April's Spotlighted Author is ... @Cheerful_Abyss with her novel Mated to the Mafioso!

Abyss (@Cheerful_Abyss) is a disabled, queer, half-Jewish Latina and half-Italian-American Floridian who hates the heat (and more recently her home state). She is an editor for one of the fastest-growing literary magazines in the US and is a freelance writer, editor, artist and designer who has multiple published and featured pieces of all types - art and writing alike. She primarily writes speculative, experimental magical realism works about apocalypses, the Internet Era (which is apocalyptic in itself), the Anthropocene, and ghosts - but also has fallen in love with romance, paranormals, and quirky characters.

When not creating she loves planning events, cooking and baking way too much food for said events, avoiding getting eaten by gators, and spoiling her two cats. 

Please help me give Abyss a warm welcome as our April Author of the Month.

Her novel Mated to the Mafioso is the focus for this month.

Werewolves, shapeshifters, and mafias, oh my!

/ / /

Andrea is a struggling shapeshifter who's trying to understand her past – and not get used for her abilities, where she can claim the form of anyone or anything. Dante is a werewolf mafioso who's trying to destroy his pack from within – and to not destroy himself in the process.

After a few fated run-ins, Dante pays Andrea to be disguised as Dante's arranged future mate and fiancee, Bianca. Unfortunately, things go sour – a mating ritual links Andrea and Dante together instead. They are strangers, enemies. And they're now mistakenly arranged mates, forced to fake-date and work toward a sham wedding. As they try to break the mating ritual, NYC's crime – and attacks against the supernatural – rise. Andrea and Dante are stuck in the middle of it all.

Chance draws them together. Fate cannot pull them apart.

* * *

Follow this duel POV, exciting, slow-burn, dark enemies-to-lovers, fake-dating, arranged-marriage/mates romance that's a new blend of contemporary thrillers, werewolf drama and strange magic.

Abyss's favourite quote from her book.

"I imagine you're exhausted, and just want to go home, but I just need you for this one night. One night. Then you'll get paid. And we'll go back to being strangers."

She watches me while chewing. Aggressively. She's angry that she's hungry, that she needs me right now. Her eyes - dark brown, deep and tired - narrow as they appraise me. They're flecked with ice now, faintly. Shards of Bianca, caught in her eyes like shrapnel. No. Too harsh. They're little dots, like the first flush of snow falling from a dusky sky.

I clear my throat, jaw tightening.

"Okay?"

"Another thousand."

"Fine." She'd bleed me dry if she could. I respect that. It excites me.

"Not fighting me this time?" She challenges.

The edge of my lips curls. I chuckle. "Do you want me to?"

Flash of panic. Momentary.

Andrea leans forward. "Two thousand."

"So you do want me to fight you on this." Silence. My grin widens. She's okay, thank god. So I push. "Nine hundred."

"What? I said-" Andrea's eyes widen.

"Eight hundred."

"A thousand! You agreed to that before, Dante-"

"Seven." I pause. "Dollars."

She flings a potato at me. I catch it and take a bite, which only makes her release a frustrated breath.

"A thousand dollars and one cent," I say.

"Deal. Che, tienes demasiado mangos -"

"Mangoes?"

"Money. I'm saying that you have a shitton of money."

"And mangoes comes in -?"

"Argentine slang." She says after swallowing, waving a fork in the air. "Like che boludo."

"I'll assume it's something about idiots?"

"Bingo." Andrea pauses, leans back; her eyes graze my frame once more.

"Maybe you're not entirely a boludo."

"Or maybe I'm just a very rich boludo." I return, sitting on the edge of the bed, picking a potato off her plate.

"That sounds more likely ..." she says after swallowing.

"This is good. But I'm still pissed at you."

I smirk. "I wouldn't have you any other way."

We also wanted to know more about Abyss as an author and the novel Mated to the Mafioso. We were able to conduct an interview with her.

Thank you so much Abyss for joining us in this interview. As Wattpad users, we are always interested in knowing what made you start writing on Wattpad? And What is the most memorable moment you have encountered here?

"I've been on and off Wattpad since around 2013, so when I was a very early teenager. The sense of community pulled me here for sure—and while I think it's harder to find community in Wattpad itself, with the forums being gone (which I will always hope they will bring back), I've found communities in book clubs and external groups!

