Ten questions with Laury Silvers
Laury Silvers is a retired historian of early Islam and early mystics and mysticism and a Muslim author of mysteries set in medieval Muslim-held lands. Thanks for your time Laury!
1. Please tell us about your debut novel.
Thank you so much for inviting me to talk about my Sufi Mysteries Quartet. The Lover is the first in the series of mysteries set in tenth-century Baghdad. A young servant boy has died under suspicious circumstances and the police are ready to let it go, but Zaytuna, a poor washerwoman, is asked by the child’s friend to intervene. Her investigation forces her to confront her past as she tries to get some justice for the most vulnerable of Baghdad. If readers like emotionally driven whodunits in immersive historical settings, this will do the trick.
2. I’ve read that only 4% of the people who start a novel, finish writing it. Why do you think you beat the odds?
Perhaps because of having been a historian. As the saying goes in the academy, publish or perish. We learn to pound words out, like it or not. But I think, too, because I had something I had to say that could not be held back. I broke through the blank page in that urgency to speak.
3. Was your debut novel the first book you wrote? (Any prior efforts hiding on your hard drive?)
I have a supernatural horror novella in very-bad-guy first person. I’ll never publish it. It was an exercise to see if I could spend time in the mind of a person I despise and write that character as a full human being, not a cardboard cutout. I did, and I set out to write my Sufi Mystery Quartet afterwards.
4. What helped you become a better writer? Any books or resources you found helpful?
I bought a book called How to Write a Cozy Mystery because I wanted to write novels in which the true mystery is the human soul. Cozy mysteries are about the people. You know, a cat may be lost, but the novel is not about finding the cat. I also paid attention to true crime podcasts. They, too, are about the effects of the crime and solving the crime on the people and community. I took notes on the mysteries I admired. I reread novels that had the emotional style I wanted. I paid attention to how bodily experiences were described, how much setting to include, and details like how to signal consistently to a reader a supernatural moment is being introduced. Then I listened to my early readers. Even if I did not take their advice on a matter, it was useful all the same as it meant they were getting caught on that scene and their comment gave me clues about what I needed to fix, my way.
5. What was your process like getting an agent?
I didn’t bother. I was fifty-four when I started writing fiction. I knew it would be a long process to query, get an agent, get published, if any of that happened at all. I could be dead by the time that happened! I had also heard harrowing stories from published authors about their experiences with publishers. I figured I would be better off just doing it on my own.
6. What was the most exciting moment involving the publication of your debut novel?
When I got the box of books, my husband and I danced around the room with The Lover, then I noticed a typo on the cover and panicked. I uploaded a correction immediately. But those first books with the word “BBaghdad” have become cherished keepsakes for my family and friends to tease me.
7. What’s your best advice for someone who wants to be self-published?
There are so many great resources online, so here I will only say don’t worry about immediate sales if it doesn’t happen. Traditional publishing is an overnight sales game. Self-publishing is a long game of building an audience. I was told sales in a series really get moving after the third book. It is true.
8. What are you currently reading? Or, what’s one of the best novels you’ve read lately?
I am reading a draft of The Promenade by Nakia Jackson, a historical novel that she describes as Black Pride and Prejudice. It’s a dramedy of love and manners set in the free Black community of 1825 Philadelphia. It’s got bonnets, handsome abolitionists, and street brawls with slave catchers. It is spectacular. I just finished a draft of an absolutely gripping Western by Jibril Stevenson, The Saracen, about a Muslim lawman and a beautiful widow with a secret past who team up to foil a secessionist plot. I really hope both get the attention of agents and publishers. There is that crazy magic in each one that spells something special.9. What are you working on now? Any projects coming out soon?
9. What are you working on now? Any projects coming out soon?
I’m writing just finishing up last installment in the Sufi Mysteries Quartet that began with The Lover. I’m also writing a novella for a collection. Revenge in Three. Each of us have written stories inspired by The Count of Monte Cristo. Mine, Rat City, is alternative history noir detective novel set in an imagined medieval Muslim world. Jibril Stevenson has written a Western, The Pasha of Texas, and J. Austin Yoshino has set The Spatial Condition in the future. If readers of the interview are interested, my novella is available for a free download as part of the promotion for the collection.