What was writing Eliza and Her Monsters like? The process, the inspiration, or how it felt, etc etc
The inspiration was interesting, because I didn't come up with the initial kernel of idea. I'd wanted to write a book about fandom for a long time, but it was actually my agent and her assistant who came up with the "girl draws monstrous sea as a webcomic and it has a fandom" idea. I was under contract for another contemporary book, but what I really like writing is sci-fi/fantasy/supernatural/horror/etc, so they were looking for a way to incorporate those loves of mine into a contemporary book. Everything that came after that initial kernel was pretty much all my ideas, of course with some nudges and help from agent/assistant/editor.
What I remember of actually writing it was very difficult. The story came to me easily, but actually putting it down was tough because I was putting so much of myself into Eliza the character, and because I had to write the book as if Monstrous Sea, this story I love that I've been working so hard on my whole life, was some super-important, mega-popular franchise. I felt like a huge fraud. I was worried people would think I had a huge ego, or I was really self-important.
That being said, I do think I managed to get a lot of truths out in that book, and I still stand by them. I like what I got to say about fandom and creating things, although I think I have even more thoughts about it now than I did then. I also really did love the parts where I got to just talk about Monstrous Sea.
No joke, anyone wants to ask me in-depth questions about the Monstrous Sea world or characters, I will absolutely get into it right now, right this second.
I donât have any immediate specific questions, but I so badly want to hear a good ramble. Whatâs a rant/infodump abt Monstrous Sea youâve been waiting to give?
OH YOU'VE DONE IT NOW
Ok so y'all know Davy, Dallas's "pet" sea monster that Eliza names her dog after? This guy:
Sorry it's so light, I never inked it. Licky boy is Davy, except this is Baby Davy. Davy gets real big. Continent Big. So big he literally controls the tides of Orcus. He's a good boy with four brains.
Davy has many names. The Tidemaker. Mother's Anchor. Gorgal. Gyurhei. He is the monster that rises from beneath Nocturne Island every thousand years to swallow the sun. He is a nigh-unstoppable force of nature. The only creature he knows besides himself is his caretakerâin this case, Dallas. To calm him when he's unsettled, Dallas literally has to go inside Davy's body to one of his brains.
Because Davy is one of a kind, he reproduces asexually. When he diesâbecause he will, eventually, dieâthere are baby versions inside that consume their siblings until only one is left, and that one claws and eats its way out of the giant corpse. It is born large enough, tough enough, and with enough weapons and speed that it has no natural predators. And it grows very quickly.
The corpse is also interesting, though. Occasionally, he dies beached on land, or in shallows that allow his bones and body to become a new landmass. Researchers have tried to measure how much of Orcus's landmass above the ocean is made of Davy's previous corpses, but it's difficult because of what has layered on top of them. Orcus was once a world of giants, and when they passed away, their sediment built the land the Orcians now live on.
One place where Davy's old bones are still fully visible is the western shearcliffs of Nocturne Island, in a small, holy, and cursed village called Soolaryal. Homes and other structures have been carved into the massive bones. This is where Nocturne Island's strongest soul wardens are said to be born, and this is where Amity grew up as a child, with Faren.
Davy is one of the last great giants and monsters of Orcus. Davy is Amity's deepest fear writ large. Davy is a terrifying reminder of Dallas's lost power as a Rai-ko-kess, the Angels of water, perhaps the only people to ever come close to taming Orcus itself.
When Dallas says "There are monsters in the sea," he really knows what he's talking aboutâin every possible sense of the phrase.
Reblogging this here because it's GOOD MONSTROUS SEA LORE.
Bonus Dallas from my Instagram:
