Born and raised in California, Amy Coombe is an award-winning writer, editor and publisher. She has lived all over the United States and is now based in London. She’s an avid reader, a licensed mudlarker, an enthusiastic fossil-hunter, a fledgling birder, and a font of useless trivia. Stay For A Spell is her first novel.

Find out more about Amy:

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Find a copy of Stay for a Spell:

Waterstones | Bookshop.org (Fantasy Hive affiliate) | Green Dragon Books UK | Barnes and Noble | Green Dragon Books US | Dymocks Australia

Welcome to the Hive, Amy. Congratulations on your debut cosy fantasy, Stay for a Spell. To start us off, can you tell us a little something about it? What can readers expect?

Thank you so much! Well, it’s a sort of fairytale for grownups, a fantasy about a princess cursed to be trapped in a bookstore until she unlocks her heart’s desire. There are small town shenanigans, a grumpy teenager, a sexy pirate who keeps stealing stuff, and seven princes, all pretty sure they can break the curse, even if they’re not all sure they want to. I crammed every happy memory I have of a bookstore into this novel; hopefully readers will feel like they’re sitting in the very best bookstore ever, hanging out with a couple of good friends (and a cat).

Tandy was a fantastic character to follow because she begins the novel as an ever so dutiful and obedient princess who serves her kingdom the best she can but sacrifices a lot of her own happiness, yet throughout the novel she goes on this wonderful journey of self discovery. How did you find subtly shaping her character arc so that her growth came organically? 

I wrote Tandy as a genuinely kind and caring person, but people who are really empathetic can also shy away from asking themselves hard questions, not because they’re afraid of the answers, but because they worry that they might hurt someone they feel depends on them. In this case, Tandy’s very aware of the life of immense privilege she lives, and is also aware that  she has it easy compared to other members of her family, so she won’t even let herself think about whether or not she actually likes her life. Literally trapping her in a bookstore let me tell a story about someone finally being forced to confront some hard truths about herself.

Tandy was such a fun character to write – I think we’ve all gone through periods where we find we’re doing what’s expected of us without realising it, and then a sudden jolt shows us that, actually, maybe we’re not entirely happy. So to answer your question literally: I developed her character, established her daily baseline, and then disrupted her entire life by (oh woe) trapping her in a bookstore. It sort of all flowed from there!

Then there are also some fantastic side characters, my favourites being Sasha, a teenage goth dracone and Bash, a pirate cursed to be afraid of the sea! I think everyone will love these two! How much fun was it to write both of these characters? 

Oh my gosh, so much fun. Both characters are absolute engines of chaos, and I loved writing both of them. I love being around teenagers; they’re in a constant state of flux, crashing around from gleeful to shy to furious to bored. You never know what they’re going to think or feel from one moment to the next. There’s only a few years’ age difference between Tandy and Sasha, but that six years is an insurmountable mountain to Sasha, whereas Tandy was only her age a few years ago, remembers it well, and can relate to her powerfully… but can’t say that to her, because the surest way to piss off a teenager is to be like, “don’t worry; you won’t feel this way forever.” Developing their dynamic was incredibly fun.

Bash – oh, lovely Bash. Having a sexy pirate stealing all Tandy’s stock was central to my initial idea for the book, but then I had to figure out why this guy was, you know, hanging out in this small town in the middle of nowhere. So obviously he had to be operating under a curse as well… but it had to be a silly curse, one that he was actually a little ashamed of. I also realised very quickly that he needed to be funny. He’s actually quite a guarded person, but he hides it behind a thick wall of humour, and most people take him at face value. In the end, he has to open up a bit, too, and let his walls come down. That was really fun to write.

One of my favourite aspects about your book was the way you play with the notion of curses, true love’s kiss, and Tandy’s heart’s desire. You wrote it in such a fun way and also managed to surprise me by the end. How important was it to you to subvert these fairytale tropes and illustrate them in a fresh way?  

So, no surprise, I adore fairytales. I found copies of Grimm’s and Hans Christian Anderson’s fairytales – and Kevin Crossley-Holland’s Folk Tales Of The British Isles, which I loved – in my parents’ book collection when I was about eight and must have reread them all about ten thousand times. But I also grew up during the 80s fantasy film era and the Disney Renaissance, and absorbed a lot of the tropes and storytelling devices from them, as well. Honestly, the book really just gave me a chance to play in those sandboxes and, to really mix my metaphors, bake myself a layer-cake with recipes from a lot of different cookbooks!

