#The Ghost Bride

[darkartfinds]

The Ghost Bride by Greg Luzniak

[liquidlightandrunningtrees]

The Chinese considered the moon to be yin, feminine and full of negative energy, as opposed to the sun that was yang and exemplified masculinity. I liked the moon, with its soft silver beams. It was at once elusive and filled with trickery, so that lost objects that had rolled into the crevices of a room were rarely found, and books read in its light seemed to contain all sorts of fanciful stories that were never there the next morning.

Yangsze Choo, The Ghost Bride

[dailyfigures]

The Ghost Bride ; Original Character ☆ Good Smile Company

[vinca-majors]

Yangsze Choo in conversation - St. Louis 2/21/24

Yangsze Choo is one of my favorite authors (The Ghost Bride is one of my favorite books ever) and last week she came to STL for her The Fox Wife book tour! I wrote up a little summary of the things she said about herself and her novels for anyone interested.

Her name is pronounced Yong-shee

She was warm, humble, funny, gracious, relaxed, and genuinely kind

She is very petite (I'd be surprised if she clears 5') and has a lovely, precise British accent reminiscent of Julie Andrews because she attended British schools when growing up

While she currently lives in California, she is Malaysian and spent parts of her childhood in Germany and Japan

This was her first time visiting Missouri and she only had the kindest things to say about it (this was heartwarming to everyone in attendance since flyover states get no love)

She is a slow writer and her drafts always have an excessively large word count

She never uses outlines "because I don't think like that" and blames her slow writing on this; her husband says if she would use outlines maybe there would be "less howling and rolling on the floor"

"There are thousands of good books that people could be reading. I am honored that people choose to read mine."

The Ghost Bride

One of her favorite scenes is the first chapter

She wrote a trial scene in the Courts of Hell but it was cut for wordcount

Pre-publication, she figured only her "mother and her hairdresser" would read it

Her older sister's feedback on a draft was that there wasn't enough romance and that what there was "is creepy"; her father's feedback was that it didn't read like classic literature; "With a family like this, who needs critics?"

She wanted to be the audiobook reader because many of the Malaysian words in the book have a specific pronunciation; she had to audition to do it "because usually voice actors do this unless you're Neil Gaiman"; the audition was in a studio in New York the day after Neil himself had been there ("I was like 'Can I touch everything that he touched?'")

She was in Trader Joe's when she got the call from her agent that Netflix wanted to make a screen adaptation - "'Give it to them! Give it to them!'"

She wasn't interested in writing the screenplay for the Netflix adaptation - "Novel writing and screenwriting are very different things."

She didn't have a problem with the book's ugly villain being played by a handsome actor - "That's Hollywood"

The Night Tiger

Her audiobook recording was an Audie Award Finalist - "My publisher says I should tell people that more often."

The Fox Wife

It is a story about "others", "what's on the other side of the door", first love, and is "a love story for old people"

Her favorite Austen is Persuasion and that inspired the elements of "regret and do-overs"

She said most ancient Chinese myths about foxes are about the human men who subdue the beautiful, wily female foxes and bear sons by them who pass the Imperial Exams; she wanted a story from the fox's point of view

She wrote it practically in the order that it reads and wrote the two timelines concurrently

The margins are wide and include footnotes because ancient Chinese scrolls had margins for readers to write notes in, which were incorporated into rewrites of those scrolls; this was also a way for women to engage with other female readers in a time when only men could gather to discuss literature and philosophy

She loves the footnotes in Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell and was inspired to include asides/short stories in the footnotes of her own novel

Her first draft was 240,000 words long - she had to cut the bulk of the footnotes, a whole character, an entire arc, and "another murder"

She calls herself 'an old auntie' and doesn't know who the hot Asian actors are today, but her fancast for Kuro is Toshiro Mifune

If she could spend the day as any of her characters she would be Snow because she's "always wanted to run along rooftops and along garden walls"

Her favorite scene is—(looking at my bookmark at the halfway point) "Well, I won't spoil it for you. I love the last scene."

4th novel

It's about plants because she loves plants - she regularly listens to the NPR gardening podcast

She has always thought that ginseng root looks like a human baby; this book will be about a ginseng root that is a fairy changeling

At heart it's about parenthood

[thecozymystic]

[twisted-wonderland-but-gayer]

I can fix her

[westwingwolf]

It’s not a bad way to end our partnership. Saving a family.

Yeah, although we’re still not partners. On the job anyway.

- Lucy Chen & Tim Bradford in The Rookie (2018 - )

//

Who will be your lookout if I go?

I’m a Heavenly Guard, remember? I don’t need a lookout.

- Pan Li Lan & Er Lang in The Ghost Bride (2020)

[suzannahnatters]

Can fiction be a form of research? I think so! THE GHOST BRIDE by Yangsze Choo is set in 1890s Malaysia, not 1890s Hong Kong, but it's still a book about the 1890s Chinese diaspora by someone with deep personal or family roots in that culture - and even more, it contains the kind of vivid detail on day-to-day life, which an academic history book might be too focused to cover. Fiction is no substitute for the academic reading - but a really quality work like this gives me lots of notes for things to bear in mind while I'm writing my own (very different) book!

[abutterflyobsession]

MC: ugh you’re so annoying who are you anyway

annoying character: I’m . . . a minor government official

me: SHUT UP THIS BOOK IS BASED IN CHINESE MYTHOLOGY AND I KNOW A DRAGON IN DISGUISE WHEN I SEE ONE

[mila-no-tblr]

The Ghost Bride, ep04

Am in love with Kuang Tian's visuals *o*

It's a pretty show in general though ~ Plus it's always a pleasure to see Chris Wu again ♥ His character is fun, I'm starting to like his dynamics with the female lead~

[thefigureresource]

The Ghost Bride

Release: December 2023

Manufacturer: Good Smile Company

Size: non scale, 14.5in

[miithridatism]

In the darkness of a thousand withered souls, it was Er Lang’s hand that I sought, and his voice that I longed to hear. Perhaps it is selfish of me, but an uncertain future with him, in all its laughter and quarrels, is better than being left behind.

The Ghost Bride by Yangsze Choo

[roseunspindle]

Favorite Books of 2022

Dracula Daily - Partly I enjoyed the story, but also the community of reading it with many people, seeing the comments, fanart. 

[vinca-majors]

yangsze choo, the ghost bride

[quotes-for-the-soul]

If I had known how easy it is to lose your life, I would have treasured mine better.

The Ghost Bride by Yangsze Choo

[thelovelygods]