Ally’s Comments (group member since Mar 05, 2013)

Ally’s comments from the Ask Ally Condie - Tuesday, March 12th! group.

Everyone, thank you so much for your questions! I have to call it a night, but I am very grateful to you for participating in this chat. I tried to answer as many questions as I could and I wish I'd been able to get to everyone.

That said, I did answer a LOT of the most frequently asked questions. If you wanted to know whether or not there will be a movie of MATCHED, if I'm writing anything new, if there will be any more books in the MATCHED trilogy, how I deal with writer's block, where I found the characters' names, what my inspiration was for the series, or whether any characters were based on people from real life, you can find those answers (and many more too!) by scrolling through the discussion.

Thanks again to all of you wonderful readers and to Goodreads for this chat! It's been a lot of fun.

xo
Ally

Dianna wrote: "Hi Ally,
I am a Middle School Media Clerk. Your books are a huge hit with our students. I have read the first two, and am currently reading the third book. One concept you brought out was the elim..."

My fascination with the eradication of writing actually came about because my husband, who is very educated, cannot write cursive. The school district never taught him so he never took the time to learn. Which makes sense--it can be a tedious process. And then, as a teacher, I realized that we were losing much of our need for/ability to write by hand. So I thought I would take that to extremes in the book. Thanks for this question! :)

Juliette wrote: "Dear Mrs. Condie, I just have one question: when you were finished writing the books, were you sad and stoppe writing or did you write doodads just to keep busy?"

When I finished writing the series, I started writing another book. Actually, I started writing two more books. :) I have so many ideas and not enough time to write them all down!

Mrs. Gilbert wrote: "Hi Ms. Condie,

I would love to know where you would send Cassia and the gang if you were to add a fourth book. We have been discussing this in class and want to know what you suppose.

Also, thank..."

I don't have any plans for a fourth book, but I love that you have been thinking about it in class! I do think that a fourth book might take us to the Otherlands, but that's about all I dare say since I'm not planning to write one. And I love even more that your students have been enjoying the books! Will you tell them how much I adore hearing that? :)

Claudia wrote: "What do you do when you have writer's block?"

I have several tricks for writer's block. First, I always have a second project I'm playing around with (which I call my "back burner" project, like the back burner on a stove). So, when my main project misbehaves, I can go mess around in my other project and sometimes that gets me unstuck.

Second, I go for a walk or a run. When I'm outside, my mind clears up and I like to get moving. I don't try to think about the book while I'm out. I let my mind be entirely clear (I also don't listen to music). That really helps.

Third, I tell myself that if these other two things aren't working, I have to take a break. I'll say, "You can't work on this book for a week!" And the first day or two without working on it might feel pretty good. But, almost every time, I want to get back to it before the week is up. Either I think of a solution to the block or I just want to roll up my sleeves and dig back in.

If none of these things work, then it might mean I'm trying to tell the wrong story. This happened to me once. It turned out that the "back burner" project was the one I really should have been working on all along, so I made that switch. ;)

Hope that helps!

Yoda wrote: "Wow, this is so awesome. I've always wanted to ask an author something. Okay, so how do you develop such a beautifully flowing, poetic writing style? Do you read or practice certain things? Als..."

This is a really nice thing for you to say. I do practice in that I've been writing all my life and I've been writing every day for the past ten years. But the flow of the writing really comes from the voice of the character, and it ends up feeling very natural when it happens. In Cassia's case, her voice came to me as I worked on the first chapter, which was nice.

I do read things aloud after I write them to see how they sound. How the words look on the page is the first thing I notice, but then I also care how they sound when spoken. I think this helps me because you can really hear the awkward parts and fix them when you're reading out loud!

Jesse wrote: "Hey Ally! As I read your books, I kept wondering... if someone living in the Society was gay, how would they be matched? Since matches were pretty focused on creating kids, would gay people simply ..."

The Society, as you know, is not good. And so they've made things very homogenous. You can infer from the Matching system that the Matches are between male and female, and everyone else who felt differently or who would have preferred a different kind of Match was marginalized. As is, sadly, the case in our own society all too often.

And yes, your assumption about singles is correct. Great questions/inferences!

Angel of Death wrote: "Hi, Ally!
I think your writing is amazing, and the best word to describe it is beautiful. It's probably one of the most well-written stories I've read. "

Thank you! And regarding the lack of combat--although war is scary and the stakes are high, I also feel like there are other things that (to me, at least) are just as frightening. Like a plague no one can solve, which is why I put the Plague in REACHED. (This might be the mom in me--I can't imagine helplessly watching my loved ones suffer and die from something for which there is no cure. It's my worst nightmare.)

I do love action in stories--and I put a war and bombing and a lot of death in CROSSED--but to me the most interesting moments happen when you find out WHY people are doing what they do and where it all began. What their motivations are. So that's what I focused most of the series on--that kind of internal tension that leads to external events, like the Plague and the firings and, on a smaller level, the choice Cassia has to make between the two boys. :)

Shay wrote: "Hi Ally,

I was wondering if you could talk about the role of feminism in your series. I really appreciated the way you used a love triangle, but still emphasized Cassia's right to make her own dec..."

Thank you for this question! I wanted Cassia to be strong and make her own decision, as you mentioned. I also felt that it was important that she was calling the shots. SPOILER ALERT: So, that was why everything turned out the way it did in REACHED regarding the sorting.

Although Cassia is a quiet girl, I wanted to show that she was proactive. She was the one who found her way to the canyon to look for Ky--she was the one who chose the Rising. Not all of her decisions turned out perfectly, but they were all HERS. I hope that came through to readers.

