Happy Wednesday, Everyone! Today
I’m excited to have Alechia Dow here to share about her new YA cozy fantasy,
Until the Clock Strikes Midnight. I interviewed Alechia in 2020, when she was a debut author, for
her first book, The Sound of Stars. She and her co-author, Tracy Badua, shared a guest post in September
2025 to celebrate
the release of Their Just Desserts. I’ve been reading more cozy fantasies these
days, and I’m super excited to read Alechia’s.
Here's a blurb from Alechia’s website:
The Good Place meets
the Brandy version of Cinderella in Until the Clock Strikes Midnight, a cozy,
romantic fantasy from award-winning author Alechia Dow.
Darling is the most talented—and unusual—Guardian to get a chance
at winning the coveted once-in-a-generation Mortal Outcome Council mentorship.
Getting the spot would mean having the opportunity to shape the future
happiness of all mortal realms—if she succeeds at her first assignment, Lucy
Addlesberg. Darling thinks it’ll be an easy razzle-dazzle job… until she
actually meets Lucy. Her life is a complete mess, from her failing bookshop in
her downtrodden village to her doomed flirtation with the princess of Lumina.
But if there’s one thing Darling’s good at, it’s a makeover.
Calamity is the most talented—and
arrogant—Misfortune of his class. It’s his job to save mortals from their own
terrible decisions made in the pursuit of the mythical "Happily Ever
After." When Calam is granted a shot at the Mortal Outcome Council
mentorship, he thinks his dreams are finally coming true. But first, he must
pass the test. It should be easy—Lucy Addlesberg has been unfortunate for
years. All he has to do is continue her string of bad luck so she can finally
come to terms with reality and settle for a safer, more logical path in life.
Yet when he arrives, he finds that Lucy has a Guardian assigned to her too—a
chipper overachiever who is as colorful as the magic pouring from her glittery
wand.
To thwart each other, Darling and Calam insert
themselves into Lucy’s life posing as a betrothed couple. As they try to guide
her down what they each see as the best path for her, they start questioning
their roles and ultimately what they truly want for themselves... and if those
feelings of loathing they have for each other might actually be something more
like love.
Before I
get to Katie’s interview, I have my IWSG post.
Posting: The
first Wednesday is officially Insecure
Writer's Support Group Day.
Purpose: To
share and encourage. Writers can express doubts and concerns without fear of
appearing foolish or weak. Those who have been through the fire can offer
assistance and guidance. It’s a safe haven for insecure writers of all
kinds!
The
awesome co-hosts this month are: J Lenni Dorner, Victoria Marie
Lees, and Sandra Cox!
Optional
Question: Many writers have written about the
experience of rereading their work years later. Have you reread any of your
early works? What was that experience like for you?
No, I've only written two
manuscripts, which I’ve been revising. I worked on each for about ten years.
Once I started working on the second one, I stopped revising the first story. I
haven’t gone back to it.
Interview With Alechia Dow
Hi Alechia! Thanks so much for joining us.
1. Where did you get the idea for Until the Clock Strikes
Midnight?
Hi! Thanks for having me, it’s always a pleasure chatting with
you! So, the concept for Until the Clock Strikes Midnight came from two places:
Whitney Houston’s version of Fairy godmother in Cinderella––I wanted to write a
fairy with incredible power and a gold, glittery wand––and the idea of a devil
and an angel sitting on your shoulders, goading you to take their advice. I’ve
always loved the visualization of that, especially in Emperor’s New Groove, and
it illustrates our impulses and the way our brain makes choices based on them.
2. Your story is a cozy fantasy. What makes a story a cozy
fantasy, and what made you decide to write yours in this genre?
Cozy fantasy is defined by a low stakes, gentle approach to
storytelling. It’s more slice of life, character-focused, and quiet. While I’d
read Legends & Lattes and The Spellshop––two books that are standouts in
the genre, I wasn’t sure I had the skills to write it until my editor gave me
the confidence to try. Honestly, if I’d sat down to consider it fully, as a
former librarian, pastry chef, food writer and author, I’m a cozy person.
