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- [00:25]
A
Hi, friends. I'm Will and it's not story time. It's time for an interview with one of the authors who makes Storytime. This week we had an incredibly wonderful conversation with Andrea Chapella, who wrote as one listens to the Rain, that really beautiful, beautiful love story set in the lake that is above what used to be Mexico City. It's just incredible. She is such a wonderful voice. We talked a lot about Latin American science fiction and what the experience of growing up in Latin America means for science fiction in Central and South America. And she introduced me to the existence of untranslated Spanish language science fiction, which is a growing genre that I'm excited to listen to. And I kind of think you might be too after you hear our conversation. Thought that I should let you all know if you're watching this on wherever we put the video up, there is a cat tax paid in this video and you'll be very happy about it. So that's enough of me. Here's some more of me and Andrea. Take it away, the two of you from before Foreign. Welcome. I am so grateful to be chatting with you. I absolutely love as one listens to the Ring. It's such a beautiful and wonderfully haunting story for me to go through. Like the whole thing was gorgeous and I would love to for you to share with us where this story came from and what your experience was like while you were developing it.
- [02:00]
B
It's a special story. I wrote that story at Clarion West. I was at Clarion west in 2017, the summer of 2017. It was a story that I wrote first in English for Clarion and it was one of the middle stories, like week four or something. And then I came back home and I translated it to Spanish and worked on it in Spanish. And then I reworked the English and went back and forth. And then I worked with Emma Turch was in clearing with me and she is the one that ended up translating the real version in English. What I remember is I was at one of the Clearing west parties talking to a friend and telling him how I have always been. Maybe haunted is a good word by this idea of the lake that used to be in Mexico City and how it was supposed to look. And I really wanted to write. I like I usually try to put that image of the lake coming back somewhere in every book I write. But then I he was like, I think you should try and write it for Clarion and see how it works. And I think one of the strangest tidbits of I don't know Clarion lore is that I wrote this story and in front of me sat Alyssa Greenblatt, who is also a writer.
- [03:13]
A
Wow.
- [03:13]
B
And we always joke the same story because she also wrote a story that happens at the end of the world with the girls at a lake. But her is very different. Yeah. It was like we were sharing the same brain while we wrote it.
- [03:25]
A
I have this idea in my head that there are these story ideas that desperately need to be told and they just throw themselves against the window of where all of the writers happen to be. And the story just grabs. A writer goes, you're gonna tell me now. And sometimes two writers happen to be looking through the glass at the same time and hear the same thing and go, cool, we're gonna do this. Did you always know that this was. There's such a beautiful love story in this. Was that always part of it?
- [03:57]
B
Yes. I'm very big on outlining. And because I was writing in English, I usually. That was the first and only time in my life I've written directly into English during Clarion because Finnish is my first language. But then I would outline way more because I had too little time. And I knew, for me, I knew two things about the story. One, that there was this lake that came back and that I thought it was a beautiful image in the. Describing the city. And the cityscape would be needed to be very evocative. But then I also wanted to write a story that would. The structure is. That would be in the point of view of one of the girls. And then in the keys, it would switch points of view. Like, it would be in omniscient. And then it would switch points of view and exit in the other point of view. So I knew that I had like. Okay, so it's a very mirror like story. So I had that structure. So the idea that it was a story about two girls having a date was always ingrained into the story. And it was more how to make that weird S shape work and also how to. Because it's a very. I think it's one of my most well known stories, either in English or in Spanish. And it had. It always surprised me because I always thought it was such a quiet story where nothing really happens to girls. Have a date. But I. It has surprised me in a very good way that a story that seems so quiet on some of the small things has had like such. Yeah, like, people have recognized it as much. It has helped me a lot in what kind of fiction I want to do. And knowing that kind of like More quiet fiction works somehow also in science fiction.
- [05:33]
A
I want to highlight this for other people like me. Hopeful writers, baby writers. We're learning, we're developing. You just said something that blew my mind. It's just a story about two girls going on a date. Yes, but it's so much more than that. That's so beautifully layered. I got this sense that you have these two women that are from real different worlds. You've got the girl who lives up on the shore. That felt to me, oh, these are the rich people who live on the hill in the suburbs and they go to the country club. And then you've got a girl who lives in the city and it's just. It's a little bit more raw. And I felt like she has this connection to the lake and the city beneath it and everything we used to have here. Our heritage, our world. And you're giving it away, you're running away from it. I. We gotta stay and fight for it. We gotta take care of this. And I. That was just such a powerful theme for me, about loving and honoring our individual heritage and our culture and respecting the culture that was there before us. Did you intend or did I just pull that out of the air?
