We chat with author Racquel Marie about This Is Me Trying, which is a profound and tender YA contemporary novel exploring grief, love, and guilt.
Hi, Racquel! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?
Hi! I’m Racquel Marie (she/her/hers), author of the YA contemporaries, OPHELIA AFTER ALL, YOU DON’T HAVE A SHOT, and now THIS IS ME TRYING! I love writing about messy queer characters, grief, growing up, and complicated relationships fueled by love.
When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?
I was in kindergarten when I first declared I wanted to be an author when I grew up, so this love has been around for a while. My family always fostered an appreciation for storytelling through bookstore trips, games of make believe, and our family histories, so it’s unsurprising that the love stuck and grew. In elementary school, I started writing my own books and haven’t found any reason to stop since then.
Quick lightning round! Tell us:
- The first book you ever remember reading: probably something like HUNGRY HUNGRY CATERPILLAR or GOODNIGHT MOON
- The one that made you want to become an author: CRACKED UP TO BE by Courtney Summers
- The one that you can’t stop thinking about: CHAIN-GANG ALL-STARS by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
Your latest novel, This Is Me Trying, is out April 16th! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?
Grief, hopeful, introspective, bittersweet, forgiveness
What can readers expect?
This story follows two estranged childhood best friends, Beatriz and Santiago, grieving their mutual best friend who died several years prior to the start of the book from suicide, so there’s a lot of heartbreak and angst in these pages. But I also infused the story with plenty of hope and love, as well as my usual assortment of bantering friend groups, dynamic family relationships, and yearning main characters.
Where did the inspiration for This Is Me Trying come from?
I’ve been trying to write this book since I was fourteen, so understandably a lot of the plot and themes were inspired by things happening around me at that age. I continued with the concept for so many years because I understood personally how much I could’ve used a book like this during my teen years, and because it still felt so relevant to me when I sat down to write this iteration of the story at twenty three.
Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?
I had a lot of fun writing a book in multiple point of views for the first time. The book is told through both Beatriz and Santiago’s perspectives, so fine-tuning their voices and deciding what scenes would be in whose mind was really engaging craft-wise. Getting to write my main characters from each other’s perspective was especially interesting because it allowed me to build them up for the reader in ways I hadn’t explored before.
With this book tackling mental health and grief, how did you approach this?
I already consider myself someone whose books will always be more hopeful than hurtful, but especially with this book being for teens, I felt an immense responsibility to tackle these issues with care and delicacy. I spent a lot of time talking over elements of the story with people in my life—my psychologist, my editor, friends, family—to be sure I was doing my due diligence. There’s also an author’s note at the start of the story that explains some of the content, as a little loving head’s up for any readers who might need that.
What do you hope your readers take away from This Is Me Trying?
I hope readers leave this book with a sense of comfort in their hearts. That they are not the only person who has ever felt the depth of pain they have, that their grief will be there forever but so will the love, that there is good to come even on days it feels impossible. Ultimately, I hope that hope itself is the thing they take away. And while I’m not naïve enough to believe this book will cure anyone’s mental illness, I do hope it can at least help anyone struggling by opening up a conversation about that.
What’s next for you?
My next book, IF WE SURVIVE THIS, comes out in 2025! It’s a YA horror about a teenage girl leading her brother and a small group of survivors to an isolated cabin months into a rabies-induced zombie apocalypse, with flashbacks to her family’s last trip to that same cabin about a year and a half ago. It’s another exploration of grief and queerness and mental illness, but still a bit of a genre shift for me, so very exciting and daunting! And certainly gorey.
Lastly, are there any book releases that you’re looking forward to picking up this year?
Books I’ve already read but can’t wait to hold in my hands include: OFF WITH THEIR HEADS by Zoe Hana Mikuta and TRUE LOVE AND OTHER IMPOSSIBLE ODDS by Christina Li. And books that I am so excited to get to read include THE BLONDE DIES FIRST by Joelle Wellington, VILEST THINGS by Chloe Gong, LADY MACBETH by Ava Reid, and IF I LOVED YOU LESS by Aamna Qureshi.
