Hi, Ericka! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?

Hello! I am 39 and live in a small village next to Brighton UK with my husband, three daughters, three dogs, a house rabbit, a tortoise, guinea pig, canary and fish. There is a duck pond in the middle of my village, a church and an old English pub. It’s tiny and quaint and used to full of smugglers.

I love books, earl grey tea, cake, watching Superstore on Netflix and walking by the sea. I am very friendly, a bit like my Labrador. I love talking about books. I just love talking actually.

I have Rheumatoid Arthritis and spend a fair bit of time in hospital. I love an afternoon nap. I’m an over-sharer and very nosy. A typical Virgo but nice.

After the chaos that was 2020, have you set any goals for this year? If so, how are they going so far?

To get book two finished. To read even more books (classics I’ve not got round too) to support other authors as best as I can. Give up sugar in my tea (never going to happen) give up cake (never going to happen either).

Quick lightning round! Tell us the first book you ever remember reading, the one that made you want to become an author, and one that you can’t stop thinking about!

Nancy Drew – Secrets Can Kill
To Kill A Mockingbird –   Harper Lee
Little Life – Hanya Yanagihara

When did you first discover your love for writing?

When I was in primary school. I loved writing stories and poems.

Your debut novel, Dog Days, is out May 11^th! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?

Funny. Sad. Surprising. Hopeful. Honest.

What can readers expect?

Laugh out loud moments, tearjerker moments. Honest, flawed, relatable characters. A twist or two.

Where did the inspiration for Dog Days come from?

I have lost more than one close friend to sudden, tragic circumstances. My experience of death and grief has been sudden and cuts like a knife. George is my experience of loss, made into a man. An angry, scared, lost old man.

I was hugely influenced by ‘A little Life’ and the love between the main characters. I didn’t want to write a romance, but I wanted the book to be suffused with different kinds of love. Platonic, sexual, maternal. Animal.

I wanted to write strong female characters. If women do anything ‘unsavory’ society looks for a reason. They have to be ‘mad’ or ‘bad’. Men don’t have this applied to them. When they hurt or kill or break the law, it’s accepted and not explained. It is human to fail, lie, cheat, steal, break, hurt.

I wanted to explore how women are perceived by other women and the way we need to force them into a shape we can understand, that goes along with the stories we tell ourselves. Everything is always about how it makes us feel, so we alter reality or bend truths to make them fit in how we need the world to be.

My dog can’t walk past a lamp post without weeing up it. He barks at post boxes. He doesn’t hide his fear or happiness. When he sees the man in the post office, who once gave him half a stale digestive biscuit, his tail wags so much he can’t run straight. He has to throw his head back and bray with joy. Dogs have no ‘game’. They are loyal and easy and simple. I wanted to set them against people battling with depression, anxiety, OCD and abuse. It highlights the best and worst of everything.

Can you tell us about any challenges you faced while writing and how you were able to overcome them?

Walking the line between too sad and then too funny wrong. Making the characters unlikable. At times believing in myself enough to finish it.

If it’s not too spoilery, were there any favourite moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?

I loved writing Betty and George. George is based on a dear friend called Maurice who I lost six years ago in an air disaster. An old grumpy man, with a heart as soft as the inside of a boiled egg, he was the best friend I could wish for. He made me laugh, he was proud and stubborn and deserved to be made into a character.

Betty was also fun. We all need someone like her in our lives. I also loved writing Atticus and Dan falling in love. Red, White and Royal Blue is one of my fave books ever and was a huge influence on the love story.

What was the road to becoming a published author like for you?

Long and full of potholes. Lots of no’s and not quites. Dog Days is my third attempt at a book. Often I wanted to give up but I believe anything is possible if all it takes is hard work. I had to prove it, for my daughters. If I can do this, they can do anything.

What’s the best and the worst writing advice you have received?

Best – read loads of books. Leave your manuscript for a month between edits (Okay, I never wait that long but…)
Worst – Write a book that will sell well. Never! Write the book that is in your heart. The characters that walk round your brain!

What’s next for you?

Book two, and I hope book three, four and beyond!

Lastly, do you have any book recommendations for our readers?

