Q&A: The Bone Season Author Samantha Shannon on Her Family’s Reaction to Her Big Book Deal: “What Book?”

____I don’t know if this is true, but I have heard that it is a slight taboo to approach publishers and say, “Right, you have got to publish all seven of my books.” It is a bit pretentious.

I can’t image that going down well.

____So I wrote the first book. Obviously, it kind of has a lot of unanswered questions, but it ends in such a way that you could possibly just leave it. I tried to get it so they could just take one if they wanted. But then [Bloomsbury] said to me, “Could you be planning to write more of this?” And we sort of talked about it and we agreed seven would be a good number. I wanted to write seven initially because it is a very strong number in the series, and they were very open to it.

Do you think you’ll approach the second book with more confidence or do you have second-book jitters?

____I think I learned a lot during the editing stage. It was a very raw product when I handed it in, and it wasn’t ready for publication yet. I always remember it had eight bath scenes in it. Paige kept having a bath! I think because I hadn’t read it back to myself before handing it to my agent. I remember one of the first notes on the manuscript said, “Bath?” And she never eats anything, either, so it was just baths and no food.

Did you grow up in a very literary household?

____I did not, actually. I am the first one to go to university in my family. I am the first writer as well. My dad is a retired policeman, and my mom works for a glass-processing company. She is health-and-safety manager, and my stepfather is a plumber. I have four half siblings, one from my mom’s marriage and three from my dad’s marriage, so we are kind of scattered.

I did not even read [the manuscript] to my parents because I was supposed to be at university doing my degree. I kept it really quiet and secret.

How do they feel about your burgeoning literary career?

____I think they are pretty surprised by it, because when I rang to my mum and said, “My booked is getting published,” she was like, “What book?” “The book I wrote behind your back”—so yeah, that was quite fun, but she was completely delighted, because she has seen what it was like with Aurora[the novel Shannon wrote at age 15 and sent out to agents at 17; it was never published]. It got to the point where she was kind of throwing away my rejections before I saw them. She just did not want to see me get even more upset. So she was really, really thrilled when I finally got it, obviously with a big publisher like Bloomsbury. We just could not believe it!

How did you celebrate?

____I think I might have gone back to university a bit earlier than expected; I can’t remember what I was doing, exactly, on the date, but I am pretty sure there was like no one else in college. So I kind of sat there in my bed and was like, “Oh my god!” It was just really, really crazy. I didn’t go out on the town or anything. I just sort of sat there and just looked at the manuscript and [was] just grinning.

And did you go buy anything totally mad?

____Just some books! I’m planning to pay off my student loans.

What parallels do you see with yourself and the protagonist, Paige? Do you see her as an alter ego?

____She is probably what I would like to be. I live vicariously through her. I’m definitely a lot more sensible than she is. I mean, she would quite happily threaten a man, like, five times her size. Some people said to me, “Do you do martial arts or anything?” and I was like, “No, if I get on top of the stairs I’m impressed.”

Do you have anyone in mind to play her?

Funny enough, Paige and Warden [a Rephaite charged with watching over her in Oxford] are the two characters I struggled with the most because I have a very clear image of what they look like in my head, and it is very difficult to put that against an actor. However Jackson [Paige’s boss in London] definitely would be Benedict Cumberbatch, and Nick [Paige’s hapless best friend] would definitely be Alexander Skarsgård. That would be my ideal cast.