Interview with Abigail Silver, Author of Visions of Fire (book 2 in the Redeeming Grace Trilogy)4/15/2023 Abigail Silver grew up reading Anne McCaffrey's Pern books and her father's old comic book collection in the mountains of central Pennsylvania. She holds a BFA from Edinboro University of PA and currently resides near Charlotte, NC. She shares a humble one-story abode with her husband, son, and fur children. When she's not reading, writing, or drawing (which is rare), she enjoys blasting music with the windows down on long road trips. Hi, Abigail! I am very excited for this interview and I appreciate you taking the time to answer the questions. Absolutely a pleasure to talk with you, Ellie! Thank you for taking the time to read Visions of Fire and to ask such thoughtful and insightful questions! 1) Are you a pantser or a plotter? Can you share a little about your writing process? So, I’ve never been someone who can plan out all of my scenes and then write them down as if I were filling out a worksheet. That process takes out all of the mystery and discovery for me, which is what keeps me coming back to the page. That said, there’s no way to tell a story this complex without some kind of a road map. This was the first time I tried to write with a particular ending scene in mind rather than letting the characters and logic take me where they would. So, starting with that scene, I sort of fleshed the story out in a backwards way, asking myself what I needed in order for everything to make sense in the end. I did do a scene by scene timeline when I was about halfway through the book, just to keep track of all the moving pieces. I referred back to it a few times, but by the end it was completely ignored. I have looked at it since finishing the trilogy, and I'm pretty sure it’s a completely different book. 2) What inspired Gracie's story? Music is a huge inspiration for me. I have a long commute and I enjoy listening to the pop stations and streaming services, as well as news and talk radio. I get a lot of inspiration for my writing from all of those things - from song lyrics to current events, as well as situations going on in my own life. Of course other fiction, like books, TV shows, and movies can give me a creative nudge as well. For Gracie in particular, I was watching a lot of Dr. Who at the time and very interested in time travel. I had just finished working on a piece about the romance between my characters, Gabriel and Olivia, and was wondering what would happen to them in the future. Then I heard “A Team” by Ed Sheeran on the radio and this little scenario came into my head. Then a writing prompt popped up on one of the writing pages I was following at the time and I decided to jot down a short story that I called “Amaya Over the Rainbow.” Gracie has her first mention at the end of that short. After that, I had to know how it all worked out! So I started writing Gracie’s story, and the original short story ended up being rewritten and incorporated into the end of Book 3. 3) Books in the Redeeming Grace series are very well balanced, whether it is the various aspects- world building, action, romance, family drama, the different fantasy and scifi elements- or the reminders of book 1 in Vision's of Fire. How do you achieve such balance? Thank you so much! This is a balance I think about constantly, especially after reading so much sci-fi and fantasy as a young person. When this mix is off, it makes a work incredibly difficult to read! When I approach a scene or a line, I always ask myself what it is contributing to the narrative. If a scene isn’t doing at least two or three important things, I usually try to cut it and incorporate the information in it somewhere else. For example, let’s take the scene from Visions of Fire where James, Liam, and Gracie are talking about Gabriel’s past while eating in the cafeteria. Obviously I needed to cover a lot of Gabriel’s backstory, but by having the banter between the three young characters occurring in the same conversation, we’re also building their relationships and characters at the same time. In fact, I tried to make a lot of the backstory and technology talk conversational, so that instead of being forced to read through blocks of text, the reader instead gets to enjoy a dialogue very much like gossiping with friends or reading a series of text messages. Not only do we learn a lot that way, but we then feel like the characters are our friends who have just shared fun information with us. 4) There are popular tropes in Visions of Fire, such as love triangles, but it's always a unique and refreshing take. Do you enjoy these tropes as a reader that you play on as a writer? And how does that affect your writing of them? As a reader, I’m very hard to please with tropes. When I was little, I’d read a story and think, “it would be so much better if they just did THIS instead!” So I’d grab a pencil and write my own stories. Thirty years later, I'm still doing it! My favorite thing to do as a writer is to turn gender roles and tropes on their head. That said, I won’t break something unless lived experience says it can be broken in a realistic way. Some tropes are that way because life is that way - like characters who aren’t always trustworthy, or who turn out to have ulterior motives. That’s just how life is, and I don’t mind including characters or tropes that bring the reader valuable insight into human nature. But let’s face it, a lot of tropes, especially romantic ones, often paint women as helpless and men as stupid or emotionally stunted. I don’t think that’s accurate or fair to anyone. My goal with breaking tropes is to make my characters as human and relatable as possible. They may be vulnerable or uninformed, but they’re not helpless or stupid, and they’ve usually got their heart in the right place. 5) "I'm not chasing after anyone, except maybe me" is just one of the lines that stuck out to me. Gracie's, the main character, exploration of identity and trying to figure out her place in the world comes across as very feminist. "Thought-provoking" is another adjective that comes to mind with the tough topics you don't shy away from, like Gabriel's addiction. You always write with such respect. How mindful are you of that while writing? How do you maintain such respect for both characters, as well as readers who might be living similar experiences? The way I view character development is empathy. I try to imagine the world through that character’s eyes. What are their hopes, dreams, and most importantly, fears? I find, more than anything, people are driven by fear. Whether it’s Gracie’s fear of being trapped in Angelus Quietum, which is just another way of saying nowhere, with her dad forever, or Gabriel’s fear that Gracie will learn about his past and no longer find him worthy of love or admiration, those kinds of deep fears are what drive their actions. When we understand a character’s motivations, when they show us that their fears are so much like our fears, suddenly we can’t help but identify with them. And that’s where I try to write from as much as possible. When you’re talking about the addiction issue and all the painful things that come with that, I wouldn’t say it’s any different. I think of these characters as real people, almost as friends, and I write them as I would want to be written - with respect and compassion for their humanity, while also being honest about the consequences of their choices. 