An Interview with Julie Leong, Author of The Teller of Small Fortunes
Author Interview #3
One of the most anticipated cozy fantasy debuts of 2024, Julie Leong is a Malaysian Chinese-American author with a great love of citrus, round animals, and flavorful food.
Julie, where’s the yuzu? You wrote this whole book and there’s no mention of yuzu?
Julie: I’m sorry! I need to save all my yuzu content for my eventual future book about a citrus witch; I’m sure you understand.
Teller opens up with casual racism and xenophobia directed at Tao for being Shinn, but one of the definitions I’ve seen of cozy fantasy floating around is that the worldbuilding is free of discrimination and the conflict is focused on something else. For authors who want to explore similar topics in cozy fantasy, what do you think is the right balance?
Julie: I think the definition of ‘cozy fantasy’ is a dynamic and inherently subjective thing, because ‘cozy’ is about how a story makes you feel, and different people will necessarily feel different ways in response to certain stories. Personally, I don’t think ‘cozy’ means the total absence of sadness or conflict. If anything, I prefer my cozy stories to have just a dash of darkness so as to highlight the warmth and joy all the better – like a sprinkle of salt in hot chocolate, if you will.
There definitely is a balance to be struck, though. I do believe that cozy requires a happy ending (or mostly happy, at least), and that if a story delves too far into violence and heavy themes, it can be challenging to pull the reader back into the cozy mindset. I’d encourage authors writing cozy fantasy to try to be mindful of how they feel as they’re writing the story, and to take special note of any scenes that evoke tense or painful emotions – are they followed by scenes that soothe away those hurts? Is there catharsis by the end? Are readers ultimately comforted, or troubled by your story?
Ghibli has been a big reference point for cozy and a lot of their films carry a thread of grief or melancholy, an undertone that Teller shares. Do you think cozy and melancholy/grief are not only compatible, but those feelings are a necessary ingredient in a cozy SFF?
Julie: I don’t think melancholy/grief are necessary in cozy SFF, but as I mentioned above, I do think they can provide a powerful counterbalance that highlights the warmth and catharsis often offered by cozy stories. They can help make the joy feel more earned, as well, and give the story an emotional heft that may be otherwise lacking.
Kiss, marry, throw off the wagon: Mash, Kina, and Silt
Julie: Oof, that’s hard. Kiss Silt, marry Kina, and throw Mash off the wagon just because I know he can keep up on foot anyway.
We have fortune cookies and tea for fortune telling and Kina is a baker. If you were a fortune teller, what food-based style would you use and how does it involve citrus?
Julie: Hahaha. Citrus-based divination! Tangerine tarot? Peel open an orange, count the number of segments and seeds, look for patterns in the pith; burn the rinds and inhale the citrus-scented smoke… there are so many ways I could go with it.
A lot of people unfamiliar with cozy are trying to define it, but I think it’s pretty defined by the community that has helped propel it from selfpub to traditional publishing. What do you think is the future of cozy and do you think the term is a bit more fluid than some might believe?
Julie: I do think the definition of cozy is fluid and still-evolving, as I mentioned above. I can’t say for certain where the future of the subgenre lies, but I can say what I hope we’ll see more of! Personally, I’d love to see more diverse voices in cozy, more cozy stories that don’t necessarily center a romance, more cozy stories that don’t involve small businesses, and more bittersweet cozy that plays with heavier themes without necessarily getting very dark.
A major theme in Teller is the importance of small changes and small moments, both good and bad, and how they add up. What other themes are you hoping readers will get from this?
Julie: I think it’s up to readers to take what they like from a story, but when I was writing Teller, other themes that were central in my mind were the different ways in which one can ‘belong’, the struggle between free will and fate, and the eternal conflict between self-interest and the common wellbeing.
You had a bit of a unicorn experience as Teller was the first book you wrote and you're launching with multiple crate deals. What has been the most exciting and the most humbling experience for you?
Julie: It’s been such a fairytale, honestly. I never in a million years expected all of the things that have happened to me and this book, and I’m so, so grateful – a lot of the credit goes to my fantastic publishing teams at Ace and Hodderscape, who have done so much to get this book out there.
One of the most recently exciting developments was my attending New York Comic Con at the invitation of my publisher. I have never (nor will I ever again) felt like such a rock star as I did signing 100+ copies of The Teller of Small Fortunes for enthusiastic readers at the Penguin Random House floor booth, and it was an amazing experience to co-present at a writing panel alongside brilliant authors like CM Waggoner, Sarah Hawley, and Rob Hart.
The most humbling experience? I’ve had a lot, but the moment when I first visited the Penguin Random House office in New York, and strolled through a hallway lined with incredible, renowned, bestselling books whose authors I’ve loved for years and years – that was definitely a surreal moment of “Oh wait, there’s been a terrible mistake. I don’t think I belong here.”
Do you think you’re going to stay in cozy fantasy or do you want to branch out into cozy sci-fi like Becky Chambers or try your hand at an epic fantasy one day? Or, perhaps, venture outside of the speculative genres and try your hand at a mystery or contemporary?