A big shoutout to @DreamlandCommunity—the most memorable moment in this era of my Wattpad life has to be when my book "Paradise" was picked for book of the week! I was flooded with comments, and I always want to respond to my readers, since they put the effort in to comment in the first place and that always makes me *so* happy. I think there was a total of around 650-700 comments they left in the span of a week! I loved that engagement and getting fantastic, substantial feedback." 

What is the challenge you found writing Mated to the Mafioso or writing in the Urban Fantasy genre?

"One of the largest challenges I have in writing this story is considering a world where magic exists, and paranormals exist, but New York City still has to be New York City, and the world has to be mostly the same. Characters don't exist in a vacuum—they're born out of the world they exist in, so I have to consider the worldbuilding and characters all at once.

The world that Andrea and Dante live in is modern, but a bit regressive and definitely authoritarian, since the modern political climate and danger are eternally present in my mind. Magic being restricted, and being a deeply puritanical, American thing, coming out of the religious extremist Pilgrims feels right (I'd elaborate, but you'll just need to read and find out the history). So magic is restricted, regulated, and most peoples' lives move around magic and paranormals, even if they are integrated into society. In front of most buildings where there are important documents and money-handling—casinos, banks, corporate skyscrapers—there are anti-scrying/sight magic wards to keep people from looking within or using magic to see the future. Subways and trains are laden with silver to keep extra-strong paranormals, like were-creatures, from shifting and fighting and potentially moving the train off the tracks. Anti-magic coatings on corporate buildings to keep witches from making magic, shifting graffiti. So on. Most magic is snuffed because of corporate interests and protections, of course."

What are your favourite details or scenes in your novel?

"As far as favourite details go, definitely the dialect and cultural elements of this piece! They get explored more later on, but I adore small cultural touches—especially considering how much insight they give to characters! I'm half Jewish Argentine and half Italian American, so the two characters reflect two aspects of my background. I spent my summers in NYC, surrounded by other proud Italian Americans—and often people who had left, or were a generation away from, or in, the mob. While I've never engaged in it personally (GOD no—just fiction please), much of my family has been involved a generation or two back, so I try to include many of those real-life details here and examine how immigrants—whether it's first-generation immigrants, like Andrea's parents, or Dante's family, who has three generations in America, lives. I've been cataloguing family stories and have included certain elements here, especially once we get deeper involved in Dante's family.

Dante and his family frequently include Italian American slang into their language, and of course, good ol' NYC cussing haha.

Andrea's been disconnected from her culture, family, and background for plot reasons (spoiler: she was in a building collapse in Miami, which also killed her parents. The impact mostly wiped her memory. Or did it?) She uses her language(s) and dialect to try and form a bridge with her past, being raised in Argentina and South Florida—but as a shapeshifter, she's able to become anyone, so she has a lot of identity issues. In the story, she becomes Dante's arranged mate, Bianca, as a part of a deal—and in doing so, she questions herself and her growing attraction to him...and who she is. After all—when you can become anyone, why be who you were born as? Especially if you have little conception of that person who you were initially? She talks differently when she shifts—her voice, dialect, and vocabulary change too.

Dialects and slang are remnants of past culture(s), signs of assimilation—and it's bittersweet. My family on both sides hasn't passed down their languages; the first generation of Italians had to practice church in basements because they spoke in Latin and Italian. My dad, first-gen American, never taught me Spanish from the prejudice he faced, being both Latino and Jewish in the US. He only speaks Spanish when necessary.

All of this is to say that the experience of different ethnic groups is varied and diverse—and language is a great tool to convey it. Anyway. Favourite non-English word? Dialect word? I'm particular to gabagool. It's so goofy. Do you have a favorite dialect/slang word?"

What do you think makes a good and intruding Werewolf story?

"This is such a good question! My answer for this is the answer for what makes any story intriguing: character. If characters aren't strong, then the story doesn't follow. Readers need to be engaged. I love seeing how characters fit into the world, and the werewolf dynamics that are at play. Rituals involving mating/imprinting, rituals with the full moon; it's all so cool to explore.