6) Your settings are always so rich and fleshed out, almost as if it is a character itself. From history to religion to politics. Can you share a little about your process for world-building? Any tips or tricks? How do you keep it at that sweet spot of just enough in your stories? My world building is a little unfair, because I have been writing in this multiverse for at least two decades now. All of that planning and history allows me to write as if I live there, because mentally, I suppose I do. One tip I can give, is one of the first things I always do when starting a new novel. And that is to create a planning document that is separate from the manuscript. It’s there that I keep any important definitions, scene ideas, and cut scenes that didn’t work out. When planning out Cybele, the planet Gracie’s story takes place on, I had the advantage of writing Gabriel and Olivia’s story first. So I knew all about the history of the Inspiration and had whole genealogy charts and charts of who was in what job on the generation ship, before I even started. Then, when I began brainstorming for Gracie, I drew out a large map of Cybele and assigned place names that tied back to individuals on the Inspiration. That way, their history would be seamless and I knew what kinds of last names and features people from various areas would have. I also kind of let my mind wander about the world at that point, thinking about what kinds of religion and societies might have sprung up from the characters and families in the earlier novel. 7) Visions of Fire deals with a bit of science. How much research went into writing your books? Was it something you have always been interested in? How do you make real-life facts compliment the fantasy elements and the flow of the narrative? My father is a retired chemist who loves science fiction. To him, I am sure my work is much more fantasy than sci-fi. He's the type to research every tiny detail. For me, as long as I can explain it in a way that makes logical sense to me, I am happy. I don't have to know the exact equations behind it. I'm more of a big picture, application sort of person. What would this concept look like in real life? That said, I have done a lot of reading on the science of aging, addiction, and the psychology of trauma. I love reading psychology text books more than is probably wise for someone without a degree in it! 8) Your illustrations are such a cool addition to the reading experience. What inspired you to include them? Can you share a little about your process for illustrating? Is this something you're planning on doing with more of your books going forward? My day job is in visual arts and drawing is intimately tied to my characters and world building. As I am thinking about these characters, drawing them is part of that empathy building process. That said, I have created well over 100 drawings for this trilogy and it has been an exhausting process! The illustrations also make publishing and downloading the books more difficult. I think they work in a unique way for Gracie's story, because I wanted to tell her story almost as if she were speaking or journaling. Since she is an artist, I feel that the sketchbook style makes sense and gives an intimate feel to her story. All this to say, I'm not sure if I will continue illustrations if or when I ever publish again after Book 3. 9) Can you share a little about book 3 in the Redeeming Grace trilogy and what else you are working on? Sure! Book 3, The Fear of Time, pulls together all of the threads I've been weaving in Child of Awareness and Visions of Fire and reveals the shape of the pattern. I will warn you, it is not for the faint of heart! As Gracie's asides have hinted since the beginning, there are so many roads that could have led away from disaster, but she isn't on one of them. For those brave enough to see how the story ends, I am hoping to have her ready for publication this summer. As for new projects, I actually have a vision of Cybele's future that I would like to write, but it has so many moving pieces that it makes Gracie's story look quite simple. As a result, I have been working on a lot of writing that I would consider "pre-work" or back story. Stuff that takes place off stage that I need to know, but that doesn't necessarily show up in the published cannon. One of those pieces is my current drafting project, a rewrite of the love story between Gracie's grandparents, Gloria and D'nay. Follow Abigail Silver on Social Media! Check out Abigail Silver's website and TikTok, as well. Follow Abigail Silver on Amazon and Goodreads! My name is Gracie Usuriel and fire is in my blood. According to my dead sister Ariel, it’s in my very DNA. She thinks I’m the strongest pyrokinetic ever born on Cybele—so strong my flames actually burn holes in the fabric of reality that allow me to peer into other times and places. Hence why my best friend happens to be the ghost of my (much) older sister. So what exactly am I supposed to do with all this firepower? At eighteen, I had no idea. I just knew I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life twiddling my thumbs on my father’s farm. Dad might choose to spend his whole life hiding out in Angelus Quietum, but I was ready to go have some adventures! Not to mention a whole bunch of long-overdue research into a particularly mysterious immortal parent. And if I happened to be taking off to the same university as a pretty, blond diplomat-in-training, well, that was just a bonus, right? Dad, on the other hand, didn’t see it my way. He pulled every guilt protocol in his coding. Once he saw I’d made up my mind, though, he relented with a stern warning about the Overwatch. “They’re our police,” he said, “the ones who make sure individuals of Awareness stay in line. With your head blindness, the telepaths will be very nervous around you and I won’t be there to make sure everyone remains… civilized.” “I’ll be fine, Dad,” I reassured him. “After all, how much trouble can I get into at school?”