This should’ve felt natural. Once my editor helped me find my voice, writing Until
the Clock Strikes Midnight became shifted the way I thought about my career. Cozy
wasn’t something I’d read much of in young adult fantasy that’s known for being
epic, twisty, and high stakes. With it gaining traction for younger audiences,
I think it’ll find audiences that crave an escape from the overwhelming weight
of the world. I’d love to think that Black youth particularly deserve books
where it’s not life and death, it’s hopeful, joyful, and magical.
3. I agree with you that there’s a YA audience for cozy fantasies.
When I interviewed you in 2020, you were a pantser, a half-plotter, who wrote the first 30 pages without an outline to get a feel for the plot and your
characters. Has your process changed at all since then? If so, how, and why
does it work for you?
My process has not changed at all, ha! The more I outline, the
less I enjoy the discovery of the characters and plot. Drafting out the first
thirty pages by excitement and a sprinkle of an idea lets me have fun and feel
free to fail. There’s no pressure; I just get to explore the story and see if
it could be a book. I write my best when I’m not stressed about making it
perfect.
4. I’ve read some reviews that praise your story for the humor and
banter between your characters. How did you create such good dialogue between
Darling and Calam and slip in humor, which is hard for many of us to write?
Oh, that’s lovely! I hoped readers would enjoy the humor and that
the banter would land well. Darling and Calam were so easy to write and creating
conversations between them was a blast. They’re incredibly different, approach
their work from opposite ends, are ambitious, driven, and for the most part,
confident. But neither are villainous, they believe they’re doing the best by
Lucy and that they deserve that mentorship, which means they’re not going to
sabotage each other in unforgivable ways. With that, it’ll shake their
confidence and it’ll cause them to reconfigure their desires––a perfect
opportunity for comedy, and love.
5. Your story deals with difficult issues, like bipolar disorder,
self-harm, parental abandonment, death, and grief, that you experienced in your
own life. Share about how you drew on your own experiences in writing your
story.
After I participated in the anthology, Ab(Solutely) Normal, where
I wrote a young adult short story about a fallen star with bipolar disorder, I
decided I wanted to write bipolar in my characters going forward. Its
underrepresentation only adds to its stigmatization, and when it is there,
it has the tendency to be detrimental rather than helpful. For the longest time
in media, characters with bipolar are unstable, chaotic, prone to violence or
evil. Imagine seeing that as a teen and thinking that’s all you can be? Yes, there
are difficulties; it can include spirals of doom, negative, intrusive thoughts,
self-harm, and those things can be compounded by death, grief and
abandonment…but that’s only one side of this illness. We can also be creative,
bubbly, in tune with our emotions and the emotions of our friends and family.
We contain multitudes. I wrote my experiences into this book because I want
readers with similar experiences to feel seen and give the chance for those who
haven’t to understand us. Destigmatize, show that we’re love interests,
magical, and we’re more than a diagnosis.
Your Journey to Publication
6. This is your seventh published
book since 2020. How has your career progressed over the years, and how have
you been able to sell so many books when many debut authors aren’t nearly as
successful as you? What tips do you have on growing a career as an author?
This is an interesting question. I
used to say that it’s all luck, and while I still believe luck plays a big part
in publishing, it’s also having a great agent, writing the right book at the
right time, finding your editor match, talent, and not giving up when it’s
tough. Your question reminds me that people might consider me successful while
I struggle with feeling like an imposter and a flop. Isn’t that weird? My
advice is to keep writing what makes you happy. Don’t try to cater to the
market; it’s always changing and what’s big now was written two years ago. Read
more, watch more media, take breaks, and don’t be afraid to try something new.
I mean, here I am chatting with you about cozy fantasy when I didn’t think I
could pull it off two years ago. You don’t know what you’re capable of unless
you try.
7. I think feeling like an imposter
is common, even if you’re successful. I used to feel like one as a lawyer when
I went to court. What’s your writing schedule like? How do you complete so many
books with different publication deadlines, plus keep up your social media
platforms, and market your books?
