First Draft Episode #303: Victoria Aveyard
May 6, 2021
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Victoria Aveyard, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Red Queen series, talks about the first book in her new YA fantasy series, Realm Breaker.
Today's show is sponsored by the Picture Book Writing & Illustration Online Course offered by author Zanni Louise, and illustrator Anna Pignataro who, combined, have made over 100 children's books, including many bestsellers. This six-month course begins in June and is specially designed to fit around busy lives.
Every month is a different module of focus on an aspect of picture book writing and illustrating, which contains videos, handouts, exercises, an assignment, and an interactive session with Zanni and Anna who are there to give you feedback all along the way. There's also an active Facebook group where participants can interact with and inspire each other. And don't worry if you're less confident with the illustration side of things, the course just offers a chance to witness the illustration process and get a more holistic view of how a picture book comes together.
Again, this online course was designed with people's real busy lives in mind, so participants can do as much or as little of the activities as they like. The month-long structure gives participants time to play and experiment, but also maintain flexibility. And you'll end the workshop with a portfolio of artwork, a polished manuscript, storyboard, and final artwork ready to present to publishers.
Zanni and Annie are offering First Draft listeners a 20% discount on the Online Picture Book Writing & Illustration Course. To learn more, and to sign up with a 20% discount, visit Zannilouise.com/course-FirstDraftPod. I will also have a link to that in the show notes. And again, that is Zannilouise.com/course-FirstDraftPod for 20% off.
Quick note about the audio of this episode, Victoria and I were so excited because we are both vaccinated so we were able to meet and talk in person. Unfortunately, I'm a little bit out of practice with that whole in-person recording thing. So I failed to note that Victoria's microphone was picking up a lot of static. Callie, my wonderful producer, has done an amazing job bringing it to the best possible sound that it can be, but you still might be a little irritated sound-wise if you're listening with headphones. I listened to it on my phone without headphones and it was fine, so I recommend that.
I'll also be expediting the transcript of this episode. So that will be up and available in the show notes of this episode within about a week or so. Apologies for that mix-up, we're all kind of getting back to normal here, but this is a wonderful, wonderful conversation and so worth finding in whatever way works for you.
Okay, now on with the show,
Welcome to First Draft with me, Sarah Enni. This week, I'm talking to Victoria Aveyard, number one New York Times bestselling author of the Red Queen series, who is launching a new YA fantasy series with Realm Breaker, out now. She is here to answer listener questions about world-building and research, and lessons that she learned from the ever expanding Red Queen universe that she's been able to apply to her new series. And she talks about how imagining a bar fight helped her get to the heart of her characters.
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Okay, now please sit back, relax and enjoy my conversation with Victoria Aveyard.
Sarah Enni: All right. So hi, Victoria, how are you doing today?
Victoria Aveyard: I'm good. Thank you so much for having me, Sarah. And it feels very special.
Sarah Enni: I know, it's so special! We are in the same room. This is the first in real life podcast episode I've recorded in over a year.
Victoria Aveyard: Oh my god, I'm making real eye contact with you right now!
Sarah Enni: Because we can! It's not zoom fractured, this is very exciting. And I also was just telling you before we started recording that I'm almost at the end of Realm Breaker, and I know you'll appreciate that this is a compliment, I'm a little bit annoyed that I'm not reading right now. But I'm so excited to chat with you.
Victoria Aveyard: I will take that.
Sarah Enni: For listeners, Victoria and I have chatted before, actually two times on the podcast (here, and here), and in the show notes for this episode I will link to those previous episodes. We learn all about Victoria's past and how she got into writing and her screenwriting background. So definitely check those episodes out. But today we are gonna be answering listener questions and talking about Realm Breaker, the first book in her new series.
I'm so excited. We got awesome, awesome questions. We got so many questions and they're so good. And we're gonna try to get to as many as we can today and have a really great conversation. A lot of it's about world-building, which I know you're familiar with talking about. But before we get into all that, I would love to have you give us the official pitch for Realm Breaker.
Victoria Aveyard: So, I like to say that Realm Breaker is a story about what happens when the heroes fail, the sort of 'chosen ones' who you always rely upon in a classic fantasy adventure. This is, who's the JV team of saving the world. What happens when the fellowship of the ring dies? Who are we calling in next? And in the case of Realm Breaker, it is a ragtag team of misfits and criminals anchored around a teenage girl who's the bastard daughter of the so-called 'chosen one' who is now dead.
Sarah Enni: I'm so excited to talk about Realm Breaker. We have kind of our way into it, we got just a ton of questions about world-building. And I think that is so important for people, or at least fantasy nerds like us, really love hearing how that stuff comes about. So I love this first question, it's from @theambivertwriter, a handle I relate to. How long has the idea for Realm Breaker been brewing in your mind?
Victoria Aveyard: So it's interesting. I have the off-the-top-of-my-head answer where I think, "Oh, it was sometime in 2018, I think." And then I was going through my emails, really tracing where it was, and the first inkling of Realm Breaker was in a batch of ideas that I sent my agent when we were starting to talk about a new series before War Storm came out. So it was in December of 2017.
And from there, it was kind of a rock slide, I guess, it really piled up. And I suddenly was sending emails and emails and emails, "Here's the pitch. Here's the proposal. Here's the first chapter. Here's the prologue," all of these things over 2018. And then it was in the back of my head while I was doing Broken Throne.
