Kiss Papercuts Goodbye Author Interview

I had the honor of talking with Kelly Lan, the Founder of Hello Prosper an organization dedicated to empowering Asian women. I was lucky enough to work with Kelly on the inspiring new Hello Prosper book called Kiss Papercuts Goodbye.

As one of the authors of this book, I got to tell the story of a real-life South Asian woman superhero, the astronaut Kalpana Chawla. To learn more about the research and writing process of this story watch the interview above.

​Support me and Hello Prosper by pre-ordering your copy of the beautiful book Kiss Papercuts Goodbye.

It's been selected as a "Project We Love" by Kickstarter and already has hundreds of backers.
There are two more weeks left to this Kickstarter and we are halfway to our goal!


Pre-order your copy now:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/hello-prosper/kiss-papercuts-goodbye

Regardless of the format you use, strong characters make the best stories. I’ve written about iconic characters in a previous blog. In this blog, I will talk about how I came up with the characters for my novel.


My novel is a story about a South Asian family and it has an ensemble cast. It is about five cousins who discover a family curse and go on a quest to break the curse. Each character is equally important to the story and is there to balance out the other characters. For example, I have a character that is strong headed with a need to control her life, one who is passive as a doormat, one who is too laid back, one who is immature and a bit self-centered, and one who feels like he has lost all control. All of these characters have distinct personalities and issues they deal with in life, but are all connected by blood and by the curse that haunts them.
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I spent over two years just researching for my novel before I began writing it. This research included developing my characters. I knew I wanted an ensemble cast and that it was going to be a story about a family curse, but developing each individual character and their storyline took research. Here are some things I did to develop them.

1. Start with who you know. I based parts of my characters’ personalities on people I know in real life. That made it much easier for me to imagine what they look like and how they would react in certain situations. I pull from real life for all my creative work so this was a natural step for me.
2. Get to know your characters. Once you start to develop your characters, you will find yourself having conversations with them in your head. This will help you get to know their personality and how they speak and respond in a conversation.
3. Write your character’s back story. Even if the character’s back story is not in the novel, it’s important that you know your characters inside out. For you to get to know them better, you need to know where they came from and how they grew up.
4. Visualize where they are from and where they currently live. Research the places where your character is from or where they currently live so you can understand their lifestyle better.
5. Socioeconomic status. This ties into where the character is from or where they live. You need to know their socioeconomic status growing up and where they are as an adult (if they are an adult character). This will tell you how they talk, how they dress, how they interact with friends/family/strangers from other socioeconomic statuses. This shapes a character. 
6. Family ties. What type of family did they grow up in? Did they have siblings? Were their parents around? How did their parents treat them? Did they have pets? How did they handle their family environment at home? This will give you a lot of insight into the type of person your character becomes. 
7. Make a Pinterest board. Make a board for each character that includes things like cultural aspects of the character, how they dress, where they live, what they eat, etc. It’s a mood board for your character to help you visualize them better.
8. What makes them iconic? What makes them special? Each character has something that makes them tick. They have positive and negative forces at work in the story that help their personality shine. Find out what that is.
9. Make your characters grow and change with the story. There are some iconic characters out there whose sole purpose is staying static through everything life throws at them. These types of characters are very difficult to write well. Characters with flaws who grow and change over time are more relatable and give your readers hope that people are capable of change. Make sure your character’s personality/mentality flows and develops with the story arch. 
10. Write characters that look like you. If you are a person of color or from a marginalized community, I encourage you to write your own stories whether fiction or nonfiction. I encourage you to write about characters that represent you or your community. There is a serious lack of diversity in the literary world. This will also help you write the most unique/iconic characters. Only you can write a character that represents you and your unique experience in the world. 
    
    
    

These are some of the strategies I used to write and develop the characters in my novel. I also noticed that after I began writing my story, I had to change who I thought my character was to make the story make sense. You might find your characters evolving through the writing process and this is natural and a good thing as long as the story makes sense. 
Do you have any character development techniques that I didn’t mention in this blog? Please share them in the comments. I’m always looking to improve my process. 

In my upcoming blogs, I will share more of my process with you and introduce you all to my characters. I would also love to hear about your experiences and suggestions that could make this journey more fun and interesting for me. Feel free to leave comments below or contact me personally through this website. 


You can sign up for my newsletter at the bottom of the page for updates on my writing, my workshops, and my events.


