The Nerd Daily recently had the absolute pleasure of sitting down with Amparo Ortiz, the author of the upcoming YA contemporary fantasy, Blazewrath Games! If you’re a dragon enthusiast or are just searching for a contemporary fantasy novel with a delightful cast of characters to completely lose yourself in, you’d be wise to add Blazewrath Games to your high-priority TBR pile immediately!
Hello Amparo! Thank you so much for doing this interview! Would you tell us a little about yourself?
Hello!! Thank you so much for having me! I’m Amparo and I’m a YA author from Puerto Rico. I also teach ESL at a local community college, think about pizza 24/7, and listen to way too much Kpop.
Oh, and for those of you who are interested, I’m a Capricorn Sun, Libra Moon, and Scorpio Rising. Apologies in advance.
Blazewrath Games hits shelves on October 6! What can readers expect?
CHAOS. No, but seriously, readers can expect my version of our world if magic users and dragons lived among us (and it wasn’t a secret!). It’s a story about finding your home, where you truly belong, and how the concept of power is explored through sports, cultural identity, and rage. Readers can also expect no main romance, since I know many want to know that specific detail, queer rep, cultural diversity, and dragonssss.
How did you come up with the idea for the Blazewrath World Cup?
I can’t really pinpoint the exact moment I thought of a sport with dragons, but I can tell you that the actual sport (how it would be played, the idea for a Cup, etc.) came to me while watching 2014’s FIFA World Cup! I was like, “THIS is what I want to write. It’s a game similar to soccer, but there are also martial arts and a lone player who’s running for their life. Oh, and I want teams from all around the world.” This led me to think deeper about which countries would be represented and how their specific dragon species would differ from both what we’re used to in mainstream media/canon, and from one another within my fictional world.
I’m in awe of your extensive worldbuilding in Blazewrath Games. What kind of research went behind it, and what did your process of constructing this world full of witches and dragons look like?
Thank you! This is actually the reason why I spent almost two years doubting myself and not starting the book—I kept thinking this idea was Too Much for an inexperienced writer like me. Once my agent nudged me to finally get the ball rolling, though, I dove in and researched as I wrote the first draft! In terms of the dragons, I looked at endemic species to each country I wanted to include in the Cup, and I had one big question for myself: do I want to use dragons that are already well known in this region (like the Zmey Gorynych from Russia or the Hydra from Greece) or am I creating them from scratch (99% of the dragons in BLAZEWRATH GAMES)? With the Zmey Gorynych, I just couldn’t pass up the opportunity to write a Blazewrath match with a three-headed dragon, you know? For the rest, national animals and/or symbols inspired them!
Now for the magic system! When it came to the magic users in the book, I knew I wanted to write about people who could cast spells with wands, but I didn’t want those wands to just be equally accessible. I wanted to have levels or ranks—I call them magical statuses. I didn’t know what they would be called or what each one could be capable of until I started writing a scene close to the beginning, where Lana—my main character—visits a wand shop. I just sat down and wrote the ranks without even thinking: Copper Wands (elemental manipulation), Silver Wands (elemental manipulation and creation), and the rare Gold Wands (elemental manipulation, creation, and destruction). I loved getting to play with how limiting these magical statuses are, especially for a main character who possesses no magical ability.
If your younger self had been a part of Team Puerto Rico, would she have been a runner just like Lana, or would she have been a charger, keeper, blocker or striker instead?
I would’ve been a Blocker! A Blocker’s job is twofold: 1) fly after the opposite team’s Runner atop their dragon steed (while the dragon tries knocking the Runner away with fireballs), and 2) land inside what’s known as a Block Zone in order to physically fight the Runner and steal their Iron Scale, which is the object they must take to the top of a mountain. I think my younger self would’ve loved to chase a fleeing opponent and engage in some serious combat to stop them from reaching their destination. It’s the ultimate Petty Move, lol.
Do you have a favourite quote from Blazewrath Games that you can share with us?
My absolute favorite quote is super spoilery, so I’ll pick my second favorite! This is a bit in one of Lana’s many internal monologues: “We matter whether the people we love believe in us, support us, or not.” It’s a big reason why I wrote this book, actually. I wanted to explore how we perceive ourselves as worthy, as mattering, whenever others agree that we, in fact, matter, and how that agreement holds more power than it should sometimes.
If you had to describe your heroine Lana in five words, what would they be?
Resilient, loyal, inquisitive, hopeful, and melodramatic! Don’t tell her I said that last word.
For readers who are inevitably going to fall in love with the world and the incredible characters of Blazewrath Games, can you give a hint as to what the sequel has in store for us?
MORE CHAOS.
Lana’s journey is less about finding a home and more about redefining her purpose within the home she’s made for herself. We have a brand new magical mystery to solve, more conspiracies to uncover, and quite a few other dragon species to meet! Oh, and spoiler alert: the sequel does have a main romance… and it also doesn’t.
*whistles*
Except for the sequel, can you tell us about any other projects you are currently working on?
I have a middle grade graphic novel coming out in 2022! It’s called SAVING CHUPIE (HarperCollins) and it’s set in Puerto Rico. It’s the story of a young girl, Violeta, who travels to PR after Hurricane Maria so she can help her grandmother reopen her beachside restaurant. But when a series of animal deaths start popping up, Violeta discovers a baby Chupacabra is the culprit, and she’ll do whatever it takes to protect Chupie from falling into the hands of a local hunter.
There’s also some other stuff brewing, but none that I can confirm for now. Stay tuned!
And finally, do you have any book recommendations for us?
SO MANY. These are just a handful of brilliant books I’ve devoured this year:
- FURIA by Yamile Saied Mendez
- LEGENDBORN by Tracy Deonn
- A CUBAN GIRL’S GUIDE TO TEA AND TOMORROW by Laura Taylor Namey
- YOU SHOULD SEE ME IN A CROWN by Leah Johnson
- LUPE WONG WON’T DANCE by Donna Barba Higuera
- A SONG OF WRAITHS & RUIN by Roseanne A. Brown
- INCENDIARY by Zoraida Cordova
And even though I haven’t read them just yet, I’m dying to dive into CATEGORY FIVE by Ann Davila Cardinal, EACH OF US A DESERT by Mark Oshiro, LOBIZONA by Romina Garber, and CEMETERY BOYS by Aiden Thomas!
