We chat with author Susie Nadler about Lies We Tell About the Stars, which a gorgeous debut about friendship, grief, and new beginnings set in near-future San Francisco in the aftermath of a catastrophic earthquake and on the cusp of the first human mission to Mars.
Hi, Susie! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?
Hi! Sure, I’d be delighted! I’m a San Francisco native, born and raised, and I still live here in SF with my husband and teenage twins. Several years ago, after lots of years juggling various jobs—from wedding florist to bookseller to recipe tester—while trying to raise kids and write fiction, I decided to go to library school. Now I’m a K-8 librarian at a girls’ school here in SF, and I love it so much. Talking to kids about books is almost my favorite thing (next to reading and writing). My agent and I sold Lies We Tell About the Stars the same week as I got this library job, so it all felt—I don’t know, maybe… written in the stars? Ha! Cringe. But true.
When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?
I’ve always written stories, really as long as I can remember. I used to write on my grandmother’s clackety old typewriter, using these sort of delicate vellum sheets that she had around for some reason. I’m really dating myself here. But those vellum sheets, they were magical! I was always reading; it’s probably not an exaggeration to say that I much preferred the imaginary world to the real one as a kid, and maybe still do? Some of the earliest stories I can remember writing were fan fiction for my favorite books (but we didn’t have that phrase at the time): The Baby-sitters Club, Island of the Blue Dolphins, Nancy Drew. I loved the characters in these books so much that I wanted to give them more stories.
Quick lightning round! Tell us:
- The first book you ever remember reading: Taking Care of Carruthers by James Marshall
- The one that made you want to become an author: The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin
- The one that you can’t stop thinking about: Beloved by Toni Morrison
Your debut novel, Lies We Tell About the Stars, is out now! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?
Friendship, loss, journey, earthquake, space.
What can readers expect?
I hope readers can expect to find characters that feel real and relatable and a story that has something for them to get excited about. Mystery readers might get hooked by the disappearance of Nicky at the center of the story. People who love dystopia and disaster books might like the post-earthquake setting. For fans of sci-fi and speculative fiction, there’s a subplot in the book about the first human mission to Mars. And of course there’s a romance, because I wanted Celeste to find someone great and complicated to love and help her on her journey.
Where did the inspiration for Lies We Tell About the Stars come from?
I’d always wanted to write a book set here in San Francisco, because the city is really carved on my heart, and at the time when I started writing, in 2018, everyone who loves it here was also just reeling about how fast things were changing and how it was becoming so hard to live and stay here. And I remember I was taking a walk, looking over the one of the city’s gorgeous and improbable vistas, and I thought, what if something huge happened to stop the pace of change in its tracks? Something like a big earthquake? I’d lived through the 1989 quake as a teen myself, so I started thinking about what that experience might be like for teenagers today (and make it bigger). The idea seemed to go well another thing that interested me: the question of what happens when your world falls apart at the moment when you’re about to become an adult. How do you cope? How does something like that help you learn to get through things?
Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?
I loved exploring Nicky, Celeste’s missing best friend, because in some ways he’s just as important to the story as Celeste, and yet he’s only on the page through her memories and her consciousness. So how do you get to know him? I toyed with the idea of writing chapters in Nicky’s point of view, but eventually it felt weird, almost like some kind of betrayal, to abandon Celeste. So I just found ways to get to know Nicky, writing scenes and moments that never even made it into a draft, until I felt like he was real to me and I could bring him to life on the page.
Did you face any challenges whilst writing? How did you overcome them?
Writing about Celeste’s diabetes was definitely a challenge, because I don’t have diabetes myself and really, really wanted to reflect that experience in a way that would feel true. I did a lot of research, read message boards and spoke to friends, and I was also able to draw from my own experience to some extent, since my dad had type 2 diabetes when I was growing up. But there were a lot of things about this part of the story that I changed along the way, based on incredibly valuable feedback (for which I’m so grateful!) and even based on changes in the medical technology that people with type 1 diabetes use to manage their health.
What do you hope readers take away from Lies We Tell About the Stars?
I hope readers, especially teen readers but really all readers, will take away some feeling of confidence or hope about getting through difficult times and repairing after disasters big and small. I think we live in a very challenging time when the future can sometimes seem pretty bleak, and it’s hard to feel hopeful about positive change or even about our ability to find a way to move forward. At its core, this story is about a girl finding herself and finding her way out of a difficult situation against the odds, and maybe readers can find some solace or strength in that.
What’s next for you?
I’m working on another YA novel with my brilliant editor, Andrew Karre at Dutton Books for Young Readers. This one actually leans even more into the speculative fiction genre, with a climate fiction angle. And it’s a road trip book, which is so much fun. I’ve been into road trip stories ever since I fell in love with the original Muppet Movie as a kid. Can’t wait to share this second book (eventually) with readers!
Lastly, what books are you looking forward to picking up this year?
I’m about to crack open Estela, Undrowning, another San Francisco YA book by an SF native debut author (and librarian!), Rene Peña-Govea. Also high on my TBR right now, perhaps for obvious reasons: The Secret Astronomers by Jessica Walker. Like Nicky and Celeste, I’m a space nerd, and I love illustrated novels, so this one really ticks a lot of boxes for me. I’m also very excited about Emma Straub’s new book that’s coming out soon, American Fantasy, because I love every last word of her books.
