Honi sat down on 16th May with Sophie Clark, an upcoming Australian author who just debuted her novel, Cruel is the Light. Clark spoke at Sydney Writers Festival on 24th May as part of the panel ‘Heart and Soul: The irresistible allure of romantasy’. Cruel is a novel set in a war-torn world that blends the Vatican with exorcists and foot soldiers. She sat down with Honi to discuss her writing process, inspiration, and what this emerging genre, romantasy, actually is.
Madison Burland: Can you tell me a little about yourself? I know you studied at the University of Melbourne, and have worked as a parliamentary advisor. How do you go from something like that into writing?
Sophie Clark: Yes, I also studied at the University of Sydney. I did my undergrad there, I went to Women’s [The Women’s College], and then I did my masters at Melbourne Uni. [Afterwards] I worked for the Senate, and then I jumped into writing! It was quite a big change, but I’ve been writing for my whole life. You do so much writing for uni, and so much when you work in an office. For the senator, I was his policy advisor, so I did a lot of reports and raising motions. So I had this kind of ecosystem going on to build my writing and then I found it quite smothering, it was not a rewarding experience.
MB: Did you always want to do something with writing? Was politics the plan or was it more writing based?
SC: I didn’t have any aspirations towards writing for a very long time. To me, authors were like a different species. It didn’t feel like something to even aspire to. It was just not a thing, I guess. They were different kinds of people; and I was me and so why would I…you know… it’s impossible, or something like that.
So I wasn’t really aspiring to it, but I think writing and English are always really valuable. Politics helped me learn how to draft a deadly email. So that’s necessary in publishing.
MB: Definitely. You mentioned that you were not really enjoying working in politics; was there something specifically — like a book or something — that really put the idea [of writing] into your mind?
SC: Definitely. So I was in Parliament House at the time, I was living in Canberra and I picked up Red Rising, and the whole first trilogy was all out. I hadn’t finished a book for years, and I remember finishing Red Rising and immediately going to drive and get the second one and start reading that. I think that one really triggered me, I just loved the escapism of it. It was so fantastic that I wanted to try it myself, even if it was a book or a story that no one but me ever read.
MB: I can see that perfectly. So, romantasy is a new genre that’s been emerging and Cruel has been described as a romantasy book. Would you say it’s romantasy or would you say it’s more fantasy?
SC: I don’t know. So the funny thing is, like you said, it’s an emerging one. When I created Cruel, it wasn’t a thing. It was a YA [young adult] fantasy with romantic elements. I never personally was in a position to call it romantasy, but I would. I’d say that. It’s a little bit of a tricky one because it is YA and that’s how I wrote it. I wrote it to be a crossover, which means it’s the kind of book that an adult would enjoy just as much as a teen.
MB: Would you say there’s a heavier focus on some aspects more than others, for example the romance, rather than the fantasy?
SC: I would say, there is fantasy, and then there’s fantasy romance, and romantasy falls halfway in between. What I always say is that for romantasy, the plot and the world and the stakes have to be equally important to the book existing and the story existing, as the romance. So the romance has to drive the plot, and the plot has to drive the romance, and neither can dominate.
For me, if you think about Cruel, Jules, and Selene and the challenges that they’re up against, as they unravel what’s going on, that is part of what drives them closer together.
Other authors will be more likely to say it’s got to be like a romance book, but in a fantasy wrapping. I disagree with that. I think it needs to have more of a balance.
MB: As an Australian author, I think fantasy and romantasy aren’t really categories that we tend to explore. Typically, I think we explore crime fiction or general fiction; what has your experience been writing in this genre that’s not really explored by Australian authors?
SC: I think the thing is that there are a lot more [authors] than you realise. Until you actually fully immerse yourself into it, you don’t realize how many there are. I can just list off the top of my head: Jay Kristoff, Empire of the Vampire, he’s Australian; Amie Kaufman, who writes with him often; Vanessa Len, Only a Monster. There’s another one coming out soon by a friend of mine, Of Flame and Fury, and that’s YA fantasy/romantasy. C. S. Pacat wrote some of the best YA fantasy you’ll ever read. There are actually a lot more than you’d think.
For me, it’s not really about being Australian at all. That’s never factored into it. I have less to do with Australian authors or the Australian publishing industry than I do with Americans.
MB: Coming back to the writing, I think writing often typically involves drawing on an aspect of life, whether it’s friendships or relationships.
I think a lot of university students who are interested in writing struggle with finding a balance between real life and inspiration. Did you draw on anything from your life when writing Cruel? Or was there a kind of line that you tried to stay behind?
SC: No, I don’t do that. My characters are never, as far as I know, taken from other people. One thing I liked about Selene is how no-nonsense she is. She’s very competent and efficient and a little bit impatient. That is a nod to someone in my life. That’s the only thing. With the Vatican and the halls of power that Selene grew up in, I obviously took inspiration from Parliament House. The atmosphere of a place with a lot of powerful people in it.
MB: That’s so interesting to think about. Would you say you align more with a chronological writing method?