- [06:49]
B
I think it's there, but this is a story. The strange thing about this story is anyone who has come to the city or has grown up in the city knows about that. But also you grow up in a city that has all those layers inside it, right? Like you know that you are walking on something that was from another type civilization before and that is part of you and it isn't at the same time. And I don't know how much of this I thought. It's a lot that I have thought through the years because I always have this fantasy of returning and writing something longer in that setting. But what I always come back to is, yes, it's like modern day, what we believe is staying somehow has disappeared the same way that ancient civilizations have disappeared for us. And then you have to rebuild and decide what stays and what goes. And I think that's an interesting relationship, especially right now when it. It seems both that we are on the end of something, but also that our time is going to be eternal. Like I think those two feelings are in the world right now, that it could never end, capitalism and the way of life. But also that we're on the verge of something. And I think putting the story in the future after some kind of collapse, where life continues, where there is the possibility of two girls having a date, even if there was a big collapse, even if everything ended and it restarted, I think I knew more of the themes, but I have kept thinking about them and about how it is a hopeful story, even if it's about, yeah, the end of our world in some way.
- [08:30]
A
I was really drawn to the simple, quiet beauty of, look, it is the end of the world, but we're here together.
- [08:37]
B
Yeah.
- [08:38]
A
And I feel like every day right now is the end of the world. And to have that reminder that, yeah, it's the end of the world, but we are here together. And if it turns out that it's not the end of the world, we are here together, we can fight to make it better. Right. We can continue to prevent the end of the world. Are these themes that you explore in a lot of your writing? Because we're going back now, 2017, almost 10 years now. I'm sure you've grown a great deal as a writer since then, and you've done a lot since since then. Do you look back on this and are you cool? You're okay to like to leave it as it is? Do you want to tinker with it at all?
- [09:11]
B
I have kept exploring it. I have a novel, it came out in Spanish last year called Todo los Fines del Mundo, which I think roughly would translate like, all those ends of the world or all the ends of the world. And it's a story that takes a little bit of this thinking of. It's about love and it's about friendship and what is the difference between each other. But also it's about what happens to those feelings, what really matters at the end of the world? Like, it has this question throughout the book, like, who would you choose to be if the world ended? Who would you choose to spend it with? And so I continue to explore that. It's very important to me to continue to see how to explore what's happening with the natural world and with the climate crisis and what it does to. To fiction. I'm so intrigued by it that I'm doing a PhD, trying to see what happens to it.
- [10:04]
A
Oh, my gosh, that's amazing.
- [10:05]
B
It's a little bit of my obsession, especially in Latin American fiction and Latin American science fiction. I'm really intrigued by the idea of hope. And how do you integrate hope? Like, how do you. How not to write ends of the world that are completely apocalyptic and chaotic and horrible when there is nothing possible? How do you write a story that feels real but also opens up to a possibility? And I feel that it's a question that Latin American fiction is posing and that I want to bring also to science fiction.
- [10:38]
A
I feel like that just as an observer, you know, as. As an American who's learned as much as I can, a lot of what we're taught here isn't necessarily accurate. We have to really go looking to get the truth of things. The history of Latin America, Central and South America is just beating back colonizers over and over and over again. That seems like that would be generationally traumatic and that, that like a desire to stay connected to what was here before they showed up and started murdering people. Does that run through. Am I correct? Does that, does that inform like a Latin American science fiction?
- [11:16]
B
It does in different ways. There is the science fiction that it's more going to like. You have the science fiction that's very decolonizing and trying to figure out how to also how to write science fiction, which is a genre that is so obsessed with progress and technology and when those values are not the values at the core of your society is necessarily. Or how do you write science fiction then? And how do you write future? Like futurist. Like how do you imagine the future for places that have never been allowed to imagine their own future? Because it has always been given to them by the process, yes, of colonization by the Spanish empire so long ago, but also in so many ways in the 19th century and 21st century, just by the industry coming and taking everything and just mining and taking natural resources. Because at the end Latin America is so rich in natural resources. So what I have seen is that a topic that is right now that in the last 10 or 15 years has come into English language a lot like this. We are destroying the world, the natural world. What is going to happen? That theme just is in literature in Latin america from the 19th century and before, like Latin America has always been a place whose nature has always been very exuberant, very untamable, but also very exploited by outside forces.
- [12:47]
A
Yeah.
