Anne Nesbet (on behalf of the Inkpot): Leah, thank you so much for coming by to talk
about DEATH SWORN! I loved the way you lead us deep into a world of caverns and
passages and secrets. Come to think of it, every fictional world you've ever
created has astonishing depth to it--layers upon layers of mystery, secrets,
and political intrigue.
But let's start with
the official description of DEATH SWORN:
"Ileni is losing
her magic. And that means she's losing everything: Her status as the renegade
sorcerers' most powerful rising star. Her purpose in life. The boy she loves.
Her home. Exiled to teach sorcery to the assassins hidden deep within the
mountains, she expects no one will ever hear from her again. The last two
tutors died within weeks of each other. As Ileni unravels the mystery
surrounding their deaths, she'll uncover secrets that have been kept for
decades--and she'll find an unexpected ally and dangerous new love. But even he
may not be able to protect her. Not when she's willing to risk
everything."
Let the questions
begin!
AN: As Ileni takes the steps into (what she is sure will be) a
world dominated by darkness, loneliness, and death, we feel her courage, but we
don't understand her world right off the bat. Of course, neither does she, in
certain key respects! But like Ileni, we understand more and more as the story
continues, and we always have the feeling we are seeing the tip of a very deep
iceberg. So how do you manage backstory, Leah? Do you think through the history
and politics of your worlds before you start writing a book, or does the
context settle into existence gradually as you write?
Leah Cypess: First of all, thank you! I'm blushing and also grinning. :)
When it comes to world-building, I am definitely in the latter camp - the
context settles into existence as I write. My first drafts, to be honest, often
take place in a world that makes no sense. I have to go back and fill the first
part of the book with everything I figured out while writing the whole thing.
AN: Ah, that's interesting. So your worlds grow almost the way
stalactites grow, with the help of that magical drip-drip-drip of Cypessian
limestone..... And since we've already gotten to the subject of caves: when I
was a child my family visited one of the largest caves in France, the Gouffre
de Padirac--I had never been in such a magical place, with stalactites and
stalagmites and paths and even boats rowing about from cavern to cavern. Have
you always liked caves? Are you not at all claustrophobic? What's the best cave
you've ever been in?
LC: It was a real treat for me to write a book set in a system of
caves -- I've always been a fan of caves (in a strictly amateur sense -- I've
gone on guided caving expeditions, but nothing requiring actual skill), and of
claustrophic murder mysteries where the rest of the world is shut out. The Cave
of the Winds in Colorado Springs is one of my favorite caves, in part because
it was the first cave where I went with a guide into the non-altered parts of
the caves, with hard hats and everything... a lot of that experience went
directly from my travel notebook into the first draft of DEATH SWORN! There is
also a cave in northern Israel called the Avshalom Cave that has the densest
concentration of stalactites and stalagmites I've ever seen, and is definitely
one of the most beautiful caves I've been in.
AN: The cavern world you describe in DEATH SWORN is populated by
assassins--a very male world, into which Ileni comes as an outsider. You do
such a great job of keeping the edge, the sense of danger, sharp, even as Ileni
gradually grows somewhat more used to her new world. There are some
extraordinary scenes that show us just how dangerous a place this is, and just
how ruthless these assassins, so that the tension doesn't let up. The moral
questions here about what is worth killing for--and even what is worth killing
an innocent person for--are very unsettling. How do you feel about ends and
means? Do you think good ends justify awful means, sometimes? What percentage
of you, as a writer, is "assassin" and what percentage
"sorceress"?
LC: Regarding the philosophical questions, while I do of course
have opinions, I try to follow a piece of advice I read in a writing book once
(unfortunately, I can't remember the book): that a writer's job is to ask
questions, not provide answers. I also try to recognize that the answers I've
personally come to might not be the answers my main character, who is a
different person in a different world, will come to. So I honestly try NOT to
think about my own opinions when I'm writing a book that deals with such
questions! Obviously, my own mindset and worldview filter in, but certainly not
in any systematic or directed way.
