A Fantasy Quest Rooted in Polynesian Culture with Makiia Lucier - Dragonfruit

Marissa chats with Makiia Lucier about her new romantic YA fantasy inspired by Pacific Island mythology, DRAGONFRUIT. Also discussed in this episode: writing by hand in notebooks, what it’s like to revise and resubmit to an agent, the advantage of keeping early writing a secret, the joy of research and using it to build lush worlds and believable fantastical creatures, how characters can surprise even the writer, the huge evolution in story and characters from first to final draft, writing standalones versus series, and so much more!

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Transcript

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Marissa: Hello and welcome to the happy writer. This is a podcast that aims to bring readers more books to enjoy and to help authors find more joy in their writing. I am your host, Marissa Meyer. Thank you so much for joining me. What's making me happy this week is that I have this house plant and I've had it for ages. I don't even know what it is. I don't know where I got it from, but for the first time ever, it has a flower bud on it, which is just like mind blowing to me. I didn't even know. I mean, I guess, do all, do all plants make flowers? Is that like a scientific fact? I kind of feel like I've heard that somewhere, but, you know, some, you just never get to see it. And so I was really, really excited to see my little houseplant doing its thing all of a sudden after all these years. Yay. The wonder of nature. I feel like I've been saying that a lot lately. There's been a lot of plant and seeds and growing of things in my life, so that's all good. I am also so happy to be talking to today's guest. She holds degrees in journalism and library science and is the author of Year of the Reaper, the Isle of Blood and Stone, duology, and a deathstruck year. Her newest standalone fantasy, Dragonfruit, came out last week. Please welcome Makea Lussier.

[02:40] Makiia : Thank you. Thank you so much for having me.

[02:42] Marissa: I am so thrilled to have you, and I'll just go ahead and let our listeners know that this is the second time Mikia and I have attempted to record this episode. We were having so many weird technical glitches and issues last time, and it was a huge headache and we finally gave up. But we're back now, and this is going to be like the best recording of all time.

[03:05] Makiia : The smoothest.

[03:07] Marissa: The smoothest. No glitchiness, no technology issues. Thank you for joining me again. I loved this book. I was thrilled to get an early copy of it, to get to read it long before anybody else got to. And it was just such a standout book, one of those books that stuck with me. I love the world, I love the story, and I'm excited that it's finally coming out and I get to talk to people about it.

[03:33] Makiia : Thank you. That is so nice to hear. Thank you so much.

[03:37] Marissa: Okay, Makea, before we get started talking about your new book, the question that I love to start with, with all my guests, I want to hear your origin story. How did you become a published author?

[03:50] Makiia : Sure. So I actually never planned on becoming a published author. I grew up on the island of Guam, and when I was a kid, there were no other published authors around. I mean, none that I knew of. So there was no one to point at and say, when I grow up, I want to be just like her or him. So it wasn't even a thought in my mind. But many, many years later, I decided to go back to graduate school to become a librarian. I wanted to be Nancy Pearl. I wanted to wear that cardigan, and I just wanted my life just surrounded by books. But during that two year program, while I was reading hundreds of picture books and young adult books, I started to get all these ideas in my head, these ideas that wouldn't go away. So finally I thought, you know, pencils are cheap, notebooks are cheap. I'm just going to buy some and start writing and see where this takes me. So that's how it all began a long, long time ago.

[04:52] Marissa: Okay. Did you actually write your original books in notebooks with pencils?

[04:59] Makiia : I still write my books in notebooks and pencils. I do. All my drafts are written and rewritten in notebooks because I. I need to feel the pencil and I need to see the blank page. And when I try to type on a laptop, my brain just kind of wanders and I go off onto the Internet and I don't come back for hours. So I need the notebook and I need the pencil.

[05:24] Marissa: You know, I love that. And you don't hear it very often because it's extra time consuming, right?

[05:30] Makiia : It is. It's a thing, yes.

[05:33] Marissa: But I also have heard of, you know, various studies that show writing by hand does, like, change the activity in our brain, and I believe that it actually makes us more creative. I don't do it. I brainstorm by hand. I don't write by hand. I do brainstorm by hand, though, because there is something about holding a pen and putting, you know, getting the ink on paper, and it kind of forces you to slow down. And. I don't know. I don't understand the brain science, but there's something to it.

