Hello, dear readers! Today I am absolutely jazzed to bring Daisy Dell, protagonist of Jasmine Gower’s Moonshine, a 1920s-esque queer fantasy that I have been gushing about to everyone who will listen.

Daisy’s starting a new job and stylish city life, but mage-hunters out for her dark magic threaten to destroy her vogue image. 

In the flourishing metropolis of Soot City (a warped version of 1920s Chicago), progressive ideals reign and the old ways of magic and liquid mana are forbidden. Daisy Dell is a Modern Girl – stylish, educated and independent – keen to establish herself in the city but reluctant to give up the taboo magic inherited from her grandmother.

Her new job takes her to unexpected places, and she gets more attention than she had hoped for. When bounty hunters start combing the city for magicians, Daisy must decide whether to stay with her new employer – even if it means revealing the grim source of her occult powers. (via Goodreads)

 

Hello, Daisy, and welcome to the blog! I know it’s nothing like Franklin Blaine’s radio program, but we’ll say that’s a good thing!

Happy to be here, Ceillie! Thank you so much for inviting me.

 

Tell us a little bit about yourself!

I’m Daisy Dell, lifelong resident of the industrious and dusty Soot City and recent graduate of the Catherine Eleanor Ruthell Women’s College, where I studied history. I consider myself to be a Modern Girl–a woman of independent mind and sophisticated fashion. But sophisticated fashion isn’t cheap, so I’ve just gotten myself my first proper job working in an office called Stripes Management. They do… well, something. I’m still not entirely clear on that point. But my job is to assist my boss, Mr. Swarz, with tasks that his disability impairs him from doing on his own.

 

How important is your heritage?

Well, that’s a complicated question, isn’t it? Everyone in Soot City is in such a rush to toss that kind of thing aside. I get that it’s for this sort of ideal of national unity, and since Ashland is such a young country, everyone is eager to find a common culture ground so we can all get along. But you can’t really toss aside centuries of family stories and feuds and traditions, can you? I’m as modern as the next girl, but there’s something precious in the idea of passing down something ancient through the generations, and the trappings of modernity deserve at least a critical eye every now and again. The concepts of heritage and progress are both more complex than people give them credit for, and I don’t think one is necessarily always better than the other.

 

If you could spend a day with someone you admire (alive, dead or fictional) who would it be?

This might sound corny, but I do miss my grandmother. We were close when I was growing up. She passed away just a few years ago while I was in college, and I was so busy with school I didn’t have much time to see her just before she passed. It wasn’t really in my control, but I still feel a bit guilty for it.

 

When do you consider it an appropriate time to lie?

Oh, I’m pretty flexible with honesty when I need to be. Most times it seems like people just lie about things that aren’t anyone else’s business, anyway. As long as it’s not hurting anyone, what does it matter?

 

Who do you find the most attractive?

Oh, gosh, I haven’t been worrying too much about that lately, what with my new job and all. I’ll admit I swoon after the dreamy picture show star here and there, but I’ve been too busy to look too hard at anyone else. Although, Miss Agatha in the office is awfully pretty…

 

What is your most treasured possession?

This might seem silly with all these trinkets I’ve inherited from my grandmother, but I’m actually quite partial to the quilt on the foot of my bed that my mother bought for me when I moved out of the house. Seems like it shouldn’t be anything special and it’s not even that cute, but I suppose it reminds me of being out on my own for the first time.

 

What talent would you most like to have?

Practically speaking, being able to drive would certainly be a benefit. But you know those little fancy glass figurines they sell in high-end department stores? I’d love to know how to make those.

 

If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

I suppose I could stand to let myself be a little more vulnerable with people. It was easy having casual friends in college because you see them every day in class, you know? Now that I’m out in the world, I think I’ll need to start letting people in closer if I want to keep them around.

 

What would you like to be remembered for after your death?

I’d like to be remembered for making a difference in society, but I don’t know what that difference would be. Something not evil, ideally. I studying history in college, it seemed like most of the names remembered there were guilty of war crimes. Maybe that’s on my history classes for focusing so much on war.

 

What do you always keep on you?

I always have at least a few of my grandmother’s old trinkets handy. For purely sentimental reasons, of course!

 

If you could teach everyone in the world one thing, what would it be?

Remember what I said about people not minding their own business? A lot of folks seem perfectly comfortable casting judgments on others for any number of perceived flaws, but we are all trying our best in this world, aren’t we? Maybe it’s time we all learned to stop getting prickly over other people’s troubles and start giving folks the benefit of the doubt. Each of us has our own struggles.