Over at Booker Albert we are very ready for the release of one of AJ’s author’s books, THE COLOR OF TIME. Since it is launching tomorrow, I am excited to present an interview with the author Millie Abecassis. In this interview, she talks about the process, the business, and a few other aspects of publishing that really shine a light on the backstory around the book. If you've ever wondered what it takes to bring a genre-mashing novel to life, Millie has some answers.

Storytelling, Space, and Sapphic Romance: A Conversation with Millie Abecassis

The Color of Time is a sapphic love story releasing at a time when queer content is the target of suppression. This means we need LGBTQ books more than ever! What are your feelings about writing queer fiction in the current atmosphere?

I agree that we need LGBTQ books more than ever and I am determined to keep writing more of them. I wrote the initial draft of The Color of Time in 2023 and never imagined we would face such drastic setback just a few years later. Queer people aren't going anywhere, and we will keep writing and reading stories about ourselves. It is true that I have moments where I ponder how to market my book. Should I mention in my pitch to a reader coming to my table that my book is sapphic? What about bookstores? I usually opt for transparency and so far I have had no negative experiences. I'm sure it will come; but I won't stop writing and publishing books with queer characters. Another interesting thing happening right now is the rising awareness about lesbophobia among the average reader of queer fiction. Some readers, many of them straight women, will present themselves as allies of queer authors and will champion gay books, but only for M/M romance. The moment it is sapphic, they disappear or worse, become hostile. What happened with Heated Rivalry vs. Bridgerton's forthcoming season is telling. But people are realizing that lesbophobia is a bad thing, and are coming together to support sapphic stories. It is a very pleasant turn of events.

What was it about the fairy tale "Donkeyskin" that inspired you to retell it?

I have been intrigued by this tale since high school. I was a literature major for my baccalauréat (high school degree in France) and Charles Perrault's tales were one of the four books on the program of our literature class during my senior year. From the premise to the resolution, I found "Donkeyskin" captivating and deeply unsettling. Fast forward to 2022, I came across a call for short story submissions about "fairy tales in space" and immediately thought of "Donkeyskin" because of the dresses the princess asks for in the original tale. She requests dresses of the color of the sky, the moon, and the sun. My mind immediately got busy imagining the same requests in a science-fiction setting with spacesuits inspired by the same elements. I didn't write a short story for the call, but the idea stayed in the back of my mind, and eventually I decided to turn it into a book.

How did the sci-fi setting allow you to expand on the fairy tale's themes in fresh ways?

The second main inspiration for The Color of Time is Dune and its political themes. Setting The Color of Time in a galactic empire with multiple spacefaring countries allowed me to expand on one aspect of the original tale that didn't sit well with me: monarchy, autocracy, and the common lack of accountability autocrats experience. In "Donkeyskin," the princess's father never faces any consequences for his heinous acts, and I wanted to change that in my retelling. I used the sci-fi setting to infuse the story with politics and rebellion against tyranny.

As fairy tales go, "Donkeyskin" isn't well-known in North America, so we could say that your background as someone born and raised in France has given you some great material to draw from. Are there other ways your experience as a French immigrant to the United States helps shape your fiction?

Many of my stories are indeed inspired by French tales such as "Donkeyskin," "Bluebeard" or "Little Red Riding Hood" (the first written version of "Little Red Riding Hood" is by Charles Perrault!) or by French history and culture. My debut novel A Legacy of Blood and Bone takes place in France during the Belle Epoque, so I leveraged my knowledge of French history and my ability to read history books in French to craft this book. Another fun fact is that I often pick old French names for my characters, even if the story isn't set in France or inspired by a French tale.

You recently had another novel come out, a historical fantasy called A Legacy of Blood and Bone. Do you like writing fantasy and sci-fi equally? Are there certain perks to writing one genre vs. the other?

