"Of Sea and Smoke" by Gillian Bronte Adams -- Author Interview

About the Book

Book: Of Sea and Smoke

Author: Gillian Bronte Adams

Genre: YA Epic Fantasy

Release Date: November 21, 2023

He rides a seablood, a steed of salt and spray, born to challenge the tides.

Six years ago, the wrong brother survived, and nothing will ever convince Rafi Tetrani otherwise. But he is done running from his past, and from the truth. As civil war threatens Ceridwen’s tenuous rule in Soldonia, Rafi vows to fight the usurper sitting on the imperial throne of Nadaar, even if it means shouldering his brother’s responsibilities as the empire’s lost heir.

The stolen shipload of magical warhorses offers just the edge he needs. But the steeds have been demanded in ransom by the emperor’s ruthless assassin, and if Rafi hopes to raise a band of riders, he must first outwit his brother’s murderer.

Yet when his best efforts end in disaster, and an audacious raid sparks an empire-wide manhunt, even forging an unexpected alliance might not be enough to help Rafi turn the tides, let alone outrace the wave of destruction intent on sweeping them all away.

 

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Author Interview 

1. What, according to you, is the hardest thing about writing?
Getting started. I don’t mean starting a project, because that’s honestly one of the most
exciting times when an idea is new and shiny and the reality of the work hasn’t quite set
in yet. But getting started writing each time I sit down to write. That may sound odd,
because I am a writer and I love to write, but each time I open up my laptop, it’s an
exercise in discipline to tune out my other to-do list items and all the other distractions
and actually sink into the story. It typically takes me about thirty minutes to an hour to
fully warm up and get my brain into writing mode, especially when I’m working on a
particularly complex project. But once I can actually get going and keep going, the words
do start to flow and then I usually don’t want to stop!

2. Do you pen down revelations and ideas as you get them, right then and there?
I do! I love brainstorming by hand, so I typically have a notebook for each project along
with stacks of sticky notes that have accumulated over time. For those lightbulb
moments that catch me when I’m on the go, I use the notes app in my phone. It’s always
fun to try to decipher my fantasy character names and worldbuilding elements with
autocorrect in the mix.
As much as I love focused, intentional brainstorming time, it’s also amazing how often
just holding a story question in the back of my mind while I go about my daily tasks can
result in wonderful surprise revelations. For some reason, both showering and washing
dishes are very common places for writers to solve story problems, which can make
recording those solutions a bit of a challenge! But I’ve learned that you have to scribble
them down as soon as you have them and include as many crisp, sharp details as you
can, because the edges of those sudden revelations can wear down very quickly. Before
you know it, you go to write it down, and your perfect missing puzzle piece now appears
hazy and unformed.

3. Do you need to be in a specific place or room to write, or you can just sit in the
middle of a café full of people and write?
I’ll make the occasional trip to a coffee shop to write with friends, but aside from that, I
do like a quiet space for writing. That’s typically either my desk, with my pup to keep me
company, or outside on the porch or on a blanket in the grass. I recently set up my
dream desk space with maps on the wall next to it, books and candles on the hutch, and
a cozy writing chair that’s basically an armchair on wheels, so I love working there. But
there is something about writing outside in particular that unlocks my imagination and
helps me to focus deeply on the story. So if I’m ever struggling to “get started” on any
given day, I’ll take my writing outdoors, even if it means braving a Texas summer
heatwave.

4. Where do you get your ideas for your books?
From all sorts of places! I’ve gotten ideas for books from a single “What if” question, like
my fantasy trilogy The Songkeeper Chronicles which grew out of the question “what if
there was a girl who could hear a song that nobody else could?” Sometimes, my ideas
come from something interesting I’ve observed in nature, which is why I think I love
spending so much time outside. Other times, ideas comes from watching films or
reading books and having that nagging sense that there was an interesting piece that
the writers chose not to explore. The Fireborn Epic grew out of the years that I spent
running the horsemanship program at a youth camp, in the saddle every day, clearing
trails from horseback with hatchets and machetes, and suddenly I couldn’t stop thinking
about firebreathing horses! I think that’s one of my favorite things about writing: the
fact that inspiration can come from anywhere and can be waiting for you just around
the next bend in the trail.

5. Do bits of yourself/friends show up in your characters?
I think there are tiny bits of me in every single one of my main characters, even though
each of them ends up being very different from me and from each other. In The Fireborn
Epic, Ceridwen gets her sense of rightness and determination from me, even if she tends
to push things to the nth degree. Like me, she also tends to value her head over her
heart. Rafi and I both know what it feels like to be a second-born with an older sibling
that you admire and aspire to be like. Jakim and I can overthink like champions. We all
have vastly different personalities. I’m not Ceridwen or Rafi or Jakim. They make choices
and do things that are 100% rooted in who they are as characters. And yet, putting a tiny
piece that I can relate to in each of them helps me feel connected to them as I write.

