Today I’m so excited
to talk with my Soho Press ‘bro’ Adam Silvera, about his about to release debut
YA novel, MORE HAPPY THAN NOT, which has been racking up starred reviews and
getting so much (well-deserved) buzz and press! Seriously, this book! And
Adam—who I haven’t met in person yet— is pretty awesome, too. (Full disclosure: The thing about writing
books for Soho Press is that everyone is
pretty damn awesome. It’s just this crazy hive of amazing creativity!)
Anyway, here’s the
synopsis from the Soho Press website:
Part Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, part Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of
the Universe, Adam Silvera’s extraordinary debut novel offers a unique
confrontation of race, class and sexuality during one charged near-future
summer in the Bronx.
The Leteo Institute’s
revolutionary memory-relief procedure seems too good to be true to Aaron
Soto—miracle cure-alls don’t tend to pop up in the Bronx projects. Aaron could
never forget how he’s grown up poor, how his friends aren’t there for him, or
how his father committed suicide in their one-bedroom apartment. Aaron has the
support of his patient girlfriend, if not necessarily his distant brother and
overworked mother, but it’s not enough.
Then Thomas shows up. He has a
sweet movie-watching setup on his roof, and he doesn’t mind Aaron’s obsession
with a popular fantasy series. There are nicknames, inside jokes. Most
importantly, Thomas doesn’t mind talking about Aaron’s past. But Aaron’s
newfound happiness isn’t welcome on his block. Since he can’t stay away from
Thomas or suddenly stop being gay, Aaron must turn to Leteo to straighten
himself out, even if it means forgetting who he is.
I know, right? You totally need to read this book.
(okay, you totally need to read all my books, too, but today it's about ADAM!)
Here's what Adam Silvera had to say when we sat down laptop to laptop:
Joy: I know that at
least part of the setting for MORE HAPPY is the Bronx you grew up in. What did
you consider as you worked to get that setting authentically on the page? Were
there places (and I know there’s a slight speculative fiction aspect to the
novel) where you worked harder to fictionalize? Did you learn anything new
about the familiar places as you re-created them as a setting for your
characters?
Adam: Great
question! One hundred percent of MORE HAPPY THAN NOT takes place in the Bronx.
The original draft divided the book between the Bronx and Manhattan where Aaron
(the narrator) worked (previously a bookstore, now a bodega on his block) but
it created tons of complications with the distance between the primary settings.
I was also living in Texas when I wrote the first draft and it was the first
time I spent that much time away from the Bronx (and New York) and the
differences between the states helped me realize how beautiful—and scary,
admittedly—the Bronx is, and I wanted the book to double as a love letter to my
home borough. That said, the book isn’t a mirror to the Bronx I grew up in. I
took some liberties with parks, hospitals, post offices, etc. because I wanted
this book to be Aaron’s story, not mine. There’s already enough in me in
Aaron’s heart that I didn’t need to make this a full-on memoir.
Joy: You recently
mentioned that you were excited that the pub date had been moved back a few
weeks so that you would achieve your goal of publishing a book by the time you
turned 25! How long have you been
writing? What inspired you to set that goal? Did your work at Books of Wonder
and Paper Lantern have an influence on those goals?
Adam: Getting the
pub date moved on was such a funny miracle—totally unimportant but still really
cool. I probably started writing when I was ten or eleven. Harry Potter
fan-fiction, of course. I was writing a big assault against Hogwarts because I
loved writing action. But I became really serious about writing when I was
fifteen or sixteen, publishing fan-fiction online for a very awesome community
of readers that were demanding of more chapters so they kept me fueled to keep
going and going. The goal itself was born out of 18-Year-Old Adam being super
ambitious for no reason, but I took it very seriously when I was 21 or 22
because I wanted to put my all into my dream, especially since I never went to
college and assumed that meant I would have a harder time getting published. So
I worked extra, extra hard.
Joy: Who/what have
been your biggest influences as a writer/teller of stories?
Adam: I’m of the
Harry Potter generation so J.K. Rowling, obviously. Lauren Oliver taught me
tons about discipline, Corey Whaley taught me how to tell a complete story
within 200-something pages, and Benjamin Alire Saenz taught me to tell an
honest story, even if it doesn’t have the “commercial value” writers always
fear publishers are exclusively seeking.
Joy: You and I share
an editor at Soho Press, the very awesome Daniel Ehrenhaft. Can you dish a little
about the editorial process as you experienced it, bringing this novel from its
incipient stages to the awesome debut that it is about to be?
Adam: Dan and I
clicked instantly. My first phone call with him led to another phone call with
my agent Brooks where I was like, “This is our guy.” Dan understood the vision
of the book where other editors hadn’t. Dan only wanted to enhance what I
produced and never strip away the essence. Dan’s double life as an author too
has been especially valuable because he (and Brooks, actually) taught me to be
more conscious of Adam Voice vs. Aaron Voice. My author voice would sometimes
invade my main character’s narrating and I think I’ve got the hang of it now.
We’ll see. I also super love Dan because when we were entering copyedits I
realized how to fix something that had been bothering me about Act 3 and he
delayed production to give me another six weeks to get my sh*t together and I’m
now fully happy with the final product, and not just more happy than not with
it. :)
Joy: MORE
HAPPY THAN NOT has received an enormous amount of (well deserved!) early
pre-pub accolades. This can be both thrilling and overwhelming for a debut
author. How do you keep even and focused amidst the hype? (Cause you seem to be
handling it all very well!)
Adam: I think I
was doing way better a couple months ago because I had two new manuscripts
keeping me busy, but I just turned in one to my agent a couple weeks ago and
the other is due in October. Keeping up with social media a month before debuting
admittedly is very demanding, but there are worst problems to have than
chatting with people who are excited about something you’ve created. I am definitely feeling pressures with my
future books though because MORE HAPPY is such a personal book and I don’t
think I can ever recreate that experience or fall in love with another book of
mine the way I have with that book. But I guess that’s not any different than
love, where sometimes you have to move on and end up surprising yourself with
your capabilities to love again.
Joy: Once a novel is
out in the world, it becomes the property of the readers and we authors have to
let go. But as the story’s creator, what do you hope readers bring away from
the novel? Why this novel at this moment in time? Why did this become your
debut, the story you had to write?
Adam: The book’s
genesis came from me wondering about nature versus nurture in regards to
homosexuality, and the way people often mistaken sexuality as a choice. And I
thought about what life would look like if you could choose your sexuality,
specifically, if a teenager who’s gay could choose to be straight. Would he do
it? And what needed to happen in his life to lead to such a decision. I paired
this with some emotional beats pulled from my relationship with the first guy I
fell in love with, and came out for. I originally wanted to write a dystopian
trilogy—that’s what was hot!—but I read some books that told very contained,
grounded stories in a single volume that impressed me and I knew that’s what I
wanted to do, too. Tell a full and honest story in one book, even if my
narrator was dealing with emotional trials that don’t always necessarily excite
a publisher or Hollywood.
Joy: What’s coming
next for Adam Silvera?
Adam: My second
novel HISTORY IS ALL YOU LEFT ME is tentatively scheduled for fall of 2016.
It’s about grief and OCD and love and lies, and it’s kicking my ass emotionally
and psychologically and is pushing me as a writer, and I hope I level up with
each book.
Thanks, Adam!