I enjoy fantasy, science fiction, and horror equally, and I love to blend them together as much as I can. If I had to pick the one genre I enjoy writing more, it would probably be fantasy because of the unending possibilities inherent to the genre. My next manuscript will be a high fantasy. But because I cannot resist blending genres, it will have sci-fi elements. It will be a second world with magic and technology. A high sci-fantasy, I guess?

Are you a plotter, a pantser, or somewhere in between? Did The Color of Time challenge your usual process in any unexpected ways?

I'm a true plantser, so in between. I outline my books to make sure the structure is solid and I have a good map to follow, but there's still a lot of discovery while writing: secondary characters, elements of worldbuilding, etc. Many of these appear while I write. I wrote The Color of Time in 2023 at the time where I was transitioning out of being a chaotic pantser after I realized it didn't work for me. It is the first manuscript that I fully outlined before writing my first draft. I enjoyed the experience a lot and was very happy with the first draft and how clean it was compared to my previous manuscripts. It confirmed that I had made the right decision to move toward being more of a plotter.

What was the hardest scene in The Color of Time to write, and why?

Probably part III, which is the scene where Cyrelle and Sianna meet for the first time in Cyrelle's room. There's a lot going on and it is a pivotal moment for the two of them. A lot of information is exchanged, decisions are made, feelings are changed... I also had to find the right balance for Cyrelle. No spoilers but she does something that can be seen as reprehensible. I had to rewrite this scene several times to ensure I conveyed her situation properly (she is threatened and acts in self-defense) and that she didn't mean to harm Sianna, but simply to protect herself. Considering that they end up developing feelings for each other, I had to tread carefully. I'm very happy with the result, but it wasn't easy to write.

How long did The Color of Time take to write from first idea to finished manuscript? Did it go through a lot of changes during revisions, or did the first version of the story come out pretty close to what readers will find on the page?

I had the idea in 2022, and wrote the first draft in four months between January and April 2023. I spent a couple of weeks self-editing it afterwards, but I didn't do major revisions before submitting it to small publishers. A first publisher acquired it in August 2023. We had planned some developmental edits, but they never happened because I ended up getting my rights back in early 2025. I had signed with A.J. Van Belle since that first sale, so it went on submission a second time but with A.J.'s help this time. When Shiraki Press acquired it, they also had plans for developmental edits, and I was very excited about them, which is one of the reasons I was happy to sign with them. Brianne had a great editorial vision for my book that respected my own vision and enhanced it. I wouldn't say the final version of the book is drastically different from the first draft. The structure and narrative device are the same. The plot and its milestones are the same. What wasn't present in the first draft are the five parts breaking down the story in digestible bits (the first draft had no chapters whatsoever...), 7,000 more words strengthening the narrative, Cyrelle's diary entries, and a lot more continuity and consistency thanks to developmental and copy edits!

How did you approach building the sci-fi elements—did you do a lot of research, or did you let your imagination lead?

Mostly my imagination. This is a soft sci-fi story, a fairytale in space, so the science isn't meant to be realistic. The only part where I did a bit of research was for the planet Phau. I wanted it to be different from an Earth-like planet by having a different gravity, axial tilt, day length, etc. So I did a bit of research for that, but it's still very simple compared to hard sci-fi. For example, my manuscript Nightbloom which is currently on submission is a lot more on the hard sci-fi side of things. I leveraged my knowledge of drug development (I work in the pharmaceutical industry) and did a lot of research to ensure the story felt as realistic as possible, while still accessible to the average reader not well-versed in this topic. I didn't worry about that in The Color of Time because it is first and foremost a fairytale in tone and vibe, and fairytales don't make a lot of sense.

Do you think you'll write other books in the world of The Color of Time?

I don't think so, but never say never. At the moment, I don't have any plans to write a sequel or another book in the same world, but who knows what wild idea I will come up with in the future. I'm still going to be honest: it is very uncommon that I revisit a world if it wasn't planned from the beginning. For example, A Legacy of Blood and Bone was written as a standalone, but I always envisioned that it could be a duology. So yes, it is likely that I will write a sequel (I already have an outline). Same for my novella Bright City, Shattered. As soon as I finished writing it, I had an idea for a sequel (and I already wrote it). As for my latest manuscript Nightbloom (currently on submission) I'd love to write another book in this world. But I wrote The Color of Time in 2023 and haven't had any idea or desire to write more in this world since then. I doubt this will change.

