In any case, I do feel a lot freer to do whatever I want now that I’m moving on to a completely new project. There’s no baggage. I have no foreshadowed promises to deliver on. Do you know how much it sucks to be tied to finishing story lines that a teenager came up with? My nineteen-year-old self was a terrible coauthor.

I’ve learned it’s important to shut out the noise when it comes to certain character arcs, though. Sometimes readers’ hopes for certain characters—particularly romantic hopes—run at odds with what the story demands. Some people are going to hate The Burning God because their favorite characters didn’t get a happily ever after, but I don’t really... See more

I think another idiosyncrasy I have that helps with writing satisfying third acts is that I always think of the ending before I come up with anything else. I can’t write from an outline and I don’t like doing too much planning, but the reason why I can “pants” my way to a coherent story is that I always have a clear end point in mind—I know where... See more

I think I’m really funny! Am I not funny?

I’m not particularly drawn to writing about darkness. Writing about tragedy and trauma for the sake of tragedy and trauma makes me feel icky. It feels voyeuristic—sensationalist, is the word? Trauma as spectacle? I try not to do that. I’m just interested in stories about a range of topics that happen to... See more

But I also write what I love. I put a lot of my joy regarding reconnecting to my Chinese heritage into The Poppy War . All of the descriptions of food, festivals, myths, and inside jokes came from experiences I had with my family—for example, when Rin goes to the market with Kitay and deliberates buying a toy statuette of a urinating monk, or when... See more