Interview with Liz Gomez, Fall ’24 Wilde Press Author
Blog Director // Leanna Florez
TW: discussions of grief, mild drug use, and cursing
I have been lucky enough to be Liz Gomez’s friend since freshman year, meaning I have gotten to see her writing and confidence evolve firsthand. All of it has led to the publishing of Breath of Death, Gomez’s debut horror novella full of complicated themes, vivid worldbuilding, and a rivetingly eerie plot. Read on to learn about Gomez’s writing process, and like me, be able to say you knew her before she was famous.
For the sake of length, I won’t include everything in the transcript, but imagine laughter, long pauses, and random words uttered in between every question—exactly the way two friends who communicate through sarcasm and internet references would speak.
FLOREZ: Hi Liz!
GOMEZ: Hello!
Cue immediate laughter.
FLOREZ: This is… the worst two people to do this.
GOMEZ: I can’t interview. I’m so nervous, I just gotta do it.
A collective deep breath.
FLOREZ: Okay, okay… How would you summarize Breath of Death?
GOMEZ: Hm, that’s a good question.
FLOREZ: Summarizing the book you wrote?
GOMEZ: The book I wrote! I would summarize it as basically, this girl named Dolores learns about this figure called The Sister, and Father Sanchez persuades her to meet with The Sister to see if she can swap places with her [dead] mother, but things aren’t what they seem. And, yeah, it doesn’t end well. Sorry! That was—
FLOREZ: It’s okay! Love it. I’m intrigued.
GOMEZ: Gracias.
FLOREZ: If you could describe the book in three words, what would they be?
GOMEZ: I would say, I was trying to go for Southern Gothic—well I guess that’s two words.
FLOREZ: I’ll count it as one.
GOMEZ: I wanted it also to take place in the Pacific West, but yeah, Southern Gothic for one. Spoopy.
FLOREZ: Awesome.
GOMEZ: Yeah, spooky, and, I guess grief-filled? I don’t know if that’s a word.
FLOREZ: I think that’s a word.
GOMEZ: Griefy.
FLOREZ: This is very intellectual of you.
GOMEZ: Thank you, I try my best.
FLOREZ: Tell me about the writing process for Breath of Death. How did it come about?
GOMEZ: What? Come?
Laughter from Liz. A deadpan look from me.
FLOREZ: I swear to God… I hope you know this is going in the fucking transcript!
GOMEZ: Dude, I literally cannot take anything seriously.
FLOREZ: It’s okay, just answer the question.
GOMEZ: Fine, last fall semester, I took an intro to creative writing class with Erin Jones. I was at my cousin’s place, and Erin had given us this project to write a short story for our final, and I could not think of anything to write… so I started smoking weed.
FLOREZ: So true bestie.
GOMEZ: So basically, I was smoking some weed—
FLOREZ: Are you okay with this going in the—
GOMEZ: I’m twenty-one!
FLOREZ: Oh, that’s right! Okay, sorry, continue.
GOMEZ: When I was smoking, I felt the smoke going down my esophagus, and I was like, “this would be such a cool metaphor.” Talking about the smoke and how it’s like a snake coiling in your lungs, so I wrote down the line, “smoke coiled in her lungs,” and that’s the first line of Breath of Death. And I just wrote it from there.
FLOREZ: That’s so cool!
GOMEZ: Yeah, so then I just came up with other ideas about The Sister and someone being able to communicate with Death. Because this was originally a short story, and in it, Dolores does meet Death, and Death resurrects her mother, but obviously it’s not actually her mother because… Okay, I’m gonna go on a side tangent.
FLOREZ: Please do.
GOMEZ: This was a story about me exploring survivor’s guilt, especially with my mom. After the first year she passed away, I always thought to myself, “what if it was me, what if it was me,” and I wanted to explore that because with my writing, I’m always exploring my grief. So in the short story, I wrote about the idea of trading places, and it doesn’t turn out well, because Death is final.
FLOREZ: That’s powerful.
GOMEZ: Thank you, I try my best. Originally, when Dolores meets Death, she dies at the end because each time, that’s the lesson. You can’t trade places with someone, and even if you could, it wouldn’t work out the way you want it to, it would just cause more pain for your family in the end. So I wrote the short story, and a lot of the comments I got from my class were people telling me it should be longer so there can be more worldbuilding. With that in the back of my mind, I went to Ireland this past summer, so I couldn’t really have a job. Instead, I volunteered at a dog shelter and I had a lot of time in the afternoon, and I’m the type of person that needs to keep doing things, if you get that.
