An Interview with National Book Award Winner, Inkie Will Alexander

An Interview with Will Alexander

by Nancy Holder

William Alexander won the National Book Award for his debut novel, Goblin Secrets, and the Earphones Award for his narration of the audiobook. His second novel, Ghoulish Song, just came out. So did the audiobook. He narrated that one, too. 

I'm so excited to interview my fellow Inkie Will about his work, and have a chance to talk about Ghoulish Song, which I loved every bit as much as Goblin Secrets. I enjoyed the mystery and adventure in both books, the lush writing, and the nods to the theater. And I'm really happy to hear that he's got more books in the works! 

Here's our interview: 

NH: First of all, congratulations on winning the National Book Award for your first novel, Goblin Secrets. Can you tell us a little bit about what it felt like to win it? 

WA:Hiccup-inducing, muppet-flailing, astonished terror and joy.

NH: Has winning the National Book Award changed your life in any fundamental ways?

WA: The day-to-day stuff hasn't changed. I have two very small children, and neither one of them is easily impressed. My toddler is starting to appreciate my juggling skills, at least, but not so much the literary honors. And I'm still writing the books that I planned to write next anyway, so that bit hasn't changed either. 

On the other hand, yes, everything is different. I get to feel like an author rather than someone indulging in a goblin-haunted hobby. This is a tremendous relief. 

NH: You have created a rich, theatrical world in which masks, music, and theater are woven into exciting and mysterious fairytale-like adventures for your young protagonists. Can you talk about how the Zombay “universe” came into being? 

WA: My sense of world-building is messy and mostly intuitive. Lots of separate interests and questions glommed together in the back of my brain when I wasn't really looking, and eventually found expression in Zombay. 

The city itself began with the bridge: a great big span of stone and metal where artists, musicians, changelings, and former pirates live suspended between two very different sides of the city. The Fiddleway Bridge is a place set apart, and it's the only thing holding Zombay together. Both books bring their young protagonists to the Fiddleway.

NH: Ghoulish Song is described as a “companion” to Goblin Secrets. Can you tell us what that means? Is it possible to read one without the other? Is there an order in which they should be read? 

WA: It means that the two books tell separate stories that take place at the same time, in the same city, with several of the same supporting characters. If you do read both then you'll notice each one unfolding in the background of the other. But you can start with either. Hopefully the new book offers some of the same satisfactions that a sequel would have given, like recognizing familiar characters.

I wanted to capture my own sense of city living, with so many different lives and stories in constant overlap. And I wanted to give Kaile her own novel.

NH: Ghoulish Song is a story about a girl and her shadow. Other notable “doubles” in fantasy include J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan and Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials series. And of course lots of people have grown up having an invisible friend. What drew you to this theme of twinning? 

WA: This is probably Ursula Le Guin's fault. Plenty of people lost their shadows in my childhood entertainments--Peter Pan, that guy in the Hans Christian Anderson story, Link in The Legend of Zelda--but Sparrowhawk's shadow in A Wizard of Earthsea haunted me most. 

Le Guin's essay "The Child and the Shadow," from her classic collection The Language of the Night, unpacks shadow imagery as a Jungian archetype. (Such archetypes are very useful for writers, whether or not Jung was actually right about anything.) She describes antagonistic shadow-characters as abject parts of ourselves rather than evil twins; everything we would rather set aside and ignore gets hidden away in our shadows. The real challenge isn't defeating your shadow but reconciling yourself to it. This thing of darkness I acknowledge mine. 

For more stories about a young girl losing and contending with her separate shadow I very much recommend Catherynne M. Valente's Fairyland books. 

Did I answer the question? Not really. I just gave you a list of reading material that I find delicious. That'll have to do. We work with what we're given. And my reasons for running with any theme are always shadowy, associative, and unconscious, so I really don't have a better answer. 

NH: What surprised you most while you were writing Ghoulish Song?

WA: The Reliquarian surprised me. She's a sort of museum curator in the Northside Reliquary, a place dedicated to collecting bones of every kind. She said and did several things that I didn't expect… 

NH: What was your favorite part about writing Ghoulish Song, and what was your least favorite?

WA: Finishing it. That's my answer to both questions. The finishing touches felt like a very satisfying loss. 

NH: Instead of chapters, Goblin Secrets was organized into acts and scenes, while Ghoulish Song was told in verses. What’s next?

WA: I'll probably have to blend the two and write something operatic. That was a joke. It was supposed to be a joke, but now it's got me thinking. Hmm. 

NH: You have planted your flag firmly in the arts—theater, music, and literature. Did anyone ever try to steer you toward more pragmatic interests? 