And we always planned for 2020 to be my year of no publishing, so I could give as much time as possible to Realm Breaker. But I was working on it starting in 2019 and then 2020 was all editing and all being very, very happy that I was not trying to launch a new series during the height of the pandemic.
We're gonna catch some of the issues with no touring in person, but I feel so lucky that we're coming out of it. And hopefully for the second book, things will be back to being able to tour and being able to promote the way that I've gotten used to.
Sarah Enni: Right. I mean, that is so wild that you had already planned on taking the break last year, a really hard year.
Victoria Aveyard: I know, and a lot of people outside publishing don't realize how far ahead our schedules are planned. Books take years to write. Books take years to come out. So it was very much, "Here's the five-year plan." And... who knew?
Sarah Enni: Who knew you were gonna call it? In some ways that's very witchy. What was that one-line thing that you sent to your agent?
Victoria Aveyard: It was definitely, "What happens when the Fellowship of the Ring fails?" I knew I had a lot of room to move after Red Queen and I could take a really big swing and my publisher would go with me on it. I was in a position where I had a lot more opportunity. So I thought, "Well, what did I want to read when I was 14 years old? What was I looking for?"
And I remember I was so active in fan fiction back then. And most of it was because I wasn't seeing myself in stories that I wanted to be part of. So that was very much my touchstone with this, was building a classic fantasy adventure that I felt like I could be part of and go on and make space for people who have felt excluded. So I tried to keep that in mind as much as possible.
Sarah Enni: So let me just make sure that we're answering the specific questions, cause I want to hear more about world-building. But there were a lot of questions about this, and I don't know that I included one that specifically asks this question, but you have the one-line pitch and then, as you said, the outline, the synopsis. So how did you build a story from that premise?
Victoria Aveyard: So once I knew I wanted the classic fantasy adventure anchored around a teenage female protagonist, it was, "Okay. I got to build the world that this is going to exist in." And I immediately knew I wanted to base it off of Europe, North Africa, and the middle East, in the 13th century. You know, middle of the Crusades, high middle ages kind of flair, and those were my boundaries. Because, going back to Lord of the Rings, or Chronicles of Narnia, or even something like the Hunger Games, I was always interested in maps and worlds, and the edges of the map in particular.
I always wanted to know what was going on in the Southern countries of Middle Earth, or South of Calormen in Narnia. There were these places that we never went to that were not so white-centric. And I wanted to build a world that felt like it went beyond the casual edges of a map that you usually see in those classic fantasies. So that the world feels big and expansive and real, and like it exists outside of the story.
In school, one of my thesis professors said, "Good world-building, especially in fantasy, is when you feel like you can step away from a scene and open a door into the next room, and something is happening in that room that has nothing to do with your story." So I very much wanted the world to feel organic and real and like it's built on itself.
And that's very important when you're world-building. I start with the map and I start with the geography because geography informs everything. It informs politics, and culture, and religion, and war, and kingdoms, and where borders are drawn. So for me, it's very important to start there and build up.
Sarah Enni: That's so clear. It's so great because Realm Breaker has this incredible map in the front of it. So as I was reading, I was referring back and tracing whatever, like Indiana Jones red line. But it's so obvious that that was the building blocks of all of it. Because, as you say, as the story moves along, you sort of get that.
They're in these port cities and it all makes sense about why the kingdoms came to be that way. But since you had this like time period and an actual real world geography in mind, how much research did you do into that time period? How much did you really delve into what was there at the time? And how much did you want it to be totally imagined?
Victoria Aveyard: It's a little bit of both because you want to have your tonal references and have something to build off of, but at the same time you want the story to not feel restrained by the world you've built. So you have to leave some element of discovery. And there was very much a point where I had to bring myself in and say, "Stop world-building, and stop creating the histories, and stop making family trees, because it's not going to be beneficial to the story anymore, and you're gonna burn through your motivation."
For me, it's more about how much you metabolize all that information so that it feels organic while you're writing it, and you're not constantly referring to something else. Because that, I think, feels very stilted and a reader can understand that. I play a lot of medieval war games [laughs], and one in particular is called Crusader Kings. And it is very, very accurate in terms of the way that that portion of the world operated, specifically the Mediterranean. How there was such a cross-cultural mix of three different continents and all of these cultures, and religions, and ethnicities.
And that was something I really wanted to bring forward, especially because so much of classic fantasy in Europe feels very white. And that's not even true, if you're going to look at actual realistic history, it's not a proper criticism to say there were no Black people in London. It's just wrong. And as you move further South, it becomes even more incorrect. So that was something I wanted to highlight as well. And I think it helps the world feel more real.
Sarah Enni: Yeah, absolutely. It was very fun to have the map to be able to look back to and be like, "Ooh, there's where we are." And being like, "Oh, Victoria got to name all of these cool things and cities and regions."
This was a really wonderful question from BeckyESarah that I also really wanted to know, "What did you learn from world-building in the world of Red Queen that informed your world-building in Realm Breaker?" Cause you had to build a world and then also exist within it for four books and many more novellas.
