With Soulswift, Megan Bannen brings us another deeply felt novel that explores belief and sacrifice. I recently had the chance to ask her about her research process, some of her favourite tragic plot twists in media (*goes to look up Nirvana in Fire*), and what has been bringing her joy in this chaotic year.
Hi Megan! Thank you so much for taking some time to answer questions for The Nerd Daily! First, tell us a bit about yourself?
Hi, Kibby! Many thanks to everyone at The Nerd Daily for this opportunity. I always feel bad when interviewers ask me to talk about myself, because I may actually be the most boring person on earth. I’m a librarian, but I’m currently working full-time as a writer / mom. I live in the Kansas City area with my magnificently coifed and very smart husband and our two adolescent kids, who are hilarious and awesome and currently eating us out of house and home. For some baffling reason, I have four different degrees from three different Kansas universities. Go, Jayhawks, Gorillas, and Hornets!
What can readers expect from Soulswift?
It’s so hard to predict what a reader is going to take away from a book, because, as the author, you have no idea what experiences each reader is bringing to the table. All I can do is hope. So, what I hope is that readers will walk away from Soulswift mulling over their personal beliefs about faith and the role that religion plays in shaping our everyday lives for good and ill. I hope the book will make people feel very deeply for the characters, and I have to admit that I hope readers will sob their hearts out for Gelya and Tavik. But while the book deals with hefty themes, I also hope readers will find moments that make them laugh out loud.
How was writing Soulswift different from your debut novel, The Bird and the Blade?
The process of writing Soulswift was so different from writing my debut. When I first started drafting The Bird and the Blade, I had no intention of publishing it. I wrote for the pleasure of telling myself the story. It wasn’t until three years into revising the book that I started to entertain the idea of trying to publish it. Soulswift, on the other hand, was the second half of a two-book deal, so there was the added pressure of needing to produce something that was good enough to put on a book store shelf. Also, while I knew the key scenes of the book before I ever started drafting it, the process of figuring out how those moments were connected was kind of a nightmare. I wrote tens of thousands of words comprising what the story was not, before I finally figured out what the story should be. Thankfully, my publisher (Balzer + Bray) and my editor (the wonderful Kristin Rens) were incredibly patient with me, and I loved Gelya and Tavik enough to stick with them and tough it out. Even though the process was arduous, I’m very proud of the final product.
Where did the inspiration for Soulswift come from?
For some reason, I decided that I wanted to write a book that felt like Ralph Vaughn Williams’s famous piece for violin and orchestra, “The Lark Ascending,” an exquisitely beautiful, bittersweet work. I played it over and over—walking the dog, on my way to work, etc.—until one day, I envisioned a moment that I understood was going to be the end of the book. It was kind of odd, though, so I asked myself, “What would make that happen?” To a certain extent, the whole novel is my attempt to answer that question. But it wasn’t until I dreamed up Tavik, a boy who prays with a sword in each hand, that I realized the book would be about faith and doubt—the central struggle of my own teenage years. Soulswift, then, is the novel I wrote for seventeen-year-old Megan, and I really hope it makes its way into the hands of teens who might be struggling with their own faith right now. I want them to know that they’re not alone and that questioning what you believe can be a good thing.
Your novels both have deep worldbuilding and very historical vibes. What kind of research do you do for your stories? And have you found any weird or interesting historical tidbits that you didn’t previously know?
*librarian knuckle cracking* Research is my life’s blood; however, if I start talking about the research process behind The Bird and the Blade, we’re going to be here for a long, long time. I’ll just say that I spent six years researching the book as I wrote it and leave it at that. Frankly, it got a little out of hand, but you better believe that I worked in the information I picked up from a doctoral dissertation about tea cultivation and preparation in the Southern Song Dynasty. Since Soulswift is a second world fantasy, the setting required far less research. That said, I did look up how to make ale in Ye Olden Days, and also little details from our own world, such as how far a horse can travel at a certain pace or what kinds of plants grow in particular climates or how medieval monasteries were structured.
Fun tidbit: While researching a book I have yet to write, I read a biography on Barbe-Nicole Cliquot, the Veuve Cliquot behind the champagne by the same name. I learned that rose bushes are planted at the end of rows of grape vines as a sort of canary in the coal mine. Roses are highly susceptible to pests and diseases, so if the rose bush starts to have problems, it’s a warning that you might have problems with your grapes as well. This is why, as Gelya and Tavik are hiking through flood-damaged vineyards in Soulswift, Gelya notes that the grape vines are rotting and there’s nothing left of the rose bushes that should stand at the end of each row.
My first thought when finishing Soulswift was “first of all, how dare you?”. Given your penchant for heartbreaking endings, can you share some of your favourite books, movies, or TV shows with tragic plot twists that you love?
#sorrynotsorry Mwah-ha-ha!
As a reader, I want a book that is going to make me feel deeply, which is why I’m drawn to tragedy and longing and sorrow. Bel Canto by Anne Patchett is a great example. No matter how much you love those characters, you know that there is no earthly way it’s going to end well for them. Another favorite of mine is The Dream of Scipio by Iain Pears, which has three plot threads, two of which end tragically and one of which ends … not as tragically. It’s gobsmackingly brilliant. And, not to be too spoiler-y here, but I’ve read Stacey Lee’s upcoming Luck of the Titanic, and I shed more than a few tears over that gorgeous manuscript. Every time I read one of Stacey’s books, I fall all over myself with admiration—her voice and sentence-level craft are stunning.
As far as movies or television that lean toward tragedy, I am a Nirvana in Fire and Nirvana in Fire 2 superfan, and I’d appreciate it if you could all watch both of those shows so that we can geek out together over how freaking amazing they are in terms of both plot and character development.
What are some of the things, big or small, that are bringing you joy in this chaotic year of 2020?
Binge-watching Netflix with my family has been a lot of fun. We’ve plowed through The Good Place, Parks and Recreation, Community, and now we’re on The Office. We’ve also been creative about getting out and about as a family—trips to outdoor historical sites, inflatable kayaks, that sort of thing. And we’ve adopted two cats since the pandemic began: Mrs. Tubbins and Hermes. They’re both punks, but we love them.
Are there any books, movies, or TV series that you’ve seen lately that you would recommend?
I’ve been reading a lot of romcom-ish stuff this year, because *gestures to the world*. I especially love the complete works of Christina Lauren. Other wonderful books I’ve read lately include A Constellation of Roses by Miranda Asebedo, By the Book by Amanda Sellet, Hunted by the Sky by Tanaz Bhathena, and Crownchasers by Rebecca Coffindaffer.
As far as movies and TV go, I loved the snot out of Crash Landing on You. Also, I think Dil Dhadakne Do is still on Netflix, which is one of my favorite movies. Ranveer Singh 4ever!
And lastly, can you tell us what you are working on next?
Sadly, no I cannot. In the publishing world, until things are officially announced in Publishers Weekly or Publishers Marketplace, you can’t say much. What I can tell you is that the next Megan Bannen project is likely to be rather different from what has come before. And while I can’t tell you anything about the draft I just completed, I can tell you that the soundtrack I made for that book has a lot of Brandi Carlile, Patty Griffin, and the Avett Brothers on it.
Megan Bannen is a librarian and the author of The Bird and the Blade. In her spare time, she collects graduate degrees from Kansas colleges and universities. While most of her professional career has been spent in public libraries, she has also sold luggage, written grants, and taught English at home and abroad. She lives in the Kansas City area with her husband, their two sons, and a few too many pets with literary names. She can be found online at www.meganbannen.com.
