Elle Gonzalez Rose (FCRH ’17), YA Author, on Novels, Writing Careers, and Staying Open to the Unexpected

Photo credit: Kristen Pierce

By Elissa Johnston

Elle Gonzalez Rose is a YA author and a writer/producer for MTV. Her debut YA romcom CAUGHT IN A BAD FAUXMANCE is forthcoming from Joy Revolution in Fall 2023.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Elissa Johnston: So to start with, Elle, I’m so grateful you’re willing to talk with us for a bit and give back to the Fordham English community! Is this is a busy time of year for you? 

Elle Gonzalez Rose: It is right now! I’m doing a lot of drafting on a deadline, which is a little bit nerve-wracking, and a lot of being very diligent. It’s been, surprisingly, not that bad. But the drafting process in the professional space is very different!

EJ: That’s fantastic to hear. Before we get into what you’re doing now, I would love to hear about your forthcoming debut novel! I see the title and the blurb on your website, but would you mind telling us a little bit more? What’s it about, and who’s publishing it?

EGR: So my debut is a queer YA romantic comedy starring a bisexual Puerto Rican protagonist. It’s called CAUGHT IN A BAD FAUXMANCE, and it’s coming from Joy Revolution, which is an imprint of Random House Children’s. It was started by David Yoon and Nicola Yoon, who are YA legends that I love and adore. Their mission is to bring all these stories into the world which are by people of color, starring people of color falling in love, and it’s all just about joy and love and romance! 

I’d like to think that’s what my book does, as well. It’s a queer romance about these two families, the Báezes and the Seo-Cookes, that have hated each other for basically forever, and they always go to this fictional lake town in Florida. They’ve been battling each other for years, specifically over this really petty bet they made with each other, years ago, over who would win a local relay race. The main character’s family (the Báez family) has not been to the town in years. They go back for one last holiday break at this cabin before they sell it. But when they’re there, they end up making another bet with the Seo-Cookes on the local race, this time wagering their cabin! So the families go head to head, and ultimately the Seo-Cooke’s middle son comes to Devin Báez, the main character, in desperate need of a fake boyfriend. And the Báezes, of course, see this as an opportunity to take down their rivals from the inside… and so the titular bad fauxmance! 

EJ: Oh, that sounds like it will be a really fun read! When do you expect it to hit shelves?

EGR: It’s slated for Fall 2023. I don’t have an exact release date, but it is a holiday romance, so I guess we’re thinking later in the season to tie in with the approaching holidays. 

EJ: Looking forward to seeing it around! Now this is more of a general writer question, but could you tell us about where you find inspiration if you’re feeling stuck in the writing process?

EGR: I find it everywhere! I find that consuming any kind of media can inspire things. This particular book was inspired by a trip I took with my family to a place that hosts families every year. There were pictures of all these families that come back year after year and compete in all these games. I had no idea that was even a thing! And I was like, that’s such a fun idea! And then I watched a movie the very next week which had a similar idea and I thought, wouldn’t this be (in the middle of covid) a very fun, outdoorsy thing about two families that spar with one another? And it was all about taking an unusual setting and throwing in other things I thought were fun.

So I think I find inspiration from anything! Sometimes I just listen to a really moody song and think, what if this were a book? Or I get an idea from reading another good book. Being open to all kinds of inspiration is very handy, and it has led to a very long list of ideas!

EJ: I love the idea of a cumulative idea list that you can go back to whenever you’re ready.

EGR: Mine is very long! I’m pretty set for the first fifteen books. You want an idea? I got plenty! [laughs]

EJ: And that fact is pretty inspiring itself, actually! Now, would you mind telling us a little bit about the process of getting your book into the hands of publishers? I know that can be a really daunting prospect for people who are in the process of writing their first book.