Without deadlines, I’m privileged
to treat writing like a regular job; I’m a full-time author living in Germany
where the cost of living is substantially cheaper than in the US. I start my
day around 8am by doing admin stuff like emails or making graphics. By 10-11am,
I’ll open my manuscript and begin reading/editing the last three chapters of
whatever I wrote the day before until 1pm. This helps me stay on track, clean
up little things, and makes it easier for me to jump into drafting. At 2pm, I
do a virtual sprint with my friend (and fellow author) Rocky Callen until about
4-5pm. Without deadlines, that’s when I’ll finish up for the day. On deadline,
I’ll dive back in around 8pm and go until 11pm. My last deadline had me up
until 1am because I can be annoying. I’m in the weeds of every word, every
line, every chapter, trying to make it perfect. All that said, you can understand
why promoting on social media, marketing, only happens when I know it has to be
done. I’m not keen on it, I’m not talented at it, and I find it really
challenging. In my ideal world, I’d hire someone to do that for me so I could focus
on writing, but I can’t afford that. And thus, you get me bumbling online with
little interaction, hoping for the best. On the plus side though, I have gotten
exponentially better at making graphics over the years!
Promoting Your Book
8. Wow! You have a long day. I saw
on your website that you’ve planned an eight-city blog tour where you’ll be
discussing your book with other authors. How did your book tour get scheduled?
The tour will be a wild ride! I
planned the first half myself; I reached out to bookstores and friends,
scheduled the best I could. The second week of tour was completely done by
Fierce Reads and Macmillan to celebrate four of us authors with recent releases.
I finish up at Love Y’all Bookfest––where I’m beyond excited to meet so many
folks I’ve admired from afar, and then I’ll head back to Germany. I’m nervous
but ecstatic too.
9. What other plans do you have to
market your book? How have your plans for promoting your books changed over the
years?
I’ll be doing interviews, podcasts,
writing articles and sending out books to influencers. We’ve always had
booktubers, bloggers, booktokers, but influencers blew up in a big way over the
years. It shows how the book community has expanded and how we reach people has
changed. We’re lucky there are people blossoming on social media, who want to shout
enthusiastically about our work––especially those of us who can’t be out there
in person doing such. From afar, even with new methods of promoting on social
media, the best way to get kidlit books into readers’ hands still is chatting
with teachers, librarians, and booksellers. They’re the ones who are with the
public the most and who genuinely want people to find the books they’ll enjoy
reading.
10. What are you working on now?
So at the end of the year, I turned
in A Taste of Memories; my next young adult cozy fantasy coming out in Spring 2027.
It’s about a witch at a magical tearoom who lets patrons relive their memories
associated with a recipe from their past and a warlock whose future is
threatened by a spirit that’s slowly being forgotten. It’s very foodtastic and
powerful. I’m also working on an adult fantasy about a romance bookstore, it’s
a HOOT!
Thanks for sharing all your advice,
Alechia.
––Thanks for having me!!
You can find Alechia at alechiadow.com, on threads and Instagram as @alechiadow.
Giveaway Details
Alechia is generously offering a
hardback of Until the
Clock Strikes Midnight for a
giveaway. To enter, all you need to do is be a
follower of my blog (via the follower gadget, email, or bloglovin’ on the
right sidebar) and leave a comment by February 14th. If I do not have
your email (I can no longer get it from your Google Profile), you must leave it
in the comments to enter the contest. Please be sure I have your email address.
If you mention this contest on
Twitter, Facebook, or other social media sites and/or follow me on Twitter or
Bluesky or follow Alechia on her social media sites, mention this in the
comments, and I'll give you an extra entry for each. You must be 13 years old
or older to enter. This book giveaway is US, EU, and the United Kingdom.
Upcoming
Interviews, Guest Posts, and Blog Hops
Monday,
February 9, I have an interview with Seema Yasmin and a giveaway of her MG
Maysoon Zayid, The Girl Who Can
Wednesday,
February 11, I have an agent spotlight interview with Tamara
Kawar and a query critique giveaway
Sunday,
February 15, I’m participating in the Wish Big Giveaway Hop
Monday,
February 16, I have a guest post by Michael P. Spraudlin and a giveaway of his
MG The Spider Strikes
Monday,
February 23, I have an interview with Christyne Morrell and a giveaway of her
MG The Case of the Scarlet Snakebite
Wednesday,
February 25, I have an agent spotlight with Renee Runge and a query critique
giveaway
I hope to
see you on Monday!
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