Stay tuned for more #browngirlwrites blogs. 
Until then…


Happy Writing! :)


Find me on social media. Links at the bottom of the page 👇🏽


Art by Loso F. Perez of Prime Vice Studios

I know a lot of people who want to write a book. They have stories and characters in their heads that they can talk about for hours. But what they don’t have is words written down on a page. The hardest part about writing a book is...writing it. Sitting down every day or once a week to type out thousands of words until you have a coherent story. 

I’ll be honest, finding the motivation to write for my memoir was much easier because I wrote most of those essays as class assignments in grad school. Also, many of those memoir pieces began as journal entries (I write those every day). However, writing my novel post-grad school was a different game. I didn’t have professors holding me responsible for my writing. I had to hold myself responsible for it.

In a previous blog, I talk about my outlining process. This was one of the most helpful ways I stayed on track and was able to motivate myself to write at least 3-5 hours a week. 
I had outlines for each chapter of my book written on an index card. This way, when I sat down to write, I didn’t just have a blank screen in front of me, I also had notes--something to build on. It was much less scary this way. I would just focus on my goal of getting through the points/scenes I had outlined on my index cards so I always knew what to write next and never fell into a writer’s block. That doesn’t mean I wrote every scene and every dialogue perfectly. My goal for the initial draft was just to get the story down and my characters fully developed. 

I will talk about my revision process later in this series. However, I decided to leave perfection for another time. All of this took a lot of pressure off of me so I could just write. I found myself zooming through each chapter. Was each chapter perfect and complete? No. As you know, most of writing is rewriting/editing. You can’t expect to write something new and have it be perfect and ready to publish all in one go. That’s way too much pressure on yourself and it’s just not realistic. Every writer needs editing/revision. 

After finishing my research and outlining process, it took me about 6 months to finish my first draft because I only wrote 3-5 hours a week. There were some weeks where I didn’t write at all (the world is a mess right now so I had to give myself a break once in a while). Some writers have a word count goal for every week. I didn’t. I set my goals according to chapters instead. I would try and finish one chapter a week minimum. This technique helped me get through and type out my first 40,000 word draft. Was this draft ready to pitch to agents/publishers? No. But now I had a whole book. A mediocre book, but a whole book. My revision process is what will take my book from mediocre to great.

Now that I am in the revision stage, I am enjoying the process of elevating my writing. I am able to spend more time on details and descriptions and making sure there are no holes in the story. I don’t have to worry about the nitty gritty parts of the story. It is already written. It's all about polishing it up and getting it ready to pitch. 
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All of the things I shared in this blog can help motivate you or ease you into writing your book. However, the most important thing is that you have to motivate yourself to write every day or every week. Writing is a habit. I write every day, even if I am not working on my novel. The more regularly you write, the easier it will be to get through writing a book. Try writing a daily journal or morning pages right after you wake up every morning. Get in the daily habit of writing and before you know it, you will have a whole book!

In my upcoming blogs, I will share more of my process with you and, soon, I will introduce you all to my characters. I would also love to hear about your experiences and suggestions that could make this journey more fun and interesting for me. How do you motivate yourself to write? What techniques helped you finish writing your book(s)? Feel free to leave comments below or contact me personally through this website. 


You can sign up for my newsletter at the bottom of the page for updates on my writing, my workshops, and my events.
Stay tuned for more #browngirlwrites blogs. Next blog: “My Revision Process: Elevating My Writing.”


Until then…


Happy Writing! :)


Find me on social media. Links at the bottom of the page 👇🏽
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Art by Loso F. Perez of Prime Vice Studios

I hope you found my previous blog useful with all the resources and tips I provided for research. In this blog, I will talk about how I developed the voice or tone for my novel. 
In my previous blog, I talked about how much research went into this novel. Before I jumped into too much research, I made sure to write at least a part of a chapter or two to explore the topic, build the main character(s), and set the tone I wanted for this book. 


If you know me as a writer, you know that I believe humor to the highest form of art. I love writing humor. I wanted my novel to have an overall lighter humorous or fun tone with some deep, dark parts. I was going for a slightly quirky or snarky tone. I didn’t want my novel to be too heavy or serious. I prefer to leave the heavy serious writing for my memoir. 
So, I knew what type of tone I wanted based on some of my favorite books. This is something you have to decide before you begin investing too much time into research and writing. 