[06:03] Makiia : Me either, but. So every morning, I'll sit down with that blank notebook and the pencil, and I'll probably just look out a window for maybe 90 minutes. It is the most inefficient process, but eventually I'll start writing, and I, you know, about 40, 50% of the time, I like what I write. It's just. It's very inefficient.

[06:23] Marissa: So do you also. So you write your draft in these notebooks, and then do you try to revise it also, or do you then type it up and then continue to revise digitally?

[06:36] Makiia : You know, there's no plan. I just write and I write and I rewrite, and I cross out and I slash and burn with a pencil. And then when I'm in the mood to just type things into the computer, that's what I'll do. But it's just a very messy process. There's no one way I do it.

[06:55] Marissa: Oh, interesting. How good is your penmanship?

[06:58] Makiia : It's terrible. Okay. It's terrible. Sometimes I can't read it.

[07:02] Marissa: I have to say, I was thinking, like, I feel like this would not work for me because I can't. Half the time, you can't read it.

[07:08] Makiia : Yes. But I go back and I read those notebooks, and there are just the words I write. There's the words in the margins. There's the doodles. There's the other notes in the margin that say, you're a terrible writer, or write better, or fix this. I mean, it's so interesting and horrible to go back and look at the beginning of a story.

[07:32] Marissa: I love it when I come across my notes. Early, early notes from a story, because you forget how much it changes, and you're like, wow, I was going to do that. With that character.

[07:42] Makiia : Yes. Yes. Even the names change. I mean, or you have these characters and you don't remember who they are. They didn't make it into the first draft. Yeah.

[07:51] Marissa: I love that. No, it's. It is like a little time capsule. And, I mean, it would be fascinating. And I. My notebooks, like, I don't have dedicated notebooks for every project. I just have spiral notebooks laying around everywhere in my house. And when I need to brainstorm or, you know, research or whatever, then I just grab whatever's close by. And so every notebook is like this jumble of things from twelve different projects and. But it would be so interesting if you could compile all of the notes from one project to, like, go back and see how it does change over the entire creativity process.

[08:30] Makiia : Right.

[08:31] Marissa: What do you do with your notebooks when you're done?

[08:34] Makiia : They're on the bookshelf gathering dust. I have a shelf per book, and so there's maybe 15 notebooks per book, and they're just sitting there on the shelves.

[08:43] Marissa: I love that someone's going to be writing your biography someday, and that's going to be research gold, you know, I.

[08:50] Makiia : Think I'm gonna get rid of it before I die. I don't look through this stuff. No, no. This. No.

[08:57] Marissa: What if we had Jane Austen's notebooks? You can't throw them away.

[09:02] Makiia : No, I'm gonna. I'm gonna recycle them because I live in Oregon. I won't throw them away, but no, I think they'll disappear.

[09:08] Marissa: That breaks my heart. I hate that. I hate that answer. I still have mine. I keep all mine in a plastic bin in the garage. And I'm like, someday, someday either I'm gonna want it or my kids are gonna want it, or some biographer is going to want it. Like, I can't. I can't just get rid of them.

[09:25] Makiia : No, I'm going to get rid of them. I don't want people in my business writing things about me when I'm not around to correct them. So funny.

[09:33] Marissa: See, I'm like, I'm going to be dead. I don't care. So way back in the day, you were a librarian, you were studying to become a librarian, and you were reading and you were inspired, and you grabbed a notebook and you started writing. How did that then translate into a multi book career? How many books did you write? Did your first book get published? What was that journey like?

[09:56] Makiia : My first book was published. Yes. And so I think looking at all my books, they are about the things that happened to fascinate me at that time. So my first book, I was fascinated with spanish flu, the 1918 spanish flu. Portland, Oregon is my favorite city in the US. I love history. So my first book is called a deathstruck year. And it's about a 17 year old girl living in Portland, Oregon, who volunteers for the American Red Cross during the 1918 spanish flu pandemic. So I basically took all these ideas and just made a book around them. And that's just the process over the years. Yeah. It took about maybe six to eight months to write that first draft. And because I didn't know anything about writing books or the publishing world, I thought my draft was beautiful and perfect. And so I sent it out to agents. And all these agents all said, no, no, thank you, except one. There was an agent named Susie who sent me a note and said. Said, hey, I'm very interested in the story. It's not quite where it needs to be yet, but if you are willing to read my notes and revise, I'd be happy to read it again. And because it was the only offer, I had this semi offer, you know, I took her notes and I rewrote. Took about three months or so, and that's how I found my agent. Yeah. And it took about a year to sell that book. It's sold to Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. So I was just over the moon delighted. It was just a crazy time.

