ICW: The Authors of Whiteout, Nic Stone, Dhonielle Clayton, Nicola Yoon, Angie Thomas and Ashley Woodfolk.

Back in 2021, follower and friend Christina Bennington gave me a book and said “you’re going to love this.” and that book was Blackout. A long story made up of a series of interconnected short stories set in New York during a blackout. And she was right, I did love it. So imagine my delight finding out that not only is there a sequel coming, but also that I got to sit down with the authors. Tiffany Jackson unfortunately couldn’t make it but I got to talk Whiteout with Nic Stone, Dhonielle Clayton, Nicola Yoon, Angie Thomas and Ashley Woodfolk. We spoke about the joy of collaboration, why they write, what inspires them, and the madness that occurred when they found out Blackout was going to be adapted for screen by none other than Barack and Michelle Obama.

Brianna (TBP)
So how's everyone doing?

Nic Stone
Great, great. Yeah. Wonderful. Yeah.

Brianna (TBP)
Okay, so before we start, can you guys all just like introduce yourselves individually.

Dhonielle Clayton
Okay, I'm Dhonielle Clayton.

Ashley Woodfolk
I'm Ashley Woodfolk.

Nicola Yoon
I'm Nicola Yoon.

Nic Stone
I'm Nic Stone.

Angie Thomas
And I'm Angie Thomas.

Brianna (TBP)
Thank you so much. Okay, so, I want to start by asking, Why are you guys writing in a group? What's the joy of writing together versus writing on your own?

Dhonielle Clayton
It's easier.

Ashley Woodfolk
I was about to say that! (laughter)

Nic Stone
You mean, besides the fact that we only have to write a sixth of the book each.

Dhonielle Clayton
And when you fall apart -

Nicola Yoon
Also like, writing alone is like, you know, you're like a troll in a cave sometimes. You never get out. Writing together is way more fun.

Everyone
(Agrees)

Dhonielle Clayton
When you fall apart. I'll be like, Ashley, I need you to rescue me because this character is feeling a little lacklustre come sprinkle some emo dust on it, please help me.

Ashley Woodfolk
Yeah, I think leaning into everybody's like strengths definitely helps us a lot and like, makes it an easier process. Like certain people are really good at dialogue. Certain people are really good at like kissing - like Nicola - kissing scenes and like making sure everything is like romantic enough. Nic is really great at dialogue. Dhonielle is really excellent at plot. Angie is super funny. Tiffany is good at sort of like building tension and making sure there's enough tension because she writes thrillers. So I think that was the other part.

Nicola Yoon
Ash is good at emo!

Ashley Woodfolk
Emotions- I also like to make things sound pretty. So yeah, I think like, in addition to it being so much easier, to only have to write part of a book, having everybody to help was definitely good as well.

Angie Thomas
And I was gonna say we did the first book Blackout during the pandemic, which already felt very isolating. So you add on the isolation of being a writer plus the isolation of a pandemic, and it was a tough time. So this, if nothing else, it allowed us to kind of get rid of that isolation a little bit and collaborate. And so it proved to be great for the first one. So we said, Let's do it again.

Nic Stone
That's right.

Brianna (TBP)
So how did this compare to obviously writing blackout because like you say, you're in lockdown. Even though you're kind of writing together, you can't really write together because everyone's locked down at home. Did you guys get to actually meet in person and do writing in person together?

Everyone
No!

Nic Stone
But, I will say it was writing Whiteout was definitely - we were even more collaborative, because we were really intent on making sure - she's not going to bite you.

(Readers, Listeners, it’s at this point I feel I must let you know that for this whole conversation so far, Nic has had her pet lizard on her shoulder, and Angie is sat immediately beside the shoulder with said Lizard on it.)

Nicola Yoon
Stay safe Angie, stay safe.

Nic Stone
Intent on making sure that it read like a novel, right? So like, we wanted to be very intentional about making sure our stories were actually reading as chapters instead of like, separate stories. So we were a lot more hands on in each other's stories this time than we were the first time. And it did, it made for a really great book, if I do say so myself.

Dhonielle Clayton
And Nic knows all the Atlanta stuff, right? Like so many of us are not from that city. She’s the one that knows. So I'm like, I need you to go in and make sure this is sounding correct. Because I don't have the vernacular. I don't know the landmarks as well, you know, so she went in and did all that.

