We are thrilled to welcome author Sharada Keats to our My Book Corner Q&A today!
Questions have been set by our reviewer, Sarah Broadley and her glowing review of These Stolen Lives follows on underneath.
Question 1 – Mora is an incredible character. Her determination is evident in every step she takes and it’s clear from the start she won’t stop until justice is served. Do you plan your characters or go with an idea and see where it takes you when drafting?
It’s a mixture… part planning, part putting the characters into certain situations and seeing how they handle themselves. I had a lot of space to explore Mora’s perspective, given she’s the first-person narrator – which has its benefits and its drawbacks. Characters aren’t always aware of all their motivations, in the same way that we aren’t! Mora is young, but she’s learnt to keep a tight rein on her emotions, and she doesn’t always want to acknowledge what she’s feeling. She’s bottled up, essentially, and she fancies herself quite self-sufficient. Some of her growth over the story is about unbottling and starting to rely more on other people.
Question 2 – The allies Mora has will do anything to help her, Mr & Mrs Scarlet, Ruzi, Kit and more, all have a different relationship with her. A satisfying mind map of support, if you like, how important was it for you to show those around her and their different views and experiences?
I love this question! Yes, I really wanted to show a range in terms of age and other demographics in the characters who rally round our protagonists and in the found family that emerges. Young people sometimes feel like the whole world is against them. It’s true that when you meet someone awful, the experience taints everything, but I still think most people genuinely want to see others succeed and they do want to look out for each other. So yes, it was important to me to show how solidarity can exist across different divisions (even if you shouldn’t trust everyone… Mora!).
Question 3 – I love a good antagonist and Venor more than lives up to that. How did you create the hierarchy of Mora’s world?
Venor is awful with few redeeming features, but he does have an Inspector Javert-ish chip on his shoulder which was actually a bit of a late addition. It just seemed to fit. The hierarchy of the government and the Life Registry bureaucracy etc was something that I wanted to be plausible, but light-touch… So while the setting is deeply dystopian, the story is quite focussed on this one main antagonist Venor, who has achieved a position of power for himself and who remains very ambitious. I think we’ve all seen figures like that in the real world and they tend to have some common traits like narcissism, an inability to empathise, strong egos, an inflated sense of self-worth kind of paired with a glaring lack of self-awareness… so those are traits you might spot in Venor.
Question 4 – A sense of belonging is throughout, with a nod to the various cultural identities of what Mora and her friends were before the invasion and the class system that now exists under the new ruler they are meant to obey. Throughout history this has been the case, can you tell us a little of the world building and character arcs required for the journey they make from their start in life to now?
Yes, sure, so the backdrop here is that this setting, this big chunk of land called Makaia (we only see a little bit of it), is now twice-colonized. Main character Mora is Crozoni – from the group who came in and colonized Makaia a hundred years ago, driving the indigenous Makaians – Kit’s people – into the margins; with all the horror that entails. It’s all backstage and unresolved. Now in more recent years, Makaia’s been colonised again, this time by the Skøl, a new set of people with different ideas about how to run an economy. So, Mora’s facing this ongoing issue of being a marginalized survivor who’s grieving lost loved ones, and looking back to her own history and reevaluating it in light of her awful new experiences. The three main cultures each seem fairly homogenous. I’d like to unpack them a bit more – maybe one day! Book 2 has allowed me to explore more of Kit’s perspective, and to start to look at some mixed-race experiences. But for These Stolen Lives, in terms of arcs for Mora, her journey includes unbottling and letting other people in; getting the courage to take actions she wouldn’t have been capable of at the beginning; and emotionally, facing up to these aspects of her inherited past and acknowledging the harm her people have committed. Kit’s arcs are less obvious as we’re not inside his head, but I think he grows and changes over the course of the book too.
Question 5 – With a follow up underway, did you plan both at the same time?
I always hoped I’d be able to write more than one book in this setting, but I didn’t get the green light until my amazing agent Kemi Ogunsanwo sold the story to Scholastic as a two-book deal. That allowed me to start solidifying some of my mistier ideas and to start building a few ideas into These Stolen Lives that can carry through into the sequel – This Shattered Promise. I think with fiction it’s not possible to plan everything in advance. The writing process unearths major themes and motifs. I mean there’s a lot of subconscious work going on… sometimes I have no idea what’s going on down there. Like Mora, I’m a bit afraid to look perhaps!
Question 6 – What’s next for Sharada Keats?
I’m working on the sequel, This Shattered Promise. It leans more into the fantasy genre. It’s narrated by both Mora and Kit. The world opens up. We get to see more of Makaia – travelling to the southernmost county, County Shipway. Mora and Kit face new challenges. Mora has to work for an evil scientist and look after his obnoxious young ward. Kit has to contend with (spoiler alert!?) pirates… and much worse. I won’t say what… you’ll have to read it to find out. He thinks he has to rescue her… maybe she has to rescue him? I am really enjoying this one and hoping it’ll resonate with readers.
These Stolen Lives by Sharada Keats
Six years after the Skøl invasion, Mora continues to pay for the right to live. Bought and sold over time by her employers, she finds solace with her friends and the closest thing she has to family as she works long days to repay her supposed debt.
When innocent 12 year-old Zako, a brother to her, is captured and sentenced to death by
Governor Venor, Mora and all her allies are running out of time to rescue him. They soon learn that Venor has a secret that jeopardises his position in office and will stop at nothing to ensure the truth doesn’t come out.
Her investigations into Venor’s past get her noticed and she is left for dead by the governor’s brutes. However, Mora’s tenacity and sheer determination to rescue Zako gives her the courage to carry on, albeit under a different guise, one Venor can never decipher if she is to prevail.
What an incredible debut from Sharada Keats as she makes her mark on the YA map.
A genuinely heart-stopping novel of bravery, defiance and love where it’s least expected, These Stolen Lives is a read-in-one-go story. So, buckle up, grab a cuppa and dive in.
I am delighted that the follow up, This Shattered Promise, will be published later this year.
With a stunning cover by Jamie Gregory, this novel is destined for stardom and I’m not surprised it has been Carnegie nominated too! Definitely one to watch.
Author Bio
Born in Kalgoorlie in 1982, Sharada loves poetry, nature, reading, writing, electricity, hot running water, petrichor, a certain degree of cliché, and circumstances that ensure young people can enjoy basic human rights, be nurtured, and grow old happily and healthily. She feels strongly that people of all ages deserve a wider variety of stories and storytellers.
Sharada grew up in Australia and Canada, with parents from Guyana and Yorkshire – influences that still shape her writing. She studied agricultural economics in university, and has spent many years working in the third sector. Sharada now lives with her partner, two young children, and ancient old cat in London, UK.
