Hello, and good morning. How are you doing. Hi, good morning,
I'm great. Thanks so much for having me. Congratulations on this book,
because this right here is going to be the summer read. And the
reason why I feel that in my soul is because you take your young readers
somewhere, you allow them to tap into their own imaginations, and more importantly,
you introduce the library back to a lot of people who don't know what
a library is. Yes, I love libraries. For me, the library
was a sanctuary growing up. It was both the physical space of it and
also the access to knowledge that it gave me. And you know, when
I was trying to imagine a repository of human knowledge four thousand years in the
future, no matter how different it seemed, you know, I mean,
it has artificial intelligences that are like gods, and it digs under the earth
and tunnels. But because I knew it was a repository of knowledge, I
knew that it had to be fundamentally a library. You were speaking the street
in this because when you talk about AIS and you talk about technology the future,
that's where everybody is there are and they're not living in this moment where
where Apple's about ready to introduce a new product. They want to know what
I aies are and how is it going to affect the way they read books
as well as their own personal lives. Absolutely, And it's ironic because I
started this book seven years ago when boys Chat CHPT was very far from anybody's
you know, ideas of the world. But I was still thinking about artificial
intelligences and not you know, the ones that are just going to like write
our essays for us, but ones that can genuinely interact with humans and genuinely
give us different perspectives. So I actually have a kind of more optimistic view
of artificial intelligences, even though I know that there's lots of evil insto which
they can be put, you know. So that was what I ended up
using in this novel was an idea that artificial intelligence could actually be part of
an ecosystem that we end up living alongside and might fundamentally change human civilization,
but for the better. I love the way that you encore operated tunnels underneath
the library because that, to me is mystery, that the mystique of all
of that. Because when I walk into a library today, I always think
that those behind the desk, they're spies. They want to know what we're
up to, but they want to teach us their language. And where do
they go when they take their breaks into the tunnels? And that's I think,
that's what I reason why why I love Freed is that she went into
the tunnels. Oh yes, Oh my gosh, I love that. Like
the romance of it. Now, I totally felt that when I was when
I was younger, I went I grew up in Washington, DC, and
I loved to go to the Jefferson Reading Room with the Library of Congress.
And I don't know if you've ever been there, if you or if your
listeners have, but it is it's this monstrous, you know, space with
these statues and like cupola and and frescoes. I mean, you just kind
of feel overwhelmed by it. But what really got to me was that I
knew that underneath my feet there were just floors and floors and floors of books
and then I could write a name on a slip of paper and they would
bring it up to me. But I couldn't go down there, and I
just long to go down into the tunnels. And it's so true, because
I mean, they would, they would disappear for about ten or fifteen minutes,
and then they would come back and I would I would sit there at
that table, going where did they go? What? What? What was
so important that they had to go away for that long? When when you
go went and went to the school library, everything was always there, but
not at the public It was just real and it was and you wanted to
know. You wanted to get down there. And sometimes they would come up
with a slip of paper and it said, we can't give this you.
Oh yeah, all I wanted to do was go down there. Oh that's
so true. That's that's where I started buying books online. It's like,
if I can't get it at the library, I've got to find it somewhere.
But then you then you pay an astronomical price because you know, not
everybody's got it exactly when you when you write a book like this, I
know it took seven years of your life, but I also know, as
as an author, when and where a book hits you? What? Wow?
How did it hit you? And where were you? All right?
Gotta be honest, here I was in the shower. You know. Um
was a bit of a cliche, but I was. I was in a
tower, and I just I was editing a different book. I was editing
my last thing. I don't know. I had no time at all.
This is where books always get you. And I had this vision of a
young woman who had left her home. I knew her home was called the
Library. I knew it was in many ways a wonderful place, but also
a place that had severely disillusioned her, and that she was crossing a desert
alone. And I knew she was going across the desert to meet a god,
and that God might kill her. And so those were just the elements.
I didn't know anything really about the library. I didn't know anything about
the god. I didn't know why that desert was there. But Freda came
straight to me, and that scene was central, and that scene is in
the book. Okay, okay, now I used to you, said Freda.
I called her Freda, so my apology. Now, now let's go
to a different name, because I want to know how badly I'm going to
pronounce it near guy, am I saying it right? They're gooy, you're
close, You're close. Listen. This is a thing of fantasy novels.
I fold it against no one like you love, you have to make up
all sorts of names, you know, I don't. I'm not going to
call anyone well actually did I You know, if it depends on where it's
said. But if it's four thousand years from the future, I'll bet they're
off. All names are different. But to put yourself in four thousand years
in the future, I know what it's like to step into the writing room.