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As I explore in my Acorn Tops Blog, The Universal Toy, dolls, within a historical context, were a source of companionship. They were discovered in graves across countries, a sign that they were thought of as precious. They can be seen as an aspect of innocence and childhood, as they were dedicated to goddesses when outgrown. Dolls were used to display clothes, such as the Bartholomew Babies in England. They were used to promote and prepare for socially acceptable roles and expectations. There’s a lot of meaning one could derive from just the historical context of this toy. What I find in writing, though, is it is not just the research of the outside world that contributes to play of symbols in stories. It is our personal connection and experience. Dolls remain an ever-popular toy of choice today. Plenty of children have had or played with dolls growing up, from brands such as Barbie to American Girl to Cabbage Patch. My favorite doll growing up was a hard plastic Molly doll from the children’s show, The Comfy Couch, and she’s been so well loved that my mother had to use nail polish to fix the red of her nose and sharpie to fix the black of her shoes. Another hugely influential doll in my own life is named Edna. She is one of the few possessions my great grandfather was allowed to keep of his mother, for who I am named, after she passed away. She’s been this incredible touch stone of connection and family history that has survived house fires and multiple moves, including one across the country. Perhaps then, given these personal ties, it is no surprise that dolls and character’s relationships to the toy become an ongoing symbol throughout my Be book series. This was something, I, as the author, did not fully realize until @DailywriterQ on twitter asked about symbolism in author’s stories. It starts in Be with Ari and Peter’s niece, Rosy, and a cloth doll with yarn hair named Emily… He forced himself to smile, fist curling tight. “I still believe in fairy tales, even after everything.” He hesitantly whispered, but a breath of hope left within him. “I know you don’t. I know you think it’s foolish.” Childhood is often denied to children where Ari, Peter, and Rosy are from. It was something denied to Ari, who makes it a point to ensure others receive what she never had. For Rosy when she receives Emily, it is hope and wishes coming true. It would be her equivalent of Santa Claus. As my mother always said, it was something to believe in that was bigger than ourselves. It is something magical in a world that does not offer children like Rosy much magic. For Peter, who was doing everything he could to try to get Rosy a doll, it is connection and community. Which carries over to when Rosy lends Emily back to Ari in a moment where Ari is feeling very isolated and alone. It then transforms for Ari into a type of companionship, comfort, and touch stone of that same hope she gave to Rosy. I would not say there is a larger cast of characters in An Impossible Dream than in Be, but where Ari feels very isolated as a young woman surrounded by men, as I explore in my interview with Jenn Romano in The AjennDa Blog, Sare in An Impossible Dream is surrounded by other young women, allowing for more of a comparing and contrasting of circumstance and symbolic meaning. “Every lil’ girl needs a dolly.” Gilly said like it was a simple matter of fact. For Sare, who has been a servant her whole life, the very notion of a doll confounds her. She associates it with pretend work, rather than play. As her conversation with, one of “the ladies,” Gilly progresses and she tries to riddle out this popular toy, dolls become a look into the divide of haves vs. have-nots, as she “would argue only certain little girls ever had a doll,” and even then, what those dolls come to mean within those varied circumstance.
Sare does not know if her friend, Gracelynn, had a doll growing up, but imagines, knowing what she knows of her home life, that it would have been treated the way Gracelynn was treated: “to sit on a shelf out of… reach, as a means to have something else to brag about.” In that same vein, both Be and An Impossible Dream, discuss the row of unblemished porcelain perfection sitting in the princess, Rochelle’s, windowsill. In Be, Henry compares it to his mother’s books which he calls “well loved” and looked it. In comparison to the cloth doll like Emily or Elsbie’s unnamed rag doll, Rochelle’s dolls, too would have been expensive and rarely played with. She is another girl who is seen as little more than an object by those in her life, a comparison Sally, another of “the ladies,” later makes about how Elsbie was treated by one who should have loved her most. Even as Sare comes to recognize a more positive benefit of the doll, beginning to see what her friend, Elsbie, saw in her doll specifically, companionship, it acts as another layer of a metaphor for Elsbie and a bit of foreshadowing when thinking about why Elsbie never took such a precious thing back with her when given the chance: “It was safer where it was.” Ultimately, for Sare, the doll comes to represent the ever foreign and elusive “before” she alone among her peers does not have, the love, family, and memories of a time before she donned an apron and scrubbed chamber pots, as this unnamed rag doll was made specifically for Elsbie by Sally and Gilly keeps it and the rest of Elsbie’s childhood treasure safe. What do dolls symbolize for you? Did you have a favorite doll growing up? If you are a storyteller, do dolls make an appearance in your story? |
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Ellie Lieberman |