yourself doing anything with them? Or are those kind of just like they live in a drawer and that's where they'll stay? Or is it something that you might revisit any of those?
loretta: I don't know. I mean I have a a couple of them that are really close to my heart. but at the same time I have so many new ideas that I wanna explore as well, so
Julia Bodwell: Yeah. The writer's dilemma is like you have so many ideas and not nearly enough time to write them all down, I'm sure.
loretta: Right.
Julia Bodwell: so you're a Muslim convert and you're also a neurodiverse author with some health issues. So what was it like writing this book through the lens of those identities? Did did they influence the story in any way?
loretta: Yeah, so all of those identities do influence all of my work, but specifically with the lustrous dark, the it's set in a fantasy world, so the characters are never explicitly named as being Muslim. But there is a religion in the world that's Islam adjacent and so those elements are definitely woven into the fabric of the story and For Shay's character in particular, she deals with some mental health issues, she goes through some episodes of depression that I think readers will really relate to. But as far as like as an author, the strongest connection that I have with her character is that we both share the experience of having a mother who struggles with addiction and the trauma surrounding that.
Julia Bodwell: Okay. And I'm sure a lot of readers, you know, young and old can can relate, not only just to that specifically, but like you said, you know, there's there's so much that, you know, young people go through. and and it's important and I'll say this over and over to everyone, so important why books should not be banned and taken away from them is they need to be able to see themselves reflected in these characters and and relate and and see that their experience is it they're not alone. So that's so important.
loretta: Yeah. And writing about such a a personal subject, there were parts of the book where I really had to process things. And so like I couldn't rush through it. I had to like give the story space to to breathe and grow and develop and it was a little bit of a challenge for me as a writer
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: who likes to set, you know, a writing schedule that's somewhat disciplined, which is to say like I set deadlines for myself that are probably unrealistic and then beat myself up when I can't meet them. But I think because I had to learn how to trust the process, the story came out in the end, you know, stronger and more powerful because of that.
Julia Bodwell: Okay. Now this is your debut, so what was that process like from from having the idea to writing the manuscript to getting your agent to publishing it with your publisher? What what was that kind of like?
loretta: Okay, so actually, my fourth book was the book that I got my agent with. And that was the book that got me into a contest called Pitch Wars. It's not around anymore, but it was like a really big deal back in the day. And it got me into the Muslim Storyteller Fellowship at Highlights. and it was really, really hard for me to let that go because we went on sub with it and it got a lot of what I call champagne rejections, which is where you get like a lot for Perfusive praise and a lot of, you know, compliments. It it almost it almost feels like it would hurt less if they just flat out said no, you know? exactly.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah. It's like, well, if you love it so much, why won't you publish it?
loretta: and then I even had an R and R from an editor with it, but it just never worked out. And so when I wrote The Lustre Stark, I wasn't feeling very confident when we went on sub, you know, and I actually wasn't sure if it was as good a book as the one that came before it, you know? But
Julia Bodwell: Okay. Yeah.
loretta: what happened was we went on sub and actually one of the editors that had rejected the book before, she along with complimenting my writing had emphasized that she really wanted to see my next book if I went out on sub again. And sure enough she was the first editor who offered on the book. So what I've really
Julia Bodwell: wow. Okay. So it's a good thing you reach back out, I guess.
loretta: Yeah. And what I've really learned is that rejection, really isn't a reflection of of if a book is good enough. A lot of times it's really just about having the right book at the right time.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah. It really it really is a a good point to make for any aspiring writer, I think, you know, is in in this field, you know, and and and we see it on the bookselling side too, is like I see plenty of books that that get published and and all of this praise and it it's really truly about Write book work time, you know, do you get your agent? Again, it's like it's t it's a lot of timing. So it doesn't mean it's a bad story. but I love that. I thank you for sharing that experience. Cause it's yeah, it's always interesting to see, especially with a debut, you know, what the process was like for the author to to get it published, you know. and and this is a junior library guild gold standard selection. That's a mouthful. so what does that mean exactly? It sounds very impressive. but I have no idea what it means.
