How Harry Potter and Reylo fanfic led to Julie Soto's debut novel and her fan-art inspired cover
The pipeline from fan fiction to published author is an increasingly common one (see: E.L James, Sally Thorne, Christina Lauren, Ali Hazelwood, etc.) — and Julie Soto is the latest to join that bunch.
Known as lovesbitca8 on fanfic platform Ao3 with over a million reads for her story The Auction, Soto has amassed quite the following writing fanfic, particularly Harry Potter (Draco and Hermione to be specific) stories.
Now, with Forget Me Not, out July 2023, Soto is getting to craft her own world from scratch. The novel follows wedding planner Ama, who is excited to potentially launch her career when she lands her biggest clients yet (a sapphic couple). But when her ex-boss sabotages her by blocking out vendors, she finds herself working with grumpy florist Elliot. The only problem is Ama broke his heart awhile back and hasn't spoken since — and their chemistry has not lessened in the intervening years.
But even though her characters and story are new, Soto is still bringing some of the fanfiction world along with her. Particularly in her cover, which EW can exclusively debut below, designed by Nikita Jobson, one of Soto's long time fan artists.
We called up Soto to talk the move to traditional publishing, working with a fan artist for a cover design, and how some Reylo (that's Rey and Kylo Ren from Star Wars for the uninitiated) influences might have made their way into the story.
Grand Central Publishing 'Forget My Not' by Julie Soto
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: What spurred the transition from writing fanfic to writing your own completely new story?
JULIE SOTO: I've always wanted to write books. I was writing musicals for a bit, doing playwriting. It really just took confidence because there's such a difference between the fanfiction community which is so immediate, and traditional publishing. In fanfiction, you don't even have to edit the chapter before you post it and you don't need anyone else's feedback on it. Then, suddenly, people are asking for more and saying, "I loved it, and here's why I loved it." There's so much dopamine involved. To go to publishing the waiting or the non-response — needing to write all 80 to 90,000 words before knowing if anyone liked it — that transition was only easy because I had the confidence that the fandom had given me. I have been writing fanfiction for five years. People will always say, "Oh, I'll read anything that you write," and you don't take it at face value necessarily. But I at least got enough confidence to know that I could take a stab at it. That was the main push for me.
Your most beloved story is a Draco-Hermione one. Ama and Elliot here are enemies to lovers. Is there some of Draco and Hermione in them? Was that a starting place for you?
There's not a lot of Draco Malfoy in Elliot. But there's a lot of a headstrong nature and ambition in Ama that's from Hermione. The way that I like to write Hermione is that she learns to ask for help, she learns that people can change, which, if you're gonna write Hermione and make it a true love story, you have to show that Draco Malfoy has changed. So, I brought that into it. Learning how to grow and evolve.
What do you think is easier — writing fanfic or writing from scratch?
God, fanfic is so much easier. It's like if you go bowling, and you have the guardrails because you're a child. Those guardrails are the characters that are already fully formed. You don't have to spend three chapters getting to know them at the beginning. You can jump into the plot. So it's infinitely easier to write fanfic. And there's excitement in community. You don't have to wait for the dopamine, so you're more easily inspired in some ways. I went back and looked at some of my early fanfics a couple months ago for some reason, and I saw one of my little author's notes before a chapter was like, "Thank you for all the kind words, you guys get two chapters this week." And I was like "Two chapters?!" I just thought to myself Who was that girl? It's such a back and forth between the readers and the writer in fanfiction, and I just haven't fully experienced that yet in original fiction. Who knows? Maybe my response will change when the book is out.
For Elliot, the art and language of flowers is very important. Was that something you were already interested in? Or did you have to do a bunch of research?
Oh, my gosh, I don't even like flowers. I I grew up doing theater and I would get flowers after shows. It's a great gift. You walk around after a show and you're holding the flowers that your aunt got you. You're like, "Ah, good to meet you." You're 12 and you feel like you're Patti LuPone. Those flowers would just come home and sit in a vase. And I would stare at them and I'd say Mom, "It smells bad in here. I don't want to keep these flowers."I've just never been a flowers person. So, I definitely had to do a lot of research. I had to fall in love with flowers. Now I've decided that dahlias are my favorite flower based on the research that I had done. Elliot tattoos himself with flowers — and a lot of them are rare or extinct. So I went into all these different places where you can hear about why a flower is going extinct and who's doing the effort to keep it alive and where are the last ones located. So many interesting things that I never would have found interesting before. But I definitely was biting off more than I could chew when I made him a florist.
Debbie Soto How 'Harry Potter' and Reylo fanfic led to Julie Soto's debut novel and her fan-art inspired cover
Your cover is unique in being drawn by a fan artist you've worked with previously, Nikita Jobson. Was that yours or your publisher's idea?
I really pushed for it. Nikita is a fan fiction artist who I've worked with a lot in the Harry Potter fandom. She drew my first piece of art for The Auction, which is my largest fanfic on Archive of Our Own. We kind of became synonymous with each other over the years. She would draw if she was inspired by something in one of my chapters. Or she would draw art without context, and I would create a fanfic for it. She's definitely done art for a bunch of other writers and other writers have written stories based on her art. But we do have a connection being associated with each other. So I told Forever that the readers of my fanfics would be very, very excited to support not only me but also Nikita in that way — taking pictures with the cover, purchasing the book. Highlighting that this is a love language that the whole world doesn't necessarily understand. It's a little community. It's almost like an inside joke in a way or an Easter egg, I should say.
In terms of the direction it went with the rich green and purple. Was that something you gave them in a mood board or where did that come from?
It was Nikita. I wasn't I was not in on initial conversations with Forever and Nikki. But they gave her a lot of freedom to use her own style. Because it does look different from a lot of the very popular book covers these days that have a lot less rendered faces or more suggestions of people. They gave her license to be herself, which is just wonderful.
As you mentioned, Nikita has this rich history within Harry Potter fan fiction and the cover really gives me Snape-Lily vibes. Was that a specific direction you or the team gave her?
No. Gosh, I can see it though. Now that you say it, she's not fully redhead but I can totally see it. In my mind, he's much more Adam Driver.
Ahhh, okay, I definitely get some Reylo here too.
Yeah, it was definitely more of a Reylo inspired story. But I know that Nikki specifically is not personally attracted to Adam Driver. I tried not to like chat with her without the art team. But she came to me and she was like, "Do I have to make him look like Adam Driver?" I'm like, "No, dear. You don't have to. It's just that's how I described him in the book." So I totally see the Snape and Lily. That's hilarious. You're giving me great prep for what people are going to say when they see the cover.
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