SC: Yeah, definitely. I write chronologically. Sometimes when I get stuck, I’ll jump around. Or if something specifically occurs to me very vividly, I’ll write that and just insert it in later. I will always revert back to the chronological order. Say a battle sequence occurs to me, I can write that. But then I’ll really want to fill in the time between; filling that gap is then so important to me.
MB: Do you think that delays your writing process ever? Because it’s like “oh, I have to finish this part, before I get to a part I want to really write or anything?”
SC: No, because I try to make every part fun. Which is something that I think: if it’s not fun for me to write, then it’s probably not going to be fun for people to read.
MB: That’s a good rule.
SC: Yeah, I think that’s always true. Often you can tell when someone hasn’t enjoyed writing a scene. If something is painstaking for them to get to, then, well, why does it exist at all?
MB: I like that idea, that’s incredibly smart. You just mentioned then that you took from your time working in Parliament House to kind of build the Vatican in Cruel. Is there anything that you would recommend paying attention to in everyday life, to write on?
SC: I think obviously, it’s a very privileged position to be in, but if you can travel, I think travel is always fantastic. It informs so many things, so many layers that you can imbue into your writing.
I don’t think there’s anything better than reading. It’s sort of like mathematicians, they have to learn the formulas and everything that came before, the foundation that they’re building upon. Ignorance is never going to get you anywhere; you can’t break new ground if you don’t know what the old ground is.
You may not even want to break new ground, but if you want to write something fresh or new or that’ll capture the modern reader, you need to know what the readers are reading and what they enjoy and resonate with. That’s always my number one piece of advice, to read as widely as you possibly can.
MB: A lot of people would think you’re going straight for the Vatican, but it’s interesting that you’ve taken from Parliament House instead of just going for a Catholic metaphor there.
SC: Well, the Catholic metaphor wrote itself, definitely. Obviously, you can’t live somewhere and work somewhere without absorbing features of that life. The atmosphere of Parliament House, how quiet it is sometimes and how high the ceilings are and how echoey the halls are, the marble floors and the dark corners, when it’s quiet and light and so on and so forth, a lot of that made its way into the book.
MB: I think that’s a good piece of advice. You did say that travel is a good thing to do if you are in the position to do it. I think a piece of advice that I’ve heard floating around before is you have to live before you write. What do you think about that?
SC: I think that’s very harsh for young writers, isn’t it? There’s nothing you can do to live 10 lifetimes before you start writing if you want to write now. I don’t necessarily think that you can’t write without experiencing life. But I do think the more life you have, the more experiences you have to go upon. It’s a bit of a truism, isn’t it?
MB: Yeah, definitely.
SC: You can’t say, you have to be 31 before you ever write a book. I don’t think that’s correct. I’d say to anyone, a teenager, an 18-year-old who came up to me and said, “I really, really want to. I love writing. Can I do it?” I’d say yeah, absolutely. Start writing. It’s about imagination. You don’t have to necessarily live to have an imagination.
MB: I completely agree. So, one more question on the romantasy genre. When writing Cruel, what came first? Did you have a specific idea or was there something that you wanted to explore more?
SC: I guess for me, when I’ve read fantasy, especially YA fantasy for a long time, I found the romance quite unsatisfying. I often felt like the female main character was like going through this journey, and the male main character was just there. Usually he was there to protect her or to help her, but it always never felt very deep.
It often felt to me that the main male character wasn’t a real person. So for me, Jules is probably the number one, the first main character in the book. It’s really his story and it’s his father’s story and it’s his journey of self-discovery. So it had to have a romance in a fantasy world that I wanted to do justice to. They came together. For me, characters come first, before either of the other two things.
MB: You’ve done a really good job at making both of them kind of the main character. Selene isn’t just a love interest. Describing this book to a friend, I didn’t really know who to name the main character, because they’re both just so developed in a way where neither of them are just there for the other to date.
SC: Yeah, they’re both main characters to me. I got to express that by having it from both of their points of views at different times; it’s definitely both of their stories. But if I had to say, Jules’ maybe a hair more ‘main character’ than her.
MB: Was there any part of Cruel that you really enjoyed writing most?
SC: No. I love the fun scenes, like the drinking scene and the fountain scene. I really enjoyed writing all the on the train scenes. I enjoyed writing Kian and Jules’ interactions, and I loved writing Caterina and Lucia, especially in their sort of back and forth. So, basically anything with the characters, the character interaction. Getting on each other’s nerves, I love that.
MB: So, just to wrap up. Cruel Is the Light number two is coming out soon. I believe it’s 2026?
SC: 2026.
MB: Okay, I’m very excited about that. Are there any upcoming releases that you’re specifically looking forward to from other authors?
SC: Of Flame and Fury, my friend’s book, is coming out in July. She’s Australian, Michaela Bridge. Air of Storms, Lauryn Hamilton Murray, that’s in June. I’m looking forward to that very much, and The River Drags Her Down by Jihyun Yun in September.
MB: That’s amazing, thank you so much for everything today. It’s been great talking with you. Good luck with the rest of the Cruel duology. I look forward to reading it when it’s released!
Sophie Clark’s second book in the Cruel is the Light duology is expected May 2026. You can find more information and her updates on her writing and beautiful art of her characters on her Instagram.