- [12:48]
B
And I think it is in so many ways not only in science fiction, but in so much of literary fiction too. Throughout the 20th century and right now I feel there is something for science fiction to say. What I've read and what I've seen, like science fiction, it's very. It's such a. It's not mainstream genre in Latin America. It's always on the fringes. And I think that has given it the power to be very contra cultural and very critical and with its own genre because it's always talking for a long time it was always in conversation with Anglo and American and English science fiction and reacting to it. But I feel in the last 10 years something has shifted. And I think Latin American science fiction is starting to look at itself and not so much of what's happening in English and just trying to create with the materials and the ideas we have here. I don't know. It's very exciting for me to be in the midst of it.
- [14:01]
A
How did you come to science fiction? What was your first exposure to the genre?
- [14:05]
B
I guess I came late in university. Yeah, I'm in the generation of fantasy, like Harry Potter or Twilight, like that generation. And I started writing and publishing very young. I published my first book when I was still in high school, when I was 18. And it was like a fantasy tetralogy and things like that. And then I started studying chemistry and I wanted to take more writing classes. So I took a class about. About fantasy and science fiction. And I read. I think the first book I read was Ender's Game. And then I just, I really liked it. It spoke to me as someone who was studying science a lot. And so I started reading a lot of the Silver and the Golden Age, like the old science fiction. And I read Ursula also. And I read Hyperion, the Fall of Hyperion. But I don't know a lot of books that I really liked. And then I, after my degree, I went to Iowa. They have a MFA in Spanish, creative writing, besides the workshop. And so I went to Iowa and I write short stories. And I wanted to write like an adult. And I didn't know how to write fantasy like an adult. I didn't know how to do it. And I thought, I think science fiction is a way for me to start writing in another mode that is not young adult, which I have been doing. And so I started writing science fiction a little bit because of that, A little bit because I was very stubborn, because my cohort was very realist in some ways. And they were always like, why do you insist, like you write so well. Why do you insist in writing this thing? And I, I don't know, I want to write this. And then finally after the mfa, I. I got to Clarion and figure out how it also worked in Clarion. I was also thinking if I wanted to write in English, it was one of the big questions that if I wanted. Because science fiction Spanish is so small and it has only become better known and the. And it has, like publishing opportunities have just started to open up. So I didn't feel in 2017 that there was somewhere I could publish if I did it in Spanish. But I decided in Clarion that I was going to write in Spanish, that if I continue doing both, I will never be good in one. So I said, I think it's important for me to write in Spanish and just try to see where this gets me.
- [16:27]
A
Grew up in Los Angeles, lived in a largely immigrant neighborhood. I have been around Spanish language my entire life. And especially Mexican culture is an enormous part of just my Los Angeles culture. I love it. I am very culturally. I strongly identify with northern Mexican influence, and I've always loved it. So I'm learning Spanish and have been learning it with Babel, and I'm okay. And sometimes I'll watch Telemundo to try to understand things. I'm actually really excited to a day where I can read your work in Spanish. I am finding that there are very peculiar and specific and important images attached to Spanish language that we don't have in English. English, it seems to be about an idea. And in Spanish, it's about the idea and the feeling and the color and the flavor and the texture. It's all kind of in one word. So I feel like Spanish is just. It's. There's just. There's more to work with there. This story is so beautiful, translated into English. Like, I can't wait to experience it in Spanish. Would you talk a little bit like, listen, America is more openly racist and despicable than we've been in our history right now. But did you have an experience coming to America as a Spanish language speaker, going to school to. To do this, about making that choice between, like, doing it in your native language and doing it in English? Does it affect your development and your writing process because you're writing in what's essentially a second language?
- [18:00]
B
No, it. It changes a lot, I would say. I think the main difference between Spanish and English is that English is obsessed with actions and verbs, and Spanish is obsessed with nouns and objects. So we are very obsessed not with who. Who has done something, but like I say, it's the gossip. We want to know what it's done to something by whom.
- [18:22]
A
Yeah.
- [18:22]
B
And not the verbs. So you have. In English, there are so many good verbs, and we don't have like. In Spanish, we have less verbs, but we have a lot of nouns and a lot of things to do with those nouns. And so I think one of the main difference writing in English in Clarion was that when I write in Spanish, and I think that's the experience of most people that are writing in their first language, the language is just there And I trust the language to come. I can think about other things. So English, what made me do is it would make me have to stop and think about language more, which was, I think, in that moment, better because I would write slower and I would think I would have to think about every word and if a word would work. And I also had. While I was in Clarend, I had a friend, a native speaker, who would read my stories the night before I turned him in and tell me. Because sometimes as a native speaker, what I feel is when you are writing in your first language or a language that you have experienced for a long time, limit it. The words have weight to them.
