Liberation is Lit Podcast
Welcome to the Liberation is Lit podcast, where the power of storytelling meets the force of social change! In this podcast, we believe in the profound impact of stories – stories that amplify voices, challenge norms, and foster understanding.
Whether you're a literature enthusiast, an advocate for social justice, or simply someone who believes in the transformative power of stories, you're in the right place. Tune in, and let's embark on a journey together – one where every story has the potential to change the world.
Liberation is Lit Podcast
Pie for Everyone (with Noah Bodie)
In this episode we have an enlightening conversation with author and illustrator Noah Bodie. They discuss Noah's passion for writing queer dark fantasy, the importance of representation in literature, and the challenges and joys of being a creator. Noah shares insights on his work, his inspiration, and the significant impact of storytelling in promoting social change. Listeners get a glimpse into Noah's world and creative process, his upcoming projects, and his advice for those aspiring to make a positive impact through their writing.
00:00 Welcome to Liberation is Lit
00:18 Meet Noah Bodie: Author and Illustrator
01:22 The Power of Queer Dark Fantasy
04:26 The Importance of Representation
06:38 Balancing Writing and Illustration
07:59 Upcoming Projects and Advice for Writers
11:35 Where to Find Noah Bodie
12:49 Closing Remarks
Noah's Books
Monsters, Mayhem, and Wild Magic
Books Mentioned in Episode
Where to find Noah
https://highlycaffeinated.art
Thank you for being part of the Liberation is Lit podcast! If you have stories to share, want to suggest topics, or just want to connect, find us on Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok @liberationislit or visit our website at liberationislit.com. If you enjoyed the episode, please consider leaving a review! Remember, your voice matters, and together, through the lens of stories, we're making a difference in the world.
Hey, y'all. Welcome to the Liberation is Lit podcast, where the power of storytelling meets the force of social change. I'm your host, Tayler Simon. And in this podcast, we believe in the profound impact of stories. So I'm so excited to be joined today with author and illustrator, Noah Bodie, and We're going to just talk about all of the books and fantasy and writing and all of those good things. So welcome to the podcast, Noah. Thank you. I'm super excited to be here. I'm super honored, because I'm sorry, you're amazing. Huge fan. I've read your poetry books. I'm obsessed with them. Thank you. Yes. I'm excited to read yours too. I haven't gotten to it yet because I'm like But I guess I was telling Noah when we were starting the podcast that I just got a bunch of new books from this book selling conference, and trying to make my way through all of the books, and it just makes me so sad that there are so many good books out there and so little time to read them, but I'm grateful that my life gets to be books and talking about books, so that's always a fun time, but let's talk about you now, Noah. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself as a writer, what genres you write in, and what inspires you to write? so, me as a writer, I have been writing off and on since I was a wee little thing. I've always had a, like, love of fantasy has been near and dear to my heart, specifically dark fantasy. I really enjoy taking, like, really dark dystopian settings and giving them, like, a breath of positivity and sunshine and joy and just highlighting struggles like mental health and things like that, that I've struggled with. For people to just be like, hey, you know, it's really bad sometimes, but it's okay, you can do this. So I mainly write queer dark fantasy. That's what I do. I'm a very visibly, actively, proud queer person. And so that's, that's what I write. I like writing queer love stories, specifically dark fantasy romance. And that's what I've been working on lately. I love that because for me, fantasy has been like the most, well actually that's a lie, science fiction has been the most learning curve for me. Fantasy, It's hard for me when the world is an entire character, but I always feel more incentivized to read a fantasy novel when it's got like people of color or queer people because growing up fantasy was J. R. R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis. And I wanted more Exactly. that. So, and I think there's too power in writing dark fantasy love stories because , yes, the setting as the dystopian society we're currently living in is very bleak, but also having this point of joy and romance a part of the setting to and having that balance. So I definitely wanted to talk with you more about how you use your voice in your stories. During these difficult times. So using my voice is definitely something that I have been working on. struggled with in the past. I used to be that person where I compartmentalized. I tried to make myself fit into those boxes that everyone wants you to fit into, and it definitely made me not use my voice as much as I, I do now. Mainly my, my thing is, is I don't, I don't write what I do, and I don't talk about Like the books that I read and I interact with and the authors that I love to be like, Oh, I want to be like a bestseller. I want to get that banner on Amazon. I, if somebody reads my book or they pick up my book or they look at my art and they say, this is what I needed for this very moment. Or this is what I need at this point when I didn't even know I needed it. That's enough for me. Because, like you said, there wasn't a lot of that when I was growing up. There weren't queer characters, you know? And I can even imagine you're like, you know, not there being black. There not being black characters or brown characters, you know? It's, it's hard to find that representation and whenever you find it, it's kind of, it hits you somewhere really deep in your soul. And that's a perfect segue to my next question, actually, is do you believe representation is important in the literary space? Why or why not? Absolutely. You can't understand everyone's Shoes and what they've been through and what they're going through, but literature gives you a people into those things. It helps you learn different struggles of different people. It helps you learn about different types of folklore and all different types of things. My family, we're, I'm an Irish import, so a lot of my stories have Celtic paganism in them because that's, that's what I grew up around. And, you know, it's, it's really fun to learn about that with people. Especially, like, marginalized authors and voices that aren't always at the table of, like, large publishing companies. Because there's only so many very, very bland historical romances I can read before I, I'm very bored with them. Listen, if all the