To Hassan: You were my first fan and you continue to be my biggest. Thank you for helping me untangle all the threads in The Sun and the Void and for stopping me from writing myself into plot holes. Thank you for being this story’s first reader and for viewing it with a critical eye. The Sun and the Void would not be the same without you. Thank you for giving me the best times of my life. I love you.
And finally, to you, the reader: Thank you for choosing this adventure, and for making it this far. I hope it was an enjoyable one.
Discover Your Next Great Read
Get sneak peeks, book recommendations, and news about your favorite authors.
Tap here to learn more.
extras
meet the author
Hassan Sefidrou
Born and raised in Venezuela, GABRIELA ROMERO LACRUZ now lives two thousand miles from home, in the land of bayous and astronauts. She graduated with a BS in chemical engineering from the University of Houston and, after a stint in oil and gas, decided to dedicate herself to the arts. She writes young adult and adult fantasy stories set in places that remind her of home, so in her mind, she’s never too far from the beaches and mountains of Venezuela. She also scratches that ChemE itch with a science fiction story or two. She illustrates as The Moonborn.
Find out more about Gabriela Romero Lacruz and other Orbit authors by registering for the free monthly newsletter at orbitbooks.net.
interview
What was the first book that made you fall in love with the fantasy genre?
I think I loved the fantasy genre since I first started reading with the Harry Potter and Chronicles of Narnia series, but the book that really opened up my ravenous appetite for secondary world fantasy was A Game of Thrones. The vast world and huge cast of A Song of Ice and Fire sparked my inspiration, and it made me realize how much I enjoyed worldbuilding above all else. Because of that series, I’ve now become the kind of writer who will spend a huge chunk of time “prewriting” an encyclopedia about my made-up worlds.
Where did the initial idea for The Sun and the Void come from and how did the story begin to take shape?
The Sun and the Void was born from this initial sentence: “Legend tells that the god Rahmagut will reward any ambitious mortal with immortality, if they collect and sacrifice the reincarnations of his nine wives.” Once I had this, I began building the story by using the collection of my favorite ideas, characters, and snippets that I kept saved for a later time, once I “became a better writer.” I was also thinking that in all my favorite books, video games, and anime, there didn’t seem to be any stories that used Venezuelan folklore and history. I grew up in Venezuela and learned about its heroes and war for independence in school, from our history books; and my upbringing is defined by Venezuelan culture, so I already knew there was so much rich folklore to use as inspiration. My favorite media used Japanese, Roman, British, etc. history, folklore, and mythology as the foundation for their magic systems and secondary fantasy worlds. I wondered why no one was doing this for Venezuela. So I decided to do it myself, for the nerds like me, who grew up loving worlds like those of Final Fantasy yet had our existence largely ignored by mainstream media. I never read Tolkien’s works, but I knew of their influence in the SFF genre and how his races have inspired those of so many fantasy worlds. I am mixed-race and had a biracial upbringing, and I wanted to create characters who experienced this otherness as well. So I created nozariels, valcos, and yares to populate the world of The Sun and the Void alongside humans, and I made my POV characters mixed, so they could explore their world through a similar lens to mine. Finally, I wanted to tell a story with a large cast and morally gray characters, much like A Song of Ice and Fire, so I created the two points of view: Reina with her desperate journey to save Celeste, who I knew needed to be a reincarnated wife, and Eva to become a companion to the antagonist, who at the time was Javier.
What was the most challenging moment of writing The Sun and the Void?
My favorite part of writing this book was building the world, and it was also the hardest. I was not new to writing, but I was new to fitting a vast secondary world to an engaging narrative. I definitely banged my head against many walls in frustration over not knowing how to balance showing and telling worldbuilding and exposition while making it make sense for the plot and characters.
The Sun and the Void’s world is inspired by South America’s history and folklore. What was your approach to creating this setting? Did you do any specific research to build the world?
My research has been very light. I have done it mostly to reinforce what I knew about Venezuela, Colombia, Gran Colombia, and their histories and culture. My mom is from the Andes and my dad is Afro-Caribbean from the coast, and I spent equal amounts of time immersed in both cultures. Because our large families are scattered all over Venezuela, we also spent a lot of time driving from the páramo to the coast, crossing the Llanos; thus I had the privilege of experiencing many cities and geographies for myself. I immersed myself in música llanera and drew a lot of thematic inspiration from the tales told in the lyrics of Simón Díaz, Juan Harvey Caycedo, Reynaldo Armas, and many others. I’m also very lucky to have a visual encyclopedia and a history book that my mom compiled from weekly issues of one of Venezuela’s biggest newspapers, El Nacional, published through C. A. Editora El Nacional y Fundación Bigott and Fundación Empresas Polar. I consulted my family and friends for their beliefs in the folklore, and for idioms and foods. I have also visited Colombia multiple times and was delighted to discover there is so much overlap in the culture, geographies, and history, which is not a surprise, thanks to our shared root as Gran Colombia.
The characters in The Sun and the Void are fascinating and constantly striving to prove their worth. If you had to pick, who would you say is your favorite? Who did you find the most difficult to write?
My favorite character has always been Javier. I indulged myself when creating his aesthetics and background. And I think we have a shared spoiled, vicious nature, so writing his lines was always a good time. The most difficult to write was Reina, because I was always worried about straddling the line between not ruining her likability for the readers, making her an active pursuer of what she wanted, and ensuring her love for Celeste didn’t come across as a misguided obsession.
Who are some of your favorite authors and how have they influenced your writing?
I am constantly blown away by the way Naomi Novik plots her books. I look up to the way she crafts complex worlds and tells such engaging stories. The same goes for Pierce Brown. His plot twists and turns are incredible, and one day I hope to write books that grip readers the way his does. I adore the carefully crafted prose of Madeline Miller, how her words are such a comfort and delight.
Without giving too much away, could you share what readers can expect in the sequel?
I hope readers will be elated to hear that I am upping my spice rating in the sequel.
And, finally, if you had to dedicate yourself to one god from The Sun and the Void, who would you choose?
Knowing what I know about Ches and Rahmagut （more of their histories and backgrounds will be shown to readers in the sequel）， I would dedicate myself to Ches.
if you enjoyed
THE SUN AND THE VOID
look out for