Ayana Gray Creates New Worlds

The Book Case

ABC News

Fiction, Arts, Books, Society & Culture

4.1 • 766 Ratings

🗓️ 26 January 2023

⏱️ 40 minutes

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Summary

Ayana Gray doesn't just write books, she creates worlds. At 29 years old, she is already one of the best selling YA authors on the market (yes, it's ok to be jealous). Her series, which became Beasts of Prey and the more recently released Beasts of Ruin, presents a lush Pan-African fantasy world that will suck you in and won't let go. As page turners with mature themes, these books are the perfect way for The Book Case to start talking about fantasy. Books Mentioned in the podcast: Beasts of Ruin by Ayana Gray Beasts of Prey by Ayana Gray Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien The Twilight Series by Stephenie Meyer The Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling The Maze Runner Series by James Dashner The Divergent Series by Veronica Roth Little Thieves by Margaret Owen How to Tell if Your Cat is Plotting to Kill You by The Oatmeal The Belgariad by David Eddings Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver Karabian Red by Ashley N. Silver Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:35.8	Well, it's the bookcase again. And welcome back. I'm Charlie Gibson. And I'm Kate Gibson. And I am
0:40.3	Kate Gibson. And I am really excited to be here today. Unless I'm wrong, this is our first fantasy author. And I'm very
0:48.7	excited. We're going to talk today to Ayana Gray. This interview I actually taped at the Brooklyn
0:53.7	Book Festival a while ago,
0:55.8	I'm so excited that she would talk to me because I am a big fan of her two books, Beast of Ruin
1:01.6	and Beast of Prey, both of which are super fun. And they're terrific fantasy books set in a sort of
1:08.5	Pan-African world. You know, it's interesting because fantasy, I think,
1:12.6	up until the last five or six years, has largely been a white genre. I mean, when you picture
1:19.1	fantasy worlds, you largely picture wizards that are white and princesses that are white.
1:24.4	And I think in some ways with the arrival of American consciousness in the last
1:31.2	few years, not to mention the commercial success of Black Panther, it's opened up a gate for
1:37.1	fantasy writers of all kinds to provide windows into worlds that we haven't seen before.
1:48.5	I read something, for instance, a few years ago called Tristan Strong punches a hole in the sky,
1:52.0	which is based entirely on African and West African folklore.
	...

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