[11:39] Marissa: That is exciting. And I feel like those revise and resubmits, they kind of have a mythical quality to them, because it's like, on one hand, you're so close, you have an agent interested, but on the other hand, it's not a yes. It's not a, here's your contract. Let's take this to publishers. And so, was it scary to feel like, okay, I'm going to put even more time into this project, and it still might not happen? Or was it just invigorating to know, okay, here's a professional eye. Here's some professional opinions. I can do this.

[12:15] Makiia : It was all of these things. And I didn't know if I could do this. But I know that I had gotten so far that to just quit and try something else, that was not an option for me. But the one great thing about writing this first book is that no one knew I was writing it except my husband. So this book was a secret book. And if I was going to fail, if this book was not going to get published, that's what I thought of as failure at the time, then no one would know. I could just take that to my grave. So, that was wonderful. So, that is one of the things that kept me going. It didn't have to be humiliating.

[12:51] Marissa: Yeah, that's funny, because I do feel like, you get, you know, talking to aspiring writers, and some will shout it from the rooftops, and, like, everybody in their life knows about their dream to be an author and knows all about the projects that they're working on. And then you have writers, like, way on the other end of the spectrum, don't tell anybody. And then their whole family is shocked when suddenly they have a book deal.

[13:15] Makiia : A friend of mine, when I told her finally that I had a book deal, she looked at me with this accusing look, and she goes, you keep secrets. And I'm like, yes, I do. I do keep secrets. I just. It needed to be secret at that time.

[13:29] Marissa: That's so funny. I remember way back when I was writing cinder, and it was a nanowrimo national novel writing month project, and I mentioned it to my husband's cousin's wife that I was writing this book. And then, like, two years later, the book comes out, and she was like, wow, when you said you were writing a book, I didn't think you were actually going to write a book.

[13:53] Makiia : Yes. Because so many people say they're. They're writing a book or they'd like to write a book, but they. Yeah, they never see it through, so it's very common.

[14:02] Marissa: Yeah, but we did see it through, and here we are. And now your fifth book is coming out, if I'm doing my math correctly.

[14:12] Makiia : Five books.

[14:13] Marissa: Yes, five books. Would you please tell listeners, what is dragon fruit about?

[14:19] Makiia : Sure. So dragon fruit is its historical fantasy. Eh, it's more fantasy than historical, but it's about a girl named Hanalei who lives on the island kingdom of Tamarin. But Hanalei is forced to flee the island when her father steals a sea dragon egg meant to cure a dying princess. It's a magical egg, so they're forced to flee. And the bulk of this story takes place ten years later when Hannah is 18 and comes across another sea dragon who might be carrying eggs. So this gives her a chance. It's a second chance to right this terrible wrong, to go home. And it's an old fashioned quest novel. I just wanted to go back to the old fashioned.

[15:06] Marissa: I love an old fashioned quest novel, and I loved this book for a million different reasons. But one of the things that really stood out to me is the lush, gorgeous, immersive world building. It is one of those fantasy worlds that just carries you away, and when you close the book, you feel like you've been transported to somewhere new. So that's the first thing I want to talk about. I know you were drawing on some real life cultures and history for inspiration. Can you talk a little bit about your research process there?

[15:41] Makiia : So when I write books, a lot of my books are historical fiction or historical fantasy. When I started those books, I always start with the research. When you write about spanish flu or medieval map makers, you have to know your history to ground you. That's your foundation. But dragonfruit was different. It's more fantasy than historical because I was writing about home. So I started. I was writing about a Pacific island, a fictional version. I started with memory. And my first notebooks are list of everything I can remember about growing up on the island of Guam. It was everything from mangoes and fruit bats to my friends to just everything. Flower lays every single little detail. And that was my foundation. My foundation was memory. I wanted to write a book about home, but I didn't want to get sued, so I made it a fantasy.

[16:37] Marissa: I was going to sue you for that.

[16:40] Makiia : All the people are fictional. No.