Victoria Aveyard: And that world in Red Queen very much expanded as I was writing. And part of that is good. And part of that is, "Oh God, I wish I had established this earlier." So it was a lot of foresight, a lot of knowing, "These are parameters you want to have to start with. You want to think about religion much earlier than you did in Red Queen."
In Red Queen, there's not a lot about religion. And it's still not central to this story, I didn't want there to be any kind of religious strife going on in these books. But it was definitely something I thought about to include because, again, it makes the world and the characters feel more real when they have these beliefs, because that's real to us.
I also did learn from Red Queen when to stop, and when to keep going, and when to move into the actual storytelling piece of the puzzle, which is much, much larger than the world building. Although I could do the world building all day long. So it was a little bit of both, preparing more than you prepared before, but also get ready to get out of it.
Sarah Enni: Right, know when to move forward and get into the characters. I love this question from CatarinaHibinova, I hope I'm saying that right. "How does she make sense of her research?" It's obviously a very researched book as well, and definitely a lot is grounded in that. But I thought that too, I was like, "Did she have a word document somewhere with all the...?"
Victoria Aveyard: So this is one of the reasons I love, love, love Scrivener. You can keep all of your research and your notes and your edits in one window with the actual document. And it's really helpful, especially if you have multiple point-of-views and multiple chapters. But it's all in the same window and I can click through from whatever chapter I'm in, over to my research, and just refer back to, "Oh right, this character is how many years old?" Or, "It takes this long to travel by horse in a day."
That was very much something I always had ready to reference is: how fast a ship can move, how fast a horse can move. Cause there's a lot of travel. And so I was trying to keep in my head what would feel realistic, but still not restrict me in the storytelling. And would I be saying days or weeks? I didn't want to get too into the nitty-gritty of, "It took seven days to get from here to here." Because I know some asshole down the road, is like, "That's not possible."
Sarah Enni: They're gonna do the math.
Victoria Aveyard: So I just wanted to keep it vague, but still usable for a reader.
Sarah Enni: And you mentioning days and weeks also reminds me that's another choice you have to make about how this world measures everything.
Victoria Aveyard: Yes.
Sarah Enni: There were some like swear words that will be familiar to English speakers too. So I'm just wondering what your thought process was on all this.
Victoria Aveyard: And a lot of it is, back to the world-building and picking a tonal reference time period, is I think for any author who is writing a fantasy world that has sort of a historical bend to it, it's really helpful to pick a year, or at the very least pick a century. And everything past that will feel out of place. And so I really tried to stick to my 13th century and maybe a little tiny bit into the 14th century, depending on where in the world you were.
And I think the flow of information was also interesting because I make it clear that some places are more technologically advanced. And that was also very true to the time period when you had Europe kind of struggling out of the middle ages and dealing with all of this crap and learning how to wash themselves properly. The Muslim world was founding universities and hospital and aqua ducts.
Sarah Enni: Like in Alexandria.
Victoria Aveyard: Yes, exactly. So I wanted to make it clear, you know, the flow of information is still very much there and different, and characters highlight, you know, "I don't want a doctor from the North. I want a doctor from the South because they're university trained." I loved getting in those little digs.
Sarah Enni: I love that. I love that plug for Scrivener there with research
Victoria Aveyard: Sponsor me Scrivener!
Sarah Enni: I love that you also, in your author's note, you referenced not only Lord of the Rings and these other stories that a lot of people are really familiar with, but also Legend of Zelda. And you're talking about a video game that's such a cool, you know, like our generation now can bring those things into the fold.
Victoria Aveyard: Yes. And I used some books as well, I had Great Battles of the Medieval Ages. And a visual dictionary was really helpful, especially in terms of building a castle or a cathedral. There's a very large scene that takes place in a palace and I actually drew out the schematic of what that would look like so I knew where characters were moving, and I could really visualize it. Because I knew it would get confusing. If I was confused, the reader was definitely gonna be confused. So definitely a lot of reference books, there are a lot of Wikipedia, a lot of just reading about actual history and kind of taking from that what you wanted to and what felt right.
Sarah Enni: And putting that into a document in your Scrivener.
Victoria Aveyard: A little bit. And a little bit was just absorbing it and maybe you read things a couple of times. And I also had some really great sensitivity readers.
Sarah Enni: That's awesome. Okay. Awesome. And this is a great question from JMKHambada, "When you start a new series, how much outlining slash planning do you do for books two and three, et cetera?" And along with that question, I'd love to just hear how you outline before you even started the first one?
Victoria Aveyard: Absolutely. So just outlining a book, in general, and this has not changed from Red Queen, I use three act, eight sequence structure. And that is something I learned in film school, I studied screenwriting, and that's very much how you would structure a feature. And to most audiences, that is the way that Western storytelling works. So the audience recognizes the general rhythm and pace, and it helps them absorb the story that much better, because they can kind of feel it moving with them.
And so that's what I like. That's what I gravitate towards. And then I do that on the series level as well. The number one thing for me with outlining a series, or writing a series, is escalation. You want each book to feel bigger than the last one, whether it be physical stakes or emotional stakes. And in Red Queen, there were definitely things that I held off on because I'm like, "I can't top it. I got to wait for the fourth book."