FLOREZ: Oh, you know I do.
GOMEZ: Yeah, you get it dude, the ADHD.
FLOREZ: Like, what am I gonna do, just sit?
GOMEZ: Fuck that. I had to do something. What I did was I walked dogs in the morning, and while I was walking dogs, I would plan my story, because in the afternoon, what I would do is write the novella.
FLOREZ: As one does.
GOMEZ: And people would look at me like I was crazy because I was muttering and telling the story to the dogs!
FLOREZ: I do the exact same thing, but my planning space is the shower. I’ll be in there like—
GOMEZ: Mind-mapping.
FLOREZ: Exactly! And then I go outside, and half of those times I’ll write something down.
GOMEZ: Yeah, it took a lot of… what’s the word?
FLOREZ: Discipline?
GOMEZ: That! So that’s how I would map out the story. I wanted to include Cain, the biblical figure, and have him be a villain in a story. I wrote that, finished the first draft, edited it again, edited it again, and edited it again. I was never taken seriously as a writer when I was in highschool. I’ve loved writing for my whole life, but I always thought there was no way I would ever make it. But then I decided, might as well, for shits and giggles. Shits and gigs. I just figured, why don’t I submit to Pub Club and see what happens? And I was not expecting this! But that’s what happened! That was a very long answer.
FLOREZ: It’s a great answer! It’s exactly the type of answer I want. Love a long answer. Were there any other works that inspired this one? TV, books, media, anything?
GOMEZ: Mhm, catholic guilt.
FLOREZ: Ope!
GOMEZ: Catholic trauma.
FLOREZ: Yeah… that does it.
GOMEZ: The Year of the Witching by Alexis Henderson. I read it after I wrote Breath of Death, but her Lilith character is really similar to Cain. I really didn’t mean to copy it, but I just love her writing. I love how she explores religious trauma. It is a great book. And What Moves the Dead by T. Kingfisher. It’s a short book, about 125 pages. I just love the aesthetic of the story. There’s nature, and a forest, and isolation, and mushrooms—I really like mushrooms, they’re so pretty. I wanted to include that vibe in my story, so that influenced it. And I guess the Bible. I was raised Catholic.
FLOREZ: Why do you feel connected to this genre, horror, for exploring those types of things? Because you do a lot with horror, what about it is something you feel so connected to?
GOMEZ: I recently did a project on Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, which I was obsessed with as a kid because I have anxiety. Even before my mom passed away, I liked horror because I could project my fears onto that clown in the movie, or that serial killer, and I could put a face to unnamable things. By the end of the movie, there’s an end, and there’s closure. I’m projecting my anxieties onto the movie and then it’s done. And that just made me feel so much better. It also kept me present. But after my mom passed away, I realized that horror is such a good place to explore grief because Cain is the personification of survivor’s guilt. And I find monsters and scary things and scary people, they’re all such good allegories for grief and they’re all metaphors. Horror has always been connected to me, both with my anxiety and understanding complex trauma and the loss of my mom.
Liz ended this enlightening statement with a fart noise.
FLOREZ: Thank you. Wow.
GOMEZ: I got you.
FLOREZ: But, like, I get what you said so much. I was also a big horror kid growing up, reading stuff and watching stuff on YouTube. Horror is a crazy way to explore things, because if you actually look into horror movies and books, they have some of the deepest metaphors, but you don’t think about it because you’re focused on the scary survival aspect of it. It’s a great way to do a metaphor that’s not in your face, because what it’s comparing itself to is exactly that; it’s something that you don’t overtly notice when you’re so focused on survival.
GOMEZ: Exactly! And I think fear… People think it’s bad, especially with anxiety, it’s not necessarily good. But it’s such a good way to explore complex issues.
FLOREZ: It’s such a huge part of us as humans. Most big issues in the world are driven by love or fear, sometimes both, sometimes one disguised as the other.
GOMEZ: Fear is one of the most powerful things in the world, especially in this economy.
FLOREZ: In this economy… It’s true!
GOMEZ: The Babadook was another movie—
FLOREZ: Such a good movie.
GOMEZ: I love the idea of the monster not being killed at the end. Grief is not seen as something monstrous, just something you have to… I don’t know.
FLOREZ: Exist with?
GOMEZ: Yes, God, I would do anything for that director.
FLOREZ: Transition… you know how professors love to find the message in a book, is there a message in yours? What do you feel like the main message is?
GOMEZ: I don’t know if it seems obvious, but the message is that there’s always someone out there who loves you. Even if you think that you’re undeserving, you’ll always have someone. Whether that’s friends, family, partners, teachers, something, someone cares about you. You can’t forget that, otherwise you’re gonna get lost, like Dolores.