The next question was, is this tone appropriate for the kind of story I want to tell? In addition to a light fun, sometimes snarky tone, I also wanted an element of mysticism in my novel. To contrast this fun mystical tone, I wanted some of my characters to be super pragmatic in their personality and voice. I felt that it would add to the humor and lightness of the tone. I did in fact already have characters like this in my story. The humor and mysticism would contrast well with a serious pragmatic character. This was also a story of self discovery that had a series of crazy or tragic events, but wasn’t just focused on just the tragedy. So, I thought I could apply this tone to my story quite well.


Now that I was sure what type of tone I wanted and that it would work well for the type of story I was telling and the characters I was developing, I needed to practice. When I begin a writing project, I prefer to begin writing by hand in a notebook before I type anything up on a computer. This is something that is personal to me so I’m not saying it works for everyone. I have noticed that especially when it comes to my voice and my tone, writing by hand is very helpful for me. So, I wrote parts of my first two chapters using the same tone. I wrote two different characters using the same tone. 


I knew the voice and tone I was using to write this story was working because I was having fun writing! Sometimes it’s just that simple. If you’re not having fun writing what is supposed to be a fun story, then do you think your readers are going to have fun reading it? This applies to serious writing as well. I am often in tears as I write my serious memoir essays. If you don’t feel emotionally involved in your writing, then your reader won’t either. Your voice or tone is often the most important tool in creating that emotional connection.


After I wrote the samples of those two chapters, I put them away for over a year as I dove into research and outlining the story. When I was ready to begin writing, I went back to those chapters and read them to remind myself of the voice and tone I created for this novel. As I read those chapters, I found myself smiling and feeling the same emotional connection I felt when I wrote them over a year ago. I knew this tone would be perfect and I was so grateful to have written those samples so long ago because now I could just pick up telling the story where I left off in the same tone of voice. I had a place to start.


This is how I developed the voice and set the tone for my novel. Now that I am in the revision stage, I am even more grateful for the tone I picked because re-reading each chapter multiple times can get tedious. At least I still feel the emotional connection and get some laughs as I do so. 

In my upcoming blogs, I will share more of my process with you and, soon, I will introduce you all to my characters. I would also love to hear about your experiences and suggestions that could make this journey more fun and interesting for me. Feel free to leave comments below or contact me personally through this website. 

You can sign up for my newsletter at the bottom of the page for updates on my writing, my workshops, and my events.


Stay tuned for more #browngirlwrites blogs. Next blog: “Just Write!”
Until then…


Happy Writing! :)


Find me on social media. Links at the bottom of the page 👇🏽
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Art by Loso F. Perez of Prime Vice Studios

If you have been keeping up with the blogs about my novel writing process, you know that I had to readjust my timeline for this novel because I found myself farther along in the writing process than I originally thought and I have been able to crank out chapters much faster than I anticipated. One of the reasons for this is because of the COVID-19 quarantine. It gave me a break from work and more time to write. However, the main reason I have been getting through this writing process faster than I expected is because of the tremendous amount of time and effort I spent on researching and outlining. 

The majority of the time I have spent on this novel so far has been on research. Because I did so much work on research and outlining, when it came time to write, I was able to crank out the chapters quickly. 

Here is what I did during my research period that helped me speed things up:

1) I read a lot.

Before I begin any writing project, I read up on as many resources as I can to get inspired and to get ideas. For example, when I was working on my memoir/MFA thesis, I spent years reading as many memoirs as I could. I made sure I had a diverse range of authors and writing styles. I read serious, sad, depressing memoirs. I read honest, funny, uplifting memoirs. Most of the memoirs I read were written by women of color and/or immigrants because those voices are not common in the publishing industry and are the most relatable to me. During the writing process of this novel, I pulled out some of my favorite novels for inspiration and read several new novels with similar voices and stories to the one I am writing. I am writing a realistic modern day novel with a hint of mysticism and a lot of exploration of the cultures I grew up in. 

Here are some (there are many more) of the novels that inspired me:
Soledad by Angie Cruz
Ayiti by Roxane Gay 
Funny Boy by Shyam Selvadurai
Unmarriageable by Soniah Kamal
Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows by Balli Kaur Jaswal
Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan
The Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling

Most of these novels are based on real life experiences of these authors so they are very realistic, but they all have a slightly mystical other-worldly element to them, especially Soledad. Obviously, the Harry Potter series is fantasy and all about the magical, mystical world.