And the same here. I think this one was a little bit more outlined than Red Queen. Red Queen I always knew kind of where the characters were gonna end up. But in this one, I know exactly what's gonna happen with each person. And that's really weird. At the end of the second book, in particular, was one of the first things that came into my head.
Sarah Enni: And when that comes into your head, do you have a sense of where in the story that is?
Victoria Aveyard: Yes. And I knew that was the end of act two for the series. So it's a really low point.
Sarah Enni: What made you think of this as three books, as opposed to four? Like the Red Queen series was.
Victoria Aveyard: So Red Queen was always supposed to be three, that's how I envisioned it. And then while I was writing two, I realized I couldn't get to the ending in one more book and I needed four. And, luckily, my publisher was very amenable to that. But this one I think is three and will stay three, please, god.
[Both laughing]
Sarah Enni: Wow, that's amazing that you know all of that. I'm interested in, you'd mentioned the tension between wanting to know where you're going but not wanting to, I liked how you phrased it earlier, not wanting to burn through your motivation.
Victoria Aveyard: Right. And it's the same with outlining. I like to outline. I mean, I don't like hard outlining. I don't like having a 30 page document of what happens in the book. I find that takes a lot of the magic out of it for me. Basically, I feel like I'm navigating a cave with a flashlight. I sorta know where the turns are, but I'm kind of finding the details along the way.
Sarah Enni: Spelunking.
Victoria Aveyard: Yeah, that's the best of both worlds for me.
Sarah Enni: You want to have freedom on the page and that gives you some.
Victoria Aveyard: And same with the characters. I feel like I've built these little rats and then I put them in the maze I built, but they're gonna run it the way they run it.
Sarah Enni: I like that. I like that. Okay. We had a couple of questions that I felt like were sort of connected and it leads to what you're talking about, about wanting it to feel, I mean, I like that you're contextualizing for the listener that there's a story structure and it is Western, but it's what you enjoy and what you like working within. Same with writing a high fantasy. There's archetypes there's ways of presenting that material that most audiences, or most high fantasy fans, will at least be familiar with.
And you, in particular, love those stories too. So I know you wanted to start by sort of honoring those works and incorporating that. All that said, Derek's great question, DerekSiStory asks, "What's the differentiating factor between this story and other fantasy epics?" And Hannah Barclays question, which I felt was related, "When you're writing do you ever get insecure about whether the story is unique enough?"
Victoria Aveyard: Yeah, oh yeah. You absolutely, with any story, regardless of what genre you're in, you're always wondering, "Am I telling this story in a way that has not been told before?" And I think, while that is a fear all of us have, there's no way that you're not telling it your own way. So I always try and rely on that.
You know me, and the author next to me, could be given the same exact prompt with the same characters and the same plot, and we would write the stories differently. We just gravitate to different things, that's who we are. What makes Realm Breaker different; one thing I really pride myself on, and I got a lot of this when I was writing Red Queen, is people who are saying, "This was the first fantasy book I ever read and I didn't think I would like fantasy. And now I love fantasy and this was my gateway book."
And I feel very much like that about Realm Breaker. That was something I came in with the intent to make it a familiar, accessible fantasy story, that might be the gateway drug. Both to other fantasy stories, but I think for adult fantasy into YA fantasy. Because YA fantasy can be a little stigmatized and marginalized and is not seen as the same level as adult fantasy. And I don't subscribe to that in any way.
So hopefully, this is a fantasy story that fans of the genre, who understand the lore and the tropes and the archetypes and know what to expect, enjoy. Because as much as I want to honor what people want from those tropes, I also want to give it to them in a different way. But also to people who don't know and just find things that they like, and it's easy for them to sink into. I work really, really hard to make this story as metabolizable as possible.
Sarah Enni: And that's one of the cool things about YA, right? Is that sometimes, you know that when you write a book, probably for at least one reader out there, this will be the first book of that type, or dealing with those issues, that a reader encounters.
I love these questions about Realm Breaker. We had a couple of great questions about the book in particular. Emma Jaggers wants to know, "What are you most excited for readers to experience in this novel?"
Victoria Aveyard: I really, really love so many of the set pieces and the action moments. And obviously, that's what I gravitate towards. But this is, I think, the first book where I'm really, really proud of the characters as well. Character is where I really struggle. And these particular voices were so, so clear to me that their relationships are what I'm really proud of and I'm really excited for people to connect to. And the way that this sort of forced, found family develops, I really enjoyed writing that. And I pride myself on as many of the quiet scenes, as I do the big loud ones, which is a weird feeling for me.
Sarah Enni: That's funny to hear you say, because I know people have total undying loyalty to characters in the Red Queen series.
Victoria Aveyard: Yes, and I am really excited because I got to do something in this book that I couldn't do in Red Queen that I know a lot of people wanted, and they wanted the villain romance. And I feel like I am all for villain romances, if they make sense with the characters. And a lot of the times they don't. You know, it's either the character's gonna betray who they are to make this romance work, or it's gonna be completely out of character. So I set out, from the beginning, to make sure it would work for certain characters.
Sarah Enni: Ooh! I'm not gonna spoil anything, but I'm like, "Mmm, I love it!" Okay, this is a great question from DaisySheldon48. I love this cause of way it was phrased, "What's the thing in Realm Breaker that you love the most, besides the map?"
