What's the story behind the story? What inspired you to write this book?
I kept getting stuck on a simple question: what does a thief do when the universe itself is cheating against him? Most fantasy heist stories let the crew be clever. I wanted to see what happens when cleverness is not enough, when probability is the villain. Then Frostfair showed up: a frozen city, occupied, fished out, crushed under a tyrant who literally cannot lose. And a hometown hero who is really not much of a hero, just stubborn enough to come back anyway. The rest was Leo and his crew refusing to shut up long enough for me to outline. I stopped fighting them and started transcribing. The story first lived on Royal Road, chapter by chapter, with readers who shaped it more than they know. This Kindle edition is the version that came out the other side.
If you had to pick theme songs for the main characters of your book, what would they be?
Leo: “Little Lion Man” by Mumford & Sons. A guy coming home to face what he ran from, knowing he deserves some of what is waiting for him.
Kilniah: “Wolf Like Me” by TV on the Radio. She is running from something she cannot remember and running toward something she refuses to explain. Also, she might actually be a wolf sometimes. It depends on the Seal.
Sam (the bard): “The Lying Song” by anyone who ever wrote one. If you hear it twice, the lyrics will be different.
Sir Gregory: “Take It Easy” by the Eagles. Nobody told him this was a heist. He thought he was here to handle contracts.
The bruiser: “The Sound of Silence” by Disturbed. Not the Simon and Garfunkel one. The Disturbed cover. He did not come here to talk.
What's your favorite genre to read? Is it the same as your favorite genre to write?
Fantasy heist and con-artist fantasy, both to read and to write. Anything where a crew of smart, tired, underqualified people tries to steal something that should not be stealable. I grew up on The Lies of Locke Lamora, Kings of the Wyld, and old Forgotten Realms paperbacks. I write toward the shelf I want to keep pulling books off of. I also read a lot of cozy fantasy when I need a break from my own plotting. Legends & Lattes is basically oxygen.
What books are on your TBR pile right now?
The Tainted Cup, Bookshops and Bonedust, The Jasad Heir, Dungeon Crawler Carl (Book 7—I am behind and ashamed), a stack of Royal Road serials I promised I would finish before starting anything new, which was a lie.
What scene in your book was your favorite to write?
Without spoilers: the scene where Leo, at his lowest, finally understands what the Luck Charm actually does. He is not outmaneuvering it. He is not outsmarting it. He has to do the one thing it cannot predict, and it costs him something he had been holding back the whole book. It is the quietest scene in the novel. No fights, no game notifications, no banter. Just a man in a frozen alley making a decision. I wrote it four times and kept almost all of the fourth version. The other contender is a scene where Sir Gregory, in the middle of a crisis, tries to negotiate with an enchanted artifact using contract law. Reader, the artifact wins on a technicality.
Do you have any quirky writing habits? (lucky mugs, cats on laps, etc.)
I write in cafés that have bad coffee, because good coffee makes me chatty, and I stop writing to talk to the barista. Bad coffee gets me back to the page faster. I also read every scene out loud before I move on. If my voice flattens, the scene is dead, and I rewrite it. Kilniah’s dialogue gets the most rereads. She is hardest to get right and easiest to get wrong. Oh, and I name every draft file something unserious. The working title of this book, for two years, was “Leo Does a Crime.”
Do you have a motto, quote or philosophy you live by?
“Write the book you wanted to find on the shelf when you were fifteen.” Everything else is noise. If the fifteen-year-old version of me had picked this up, hid it under the covers, and read it with a flashlight, I did my job.
If you could choose one thing for readers to remember after reading your book, what would it be?
That loyalty is a form of courage. Leo\'s crew sticks with him not because he is winning. They stick with him when he is clearly losing, when the odds are literally rigged against them, when walking away is the smart move. That is not stubbornness. That is love, dressed up as bad decision-making. If you remember one thing: it is worth showing up for your people, even when the Luck Charm says no.