Julie: I don’t know yet, to be honest! As of right now, I still have more ideas for cozy fantasies that I’d love to write – but I also don’t want to limit myself. There’s something thrilling and liberating about the idea that I might one day wake up and decide to write something totally new and unfamiliar.
Tao is very AroAce-coded, which is slowly becoming more common in fantasy. Was that a conscious choice on your part or did that organically reveal itself as you wrote the book or something in between?
Julie: It was more of the latter. I knew from the start that I did not want to write a romance-centric book, in part because I wanted to tell a story that highlighted the importance of non-romantic relationships like friendship and family. But it wasn’t until midway through the first draft, when Tao and Kina were having a conversation about romantic attention, that I realized that it felt very natural that Tao – as I had written her – was aro/ace-spec.
Tao briefly considers the story of the Monkey Prince and how it mirrors her own journey. Is this a call back to Journey to the West and Sun Wukong?
Julie: Yes! Journey to the West is such a classic tale from Chinese mythology, and also one of the first bedtime stories that I heard from my dad growing up. It felt right for Tao to know it, too.
Sorry, but I have to get a bit sappy. As an immigrant and the child of an immigrant, I found a lot of my own journey reflected in Tao even if there are some differences, including the part where she’s constantly othered despite having lived in Eshtera for a long time. It feels like there’s not that many fantasies that truly get into the nitty-gritty of what it means to be an immigrant. Were you filling in a gap that you saw or is there a treasure trove of immigrant fantasy I don’t know about?
Julie: I’m so glad that that part of Tao’s story resonated with you. I, similarly, have never read much fantasy that features immigrant experiences specifically, and I knew from the very start of writing Teller that I wanted to tell an immigrant story. I wanted to see myself reflected in a character who felt caught between cultures, and was wrestling with herself about where she belonged, and how she defined her own identity. Some of Tao’s experiences I took directly from my own childhood, and I’ve already heard from many readers how they shared those experiences and felt them deeply: the loss of language, for example.
Until recently, cozy was pretty much relegated to selfpub and then exploded on the traditional publishing scene with Legends and Lattes. When you queried Teller, the trend was just starting to pick up in traditional publishing. Do you think authors looking to be traditionally published should pay attention to what is trending in selfpub?
Julie: Absolutely! I think any aspiring authors should pay attention to what’s happening in their genres, period.
Completely agree. You need to know your genre to write and sell in it.
There's all kinds of advice out there in regards to the writing process, but I've found that the best thing to do is experiment with a lot of authors' processes until you find a combination that works for you. What's your drafting process like?
Julie: It’s… chaos. I basically turn into a hermit and disappear into my writing cave for as many weeks as it takes to churn out a workable draft. I draft scenes out of order, I cobble together an outline only if and when I start feeling like I need one, I edit as I go sometimes and leave entire scenes as bracketed placeholders other times… basically, I give myself the liberty to write when and how I want to, and I don’t subscribe to any particular process or system. I’m not sure I’d recommend it to others, but it’s what’s worked for me so far!
We talk a lot in writers spaces about how you have to read modern authors to be part of the conversation going on in our genres. What books is your book in conversation with?
Julie: Love this question! Definitely Travis Baldree’s Legends & Lattes, which sparked the recent wave of cozy fantasy, but also with heavy influence from Becky Chambers’ Monk & Robot series, and the Singing Hills novellas from Nghi Vo.
Author as Brand gets thrown around a lot in some circles and not everyone likes it but it's impossible to stop the train at this point. What do you want your Brand to be?
Julie: Kindness. Humor. Warmth.
Some authors focus on food, others on clothes. What's your favorite way to worldbuild?
Julie: I'm a vibes-first writer! My worldbuilding happens sort of like piecing together a puzzle, where various sections and chunks of it come together first before I fill in the rest of it. Some of those starting pieces might be big (political and economic systems) or small (cats and bees are inherently magical beings).
I only do as much worldbuilding as I strictly need for a given book, in part because I like there to be some vagueness/unexplained things, but also to leave room for more worldbuilding in subsequent books, so I don't accidentally write myself into any corners.
What's next on the horizon for you?
Julie: I’m currently revising my second book, The Keeper of Magical Things, which will be coming out in fall 2025 if all goes as planned. It’s a sapphic cozy fantasy set in the same world as Teller but with a new cast of characters. I’m pitching it as The Spellshop meets Warehouse 13 with Stardew Valley vibes.
Are there any debuts you wanna give a shout-out to?
Julie: So many wonderful fellow debuts! I’m sure I’m missing some people (and apologies to them), but off of the top of my head:
Genoveva Dimova (Foul Days, Monstrous Nights)
Eliza Chan (Fathomfolk)
SA MacLean (The Phoenix Keeper)
Maiga Doocy (Sorcery and Small Magics)
Amy Avery (The Longest Autumn)
Riley August (The Last Gifts of the Universe)
Samantha Mills (The Wings Upon Her Back)
Lucy Jane Wood (Rewitched)
Frances White (Voyage of the Damned)
John Wiswell (Someone You Can Build a Nest In)
Jules Arbeaux (Lord of the Empty Isles)
I recommend all of those titles as well, especially Phoenix Keeper, Foul Days, The Wings Upon Her Back, and Fathomfolk.
Thank you so much, Julie!
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