EGR: I had kind of this pipe dream my whole life: if you look at my eighth grade yearbook, it says, “I want to grow up to be a writer”! And for me, that has always meant writing books. Over the years I’ve written lots of things. At Fordham I wrote one-act plays, and I’ve been writing fan fiction my entire life. So the story of what happened with this book starts with the fact that I was in the Fordham Creative Writing program and I was writing a lot, all the time! But I didn’t want to start writing a book because I didn’t think I had the time, so I was doing a lot of short stories and poetry. And then after that I stopped writing for a long time so that I could focus on having a job, on starting my life as a non-college person, because I did not start as a writer when I first graduated from college. But then I started doing this podcast where I read fan fiction I had written when I was young, twelve or maybe even younger. And it’s so bad, it’s just really, really bad, and I would read it with my friends. And it reminded me: this is so fun! Why don’t I do it again?

So I wrote a fan fiction for fun, because why not? It just inspires so much joy, and it brought back that love for writing that I had kind of lost while I was so focused on having a job. From there, there came a point when I knew I wasn’t writing fan fiction anymore. It had moved out of the fandom space. These characters had become original at some point. But I knew that I still wanted to write something that makes me happy! And so I thought of this story. I knew it was exactly what I needed just then, something very escapist and joyful, and also based on reckoning with my own identity and where I was in my life. So I decided to write this book! 

I knew from the beginning that I wanted it to be a traditionally published book. It was the first time I had ever written a novel, even though I had written various things over the years. On my first attempt, I did not know what I was doing at all, and the first draft of this book is extremely different [laughs] from the finished product! But I knew from the beginning that I didn’t know what I was doing, and I needed to get a first draft done, which I was able to do in maybe five months. And from there, I was confused about how you go about finding an agent and writing a query letter, and I also knew that at that point, the book was not ready to be sent to agents or publishers, and I didn’t know where to go to find guidance because I didn’t have the writing community that I have now. So I looked up unagented writer mentorship programs and I found Author Mentor Match, which is a program that pairs unagented writers with agented writers, and then you work through your manuscript together. I got into that, which was awesome! Yay! And that’s where the story really starts. 

I worked with my mentor for a couple months, completely revising this book. That was exactly what I needed, because I finally learned not only what it means to, you know, try to get a book traditionally published, but also how you write a book! Because my first-draft book was a book, but it did not follow the more commercial structure of a book. It meandered a lot, and it was way over the word count of a traditionally published YA romance. I learned so much about beats and acts and how to flesh out a character through the program and through working with this mentor. And from that experience, I was able to learn the skillset I needed not only to send out my book to agents, but also to write more books. I am significantly more confident going into book #2 after having read books like Save the Cat!, doing beat sheets and things like that, and just reading more so I finally understand the classic arc of the novel and how to create my own. I write outlines now, which is very important and I didn’t do before. 

I also met so many other writers through being more open about my writing. I started a Twitter to talk about my writing because I didn’t want to bother my friends with it [laughs], and I met so many amazing people! It gave me other writers to talk to about the process.  Having other people who are going through the same thing and who are willing to read your work is so incredibly helpful. So is having community so that you don’t feel so alone and you have a place to ask your questions.

EJ: That’s great. I love the idea of having a writing Twitter, though wow, that takes a lot of guts! [laughs]

EGR: I felt like I was bogging down my friends by talking about the book, and I didn’t tweet much anyway, so I thought why not? And now this is my only Twitter account! 

EJ: So how did you choose where you were going to submit when you started looking for places that could publish your book?

EGR: So it started for me with querying agents, since I knew I wanted to go for traditional publishing. I just didn’t have the will-how or the funds to self-publish. When I picked my agents, they told me where to submit it. In terms of choosing agents, I focused on agents who had represented other books I really liked, and agents who wanted YA romance and had a good track record with queer romance and representing writers of color. That’s how I found my agent. And I will say, all the agents I talked to had Joy Revolution, this imprint, in mind. Which is so cool, because I thought it was way out of my depth! [laughs] I didn’t think that they would want me!  But everyone I talked to said, no, you have to submit to Joy Revolution. Some of my friends even said it, and I said, sure, that sounds great! And that was definitely the right call. They were on the first round of submissions and they were the first we heard back from. 

EJ: Wow. Congratulations again! 

EGR: Thank you!

EJ: Now, I see from your online bio—which was a delight to read, by the way—

EGR: Thank you! I agonized over it for so long! 