Rebecca wrote: "Hey Ally!
How did you come up with the idea of the pilot and the rolling of the rock? Also are you currently writing another book? If so what is it about? :)

Becca"

I came up with the idea for the Pilot from two places--first, from the Tennyson poem in MATCHED that mentions the Pilot, and second, from the myth of Sisyphus (also mentioned in MATCHED). I decided to combine those two stories/poems and make that person into the leader of the Rising, and then I wrote my own origin story about the Pilot (it's the one that appears in CROSSED and REACHED). It was a lot of fun to do!

Mary wrote: "Dear Ally,
Firstly, will you ever possibly ever write a short story/e-book about Bran? He was definitely my favorite character and I missed him!
Secondly, I realize you left the ending vague on pu..."

I do love Bram too. He was a lot of fun to write. I think he definitely has his own story, and while I have no plans to write it now, I wouldn't rule that out. Never say never.

And thank you for the compliment about the playlists for the books! It's so fun to put those together.

Angie wrote: "Hi Ally! I'm a middle school librarian and my kids and I both loved the series. One question is left for us: Why did the Society keep the tissue samples? I know it was told that some groups used i..."

I have a few theories behind this. The first reason they kept the tissue samples was the one you mentioned--as collateral, as something to hang over its citizens' heads.

Another reason I think the Society kept the samples is because I think the Society truly believed in their own power/brilliance. I think the Society DID think they could bring people back someday, and that's another reason they went to all the trouble to store the samples. They didn't have the technology yet, but they thought they'd develop it at some point.

And then, of course, when things started to go south for them, they couldn't spare all the resources they'd once hoped to use in discovering that technology.

Hope that helps! Again, much of this is not on the page of the books, but it's my own personal thoughts on the matter. :)

Melainebooks wrote: "Dear Ally Condie,
I wanted to know if you named Ky "Markham" in reference to Gilbert Markham from Anne Brontë's novel "The Tenant of Wildfell Hall" ? If it's so, why did you do that ?
Thanks for an..."

I didn't, actually! I haven't read THE TENANT OF WILDFELL HALL. But that's very fun to know there's a Markham in that story too. :)

Amanda wrote: "What an honor it is to speak with you today Mrs. Condie. I have read and own all of your books and I loved every min. reading them. I would like to know if you base your characters off of real peop..."

I answered some of these other questions in my longer responses, but I wanted to answer your question about CROSSED. Yes, I think Cassia needed that journey in CROSSED to become the kind of person who does what she does in REACHED. If she'd never left her family or had to survive on her own, then she couldn't have created the gallery, and she wouldn't have loved Ky as much or known him as well.

I call Cassia's journey "coming through the canyon" and I think we all have canyons (or mountains, or whatever metaphor you prefer!) that we have to come through alone. And we emerge different people.

Sahvana wrote: "Dear Ally,

First off, I loved the book. It was one of the few series that had me completely satisfied at the end. But to the point, have you ever thought about the "after"? Like, what happens ne..."

This is a really thoughtful, excellent set of questions. Yes, I do have ideas about what happens "after." Lots of ideas, in fact. And I thought about writing an epilogue. But in the end, it just felt right to end the story where we did--knowing who Cassia chose, knowing that they were able to change their world--but also leaving some things open to the reader.

I sometimes say that the end--SPOILER ALERT--is up to you. And it tells a little bit about you when you say who you think won the election in the end. I find that really fun. I love asking readers who they think won the election and their reasoning for that.

Sabrina wrote: "How long did it take you to complete your first book?"

It took me eighteen months to complete the first full draft of my first book. And then I had to revise it. I've gotten faster since then, but I'm definitely a slower writer than many of my peers. A book a year feels like the right pace for me and my writing process--I'm thinking about it and working on it daily, but it's not a rushed, crazy situation. I know other authors are a lot faster and I think that's awesome. But I'm learning to be okay with my own process too. :)

Lena wrote: "hello ally! Greetings from Argentina!
I have to ask ... ever thought that your book would do so well known and would be translated and read in other countries? and that would have so many fans? hav..."

I had no idea MATCHED would be sold in foreign countries, or that it would hit the bestseller list. It has all been so wonderful and unreal. It makes me happy to know that people in other countries read the book. And I think your English is wonderful!

I really appreciate anyone who recommends the books to their friends. That's a huge honor.

Anna wrote: "Is writing a novel difficult? Specifically for you? I've been told that for some people it is difficult, while for others it seems simple."

Writing a novel for me is hard work. It's also very fun. There are days when it feels like I never want to stop and other days when it's hard to get started. I think it's like any creative process--there's a certain amount of inspiration and also a certain amount of just pushing through and doing your best.

Meiyu wrote: "Did you just write and think of ideas for the book as u went along??Or did you think of who's going to die what's doing to happen before u started writing?Because i'm writing my own book and my big..."

I definitely get ideas as I write. It is okay not to know everything when you start--it's great to have a few big ideas, and some scenes you're really excited about writing--but I've found that I also get lots of my ideas as I go along. :)

Rachel wrote: "Hi Rachel here:) me and my friend have some questions...

Was Lei's appearance inspired by people of Hawaiian or Filipino ethnicity? What caused you to create the character this way? Was it possibl..."

I can't answer all the questions (love them, though!) but I can answer this first one. Yes. Lei is. I have a niece and a nephew who are of Pacific Islander descent and so my intent was to include a bit of that heritage in the story. In my mind, Ky is also of Pacific Islander descent. His last name--Finnow--is a modernized/Society-changed version of the name Finau.