WA: Science is strong in my family, so I might have become some flavor of scientist--but science education isn't really designed to reward curiosity, not once you get past a certain point. Instead it brutalizes students by forcing them to memorize organic chem compounds. Only a few survive beyond the introductory college courses, and they have a long slog ahead before they'll get to indulge in basic curiosity and wonder. Or so I'm told. If true, it's a terrible loss. And it might explain why many of our best minds went into banking (rather than say, NASA), got bored, and destroyed the word economy in their boredom. They might have caused less damage as mad scientists. 

NA: What are you working on now?

WA: Science Fiction! As a kid I always figured I would write SF someday, and the time has finally come. The book is called Ambassador, and it's about a kid named Gabe Fuentes who becomes the representative of our world. Meanwhile his parents are getting deported (from our country, not from our world). 

After Ambassador I plan to write a proper sequel to both Goblin Secrets and Ghoulish Song called The Fiddleway Siege. 

NH: Is there anything you’d like to say to the Enchanted Inkpot community, and those who read our blog? 

WA: Read widely and wildly. Stretch your sense of the possible by first enjoying impossibilities. Don't skimp on the chocolate. 

Nancy Holder is a proud member of The Enchanted Inkpot. She has a short story in Shards and Ashes, edited by Melissa Marr and Kelley Armstrong, from HarperCollins 

Goblins

Fantastical literature has given us many different versions of the roguish goblin, from Christina Rossetti's seductive fruit mongers to J.R.R. Tolkien's violent and villainous fighters, from the bankers of Gringotts to the glass-toothed critters chronicled by Spiderwick.

The following Inkies have all written books about goblins, and this is what they have to say:

Jennifer Nielsen

What a fun thing to be able to compare my goblins with those of other Inkies! The goblins in my books are from The Underworld Chronicles and are primarily in Book 1, Elliot and the Goblin War. This book tells the story of how 11-year-old Elliot Penster becomes king of the brownies and accidentally launches an interspecies war with the goblins.

One of the wonderful things about using goblins as characters is that there is a lot of latitude in the “classic definition” of what a goblin should be. Generally speaking, a goblin is a twisted sort of fairy: smaller in size and grotesque in appearance. They’re not necessarily evil, but they are lazy, disorderly, and mean. They also tend to be troublemakers to humans, but can be appeased if the family leaves food out for them.

These were exactly the qualities I wanted as antagonists for Elliot and the Goblin War, but I did make some changes so that these goblins would be unique to this series.

Primarily, I wanted to give the goblins some magical abilities that would make them even more threatening to Elliot. In particular, they have two abilities. The first is they can scare other creatures to death. If Elliot is lucky, he’ll get away from a goblin attack only having been scared half to death.

The second goblin ability is in blowing things up. This is a definite departure from traditional mythology, but I added it because…well, it was funny.

As the series progresses, the goblins definitely evolve as characters and eventually learn to get along with Elliot. To be sure, they were some of the most fun mythological characters I got to play with throughout the stories.

Cover art by Gideon Kendall

Hilari Bell

I have to confess, I’m not really sure what a “classic” goblin is. My vague, personal definition is a small, not particularly pretty humanoid, with some form of magic. And more important than any of the above; not particularly good, either. If not outright evil, goblins should at least be mischievous. So when I wanted small, mischievous, neither good nor evil creatures to torment my heroine, befriend her, and ultimately be championed by her—well, goblins sounded like a good fit.

Of course, then I had to evolve my goblins to suit my story, with differing magical powers that defined what types of goblin they were, and a social order built on equal trades, with a horror of being indebted to anyone because that left you unequal, always owing the person you were indebted to. Though they soften this rule for friends and family, so that when favors were done for those close to you only a token needed to be paid in exchange. And that token could be anything—a pinecone, a pretty pebble, a button. Which is why, after my heroine became the general of the goblin’s army, she always wore a vest covered with loosely stitched buttons.

Cover art by Cliff Neilsen

William Alexander

The idea that goblins used to be human, and that they used to be children, has always stuck with me. I'm pretty sure that I first absorbed this piece of goblin lore from George MacDonald's The Princess and the Goblin, and David Bowie later reinforced it when he kidnapped a potential new goblin babe in Labyrinth. Wherever I got it, I still find it haunting. Goblins are the vampires and werewolves of childhood. They are the monsters that you might become.

My own goblins are likewise small humans transformed. Everyone knows that they steal children, but not everyone realizes that they are the children that they steal. They are also traveling actors, which fits the mischievous temperament that goblins always seem to have. My hero runs off with this theatrical goblin troupe, and he has to decide whether or not he can possibly trust them.

Cover art by Alexander Jansson