Veronica Rossi, Tahereh Mafi, and Ransom Riggs (+giveaway!)

Nearly 2,000 Filipino fans turned out for New York Times bestselling authors Veronica Rossi, Tahereh Mafi, and Ransom Riggs at the book signing tour held by National Book Store this weekend at the Glorietta Activity Center and Ayala Center Cebu.

Veronica Rossi is the author of the “Under the Never Sky” trilogy,” with the books “Under the Never Sky,” “Through the Ever Night” and “Into the Still Blue”; Tahereh Mafi penned the “Shatter Me” trilogy, with the books “Shatter Me,” “Unravel Me” and “Ignite Me”; while Ransom Riggs is best known for his “Miss Peregrine” books, currently with two installments, “Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children,” and “Hollow City.”

After signing thousands of books in their back-to-back events, I was lucky I got to catch them for a quick chat today at the Writer’s Bar at the Fairmont.

An exercise in opposites

The  “Under the Never Sky” trilogy features a post-apocalyptic world, where destructive Aether storms have drawn a divide between people who live in bubble cities (“Dwellers”) and those who’ve chosen to live with the harsh environment (“Outsider”). When Aria is exiled from the city of Reverie, she meets Perry, a rugged Outsider from the tribe of the Tides. Aria and Perry form a tenuous alliance to achieve their respective goals, but destiny throws them together as they fight not just for their lives, but for the survival of human civilization.

Veronica, who wrote for 7-8 years before her manuscript got picked up at a writing convention, notes that she conceived of the series based on the idea of opposites. “I wanted to write a romance with a strong adventure feel to it, with two characters completely different from one another, so I thought about having a girl who’s thrown out of her comfort zone. For a little while, I thought about the idea of time travel, but then I realized I get very confused with the rules of time travel. So I thought,  how can I do that in the same place, where you have two totally different societies that are completely separate but side by side. From there I started building the world piece by piece, with Aria’s technologically advanced society and Perry’s primitive, tribal, and very dangerous life.”

After doing some research on genetics and coming across genetic swings in small populations, she incorporated this into her novels as the Aether causes mutative effects on Outsiders, rendering some of them with heightened senses. “As a writer, it was just a fun way to see the world, to imagine what it would be like [to have these abilities]. It made sense, and they were fun toys to play with as a writer. I enjoyed breaking the senses down, I had previously read ‘Tales of the Otori,’ where the character has a heightened sense of hearing; and “The Natural History of the Senses” by Dianne Ackerman,  a gorgeously written, non-fiction work that is an exploration on each one of the senses…. Those two books were buzzing around in my brain.”

I enjoyed the trilogy for its sci-fi feel, reminding me a lot of Battlestar Galactica, in the quest for a new habitable environment for the human race, and even a bit of Firefly in the funny little words sprinkled into the Outsider language. I also enjoyed the series for the absence of a love triangle, quite uncommon in an epic trilogy such as this.

Veronica says she never considered adding another character into the mix. “I think a triangle’s a tricky thing; sometimes it’s done really well, but when it isn’t, as a reader I get really frustrated. It can feel very artificial at times. I thought it would be a much bigger challenge to keep the tension between Aria and Perry alive in other ways. It’s harder as a writer, because it’s easy to just throw another guy in there. I thought it would be much more interesting to have these two teenagers really like each other but have to deal with other things, external things as opposed to how they feel about each other.”

Often writing ten hours a day, seven days a week, the author is taking it easy at the moment as she gears up for a new series.

“I can’t really say much about it; nothing’s set in stone. But I’m working on YA — probably upper YA — that’s more fantasy based than the Never Sky trilogy, and my agent likes to call it my version of the YA Avengers.”

Her advice to aspiring writers? “Read a lot. Write a lot. Write to find your voice, and the only way to find your voice is to write, write a lot.”

She also emphasizes the importance of not getting discouraged. “I used to compare my writing to the writing in published books and I would get really overwhelmed and frustrated, thinking I would never get to do that. And the truth is that you can, it’s just a question of time, and keeping at it — revising and sharing your work people and getting feedback… Keep doing that and you can absolutely get there.Everybody gets discouraged, and the difference is when you don’t give up.

Catching up on Tahereh and Ransom

I’d met Tahereh Mafi and Ransom Riggs last year, and got to catch up on their books as well.

Ransom’s Hollow City was released earlier this year, which introduced us to new characters in his strange world: peculiar animals and peculiar adults.

“I don’t know where I get my inspiration, to be honest with you. Sometimes from the pictures, and I just feel my way blindly to the story at some points, and [write] whatever feels like it needs to happen,” Ransom quips.

While the next book is due out in 2015, the series also has an ongoing graphic novel.

“I think [the graphic novel] is great. I think the artist did a great job, and it’s really cool to see a book in that form. I don’t really know a lot about graphic novels; I’ve read a few, but if they’re all that good then I want to read more.”