AN: How was the writing of this book a different experience for
you than the writing of MISTWOOD and/or NIGHTSPELL?
LC: DEATH SWORN is the first book I ever wrote with the knowledge
that, when I was done, there was a very good chance it would get accepted for
publication. I finished the first draft of NIGHTSPELL before I sold MISTWOOD --
and MISTWOOD was the fifth manuscript I had ever submitted for publication --
so I always wrote with an underlying sense that I was going to send these books
out to every editor on earth and get lots of encouraging rejection letters and
then move on to the next manuscript. Of course, I always hoped I would get
published -- and I almost always believed I would, eventually -- but it wasn't
as real to me as with DEATH SWORN, where I not only had an agent, but I had
already run the basic idea of the story by my editor. None of that guarantees
anything, of course, but I still had a very real sense that DEATH SWORN might
end up as a real book.
AN: Your book's cover is a gorgeous mystery. It's so beautiful,
but how are we to understand it? Is the tower meant to represent the column
that plays such a symbolic role in the assassins' lives? Or is it about cliffs
and heights and verticality (so important in this story)?
LC: I asked my editor that same question! I think the tower is
more symbolic than literal, and I think of it as representing the master's
perch (though in the book, that's at the edge of the mountain, not a
free-standing tower -- a free-standing tower certainly looks better on a
cover!) I know the art director read the book and tried hard to capture its
feel in the cover -- she told me she drew upon Lascaux Caves, which she had
visited as a child, for inspiration. I think she did an unbelievably amazing
job.
AN: Here's a very silly question for you: when you were writing
the bit about Ileni showing up at the caverns, her magic on the wane, as
sorcerer number three after the apparent murders of the first two, did
you ever find yourself secretly muttering, "twelfth in a
long line of governesses...."?
LC: I did NOT! Though it's an apt line. Thanks, now I won't be
able to get it out of my head. ;)
AN (now really getting carried away with the
silliness): Because it is
intriguing, isn't it, how many times young women have to step in to educate
large groups of misbehaving/dangerous young people: Ileni faces her assassins;
Maria faces the Von Trapp children; Wendy must deal with the Lost Boys [who
also live underground!]. And in all those cases, there's a more or less
ruthless male figure who thinks he really runs things, but we are not sure . .
. . )
LC (being oh so very patient with AN's
meandering mind): Hmmm, I hadn't
thought of the Lost Boys either! The idea for this book actually came to me
while reading THE ELENIUM by David Eddings, in which one of the characters is a
sorceress who serves as magic tutor to a society of knights. In that book, the
knights are misbehaving rogueish heroes, but not really dangerous -- at least,
not to the sorceress. Once I was developing the idea on my own, I naturally thought
it would be better if they were actually dangerous.
AN, back on track: Oh, the romance in this story! It makes us
ask the question (which now I'll bounce over to you), "Can love work, do
you think, between two people whose loyalties lie in very different
directions?" You make us want it to work, that's for sure.
LC: That's another of those absolute questions that I try not to
think about when I'm writing a book! The question for me is, Can THIS love,
between these two people, work? Or, more specifically, will it? I answer that
in the sequel so I'll have to plead the fifth for now. ;)
AN: That's an excellent writing tip, really: to be thinking always
of "THIS love" and not of some generic idea of what a romance should
be like! Let me ask an Ileni question: she has to show enormous courage at many
points in this story. Of all the brave things she has to do, which one do you
think would be hardest for you personally?
LC: All of them! I'm not nearly as brave as Ileni. But I'm
particularly afraid of heights -- I have a hard time walking over high bridges
-- so the sequence in the end of the book (*hums mysteriously*) would probably
have been the most difficult for me.
AN: Oh, good grief, me too. (*shudders all over again*) The
description of Ileni's secret wound--how it feels to have once been the most
talented sorceress around and now to be losing her powers--is very evocative.
When you were the age of the teens reading your books now, would you have
understood that sense of loss? What do you remember feeling yourself growing
out of, when you were in middle school or high school?