[16:43] Marissa: And it was. I mean, I love that. I love that it comes from memory. And I wonder how much just you having this very real life childhood experience and being able to draw on that played a part in being able to write it so authentically. Because, I mean, there's the smells, there's the flavors. I mean, the smell of the ocean, all of it. You really captured it quite beautifully.

[17:08] Makiia : Thank you. I remember my first book came out, May is Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month. And I was so excited for Maine. And then I started to look around and I thought, where is everyone? Where are all the other Pacific Islander children's writers? And I realized that I am one of a very few. And it was a very lonely thing to realize at that time over ten years ago. And I also realized that there are very few books about Pacific Islander kids or islander kids in stories and fictional stories. So it was just a tiny tidbit of a story idea that was in my brain for the past ten years, and I finally decided to write it. I said, hey, we need our own story. So my dedication page for dragon fruit, it's for the island kids. Hafa day. And half a day is a greeting back home on Guam.

[18:04] Marissa: I love that. And I loved what you did, obviously based on real life cultures, Pacific island culture, and the setting, the islands, all this. However, you have now turned it into your own fantasy world. Did you draw maps? Did you find inspiration? Pictures? What were some of the things that you did to kind of ground yourself in it?

[18:28] Makiia : I did. I have this giant storyboard in my office, and I just print out photos from the Internet and slap them on this board. It's very old school. Just island pictures, people pictures, building pictures. We have these great limestone structures on Guam called lady stones. And in the old days, houses were built on these stones. They're standing above, you know, above ground. And so that made it into the story. Fruit bats, I grew up with that made it into the story. I used to swim at Ypal beach as a kid, and I would look down, and at the very bottom, along the sand, were these gross sea snakes, eels, and in one form or another, that made it into the story. So it was really just all these little bits and pieces thrown into a cooking pot to make this one story. The food was from home. The flower lays were from home. Just everything, really. Everything was about home.

[19:30] Marissa: The sea dragons were from home.

[19:33] Makiia : The sea dragons, I made up talk.

[19:37] Marissa: About the sea dragons because they are so cool. And here, again, even though they're fantasy, they feel very real. They feel like creatures that I could go find in a zoo. Most of that is that you really have dug into the science, the biology, their mating habits, their different coloring, their life cycle. What was your process for creating this fantasy character or creature, but making it so realistic?

[20:09] Makiia : Sure. I write a bunch of books, picture books, children's books on regular old dragons, just not sea dragons. And I looked at how they were built, what their characteristics are, and I tweaked it to make it more Pacific Islander oriented. I made my own dragon based on these other dragons, but also I read all these other stories. For example, Naomi Novik's his Majesty's Dragon, which is about England's war against France, but with a dragon air force. I mean, and I just. I loved how she brought these characters, these dragons to life. So it was just all kinds of serious dragon research, really.

[20:53] Marissa: Yeah, serious dragon research. Really digging into the nitty gritty.

[20:59] Makiia : But also, Marissa, I remember when I was a kid, I came across this romance novel, I think it was called twice loved, and it was about these whaling ships on Nantucket. And I was fascinated by these whalers and how they were hunting these whales. And that must have stuck in the back of my mind also, because they were inspiration for the dragoners, the sea dragon hunting villains in the story.

[21:27] Marissa: Yeah, no, it's interesting because it feels like they're a little bit mythical dragon, a little bit whale, a little bit reptile. You can kind of see where some of the influences come from, but they really do seem like they come together to create something that's very unique to this book.

[21:48] Makiia : Yeah. And I remember, there was a scene where Hanalei is on a ship, and I think they're doing something with dragon oil. They're separating it or something. And I took that by researching the process. The whalers used to separate whale oil on ships. So some of it's historical, but not enough, really, to call historical fantasy. It was just a big mish mash.

[22:12] Marissa: Right, right. You sound like you enjoy research.

[22:15] Makiia : I love it. I do, too.

[22:17] Marissa: I also love research. Why do you love research?

[22:20] Makiia : I just. I. You know, I. My first library job was when I was 17 years old at the University of Oregon Knight Library. And so research is just. It's in my blood. I wanted to be a librarian. I wanted. Sometimes I think I enjoy the research more than writing the book. It's just. It's. It's a good thing I have deadlines because I'd still be researching. It's just. Yeah, it feels like a treasure hunt is what it feels like.

