By doing so, they would no longer have to keep their relationship a secret. The story follows two girls, Stevie and Nora, who’ve been planning to escape their conservative town after graduation and flee to California. THE MISEDUCATION OF CAMERON POST by Emily Danforth (my favorite book)Ĭlick on the cover to head to the Goodreads pages of these books.Alyson Derrick’s solo debut, “Forget Me Not,” is an upcoming sapphic young adult romance novel.SHE GETS THE GIRL (a book I wrote with my wife).Hang in there.įor someone who loves Forget Me Not, can you recommend three books with similar themes to check out next? If you’re one of those people, just know that it really does get better. Life can feel impossible living in certain places for certain people. If readers could take away one thing from your book, what would you want it to be? But my editor and I decided it would be better if that changed! Since Catholicism wasn’t a part of the book, Stevie’s mom was someone who likely would’ve been more accepting of Stevie being queer. One that evolved a lot throughout the drafting process was Stevie’s mom. I had a really good idea of most of the characters. Did you know from the start who the characters in this story were or did they evolve as you wrote? Stevie’s accident offers a second chance to many people in her life. I needed Stevie to have a really good reason for being so secretive about her sexuality. In the first draft, there was nothing about Catholicism, which was a pretty drastic change! It ended up being quite an important portion of the book. In what way did the final draft of the book look different from the first one? I’ve taken one down before, but never put one up. I think the only thing I remember researching is how to put up a fence. What kind of research did you do for this book? So, I definitely brought a lot of my own life experiences into this book. Well, I just happened to be a young girl in a conservative rural town for most of my life! Like Stevie, I’m queer and Korean-American, and I grew up in a very catholic family in a small town in Pennsylvania. What drew you to a story about a young girl in a conservative rural town? Are there any life experiences that you brought into this book? When I’m not writing, I like to hike, fish, and play board games with my family (Moonrakers, Dominion, and Catan are some of my favorites). After college I opened a food truck that my wife and I ran for two years before I decided to give it up to write full-time. I live in Pittsburgh, PA with my wife, our daughter, and our dog.

Alyson derrick forget me not