#makiia lucier
Where do you find your story ideas? It’s a question I’m asked from time to time, and the answer is always the same; I find them everywhere. In history books and old newspapers. On walks around the neighborhood and travel farther afield. By sitting in parks and restaurants and watching the world unfold around me. Really, everywhere. My books are made up of whatever happens to fascinate me at the time I’m writing them.
For my debut, A Death-Struck Year, those things were plague, architecture, and the State of Oregon. An odd trio, but I found an editor who was game, and in the end the description went something like this: When the Spanish influenza epidemic reaches Portland, Oregon in 1918, seventeen-year-old Cleo leaves behind the comfort of her boarding school to work for the American Red Cross.
My second book, Isle of Blood and Stone, is the story of a royal mapmaker, nineteen-year old Elias, who discovers a riddle hidden in the borders of an old map. My interests had shifted, to mapmakers, mysteries, and islands. Mapmakers because I had just finished a book on the Lewis and Clark expedition, one that made me want to learn everything I could about the early days of world exploration. Mysteries because it’s a genre I love, and I like to write what I read. And islands because my mother had died recently, and I found my thoughts turning, with increasing frequency, toward home.
I grew up on a tiny island in the Pacific. If you were to look at any world map, you’d have a hard time finding Guam. But it’s there, halfway between Australia and Japan. It’s a wonderful place to be a kid. I learned to swim in its beaches, to roller skate down the sidewalks in my village, and my earliest memories are of shave ice and seafood and plumeria trees everywhere I looked.
If you were to thumb through a copy of Isle of Blood and Stone, you would see the requisite fantasy map near the front-the island kingdom of St. John del Mar. A fictional island, but anyone familiar with Guam will recognize its distinct shape. There are other, more subtle, inclusions. The Sea of Magdalen is named for my mom, Maggie. Del Mar’s Marinus Road is a nod to Guam’s main thoroughfare, Marine Drive. The harmless water snakes I swam with as a child are turned into monstrous sea serpents. What else? A forest inspired by an old legend, a young explorer named after a favorite cousin (sorry other cousins!). And though Elias’ relatives wear fancy medieval clothing, I gave them characteristics I could relate to. They’re loud, loving, nosy, the kind of relatives who always know more than you want them to.
There will be other books, if I’m lucky. Other stories, other interests. But not a book like Isle, one that walks me back through the years to my childhood and reminds me of home. This is a once in a lifetime story, and I’m very happy I have a chance to tell it.
Makiia Lucier grew up on the Pacific island of Guam and has degrees in journalism and library science from the University of Oregon and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She is the author of A Death-Struck YearandIsle of Blood and Stone, described as “a brilliant fantasy” by Booklist. She lives in North Carolina with her family. You can visit her at makiialucier.com or on Twitter: @makiialucier.
Isle of Blood and Stone is available for purchase.
BothIsle of Blood and Stone and its standalone companion, Song of the Abyss, are about mapmakers and explorers. Why did you decide to write about these topics?
It really came down to writing what interests me. I’ve always loved adventure stories and historical fiction. The Count of Monte Cristo,Jane Eyre, and Anne of Green Gables were favorites growing up. Additionally, I’ve always loved old maps, the beautiful ones with the sea serpents and sailing ships painted onto them. And growing up, I was obsessed with the Indiana Jones movies. With this duology, I wanted to create characters inspired by Dr. Jones, young men and women who were smart and funny and who used their intellect to solve the mysteries that were at the heart of these stories.
Did any particular place inspire the maps in your book?
Most definitely. The map at the front of Isle of Blood and Stone depicts the fictional island kingdom of St. John del Mar. But if you were to google the island “Guam,” where I was raised, you would see that they are a near perfect match. Why not? I needed an island and I thought it would be fun to use the one I know best.
How do you choose your character names?
ForIsle of Blood and Stone, I was looking for old-fashioned names that were Spanish in origin. I started with ‘Mercedes,’ which I first came across in Alexandre Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cristo. Then I followed up with Elias, Jaime, and Ulises. Some names had a more personal connection. Reyna is the hero in Song of the Abyss. Reyna also happens to be my favorite cousin’s name. The village of Esperanca is named after my grandmother. And the Sea of Magdalen…well, Maggie was my mother’s name.
If you weren’t a writer, what would you be doing?
I have a library degree so I would most likely head over to the nearest public library if they’d have me. But part of the reason I became a writer is because there are so many things that fascinate me and, as a writer, I get to explore them all within the pages of a book. I would like to try my hand at being a spy, a time traveler, an arborist, an architect, a medieval military engineer, a 20th century physician. So many things!
What does being a diverse author mean to you?
I am part African American, part Pacific Islander, born on the Northern Mariana island of Saipan and raised on the neighboring U.S. Territory of Guam. I didn’t know a single Guamanian children’s author as a child. No island version of Laurie Halse Anderson or Jennifer Donnelly where I could say, “When I grow, I want to be just like her.” I hope that my story helps change that. That an island kid, thousands of miles from the New York publishing houses, will see that writing stories for a living is a possibility for them, if that is their dream.
Can you recommend any recent diverse lit titles?
I really enjoyed Sleepless by Sarah Vaughn. You rarely see people of color as the main characters in medieval fantasy lit, and this graphic novel, about a king’s daughter protected by a member of the elite Sleepless Order, is just so well done and lovely to look at.
Makiia Lucier grew up on the Pacific Island of Guam and holds degrees in journalism and library studies from the University of Oregon and the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. She is the author of A Death-Struck Year, Isle of Blood and Stone, and Song of the Abyss.