[22:48] Marissa: I feel that way, too. Now. If I wasn't forced to stop researching and start writing, I could just research all the time, because it's all. There's so much interesting stuff out there.

[22:58] Makiia : Yes. And I hear sometimes about these writers, maybe some fictional writers who have these researchers to do their work for them, and I think, what is that? No, I have to do my own research because I want the glory. Research is the best part.

[23:14] Marissa: So when I'm writing, if I need a little detail, a lot of times I'll just put a placeholder in the manuscript and then keep writing and go and do the research later at the end of the process. And I love that. I love the very end when I can just go through and start filling in all of these little research holes. And there's been a couple of times the last few years where I was on such a tight deadline that I asked, um, Joanne, my assistant, slash the. Our podcast admin here, um, if she could help me do some of that research and fill in those blanks for me. Uh, it was like, it was such a great time saver, but I hated it. I hate not being able to do the research because that's, like, one of the most fun parts for me.

[23:57] Makiia : Yes, it's mine.

[23:59] Marissa: Yeah. 

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Marissa: Okay, so you mentioned this is a quest story, kind of very classic quest structure. But you've also said that it sounds like you're not much of a planner, not much of an outliner. You just kind of go with the flow. How did those two things combine to make this plot in this story?

[25:47] Makiia : Sure. And I think it would be so great if I could plan a book, if I could just outline it from beginning to end, but it just doesn't work. It doesn't work that way. And what I love about just sitting there with a blank notebook is that when you write something and you don't plan it, then sometimes you surprise yourself. And if I can surprise myself, there's a good chance I'll surprise some of my readers, too. And I love that. I love that part of it. But my process is I'll write this book in the first draft. It's embarrassing. It's like a pamphlet. It is so skinny. It's like a fat outline, basically, 40, 45,000 words. I mean, it's just, it's horrible to say. And then I will go back for a second draft and then a third draft and then a fourth and then a 9th draft if needed. And with every draft, I'm adding in more research, I'm adding in more description, I'm adding in more people. I'm just, I'm flushing out this skinny draft. And, you know, world building, story building.

[26:53] Marissa: Do you have, because, of course, talking to so many writers, and they all run the gamut from really intense outliners to like, I have absolutely no idea. I'm just, you know, figuring it out scene by scene. What's the balance of having absolutely no idea what's happening next? Versus, like, do you have ideas for scenes later on that you feel like you're writing toward, or is it just completely blank in your imagination until you discover it?

[27:22] Makiia : No, I have scenes that I think about and I write notes to myself, and they're all over my office. There are post its all over the place. There is just a big giant mess in my office. And then I want to see your.

[27:36] Marissa: Office like you've done post it notes, maps, and all of these great inspiration.

[27:43] Makiia : So I have these, these lists. It's called to write, and it's just kind of a, just a couple of words of what I should think about writing. And you write that really, that really short paragraph, and then you just build upon it. It's just, yeah. I don't know. It feels like magic sometimes, and sometimes it doesn't feel like magic.

[28:04] Marissa: It happens if you're, you use outlines also. Sometimes it feels like magic. Sometimes it does not.

[28:10] Makiia : No.

[28:11] Marissa: Let's talk character development. So there's a lot of wonderful characters I adore. Hannah Leigh. Sam the prince is super dreamy but really complicated. But the character that I really am so excited to talk about is actually one of our villains. Let's talk about the captain. How do you say his name? Braga. How do you say his name? Braga.

[28:35] Makiia : It's Captain Braggadin Bragadin.

[28:38] Marissa: He is dastardly, and I love a good villain. Where did he come from?

[28:45] Makiia : I don't remember, Marissa. I don't remember where he came from. I don't remember. I know we needed a villain, but one thing about a villain is I don't like those stories where the villain is so black and white, where he is evil just to be evil and you don't understand why. So with Captain Bragadin, I wanted you to hate this man because he's terrible, but I wanted you to have a little bit of a glimpse into his past. Why is he terrible? And I think that, yeah, that's what I did.

[29:17] Marissa: Yeah. So when you're writing and you're kind of uncovering this character as you go and getting to know him and his motivations, are there moments when he, like, would just do something horrific and you'd be like, hold on. Are we really going there right now?

[29:36] Makiia : Yes. That happens with a lot of characters where you have a certain something in mind when you're, when you're writing about these characters and they just go off on their own and do their own thing, and it's so irritating because it means a lot more work.