Amy, I have to ask, why turnips?! (For reader’s context Tandy has to consume a lot of turnip tea and in her meals!)
[Editor Beth, who hasn’t read the book, is hoping this is a Blackadder reference]

Beth, I’m sorry to say I wish it were a Blackadder reference! Honestly, the idea that the former owner of the bookstore was a turnip-arian who only ate turnips and only drank tea made from their leaves made me laugh!

Did you have a favourite scene to write?

My very favourite scene comes early in the book, when Sasha gets Bash to admit he’s been cursed himself, and they then draw Tandy into a circular discussion about what his curse is, whether it’s actually two curses, how curses operate, and exactly what he does when it rains. (If he’s afraid of water, is he afraid of rain?) The thing I realised pretty early on, to misuse a quote from a Dorothy Sayers novel, is that curses are like cows; if you look at them long enough, they run away. That is, the moment I started digging into the details of how Tandy’s curse worked, I ran into problems. It was even worse with Bash’s curse/s, so I lampshaded the problem! Sasha wants to understand the particulars, Bash doesn’t really want to give anything away, and Tandy keeps trying to rein both of their worst instincts in. The whole thing made me laugh.

You present us with seven hilariously pompous princes! Which was your favourite to write and why? (My personal favourite was Prince Astebaen, who I felt quite sorry for given his parents’ demands and their rigid formality!) 

I had a running joke (mostly cut) through an early draft of the novel where Tandy foreshadows the final prince, Astebaen, as the most horrible of them all, and then we meet him and realise she’s only dreading him because he’s a thirteen-year-old boy. But as I actually developed his character and his little country, I found that the joke didn’t work at all. I’m quite fond of Astebaen, though I think Driz and his pompous malapropisms were my favourite to write.

I also want to throw out a HUGE round of applause for the audio edition; narrator Lottie Bourne did yeoman’s work in reproducing a huge range of accents, one for each prince, a different one for Bash, and different ones again for Tandy and Sasha – not to mention all the secondary characters!

Your book cover is sparklingly eye catching! How involved in the process were you? Did the artist capture the essence of the book for you?

Ah, thank you! I am so, so lucky to have multiple incredible covers. The US cover is exactly how I had imagined the book – Tandy is reading on a pile of books – but I love that the UK cover went a totally different direction. In both cases, I sent moodboards to the publishers and they ran their ideas past me and then found the artists (Jessica Chen Liu for the US, Philippa von Rekowski for the UK) and I was able to comment on the drafts. Philippa was very tolerant when my feedback was “well, I love it but the shop is actually three stories high and the windows are bowed”… I have to say, that both covers absolutely thrill me. And there’s a different cover for the German edition, and a different cover again for the large-print edition! I couldn’t be luckier.

How does it feel to have your book in bookshops? 

Absolutely wonderful. I’m so proud!

Will there be more books in the series, Amy? If so, which characters will we be following next? 

Yes! There are two more under contract; I don’t want to give away much about book 2 yet, but anyone who finished Stay For A Spell can probably guess who’s taking centre stage in book 2! I’m currently working on book 3, which will follow a character we meet in book 2… and there’s a library involved. (All three books are, in one way or another, about books!)

I’m also just going to casually manifest that I’ve also got the plots outlined for three more books set in this world…

Finally, what is the one thing you hope readers take away from your writing?

I’m a rereader; I go back to favourite books over and over again. (I’m currently rereading Pride And Prejudice for about the 87th time!) I genuinely hope that people find the same kind of joy and refuge in my book that I have found in so many wonderful novels over the years. 

Also, I got memed on a German-language Instagram account, the “Gen X vs Gen Z marketing” thing. Apparently the Gen Z marketing for my book is “sexy pirate halleluja” (I’ve never been prouder) so maybe the real thing I hope readers take away from my writing is, y’know, sexy pirate, hallelujah! 

Thank you so much for joining us today!

Thank you so much for having me! 🙂

Find a copy of Stay for a Spell:

Waterstones | Bookshop.org (Fantasy Hive affiliate) | Green Dragon Books UK | Barnes and Noble | Green Dragon Books US | Dymocks Australia