loretta: I didn't either. So
Julia Bodwell: It sounds like a very prestigious award or or you know, acclaim to to to stick on your cover. So can you tell us little bit about what that means?
loretta: Sure. So the Junior Library Guild receives submissions of thousands of books every year and th they read them when they're very, very early in the publication stage. and they choose
Julia Bodwell: So is this before it actually releases to the general public that they're reading and reviewing them?
loretta: Yeah, I I think that it's even before ARCs come out, if I'm not mistaken, it's very early days.
Julia Bodwell: Okay, okay, okay.
loretta: so they select the ones that they feel have very high quality writing and are very engaging for young readers. And they have a pretty good track record because they say that the statistic is something like ninety-five percent of the books that they select go on to receive other awards or earn
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: other alkalades. And it's really helpful for an author with it's kind of a stamp of approval that earns the trust of librarians and teachers, so it increases your chances of getting your book into schools and libraries. And then another benefit is that they do a guaranteed bulk purchase and they feature
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: your novel in their catalogue for their monthly curated book box.
Julia Bodwell: wow. Well well congratulations, 'cause that sounds like
loretta: Thank you.
Julia Bodwell: such an honor, and I guess we'll we'll be looking out for more awards coming soon for the book. Right?
loretta: I hope so.
Julia Bodwell: so what has been your favorite part so far of releasing this book into the world?
loretta: definitely hearing from readers, like getting a message from a reader that Shay's story really resonated with them, or you know, I got one message that was from a teenager who is an aspiring writer saying, you know, that she hopes that one day she writes a book like mine and you know, so if you're
Julia Bodwell: that's gotta feel like the highest praise, you know.
loretta: really so like if you're a reader and you ever wondered if you should send an author a message if you loved their book, you definitely should because I don't know
Julia Bodwell: Absolutely.
loretta: any author who doesn't like to hear those things and those messages really, like you said, they mean as much, if not more, to me than, you know, other like industry alkalades.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah. Because it's coming right from the reader, you know, like they read the book
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: and it and it resonated with them and and they felt moved enough to reach out to you to let you know, Hey, this this meant something to me, you know?
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: has there an been anything that sort of was surprising or unexpected about the whole process?
loretta: Okay, so two things. The first one is like the pleasant surprise, which
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: is how gorgeous my book is. Like I
Julia Bodwell: my gosh, it's stunning. Those edges, those sprayed the sprayed edges, they did a really nice job.
loretta: Yeah, so I always dreamed of having a beautiful cover, but I honestly never even dreamed about having the sprayed edges and the
Julia Bodwell: Did you know that they were gonna do that whole like like give it that whole treatment? Was that something
loretta: I mean
Julia Bodwell: that courta kinda came, later in the process
loretta: it it was around the time when we were designing the cover that I got an email from my editor and she mentioned, you know, that it was approved that we were gonna have sprayed edges and custom end papers and as a debut author I definitely didn't expect that and I I just I love the way my book looks. So Yes.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah, it's beautiful. What a what a pleasant surprise, you know.
loretta: And for the more challenging, shall we say, surprise
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: I really didn't expect like how much control you give away. Like when you sign that publishing contract, yes it's still your book, but in a lot of ways it isn't. There's just so many things that are going on behind the scenes and you don't a lot of them are probably really good, but you just don't
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: hear about them. It's kind of like a need to know basis. Like if somebody deems that that's information that you really need, then you'll hear about it. But besides that, you know, you have to either ask questions and, you know, in order to do that, you have to know what questions to ask, or otherwise
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: you'll just have to accept that you're really gonna be out of the loop on a lot of things. So as somebody who overthinks everything,
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: that was hard for me to adjust to. And that's why, you know, you'll find me regularly Googling my book to try to get scraps of information.