Victoria Aveyard: I do you love the map and we had a fantastic artist who created the map that you guys see in your books now. I had my very simple one that I worked off of, and I definitely want to do a blog post or something of, "Compare these two!" I send it out in my newsletter. And I remember when we first chose her, there was a worry that my map was so detailed, and she's a very, very detailed artist, that it might be too much.
And then we got the original sketch and I was going through it at full zoom in PDF just like screaming to myself, because even the architecture in the different cities is correct. There's onion domes in the place that's closer to Poland, Russia. And then in the sort of medieval Germany one, they have castles and cathedrals and all of this stuff. It was so cool to get to see her synthesize my vision and elevate it.
But yeah, so I love the map [laughs], but besides that, I really love... oh my god, there's so many scenes that I love. And I love the middle. I love the way that the story hinges at the mid-point. I think a lot of people are expecting twists towards the end of my books and I, hopefully, surprise some people. So I always get excited to watch people experience the twists and what they don't expect to happen. And the prologue, I love the prologue.
Sarah Enni: The prologue is great. It's difficult to not ask spoiler-y questions.
Victoria Aveyard: I had to fight for that prologue.
Sarah Enni: You did?
Victoria Aveyard: Yes. There was talk of pulling it out and making it its own novella when it was originally 12,000 words long.
Sarah Enni: That's very interesting... 12,000 words [laughs].
Victoria Aveyard: I know. And I got it to six and they said, can we get it to three? And I said, "If we get it to three, it's not gonna have the same effect. And then there's no point in having it." So that was where I cashed my chips in, was to get that prologue where I wanted it.
Sarah Enni: Well, I think that that was wise.
Victoria Aveyard: I feel vindicated.
Sarah Enni: Yes. I think you should feel vindicated. And in reading the book - I mean, maybe I'll cut this part - but in reading the book, there were several points where I was like, "Oh, she could have started back there. Oh, she just started back there." Like there was a lot where I could see there would be a whole 600 page prequel novel. Not to put that on you.
[Both laughing].
Victoria Aveyard: Mm-hm... later.
Sarah Enni: But I think where you started was perfect, especially given what you really wanted to express with the story.
Victoria Aveyard: Thank you.
Sarah Enni: Okay. We have a few great questions about writing process. And I really liked this one from Hannah Barkley. Again, "Any advice for low confidence while working on a first draft?" I think that is a very relatable question.
Victoria Aveyard: Absolutely, and that's the thing, that's the thing. We all go through it. And that's what I have to lean on is knowing that we all get to the point where we think this is garbage and terrible and no one wants to read this and you can't see the forest for the trees anymore. And we all have imposter syndrome. We all think, "Why the hell am I here? How is someone letting me do this? No one really enjoys these books. I'm a failure."
So I just have to lean on, that's more [unintelligible], which sucks. But it's what we all go through, and we all have to deal with, and continuously deal with. There's never, at least for me, I've never gotten to a place where I feel safe in my career. And I think there are very, very few authors, if any, who get to a place where they feel safe. And that's a real double-edged sword because it drives you, but you also always kind of feel a little off balance.
Sarah Enni: Right, it's a tricky balance to make. And I'm picturing you, I think fans of yours will know, you kind of get a glimpse into your office on TikTok or Instagram sometimes. And I'm picturing you kind of being in the office, banging your head against the wall. When you have days where the confidence is low, is there anything that you do that bulks you back up? Or people you could call?
Victoria Aveyard: I don't really talk to people about my stories until the draft is done. I find that slows me down. I will send chapters to my dad who reads them, but he's not giving me notes. He's just saying like, "Yeah, great. I'm interested. Where's the next one?" And that is enough for me. Getting notes at that point is too much for me. I have to just get through a draft and that's always my best writing advice is, "Get through the damn draft." Good is better than a perfect first chapter.
Sarah Enni: CamMCP2000.CM wants to know, "How long did each of the drafts take?" I'm interested in what was true for Red Queen and what was true for Realm Breaker?
Victoria Aveyard: It was quite similar, honestly. I take between six and seven months on the first draft, usually. I might have to be a little faster on Realm Breaker 2 because a lot of other stuff has come up and has shortened my time. But yeah, if I have pure writing time, six to seven months. It can get squeezed or elongated depending, and then edits usually are another six months. But again, once you're on that publishing schedule, you're very much running ahead of a train, trying to lay track while it's coming up behind you.
Sarah Enni: Right, was that true when you wrote the first draft of Red Queen?
Victoria Aveyard: So the first draft of Red Queen I really started in earnest in July of 2012 after I graduated college. And I finished the first draft in January, 2013. So it's a hard six months. All I was doing during that was writing and living at home with my parents. At a coffee table hunched over, and that's probably why I have back problems.
Sarah Enni: Yeah. Not great, not great. I love that the length of time though - even without contract - cause that was not on contract, that was on spec, right?
Victoria Aveyard: That was on spec that had no promises whatsoever. That was scary. It was definitely the scariest time and the hardest time writing. And any time I run up against difficulty or disbelief or something, I lean back on, you know, "This is your job, and you're on contract, and you're on deadline." And you have all of these things that feel like boundaries, but are actually holding you up at the same time.
Sarah Enni: That's a great perspective to have on it. I love this, the AmbivertWriter wants to know, "What distracts you most from writing?"