Since I am also exploring my culture, these are some memoirs that inspired that aspect of my novel:
One Day We’ll All be Dead and None of This Will Matter by Scaachi Koul 
If They Come For Us by Fatimah Asghar
Fresh Off the Boat by Eddie Huang
Becoming by Michelle Obama
Born a Crime by Trevor Noah
We are Never Meeting in Real Life by Samantha Irby

There was another book that helped me establish the outline and structure of my book as well as some of the character development. I was very clear from the beginning of researching my novel that I envisioned this story on the big screen as a movie. After taking a screen writing workshop with Tamil Hall sponsored by the Atlanta Writers Club that gave me many helpful ideas for my novel, I decided to use a screen writing book as a template to write the outline of my novel in a way that it could also be easily converted to a screenplay in the future. The book I used for this (recommended by Tamlin Hall) is The Screenwriter’s Roadmap: 21 Ways to Jumpstart Your Story by Neil Landau. This book focuses on story structure and character development in many ways that helped my writing process. Although it focuses on screenwriting, it is generally a helpful book for storytelling in any genre.


2) I used index cards to help me organize my research/outline.

By the time I was finished with my research process, a year later, I had a solid outline for my novel and the main characters mostly developed. Here is how I used the cards:

• One card for each section of the outline. Fill in the cards with details of what happens during each of those beats. I decided to use a screenwriting format and divided my story into three acts.
• One card for each character. I began with making index cards for the main characters first and filled in each card with the characteristics and brief background of each character. Also, notes on how the character will evolve.
• One card for each chapter. I filled in each card with the highlights of each chapter. This helped me so much when I sat down to write the chapters. The blank screen in front of me didn’t scare me because I knew where to start and it helped me stay focused on the main events in each chapter so I didn’t get lost or side-tracked. 
• One card for each theme that I am exploring in the book. I wrote my story around certain themes and these index cards help remind me to keep exploring and developing these themes throughout the story. 
• Finally, one card with ideas of what I should discuss in this blog about my process. The challenges I faced and things that helped make the process smoother are listed on this card.

Needless to say, I had to invest in a few stacks of index cards. I use the white lined cards as well as the ones with different colors to help me categorize. It also helps to organize the cards on a wall or bulletin board so you can visualize your novel.

3) I paid more attention than ever before to my family and friends.

I began taking notes on our encounters and exploring these encounters in my journal. Since I am exploring my culture in my novel, it is important I explore it in the most authentic and detailed way possible. I also paid attention to and explored the cultural programming I was raised with. 

4) I used Pinterest for character development.

It has really helped me to make mood boards for each of my characters on Pinterest so I can visualize what they look like in my head while writing and become more familiar with their lifestyle and personality. I fill the boards with clothes they wear, what their home looks like, what kind of profession they have, what kind of town they live in, what their hobbies are, etc. It’s a really fun way to get to know your characters!

5) I continue to read more books.

Now that I am well into the writing process, I have to keep reading or re-reading books to help me stay inspired and focused on my novel. You can never read enough books or find enough inspiration.
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The most important thing to remember about this crucial part of the process is to know when to stop digging. It is very tempting to spend months and years researching and use research as an excuse to procrastinate on actually writing the book. I spent about a year researching my novel. During that time I did a little bit of writing, but it was more for me to establish the tone and explore my character's personalities. But, eventually, I made the decision to step out of research mode and get into writing mode.   

This blog is a lot longer and more detailed than my previous blogs, but that’s because a lot goes into this part of the process. 

In my upcoming blogs, I will share more of my process with you and, soon, I will introduce you all to my characters! I would also love to hear about your experiences and suggestions that could make this journey more fun and interesting for me. Feel free to leave comments below or contact me personally through this website. 

You can sign up for my newsletter at the bottom of the page for updates on my writing, my workshops, and my events.