Nic Stone
ATL Yo!

Dhonielle Clayton
I don't have all that. I'm in New York alright, I'm in New York right now!

Brianna (TBP)
So how do you decide when you're writing a book like this, like you say, you're only writing a sixth. How do you decide who's writing the start? Who's getting the end? Who gets to bring it all together? Who's writing in the middle? How do you dose that out to each other?

Nic Stone
Dhonielle.

Dhonielle Clayton
I knew you were going to come in here and throw me under the bus. Look, these are leadership skills.

Nic Stone
I mean, you're not wrong!

Dhonielle Clayton
I just was like, you know, let me see the overall shape. I kept thinking this is going to be our big like queer holiday movie like blah, blah, blah. And I kept thinking cinematically and then I talked to Nic about like, what are the landmarks that we should use in the city that are most most iconic, right? That could be like swoony, right? And then we just sort of organised. Because Nic, you did a lot of the organising of like, where things should be and then I just placed people where it made most sense for the shape of the story, which is a very different shape than blackout, right? This is the grovel, this is second chances. This is can all of these friends come together to help a character, like fix what she did with her, you know, blew up her relationship with her girlfriend. So it's a different type of story. So it took a lot of sort of pre work and then slotting everyone in, in their chapters.

Brianna (TBP)
So you say it's easier kind of writing together. And I'm interested, every single one of you has got a very distinctive style, you kind of touched on that you're all good at different things. But like you say, it does read like a novel. If you guys took off the six names off the front. I wouldn't know that six different people had written this book, how do such different styles come together and feel and flow like one? I’m sorry, I can't get over the fact there's a lizard sat on your shoulder.

Everyone
*laughter*

Angie Thomas
I obviously can't either!

Ashley Woodfolk
Put it on the other shoulder, so Angie feels safe!

Nic Stone
Usually she’d be on top of my head, climbing in my hair. She's so sweet. She's like the perfect pet. This is Elizabeth by the way.

Dhonielle Clayton
She named after the Queen?

Nic Stone
No. No Ma’am.

Brianna (TBP)
Straight no, hard no. (laughter)

Ashley Woodfolk
Is she named after the lizard on Magic School Bus?

Nic Stone
No.

Ashley Woodfolk
Isn't her name liz too?

Nic Stone
Actually, she probably is. So my son named her. This is so not on topic for Whiteout, but my son named her, it's technically she was my son's birthday present. And he named her Lizzie. So maybe he did name her after magic school bus, but I was like, Honey, you can't be the child of a writer and name a lizard Lizzie, we're gonna have to get a little more creative.

Everyone
(Laughs)

Brianna (TBP)
Bringing it back- How did we make it flow as as if it was one writer when there is actually six of you?

Nicola Yoon
Can I say that we're all geniuses, and that's why (laughs)

Angie Thomas
I think we just, we collaborated and we talked with one another. And we would like, if I'm getting to a kissing scene, and I'm like help Nic! Like if there's humour somebody may ask me about something. So we really just, we knew we know what our strengths are. And we kind of borrowed from each other in that sense. So and I'm glad I think we're all glad to hear that when you read it, you heard one voice

Nic Stone
I am so glad! That’s what we were aiming for!

Ashley Woodfolk
Yeah and I was also like, oh, Lizzie gotta go. (Nic takes a minute to put Lizzie back in her tank) I was gonna say also, we literally did dip in and out of each other's stories, like there are parts that one of us was working on, and when we went to another for help, like, literally, we might have added a sentence here or there. Like that kind of stuff. So I think that helped blend it together to like, Nic definitely has touched every single story literally.

Nic Stone
Yeah I put stuff and made changes to everybody’s story.

Dhonielle Clayton
Every chapter.

Nic Stone
Yeah, every chapter.

Ashley Woodfolk
Right. And, and like, I helped out with some emotional stuff in different chapters. So yeah, so I think..

Nicola Yoon
I also think that like the overall plot just naturally ties it together, right? I mean, there's like a driving mission, like throughout the whole thing, right? Everyone is on the same goal. So it really really ties it together too.

