I could be shooting myself in the foot, but in some ways, I feel I've said all I've needed to say when to comes to, say, the 'X-Men.' I think I've hit the bright points, I think I've hit what I wanted to hit, and I can be happy moving on doing other things.
I love writing romance, along with science fiction and fantasy - and my books usually meld all three to some degree.
Individual writers can certainly make a difference, but they are working within a system, an institution, that still holds tremendous power over whose voices are heard and whose voices are rewarded.
I was going to be a lawyer, and I had studied hard, but then it suddenly occurred to me in a very deep, profound way that I didn't want to keep practicing law for the rest of my life.
My dad is Chinese, and my mom is a white American, and they married only ten years after the United States Supreme Court ruled that it was illegal to ban mixed marriages. Imagine that. Marriages between people of different races - now common and accepted - were illegal in many states up until the late Sixties.
Part of the reason why my folks - why any immigrant family - wants their kids to go into law or medicine is because there's the promise of reliable work. That's a powerful idea that got hammered into my head growing up: Be this thing, or else you'll starve.
I wanted to be her; I wanted to write her. Red Sonja became anchored in my imagination like a mountain.
Han Solo has always been - and I think for a lot of people, too - this iconic character who's the absolute definition of cool.
I think when you look at the diversity of the readership, all the different people who love comics, I want comics to reflect the real world, and I think Marvel does a good job of trying to do that, but I don't think there's ever an end point when it comes to creating diversity and creating stories that people can relate to.
I had my dreams, and even though everyone told me that they weren't practical, I knew in my heart that this is what I had to do. Even if it ended up being a failure, I had to make the attempt.
Superheroes are the best of us. Never mind all those powers or the crazy costumes. The heart of a superhero is meant to inspire.
Most of the female 'superhero' role models of my childhood came from novels, and they rarely had powers. Take Dorothy, for example, from 'The Wizard of Oz;' or Laura Ingalls and her sisters in the 'Little House on the Prairie' novels.
Muscles are fleeting. Bodies give out. But integrity, honor? The confidence to be oneself, to follow one's heart? The compassionate drive to help others, even at great risk? That's strength.
People either fall into two camps, where they're pro-fanfic, or they're anti-fanfic. I would not have had the skills to write and publish my first novel if I hadn't been writing fanfic.
To all the young kids of color - and not so young - people who want to use their voices, who are thinking, 'This seems difficult because I don't see myself out there,' I tell you, you must be persistent because we need you. We need you so, so badly.
'Monstress' has been hard because I want to keep writing longer, but I can't.
I didn't know how to write comics. I had to teach myself.
I had never been a comic book person before, really, because I had no access to them. Once I had access, I thought that these are just another avenue for telling stories and delving into the imagination.
When I'm writing comics, I'm also visualizing how the story will look on the page - not even always art-wise, but panel-wise, like how a moment will be enhanced dramatically by simply turning a page and getting a reveal. It requires thinking about story in a way I never had to consider when I was writing prose.
I got into comics because I wrote an 'X-Men' novel for Pocket Books, and I introduced myself to the head of recruitment at Marvel. I'd heard through the grapevine they liked the book, so that gave me the courage to go up to them and be like, 'Hey, if you ever need a writer, here I am.'