- [19:28]
A
Yeah.
- [19:28]
B
They are not just words. They contain so much of how you've used them and of the culture and of the feeling of them. And in your second language, especially if you don't have. If you are not. Yeah. If you don't. I don't know. I think you have to have loved someone in the language to be able to have that someone of something.
- [19:49]
A
Oh, my God, that's great.
- [19:51]
B
I think that is very important because then it. It gets that kind of weight and that kind of passed. But I was living in the US but my MFA was in Spanish and I had learned English since I was small. But I still right now feel. And back then. Because right now I've been living in Mexico, back in Mexico for six years in the pandemic, and that's different. But back then, while I had been living in the US I felt the English was there. But it's still. What I remember the most is how slow I was at writing because I had no confidence that what I was saying was correct. When in Spanish, I know that what comes out is correct. Spanish in English, do you say this or is it that? Or can I play with words in this way that I would know in Spanish, but in English it might be awkward and I cannot hear it. So I think it's both a matter of feeling and also a matter of hearing that probably develops. But I never lived long enough in the States or in an English country, I think to develop it.
- [20:54]
A
In your career now and in the. In the next couple of years. Are you writing primarily in English or Spanish, or is it split Spanish?
- [21:02]
B
I decided in 2017.
- [21:04]
A
You're just going to stay there. Yeah, yeah.
- [21:06]
B
And I have two good friends that translate. Emma is one, and then Kelsey Vanada. Vanita, she's a poet and she translates the only book I have in English, which is called the Visible Unseen. And that's not it's. An essay about science and beauty and poetry and how I feel all of those things are connected. And she was the one to translate that. And I don't know. Like, I feel that they make my English. Sometimes I read their English translation myself. Oh, this is so much prettier. They are so good doing it. Why would I try it?
- [21:41]
A
I get that.
- [21:42]
B
I also think while I was living in the United States, I lived there from 2014 to 2017. I just left when the first Trump term was starting. So it was wildly different. Yes, it was very different from now. And the more time has passed in the last 10 years, the more politically, I feel that it's very important that as a Mexican that lives in Mexico, I read in Spanish and I tried. If the United States was to read me, they can figure out how to translate me or how to. But I don't have to do that work. And I have to.
- [22:16]
A
Yeah, don't do that. Labor for people who won't learn your language. That's.
- [22:19]
B
Yeah.
- [22:19]
A
Or there's a band that I love called the Warning. They're from Monterey, and. And most of their songs are in English, but every album has at least one song in Spanish. And it slaps. It's just incredible. And the passion and the energy behind it. And somebody asked them, like, why do you do that? And they were like, because we're from Mexico. Like, why do you think? It's really interesting to hear. To hear the difference in just kind of like, where the language originates in your body, Right? Like, whether it originates kind of in the belly or, like, up in the head or, like, somewhere across the chest. You mentioned that one of your friends is a poet. When I was prepping to talk to you today, I came across a poem by Octavio Paz called as One Listens to the rain. Is that intentional?
- [23:04]
B
Yes.
- [23:05]
A
Is that Ryuan? Okay. So that poem. Oh, my God.
- [23:09]
B
It's a beautiful poem.
- [23:11]
A
Oh, my God. It made me weep. It is. It's gorgeous. And, like, it dovetails perfectly with your story. It should almost be like, listen, if you really want to get an this, Andre's story is incredible on its own. But if you want something extra, if you want to experience it at another level, read this first. I. How'd you find it and put it together?
- [23:35]
B
I knew the poem because Octavio Pass is our. One of the main points.
- [23:39]
A
Yeah, of course I knew the poem.
- [23:41]
B
I really love the poem. And I think the poem expresses a kind of feeling that I think I was trying to get that with the story, too. I think it's something. The feeling. The feeling I get reading that poem, that kind of. Yeah. Of longing that I think it's in the middle of the story and it is like maybe a civilization longing, but it's also a longing these two girls, like. I think even if the two girls aren't in longing yet, by the end of the story, that's the feeling they are walking towards. Right. Somehow. So I think for me, that poem helped me know what I want, like, what I was getting to. So that's why. And I really love the title.