LC: I think I would have, yes, and I hope teens will as well. I
think it's pretty universal that most of us have dreams of various destinies
awaiting us and we have to give some of them up -- not necessarily tragically,
just because as part of life, you cannot be an Olympic gymnast AND an
illustrator AND a fashion designer AND an author AND cure cancer AND discover
the secret language of dolphins AND become an expert horse-trainer AND discover
that you are secretly a princess in an alternate reality (just speaking about
my personal childhood life goals, here).
For me, I think the
thing that changed the most as I grew up was my own estimation of my abilities.
In elementary school, I thought I was the smartest kid in the class -- whether
or not that was true is impossible to say, since I was so confident I didn't
feel the need to prove myself by studying or getting great grades (much to my
parents' delight) -- but when I started high school with a whole new set of
fairly advanced students, it was certainly not true, and I had to adjust to
that.
AN: You know, Leah, I actually think you're probably still one of
the smartest kids in the class. Seriously! Your books totally give you
away--they are multi-talented, kind of like your childhood self. Tell me, when
you were revising this book, what changed most?
LC: The first draft had this whole OTHER subplot involving a
contest between the students that, after a few revisions, my editor gently
pointed out served no point in the story. She was right. Thank goodness for
editors.
AN: What's the name of the next book, and will we be getting a
closer look at the Empire and the home of the Renegai?
LC: "What's the name of the next book....." Hahahaha. We
are working on it. Extensively. Trust me. (I think we may have it, actually,
but I'm not going to announce it until I have confirmation that it's final!)
AN: So you have to promise to come back and tell us, just as soon
as you know for sure!!
LC: I totally promise to come tell you immediately!!*
(*The Inkpot Legal Team insists that I, AN, point out that I just 100%
made up this line and attributed it to "Leah Cypess". I explained to
the ILT that we're all writers here, right? A little fictionalized non-fiction
is fine between friends, right? Leah herself will forgive me, right? I REALLY
WANT TO KNOW THE TITLE AND WILL STOP AT NOTHING TO MAKE LEAH TELL US SOONEST,
right? But everything else Leah says in this interview, she really did say
herself.--AN)
LC: . . . .As for the second part of the question [about the
sequel] - now you're asking me for spoilers! You will definitely be getting a
closer look at the Empire. That is all I will say. Even if you torture me.
Unless you offer me chocolate.
AN: Now, as another person whose name is always always always
misspelled, let me ask, sympathetically, how "Cypess" is actually
pronounced and whether you're having any more success, these days, in keeping
people from always popping an "r" in there because they love trees so
much.
LC: It's pronounced like "cypress," but without the
"r." And no, I have no success in keeping the "r" out. I'm
mildly grateful that it's never actually appeared on the cover of any of my
books! But trust me, it has appeared everywhere else.
AN: And, finally, a food question! Chocolate plays a fairly
significant role in this book, as something even assassins are willing to bend
the rules to acquire. What kind of chocolate do you personally prefer--milk,
dark, or something more specific than that? Most particularly, what kind of
cookies will you be serving at your launch party on Sunday, March 9, from
2-4 p.m. at The Children's Bookshop in Brookline, Massachusetts?
LC: *deep breath* My favorite type of chocolate is... white
chocolate. I know! I know! It's not even REAL CHOCOLATE. So I've been told. What
can I say? The heart wants what it wants. Although when it comes to chocolate
combinations, I'm really fond of Godiva truffles (almost any kind) and of milk
chocolate peanut butter cups.
As for cookies, we
(i.e. me and my kids) have plans! We have cookie-cutters shaped like books and
swords. We also have some great recipes and a stash of chocolate chips from
Trader Joes. Everyone should come eat cookies even if they have no interest in
books at all.
AN: Sounds great! Every New England Inkie should commit to
Brookline this weekend. Leah, thank you for writing this haunting story, and I
can't wait to read your next installment....
LC:
Thank you so much for the interview and for asking such interesting questions!
(Another Inkpot note: Thanks to the wonders of technology, this interview looks like it was posted by Ellen Booraem. But it's an Anne Nesbet production through and through.)
