Welcome to another edition of “Anatomy of a YA anthology.” I’m really excited to present this interview with Jessica Spotswood, in honor of the release of her new anthology The Radical Element, which hits shelves today. Spotswood’s first anthology, A Tyranny of Petticoats, was a fabulous romp through history and I’m eager to dive into the companion.

But without further ado, Jessica is here to talk about the work behind the creation of her anthology.

 

Your Name​: Jessica Spotswood​

 

Your Anthology’s Name​: THE RADICAL ELEMENT: 12 ​STORIES OF DAREDEVILS, DEBUTANTES, & OTHER DAUNTLESS GIRLS​

 

Anthology Description​: ​

 

Respect yourself. Love yourself. As radical a decision for an American girl to make today as it was in 1927, as radical for a student as for a spy, for a printer’s apprentice or a poker player. It’s a radical decision when you’re balancing on the tightrope of being a second-generation immigrant, of neurodivergence, of facing down American racism while loving America. It’s the only decision when you’ve weighed society’s expectations and found them wanting.

With respect and love, twelve of the most talented writers working in young adult literature today —an impressive sisterhood that includes Marieke Nijkamp, Meg Medina, and Anna-Marie McLemore — have created a century and a half of heroines on the margins and in the intersections, young women of all colors and creeds standing up for themselves and their beliefs. They are ignoring their mothers’ well-meant advice and forging their own paths — whether secretly learning Hebrew in early Savannah, using the family magic to pass as white in 1920s Hollywood, or singing in a feminist punk band in 1980s Boston. And they’re asking you to join them.

 

How did you get your idea/what was the initial spark?

​I had enjoyed the process of editing A TYRANNY OF PETTICOATS and the publishing team so much that I wanted to edit a second historical anthology with them. This time I wanted to focus on women who were outside the norm in their communities, whether by virtue of race, sexuality, religion, disability, or the profession they were pursuing. And I wanted to seek out more authors who shared marginalized identities with their characters. In A TYRANNY OF PETTICOATS, many of our heroines were brave in big, adventurous ways – robbing banks to feed their families during the Depression or running a saloon in the lawless Alaskan frontier. In THE RADICAL ELEMENT, they’re brave in quieter, more personal ways as they learn what it is they’re willing to fight for, whether they want to explode tradition or embrace it.

 

What steps did you take from idea to proposal?

​I was lucky in that I had a very positive pre-existing relationship with my Candlewick editors, so I proposed this in a very informal way. It was just a paragraph-length ​pitch and a list of authors I wanted to approach.

Did you use an agent? If you didn’t use an agent, how did you find a publisher?

​Yes, I have a fabulous agent, Jim McCarthy at Dystel, Goderich, and Bourret. He sent the proposal to our acquiring editors at Candlewick, Hilary Van Dusen and Miriam Newman.

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How did you find your writers?

​All of my authors are folks whose work I’d admired. Some of them (Erin Bowman, Mackenzi Lee, Stacey Lee, Meg Medina, Megan Shepherd, Sarvenaz Tash) had written historical fiction I loved. Others had written primarily contemporary fiction (Dahlia Adler, Sara Farizan, Marieke Nijkamp) but I was an enormous fan of their work and was purposely seeking out more intersectional authors this time around. And then there were Dhonielle Clayton and Anna-Marie McLemore, whose work I love, and whose skill in fantasy world-building I suspected would translate beautifully to historical fiction.

 

How did writers pick their story or essay topic ideas? What process did you as editor use to vet them?

I asked each author to send me a brief, paragraph-length pitch. The parameters were as follows: the story needed to be ​​between 5000-7000 words and setting needed to play a strong role; each story needed to feel like it couldn’t take place anywhere or anywhen else. I used the pitches to ensure that we didn’t have five stories about girls cross-dressing as boys or four stories set during the 1920s. There was one conflict with two pitches that were too close in theme and would have appeared next to each other chronologically, so I asked the author who had turned in her pitch last to rethink it, and she came up with a fantastic, powerful new idea.

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As an editor, were you responsible for contracts between you and your writers? Did your publisher or agent handle the administrative/legal side of things?

​​I am enormously grateful that Candlewick handled all of the contracts, payments, and tax paperwork for the authors. I know that is somewhat unusual.

 

How did the editing process work between you and your writers?

I sent each writer an edit letter, noting things I loved and thought were working well in each story, and asking questions about things I thought were unclear or could be strengthened. At this stage it’s about the big picture: setting, character motivations, conflict, stakes, pacing. I made suggestions, but tried to emphasize that it’s the author’s call which suggestions to implement and which suggestions to use as a starting point to find a different solution. The authors revised. Then I did a round or two of line edits, focusing in more on the prose and tweaking pacing and character as needed. The authors revised accordingly, and then we were off to copyedits!

Money talk: how did you get paid for your work? ​

I got an advance from the publisher. I was paid half of it after we signed the contract, and half when the manuscript was accepted (when it went to copyedits).