- [24:19]
A
It's beautiful. And there's a moment in the story where I go, oh, I think they're on a date. Oh, I think. Does she know that she likes her. Oh, please let her know that she likes her. Like, I experienced that through the whole thing. And had I had the grounding of the language of that poem beforehand, I would have been wishing even harder than I was that they, you know, that they were gonna, like, make that connection. You mentioned one of the questions I ask every author is, was there a moment in your life when you knew, I am a capital W writer, this is my thing? And it sounds like that happened for you when you were very young.
- [24:55]
B
Maybe, but not really. I think it happened for me at Iowa.
- [24:59]
A
Okay.
- [24:59]
B
I think before that, even if I had published books, it never felt like it was going to be the thing I chose. I think for the longest time, even, like, I started writing fan fiction when I was in school, and then I wrote novels, and it was my hobby and it was a thing I did during the summer holidays. But I always felt like I. I had to choose it. Even if I had written books, even if I had been published, I needed to choose to be a writer. And I think I chose to be a writer during my first semester at Iowa. I remember it so clearly because I had that question, am I going to be a writer? And it was my last. It was the last submission I had to give for my prose class. And I had. All my submission had been, like, I started very weak in. Because I was writing short stories for the first time. And I got the hang of it throughout the semester and during the workshop. And I remember at Yotzinapa, the disappearance of the students had just happened in Mexico. I wanted to write something about that, but I didn't know how to do it with speculative fiction. And I. During a weekend, like, I got this idea and I started writing. And I remember Monday night, I needed to turn in the story, and I remember finishing classes and going to a coffee shop to work on the story. And I was kicked out of there like at 11pm and I went home and I continued working. And like at 2am I like, I've been writing this for seven hours and I haven't stopped and I don't want to stop. And this is the best thing I've done. And I think that's. And then I turn in the story and I remember listening to my peers talk about it and the professor, Horacio Castillanes Moya, who is a very, A really great writer, he said, I think we're discussing the story. So the story really is finished. It's done so because we're discussing what it's about, we're not workshopping it.
- [26:53]
A
Yeah.
- [26:54]
B
And it felt so good to hear that. And it like. And I, yeah. And I thought, yes, this is the thing I want to do. Whatever it takes is the thing I'm going to do. And even if I had some prior experience, I think that's the first time I said yes, writing is going to be the big bet of my life and we'll see what it. Where it takes me.
- [27:14]
A
I love that. Have you found any writing tricks or secret weapons that you can deploy in those inevitable moments we all have where we feel like, man, I'm never getting over this story problem.
- [27:27]
B
One of them is I developed this thing when I was in a. I did like two year writers residency in Spain and it was nerve wracking because my only thing I had to do was write. And so many times I couldn't and I would spiral into not being able to do it when I had all the time in the world to do it.
- [27:45]
A
Yeah.
- [27:46]
B
And I had a friend there and we developed this thing where we'll meet in the late afternoon. He would say to me this, we're doing this coffee we're doing. You can put it up as writing expenses to the back of the bank of time. And so we developed this thing of thinking of the bank of time and that we could put as writing expenses. Going to the movies, talking to each other, reading each other. And so remind me that writing is not just what I do on the page, but so much of living is also writing. And so yeah, when I can work through the problem is like I will just go on a walk and I will go to the movies. If there is a movie I've been wanting to see, maybe it has the answer. You never know. Like sometimes you just select things in the world and because you are so obsessed with your idea, the world speaks to you.
- [28:37]
A
Yeah.
- [28:38]
B
You hadn't before. So I remember that staying in the page is not always the solution. It's just maybe getting some air and allowing life to give me the solution. But, yeah, I think I've developed more patience the more I've written. Because before, I always thought I. It was going to be the only idea I had. And if I didn't work it out, it will break on me. And I. Now I've. I've done it enough times that I know that maybe an idea from three or four years ago is going to be ready later. So I allow myself to say, maybe it's not the time for this yet. So I'll work it to the point that I need to work. Like I can do it. And maybe in two years I'll finish this story and it'll be okay.
