Calliope Wakes follows a young adult woman who is plagued by relentless nightmares and strange uncontrollable events happening around her. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?

I grew up in the Midwest where I looked like no one else. First-generation immigrant families sometimes don’t assimilate well and I was stuck straddling two very different cultures. You want weird looks? Bring chopsticks for your school lunch. My happy place growing up with the tiny city library and that’s where I started exploring. All the good classics–Lloyd Alexander, Patricia McKillip, Alice Hoffman, Andre Norton, Katharine Kerr, Susan Cooper. If it was available, I read it. I wanted to write a book about an outsider trying to reconcile two completely different worlds. And, of course, I wanted sweeping romance, epic battles, and earth-shattering endings.

Callie struggles with her nightmares and the return of Erik into her life leaving her questioning what is happening and if she is the cause. What were some driving ideals behind your character’s development?

I needed Callie to earn her self-actualization. There’s always someone else telling you who you should be, what you should do, and weighing your worth, screw all of that. It took me a long time to realize I needed to run my own race and I pushed for Callie to start having faith in herself.

What were some themes that were important for you to explore in this book?

For all young folks moving from high school to college, the mission should be to discover yourself. What do you believe in, what do you want to do with your life, what are your hard limits, or do you even have them? Emerging adulthood is a time like no other because you’re still unformed and that is your first shot at making yourself who you want to be. A key part of that is letting go of the past or resolving old trauma because you don’t want that weighing you down going forward.

Will there be a follow-up novel to this story? If so, what aspects of the story will the next book cover?

I always intended for this to be a one-shot but now I want to write a full trilogy! Let’s see what my lovely publisher at Evernight Teen thinks. Celtic and Norse mythology is vast and wide-ranging but there are some fantastic myths that I want to tie to the young adult experience.

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The gods are alive, and they’re in Michigan.

Then buildings are collapsing, wolves are attacking, people are dying and only Callie can save them. Will this time be different? Will they finally live to see the sun rise on All Hallows’ Eve?

Original source: https://literarytitan.com/2024/09/07/resolving-old-trauma/