Everyone
(Agreement)

Brianna (TBP)
I would say even the first book felt like that, though. I know, you guys said you wanted this one to feel more like that. But as a reader, I do kind of struggle with short stories sometimes, because I feel like they're almost too quick for me. I'm not getting into it. But I really didn't struggle with Blackout because it read like chapters it read like, “this is a short story, and I love it, but we're still in the same story.” Like I'm on the next one. But it's still the same. I think you've done a really clever thing with this. It's yeah, I love it. I love this style. I'm so glad that you sat down in lockdown Dhonielle and went 'I'm doing this,' I love it.

Dhonielle Clayton
That's exactly how it was. I was like, let's do this. This is so great. This is gonna be so much fun. And it was!

Brianna (TBP)
So, what are your favourite themes to explore as a writer not necessarily just in this world of blackout and whiteout but just in general. What do you really love to explore?

Nic Stone
I like exploring and writing about things that pissed me off.

Ashley Woodfolk
(laughs)

Nic Stone
Really, No, I was at a writing retreat. I was like, on staff at a writing retreat this week. And like, we were talking about what mood, what like is the driving force behind a person's writing and for me, it really is things that bother me. Because I use writing - I use writing as a way to like explore things that bother me and figure out what my perspective is. Because a lot of the time, you know, you go into something thinking, you know how you feel. But I find that as I explore things through narrative, sometimes I'm wrong.

Brianna (TBP)
It's a great tool for growth.

Nic Stone
Yeah.

Ashley Woodfolk
Yeah. I think for me, it's more like catharsis. Like, it's things that it's like therapy a little bit. It's like things that I have that I struggle with, or things that bothered me when I was younger. And sort of trying to find a way to tell a story that makes me or like, my inner child, or like younger me feel better about things that have happened, or things that I'm still sort of processing now.

Angie Thomas
For me, I write the things I want to see, I write the characters I want to see, the characters I wish I would have seen already, the families or the worlds that I wish I could have seen that I haven't seen. So you know, whether it's like a family like the Carter family In The Hate U Give, or a young girl rapper, like in On The Come Up, whatever it may be, these are characters I wish I could have seen in books or in film beforehand. And I'm like, you know what, since I haven't seen them, why can't I do it? So you know, if I think of something wild, like, you know, a Black vampire with gold teeth, I'm gonna write a story about it. I haven't seen a vampire with gold teeth, with locs, I haven't seen that. So let me do it, you know. So that's, that's kind of what what pushes me is, is writing those things I haven't seen so that the kids coming up, who read my books will see them and not have to say, Oh, I've never seen that. I've never seen someone like me in a situation like that in a book or TV or film. So I want to give them what I haven't gotten.

Brianna (TBP)
And you do it incredibly well!

Dhonielle Clayton
Do I still have to go because they they took all the good stuff, so you know..

Brianna (TBP)
If you dont want to go, you can leave it (laughter)

Ashley Woodfolk
Nicci had something.

Nicola Yoon
No, I was just gonna say it's just questions that I have about the world like something that's really been bugging me. So I don't necessarily ever have the answer by the end of it. But for me, it always revolves around love and whether or not it's worth it, and questions like that, like the things that stick in my mind, and won't let go for some reason.

Brianna (TBP)
Thank you. So I'm gonna come back to the book questions, but I'm just conscious of time. And I ask everyone this question, so I want to ask you guys. What does being Black mean to you?

Angie Thomas
Being Black means to me that there's not one single experience of being Black, we sometimes have shared experiences, but there's no one single way to be black. And I want young people especially to know that, because so often they're made to feel as if, oh, in order to be seen as Black, you have to listen to this kind of music, you have to speak this certain way. And that is a total lie. You define your blackness at the end of the day. And I think that's the - I think being black is about being free. And we have not been given that.

Nic Stone
Damn.

Angie Thomas
So we have to take that freedom back. You know, so being black is about being free to be whoever we want to be. That's what being Black is.

Nic Stone
I don't have a response. That is fantastic.

Ashley Woodfolk
*snaps in praise*

Dhonielle Clayton
I think that speaks for all of us.

Nic Stone
It's about being free.

Dhonielle Clayton
Dropped the mic and *makes explosion with hands*

Brianna (TBP)
Thank you. Yeah. So I'm glad you said that. That's the reason I started asking this question was to prove that there isn't one answer. People see us as a monolith. And we're not a monolith. There's so many different experiences. So you summed everything up in a perfect little soundbite. So thank you so much. Okay, so back to the books. What was the reading experience or maybe not reading it could have been film, what was the storytelling experience for you that made you go I want to tell stories?