Stay tuned for more #browngirlwrites blogs. Next blog: “Set the Tone”
Until then…


Happy Writing! :)


Find me on social media. Links at the bottom of the page 👇🏽


Art by Loso F. Perez of Prime Vice Studios

The conversation I want to have with you in this blog is something that a lot of us struggle with. It is a struggle for me. When I published my previous blog, “Let It Simmer,” some of you mentioned that you tend to let things simmer too long because you are fussing over everything you’ve written trying to make it perfect. I was guilty of this early in my writing process as well. One of the things I did while letting my writing simmer was to spend too much time editing one chapter instead of writing new ones. I kept going back to my first chapter and spending hours cleaning it up or trying to perfect it. Eventually, this took a toll on my motivation. 

I love editing, however, I use a different part of my brain to edit than I do to write new material. The editing part of my brain became overwhelmed with trying to perfect my first chapter and writing my novel started to feel like a chore. 

The most exciting part of writing my novel for me is starting a new chapter and getting the story out of my head and into my document. I get to make my ideas real by putting them down on a page and I get to empty my head and make room for new ideas. I get to use all the research and outlining I have done and turn it into chapters. There is nothing more satisfying than finishing yet another chapter in my book.

Unfortunately, when I get stuck editing the same chapter, my ideas for the rest of the book are also stuck in my brain collecting dust, and my book is no longer moving forward. 
The last thing I wanted was to make my novel writing process a chore. I wanted to be excited every time I sat down to work on it. One of the values I live by when it comes to creative work is, “if you’re not having fun, then why are you doing it?” I believe that creative work should always be fun, exciting, or fulfilling in some way otherwise you are wasting your time and your skill.

I had to make a pact with myself. I vowed that during this part of the process I am only focusing on quantity not quality. My goal is to get the entire story out of my head and all the chapters written before I even think about going back and editing. This has taken a lot of pressure off of me. I’m no longer aiming for perfection. I’m just letting the words flow out of me. 

Once I made this decision, I was amazed at how quickly I was getting through my novel (being quarantined at home for a month also helped). Now I just focus on putting down as many words as I can and drafting as many chapters as I can. No, my chapters are not even close to perfect. They’re not all the right length or contain all the information I want them to. They’re not all polished and ready for an agent. But, they exist. That is my only goal in this part of my writing process. 

In my upcoming blogs, I will share more of my process with you and, soon, I will introduce you all to my characters! I would love to hear about your experiences and suggestions that could make this journey more fun and interesting for me. Feel free to leave comments below or contact me personally through this website. 

You can sign up for my newsletter at the bottom of the page for updates on my writing, my workshops, and my events.

Stay tuned for more #browngirlwrites blogs. Next blog: “First Draft: Research Tips and Resources.”

Until then…


Happy Writing! :)


Find me on social media. Links at the bottom of the page 👇🏽
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Art by Loso F. Perez of Prime Vice Studios

As most of us sit stuck at home during this quarantine, we are trying to keep our minds occupied to keep us from going crazy. Some of us are starting new projects, some of us are focusing on our fitness, some of us are taking time to just relax our bodies and minds. Personally, I’m doing a bit of all of those things plus re-watching all the Harry Potter movies.

As someone who was self-employed for years, I am used to being home all the time, working, relaxing, exercising, and spending time with my husband. For me, the quarantine brings back a familiar routine of waking up every day and getting to work or just taking a day to relax. 

​As a writer, the COVID-19 quarantine has been very helpful in keeping me on track with my novel. In fact, I am ahead of the goals I set for my novel for spring! 

​I was surprised at how quickly I was progressing through this book. But then, I took a closer look at my process and realized I have been working on this book since August 2018! I spent over a year researching, developing characters, and putting together an outline for this book. But, most importantly, I gave it time to simmer. I gave it time to slow roast. 

The reason I find myself cranking out the first drafts of these chapters so quickly now is because of the time I spent on the preliminary work. As you saw in my previous post, life did get in the way, but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing. It gave my novel time to simmer. It gave me time to really figure out what each character represents and what themes I should be focusing on in this book. It also gave me more time to research not just through reading books and articles but also by spending time with family, friends, and my community to learn more about my culture, the culture that I am exploring in this novel. 

Over time, it became more and more clear to me what purpose this novel will serve to the South Asian community and to the literary community as a whole. That made it easier for me to write iconic characters and create a more complex and nuanced story. 

I learned things about myself as a South Asian woman and as a writer that I was able to use to make the story richer. Writing about personal experiences in essays and memoirs is the most difficult type of writing. Applying your personal experiences in a fictitious novel, however, is a bit easier and much more fun. Your readers don’t know what’s based on real-life and what is made-up. The best writing is always based on personal experiences. Take time to build those personal experiences and include them in your novel.