Julia Bodwell: Just get any little bit of info you can get, any intel that's out there for you. So were there any concessions that you kind of had to make that you maybe weren't expecting that you would have had to you know, give up or or like any pushback that you had for certain things that you really wanted that didn't that didn't make it into the book or or didn't come out the way you wanted?
loretta: Okay, so there is a character in the book and it's not the main villain, but it's someone who is definitely villainous.
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: and in the first version of the book and the first many versions, this person is unalived in the last third of the book. And, you know, even in early days I got mixed feedback from, you know, early readers about that and I don't know why. It's kinda like one of those characters that you love to hate and
Julia Bodwell: Mm-hmm.
loretta: like people just didn't want to like see him go. And
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: it wasn't until, you know, when I was doing edit developmental edits with my editor that she was like, I never beg my authors for anything, but I'm begging you to let this character live to be in the second
Julia Bodwell: Just has to. Yeah.
loretta: to be in the second book because it's a duology and you know she said he's gonna bring such good juicy conflict to the second book and now yeah,
Julia Bodwell: We need him.
loretta: so now having drafted the second book I have to say she was right. Yes.
Julia Bodwell: Okay, alright. So so your editors do know some things. I love that. so what are you working on next? Other than the the second part of the story, you know, since it's a duology. Are you working on that actively? Are you working on other projects? Are you are you a multi project writer?
loretta: So I'm mainly working on book two, which
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: will come out in fall of twenty seven. But I all yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Okay. So next year, yeah, soon.
loretta: And I also have started working on something new, but it's in really early stages, so I'm not gonna say much about it, but I will
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: say that it has Time Crossed Lovers, A Sentient Tree,
Julia Bodwell: Ooh.
loretta: it has Wear Hyenas.
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: And it's partly set in a fantasy world that is inspired by the inventions of the thirteenth century engineer Ismail El Jazari, who is really known for his ingenious mechanical devices.
Julia Bodwell: Wow. Will that be another young adult? Okay. That's ex that's very exciting. Hey, you know, you could you can do whatever you want. You're the author. You call the
loretta: Yes, of course. I mean I say of course, but you never know what the future holds. Yeah?
Julia Bodwell: shots. I always like to to ask our guests what they're currently reading. So what what's something that you're either in the middle of reading or you might have just finished that you really loved that you can recommend?
loretta: Okay, so right now I am about halfway through two books, one that I'm reading on the ebook and one that I'm listening to with the audiobook. So the
Julia Bodwell: Okay. Okay.
loretta: audiobook that I'm listening to is A Dead Thing Like Me by E. G. Young. Yeah, it's delightful. I was Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: so good. Yep, she was on the show she was on the show earlier this year, so that was great.
loretta: So I was in the kitchen. unloading the dishwasher this morning and I'm listening to it and my son walks in and I'm like, hi and smiling and he's like, You're in a good mood and I'm like, Yeah,
Julia Bodwell: Ha ha.
loretta: I'm listening to this book that's about a ghost named hot dog
Julia Bodwell: Mm.
loretta: and a demon who has a a pet snake named Horse who drinks margaritas on Fridays
Julia Bodwell: He was great. I loved his character. He was probably my favorite character. Okay, so that's the audiobook. So then what's the ebook?
loretta: I'm reading Natural Selection by Claire Edge. Have you heard of that one? No,
Julia Bodwell: Okay. I don't know that one. Is that I haven't. No, is that one a fantasy?
loretta: it's not one of the family. It's w it you know, it has some speculative elements in it, but it's mostly a thriller. So it's,
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: you know, about how do I even describe this book? Okay, so it's a ch
Julia Bodwell: I don't know, I've never heard of it.
loretta: It's a choose the bear book. It's about the this group of teenage girls who are it involved in a situation in a small town where the men who have done bad things are getting attacked by this bear,
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: vengeful bear And they're not sure if they're causing this to happen or not. So they're trying to figure
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: out how they're related to it because it's, you know, specifically boys who have done something to them. So yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Okay. So it so it's like, I can see where that would be sort of like the speculative, you know, aspect is like this this bears like, are we causing this bear to to do this? Okay. It was called natural selection. N
loretta: Right. Yes.
