Giselle Vriesen (she/they) is an author living on Halalt First Nations land on Vancouver Island. Her debut YA fantasy novel Why We Play with Fire was released in February of 2024 through Row House Publishing, distributed by Simon and Schuster. She is currently working on the sequel. Giselle is also the co-creator of the Anti-Racism Course for Educators, teaches writing through her course Book Baby which encourages marginalized writers to decolonize through storytelling, and has been a professional tarot reader for nearly a decade.
Why We Play with Fire is a thrilling journey of self-discovery and magical intrigue. Thea finds herself transported to a house for the children of gods where she must retrieve lost keys while navigating secrets, rival schools, and her own doubts, all before the shadow creatures catch up to her.
Interviewed by Isabel Jones
Isabel Jones (IJ): There’s a lot going on in Why We Play with Fire! Tell us about your interest in the many cultural mythologies that permeate your book and why you chose to set your story in this milieu.
Giselle Vriesen (GV): Because I’m mixed race—Black, Chinese, and white—growing up I never found a book that encompassed my mixed identity until I wrote WWPWF. The inspiration for WWPWF was for it to be a reflection of my ancestral roots, and my main character is the same mix as my mother, who until I wrote it had never seen a character with the same background as her.
(IJ): You grew up as your heroine Thea does, somewhat remotely on Vancouver Island. How much does Thea’s journey reflect your own—magic artifacts and world jumping aside?
(GV): I rooted the beginning of the book in a very close representation to my experiences out here, though I wouldn’t call it autobiographical by any means. I changed the descriptions of certain landmarks to set the story adjacent to life but not an exact copy. I really wanted it to have the texture of reality so that when we went into fantasy it was satisfying.
My reflection of the culture is quite accurate to the experience a lot of black people are having on the island presently, distilled, though again—not autobiographical.
(IJ): I’m always curious about the level of planning it must take to create fantasy worlds. In Why We Play with Fire there are several different worlds, each with complex cultural detail. How did you map out each of those and imbue them with their distinct personalities?
(GV): Before going into this project, I was totally unconnected to my cultural roots and the mythologies of my ancestors. I still have so much to learn.
I wanted this book to hold the wonder of the mythologies that, because of colonialism, I was cut off from. The interesting thing about myth is that while it’s as ancient as language it’s at its core culturally informed fiction. Mythologies are the stories that a culture held itself together with. So, when I wrote WWPWF I took it as an opportunity to continue the legacy of myth making by breathing in the lessons and excitements that stirred my life at the time, knit together with my multicultural experience—because that’s what myth is for—passing on wisdom, filling in with our own interpretation.
So, I lead from that space of cultural reclamation and expanded both classic interpretations of the worlds I expressed and my own take too in as integrated a way as I could, over many editing phases and stages.
(IJ): As a former school librarian, I believe that literature can broaden readers’ understanding of the world, provide perspective on others’ points of view, and can help develop insights into the human condition. What are the big messages or ideas you hope readers will take from your story?
(GV): All parts of you belong and matter. Listen to your intuition.
(IJ): I was fascinated to learn that you come from four generations of intuitive tarot readers. How does this lineage of wisdom and insight manifest in your writing—the content and the process?
(GV): I come from a lineage of readers, though I’m the first in a long while to use tarot as my medium. That connection manifests in my writing process by helping me intuitively move through the creative blocks that come up for me around writing as a black woman; blocks around belonging, being seen, being honest, and more. It manifests in the content by helping me feel my way through the details and planning of the book, getting into my character’s headspace, and connecting plot points/filling in holes during editing.
I also write magical stories, which is definitely thematically informed by my magical upbringing.