- [29:35]
A
A lot of the time when I'm writing, it looks like I'm not writing. The time that I'm actually at the keyboard is very. It's expressed as a percentage. It's very little. Most of when I'm writing, it looks like I'm walking, I'm running, I'm playing a game, I'm making a meal, I'm reading something else. It's. It is always so validating and reassuring to hear someone whose work I respect say the same thing. Like, look, I know it looks like I'm goofing off, but I'm just. I promise you, I'm working right now. In the old days, the writers who came before us would write on a yellow pad or whatever and then throw away the pages that didn't work. And they could look around the room and see, look at all this work I did today. We don't get to do that. It's a document that just gets deleted and saved or whatever. Like, the. That tactile thing isn't kind of around. I've occasionally flirted with the idea of just getting a pad. And when I delete a section on the thing, I will tear up and throw it into the room. So it's. So it's there. Is there something that you have written that you really love that you just don't? You wish that it had more eyes. You wish that more people had seen it. What's something you really love that you want to talk about?
- [30:44]
B
I guess in English, because, like, it's so split right now, but in English. I really love that book, the Visible Unseen I was talking about. And it's also. The edition is very pretty, is very. Is it Riverside? But it's hardcover and it has images by a photographer that I really love. And it is. Yeah. I grew up. My parents are scientists. I studied science. So science is something I really loved. And it took me a long time to realize that. I looked at it as someone who has studied it, but I never looked at its language. And so when I started to looking at it as a writer and as language, I just discovered. Yeah, there are so many metaphors and so many. So much of science has been somehow intertwined with also some kind of, like, imaginary. And it's very poetic if you look at it as language. So it's a book about. Yeah. My family and science and how we cannot trust our senses a lot. Yeah. And how much of science, I believe is poetry if we really. They are like. Yeah, just the size of the same coin.
- [31:53]
A
Yeah.
- [31:54]
B
And so that. That book I really love. And it's a very beautiful object. So that one is in English.
- [32:00]
A
So I'm remembering this moment during the recent Artemis mission around the moon. There's a moment where the spacecraft goes behind the moon. We're about to lose contact with the astronauts, and they're looking at this tiny little slice of the Earth. And that's us, right? That's everything. And the moon is enormous in the foreground. And they are talking about it in the way humans talk about it. Right. They're just describing it. And somebody somewhere says it's such a good idea that they sent a poet to do this, like, rather than just like a robot to look at it. There is such beautiful poetry and science and the math being the language of the universe. Right. And like, expressing construction and all that. Of course, your parents received this. Of course, it all matches up your Spanish language work that you have done. Is it. Forgive my ignorance, is it translated into English? Are you working with these translators to
- [32:50]
B
translate it into English as one listens to Rain is in a short story collection that was published in Spanish in 2020. And a lot of those stories are in English in many magazines. Okay. And the book is completely translated, but no one has wanted it yet. And we're working on my novel to see if the novel is easier to sell novels in English. So the novel that was published last year in Mexico is coming out. It just came out in Spain. And I'm hoping that someone might want it. But if someone wanted to know it, I was selected by Granta in 2020 as one of the youngest Finnish. But the story that is in that number of Granta, that is in English, called Borromean Drinks, that is comes out. It's Very. It's a lot like the novel. It's. Yeah, like I took the novel and it's like a short story form, not a whole novel, but of a section of it. And so that's what I have right now. But I. I'm working with my friends, I don't know, biding my time. I have a new story that I just wrote in Spanish and one of my friends translated it and I'm going to start doing the rounds of the speculative magazines in the US and see if anyone wants it.
- [34:06]
A
I don't know what I can do to help move that along, but if you need a reference, I'm here for you.
- [34:10]
B
Thank you.
- [34:11]
A
What are you reading for pleasure these days? Do you have time and if so, what are you reading or listening to right now?
- [34:17]
B
The semester just ended, so I do have time. I'm reading Taiwan Travelogue, the one that just won the translation prize. And then I'm listening to the only Brandon Sanderson book I have left, Isles of Ember Dark, that I listen when I go out on walks. So that's my pleasure in reading.
- [34:36]
A
I took his class. He teaches a class at like Brigham Young that's online and I just took it a few years ago and I learned so much about the business of writing from that class. It was great. And he said that we all get A's. So I'm very excited to have done very well. I'm going to give you an opportunity to hype up and celebrate an author who you think is wonderful, who's somebody you think is great that we should know about.
- [34:58]
B
There is this Mexican writer called Damian Neri. He is great. He just started this magazine so it works a lot like clarkwork or like Uncanny. It's all in Spanish. It's all. It's called. So fun. Yeah, buy it in Amazon. But his stories are also in English. He has published with Clark's World and Uncanny. Maybe. I don't know. Damian Meri is his name and he's from Mexico and he's a very good science fiction Mexican spin writer. So if someone else wants to see what's happening. And so this is also if someone speaks or reads in Spanish, this is the second. They're in their third number. So it's a very new magazine. We don't usually pay writers in Mexico for their but he is paying everyone like mine of like, oh, that's wonderful. So it's a very nice thing that I want to shout out that it exists that we have a proper speculative magazine here in Mexico and Him, who is doing such a wonderful job editing this and also writing. He continues to be writing.
