Author Gabby Squailia reads a passage from her debut fantasy novel Dead Boys, a macabre, rollicking story set in the afterlife. She takes us through the unconventional road from idea to published book, and explains how her writing process continues to evolve.

Gabby’s passage, excerpted from Dead Boys:

Just beyond the edge of the path, an upended water tower was half-buried in a mound of debris, and beyond its rusted curve lay a view of the River Lethe unparalleled in the city proper. Jacob, despite his unmoving lungs, gasped.

Its purplish waters were wide and slow-moving. The motionless corpses that floated on its surface were surrounded by glittering shoals of refuse and roiling rainbows of oil. There, past the bobbing shape of a claw-footed bathtub, was the stretch of river-bend where he’d thrashed out of the mud and onto his newly lifeless feet nearly a decade ago. With this unexpected glimpse of his point of deathly origin, it all came rushing back: how, after days of toil, he’d propped his numb body up on one palm, then another, only to lose his purchase in the slippery mud and splash face-first into those amniotic waters, where the whole humiliating process began anew. 

Giving his full attention to his footsteps, Jacob was surprised at how well-tended the interrupted path became as it led to the seer’s door. Someone had packed it down, forcibly and recently. Stepping lightly now, he rubbed his reupholstered palms together, the high-pitched scrunch of their leather soothing his mind. 

“Greetings!” he cried, jerking one hand over his head, but as soon as he’d had a good look into the murk of her chamber, he choked on his prepared speech. From the roof to the rust-bitten curve of the floor, the room was packed with filth-encrusted children’s toys. Quilts and blankets spewed moldy down onto jacks-in-the-box with broken springs. Board games missing their pieces served as tables for eyeless dolls. In the center of the candy-colored sprawl sat the seer known as Ma Kicks, her body so thoroughly ravaged by time that Jacob felt a professional ache at the sight. From forehead to foot, her skin was full of holes, flashing elbows, cheekbones, and knuckles alike. Her face was a soiled handkerchief askew on her skull, incapable of expression.

“My name is Jacob Campbell,” he said, steadying himself enough to bow. “I come with a gift — and an uncommon question.”

Ma Kicks still hadn’t moved, but at the sound of his voice, something within her did. Startled, he staggered backward, fixing his attention on her belly.

She must have been near her ninth month of pregnancy when she’d died. Since then, her womb had given way, and from its dark cavity two tiny, skeletal feet emerged, dangling over the edge, kicking into the open air.