Buckle in gang!
The Heart’s Invisible Furies – John Boyne
Transcendent Kingdom – Yaa Gyasi
Early Morning Riser – Katherine Heiny
Old Baggage – Lissa Evans
A Little Life – Hanya Yanagihara
Red, White and Royal Blue – Casey McQuiston
Small Pleasures – Clare Chambers
Accidental Tourist – Anne Tyler
Beartown – Fredrik Backman
American Dirt – Jeanine Cummins
Ask Again Yes – Mary Beth Keane
A Good Neighbourhood – Therese Anne Fowler
The Most Fun We Ever Had – Claire Lombardo

The post Q&A: Ericka Waller, Author of ‘Dog Days’ appeared first on The Nerd Daily.

JANUARY

Happily Ever Afters by Elise Bryant
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Jane the Virgin meets To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before in this charming debut romantic comedy filled with Black Girl Magic. Perfect for fans of Mary H. K. Choi and Nicola Yoon, with crossover appeal for readers of Jasmine Guillory and Talia Hibbert romances.

Black Buck by Mateo Askaripour
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For fans of Sorry to Bother You and The Wolf of Wall Street—a crackling, satirical debut novel about a young man given a shot at stardom as the lone Black salesman at a mysterious, cult-like, and wildly successful startup where nothing is as it seems. Black Buck is a hilarious, razor-sharp skewering of America’s workforce; it is a propulsive, crackling debut that explores ambition and race, and makes way for a necessary new vision of the American dream.

Waiting for the Night Song by Julie Carrick Dalton
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A startling and timely debut, this is a moving, brilliant novel about friendships forged in childhood magic and ruptured by the high price of secrets that leave you forever changed. Waiting for the Night Song is a love song to the natural beauty around us, a call to fight for what we believe in, and a reminder that the truth will always rise

If I Disappear by Eliza Jane Brazier
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When her favorite true crime podcast host goes missing, an adrift young woman plunges headfirst into the wild backcountry of Northern California and her own dangerous obsession.

Detransition, Baby by Torrey Peters
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A whipsmart debut about three women–transgender and cisgender–whose lives collide after an unexpected pregnancy forces them to confront their deepest desires around gender, motherhood, and sex. 

FEBRUARY

The Kindest Lie by Nancy Johnson
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The Kindest Lie examines the heartbreaking divide between black and white communities and plumbs the emotional depths of the struggles faced by ordinary Americans in the wake of the financial crisis. Capturing the profound racial injustices and class inequalities roiling society, Nancy Johnson’s debut novel offers an unflinching view of motherhood in contemporary America and the never-ending quest to achieve the American Dream. 

Fat Chance, Charlie Vega by Crystal Maldonado
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Coming of age as a Fat brown girl in a white Connecticut suburb is hard. Harder when your whole life is on fire, though. A sensitive, funny, and painful coming-of-age story with a wry voice and tons of chisme, Fat Chance, Charlie Vega tackles our relationships to our parents, our bodies, our cultures, and ourselves.

Like Home by Louisa Onomé
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Fans of Netflix’s On My Block, In the Heights, and readers of Elizabeth Acevedo and Ibi Zoboi will love this debut novel about a girl whose life is turned upside down after one local act of vandalism throws her relationships and even her neighborhood into turmoil.

Me, My Dad and the End of the Rainbow by Benjamin Dean
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The rainbow-filled, joyous debut from a hugely exciting new talent. Perfect for fans of Lisa Thompson, Stewart Foster and Onjali Rauf, this promises to be a story all about celebrating your individuality, navigating gender, family and advocating for kindness always.

Open Water by Caleb Azumah Nelson
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A stunning, shattering debut novel about two Black artists falling in and out of love. At once an achingly beautiful love story and a potent insight into race and masculinity, Open Water asks what it means to be a person in a world that sees you only as a Black body, to be vulnerable when you are only respected for strength, to find safety in love, only to lose it.

MARCH

Body of Stars by Laura Maylene Walter
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A bold and dazzling exploration of fate and female agency in a world very similar to our own–except that the markings on women’s bodies reveal the future.

The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner
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In this addictive and spectacularly imagined debut, a female apothecary secretly dispenses poisons to liberate women from the men who have wronged them—setting three lives across centuries on a dangerous collision course.

Saving Grace by Debbie Babitt
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Set in a remote mountain town, where the secrets run as deep as the hollows, Saving Grace is at once a spell-binding tale of innocence lost and a twisty, edge-of-your-seat psychological thriller. This startling debut novel introduces a captivating protagonist whose concept of good and evil can shape a young girl—then and now.

