"Girls Like Us" is the sequel to "Some Girls Do." Read more about it down below.
What was your inspiration behind "Girls Like Us"?
There were so many things that made me want to continue Ruby and Morgan’s story. When I wrote "Some Girls Do", I never intended for there to be a sequel, but I could not stop thinking about them. I would always be asked at events where I saw them now. At first, I would make up little stories to answer with, which grew into me jotting down a few short stories just to try to get them out of my head. . . but eventually it felt bigger than that. It started feeling like their story wasn’t truly over.
As my own child prepared to head off to college, just like Morgan and Ruby would do soon after the end of "Some Girls Do", I felt really inspired to get back into it and explore what that next chapter might look like in their lives. Before I knew it, it was time to loop in my team and make things more official.
What does Reading Rainbow mean to you?
To me, Reading Rainbow means creating a bookshelf that is as diverse as the world around us. For me, it especially means decentering straight romances (though there are many of those I love reading too!) and uplifting and shouting about queer love stories as much as possible.
Why do you feel representation of a variety of people is so important when it comes to writing books?
I think everyone deserves to see themselves reflected in books as heroes, lovers, adventurers and more. Everyone deserves to be a main character. I’ve been really deliberate about trying to reflect the world around me in my books, and to try to uplift other diverse stories as well. It’s exciting to me that today’s queer young adults can be represented in publishing in ways that I certainly wasn’t when I was growing up. There is still a lot of work to be done, but I’m glad to see publishers making a concerted effort to get the stories onto shelves.
Tell us a little more about "Girls Like Us" and why you decided to write it.
In "Girls Like Us" we pick up just about a year after the events of "Some Girls Do", during the second semester of the girls’ freshman year. Morgan is now running track at a D1 university a few hours from home and is struggling a bit to find her footing. Ruby on the other hand has become the star student in the automotive program at the local community college. It’s a bit of a role reversal from the first book, which was a dynamic I really wanted to explore. Throughout the course of the story, we get to see how they navigate these new roles, new friends and experiences and how they balance loving themselves and each other.
What can fans expect from your book?
There is plenty of pining and a dash of drama, but also a lot of love in this one. (It is a romance after all!) Readers will get to meet Ruby and Morgan’s college friends, while still spending plenty of time with many of the characters we all fell in love with in "Some Girls Do", like Ruby’s stepdad and Morgan’s friends from high school track and pride club.
What's up next for you in the bookish world?
It’s a very busy book year for me! My adult romance, Anderson in Bloom, came out in March, and "Girls Like Us" dropped this month. Coming up this summer, I have a short story in the Taylor Swift inspired anthology, 13 LITTLE LOVE STORIES, as well as a graphic novel about a newly turned teen vampire who discovers her high school crush is a slayer, called BITE ME, with artist Kit Seaton. I’m incredibly excited for those to hit shelves so soon!
