Cassandra Clare, the New York Times bestselling author behind the beloved Shadowhunter Chronicles, is ready to take readers on an exciting new journey. Her latest novel, The Ragpicker King, the highly anticipated sequel to her 2023 adult fantasy debut, Sword Catcher, is out today. Clare is known for building rich worlds and creating unforgettable characters, and her shift from young adult to adult fantasy is proving to be just as captivating.
While the Shadowhunter Chronicles follow characters in their late teens, Clare’s initial inspiration for The Chronicles of Castellane took her in a new direction. “As I started writing and creating these characters, I realized they were older,” Clare tells First. “This allowed me to explore some themes that I felt were more relevant to adults.”
Here, First for Women caught up with Clare to discuss today’s book release, what she hopes readers will take away from the story, her upcoming projects and more. Keep scrolling to find out all the details.
What is The Ragpicker King about?
The sequel to Cassandra Clare’s Sword Catcher has it all: dark conspiracies, high-stakes danger, powerful magic and a touch of forbidden love. Kel Saren, the body double to Prince Conor, is hunting for whoever is responsible for a massacre at the palace. But the only clues are held by the Ragpicker King, the criminal who rules the underworld. Meanwhile, Lin Castor faces the aftermath of a risky decision. As tensions rise, Kel and Lin decide who to trust.
First for Women: Congratulations on your latest book! What inspired your transition into adult fantasy, and what do you hope readers take away from your newest series, ‘Chronicles of Castellane?’
Cassandra Clare: Originally, I actually thought of it as a young adult series because everything I’ve written has been young adult, and that’s sort of where my general space is. But I had the idea while I was traveling around in Asia with my husband, and I suddenly thought of this fantasy world that was somewhat based on the concept of a city where everybody comes from all over the world. I often felt, when I was reading fantasy, there was this almost proto-European, Medieval or Renaissance-type world, where all the people of one kind live in one city, and all the people of another kind live in another city. We often think that’s what medieval Europe was, but it wasn’t. It was actually these cities that were huge centers of commerce that were extremely diverse, that were filled with people with different skin colors, different languages. So, I wanted to write a story that would reflect that.
As I started writing and creating these characters, I thought, these people are adults. Lin is a doctor, Conor is a prince and there’s no way they could be kids. That allowed me to explore some themes that I felt were more relevant to adults. I also think the series is very much about identity. Kel sort of struggles with his identity, since he has to spend his life pretending to be Conor. Lin struggles with her identity because she is very much someone who belongs to this minority religion within a larger community. And Conor questions whether or not he’ll be a good king. And I think readers deal with the same struggles in a real-world sense.
FFW: Sword Catcher and The Ragpicker King take place in a high-stakes world full of intrigue, magic and secrets. How was writing this different than the ‘Shadowhunter Chronicles,’ which are set in real places?
CC: That’s definitely different. You think at the beginning, it’s going to be easy because I could just make everything up and I can decide all the rules. But it’s not, because the world has to be coherent and come together and it has to make sense. You have to really believe people could live there and that the systems of governance and trade and magic would all work. So that actually was really difficult.
FFW: All your books have some kind of Jewish representation, but it’s especially prominent in the Chronicles of Castellane. Why was it important to include this, and why does representation matter to you as an author?
CC: Growing up as a Jewish kid who loved fantasy, I often felt very left out of it. Even when it’s not explicitly any specific religion, there is often this sort of underpinning of a sort of Christian viewpoint and mythology. So, making Simon Jewish in the Shadowhunter Chronicles was easy because I knew I wanted that representation. I’ve also never seen a Jewish vampire, and it was fun to figure out what he would be scared of. For me, it was very important to have a lot of representation in the Shadowhunter books, because I wanted people to feel they could be a Shadowhunter. Everyone can be a Shadowhunter, regardless of identity, of religion, of anything, so they could feel like they had a place in that world.
I’ve also always wanted to write a book that was based on Jewish magic and our mythology, which I got to explore with The Chronicles of Castellane. The Ashkar are not Jews, they’re more like an analog. But I think for Jewish readers, they pick up on a lot of the stuff that’s in there, and for non-Jewish readers, sometimes they pick up on it too. But either way, what was really important to me was to hit on that tension between protection and restriction with a minority group like the Ashkar.
FFW: So many editors here love the Shadowhunter Chronicles. What’s it like to write multiple books in the same universe, and what can readers expect from the last installments?
CC: Well, it’s great. I mean, I’ve really loved inhabiting the Shadowhunter world for so long. And the first thing I actually did when I was done with The Ragpicker King was turn around and write 10 short stories that are set in the Shadowhunter world. It’s really been a wonderful experience because having created this world that people are familiar with, I can write different kinds of stories in that world. Each series is different from the other series. They have different themes. The characters are different, the settings are different. But I can take this world that’s so known to the readers and do all this fun and experimental stuff in it.
FFW: As lifelong Will Herondale fans, we have to ask who is your favorite character you’ve written…or do you connect with any of your characters more than others?
CC: I connect with different characters in different ways. With Tessa, I really connected with her because of the way she reads, and that felt so close to me. I think one of my favorite romances was Tessa and Will because it was so much about books, which is similar to my husband and I. So, I really relate to both of them, and then I would relate to Simon because he is both Jewish like me, and also an ordinary human being who has no powers.
FFW: We’d love to hear a bit about your writing journey. Did you always know you wanted to be an author, and if so, did you always want to write fantasy?
CC: Yes and yes, I always wanted to be a writer, and I always wanted to write fantasy. And I wrote a lot of terrible fantasy books when I was in high school and college that have since disappeared. I predate the internet. I didn’t know how you would meet a writer. I didn’t know how you would ask any questions about how you would become a writer. Even though I did English in college and I did creative writing, I felt like this was a world that was so far away from me, and I had no idea how anybody ever got there.
So, after college, I did journalism, which was really fun, but there was a point when I got moved off editorial into copy editing, which wasn’t that exciting for me. I was so tired all the time that I started to sort of hallucinate this story, which was City of Bones. I spent so much of my time at work just sitting there waiting for something to come to my desk, so I decided I was just going to start writing. So once I had about half of a book, I met Holly Black at a book signing and we became friends, and she read my half of a book, and she suggested edits, and I made edits and I sent it to agents. When I actually got an agent. I was sort of shocked that this could actually happen.
FFW: What does a typical day look like for you?
CC: I work a lot at night, so I wake up and I usually do beginning-of-the-day stuff. I do housekeeping, stuff like email, newsletter, social media, work-type things like that and meetings. And then from 12 until about 8 o’clock at night, I write. After that, I’ll take a break, have dinner, hang out with my husband, watch an episode of TV and then I’ll work again until about midnight or a little later, and then I go to sleep.
FFW: Are you working on anything new? We’d love a sneak peek or a hint if you can share anything!
CC: I try not to work on things all the time, but there are a couple of things right now. I’m back to working on the Wicked Powers series, which will be the last trilogy in the Shadowhunters world. There will also be a third book in the Chronicles of Castellane called The Bone Conjurers, and this is the first time I’m sharing that title, which is cool. I also sold my first non-Shadowhunters series to Random House and right now the first book is currently called Foretold.
FFW: Finally, we adore knowing what our favorite authors are reading. What are a few books you’ve been reading—and loving—lately?
CC: Let me grab my Kindle! Some of my recent favorites include: