I'm thrilled today to be a part of the promotional tour for This Shattered World, the second book in the Starbound Trilogy by Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner. I fell madly in love with These Broken Stars last year and could barely summon up the patience to wait until This Shattered World released, but somehow I pulled from patience reserves I never knew I had and endured until I was lucky enough to get my hands on a copy. So good.
Now I have the pleasure of welcoming Amie and Meagan back to the blog to answer a few questions, so I hope you all enjoy the interview! Be sure and check out the bottom of the post for all the details on a giveaway as well as the full list of participating blogs.
Given Lee and Flynn are on opposite sides of Avon's rebellion, there's a forbidden aspect to their romance. What are your top three fictional forbidden or starcrossed romances?
Oh, soooooo many to choose from! Given the influence their story had on this book (it’s set on planet Avon, after all), we have to choose Romeo and Juliet. We love a story about secret allies from two warring factions, and the agony of conflicting loyalties that comes with it. (We’re basically awful people. We just like agony.)
We also love the movie 10 Things I Hate About You—also, interestingly enough, a Shakespearean play in film form. There’s just something about their banter that stuck with us, and it’s that back and forth that we always try to give to each of our couples in each book. Especially with Flynn and Jubilee, who get along like matches and gasoline. (Explosively. Also: hot.)
And finally, what better starcrossed romance is there than Elizabeth Bennett and Fitzwilliam Darcy? No one would’ve ever picked those two for a couple, and yet they just end up working. Unlikely couples are our favorites.
If you were to find yourself under Lee's military command, what are a few of the words she might use to describe your physical abilities in her initial evaluation of your combat readiness?
Oh man, you had to ask. Let’s just say we’re both significantly better at writing about great feats of physical prowess than we are at performing them. A few phrases on our personal reports would include ‘noodly-armed’, ‘a danger to themselves and others’, ‘constantly daydreaming’ and ‘too busy talking to take orders’. We would also suck at getting up in time for the morning parade.
If you lived in the world of the Starbound Trilogy–where interstellar travel is commonplace and numerous planets are inhabitable–and found yourself on a previously unknown planet with your dream environment, what would that environment consist of and what would you name your new world?
Oooh, good question! The two things we love to do most together are write stories and go out on road trips, so those would shape our dream planet. We’d find ourselves surrounded by breathtaking scenery—some of our favourite places to explore were the Grand Canyon and Yosemite National Park—though we have to be honest, our dream environment would also involve a comfy house to kick back after our days of exploring.
When we need to work on a story, we love to head somewhere beautiful to walk and brainstorm, whether that’s the luxurious hot springs just outside Melbourne, or the amazing Biltmore Estate outside Asheville. So, sounds like our dream planet would be magnificent in its natural beauty, with just a touch of luxury. And hopefully some very easily harvested food. We’re not survivors like our characters!
What would we call our planet? Home.
Let's say that tomorrow you board a ship for an entirely new planet, with little to no knowledge of what awaits you in terms of food, living conditions, amenities, etc. What one aspect of this world or the comforts of your current life would you miss most?
As outlined above, we really do like our creature comforts! The truth is, though, that we’re both okay roughing it when we need to. As long as we could take our families (and our pets) with us, then the one thing we’d miss most would be our bookshelves! With comfy beds a close second ;)
If Lee and Flynn were told their lives were the subject matter for a piece of fiction, what would their first immediate reactions be? Would they want to read their story?
Flynn would absolutely love it! He comes from a long tradition of Irish storytelling, and one of the things we get to see in This Shattered World is his cousin Sean re-telling an old Irish legend about a couple called Niamh and Oisín, complete with modern touches like space shuttles. Flynn would probably prefer to hear the story told with all the embellishments you could manage, but he’d definitely want to read it too.
Jubilee’s a little more no-nonsense than Flynn (A little? A lot…) and would probably just say that she’s already lived it, she knows how it ends, and she’d rather focus on the future than spend time rehashing the past. That said, she’d probably end up reading it to humor Flynn, and we bet she’d enjoy it, even if she did critique everyone’s tactics.
A huge thank you to Amie and Meagan for taking the time to answer my questions!
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THIS SHATTERED WORLD
Jubilee Chase and Flynn Cormac should never have met.
Lee is captain of the forces sent to Avon to crush the terraformed planet's rebellious colonists, but she has her own reasons for hating the insurgents.
Rebellion is in Flynn's blood. Terraforming corporations make their fortune by recruiting colonists to make the inhospitable planets livable, with the promise of a better life for their children. But they never fulfilled their promise on Avon, and decades later, Flynn is leading the rebellion.
Desperate for any advantage in a bloody and unrelentingly war, Flynn does the only thing that makes sense when he and Lee cross paths: he returns to base with her as prisoner. But as his fellow rebels prepare to execute this tough-talking girl with nerves of steel, Flynn makes another choice that will change him forever. He and Lee escape the rebel base together, caught between two sides of a senseless war.
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AMIE KAUFMAN + MEAGAN SPOONER
Visit the These Broken Stars website for the latest news on the series and follow the authors on Twitter at @AmieKaufman and @MeaganSpooner. This Shattered World is available for pre-order (with fun swag!) and will be released in North America on December 23, 2014.
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GIVEAWAY
a Rafflecopter giveaway
Monday, Dec.8 - The Midnight Garden - Secrets of Starbound: Characters
Tuesday, Dec. - The Book Smugglers - Making an Audiobook
Wednesday, Dec. 10 - Ivy Book Bindings - Secrets of Starbound: Science and Settings
Thursday, Dec. 11 - Cuddlebuggery - How Amie & Meagan Met
Friday, Dec. 12 - Little Book Owl - Video Interview
Monday, Dec. 15 - Mundie Moms - Shooting the Cover
Tuesday, Dec. 16 - Xpresso Reads - Starbound Inspirations
Wednesday, Dec. 17 - A Book Utopia - Video: Your New Book Boyfriend
Thursday, Dec. 18 - Supernatural Snark - Q & A
Friday, Dec. 19 - Love is Not a Triangle - Gender in Science Fiction