Of Women and Salt by Gabriela Garcia
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A sweeping, masterful debut about a daughter’s fateful choice, a mother motivated by her own past, and a family legacy that begins in Cuba before either of them were born.

Dog Days by Ericka Waller
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Dog Days is a novel about those small but life-changing moments that only come when we pause to let the light in. It is about three people learning to make connections and find joy in living life off the leash.

APRIL

Dial A for Aunties by Jesse Q Sutanto
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A hilariously quirky novel that is equal parts murder mystery, rom-com, and a celebration of mothers and daughters as well as a deep dive into Chinese-Indonesian culture.

Witches Steeped in Gold by Ciannon Smart
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Deadly, fierce, magnetically addictive: this Jamaican-inspired fantasy debut is a thrilling journey where dangerous magic reigns supreme and betrayal lurks beneath every word.

Fragile Monsters by Catherine Menon
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In her stunning debut Catherine Menon traces one family’s story from 1920 to the present, unravelling a thrilling tale of love, betrayal and redemption against the backdrop of natural disasters and fallen empires. Written in vivid technicolour, with an electric daughter-grandmother relationship at its heart, Fragile Monsters explores what happens when secrets fester through the generations.

Hot Copy by Ruby Barrett
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A meet-cute-gone-wrong on his first day leads an intern to prove to his boss that he’s not the type of man she thinks he is, and they’re both forced to choose what matters more: work, or love.  

The Music of Bees by Eileen Garvin
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A heartwarming debut novel for readers of Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine, following three lonely strangers in a rural Oregon town, each working through grief and life’s curveballs, who are brought together by happenstance on a local honeybee farm where they find surprising friendship, healing–and maybe even a second chance–just when they least expect it.

MAY

Arsenic and Adobo by Mia P. Manansala
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The first book in a new culinary cozy series full of sharp humor and delectable dishes—one that might just be killer…. n the small town of Shady Palms, Illinois, Lila Macapagal and her relatives run Tita Rosie’s Kitchen, serve delicious Flipino dishes, and solve crimes on the side.

Threadneedle by Cari Thomas
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Within the boroughs of London, nestled among its streets, hides another city, filled with magic. But magic is the first sin. It must be bound. 

Talk Bookish to Me by Kate Bromley
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For fans of Beach Read and The Bookish Life of Nina Hill a whip-smart, laugh-out-loud story about a bestselling romance novelist with writer’s block who finds herself having an unexpected creative and personal reawakening when she’s thrown together with her infuriating (and gorgeous) ex-boyfriend during the week of her best friend’s wedding.

Indivisible by Daniel Aleman
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A timely, moving debut novel about a teen’s efforts to keep his family together while his parents face deportation from the United States.

Things We Lost to the Water by Eric Nguyen
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A stunning debut about an immigrant Vietnamese family who settles in New Orleans and struggles to remain connected to one another as their lives are inextricably reshaped.

JUNE

For the Love of Friends by Sara Goodman Confino
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A sharp and hilariously relatable novel about the business of weddings, the toll they can take, and the lengths one exasperated bridesmaid will go to for the love of friends.

The Sea is Salt and So Am I by Cassandra Hartt
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I’ll Give You the Sun meets Normal People in Cassandra Hartt’s The Sea Is Salt and So Am I, a stunning YA contemporary debut that asks if the secrets we keep and the people we love can change who we are.

Blood Like Magic by Liselle Sambury
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A rich, dark urban fantasy debut following a teen witch who is given a horrifying task: sacrificing her first love to save her family’s magic. The problem is, she’s never been in love—she’ll have to find the perfect guy before she can kill him.

Star Eater by Kerstin Hall
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A phantasmagorical indictment of hereditary power, Star Eater takes readers deep into a perilous and uncanny world where even the most powerful women are forced to choose what sacrifices they will make, so that they might have any choice at all. 

I Don’t Forgive You by Aggie Blum Thompson
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It all starts at a neighborhood party when a local dad corners Allie and calls her by an old, forgotten nickname from her dark past. The next day, he is found dead. 

What debut novels are you looking forward to? Tell us in the comments below!

The post Anticipated Debut Novels You Should Have On Your Radar In 2021 appeared first on The Nerd Daily.