Dhonielle Clayton
For me, it was the lack of that. It was the fact that I was a librarian and teacher for 13 years in East Harlem, New York. And my students hated books, because they couldn't see themselves in fun things. They saw themselves in things that were like, nonfiction, right, about the pain of their collective background. That's where they found themselves in the written word at the time. And I wanted them to be able to see themselves saving the world, getting getting the person to love them back, you know, like defeating the monster. And so that is why I started telling stories because I wanted to fill those gaps and make kids fall in love with reading, because they can see themselves, a little bit of what Angie was saying. So it's like Vampire with gold grills. Yeah, my students would be like bring it to me, versus you know, Twilight, not to dunk on Twilight, just saying, it's a little different to my students lived experiences. So the only reason why I'm a writer is because of those children, because they gave me the challenge to give them something to make them fall in love with reading, and also to help their literacy rates and their engagement in the written word and story.

Brianna (TBP)
That gave me chills. Because it's so much, when you think of it like that it's so much deeper than just I want to read a story, like you say it ties into literacy rates, it ties then into success in education, it ties into higher education, there's so much to this. It's not just 'I want to see myself' There is so much there.

Everyone
(Agrees)

Dhonielle Clayton
That’s why we get death threats and rape threats when we're talking about diverse books for kids. Because the people who don't want people who look like us to have these books, they know what it means to, to see themselves in stories and to have a relationship with the written word. That's why it's so divisive, especially in this country, with book banning.

Ashley Woodfolk
Yeah, I would say my like situation is very similar to Dhonielle where I had, I feel like I had two reading experiences as a young person that really made me want to write stories. And one was Deenie, because I found that book, right when I got diagnosed with scoliosis. And I was also trying to like be like a model. And so that story was like literally exactly what was happening in my life at the time. And it was just so I don't know, it was just like, so bizarre to think about somebody writing a story in the 70s that I was relating to, you know, at the current time. And then I had a similar experience with the Colour Purple where I had, it was the first time I had seen a female character, who was black, who had feelings for another female character, and like, I didn't really understand it at the time, or like, why I was so drawn to it. But in retrospect, like, it's very, very clear. And so those, those two stories I feel were the ones that, like, made me want to write because I was like, wow, somebody else wrote something that I could see myself in. And I want to do that for other people too.

Nic Stone
I'll piggyback off of that, because like, the Colour Purple was also pretty formative for me. The interesting thing though, it was less for me, it was less about the relationship between the two characters that Ashley mentioned-I almost said their names, but I'm like, there are people who haven't read the colour purple, so I shouldn't spoil it-But it was for me the Colour Purple opened my eyes to the fact that you could tell stories in different ways, right? Because it's an epistolary novel. Right? So recognising that I didn't have to just write perfectly grammatically correct paragraphs to tell a story and that I could use like, there are other ways of storytelling, is really what turned the light bulb on for me, though, it did still take me another eight years or so before I developed any kind of courage, I guess, to sit down and try to write anything. Because as much as I loved the Colour Purple, I loved The Bluest Eye, like there were these these really hardcore Black literary fiction novels that are total classics now that I was reading when I was in college. But I didn't think that that was something I could do, right. Like ain’t nobody out here trying to be Toni Morrison, that is a plan to fail.

Everyone
*laughs in agreement*

Nic Stone

That's not a thing that we're out here doing. So I knew that it helped me to see that there was a way to tell a story that was not traditional. But yeah, it still took me a while to sit down and start writing. And that actually happened as a result of reading the character Christina, from the Divergent series, which I know people are like, 'really?' but yeah. Christina was the Black girl in the Divergent series who actually survived the whole series. And like that alone, the fact that she survived the whole series was like, we can do that? We can live through an apocalypse? O shoot.

Brianna (TBP)
Anyone else want to add?

Nicola Yoon
I would say for me, it's just reading in general, just growing up being a reader and still to this day, I read at least two books a week I just consume them. So The Little Prince and The Bluest Eye are my books that turned me on to like, oh, you could do this thing. But you know, the question was interesting, because I write because I have to right, because I make art, that's just part of who I am. But the characters look the way they do because we live in the world that underrepresents Black kids, right and Black people, and people of colour, so the books are for me, but the people look the way they do because that's just the truth. That's the world we live in and Black people fall in love and and they have aspirational dreams, and they're sometimes messy, and they're sometimes great and, and we just never, we don't see that story enough, we don't see all of the facets of the humanity of people of colour, which is just a lie, right? So we are, we have to tell the truth. That's what your, your job as a writer is. So, like, I make the books for me, but the characters look the way they do because that's a political act. Right? And it's a true act too, it's saying, Look, you don't get to define us, we get to define us. So, yeah, that there are two sides where to me, it's like, I need to make stuff. Just I have to. But I have to make some good stuff.

