Marissa Meyer captured the attention of YA readers with her 2012 debut novel, Cinder. Since then, she has grown in popularity with the remainder of her series which features fairy tale characters in a whole new light.
Meyer is a powerhouse, writing books such as the action-packed Renegade series, which features superhero-like characters, and her young adult retelling of Rumpelstiltskin which began with Gilded. Meyer’s settings immerse readers who are looking for strong characters and well-built fantasy worlds, but it’s the relationships and the banter between characters that have always stood out in her novels.
Now, Meyer’s work has pivoted towards a new genre. Her latest books have been romantic contemporary novels. One favorite among fans is Instant Karma, an enemies-to-lovers story of a girl who can cast Karma on others. Her new release is the second novel of the Fortuna Beach series, another contemporary YA romance titled With a Little Luck. Jude, a boy gifted with the power of luck, realizes his power doesn’t help the fact that he’s unlucky in love.
BookTrib had a chance to speak to Marissa Meyer about her latest novel, how to keep retellings fresh, and what she’s currently working on.
Interview with Marissa Meyer:
You are most well known for your The Lunar Chronicles series — which retells classic fairytales like Cinderella, Red Riding Hood, and Rapunzel — and Gilded, which builds on the lore of Rumpelstiltskin. Is it intimidating to tackle well-known stories and make them fresh for readers? How have you found the transition to original stories with no familiar source material to fall back on?
Both retellings and originals have their own challenges, and I enjoy each one for completely different reasons. With retellings, I’m constantly trying to strike a balance between the familiar and the new. I want readers to feel like this is already a story they know and love, but also to be constantly surprised with the twists and turns and the way that I’ve expanded the story to be something very unlike the tale we remember from childhood. It can be hard to follow an existing plot while still trying to surprise readers – but that is part of what I love about retellings!
When it comes to more original novels, definitely writing a story without that built-in skeleton of a plot or preexisting characters comes with different challenges. At the start of a project, I can get overwhelmed with all the possibilities, knowing the plot could go in any direction I choose — and suddenly, there are so many choices to be made! It can be difficult to boil a story down to its essentials, and really figure out what — to me — is the heart of the story and what I want to focus on.
In both cases, I find that I think of writing a book a lot like putting together a jigsaw puzzle. I have a lot of ideas for scenes and characters and twists, then I have to see how I can fit them together to create one complete, coherent story. I really enjoy that aspect of writing.
Recently, you’ve focused on contemporary fiction. In Instant Karma and your new release, With a Little Luck, romance and self-discovery are central themes. Do you feel that realistic love stories are important for young adults to read?
Important is a scary word to me… as soon as I start thinking about my work in terms of how important / necessary / meaningful it might be to readers, I get intimidated by what that means and if I’m capable of doing a story justice. I generally focus on trying to write books that are fun and entertaining, romantic and exciting … books that I would have loved to read when I was a teenager (or today, for that matter!). Naturally, I will gravitate toward stories that have themes that speak to me, whether that’s bullying and prejudice, stories about teens who don’t always fit in, characters trying to figure out who they are and what they want and where they fit in the world — because those are stories that appeal to me on a deep level, and I hope that they will find readers who relate to them just as strongly.
In With a Little Luck, the story focuses on Jude, a boy living a lowkeyed life who loves to play D&D and read comics. He suddenly finds himself with a supernatural power that grants him luck with everything. But he is still not lucky with love. Is Jude inspired by you or anyone you know?
I was such a nerdy kid growing up. These days, that isn’t such a bad thing — nerds get a lot more respect in teen hierarchies — but when I was in high school, playing D&D and watching anime and drawing comics with my friends — there was no coolness factor. My friends and I were definitely on the outskirts of the social sphere. It was fun for me to write Jude as a character who is unapologetically nerdy, and also to write Maya — a girl who comes to embrace her own nerdiness over the course of the story. I connected with both characters a lot.
Beyond that, I think Jude is definitely the sort of boy I would have crushed on when I was a teen. He is so sweet and thoughful, a little shy and awkward, but also charming in his own way. So there’s that!
What inspired you to create Jude’s power and to tackle the topic of luck? Have you experienced a lot of luck in your own life?
I’m fascinated by the idea of luck. When I was growing up, one of my dad’s favorite sayings was “Luck plagues the diligent,” and I took that to heart. I’ve always been focused and ambitious, especially when it came to pursuing dreams, like becoming a writer. But when my first novel came out, I was constantly being told how “lucky” I was — and I didn’t disagree! I was lucky to be published, lucky to get a good advance, lucky to have a big marketing campaign, lucky to enjoy my job … and those things are all true, but after a while I also realized how much those statements dismissed all the work I’d done to get there. I had to take a hard look at luck and diligence and the relationship between the two, so that’s been in my head for years now. The “luck” that Jude gets in the book varies widely from things just happening to him versus things he has to work for, and tend to have very different results in the long run.
I’m also interested in our perception of luck, and how the way we look at our circumstances can change our feelings about whether we’re lucky or not. So much of life revolves around our own attitudes, so that was something I wanted to take a look at in this book, too.
Are there any upcoming creative projects or books in progress that you can talk about?
I have a lot of new books in the works! Next up will be Let It Glow, co-written with Joanne Levy — a cheerful middle grade about twin sisters separated at birth who find each other at a holiday pageant and decide to switch lives for the holidays. I also have more fairy tale retellings coming up, a couple of graphic novels, and a nonfiction project. I’m excited to talk more about them in the coming months!