I love the built-in structures of werewolves and exploring (and often breaking or subverting) those hierarchies. The contemporary world is more disparate and disconnected than ever—everything is virtual, and community centers and resources are being stripped—so I love that werewolves have a built-in sense of community, so I look for that in a story too. While it's not a requirement, it's always a plus to me."

What is your favourite Urban Fantasy book here on Wattpad? Or in general?

"This is so hard to choose! One urban fantasy and magical realism story that's stuck with me throughout my life—and was a foray into the genre—was "Selkie Stories are for Losers" by Sofia Samatar. It's subtle, and queer, and fantastical. I love it. The narrator's voice is so strong, so lost, so simple, and so achy. After talking about selkies' origins, she says, "You might suspect my dad picked my mom up in Norway, where they have seals. He didn't, though. He met her at the pool." It's about connection and disconnection and power and gender, too. And it's so quiet. It was written in 2013, which is an eternity ago, but in a world full of overstimulation (which has only gotten worse now), those quiet moments matter. The quiet traces of magic in the world—or closet—like a faint shudder of dust. I read this story at least once a year, and re-read it for this interview, so thanks for the reminder, ha!

Most of the stories on my page are urban fantasies, so definitely check them out! I wouldn't put up anything I don't recommend."

What is your writing playlist?

"YES, I love gushing about magic. Let me just say that Spotify has ruined (saved) me from the standard top-hit radio and made my tastes wonderfully eclectic. I love some space jazz lol. Dante's and Andrea's songs cross over since their stories intersect. I'll break the playlist into three sections and yes, I wrote down way too many songs, but take a gander if you wish. If this overlong interview leaves you with anything, maybe some new music recs.

[CITY]

New York City is its own character in the story. So I listen to a lot of Jazz while writing it.

"Epistrophy" by Theon Cross (conveys the rattle of a subway fantastically; it's jazz but very mechanical.) Also "Next Stop" by Portico Quartet, "BTSTU" by Jai Paul, "Not TiGHT" by DOMi and JD Beck, "Asynchronous Intervals" by Binker and Moses, "New York, New York" by Frank Sinatra (of course) and way more. There's a video of the legendary Pharoah Sanders playing "Kazuko" in an abandoned tunnel on the sax, and it conveys the feeling of walking through Central Park, hearing a music player in the distance, music carried by the wind. Anything goes. Depending on where you are, any music fits.

[DANTE]

"Sweet Isolation" by Oscar Jerome is jazzy and smooth and sexy, and fits Dante's life well. A lot of Oscar Jerome, in his album 'The Spoon,' fits Dante. Same with the songs "Channel Your Anger" (shocker, Dante has anger issues. And daddy issues. And issues. But who doesn't?)

Also some Daniel Caesar:"Please Do Not Lean," "Get You," "We Find Love,"

Moses Sumney (amazing lyricism and strong instrumentation. My favorite artist lol): "Virile" "Conveyor." Others: "Mister Unknown" by Kolinga, "A BOY IS A GUN" by Tyler, the Creator; "Nights" by Frank Ocean, "Defection" by Jordan Rakei, and anything that's classic Italian American Music lmao.

[ANDREA]

Songs full of empty space, conveying loneliness and desperation and ache and identity.

From Moses Sumney: "Doomed," "Nobody," "Polly,"

Others: "Plastic 100C" by Sampha, "Kept Woman" by Fleet Foxes, "Cranes in the Sky" by Solange, "Mequertefe" by Arca, "Assume Form" by James Blake," "Barefoot in the Park" by James Blake and ROSALÍA, and more."

Is there anything else you would like to say?

"Thank you so much for this opportunity! I love the chance to gush about my books and ideas, I am so honoured to have this chance with you."

—

Thank you so much for taking the time to answer our questions Abyss, your novel Mated to the Mafioso and your other novels are the perfect addition to Urban Fantasy and the Wattpad community. Thank you so much for bringing this side of Urban Fantasy to the forefront of the Wattpad reading community. Keep up the great work.

We're delighted to have Abyss from @Cheerful_Abyss as one of our spotlighted authors! Everyone do yourself a favour and check out the amazing Urban Fantasy Novel Mated to the Mafioso!

Interested to know how you can become a spotlighted author? Each author here has been noticed by us for their outstanding writing. Keep working on your story and submit your story to our reading lists to get noticed more easily.