Victoria Aveyard: Oh my god, TikTok. But now TikTok has also become a great tool for us writers and the BookTok community is amazing and I love it, like genuinely love it. And I think people who love it will use it to their advantage. But if you're just doing it to try and advertise to people, it's very disingenuous and it comes through in the videos, and whatever. I could scroll through TikTok forever. I definitely hit those points where the TikTok app itself says, "Stop scrolling and go to sleep."
Sarah Enni: Does it really?
Victoria Aveyard: And that's really offensive to me. "You don't know my life, TikTok!" TikTok is distracting. For the most part, I just really try and keep my office hours and do Monday to Friday and give myself my weekends. I feel like if I write all the way through, I'm gonna burn out. And that is worse than distraction.
Sarah Enni: You're really good about that. You're nine to five, which I admire. I'm trying to come up with a good schedule for myself. And you've spoken to this a little bit, but what's the biggest difference between writing Red Queen versus Realm Breaker?
Victoria Aveyard: I'm definitely more nervous. I have a lot more anxiety with this book and I think it's probably just because I understand how many bullets I dodged coming up and how many more bullets there are to dodge. So you just know more of the dangers and difficulties and you're aware of them. Which, I mean, you'd want to be aware of them, but in the past it was really, ignorance is bliss.
And I also feel such a responsibility to my readers that I have, and that's such a privileged to have had such a great support system. And just hoping for them to follow me to the next sandbox, so to speak. And I want to keep giving them books they want to read. I'm not doing this just for myself. I'm doing this because this is how I connect to the world.
Sarah Enni: Right, right. To whatever degree you feel comfortable talking about it. Not every listener might be familiar with the idea of launching a new series and how that is like a big challenge unto itself. When you knew you were wrapping up the Red Queen series, how were you thinking about launching into the next thing?
Victoria Aveyard: Well, my agent and I sat down and had a conversation. And one of the great things about having a good agent is, they understand that they're not just selling the books, they're selling you. And you are the commodity as much as the book is. The publishers are more book-minded, right? So this was about how do I establish myself and my brand and continue that brand while also still evolving with it.
So I knew I didn't want to write a carbon copy of Red Queen. I knew I didn't want to extend Red Queen at that point in time, I wanted to go somewhere different, but you want to make it a natural step. You don't want to go in completely the other direction. And luckily, Red Queen kind of morphed as I was writing it, into my tastes as an author.
So Realm Breaker definitely feels like the natural next step, but also allows me to go to adult fantasy if I want to afterwards, or stay in YA fantasy. It opens a lot of paths, I think. It allows me to go in a lot of directions for readers and find readers who want to go in all of those directions with me.
Sarah Enni: I'm actually interested if you encountered anyone who was a little side-eye about high fantasy.
Victoria Aveyard: Yes.
Sarah Enni: Which is wild to me. Obviously, you're talking to another high fantasy lover, so that seems nuts to me.
Victoria Aveyard: Yes, yes. And high fantasy is a hard sell. And second series are a hard sell. Very, very, very few authors will match, or exceed, what their previous series has done. Especially if it's a series that's done as well as Red Queen. I'm very aware of that. I'm very braced for the let-down, essentially. I hope it doesn't happen, but we'll see.
But we call it in the industry, you know, leveling up. If you're able to repeat with two series is something big. Then that feels like, "Okay, you've hit another tier in your career." And publishers are aware of that. And it's very much a business on their side of things too. They're gun shy about a lot of things. And high fantasy is one of them, and series are another one. So I have two strikes.
Sarah Enni: And I appreciate you speaking to that because that's a little bit behind-the-scenes type of stuff, but I think people on the outside might think that once you have a successful series, you can write your own checks for the rest of your life. And that's not true.
Victoria Aveyard: No, especially not in YA, and especially not for women.
Sarah Enni: Yeah [sighs]. Yeah, yeah. Ugh. A whole other podcast.
Victoria Aveyard: If you're not a straight white guy [chuckles], you're gonna have to prove yourself a lot more, and there's varying degrees of that.
Sarah Enni: Yes. Well I'm glad that you did this, obviously, a high fantasy. I was like, "Hooray!" Well, okay. Just the last thing about writing a series and the way that you talked about structuring it. The question from JDLawson is, "If you're writing a duology, or trilogy, how do you create a fulfilling story arc for book one?" You talked about how you conceive of it all, but how do you check that and say, "Yes, this first arc does make sense."
Victoria Aveyard: Right. Again, you're thinking about escalation, but you're also thinking about each story that has to be contained in itself. And yes, you can end on cliffhangers, and I usually do because that's my little cheap tactic to get you to get to the next book. But it very much has to feel like there was an arc here, and there was a change in the character from page one to page 500, or whatever it is. And that there was movement forward and you know there's more to come, but this was, itself, a satisfying journey for you.
I definitely used the original Star Wars trilogy and Lord of the Rings as inspiration for that contained story within a bigger story.
Sarah Enni: How did you think about, because they are, as you said, a kind of a ragtag crew that accumulates over the course of the story. Were you really focused on a satisfying emotional character arc for like one or two or three, or how did you think about that?