Julia Bodwell: natural selection. Okay, I'll have to look for that. That sounds really interesting. Do you tend to read like, you know, you write YA fantasy, is that tend to be your go to genre for reading? Are you kind of all over the place with what you read?
loretta: I do read fantasy, but my like my comfort read is thrillers. but I can't I can't write them because it just gives me a headache, but
Julia Bodwell: Okay, I love thrillers too. They're very difficult to do well. Like I mean I I that's what I read a lot of as thrillers and it's like you really have to string the the the reader along. You have to have enough twists and turns where they don't know where you're going, but not too many to overwhelm them. So it's it's difficult to write, you know.
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: I I commend anyone who can sort of like plot out a really good thriller and and you know I get to the end, I'm like, I didn't see that coming, so get me with that twist ending.
loretta: Yeah. And you know, it's harder and harder to surprise me now that I'm a writer. So
Julia Bodwell: Mm-hmm.
loretta: I've become better able to predict what's gonna happen. But still, I love
Julia Bodwell: Yeah.
loretta: thrillers just for that, you know, like it's like popcorn, like y you Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Yeah, you just keep keep consuming it. Do you have any favorite thriller authors or your your top thriller book that you always come back to, like that you'll reread or you'll recommend?
loretta: I really like Tiffany Jackson's books. Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Okay. Yeah, she's great. I've I think I've read one or two of hers, but yeah, I've I've heard really good things about all of her books. Is there anything that you want to leave our our listeners with before we go?
loretta: Sure. I just wanted to do a a a plug if I can for
Julia Bodwell: Yeah, of course.
loretta: I have I contributed a short story to an anthology that just came out in September. It's called A Thousand Nights. And it has short stories from fifteen Muslim women authors embedded in a frame story written by two Muslim authors. So the editors who wrote the frame story are Nafiza Azad and Intissar Kanani. And The frame story is in the vein of A Thousand and One Knights and it follows
Julia Bodwell: Okay.
loretta: this group of teens who are they're refugees and so they're traveling across this dangerous desert trying to get to a land of safety and along the way they tell each other these stories to keep their hopes alive. So the stories come from the various cultures of the authors and they all have like folklore and fantasy elements, there's magic and threads of resistance and hope. And so that just came out on September eighth. And I I also thank you.
Julia Bodwell: Excellent. It sounds great. So you said it's a it's a f there's a frame story, so it's like like the the stories are within the larger story. Is that how that works? Okay. All right. that sounds awesome.
loretta: Yes, exactly. Yeah. And also for any writers who are listening, I wanted to plug an organization that I recently became a board member of, which is called Right to Empower and it supports authors who are writing on or through topics of trauma and grief. We're right now in the midst of our first ever mentorship program that's going on this fall. And we hope in the future to offer more programs like workshops and retreats. So if you're interested in that you can follow us on Instagram and sign up for our Substack. And if you're interested in writing a guest article, we would love to hear from you. And that's called Right
Julia Bodwell: Excellent.
loretta: to Empower.
Julia Bodwell: Right to empower. Okay. And you you're a board member now.
loretta: Yeah.
Julia Bodwell: Excellent. Well, thank you for both of those plugs. I'm gonna plug you as well. for those that are local to the Gilded Page here in Tarpon Springs, Florida, Loretta will be joining us for a meet and greet signing on Saturday, November 14th from eleven to two PM. And of course, if you're not local, you can follow her and learn more about her at Lorchefrights.com. Loretta, thank you so much for joining me. this has been lovely and I I can't wait to to meet you in person soon at the Gilded Page. And and readers,
loretta: Me too Me too, thank you.
Julia Bodwell: we'll see you next time.