​It is also important to give your writing time to breathe because when you go back to it after a while, you see it with fresh eyes and from a new perspective. If you believe in your work and believe that you are writing a masterpiece, you must give it the time it deserves. Good things take time. Let it simmer. 

In my upcoming blogs, I will share more of my process with you and, eventually, I will introduce you all to my characters! I would also love to hear about your experiences and suggestions that could make this journey more fun and interesting for me. Feel free to leave comments below or contact me personally through this website. 

You can sign up for my newsletter at the bottom of the page for updates on my writing, my workshops, and my events.

Stay tuned for more #browngirlwrites blogs. Next blog: “The First Draft: Less editing, more writing.”

Until then…

​
Happy Writing! :)


Find me on social media. Links at the bottom of the page ??

Art by Loso F. Perez of Prime Vice Studios

Why I started this blog.

​A couple of years ago, while I was working on my memoir/MFA thesis, I decided to share my writing process with all of you in a series of video and written blogs. I successfully defended my memoir/thesis in May 2018, won an award for “Best Manuscript” at the Atlanta Writers Conference the same month for it, and then decided to put it away for a few years.

Yes, I still find myself writing essays for it, but I came to a point where I realized I needed more time and experience before finishing that memoir and trying to get it published. I just wasn’t ready. I will write more about this in my next blog… “Let it Simmer.”

What came next…

I graduated with my MFA in Writing in June 2018 and began working on my novel in August 2018. I was very excited to switch gears from memoir to novel. I now had the freedom to make up stuff. The embellishment gene runs strong in my family of storytellers. I had to give in. :)
I came up with a story based on real life experiences (“write what you know”), and sprinkled some humor, mysticism, and all types of cultural experiences to make it fun to write and, hopefully, to read. I’m not gonna talk about it now, but I will discuss more about the story and characters in a later blog post. Stay tuned.
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Then, life got in the way.

I began crafting my characters and the gist of my story including a couple short drafts of the beginning chapters in August 2018. Then, in September 2018, life got in the way. This new project that I was so excited about, had to be put on hold. I went on a roller coaster ride of family issues for months. I had to put away several projects and deal with life. But, I didn’t give up.
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I got off the ride (quite disoriented) in April 2019 and have been consistently chipping away at my novel ever since. Even moving to another country didn’t slow me down!

So here I am, in a brand new country, done with the research and character development phase of my book, working on putting together a solid outline before I get into writing more chapters, and I don’t feel bad that it has taken me a year and a half to get to this point. Why? Because life gets in the way sometimes and that’s okay. In fact, the more time that has passed, the clearer the story and characters have gotten in my head. I’m not in a race and I’m competing with no one but myself.

Never lost sight of my goal.

It doesn’t matter how rich or talented you are, sometimes life just stops you in your tracks and forces you to change focus. In my case, I accepted that I wasn’t going to be able to work on this exciting new venture for a few months. However, through it all, I never lost sight of my book. As soon as I pulled my life back together, I was back on it. 
I guess what I’m trying to say is, it’s okay to cut yourself some slack and give yourself a break. If what you are writing is that important and inspiring, you will always find a way back to it when you are ready. You will come back and add your new, rich experiences to it and make it the best project ever. 

Moving forward. What will I blog about?

Now that I am back on track, I am very excited to keep working on this novel and sharing the process (and, eventually, some of the story) with you all. I will keep updating this blog with my process: the fun parts of writing a novel and the not-so-fun parts.
I will talk about research, organization, structure, time-management, and whatever personal issues (related to writing) that come up along the way. I would also love to hear about your experiences and suggestions that could make this journey more fun and interesting for me.

Feel free to leave comments below or contact me personally through this website. 
You can sign up for my newsletter at the bottom of the page for updates on my writing, and my events.

Stay tuned for more #browngirlwrites blogs. Next blog: “Let It Simmer”
Until then…


Happy Writing! :)


Find me on social media. Links at the bottom of the page 👇🏽
​
Art by Loso F. Perez of Prime Vice Studios

I had the pleasure of interviewing the amazing award-winning author Soniah Kamal. Her latest novel Unmarriageable is now out in paperback. Soniah shared some insights into accepting her journey as a writer and the cultural obstacles she faced on that journey. 