Ashley Woodfolk
And you do!

Nicola Yoon
Because we exist.

Brianna (TBP)
Thank you. Angie, you want to add?

Angie Thomas
Yeah, my, the book for me was Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor, when I was a kid. Because it was the first time I read a book about a black girl in Mississippi and there I was a black girl in Mississippi, it really gave me permission to exist on page. You know, and I think that's a powerful thing. You know, when so often you're reading books about young people, and you're a young person, but they never look like you. Or when they do look like you they're a stereotype or they're, you know, just the sidekick never the main character, but for this book to have not only a black girl as the main character, but a black family, as the you know, at the forefront. It really gave me that permission as a young creator to see myself on page. So I credit that book for igniting the flame inside me.

Brianna (TBP)
Thank you. Okay, so we need to wrap it up. So I'm going to quickly throw my last question and then say goodbye. And that is the Obama's are adapting Blackout -

Everyone
(Loud Laughter)

Brianna (TBP)
Right, the laugh! How did you find that out? How insane is that and how involved do you get to be?

Angie Thomas
We'll let Dhonielle tell it if we're pressed for time.

Dhonielle Clayton
Oh, it's a great story okay. Because all of them acted a whole fool. Okay.

Nic Stone
So did you!

Dhonielle Clayton
I did. I did. But everyone's personality was on display. So it's great, it went out. Netflix was like, yes, we want it. You know, it was a whole bidding, bidding war situation. And then when we found out that the Obama’s wanted to be our producers. Our film agent Mary Pender called me and she said, I need you to sit down and then I need you to lay down. And I said, “Oh no, it’s about to be bad.” I thought somebody had died. And then she told me and I was like, wait, what? She was like, Yep, she was like yep, and now you have to call everyone. And I was like Oh, no. So I texted our group chat and I said, where is everybody? Right, like, report in, tell me when you're sitting down, you know? And then I started calling people. Nicci just was like, 'wait, what? Huh? No, no, no, no,' she just said no, over and over again. She's like 'You're lying. You're lying. I'm about to fall down.' Right? Even though I told everyone to sit down and lay down. Ashley did not pick up the phone. She clicked me to voicemail like five times I robo-called her. Okay. Nic was like, I can't repeat what she said okay because she started cussing. Angie was driving with her mom and I said, I need you to pull over because you're gonna run into a tree. And as soon as I said it, she was screaming, screaming. And it was the best thing ever. I had to I had to like put the phone down and she was screaming so loud. Tiffany was like, yo. She said 'yo Yo, don't play don't play, don’t play with me.’ She was like I can't tell anyone. She was like if I tell my mom all of Jamaica will know, what am I gonna do. Her mom didn't know till the day before the annoucement went live. Everybody elses mum knew, she didn't know. She just kept saying stop playing. Don't play. Don't play with me. Souding like she's gonna fight me. I was like I'm serious you can call Mary yourself. Oh, it was great. And then Ashley finally called me back. She's like, what's going on? She'd had few beverages. What is it? What? It was a Friday night. I feel like was a Friday night.

Brianna (TBP)
That was even better than I was expecting the answers to be.

Dhonielle Clayton
Angie ran off the road. Right? Like literally can hear the car screeching in the background. It was great. And we do get to be involved. So we have a great show runner, which we can't say yet, who's an amazing black woman. It's gonna be awesome. So now it's time for Whiteout to get its due.

Brianna (TBP)
Oh, yes. Amazing. Well, I'm so happy for all of you. It's stunning. The second book is stunning. Everything about your writing styles is stunning. And I'm just-look at this Black joy. I am just so happy to be a part of sharing this with the world.

Ashley Woodfolk
Yay!

Everyone
Thank you!

Brianna (TBP)
Thank you! Enjoy the rest of your days. Thank you very much.

Whiteout is out now! Get a copy for Christmas here. To get the set, here’s where you can buy Blackout.