The Next Big Thing

Posted by Raven M on 5:55 AM in inspiration, snow white, the next big thing, unfair, writing,

Hello everyone!

I haven't seen one of these post in a while. So this is me bringing it back! Unfair is currently at 12, 243 words. To celebrate I want to tell you guys a little more about it. If you want to do this (and please do) consider yourself tagged!

1.) What is the working title of your book?



I like to procrastinate make covers

It's a play on words. Well, sort of.

Since this is a Snow White retelling, the story itself has a lot of elements of the original story in it. This title is inspired by the Evil Queen's famous lines:

Mirror, mirror on the wall
Who's the fairest of them all

Unfair works in so many ways because a lot of what happens in the story, to the main character, and to other characters isn't fair. Of course, this isn't the fair that the Evil Queen is referring to. That said, this title also has a lot to do with beauty (what it is and what it isn't).

2.) Where did the idea for the book come from?

The idea for the story stems from a lot of questions that popped into my head one day. For example: Who is the man in the mirror? What was going on in the rest of the world (because Snow White's world isn't the center of the universe)? etc.

From there I was able to figure out who my characters were and what the story was going to be about. A course I took last semester called Rhetorical Theory is another source of inspiration (college is useful, guys). We explored the rhetoric of beauty and war, two themes that play an important role in the story.

3.) What genre does your book fall under?

YA High Fantasy.

4.) Which actors would you choose to play your characters in the movie rendition?

When I get a new idea for a story, I usually know what the main characters look like right off the bat. Luckily, I was able to find pictures of people who looked exactly how I pictured them in my head. OK. Maybe they're a little prettier than I pictured them to be (and two of them aren't actors), but oh well.

Camellia (Portrayed by Senait Gidey)

The Huntsman (portrayed by Alex Pettyfer)

Prince Gaspar (Portrayed by Marlon Teixeira)

Just noticed how intense everyone looks in these pictures. This was not intentional lol

5.) What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?

I happen to have a pitch. It's a rough one but IT'S A PITCH!!!

When kidnapped by the Huntsman, eighteen year old mage-in-training Camellia, is left with only two choices: escape and go search for her sister or stay with her kidnapper and help save the kingdom from the approaching darkness.

There is a lot of action, a journey, magic, and kissing because it wouldn't be my kind of story if there wasn't kissing involved. Though I don't think I'll be able to write a kissing scene any time soon. My main character hasn't even met her LI yet. *pouts*

If you need a pitch or are just looking for something fun to do, I highly reccommend that you check out Carissa Taylor's Pitch Factory. I tweaked mine a little (it was a lot shorter) but it's a really helpful resource for those of you who have finished manuscripts and want to enter a pitch contest or something. They don't come out perfect, but it's a good start.

6.) Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

Only time will tell. I'm open to both routes. I do know that I want to query someday, and if that lands me an agent, then I will be happy about that, but I just want to share my story with the world, so if that means I have to self-pub then that's also fine with me. I have a lot of respect for people who self-pub, and I think people look down them a little too much. Sure it might be extremely hard and difficult but being represented by an agency isn't a piece of cake either. So there's that. Anyways, I'm not thinking too much about it right now. I just want to finish this draft, and work it into the book I envision in my head.

7.) How long did it take you to write the first draft of your manuscript?

I'm still working on it. I don't know how long it's going to take to finish but I hope to have a good chunk of it written before summer is over. *crosses fingers*

8.) What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

I'm not really sure. I could be getting ahead of myself here but I'd say it's Kristin Cashore's Fire meets Leigh Bardugo's Shadow & Bone. The former because it's an adventure story, and just like Fire, Camellia is taken from her home, and has to travel to far away places. There is also a prince but sadly Gaspar isn't Brigan. I still love him, though. As for Shadow & Bone, it doesn't have too much in common except for the fact that like S&B, Unfair doesn't take place in your conventional fantasy world. The setting is inspired a lot by Portugal/Cape Verde and I still don't know how I'm going to incorporate language into the story (because I want this world to have it's own unique language) but Shadow & Bone has inspired me to play around with the worldbuilding. Hopefully something good comes out of my experimentation.

9.) Who or what inspired you to write this book?

I really wanted to write a book with a diverse cast. So I guess you can say the lack (yes, I know it's getting better but still) of diversity is inspiring me to write this. But it's more than that. Like I said, not only do I want to see more diversity in YA, but...I need it. As a POC, a reader, and teenager (for the time being), it sucks when you don't see characters (MAIN characters not sidekicks) that look like you. Sure I can relate to ones that don't look like me, but that doesn't mean I shouldn't be able to read about a black girl saving the world [enter kick-ass female character name here] - style.

Camellia (my main character) is a badass, and I think she can give Katniss a run for her money.

To make it simple: this book is for me and that's the ultimate inspiration for Unfair.

10.) What else about your book might pique the reader's interest?

I don't know about reader's (it's going to be awhile before I have those) but what keeps me interested in the story is my take on the fairytale that I chose to retell. Maybe it's not going to get awards for originality but it does tell a different side of the Snow White story. Unfair isn't told from Snow White's POV and you don't hear much about her until later on in the book. And since this takes place in a different part of the kingdom, I have to rebuild the story from the ground up, with characters (the only two characters that come from the original story is the Prince and the Huntsman) that are entirely my own.

Also, I think readers will like Camellia. She is very opionated, and says what's on her mind, though half the time what she says can get her in a lot of trouble. I wanted to play around with a few overused tropes. So this isn't a story about a seemingly not-special girl who finds out she is, in fact, special or the Chosen One. It isn't a story about a girl who is self-conscious and cares about what other people think. Not that those characters aren't important (because I know I'm not the most confident person in the world) but I really want to read a MC who is comfortable in her own skin, one who doesn't need a guy to tell her she's beautiful, and at the same time isn't afraid of getting her hands dirty. Camellia knows she's 'special'. She knows she has powers from the start of the book (and even before then). This book is about her learning how to control them and save the kingdom.

I hope you guys get to read it one day.

Again, anyone who reads this, consider yourself tagged! If you don't want to do this, that's fine, but if do decide to put up a Next Big Thing post please drop a link in the comments.

Thanks for reading!