Ep 190: Stephanie Garber

First Draft Episode #190: Stephanie Garber

Stephanie Garber, #1 New York Times bestselling author of the
Caraval series, talks about turning to writing to escape burnout
and depression from her first job, persevering when even her Mom
told her the writing thing wasn’t meant to happen, and the things
that make her nervous about releasing Finale, the final book in
her breakout series.
Links and Topics Mentioned In This Episode



The North Texas Teen Book Festival, which Stephanie and I
were both in attendance this year. On the sidelines, we made
time to sit down and chat for the podcast!




SASE: an abbreviation for 'self-addressed stamped envelope.'
An SASE is an envelope on which you have stuck a stamp and
written your own name and address.




Twilight by Stephenie Meyer; The Uglies series by Scott
Westerfeld; and Wicked Lovely by Melissa Marr were among the
first YA books that Stephanie discovered when she was
rediscovering writing, while battling burnout and depression
at her first job out of college




Big Sur Children’s Writing Workshops, where Stephanie said
they “eviscerated” her work—but she loved it




Much like Anne Montgomery in the Anne of Green Gables series
by L.M. Montgomery, Stephanie is a sensitive person who may
or may not have ever exclaimed to be “in the depths of
despair!”




Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein, which inspired Stephanie
to write Caraval (though the books are very different!)




The Game (movie) directed by David Fincher and starring
Michael Douglas, which has a passing similarity to some
elements of Caraval




Stephanie has said she wanted Caraval to feel like a Baz
Luhrmann movie or a Florence and the Machine song




The Great Gatsby, directed by Baz Luhrmann, from which we got
our glorious .gif of Leonardo DiCaprio holding out a glass of
champagne




Stephanie was inspired to write Caraval after hearing the
song “Centuries,” by Fallout Boy, which features the lyrics:
“Some legends are told / Some turn to dust or to gold / But
you will remember me / Remember me, for centuries”




Legend by Marie Lu, which Stephanie erroneously believed was
about a character named Legend (it is not). Instead of
waiting for someone else to write about that kind of
character, Stephanie went and did it herself!




Jennifer E. Smith, who was an editor and still does freelance
editing, in addition to being the author of The Statistical
Probability of Love at First Sight and Field Notes on Love,
and more! (Listen to her First Draft podcast episode here)




SCBWI, the Society of Children’s Book Writers and
Illustrators, was one place Stephanie turned to for help
editing an early version of Caraval (and the editor there
told her it would never sell…)




Prim from The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins is the kind of
sister character Stephanie wanted to avoid, especially when
she was writing Legendary




Stacey Lee, author of Under a Painted Sky and Outrun the
Moon, is an author-friend who Stephanie counts on to always
tell her the truth


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