I'm Jesse Thorne. Why did Koliskola write a bonkers extremely fictionalized play about Mary Todd Lincoln?

Well, you know, it was 2020 and we were all so isolated. I just started doing research, but the truth is, no. I just started doing research but the truth is no I just thought of it.

We'll talk about that and more on bullsey for maximum fun.org and NPR.

This is fresh air. I'm Terry Gross. Lee Bardugo is one of today's most successful and popular authors working in the fantasy genre, writing books for both the adult and YA markets.

She became famous for her Shadow and Bone novels

which took place in a world inspired by 19th century Russia.

They were adapted into a series for Netflix.

Her latest novel, The Familiar, takes place in 16th century Spain.

Bardugo spoke with our producer Sam Brigger.

Here's Sam.

The heroine of The familiar is Lucia, a young woman with little prospects, working in the kitchen of a not very important noble and his wife in Madrid. However, Lucia has a secret. She's able to perform small miracles. Like when the cook burns the

bread, she's able to unburn it. Her secret is discovered by her employer, the haughty woman of the house, Donya, who imagines she will be able to rise in society, having such a woman working for her.

But the story of Lucia's parlor trick-like miracles travels fast, and members of King Philip II's

court take notice.

Perhaps they think she can serve a larger purpose in the pursuits of Spain's empire. But first she must prove her magical skills in a

contest with other miracle workers, some of whom may be Hucksters, some might be

real. And in a society policed by the Inquisition, she must prove that her abilities are the products of God's blessings and not the work of the devil, which would surely be the conclusion if it's revealed that she is of Jewish descent, that she is one of the conversos, the Jews

that in 1492, when faced with exile from Spain, converted to Catholicism to remain.

Lucia faces mortal traps everywhere as she tries to find a place for

herself in the oppressive world she's been born into and as she discovers love.

Lee Bardugu is well known for her YA books in The Shadow and Bone and Six of Crow series, as well as her adult books, ninth house and Hellbent, which take place on a version of Yale's campus where she went to school, where magic is

magic is used to maintain the power and privilege of the school's

...