bodice rippers it's Fabio on the, like, the cover, we can talk maybe. It's got to be good. right, right. And , I, I too, found it boring, reading the same stories over and over and over again and not having that, that representation seeing people like me or even seeing people who are different than me. And that was really, important for me. And. I said, like, that's how I got into fantasy, was like, finding those, queer fantasies, the, the fantasies with a black girl on the cover, so, I will say, probably, the Legendborn series was my gateway into, and I think the one came out today. We're recording on March 4th. 3rd. No, tomorrow. March 4th. But, yes, so, I think representation is important in that vein, but I feel like publishing companies feel like, well these stories aren't universal and they're not marketable because they're not universal. So, it's hard to yeah, really break in. that work. what keeps you grounded in this work as a writer? And talk a little bit about your work as an illustrator as well. As far as I guess what keeps me grounded is it gives me joy. So I guess that's, that's the main thing. And you know, I, I do this, I do it part time. It's, I'm not to where I can do it full time, to pay my bills and everything, you know. So I go out into the world and. I'm experienced and perceived as certain things and I'm put into certain boxes. And I think that helps ground me in my creative endeavors because I want to make sure that I'm Looking at other creators through a lens of not doing that to them I want to make sure that I am Doing what I can not only to represent people like me but people who aren't like me who don't get to sit at the table it's I guess it's it's a humbling aspect is kind of what keeps me grounded because I've seen the bad side of what not being humble about these type of things can be, and I've seen the better side of being humble and realizing that there's enough pie for everyone to go around as long as you know we're not in the top three percentage of earning in the world. and there definitely would be more pie if people weren't hoarding all of the pie for themselves and going to space. And so what are some of your upcoming projects? so excited. Yes. How do you work on two series at once? Because I can barely focus on this one novel that I'll probably be writing for like a decade. So I, I started building my world and that it, all of these are like set into, it's a dark fantasy world. When I was 16, I'm 33, so I have like a lore upon lo upon Laura, we're talking, I have probably like 300 folders with some folders and things like that of just. in depth stuff. So it's, it's literally like I'm plug and playing on timelines and with them following essentially like the same timeline but just in two different viewpoints is a little bit easier. If it was different timelines probably not so much, but That's perfect. And I'm, I'm gonna just work on, cause I'm writing horror. So I don't have a lot of world building, but it's set, it's going to be set in like the 80s. So I, I feel like I'm going down the rabbit hole of research, but good to know that. Like, it's gonna age like fine wine. ready. absolutely, yeah. Horror is, horror is a fun genre. Mine, mine is like Animal as horror esque. I, I, it's funny because whenever you go on certain like websites, and you type in dark fantasy, it like sub genres it into horror, and I'm like, this is strange, and I don't know how I'm here, but I guess we're here. Right. Because there’s a lot of like I've reading a lot of body like natural Beauty the eyes is the best part that kind of blends in but who knows? but my last question for you is what advice would you offer listeners who want to make a positive impact on their communities? Keep going. That was something I made sure to put into the dedication of my first book, my debut that I released in October, is just keep going. Somebody somewhere at some point in time needs the words that you're thinking of that you're putting on a page that you've probably looked at like 8 million different times and edited into to hell and back to where you were sick of looking at your own words. Somebody needs it, and it might be in a month, it might be two years down the line. Somebody somewhere needs to hear that, and use your voice to uplift other people when you can. It's a, it's a, like you said, it's a, it's a deep, dark world where a lot of people want to hoard pie. And unfortunately, if we don't band together and give each other some pizza, then there's not going to be any pizza. So. Definitely. And there is enough to share. Like how many times have you been at the company partying? It's like, okay, we're going to cut this slice in half and make sure everybody gets some. And we always side eye the person who takes the last one without asking. So, and those are the billionaires out here, except instead of taking the last slice, they're taking like the last half of the pizza. It's even worse too whenever it's like, we have these specific pizzas, we have the cheese, and we have the meat lovers, and we have the vegetarian, and it's not even like they take like the cheese, the last half of the cheese, they take the last half of the vegetarian, which they know that only like certain people can eat. So. Right, exactly. So thank you so much for talking to us about writing and your books. Where can people find you and keep up with your work and all of the recent releases that are coming out? So my website is highlycaffeinated. art, most of my socials are going to be that or some version of High Caffe Art, things like that. I have found from a friend of mine, unfortunately if you type in Noah Bodie, I pop up quite a lot now, so. So, yeah. And where did you get the name Highly Caffeinated from? So I, I have worked in food for almost 20 years. Of that, I have worked in coffee specifically for about 12. So I drink a lot of coffee. I used to drink like 16 shots of espresso a day. Yeah, yeah, that's the same, that's the exact same thing I get from everyone. I've cut it back down to about eight now, so. Meanwhile, I have a second cup of coffee and I'm Up for the rest of the night. I'll go to sleep and then wake up at 1 a. m And won't be able to fall back to sleep and i'm like, why is this? Oh, yeah, because I had a second cup of coffee today See, my son laughs at me. He's like, Dad, did you get half decaf in your cup of coffee today? I said, yes, I did. I did. for A podcast. And thank you listeners for joining us today. If you have any stories that you want to share, want to suggest any topics or just want to connect, you can find us on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok at liberation is lit or our website liberation. com. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a review and remember your voice matters through the lens of stories. We're going to make a difference until next time.