1. Why and how did you get into writing?

I wanted to be an actress but my father forbade it because he didn’t deem acting a respectable profession. Writing seems to have chosen me, in fact I call myself a reluctant writer, and there was a time when I thought regrets were going to bury me. Living with regrets is hard enough, but parental/cultural given regrets are acidic, and how do you possibly heal from that?  

2. What did you hope to get out of this career as a professional and on a personal level?

​When you’re younger, you think you can change the world, but as an older person even bringing a smile, or hope, or comfort to one reader is enough. Books were my balm growing up and I hope my words can serve as someone’s balm too.

3. What compelled/inspired you to write Unmarriageable?

​Unmarriageable is a parallel retelling meaning that it hits all the plot points of Pride and Prejudice. I was inspired to write it in order to remap colonial legacy in a postcolonial world and reclaim identity and also fuse my English language/British literature upbringing with my Pakistani culture. Also, Pride and Prejudice is so very much a novel reflecting Pakistani concerns with its social climbing mother frantic to get her five daughters married off well and the way Austen exposes social hypocrisies and pretensions which give birth to people like Mrs. Bennet.     

4. You write about South Asian, specifically, Pakistani culture. Who is the target audience in your mind when you are writing?

I write what is important for me to address which is very often cultural misunderstandings, class issues and feminist and postcolonial concerns. I hope my stories are universal enough to resonate with readers everywhere and so I really have no target audience.

5. What are some obstacles you have faced in your profession as a woman of color?

A few years back, I found that the U.S. publishing industry had certain expectations such as asking whether an immigrant family in the U.S. would be eating pizza at home, I suppose meaning that the family wasn’t exotic, ‘other’ enough. On the flip side, I’d worry about whether including a mango in my work might imply exotification and othering on purpose. I have to say that given that there are marriages etc. in Unmarriageable, I was a little wary of publisher expectations and suggestions, but I was truly delighted when my editor at Penguin Random House (U.S.) had none. I was to tell the story I wanted to tell in which every way I wanted with however much color, or not, I chose to put in it. Unmarriageable is a feel good novel told through a feminist and postcolonial lens and it had had nothing to do with immigration, woe woman is me, or terrorism, and I’m so thrilled it’s resonated with readers across all cultures and backgrounds. 

6. What are some opportunities you have come across in your profession as a woman of color?

I’ll let you know when I see them. Lol.

7. Do you feel you are compensated fairly for the work you do?

No. Writers are all too often expected to write for free or for peanuts.

8. What advice would you give to women of color/South Asian-American women who want to follow your career path?

Marry a millionaire, as long as he is a kind and good person. Seriously though, tell the story you want to tell. Unlike when I began writing, there are so many indie presses now who are willing to bring your voice to readers, and also books by independent small presses are getting reviews and coverage that before used to be very difficult to procure. Never give up no matter how much rejection you encounter. It’s taken me twenty years, but Unmarriageable was published in the U.S. and my novel An Isolated Incident is coming out in the U.K. this year.

About Unmarriageable

Soniah Kamal’s novel, Unmarriageable, is a Financial Times Readers’ Best Book of 2019, a 2019 Book All Georgians Should Read, and shortlisted for the 2020 Townsend Prize for Fiction. Her debut novel, An Isolated Incident, was a finalist for the KLF French Fiction Prize and the Townsend Prize for Fiction. Soniah's TEDx talk is about second chances. Her work is in New York Times, Guardian, Buzzfeed, Catapult, Normal School, Georgia Review and more.  www.soniahkamal.com twitter & instagram: @soniahkamal 

The paper back of Unmarriageable is out now and contains the following bonus features:
Essay- How ‘Dilipabad’ got its name.
Essay- How the characters were named.
Book Club Questions.
A List of all the books, films, songs etc. in Unmarriageable.​

Thank you Soniah for your inspiring words and the complex stories you tell about our South Asian community.

I’m sure you found Soniah’s interview insightful. If you have questions or thoughts about her interview or her work, please feel to leave a comment below. 

You can learn more about Soniah Kamal at her website: www.soniahkamal.com
You can also find her on Twitter & Instagram @SoniahKamal

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The next blog will be more #browngirlwrites stories, interviews, and book reviews.
Until then…

Happy Writing! :)

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Art by Loso F. Perez of Prime Vice Studios