[29:50] Marissa: Yeah.

[29:51] Makiia : Yeah. But it's fascinating. And, you know, they, they eventually get to where they need to go.

[29:56] Marissa: Mm hmm. Another character that I really loved is katamara. And, of course, we're not gonna spoil anything, but he has a big secret. Is that something that surprised you, or is that something that you knew going into it?

[30:11] Makiia : I had no idea going in. And, in fact, Kata didn't. I don't think he existed in the early drafts, so. The early drafts, yeah, they're just these skinny little pamphlets. So eventually, you're adding in these random characters. Katamara was the animal keeper at the menagerie, and you're like, hey, this is kind of an interesting guy. What can I do with this guy? And so you start building. Just, you start fleshing out his character and dreaming up his past and his background. And I did surprise myself. Yes.

[30:45] Marissa: And I love hearing other authors talk about the things that changed from early drafts to final drafts. And it's always, like, a reminder to me and to hopefully writers who are listening to this that the first draft is never the final. It's never perfect. It's never done. Like, we're always discovering things later on in the process. And I think sometimes aspiring writers, you know, they're trying to compare their first or their second or their third draft to our final published books, and it's like, no, no, that's not how that works.

[31:18] Makiia : Right. And I remember I've gone back and looked at some of my first drafts, and you kind of. You feel nauseous. I mean, they're so bad. I mean, they're embarrassing, that. But it's a first draft. You have. You have a long way to go. But for this story, dragonfruit, I remember that I have a character called Fethu. He's a fruit bat, and he has become a huge favorite for people who have read the story. But Fethu didn't exist until, I think, my third draft. So it's just. Yeah, I don't care.

[31:52] Marissa: He's so great.

[31:53] Makiia : He's so great. He's adorable.

[31:56] Marissa: He's adorable. And it's, you know, that is really interesting, because not only is he a great character that adds a lot of color to the story, but he also plays some important plot parts and plot roles. And so, yeah, just another example of, you know, things that get intertwined as we revise, but doesn't necessarily mean that they were there all along.

[32:19] Makiia : Right. And also, for my early drafts, there was really no mention of tattoos. And tattoos are a very important part of both polynesian and micronesian culture, just Pacific islander culture. So I went back, and I found these historical books on 18th century 17th century Pacific islander tattoos and reading the history of them, the patterns and the process by which they are inked onto the skin were fascinating. And I read those books around draft two, and that's why it made into draft three in some form or another. It's the research and then the story and sometimes the memory and then the story. It's just a big old mess. Yeah, but.

[33:04] Marissa: No, but there's logic to the mess. Yes, I know. I mean, I've experienced that myself countless times, where you are in the middle of a project, and then you read something interesting or you hear something interesting, or your imagination just jump starts, and at the end, it feels like it was meant to be all along. Like there's a very serendipitous element to it. Yes, but that's just kind of how the creative process goes sometimes.

[33:31] Makiia : Yes. Which is fascinating and hard, and I wouldn't pick anything else. This is a dream.

[33:36] Marissa: Yeah, no, I know. I know. And it's always. It makes me curious to think, like, what if I had read a different book, you know, while I was working on this project, and I read this thing, and that inspired this twist? What if I hadn't read this thing and I had read something different instead? And you can just imagine, like, I don't know, a million alternate universes out there, written totally different books.

[33:57] Makiia : Yes. What if I hadn't read that tattoo book? It's such a huge part of the story, I just can't even imagine.

[34:03] Marissa: Yeah, I know. Oh, that's interesting. Okay. One thing that I really love about this book is it takes a trope that you see quite a lot in when it comes to magic systems. The idea that in order for the magic to work, you have to pay a price, or there's a price to be paid in order to get this thing that the magic is promised. In the case of this book, people are after these dragon eggs called dragon fruit, because they will grant a wish, so to speak. But then, as the story goes on, we start to uncover that it hasn't always gone well for the people who have gotten these wishes. So, for you, what was that process like for coming up with what the price to be paid was? Because it's different for every character.

[34:51] Makiia : It was different for every character. And I started off with just saying, hey, there's a price to be paid. But when you go into multiple drafts, you want to show them. You want to show your readers what the price is to be paid. So I went back and I thought about different examples. There's an old soldier who slurps up a dragon egg. What happened to that guy? What happened to all these people who came across dragon eggs in the past? And it was just a way of showing all these different examples and not just talking about them like in a conversation. I wanted to bring these people and these experiences to life, but it involved some hard thinking. Yeah, making things up is hard.

