Exclusive Interview
‘Red City’ Author Marie Lu Talks Sam & Ari’s Romance and Teases Sequel Plans (VIDEO)
With its unique alchemical magic system in an alternate Los Angeles, Marie Lu’s Red City is a sprawling urban fantasy that deals with themes of power and ambition. At its heart, though, the author describes the book as a love story.
“But it’s a love story with all the thorns attached to it,” Lu told Swooon at New York Comic Con. “So it’s not just romantic love. It is familial love. It is love for yourself and what you’re willing to sacrifice for the people that you love. It is toxic love. There is an exploitation of love in the story of characters that are too blinded by love or too starved of love to see it.”
In the Legend author’s adult debut, Sam and Ari’s relationship is just as complex as the world they live in. They begin as each other’s only childhood friends, none the wiser that the other is being recruited by rival syndicates, which are competing for dominance in the production of a drug that turns users into the perfect version of themselves. As they hone their alchemy skills, the friends bury their unspoken feelings for each other and lose touch for years — until they come face to face on opposite sides.
Lu goes on to paraphrase Shel Silverstein’s poem, Masks, to describe Sam and Ari’s arc. “It’s about two people who are like, ‘She was blue and he was blue. And then they both hid it from the world. And then they walked right past each other while they were searching for other people like themselves and never knew that they had found each other, actually.'”
After their reunion, Sam and Ari begin a dangerous game, which stands in stark contrast to their sweet friendship when they were kids. They serve opposite purposes for their syndicates: Ari is the charming negotiator, while Sam operates in the shadows. It’s reminiscent of how they were when they were younger, with Ari attracting attention — “for better or worse,” Lu says — and Sam being ignored.
Matt Doyle
“I loved putting them together because they’re such foils of each other,” Lu said about their dynamic. “So they’ve got these kinds of opposite strengths or a weakness, and they’re both kind of envious of the other for being that opposite. So it was always very fun to put them in the same room and see what would happen when they had these kind of opposite dynamics.”
Despite their differences, Lu explains that they’re both young people who come from difficult circumstances, trying to find their place. They also both feel a deep loneliness, which is only sated by each other. “But because they’re so afraid to lose each other, they never really are brave enough to show each other their true selves,” the author said. “And ironically, that’s why they lose each other. I wanted them to go through that entire arc of finding themselves before they are able to find someone else.”
[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Red City‘s ending.]
Ari and Sam can’t stay away from each other even though they’re supposed to. As they try to figure out if they can trust each other again, they’re also forced to betray each other as both of their syndicates try to exploit their connection. By the end of the book, however, the two decide to fight for each other instead. Not only that, but slow burn pays off: They confess their love.
“I love seeing characters kind of grappling with themselves and how they feel for someone else and why they can’t share that with that person,” Lu said of keeping Sam and Ari apart and yearning for each other until the final act. “So I hope that when the moment finally hit for Sam and Ari, that it felt earned.”
While Sam and Ari make it out alive after their syndicates learn of their betrayal, they’re also driven apart again. Ari, who has been held prisoner by Sam’s bosses, escapes the world of alchemy and finds himself in another city. But Sam isn’t so lucky. She manages to get her boss arrested, but she chooses not to walk away from the world she’s become entangled in.
Lu confirms that she’s already hard at work on the sequel, which will take readers out of Angel City and show them the broader world of alchemy. “So we’re headed to Lindenium or London and Europe to see what their alchemy situation is like. Sam has been recruited… and Ari is going to follow her,” she explained. “And I think Ari, he’s over there for practical reasons, but he’s also there mainly because he’s worried about Sam and for good reason.”
She continued, “I think Sam is in a situation where she thinks she can handle it, but she is very much going to get in over her head. There will be a return of some characters that we thought maybe hadn’t met their end at the end, but perhaps haven’t. And I think a couple points of view that hopefully people were searching for in book one and didn’t get, but they might get it in the second one.”
Is it possible for Sam and Ari to ever fully trust each other again? It’s a question that Lu will be exploring in the next installment. Their love was pure when they were children, but even then, they didn’t really know who the other was. At this point in the series, Sam and Ari have only just scratched the surface of their relationship, Lu noted.
“So they’re actually now kind of starting from scratch,” she added. “‘OK, now I know who you are, and we’ve been through some stuff. So what happens now if we are in the same place at the same time, knowing that we have feelings for each other, how do we connect again? How do we get to know each other?’ That is some of the tension that I’m really excited to play with, where it’s almost like forced proximity, where they’ve got to learn each other again.”
Though Lu hasn’t committed to a number of books yet, she thinks Sam and Ari’s journey will play out over three books. But for now, she hopes readers finish Red City with a feeling of escapism, despite being put through “the wringer” and experiencing its darker tone.
“I hope they kind of leave with a sense of optimism, of thinking that even if things are bad, even if things are dark, there is somebody out there who sees you and who knows you and is willing to be there for you,” she says. “And I hope that they feel that way with Sam and Ari, and I hope they want to continue the journey with them.”