A film adaptation is also in the offing for Ransom, with Tim Burton at the helm. “They’re shooting this summer, Tim Burton’s directing, and it’s coming out in July of next year,” Ransom reveals.”I think I might actually be jinxing it by telling everyone it’s coming out next year. I mean, they’re pretty sure it’s coming out, but you never know; Hollywood’s a cruel mistress.”

Meanwhile, Tahereh just concluded her trilogy, with “Ignite Me” this February. I just finished it this weekend and thought it was brilliant, both as a dystopian series and as a romance. In the series, Juliette Ferrars has been ostracized and isolated her whole life, only to be freed to use her horrific abilities as a weapon for the Reestablishment, the dictatorship that has taken over the post-apocalyptic world. As Juliette begins to accept herself and embrace her identity, she discovers just what she can do to create the change she wants in her broken world. I thought the whole series was well executed, with elegant prose, lots of exciting moments and complex characters, and I’ve been kicking myself for not getting at the books sooner — I’ve had them on my shelf for months! I’m not normally a fan of love triangles, but the series features one of the best examples I have ever encountered in YA, rife with romantic tension, and believable all throughout.

Tahereh says she feels great now that the series is over.

“We have a lot of author friends, and it’s great to be able to share these experiences with them and see how it felt for them, how they reacted, and everyone has a different experience: some people get really emotional, and some are stoic about it. I feel that I was really ready to give these characters a finality. It felt really right, so it was easy to say goodbye and left them with their lines.”

Tahereh reveals she knew at the end of the first book who Juliette would end up with. “I usually spend the first book getting to know the characters and spending time building the world and understanding their personalities and figuring out what the rules are. Once you’ve done that, in the second  and third books, you have to play with them within the confines of the world you’ve created so it has to be a little more rigid, a little more plotted out, and so I needed that first book to get to know everyone, and then I knew, almost immediately.

Fans, including me, have been vocal about wanting an epilogue, but we won’t be seeing one, Tahereh says. “I have a love-hate relationship with epilogues. I’m not quite sure how I feel about them. Sometimes they’re great, but I think it’s almost kinder not to [write one]. Readers say that they want an epilogue, but whatif you give it to them, and they’re like, ‘That’s not what I wanted,’ what happens? For “Mockingjay,” for example, that epilogue murdered me. That was not what I wanted, and it broke my heart in a sort of permanent way. In a beautiful way. I love those books, and I’m a big fan, but I wanted to leave it open-ended. Sometimes, readers want something, but what they really want is to know for sure that what the author had in mind was what they had in mind, and I didn’t want to break any hearts, just in case.”

On the ‘next big thing’ in YA

Veronica, Tahereh, and Ransom

I got the three of them together and we chatted some more on what they felt was the next big thing for the YA genre. 

“I feel like right now, YA is sort of searching for what the next big thing is, and I don’t think they’ve found it yet,” Ransom states, “although I think contemporary is having a great moment right now.”

I then asked Veronica and Tahereh, as dystopian writers, on how they felt about the industry buzz on the “death of dystopia.”

Veronica appears unconcerned. “We don’t actually think of it that much; we’re the writers, so we write what we want to write and let the business side of it analyze the trends. I guess if I look at it closely, there’s probably a wave of dystopia and it’s probably on the tail end, but it’s not really our concern. We just try to tell great stories. And if dystopia’s dead, then I’m sorry that you’re dead, but I think there’s always a place for good books,” she states.

Tahereh agrees. “It’s so important to point out that for writers, even the ones who wrote dystopian fiction, it  was not intentional. We wrote the books that were the books of our hearts, and the market was like, ok, we’ll take that. We like this right now. In the same way that people talk about the death of dystopia, even I am tired of dystopia. Not dystopia [per se], but the exploitation of dystopia even though I myself am a big fan.”

She notes, however, that the success of the Divergent franchise has somewhat reinvigorated the genre. “People are picking up the books again. Hollywood is optioning, left and right, all the dystopian novels. And I thought, for sure, that people have had enough, but you never know. It’s interesting.”

It doesn’t have to mean no one will ever write another dystopian novel, Ransom adds. “Just because the trend is dead, that doesn’t mean that if you write a good story and it touches on something that happens to be related to the trend, that it won’t resonate with people.”

“It only goes to show, for sure how unpredictable the market trends are,” seconds Veronica.

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I’ve had to read seven novels in the last two days, but it was totally worth it, and Veronica, Tahereh and Ransom were real troopers for squeezing in some time with me. They were bowled over by the support from Filipino fans, proclaiming them to be “the most enthusiastic fans”  they’ve ever come across.

Of course, I got my books signed, too!

Plus, how awesome is this photo?!? Squeeeeeee.

Missed the signing? Join my giveaway!

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A huge thank you to National Book Store for arranging the interview!

Under the Never Sky Trilogy (Kobo ebooks + trade paperback), 3.5/5 stars; Shatter Me Trilogy (trade paperbacks), 4.5/5 stars

Veronica Rossi, Tahereh Mafi, and Ransom Riggs books are available at National Book Store.