What happens when you have to come back to this year? Did you
have to go through any transitions? Did you have to step outside and go
for a walk through a force? Because because I know what it's like to
be on the radio in six different markets and I never really left this city.
It plays with a head and heart. Yes, yes, absolutely,
and I love it in a lot of ways. I love traveling. I
mean, when I first started writing for me, it was very much like
I was between worlds. I didn't really, you know, understand where I
was, and I wanted to get away, you know, and I wanted
to I wanted to imagine something different. And and now I'm very different circumstances.
I actually moved to Mexico nine years ago and I live in Wahaka now,
and so I'll lot of us. Also for me was that I go
into the future and there's all of these, you know, different ways of
seeing the world, and I come back to my president. I present was
still I was speaking of different language, I'm eating different food, I am
learning entirely different ways of experiencing and interacting with the world, you know.
So in a lot of ways, I wasn't coming back to something that I
felt was humdrum, you know. I was coming back to something that was
also an adventure and very different, and that was really stimulating. It was
also kind of exhausting sometimes, you know, because I was I was at
that point really learning Spanish. I'm pretty fluent in it now, you know.
So, so it was it was a lot of different experiences. But
I feel like that really helped me get into the future because I understood that
the future did not have to look the way I grew up. I didn't
have to look like something that was familiar to me. It could look very
different. I can just see a YA reader as well as a secret writer
in their bedroom, hearing what you just shared, their and their hearts going
I want to do this. I love going places with other people's words,
but I want to create my own words. And to me, that's what
I love about talking with why a authors is the fact that you are the
seed you're planting inside an open field. Oh and I'm so grateful to be
able to do that. I mean for me, for me, My goal
always in writing is to be able to open up spaces to give room to
young readers and especially young writers who, like I was, who just wanted
to be able to see themselves in the future, in fantasy, in the
world. And I really wanted to create a narrative space that's big enough for
young readers to be able to imagine something genuinely different. I wanted to support
young people's imaginations. I think that's that's more important now than ever, you
know, with all these attacks on libraries, on learning, on knowledge,
you know, and I just to me, the idea that any young reader
could listen to me or read this novel and feel empowered and aspired to create
something is the best thing it could have possibly happened. A lot of readers
don't understand that you and I, as we put words on a page,
we hear the voices of each one of these characters. What was the inspiration
between all of these characters coming together as one because you you must have thought
about somebody's voice, because it would it would really put into your you know,
your commas and your quotations and the way it was played out. Yeah.
You know, it's funny because I do have the characterist voices in my
head, but they they come out in ways where I have to sometimes say
it out loud. I sometimes I hear it on the page and I and
I realize that there's a snap, and that snap makes me hear the character,
you know. But sometimes I'll write a draft and I guess, like
a character isn't hitting, you know, and I'll have to go back and
eventually, eventually suddenly it'll it'll come together. And with Great I had her
voice immediately, you know, I had to Namor in the War God's voice
immediately. But there are some characters like Joshua, who I had to go
back and once I once I had it, it was like, oh,
yeah, there he is. But it was interesting because you know, I
was like, I'm trying to like tune the diet. I couldn't quite get
their voices right for a long time, you know, speaking of going back
with all those tunnels, underneath that library. This, this is not over.
This is not over. Oh absolutely not. It's there's there's so much
more to come. There's like the four human systems, there's all of the
gods that there's so much more to explore. I mean, and my world
building has just exploded. I mean I have like reams more for sure.
I'm shocked that Disney has not reached out to you yet or even Universal because
I mean, everything that you've got here is a series. I mean,
this, this right here is what what everybody's watching on TV two when it
comes to binge watching, Oh well, you know finger Cross because I'm concerned,
all right, yeah, because you have set your imagination on fire here
and Pete when they pick up this book this summer, the library Broken Worlds,
they're there, you know, they're they're gonna see inside their imaginations,
but they're gonna want to see actual moving pictures in front of them. Yes,
yes, absolutely, And I think you know the wonderful interplay between between
what you see in your head and what you end up seeing on the screen
and all of that it's really fun too. Wow, where can people find
out more about you and give you some love? I am on Twitter and
Instagram as Eliah DJU and online at Eliah don Johnson dot com and you can
find out all sorts of things about me and follow me on subtack and read
my book. You've got to come back to this show anytime in the future.
I mean, the door is always going to be open for you.
I love your passion and I really feel that listeners as well as readers really
are going to pick up on that and move it forward. Oh, thank
you so much. This is a delight. Well you be brilliant today.
Okay, yes, thank you