Q&A: Lisa M. Sylvan, Author of ‘Dangerous Girls’

Today we’re delighted to be talking to Lisa M. Sylvan about Dangerous Girls. Her upbringing steeped in fantasy and fairytales has come to the fore in her exciting YA fantasy-mystery debut!

Hi Lisa, thank you for joining us today! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and your book Dangerous Girls?

Hello, and thank you so much for having me! I currently live in New England, although my husband is English and we try to spend as much time in England as we can. The book follows a group of girls with strange and dangerous gifts, all living on an island off the coast of Scotland. It’s part murder mystery, part gothic fantasy, and I had so much fun writing it.

This is such a fascinating and unique story – where did the initial spark for this story come from and how did it grow?

I’d had an early version of the idea a while ago, but I couldn’t quite get it right, so I just had to sit with it. And then I was looking at a book about islands, and that’s when the setting hit me, and it all just came together from there. After that, it became one of those ideas that I couldn’t stop thinking about, and I kept coming up with new pieces of it – sometimes in the middle of the night.

It is a mix of fantasy and murder mystery, so I would love to hear more about your plotting process and how you keep these elements balanced?

It all came together almost easily, because I have such a deep love of both fantasy and mysteries/thrillers. So combining the two felt natural, in a way. I love stories that do a bit of genre blending, and balancing them ended up being much easier than I thought it would be. Setting is always one of, if not THE, biggest pieces of a story for me, so once I had that figured out, it was much easier to pull everything else into place.

I loved how intertwined the magic system was with the characterisation of each of the girls – which part came first for you: personality or power?

The girls all came first, and I sort of worked out their powers after I figured out their personalities. Working out the girls and all of their gifts was one of my favourite parts of writing Dangerous Girls, and it was such an important piece to try to get right. I needed each of them to feel unique, and once I felt like I understood each of them and they were, in a way, “speaking on their own”, the world felt much more real and vivid for me.

It is such an atmospheric book with that gothic and isolated setting heightening the ostracisation Imogen feels. How did you craft these elements?

I’m always drawn to books that feature a sense of isolation, because it almost automatically ups the stakes in a major way. I think it’s human nature to be afraid of that sense of remoteness and having nowhere to run. In Dangerous Girls, Imogen arrives from the mainland at the start of the book and is immediately cut off from the busy London life she left. I wanted that sense of closeness to set the tone for the book from the outset, and then carry it on in new ways throughout. But it’s mirrored in the isolation that she feels from the girls, or that the other girls might feel from each other, like it’s managed to find its way into their bones. I think those elements lend themselves well to a gothic style of story.

What songs would form the soundtrack to Dangerous Girls for you?

The first song on my playlist is Who’s Afraid of Little Old Me? by Taylor Swift, followed closely by Look What You Made Me Do, Mad Woman, Bury A Friend by Billie Eilish, and Demons by Imagine Dragons.

What message would you like readers to take away from this story?

I think the biggest thing I’d like people to take away from Dangerous Girls is the idea of being truly and authentically yourself. I know it’s said a lot, and it might not feel groundbreaking, but it’s a message worth repeating, and it’s something that each of the girls in the story reckon with. Self-acceptance is such an important part of growing up, and even in my 30s it’s something I’m still learning.

What books have you enjoyed so far this year and are there any that you can’t wait to get your hands on?

Some books that I read this year and loved are The Lamb by Lucy Rose, Lost in the Garden by Adam S. Leslie, and Once Was Willem by Mike Carey. I have a seemingly never-ending list of other books that I want to read, including Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V. E. Schwab, and What Hunger by Catherine Dang.

If possible, can you share a little about what you are currently working on or any upcoming projects you have?

Without being too specific, I’m working on something else that I think would be perfect for anyone who enjoyed Dangerous Girls.

Finally, if you could only use five words to describe Dangerous Girls, what would they be?

This is such a hard question! No fair! But if I had to narrow it down, I think I would choose: poisonous, dark, misty, preternatural and floral.

Will you be picking up Dangerous Girls? Tell us in the comments below!