Author Brings Representation To Fantasy Romance Space

Britney Lewis – Author Britney S. Lewis has written “The Undead Truth of Us,” “The Dark Place,” and “Blood Moon,” which is set to be released in 2025. PHOTO PROVIDED BY JILL GRINBERG LITERARY MANAGEMENT.
Britney Lewis – Author Britney S. Lewis has written “The Undead Truth of Us,” “The Dark Place,” and “Blood Moon,” which is set to be released in 2025. PHOTO PROVIDED BY JILL GRINBERG LITERARY MANAGEMENT.

Author Brings Representation To Fantasy Romance Space

By Tia Carol Jones

When Britney S. Lewis was younger, she read the “Twilight” series. She wanted to see more representation in fantasy and contemporary books, so she decided she wanted to tell her own stories and set out to do that. It was the start of her falling in love with storytelling.


Lewis has already written and released “The Dark Place” and “The Undead Truth of Us.” In 2025, her book, “Blood Moon,” is slated for release. The book follows Mirabella “Mira” Owens as she starts her freshman year at a college in Kansas.


Lewis said it feels surreal to release her work into the world. She always dreamed of having her books out in the world. She said it is a good feeling to have her books published. She has a lot of pride and is grateful that it is happening.


“I had been living in this dream state for so long, I had been waiting to get my books published for just about 10 years,” she said.


Lewis describes her writing as very metaphorical. Her first two books deal with grief and love and how those affect people. In “The Undead Truth of Us,” she used words and allegories to describe how losing a parent can reshape a person’s entire world and how it can cause a person to see things that aren’t really there. “The Dark Place,” deals with the loss of a sibling and how it affects the parents and siblings and how grief can make a person feel like they’re not in their body anymore. She said her writing can also be a little lyrical.


Lewis was inspired to write “Blood Moon” in Winter 2022. She was watching “Sirens” and started re-watching “Vampire Diaries.” She started to go down the rabbit hole of the drama that was taking place with the cast, especially with the way Kat Graham, who played Bonnie Bennett, was treated during cast interviews. She was frustrated about the way Graham and her character were treated, as well as re-watching “Twilght,” and was always Team Jacob. She had a moment.


“I’m going to write and tell my own story with all the things that made me mad and make it better,” she said. She created a main character that had the same drive and fierceness as Bonnie Bennett, with the chemistry Bonnie and Damon Salvatore had, as well as get payback for Maddie Bishop in “Sirens.”

Lewis was so excited about the idea for the book that she started writing “Blood Moon” in January 2023 and by February of that year she had a first draft completed. By Fall 2023, the book was sold to Page Street, an imprint of Macmillan Publishers.


Lewis said for her, having Black and diverse characters throughout her stories is about representation and that representation signifying the humanity of the people portrayed in her books. She said oftentimes, Black people get used as a plot device in stories, for example Rue in the Hunger Games.


“We get used in these tragic ways and I just wanted to show that we’re human, we feel, we think and we do. We’re more than just a plot device or a narrative for someone’s story,” she said. “We get to fall in love and we should be the main character in all of our stories. We also can be the villain, if we want to be the villain, but we don’t have to be stuck in one particular role to serve someone else.”


Lewis wants the representation to be present and for other Black writers and writers of color to know they can write about whatever they want to write about. As a native of Kansas City, Lewis wanted to set her stories there because all the stories she read growing up weren’t based in that part of the Midwest. 


Lewis said her first two books have been very well received. She won the Kansas Notable Book Award in 2023 for “The Undead Truth of Us.” Her book, “The Dark Place” was selected as a recommended title by the Kansas National Education Association’s Reading Circle Commission. Lewis said the books have done more than she could’ve dreamt they would do, and she is very happy with them.


Lewis hopes that people love “Blood Moon,” and she has so much joy about the story. She always wanted to create a fantasy romance series because it was something she wanted as a teenager and wants to read as an adult.


For more information about Britney S. Lewis, visit britneyslewis.com.


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