Fractured is a contemporary young adult coming of age novel. It’s a mature YA that deals with many societal issues that teens face today like mental health, toxic masculinity, and rape culture (these are also trigger warnings). The narrator is Mason Vance, and he’s not a very likeable character, especially in the beginning of the story. He’s the popular star quarterback and “it” boy who breaks his wrist during the homecoming game, and he’s left wondering if all his football dreams are over. When he goes to the doctor, he meets Lace, an artsy anxious girl who is in the same building for a therapy appointment, and she seems immune to Mason’s charm. Once Lace lets him in and Mason starts spending time with her, he begins to learn about her inner mental health struggles, and it leads him to introspect and question a lot of his past behavior. Their relationship comes to a breaking point one night when Mason realizes he couldn’t escape everything he had been up until now as easily as he thought, regardless of the time he spent falling for and caring about Lace. He must confront the ugliest side of himself and find his path to healing both physically and emotionally. 

🏈 🦴 🏥 😔 👫 ☄ 💔 🆗 

I love them all for different reasons, but I guess it would be Lace. I relate to her the most and I understand her mental health struggles, and the way in which she feels so misunderstood due to those struggles. Writing about what goes on inside her head, and the difficulty she has explaining it, also helped me sort out some of my own thoughts. 

I had the idea for Fractured shortly after I broke my own wrist, which was the inspiration behind Mason’s wrist fracture in the novel. I started thinking about the ways in which society views physical conditions that you can see, like broken bones, in comparison to mental “injuries” that can’t be seen like depression and anxiety. I wanted to write from the perspective of a character who didn’t fully understand this societal perception either because I felt it was a different take on incorporating themes of mental health, but something that people who struggle with mental health can relate to in terms of feeling misunderstood. I also liked the idea of making an unlikeable character the narrator and trying to get into the mind of someone like that to see if they had potential to change, while integrating the theme of literal and metaphorical fractures throughout the story. 

If you could choose one song to describe your book, which one would it be? 

“Fell on Black Days” by Soundgarden 

I know many authors will use actors as inspiration for their characters or even base them on particular people, but I don’t do that at all, and sometimes I can’t even envision a real-life person as the character after I’ve written them. But now with this question, and actually having to think about it, I can definitely picture these actors as the characters. As well as Mason and Lace, I’ll include just a few of the secondary characters in the list. 

Mason: Wolfgang Novogratz 

Lace: Olivia DeJonge 

Chad (Mason’s younger brother): Noah Schnapp 

Chris (Mason’s best friend): Miles Heizer 

Teresa (Mason’s mom): Jennifer Garner 

A remote park or nature trail with an iced tea (weather permitting). But it’d also be a great cozy fireplace read with a hot chocolate. Any place or drink that might bring comfort during an emotional read. 

Two great YA reads that deal with sexual assault are: The Way I Used to Be by Amber Smith and Asking for It by Louise O’Neill. A great portrayal of mental health in a YA book is Turtles All the Way Down by John Green. Then of course there’s always the very raw issue-driven 13 Reasons Why by Jay Asher. 

All the small details that go along with actually finishing it. Drafting can be as messy as needed, but it becomes more difficult when you know you have some great scenes or paragraphs, and even just sentences, and they aren’t necessarily in the right order or combined with the correct scenes. It’s tricky taking pieces apart and finding a way to put them back together differently, especially because there is no “right” answer like fitting a puzzle piece. So, the later drafts are definitely the most challenging for me. 

I’m working on a new YA novel, it’s another coming of age contemporary story. It’s very different than Fractured, but will deal with some mental health topics, friendship and family, and identity. I also write poetry and am working on a new poetry collection about my selective mutism (which is an anxiety disorder that has to do with speaking) growing up. I plan to just keep writing and hopefully become a voice in the YA community!