For more on Ashley, please visit her website and read our review of her debut novel, Every Bone a Prayer, here.
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BOOKS:
Every Bone a Prayer (2020)
Your biggest literary influences:
Shirley Jackson, Louise Erdrich, Kelly Link, Stephen King
Last book read:
I recently finished The Silent Companions by Laura Purcell, a slow-burn Victorian ghost story that was wonderfully creepy and beautifully written. I also just started Strange the Dreamer by Laini Taylor and I’m already in love!
The book that changed your life:
Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House was transformational for me. It was one of those books that I read and thought: there it is, that’s exactly what I want to do. The language is intoxicating, the images linger long after the book is done, and the characters are unforgettable. Just thinking of it makes me want to reread it again to see what else I might learn.
Your favorite literary character:
Unsurprisingly, Eleanor Vance from The Haunting of Hill House is very high on my list. There is something so incredibly tender and yet fierce about Eleanor as she begins to seek out and claim her life for herself for the first time. The vacillation between her desire to be seen and wanted coupled with her distrust, guilt and jealousy — it all feels so … human. I think often of Eleanor and the little girl with her cup of stars, and how women are punished for their “selfish” desires, and how hard they must fight to hold onto those desires in the face of so much pressure to be good and quiet and not make a fuss. How brave it is to fight against that. To want more.
Currently working on:
My second adult novel for Sourcebooks! I’m still very early in the process, but I’m excited to get wrapped up in new characters and a new story.
Words to live by:
Be kind.
Advice for aspiring authors:
It’s okay to ignore advice that doesn’t feel right to you. Even if it’s from a hugely successful author or an author whose work you really admire. I think most writers (and maybe especially young writers) want to feel like we’re doing it right, that we’re not somehow messing up this thing we love so much. And since a lot of the publication process can seem inscrutable before you’ve been through it, I think we worry that there are rules that we might be breaking unknowingly. So we ask for advice from people who have been there. We look for clues, hints, anything that will make us feel like we’re on the right track. But a lot of writing advice is very personal and just won’t apply to you. If someone says that you have to write every day to be a writer, for example, but you have a job or children or your creativity just doesn’t work that way, it’s okay! Ignore it. Keep doing what works for you. There’s no one path to being a writer, which is beautiful and terrifying. Keep writing and reading. Keep trying. You’ll get there.