- [36:02]
A
If writers don't get paid in Mexico, how does that work? I'm missing something.
- [36:06]
B
Yeah, maybe I didn't express myself. So magazines, most of them don't pay in Mexico. Like, literally, like literary magazines in the U.S. they don't pay. Also, most of them, only a couple of them pay. And then, I don't know, like, in Mexico, most riders don't live out of rider writing. They live out of. Of teaching or other things. But I think there might be just three or something like that that live out of writing. Okay. It's something that you have to have always. I think that's a very big difference between. When I was in Iowa, I always felt that in Spanish, we were less competitive because we all knew that we. None of us will be able to live all of that. We will all have to juggle all of things. And in the workshop, where people are competing from, like, big advances, and you can feel the difference when you know that there's no money in it.
- [37:02]
A
Okay, I've got two last questions before I get to the actual final question. I'm reasonably sure that I've seen you have a cat near you, and I think we would love it if you would. If it's possible for you to pay the cat tax and show us your cat, I know that we would all very much love to see them. Hey, buddy.
- [37:19]
B
And there is another one, Pandemia, but she's not near.
- [37:24]
A
Okay. We started my. My friends and colleagues and I started a tradition when we were doing everything online that if we ever saw a tail or the sight of an ear come through the camera, you had to. Everybody had to stop. And whatever pet that was, we had to pay the tax. So thank you for paying the pet tax. Where can your new fans who have discovered you through the podcast, find you online?
- [37:45]
B
Instagram, I think, is the easiest way. I'm in Instagram as Andrea Chapella. And, yeah, if you read, I can answer in English. And in my Instagram, There's a link 3. And all my stories, English and Spanish versions that are free somewhere can be accessed there. So I think they're easy to find. And that's the easiest way to find me right now.
- [38:11]
A
If it ever happens that you have another short story that is translated into English that you feel you're willing to trust me with narrating it. I had such a lovely time telling your story. It felt good in my body the whole time I told it. I really enjoyed Being out on the lake, I loved being under those stars. I loved the smell of the petrichor as that storm is coming in. I just loved all of it. And the lights under the water. Oh, my God. I just. It was great. If there is ever an opportunity for me to tell another one of your stories, it would be my privilege and my honor to do that. So just file that away someplace if it ever comes up. Really appreciate you. I appreciate your time so much. And just for sharing just the incredible talent you have as a storyteller with me and with the audience, it's just a real privilege to talk with you.
- [39:04]
B
Thank you. And thank you for selecting the story. I know the names are not the easiest in that story because it's not even Spanish.
- [39:12]
A
Did you hear it?
- [39:13]
B
I haven't heard it.
- [39:15]
A
I'm just wondering. I'm always afraid I'm saying to Gabrielle, apologies to the people who are native speakers in this language. I am told that I have a really heavy Los Angeles San Fernando Valley accent. I don't know what that means because it's just how I talk, but I am told, wow, you have an incredibly thick accent. And I'm worried when I'm trying to use someone else's language. Listen, I gotta honor the ancestors, so I'm doing my best, but there were a few times. But I think we got there. I think we got there.
- [39:43]
B
And I sent some voice notes saying how this is how it sounds.
- [39:47]
A
I know we used them. It was incredibly helpful. Thank you. Something I'm noticing with it Storytime, is that I feel like I'm talking to authors who are also fans of the experience of writing, who respect other people in our industry. And every time I reach out to an author or Gabrielle reaches out to an author, or what we get back is, hey, how can I help? What do you want? Let me give you some stuff to help you out with that. Sure, I'll answer your questions. It feels supportive. It doesn't feel. It feels like a giant collaborative process, and I really enjoy being in that space. I feel like I'm part of something bigger than all of us individually, and it's a real privilege to have this little role in that larger world right now.
- [40:30]
B
Thank you. That's how I feel about the community of science fiction and fantasy in the US too. They were so welcoming when I was there and with Clarion.
- [40:39]
A
I'm glad to hear that.
- [40:40]
B
Yeah. So, yes, I. I'm so.
- [40:42]
A
That's wonderful.
- [40:43]
B
This has made me very happy. So thank you for your time also. Yeah.
