Love You However
by Katherine Blakeman
Released: Mar 22, 2024
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Why this book and why now?
The original nugget of an idea was born about eighteen months ago when Chloe Keto and I were chatting one day, and she mentioned that there’s an absence of Sapphic fiction books that feature already-established couples. Around the same time, the gender spectrum was at the forefront of my mind due to a personal friend of mine exploring their gender identity, and I knew that at some point I wanted to write a book featuring an older character exploring their own gender identity. I wanted to show that it’s not just a young person’s fad. I also wasn’t ready to leave the village of Miltree behind after The Summer We’ve Had, and I’d already introduced Petra and Jean as side characters, so it seemed like the most natural combination in the world!
Would you and your main character(s) get along?
I feel like Jean and I would get along like a house on fire. We have similar senses of humour and we’re also very deep and introspective. I’m not sure how well I’d get on with Petra – on the surface, of course, we’d get on beautifully. But I’m good at spotting when people are putting on a happy/cheery front. I feel like I’d spot that in Petra, if we were interacting over the course of this book, because as we discover, she is really struggling too.
What TV show would your main character(s) most likely binge watch and why?
Jean would 100% be Heartstopper. In fact, they watch it during Love You However! Petra watches it later because she’s too busy at the time, but I see her as more of a Killing Eve fan.
What 3 things would your main character want with them if they got stranded away from civilization, and why?
Petra is a tech addict, so she’d absolutely take her phone, her laptop, and a router so that she could connect them both to the internet! Jean would probably take their phone (purely for potential communication purposes), a violin (since they can’t survive without music) and a photo album that contains their sister, who died eleven years ago and who they miss like a limb.
(All of these answers are assuming that ‘each other’ is not an option!)
What song does your character put on to start your book launch party?
Music is the lifeblood that runs through this book. Music is what brought Jean and Petra together as a couple. I could make a whole playlist of songs that inspired it – and perhaps I will one day.
I think to kick off a party, Jean would choose something Scottish-sounding. Something you’d get at a ceilidh, to reflect their Scottish heritage. Petra has a complicated relationship with her own Greek heritage, so she’d probably choose something more pop, something like ‘I’m Coming Out’ as a giant two-fingers to her homophobic parents. (And because, of course, coming out is involved in the book.)