 

How did your writers get paid? ​

If the sum total that the publisher paid for the book was X, I received half of X and the writers got the other half of X, split twelve ways, paid directly from the publisher. (I also got paid for my story.)

 

What role did you take on as editor of the anthology? Were you hands on? Hands off?

I was hands on, but I was also lucky to have the support and guidance of our Candlewick editors. They sent me a paragraph or two of big-picture thoughts on each story, which I incorporated and extrapolated into my edit letters along with my own thoughts and questions.  They each did some light line-editing of the stories too, though I did the bulk of it. It’s fantastic to be able to compare notes and bounce ideas off them. Reading is so subjective; it makes me more confident knowing that I’m approaching our authors with a consensus of what is working and what isn’t yet.

How did you communicate with your writers? What sort of information did you share with them and how?

I email them. I’m definitely a fan of sharing information (like positive trade reviews) as they come in. I’m very aware that they’re all working on other projects, and many of them have families and day jobs too, so I try not to email too often, and I try to be very clear about what I need and when I need it by.

Where and how did you decide to include your own work in the collection?

I knew I’d include a story of my own, but I tend to decide what it will be once I’ve collected all of the pitches, so it can fill any gaps in chronology. We had a really big gap this time between 1863 and 1923, so I decided to set my story in 1905 Tulsa. Which worked out well for the heyday of the traveling circus.

Where and how did you come to “direct” the anthology? Did you have an idea of how you wanted pieces to progress early on or did you wait until all pieces were available to you to begin constructing the collection?

The clear choice for us was to organize the story chronologically; that’s how TYRANNY was organized as well. The stories start in 1838 Savannah with a Jewish girl seeking a religious education forbidden to women, and end in 1984 Boston with an Iranian American immigrant who joins a feminist punk band.

How involved was your editor/publisher throughout the creation process, prior to turning in a manuscript?

I went into this a little bit above, but basically: they weighed in with big-picture thoughts, did some light line-editing, answered my questions, and advised me through any hiccups with the contributors. They never emailed the authors directly; I served as the intermediary. I conveyed notes, reminded authors of upcoming deadlines, and kept the authors apprised of any news (cover, jacket copy, on-sale date, etc).

When it came to the package of your anthology, how much say did you have in the cover or design? How much were contributors involved in that part of the process? ​

I didn’t see a cover it was close to final – but when I did get to see it, I was wowed. I love the pink and yellow; I think it’ll really pop on shelves. I love the girl’s silhouette and the way her hair blows forward; to me it symbolizes progress and momentum, and looks a bit more modern than the silhouette for TYRANNY. So while I wasn’t involved in the design process, I had absolute trust in the team at Candlewick and that trust was totally rewarded. I did help write the jacket copy though! The contributors were not involved, but hopefully they are as pleased with the packaging as I am.

 

What was your favorite part of the anthology creation process?

​I​ love the editing process. I love being able to gauge the strengths and weaknesses of a piece and having a sense of what questions to ask the author to help make the story stronger. I love getting a revision that just nails it – especially when they address my questions in an unexpected but brilliant way.

What was your least favorite part? ​

Hitting “send” on edits! There really is almost as much nervousness in sending an edit letter as in receiving one. I know it can be tricky to get constructive criticism, especially from a colleague. Fortunately, all my authors are gracious and wonderful to work with. But I’m always nervous anyhow.​

 

What were some of the biggest lessons you as an editor learned in creating an anthology?

I didn’t want to assign any author a specific subject/setting, and I don’t want to assume that any author will only want to write characters that share their own marginalization. But I realized at the end of the editing process for THE RADICAL ELEMENT that despite having six authors who identify as queer, we don’t have any stories that feature a f/f romance. I’ve seen that some reviewers are disappointed about that, which is totally valid. Next time I would try to make sure during the pitch process that we didn’t have any obvious gaps in representation.

 

What were some of the biggest successes?

​I’ve been thrilled by our trade reviews so far. We got a starred review from Kirkus that said, “A needed collection to broaden understanding of the many different faces of history.” School Library Journal said, “This collection is extremely informative, intersectional, and inspirational, and will be sure to spark dialogue. Recommended for all young adult collections.”

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If you are working on another anthology, what made you want to try your hand at it again? What, if any, parts of the process are/were different in the next project?

​My next anthology, TOIL & TROUBLE: 15 STORIES OF WOMEN & WITCHCRAFT, will be out August 28. I love editing, and I find the collaborative nature of anthologies super satisfying, so I knew I wanted to do a third (and now I’d love to do a fourth!). TOIL & TROUBLE was different because I had a co-editor, Tess Sharpe, and we were working with a different publisher (HarlequinTeen).

 

Anything else you’d like to add?

​I’m often asked what I hope readers will take away from THE RADICAL ELEMENT, and it is this: I hope that they will notice that the voices of women – especially women of color and queer women and disabled women – are often missing from our traditional history lessons, and they will ask themselves why, and then ask themselves how they can boost those voices now. And I hope my young readers especially will remember that their voices are important and that it’s vital to speak up.

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Want more posts in the “Anatomy of a YA Anthology?” You can read the previous posts here.