[35:33] Marissa: It is hard. And it's hard to make it unique, you know, as compared to like other fantasy literature out there. You don't want it to be just like, oh, yeah, this happens in every book or whatever, but also make it world specific, make it character specific. It really takes a lot of brainpower.

[35:50] Makiia : Right. So I'm very tired. Yeah, very tired.

[35:54] Marissa: Did the, did the prices to be paid, did those change over multiple drafts or was it like, once you figured it out, was it like, oh, yeah, that's clearly the right thing here.

[36:04] Makiia : They changed and some were deleted altogether and some were added at the last minute. Yeah, it was just all over the map, really.

[36:12] Marissa: Yeah, yeah. No, and I hate that. Obviously, I'm trying not to spoil anything. There is one in particular that was so interesting and so just like nothing I'd ever read before. And I thought, oh, I'm so curious about that. And it's so clever. But of course we can't really talk about it because readers go read the book and then you'll know what we're talking about.

[36:35] Makiia : Maybe later.

[36:36] Marissa: Maybe later. All right. One kind of last thing I want to talk about before we move on to our bonus round is just kind of a general publishing market question because I feel like forever when you would hear about new fantasies coming out, they were always coming out in sets of threes. Like it was the fantasy trilogy, the epic fantasy trilogy all the time. And I feel like that's just how it was for ages. I mean, certainly when my first books were coming out, everything was about a trilogy. And then I feel like the last maybe four or five years, there's like this big rush of duologies and everyone was writing duologies and two books, blah, blah, blah. And now suddenly I'm seeing all of these fantasy standalones and you could never find a fantasy standalone before, and now there's like a rush of them. Where do you think that's coming from? Why is it the publishers, the market, readers? Is it the writers loving standalones right now? Where is that coming from?

[37:39] Makiia : I think it's all of these things, but for me specifically, I love writing standalones. I like taking this one book and throwing my whole life into it, putting everything in this one book not saving it for book two, not saving anything for book three, just putting my whole soul into it and then being done. And when you're done with these books after 4567 drafts, I'm sick of the book. I don't want to go back to this world, so I just want to get all my love into the story and then walk away. It's for someone else. After that, it's just I don't have, I couldn't follow up Dragonfruit. I finished the story. I did what I meant to do, and that's that.

[38:22] Marissa: Yeah, I get that. I also enjoy standalones, although I have not yet written a fantasy standalone, only contemporary. But I also feel like, like on the flip side of that, like, on one hand, you just get to pour your love into it, and then when you're done, you're done. And that's a really great feeling. And then you get to move on to something new that you're excited about. On the other hand, with fantasy, there's so much that goes into the world building and the creation of the magic system and politics and all of this that I feel like part of us are like, but I've done all this work. I want to keep using that. It's kind of hard to let all that work go.

[39:02] Makiia : Yeah, it's easy for me to walk away. It's just because, yeah, I'm interested in other things by that time, but, yeah. Yeah. So I think standalones are my future.

[39:12] Marissa: Okay, well, I love it. I mean, do you see yourself coming back to this world but just like a different story within this world?

[39:20] Makiia : No, I don't think so. And with my previous book, Year of the Reaper, one of the best compliments is, hey, we need an epilogue. We need to know specifically what happens five years later. Some readers are very upset, and that's a huge compliment. It means they love these characters, they love the story, and they want to read more. But my brain and my heart is just not there. I mean, I'll never say never, but it's pretty close to never.

[39:48] Marissa: Sure. No, I mean, that's interesting and I agree completely. Like, people wanting more says that you've done something right for sure.

[39:57] Makiia : Right. It's better than the opposite.

[39:59] Marissa: Yeah, yeah. No, it is so interesting to me as a reader. I love a standalone. I mean, I also enjoy, you know, your epic big series, but there's something really satisfying about getting to go into a story and experience that story. But then at the end, okay, you can close it and put it on your shelf and like, move on to something else as opposed to, okay, now we need to go to book three or wait a year for book three. The situation is as a reader it can be really nice to have occasional standalone.