FLOREZ: That’s beautiful. What has been the most difficult part of the publishing process?
GOMEZ: Hm, when I say difficult, I want to say that Maggie and Sam from substantive editing literally are queens and I hope they have a cold pillow every time they go to sleep. I hope they have so much fun. I owe so much to them. But that substantive editing was really hard. It was difficult. Just because I question myself so much. Immediately if I see a mistake, especially if it’s with my storyline, I feel like everything else is shit. So when I saw their suggestions—which were really helpful—I was like, “Shit. I have to rewrite the whole thing.” But then I was able to calm myself down and make the changes to these few little sections, I’m going to trust Maggie and Sam, and if they wanted me to change the whole thing, they would have just told me. That was the most difficult part.
FLOREZ: That’s really interesting. I think I have that issue too, if I find a plot hole, I want to rewrite the whole thing.
GOMEZ: Yeah, I had to stop myself from rewriting.
FLOREZ: That’s actually so true, I’m realizing this right now. I have a book I’ve rewritten, like, twice already—
GOMEZ: Which one?
FLOREZ: That gay one from freshman year. But yeah, I don’t need to start from scratch just because there’s plot holes. That was actually so helpful for me, thank you Liz.
GOMEZ: Absolutely! I’m so glad to hear that.
FLOREZ: What has been your favorite part of the publishing process?
GOMEZ: The cover. Oh my God, Sydney popped off. I was so excited for the cover because I like to think I’m kind of a visual person, like I’m not an artist, but I really pride myself on my descriptions, and I hope that they’re okay.
FLOREZ: I’ve been looking at your writing for years at this point and one of my favorite things about your writing is your imagery. When I’m reading it, I’m there. I can see it. That’s why I had so many specifics when I was helping with the cover.
GOMEZ: You were so helpful, dude. Thank you.
FLOREZ: No problem, Liz. But yeah, the cover was your favorite part?
GOMEZ: Yeah! You know how when people write they can imagine scenes? Like when you get in the zone? With me, I imagine still images. So when I do scenes, I try to keep this one image in my mind and go from there. I was really excited to see what the artist would come out with from the images I came up with, and Sydney just slayed.
FLOREZ: It’s fire.
GOMEZ: Ate. Lunch, dinner, and desert.
FLOREZ: Next question, how, if at all, has Emerson helped you in the writing or publishing process of this book? Is there anything you’ve learned here that was helpful?
GOMEZ: Like Pub Club? Or just Emerson in general.
FLOREZ: Anything from being at Emerson. It doesn’t have to be “I learned this in this class,” it can be something from a person.
GOMEZ: In general, Emerson has made me a lot more confident in my writing. I remember when I shared this short story, I was so nervous. I didn’t sleep the night before, I thought everything was terrible, that it didn’t make sense. Then the next day, everyone was really kind. They gave me good criticism, but they also helped my self-conscious ass. They helped me realize that I was being too hard on myself and that I’m allowed to be proud of my writing. So Emerson has just let me know that I can write.
FLOREZ: Yes! You can write! And you’re great at it. You’re literally getting published.
GOMEZ: I still can’t believe that. I remember when I got the news, I genuinely did not think I was going to get picked. I did this for fun, just to put myself out there, because you know me a year ago would have never done this. So I’m very lucky and I’m very happy.
FLOREZ: Very exciting! Do you have any advice for the writers of the world?
GOMEZ: Yeah, just write. I think writing can be so freeing, but there’s also this pressure to please other people, and what I’ve learned is to write for yourself. If people don’t like it, then whatever. If you’re proud of it, that’s what matters.
FLOREZ: Absolutely. Okay, rapid fire fun question time.
GOMEZ: I’m ready.
FLOREZ: Song for the book?
GOMEZ: It’s the Ethel Cain one, I can’t pronounce it!
FLOREZ: Bye.
GOMEZ: Ptolemaea. My pronunciation is off the record.
FLOREZ: Color, what color is this book?
GOMEZ: Mushy brown. Like leaves in fall after rain.
FLOREZ: What fruit is this book?
GOMEZ: An apple?
FLOREZ: Give me a no-context spoiler. Like, you know when it’s a TV show and they show you a banana and it’s because someone eats a banana?
GOMEZ: Got it. Beetle.
To snag your copy of Breath of Death by Liz Gomez, come to Wilde Press’ launch party December 7th! More details on Pub Club’s Instagram.