City of the Uncommon Thief by Lynne Bertrand hits shelves THIS TUESDAY! This dark and intricate fantasy follows the story of a quarantined city gripped by fear and of the war that can free it. If you absolutely love to get lost in a deep, complex fantasy book, we hope you’ve marked your calendar for this one.

But that got us thinking: how does an author create such a detailed fantasy world? Luckily, Lynne Bertrand had answers! Scroll down to read how she created the world of City of the Uncommon Thief and a few things she learned along the way.

Hi, Penguin Teen Followers! My fantasy novel CITY OF THE UNCOMMON THIEF comes out this week! You could say CITY is a vertical epic, as the whole tale plays out in one nameless, quarantined city, from the mile-high guild tower roofs to the dark undermines. No map, no calendar. And all kinds of trouble is afoot. Errol and Odd Thebes, runners on the roofs,  are caught up in it. So is the mysterious morgue dweller, Jamila Foundling. I won’t be giving too much away to say the three have stumbled upon the tools that release the animal “other.” This week the reviewer at BookPage called CITY “genre-defying fiction at its finest … a book that knows no fear.” When someone says that about your writing, you spend the rest of the day in a state of gratitude. The same reviewer also said readers “should prepare for two hurdles” before they begin this book: The writing is dense and tricky, and the writer doesn’t explain every last thing. These are true facts. In the end I hope the hurdles become part of the pleasure for you, of coming to know the city and its inhabitants.

I work in the music business and am backstage for much of my life. Huge ideas, wildass language, and a fearless roar are very often found in the work of daring young writers and players. I’ve learned courage backstage. In writing CITY I faced questions I could not otherwise understand, about good and evil, infectious love and gaping-wound hate, and what we do when we have something insanely powerful in our hands. I’d love to know what you make of these questions and of the answers these actors offer. Anyway, it’s a big week for me. Thanks for being out there — LB

Things I learned, while writing CITY OF THE UNCOMMON THIEF. 

I learned: 

… to build a repository of ideas. Newspaper clippings, scraps of poetry, odd facts, old words, narrative photographs, portraits, surprising art, random ideas. This notebook became Central Casting. A mood board. Fertile soil for narrative. 

… to establish rituals, in order to understand characters. For example the guilders in CITY are all marked with the tatu of the tower where they live and work. The marks have big significance on the roofs of the city. At first I ignored the fact that they would have a whole different meaning, or get a different reaction, on the streets. This particular crow, btw, was drawn by the real tattoo artist Rick Beaupre.

… that old ideas are frequently more helpful than new ones. For example, check out the sketches of Giovanni Battista, He could see the faces of animals in people and vice versa. His images, 400 years old,  infused my understanding of the character of Odd’s da, Slyngel Thebes, who sees things he wishes he didn’t.

…  to experience the story through every actor, not just the leads. Take a look at the bullfight here. We have heard the bullfighter’s story. But look at the face of that bull. He’s totally taken by surprise at what’s going on here. In my understanding, he is wondering, Wait, will anyone help me? Why are people cheering? 

… to relish the details. It was tempting for me to think mostly about a thousand guild towers and a wall. But what do runners eat for breakfast, or wear to keep warm in skyscraping winds? What soap, card games, dance music? That photo on the left is an old ditty bag, hand-sewn by a sailor. This became the prevailing image for a tellensac, the bag worn on the belt of every guilder, containing the relics of their life so far. 

… to listen closely in all of life, in order to write with precision. Here are two quick lines which express the exquisite loneliness of missing home. 

… to use other languages besides the “common tongue” with restraint. On the first draft of this manuscript, I went overboard, thinking that a wide range of languages, practically on every page, added street cred. But it was actually just overwhelming. In the end I took most of it out, and used a spare phrase of some other language–Portuguese, Latin, Sanskrit, Old English– to add depth or emotion to a scene. And still there were 500 words we had to figure out how to pronounce for the production of the audio book. 

… to look everywhere for epic characters. This young woman has all the power of a roof runner–totally hardcore. In the next image over, the dog grieving her human is another kind of powerful.

… to let things get big. I had originally written a small city, with low guilds. Making it a thousand guilds, all a mile high, gave the story room to expand. I drew this bit of the city at the art department’s request. The brilliant artist Francesca Baerald took it from here, using this as a reference for her beautiful Gallia District map at the beginning of CITY. 

… to add a constant supply of humor. Even the darkest moments of plot can be lightened if someone remembers to be funny.

City of the Uncommon Thief is out 2/9! Order your copy here

February is full of amazing reads! See what’s hitting shelves this month here