- [40:47]
A
Yeah, it's a privilege and a pleasure. And I am even more motivated to get closer to fluency in Spanish so that I can read your stories. Like, that's great, because, listen, I'm doing okay with telenovelas, but the stories are a little thin, you know, I'd rather read something that's a little more impactful.
- [41:02]
B
Little by little.
- [41:04]
A
Yeah. Thanks a lot, Andrea. Have a wonderful day, and I hope that we're talking together another time in the future.
- [41:09]
B
Yes, you too. Have a wonderful day, and thank you for everything.
- [41:12]
A
Okay. Yeah, take care. That was awesome. Thank you. Thank you so much. Really appreciated it. Good luck with everything. I'm excited to watch your career roll out in front of me.
- [41:25]
B
Thank you.
- [41:26]
A
All right, take care. I'll talk to you again. Okay, bye.
- [41:28]
B
Bye.
- [41:34]
A
I just want to once again say thank you to Andrea. And, you know, she mentioned something. She mentioned Clark's World. And I've been meaning to say this, and I keep forgetting to. We are standing on the shoulders of giants here with it's story time with Wil Wheaton. You know, this obviously would not exist without LeVar Burton, and LeVar Burton Reads, but I don't know that LeVar Burton Reads exists without escape pod and pseudo pod and lightspeed and Clark's world and Uncanny and the podcasts, a lot of which originated in the studio I'm in, narrated by the people I get to work with right now on my own podcast. Nothing ever happens in a vacuum. Nothing ever happens because one person did it without anybody else's help. And it's so important to me that I say thank you to all of the people who have come before me, who have made it possible for any of this to exist so that I can have a conversation with Andrea Chappella today so that I can talk to an author whose work I absolutely love. I say at the beginning of some of these shows, like, I'm gonna introduce you to artists, and you are massive fans. You just don't know it yet. And I've done that for myself over the last 30 plus episodes of the show. I keep encountering authors, and I'm like, wow, I'm a massive fan for life, and Andrea is one of those authors. I said when we talked to Maria Dong, I said, you know, I really think this is an author we ought to keep an eye on. And I think Andrea is the same. She mentioned that she's primarily working in Spanish, which I think is wonderful, and I'm really looking forward to reading it in the native language when I level up those skills. But I think we're going to see a lot of her here in the English speaking world and I, I just feel like we're really lucky to be aware of that so we can keep our eyes out for that moment when something of hers comes around and we can just grab it and introduce it to other people who are going to be her biggest fans. It's Storytime with Wil Wheaton is available every Wednesday wherever you get your podcasts. Next week we will be back with a brand new piece of short speculative fiction and then another author interview the week after that. And that's just the way we're going to do it. Really appreciate you being here. If you would like an ad free experience, if you would like behind the scenes information, if you'd like to talk to me directly about what we do on the show, you can check us out at patreon. It's patreon.com storytime. I'm online@willwheaton.net and I'm its wil Wheaton on threads and Instagram. Hope wherever you are you are having the very best possible day and until next time, take care of yourselves and take care of each other. Okay, bye. It's Story Time with Wil Wheaton was produced in 2026 by Traveler Enterprises Incorporated, who holds the copyright. Our producer is Harris Lane, our story producer and director. My partner in Crime on the Other side of the Glass is Gabrielle Decur. Our content editor is Michael Thomas. Our podcast is edited, mixed and mastered by the great Alex Barton of Phase Shift av. Very special thanks to Wes Stevens, Christopher Black and everyone at Rhapsody Voices for helping me get this out the door. It's Storytime with Wil Wheaton is recorded at Skyboat Media in the gorgeous San Fernando Valley which is bordered by the Santa Monica Mountains. On the mouth. On the mouth. Yep, we're going to go with that. It's mounted by the Santa Monica Mountains on the mouth. That is everything you need to know about the San Fernando Valley. The San Fernando Valley is mounted on on the Santa Monica Mountains at the mouth. You heard it here first and you will never hear it again. If you would like an ad free experience as well as access to tons of really fun behind the scenes extras, how we go into finding the character beats how we make choices for what the characters sound like. If you want to hear me really struggling to pronounce common English words, then you could check out our Patreon which is@patreon.com storytime there you will find a couple of options starting at five bucks a month for all kinds of fun, extra stuff. I would love for you to join us there. Thanks so much for listening. I am Wil Wheaton. You can find me@wilwheaton.net that's all for now. Until next time. Take care of yourselves. And take care of each other. Bye,
- [45:48]
B
Sam.