Beyond the Page: Claire Legrand
This week we are excited to feature Claire Legrand, author of Kingsbane (Sourcebooks Fire, May 2019). Get to know her through fun questions below.
If you could live on any planet (and survive), which one would you choose and why?
I would want to live on Neptune, solely because “Neptune” from The Planets by Gustav Holst being a spectacularly beautiful piece of music. The female chorus fading to silence at the piece’s conclusion never fails to give me serious chills.
What’s your Hogwarts house? What qualities about the house do you feel best suit you? Which qualities make you think the Sorting Hat should think again?
When I was 11 years old, I would have chosen to be in Ravenclaw because I was so eager to be considered smart. Now, however, I feel more like a Hufflepuff. I want to work hard, help my friends, be fair to everyone, and live by the kitchens.
What fictional place would you most like to go?
I would want to go to Lyra’s Oxford from Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials, an answer that should shock no one, since I talk about those books constantly. I would love to poke around the ancient buildings on campus, hang out with Lord Asriel (if he would deign to spend time with me, that is), and discover my daemon.
Tell us one fun insider-fact about Kingsbane.
The original draft of Kingsbane clocked in at around 250,000 words! Which is…really, really long. The final draft is a good 75,000 words shorter, and thank god for that. My editor is a saint.
Claire Legrand
Claire Legrand is the author of several novels for children and young adults, most notably The Cavendish Home for Boys and Girls, Some Kind of Happiness, Winterspell, and The Empirium Trilogy. Claire lives in Princeton, New Jersey.