Victoria Aveyard: They all have [unintelligible] things that they want, that they either give up or learn are not something they actually want. And that was very helpful for me to key into that. And it's simple too, just knowing, "What does this person want?" There's a character; he wants to be a knight. And he has to portray the kingdom he wants to be a knight for, to save the world. And that's very simple and very easy.
One thing I did do, as sort of an exercise for myself to make them very clear to me, was I wrote down just one line of what each character would be doing in the middle of a bar fight.
Sarah Enni: Oh! [Laughs]
Victoria Aveyard: You know, there's one person who started it as a distraction for something else. And there's one person who's upstairs sleeping. And there's one person who's using it to steal drinks from everybody else. And that was very, very eye-opening to me of like, got to the heart of each person, but also the fun heart of each person. And then I did get to write that bar fight in the book, and it felt fun to me, and it worked. I highly encourage people to do little exercises like that with characters and just kind of find that core piece of them that whenever you're confused, you can come back to.
Sarah Enni: Yeah, I love that. And I love you speaking about taking, you know, you could watch Lord of the Rings, you could watch Star Wars and you can track how those characters move through the story. And using those beats for your own structure is not copying. You know what I mean? That's something I want to impress upon people.
Victoria Aveyard: It works for a reason. It's a pattern for a reason. And it just helps the audience so much. And when you're writing high fantasy, you want to do it in a way that is most easily understood for an audience. And that's a tool you can use. It's using the story structure that the audience automatically understands.
Sarah Enni: Yep. They're clued in and they don't have questions about that, so they have the brain space to focus on where you want them.
Victoria Aveyard: Exactly. You push them a little bit further.
Sarah Enni: I love that. Okay, just a couple of these and then we'll wrap up. Someone really knows you and wants to know, @MedinaJLynn wants to know, "True or false: Sam is the true hero of Lord of the Rings?"
Victoria Aveyard: I mean, true. But I feel like there are different facets of Lord of the Rings where other people are heroes: Aragorn, Gandalf, those would be my other two. But for sure, Sam pushes Frodo along. But Frodo does make a very heroic choice and he gets a bad rap as much as I skip over his parts in The Two Towers. He's being a wiener.
Sarah Enni: Yeah. It's true. It's true. I do think that Tolkien would say Sam.
Victoria Aveyard: Yes. Yes.
Sarah Enni: And then as an enjoyer of that series, there are other characters that I just enjoy more [laughs]. But yes, Sam. And I think the older I get, the more I watch it and I'm like, "Okay, Sam is great."
Victoria Aveyard: Sean Astin really, really kept that together.
Sarah Enni: He really did. A mutual friend of ours, who I won't blow up her spot on this podcast, but had never seen that before. And we co-watched over texts during pandemic, and it was life-changing. So happy [laughs].
Oh yep, this was a question from many, many, many people, "Any news that you can share about the Red Queen movie or development?"
Victoria Aveyard: Um, there are things I want to say, and there are things I can't say yet. It's literally one of those, they could tell me this morning, "Yep. The announcement is coming out today." And that's just when it will happen. So I'm very much waiting to tell you guys what I can tell you.
Sarah Enni: So stay tuned. "Watch this space," as they say.
Victoria Aveyard: I hate to do that to you.
Sarah Enni: Oh, I really thought this was a wonderful question. This is from, @Walkbyme, wants to know, "Is there a character that you have in your mind who you have not yet found the story for?" I love that way of phrasing it.
Victoria Aveyard: Yeah, and that's very much, "Do you come at a story because of the world or because of the character?" And I am much more on the concept world side. Red Queen was both concept and sort of a person embedded in the concept. But no, I don't have a character. I do have a premise slash world that I want to write next, maybe years from now. But we'll see. It's very much a world that has stuck with me.
And that's one of the good things about deadlines and contracts and being on a publishing schedule is, we get ideas all the time, and certain ones stay with you. And those are the ones you know you have to tell. This one stayed with me for years. And the other one has been with me for years. So I know that eventually they have to come out.
Sarah Enni: How do you deal with that? When an idea for non-Realm Breaker stuff is just tapping on your mind. Is there a place that you write that down?
Victoria Aveyard: At one point it was Realm Breaker tapping. So I had a little bit of notes and things, but mostly it was just in my head listening to music and coming up with pieces. The other one I've written like 30,000 words of, when I had downtime in Red Queen. I don't know if any of that will be a part of the final, it's gonna be really long. It's probably adult. We'll see where that one ends up, but I really like it because it has dragons and unicorns and steam engines.
Sarah Enni: Amazing, amazing. I'm facing that challenge myself right now, actually. And actually reading Realm Breaker, how dare you, made me think of this other idea.
Victoria Aveyard: Those are the best books though. And there are definitely books I've read where I have a hard time finishing because they want to make me write. So I have to put it down and go write.
Sarah Enni: Yeah, but not write the book I'm supposed to be writing! So it was like, "I need to open a new Scrivener file and just jot some stuff down." But it's a fun book in that way. I was like, "Ooh, so generative." Okay, last question. This is a tough one, but a really fun one. This is from ZenithOver Shown, "What's the one thing you wish people would ask you, but they never do?"
Victoria Aveyard: And I've been trying to think of this one as we're talking, because this is a really good question. And I usually bring this up in conversation, but there's a lot of talk about what denotes YA versus new adult or adult, and what is the core of YA to you. And a lot of people would immediately say age range.