EJ: And it’s great! And I see you’re also a writer and producer for MTV. Would you tell us about that? How did you find your way into that position?

EGR: It was another case of being in the right place at the right time! I think a lot of my success comes from hard work, but a lot also comes from luck. 

I had interned at MTV as an assistant in production while I was in my senior year at Fordham, which was totally different from what I do now. Then I worked as an assistant in the entertainment industry for my first two years out of college. When I was there, there were a bunch of different groups of assistants looking to help each other out; sometimes you can get into a tough bind because you need to get hold of something for a client or your boss. It was awesome and so helpful. But there were also people there who had broken out of the assistant path and had opportunities that they would post there that you don’t really find in other places, mostly because they were looking for people who were already in the entertainment sphere and they didn’t want to get inundated with applications. So you get to see a lot of jobs that aren’t out in the open. Someone posted the MTV job for a junior writer/producer and I thought, oh, I wonder what that means! Because in the department where I did my internship we didn’t have writer/producers, and I was very curious. I was happy with my assistant job, but I thought, why not apply for this? It sounds so cool! It’s basically a job writing promos, which I hadn’t realized was a real job, and I was really excited by it. But I also knew that I had no professional writing experience on my resume. I had been an assistant for two years and, while I had done writing stuff at Fordham and I LIKE to write, I didn’t have anything to back me up in a professional capacity. 

But I could see that the application was going to a real person (there was a real gmail account), and so I thought, well, I should do something fun. I love MTV, so I wrote my cover letter in the form of a letter to Nev from Catfish, hoping that it would get noticed! It was just a little thing I could do to show that I knew the brand and that I’m a creative person. I don't know if that's what made them bring me in for the interview, but I did get to come in! And from there I just kept looking for other ways to be very creative throughout the application process, which also involved a writing sample and interviews. I hoped that all of those things would show that even if I didn't have a background in writing, I’m a creative person who would go all the way if you give me the chance. And now I have been there for over two years, and it's amazing! It's a job I never knew existed, and I think it's such a fun way to be a creative, but to still have structure and that 9-5 job and a team environment where you're working collaboratively. I would say my big piece of advice to people who are interested in doing something in the creative field is think outside the box, and be open to unexpected possibilities.

EJ: Great advice, and that brings us to my last question, actually: what advice do you have to undergrads and recent grads about getting into the world of novel writing or making a career out of writing?

EGR: Yeah, and I'll address both of those things separately. For people who are interested in writing novels, I always say my biggest piece of advice is to finish writing the book. Done is better than perfect. I dealt with that a lot, and I spent a lot of time agonizing about needing to send the book out immediately. But there is no timeline for publishing! It's slow, and it's going to take a while if you want to pursue it. So only ever do things when you're feeling comfortable, and don't send out a book you don't think is ready. Also, I think it's really important to love what you're writing. Write for yourself first and others later, because you're going to spend a lot of time with that book, even if it gets sold. Having that passion for it makes it easy to revisit it time and time again and spend so much time with it. 

For pursuing a career in writing, when you're in undergrad, explore internships in places that you admire. I think my internships were the most innaluable thing I've done because it helped me figure out where in the creative sphere I wanted to work. I tried journalism, I didn't like it too much: I did theater, it wasn't really for me. And then I figured out that I wanted to be in the TV space, and even tough I didn't get to work there directly at first, my ackground led me there in the end. I think that part of why I was able to get in the door at MTV was because I worked there as an intern. But also, be open to new experiences, because writing can be so different in so many different places! You can be a copy writer, you can be a writer producer, you can be a regular producer, an editor--you can be so many different things in so many different fields. I think being open to what it means to be a writer is really great. Also, don't be afraid to be creative and make yourself stand out in ways that you think might be fun. 

EJ: Thanks, Elle! It's been really helpful (and also inspiring) to hear you talk about your work and your life, so thank you for your willingness to sit down, talk with me, and give back to your community! 

EGR: I'm the one who's honored here! I haven't been able to talk about this for so long, so being able to share with Fordham people is so exciting. I'm genuinely honored and grateful to be able to talk about it at all. So thank you!