About the Author

Gillian Bronte Adams writes epic fantasy novels, including the award- winning Of Fire and Ash and The Songkeeper Chronicles. She loves strong coffee, desert hikes, and trying out new soup recipes on crisp fall nights. Her favorite books are the ones that make your heart ache and soar in turn. When she’s not creating vibrant new worlds or dreaming up stories that ring with the echoes of eternity, she can be found off chasing sunsets with her horse, or her dog, Took.

 

 

 

More from Gillian

One of my favorite things about writing epic fantasy is not actually what you might expect. It’s not the fantastical elements, although I absolutely love creating worlds filled with magical warhorses, sosswyrm tangles, and stone-eye tigers who can paralyze their prey with a glance. It’s not the intensity of the action or the world altering stakes, although there’s nothing quite so thrilling as throwing your characters into a do-or-die situation, and the pulse-pounding, breathtaking, heart-aching battle sequences that follow.

Instead, one of my favorite things about writing such wild and epic stories is the opportunity to ground them in very real, very human characters, with very real, very human emotions, and in the complexity of those characters’ relationships with others. Mentor relationships, deeply loyal friendships, and especially sibling relationships.

I am the second-born of five siblings, and I love and admire each of my siblings. Each one encourages and inspires and awes me in his or her own unique way. But growing up, if you had told me that my older sister had hung the moon, I would have believed you. She was two and a half years older than me—and yes, that half year mattered to both of us, though for opposite reasons; she because it meant she was that much older, me because it meant we were that much closer. Somehow, everything she touched seemed golden, and I wanted to be a part of it too.

She was a force of nature—a foaming ocean tide—and I was caught up in her wake.

She took up horseback riding, and so did I. She picked up books, and I had to read them too, even if it meant sitting beside her in the car with my own book open on my lap, surreptitiously reading hers over her shoulder. (Needless to say, that drove her crazy, and older siblings everywhere can probably commiserate.)

She dove into creative writing, and out of nowhere, I developed a passion for the written word. But always, within her, there was this spark of imagination and creativity that I felt I could only ever aspire to. Whatever I did, she had done first and better.

And I could only hope to one day achieve her level of greatness.

Rafi, one of the main characters in Of Sea and Smoke, also has an older sibling, a brother he has always looked up to. While Rafi and his relationship with his brother is not based on my relationship with my older sister—we’re all four of us wildly different people—there were some aspects of my experience as a second-born that I was able to draw upon. Rafi admires his brother’s strength and confidence. His assurance and rightness. His nobility and leadership. By the time we enter the story, his older brother is no longer around, but Rafi has spent his whole life setting his brother up on a pedestal and then trying to measure up to that ideal.

Is it any wonder, then, that he has always found himself wanting?

Now, Rafi finds himself having to step into the role that should have been his brother’s, and the only way he can contemplate facing that challenge is by stamping out the things he looks down upon in himself—many of them, the things that make him himself—and trying to be his brother instead.

Growing up, I can’t tell you how many times I looked at my older sister and wished that I could be more like her and less like myself. More confident. More brilliant. More vibrant. More her. But it wasn’t until my older sister’s interests began to drift into new additional avenues, while mine stayed mostly the same (horses, books, writing), that I finally began to grow into myself. To recognize my strengths, my unique skills, the things that only I bring to the table, and to acknowledge that even when they are different from hers, they are still good.

These days, my older sister and I are best friends. She was the first person I trusted to read Of Sea and Smoke before it went out into the world. I still look up to her in so many ways, and yes, I think I’ll always feel a bit like she hung the moon. But I have grown to appreciate the beauty of what I can learn from my sister’s strengths, while also recognizing the value of my own. And without revealing any spoilers, I think I can safely say that part of Rafi’s journey in Of Sea and Smoke wraps around learning that too, all while he’s raising a band of rebel fighters, trying to outwit an infamous assassin, and plotting to overthrow the empire’s oppressive rule.

Wild, epic stories, grounded in real, human experiences, and honestly, can reading get any more fun than that?

I hope you enjoy the ride!

Gillian Bronte Adams

Blog Stops

Truth and Grace Homeschool Academy, December 2

Through the Fire Blogs, December 3 (Author Interview)

Labor Not in Vain, December 3

Texas Book-aholic, December 4

Artistic Nobody, December 5 (Author Interview)

Locks, Hooks and Books, December 6

Guild Master, December 7 (Author Interview)

Debbie’s Dusty Deliberations, December 8

Blossoms and Blessings, December 9 (Author Interview)

Blogging With Carol, December 10

Tell Tale Book Reviews, December 11 (Author Interview)

Simple Harvest Reads, December 12 (Guest Review from Mindy)

Library Lady’s Kid Lit, December 13 (Author Interview)

By The Book, December 14 (Author Interview)

The Lofty Pages, December 14

Fiction Book Lover, December 15 (Author Interview)

Giveaway

To celebrate her tour, Gillian is giving away the grand prize of a $25 Barnes & Noble Gift Card and hardcover copy of the book!!

Be sure to comment on the blog stops for nine extra entries into the giveaway! Click the link below to enter.

https://promosimple.com/ps/2909e/of-sea-and-smoke-celebration-tour-giveaway

I got a free copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own and given voluntarily. No compensation was received for my review.