And that's true, but for me, it really has to do with, is there a coming of age moment? Is there someone figuring out who they are, or seeing who they've become and choosing not to be that person, or not liking it and trying to change their fate?
So for Realm Breaker, there are POV characters who are very much adults. One of them is 500 years old. But they all have that journey of self-discovery and figuring out who they are in the world, and where they fit and where they want to fit. And I think that is the core of all young adult fiction. More so than age, more so than any other piece of it.
Also, I think YA, a lot of people would just call it a marketing sort of sphere, which is kind of true, but I still see it as a genre that encompasses all other genres. I love that in YA you can go anywhere, and you can combine things, and you can sort of build your sandbox so to speak.
Sarah Enni: Yeah, YA thinking of it as the category. And then within that, every genre is present and many genres are colliding.
Victoria Aveyard: Yes, and pace too. Pace is very, very key to YA. A work can be 200,000 words long, but if it moves, it moves, and it's not gonna feel that long. And it fits in YA that way. I think that's why there's a lot of people who have a background in film schools who gravitate towards YA because screenplays and movies are written with such immediacy and it translates really, really well.
Sarah Enni: Yeah. And it does make me think, like, I think high fantasy... and I've thought about this a lot with Sabaa Tahir's books as well. An Ember in the Ashes, that series is every bit as good as every other high fantasy series I've ever read.
Victoria Aveyard: Absolutely.
Sarah Enni: And it was like, "What is it that makes...? I think the line between YA and adult with high fantasy, and to some degree science fiction, is just sort of even less clear because if you love one, you'll love all of it.
Victoria Aveyard: Right. But then if they get the YA sticker, a lot of adult fantasy readers won't come around until they're told they should come around. And that's tough. I just found out Realm Breaker is being shelved as adult in the UK. And I was like, "Oh, that's interesting." We'll see how that goes.
Sarah Enni: Huh! That's really wild. Interesting. So I love that question, so I'm glad that we brought it up. Was there anything else about Realm Breaker that you wanted to talk about or that you're excited for your fans to get into? Or should they know before they sit down?
Victoria Aveyard: I really want them to go into this not knowing too much, just that it's a fantasy adventure. And hopefully you'll find someone you connect with in the pages and you get to join this little family and go on this journey with them, and you feel part of it and you feel included. And also you feel surprised.
Sarah Enni: Yes, I was definitely [chuckles], I feel like my suggestion would be to sit down with snacks because you are just not gonna stand up for a long time, at least that was my experience. A question I didn't include but I got from many, many listeners was about when they can expect two and three.
Victoria Aveyard: So we were just having that talk, actually. We're looking at two being next summer. I've had a lot of promo and publicity and marketing stuff going on with this book that has slowed down writing the second one. And that's just the name of the game.
So we're hoping that I will be finished with that first draft this summer. And then we can get about a year to edit and get her ready so she works for you guys. And then hopefully the third one will be coming up the year after. So, bing, bing, bing.
Sarah Enni: Whenever someone's listening, that's summer 2022. Well, the next time you decide to take a year break, let all of us know so we can expect the next year-long dramatic global event. Ah, and then we're all good. This has been so fun. Thank you for coming over, so special.
Victoria Aveyard: Yes. Thank you for having me. I feel like a human.
Thank you so much to Victoria. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram @VictoriaAvyeard. Oh, and Tik TOK. Follow her on Tik TOK @VictoriaAveyard as well. She is doing great stuff over there. Follow me on both @Sarah Enni (Twitter and Instagram), and the show @FirstDraftPod (Twitter and Instagram). By both I mean Twitter and Instagram. I am not on TikTok. Well I am, but it's um, kind of a secret account where I'm doing nothing related to books. I'm just watching kids dance, basically.
Okay. Moving on. Also thank you to our sponsor. The six month Picture Book Writing and Illustration Online Course offered by author Zanni Louise, and illustrator Anna Pignataro. First Draft listeners get a 20% discount on the course. To learn more and sign up with that 20% discount visit Zannilouise.com/course-FirstDraftPod, or check the link in the show notes of this episode.
As I mentioned at the top of the show, leaving a rating and review on Apple podcasts is a great way to help support the show and help new listeners find us. I'm gonna read a review that was left, now. This was left by PonyFly. PonyFly says, "Vital and interesting podcast for writers. Sarah is an incredible interviewer. I love hearing where these interviews go; curious and fun, unexpected places without feeling like they've lost focus. It's a narrow magical line, and I'm glad Sarah finds it, walks it and shares it."
That's like just uncommonly sweet. And I so, so appreciate you, PonyFly, taking the time to leave that review. Tons of people have left ratings lately, which I am so grateful for, but also I would love to shout you out and read a review from you like I did with PonyFly here. Be like pony fly, leave a review so I can read your kind words and give you shout-outs.
First Draft is produced by me, Sarah Enni. Today's episode was produced and sound designed by Callie Wright. The theme music is by Dan Bailey and the logo was designed by Collin Keith. Thanks to social media director, Jennifer Nkosi and transcriptionist-at-large Julie Anderson.
And as ever, thanks to you, unlikely heroes for listening.
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