INTERVIEW: Cassandra Davis Wrote Her Debut Book at Age Twelve

Christina Boyd
Jul 1
3 min read

Interview with Cassandra Davis. Text overlay quotes Davis on her characters, describing them as disorderly. Face and sparkles in the background. — Welcome to the Tuesday Author Interview with Christina Boyd for the Who, What, When, Where, and Why.

CHRISTINA: Welcome to my Tuesday Author Interview with award-winning sci-fi author Cassandra Davis.

When did you first think you had a book to write, and how did you start?

CASSANDRA: My seventh-grade English teacher—the one I mention in my bio who handed me a notebook and told me to write my own stories—started a writing club. One afternoon, she handed each of us a writing prompt with just one word: Dremiks. 12-year-old me loved fantasy, science fiction, and everything in between. I still recall sitting under the oak tree in our front yard and scribbling the first chapter of a story about an alien planet named Dremiks and the intrepid crew of humans traveling to save that dying world.

Text on a starry night background: "The mission: Save a dying planet. The crew: Shifting loyalties and dark pasts. The Catch: It's a trap." — About 'Dremliks." Courtesy Cassandra Davis.

For the next six months, my friends passed around my notebook, eagerly consuming the next chapter I’d written. When we moved from Frostburg, Maryland to Marietta, Georgia, I would copy out the new chapters by hand and send them via mail. (Email was still a few years off!)

And then… life happened. The notebooks containing Dremiks went in a box as I moved from state to state. When Firefly and Ron Moore’s reboot of Battlestar Galactica came around, I realized that people could like a spunky female pilot with serious character flaws. I pulled those old notebooks out of the box and rewrote 90% of my teenage ramblings.

I tinkered with the manuscript for another 6 years before finally taking the chance and self-publishing via Amazon and Barnes & Noble. Dremiks was a Top 5 Finalist in the Science-Fiction/Fantasy category of the Kindle Book Review Awards in 2012. Considering that the winner was Hugh Howey’s Wool, I feel pretty honored!

CHRISTINA: Wow! That's amazing. What a journey.

What comes first: plot or characters, and do you put people you know or their characteristics in your book?

Seattle skyline at sunset with text: "She barely survived Seattle's streets. He's avenging his father's crimes. They'll make a formidable team—if they live." — About "The Sentinels: Requital." Courtesy Cassandra Davis.

CASSANDRA: Characters come first, and I absolutely base them off of people I’ve encountered in my life. Having grown up in a military family, then spent time as a sports reporter in college, before becoming a US Senate aide and then working for a government security contractor, I’ve met so many people who are just begging to be put into a book.

I’ve often said that my characters live in my head, and I frantically try to record their shenanigans. They are recalcitrant hooligans, every single one, and regularly disregard my neat plot outlines. Nicholas Reed was not supposed to jump out of a ninth-story window in chapter 23 of The Sentinels: Requital, but it just popped into my head that Nicholas would do exactly that. (Don’t fret, no billionaire superhero-vigilantes were harmed in the incident!)

CHRISTINA: Ha! You made me laugh.

If you could tell your 21-year-old self anything, what would you share?

CASSANDRA: Definitely stick with the guy who is excited to read what you’ve been scribbling in that notebook that is supposed to be notes from Soviet history class. He’s going to be your biggest fan. He will encourage you every step of the way and yet be a great critic of ridiculous sentences and weird characterizations. Twenty-nine years later, he’ll still be begging you to “finish that one story about the angelic immortals you told me about in college.”

CHRISTINA: Aw, I love that. Thank you for your time with this interview. Best of luck on your upcoming projects!

Woman with curly red hair smiling, sparkly overlay, dark background. Mood is bright and cheerful. No text visible. — Cassandra Davis, author

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Cassandra Davis (Amy to her friends and family) was raised an army brat: constantly traveling, making new friends every four years, and surrounded by a unique military culture. In the seventh grade, she complained to her English teacher that she'd read every fiction book in the library. The teacher handed Cassandra a blank notebook and told her to write her own stories. Her first novel, Dremiks, was published in 2012. She then contributed Aliens & Gingerbread to the Winter Wonder anthology (2017). In November 2021, she launched the superhero-vigilante thriller The Sentinels: Requital.

Cassandra now lives outside Austin, Texas, with her husband and sons. When not creating alien civilizations or superhero stories, Cassandra spends her time advocating for her community, playing online games, baking tasty dairy-free recipes, and cheering for her University of Kentucky Wildcats. She will absolutely ask to pet your dog. Connect with Cassandra via her website and social media.