I truly never would have been as drawn to Shanghai as I was and as I still am if it weren’t for my family’s stories! Juliette is so close to my heart.

What sparked the idea to create her as your main character? And speaking of angsty heroines, Juliette is this fierce, protective total badass. I, too, love books filled with angst! It’s so interesting to hear that stories passed down from your family helped shape your own novels. I’ve always adored the Roaring '20s aesthetic, but there was something especially delicious about Shanghai at this time - the good, the bad, and the ugly where the streets were soaked in debauchery, but it was efforts of foreign colonialism that caused the sense of party in the city…so it was just a perfect setting for me to really sink into and explore! But I also wanted to see myself represented in the type of angsty heroines who got to star in those fantastical stories, so the immediate setting that came to mind for mine was 1920s Shanghai, since I had grown up hearing about this golden age era from the cool stories my parents pass on from *their* parents and relatives. I LOVE angst, and I had grown up reading angsty YA, and the stories that I was most obsessed with always involved love and hate and familial drama. I first got the idea for a Romeo and Juliet meets 1920s Shanghai story because I wanted to write about two families caught in a blood feud and the inherent tension that comes with trying to fight against that. As the deaths stack up, Juliette and Roma must set their guns-and grudges-aside and work together, for if they can't stop this mayhem, then there will be no city left for either to rule.SO excited for the questions, and I will try very hard not to typo all over the place or slip into my usual lower-case-everywhere habits. and first betrayal.īut when gangsters on both sides show signs of instability culminating in clawing their own throats out, the people start to whisper. And behind every move is their heir, Roma Montagov, Juliette's first love.

Their only rivals in power are the White Flowers, who have fought the Scarlets for generations. At the heart of it all is eighteen-year-old Juliette Cai, a former flapper who has returned to assume her role as the proud heir of the Scarlet Gang-a network of criminals far above the law. The year is 1926, and Shanghai hums to the tune of debauchery.Ī blood feud between two gangs runs the streets red, leaving the city helpless in the grip of chaos. Chloe Gong presents Book 1 in the These Violent Delights series.

These violent delights book