LITITZ, Pa. — Author A.S. King loves Pennsylvania so much that when she moved to Ireland for a decade, she planted a cornfield in the shape of the Keystone State.
If that love letter wasn’t enough to prove her affection, the writer also sets all of her books in Pennsylvania, including the FOX43 Book Club's June pick, “Ask the Passengers.”
“It’s kind of a feel good book, and it might be familiar because, you know, that's the one thing about setting things in Pennsylvania," King said. "There's certain things that will feel kind of familiar, I think, to readers honestly all over the country, but I feel like Pennsylvanians get it even more.”
The novel is one of King's first and was inspired by her childhood hobby: sending love to the airplanes passing overhead.
“I used to just send my love and kind of, like, send a vibe," King said. "I know it sounds really cosmic for a 6-year-old, but I was a cosmic 6-year-old. So I used to just send vibes to the passengers and I also really wished that one day I would be somebody in one of those planes, and now I travel pretty much for a living, so I ended up that person, which is pretty cool.”
A two-time Printz award winner, King has an unconventional writing style.
“I'm known for writing very weird books and surrealist books, or that kind of thing," she said. "I'm a little bit of a weirdo in that way."
The method by which her books go from concept to written page is a bit unusual as well.
“Basically I go in and I let my unconscious write the story. Usually I follow a character, so my unconscious comes up with a character. It's usually connected to a feeling, connected to an experience, connected to something about society—let's say I don't really feel great about or I want to explore, right? And then that becomes personified, becomes a character. Then I get to follow the character, who of course is on the same journey as I am, which is to find out more, right, about this thing that I’m curious about.”
The writer constantly finds herself asking questions about the world and society--and often, the question leads to a novel.
“Curiosity is actually—I think—the most important human trait altogether. If everybody's telling you how to think, be careful because you're supposed to figure it out yourself.
“There's a lot of stuff now that's out there in the world that's just very, just very, very strict," King said. "‘This is how you should think.’ ‘This is how I feel.’ ‘This is…’ and it's just sort of like instead of having statements, why don't we have more questions? And that's what a writer is, right? That's every single book I have. I'm looking at the whole library here. Every single one of them was born from a question. And in the end, you know, sometimes the answer isn't what I expected.”
Once the author has a draft written, it's time to head to the cutting room floor. She estimates that about half of the original draft is changed in some way before publication.
“But usually, it’s really funny, like my prologues, that first line, that first chunk or those first chapters, they usually don't change much at all, because that's what that's what got me there," King shared. "And it's the same thing that gets the reader there.”
When King was in eighth grade, she decided she wanted to write books that helped adults and teenagers understand each other.
“Like all I wanted to do was, I don't know, write stuff for other people to read and feel like I felt, you know, because the feeling is so important to me and emotions are really important," she explained. "And then it turned out I ended up really getting good at it, which is really cool.
“Honestly, in our culture, we have been trained to bully teenagers. We've been trained to put them down, put down what they like, put down what they wear, how they do their hair, the music, everything.”
The author pens books that appeal to both teenagers and adults, as well as some middle-grade fiction novels for a younger audience.
“We all see ourselves in what we read or the songs we listen to or whatever," she said. "There is a connection. That's the reason art is made.”
When she's not writing, King can be found visiting schools around the country to talk about mental health, self-esteem, facing trauma and pretty much every topic under the sun.
“But then I get to hang out with young people, and they teach me a lot," she said. "I learn a lot from young people. I’d say I learn more from them than they learn from me.”
She advocates for aspiring writers to meet as many people as possible through volunteering or traveling.
“And once you meet more people who are on the struggle and who are different to you, the more empathetic you become," King pointed out. "And a writer is technically an empathy machine. That's what we do with our words, we try to get other people to understand people different to them inside of the book, and that is the goal for me. So the more people you meet that you didn't understand 10 years ago, the better writer you're going to be.”
Although King hopes her books help people reach a deeper level of understanding, she says none of her novels have a definitive message.
“I like to trust my audience to have the intelligence to have critical thinking skills, you know, and stick their own story together,” King said.
“With ‘Ask the Passengers,’ I think there was, I wanted to talk about love, and I wanted to focus specifically on just love and that who you love doesn't really matter," she added. "What matters is that you love and that you don't go around hating people, and to look at two different types of people and go ‘this person's really into love and this person's not,’ and ‘look at how unhappy this person is’ and ‘look at how happy this person is’ and just sort of put it right out there, but never give a message. My idea is really to leave the puzzle pieces for the reader to put them together.”
King will release her next book, "Pick the Lock," on Sept. 24.
Those who want to keep up with the author can follow along with King on her website, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. King talks more about her book, writing process, life and advice for up-and-coming authors in the full interview below:
Next month, the Book Club will read “Romancing the Pages” by Kristin Anderson Iwancio.