I don’t believe that pain is something extrinsic to goodness. I believe there can be goodness in suffering, but that this does not mean suffering itself is good.

I’d argue that’s the basis for all good fantasy stories: Ground the reader in the familiar so that when you do bring more improbable elements on stage, they’re more readily accepted.

I have many friends in the FBI (that makes my old hippie self shudder) and lots and lots of friends in the legal community. So law enforcement stuff is almost as natural as breathing to me.

I think monsters serve as a means of social control, representative of both unsavory behaviors and unsavory punishments. Then there’s also the need we have for an “other” to define ourselves against.

I’m not sure why the protagonist ended up being such a miserable bastard. Perhaps because miserable bastards need magical beaches the most.

Ultimately, I realized I was writing a story about three people who are trapped in different versions of hell: the three damnations in the title. None of the three has the strength of character to break free.

There’s evidence that quite a few women disguised themselves and took the seas. Fast Ships, Black Sails included quite a few stories about women pirates. Should I bring up Cutthroat Island? No?

What strikes me now is how much like Pratt I am, in a way—devoted to hardening my shell of ignorance, and operating within it, even if it isn’t so small as his.

As the story went through revisions, I reworked some of the lessons (and sometimes changed them back again!) to be sillier and less predictable. Perhaps unsurprisingly, it was tempting to fall back on “true love conquers all.”

The problem Donna, Russ, and Piggy have is that they live in a world which is, so far as they can tell, entirely devoid of magic. Also, they’re adolescents, which amounts to the same thing.