[40:34] Makiia : Right. And also I'm a slow writer. I mean it takes me a long time to do all the research and put the words down and then type the words into the computer. I go through many drafts. So if I were to do a series, it would be take forever and I feel like people would lose interest because they'd be 20 years older. I mean it just, it won't work.

[40:54] Marissa: Yeah, yeah. Well, yes, when you're writing everything by.

[40:58] Makiia : Hand, it does takes a long time.

[41:02] Marissa: No, no, that's, it's so interesting to me and I'm fascinated by market trends and of course I would never encourage anybody to write to a trend. So I hope people aren't hearing this and thinking, oh, I need to change my series to a standalone. Like, that's not the point of this conversation. But I do think it's interesting and I'll be curious to see like does it swing the other way here in a couple years from now, is it going to be all trilogies again? Or maybe it'll be quartets or. I don't know. I'm just fascinated by it.

[41:29] Makiia : Me too.

[41:30] Marissa: Yeah. Okay, are you ready for our bonus round?

[41:35] Makiia : Yes.

[41:36] Marissa: What book makes you happy?

[41:39] Makiia : I don't think I have a favorite book that makes me happy. I really just like books with happy endings. And I have a confession. I've actually confessed this a couple times before. Is that before I read a book, any book, I will read the end. Just. Sorry. Yes, sorry.

[41:56] Marissa: You're one of those.

[41:58] Makiia : Yes. So just really fast, I just want to make sure the last page that the main character is still alive or if there's some kind of romance involved, that there are two people alive at the end of that book because my heart just can't take that kind of sad ending. So, yeah, I just love books with happy endings.

[42:19] Marissa: Oh my gosh, that's so funny. I hate the idea of reading ahead. I will, I'm at the end of a chapter and I can feel a big reveal or a big twist coming up. I will put my hand over the text as I go line by line so that I don't accidentally see a spoiler.

[42:36] Makiia : You know, I have to tell you that the one time I did not read ahead was the series. I won't say who wrote it, but they make you, this author, made you fall in love with this policeman and his wife. As they solved mysteries and then so many books into it. She has this guy go to the mailbox to check the mail, and then there's a bomb in the mailbox and it blows him up and he just dies. And it was a library book. And I remember taking that library book. I was so upset, and I threw it across the room. And it's just, I don't like those kinds of endings at all.

[43:14] Marissa: Well, it's fine to know what you like.

[43:16] Makiia : Yes.

[43:19] Marissa: What are you working on next?

[43:21] Makiia : It is, I think when you're so early into another book, it is just top secret. Top secret. And that's just a way of saying, I have no idea what I'm doing. I'm still in those early stages of writing those post its and printing out those photos and just daydreaming. But I have something. I just. I don't quite know how to describe it yet.

[43:44] Marissa: Okay, well, something for us all to look forward to.

[43:48] Makiia : Yes, it's going to be a while.

[43:51] Marissa: Lastly, where can people find you physically? How about social media?

[43:58] Makiia : Okay, well, you can find me on Instagram. I'm on Instagram. And you can just look up Makea Lucer. There's my webpage, but it's mostly Instagram. You can find my. Where I'm going to be for events. You can find updated news on my books. You can find all the things.

[44:15] Marissa: Awesome. Makea, thank you for joining me. It was such a delight to talk to you.

[44:19] Makiia : You as well, Marissa. And look, we had no glitches. This is not a sync glitch. I'm delighted.

[44:25] Marissa: I'm gonna blame Zoom. I think Zoom was having troubles that day. I don't think it was you and me.

[44:30] Makiia : It's me. No, definitely not you or me.

[44:33] Marissa: Readers, I hope you will check out dragonfruit. It is out now. Of course, we encourage you to support your local indie bookstore. If you don't have a local indie, you can check out our affiliate store@bookshop.org, shop. Marissa Meyer. Next week, I'll be talking with Anna Ellicsen about her debut urban fantasy, the Vanishing station. Don't forget to leave us a rating or review on your favorite podcast app and check out our merchandise on Etsy, Instagram, and teepublic. If you're enjoying these conversations, you can subscribe and follow us on Instagram. Arissa Meyer, author and Happy writer podcast. And just a heads up, we have some really fun giveaways coming up, so I hope you will be sure to follow us on Instagram. Until next time, stay inspired. Keep writing. And whatever life throws at you today, I hope that now you're feeling a little bit happier.