Going into the launch of The Color of Time, what wisdom are you taking with you from your experience with A Legacy of Blood and Bone? What will you be doing the same and what will you be doing differently? 

Those two launches are very different because A Legacy of Blood and Bone launched as a digital-first release, so I didn't have a physical book. It means I haven't been able to do events with bookstores or sell the book physically to readers. It was a unique experience. I still learned a lot from it, in particular during the pre-launch phase. I leveraged a lot of what I did for that launch for The Color of Time. I'm doing a lot of the same, but more of it after I realized you cannot do too much marketing or promotion of your book. You cannot get too many ARC readers or post too much about your book. So I'm doubling down! And because The Color of Time will have a paperback release, I'm planning a lot of in-person events to promote it. I already planned in-person events with four local bookstores, I will be on a panel at the Bay Area Book Festival, I will be at multiple conventions and book festivals to promote and sell my book to readers... 2026 is going to be busy!

Thank you so much, Millie, for being willing to share your insights!

Please support her by connecting with her over her socials or ordering her new book!

MillieAbecassis.com

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BlueSky

The Color of Time: The Fairy Tale/Sci-Fi Mashup We Need Right Now

If you’d told me a year ago that the second book I ever sold as an agent would be a sci-fantasy retelling of a lesser-known fairytale, told in a perfectly executed second-person point of view (for very valid story reasons that become apparent as the plot progresses), I probably wouldn’t have believed you. But it was, and we’re all a bit better off for the existence of this subtly shimmering gem of a book.

I studied French from age 8 through high school and grew up with an assortment of used bookstore finds that included vintage volumes of classic fairy tales in French. So when Millie’s works landed in my inbox, layered with the influence of her French heritage, it felt like kismet. I signed Millie for her historical fantasy set in France’s Belle Époque (A Legacy of Blood and Bone, Row House, 2025), so when she sent me a second manuscript pitched as a Dune-inspired retelling of a Charles Perrault fairytale, “Donkeyskin,” I didn’t know what to expect.

What I found was the perfect blend of old-school fairy tale and sweeping sci-fi. The Color of Time delivers every bit of the classic fairy tale’s uncomfortable darkness woven with ethereal threads of magic, planetary politics echoing some all-too-familiar situations found in real life, and a sapphic romance that feels as inevitable as the sun.

If you, like me, once found doors to other worlds in the worn pages of fairy tales printed before the originals were deemed too scary for children, if you want to recapture the galactic vastness of classic sci-fi but with relevance to the social justice issues we face today, or if you just want to escape into another world for a few hours, The Color of Time delivers.

–A.J. Van Belle

Blurb

A brother’s forbidden demand. A silent goddess. A galaxy to rule.

Princess Cyrelle has always been faithful and true to her family, country, and Goddess. But now her brother, King Elias of Cicia, has ordered her to marry him.

Desperate to avoid this incestuous union, Cyrelle requests a series of increasingly impossible gifts and petitions the Goddess for a sign to sway her resolute brother. As Elias persists, Cyrelle must flee across the galaxy to avoid her fate.

Ending up on the faraway planet Phau, she becomes Green Scales, hiding and struggling to survive on her own. But Phau isn't the peaceful refuge Cyrelle had hoped for, and when the leader of its burgeoning rebel faction recognizes the runaway princess, she is forced to choose between safety and freedom. With the fate of two kingdoms on the line and nowhere left to run, Cyrelle must decide what it means to be true to herself, to her people, and to her heart.

Books Available for Preorder

We, The Missing

From Arwyn Sherman and Sobelo Books in 2026, WE, THE MISSING evokes the theme of powerlessness as in The Devil All the Time and is reminiscent of the dark world of Constantine.

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