John North (he/him) graduated from Georgia State University, where he definitely didn’t spend thousands of dollars just to study Film & Media. John’s love for films and animated media inspired his love for writing. What started as an afterschool hobby became a deep passion, one he wanted to share with the world.
John brought new worlds to life with his imagination, fully inspired by the anime he watched while growing much. John learned so much from the stories he grew up with. He learned to value perseverance, confidence, self-improvement, empathy, friendship, and most importantly, family. These messages show through his writing.
Welcome to his Gorgon series, which is the product of seven years of hard work and discipline. It’s a bloody, violent story, but at its heart, its all about family bonds, personal improvement, responsibility, and achieving self-love. The biggest lesson that John’s learned through his life so far is the following. ‘While who you are is important, and what you do is what you’re remembered for, it’s where you want to be that will always keep you moving forward’.
What draws you to write YA Dark Fantasy Adventure with strong themes of sisterhood?
The short answer is the anime I watched growing up. Series like Dragon Ball, Naruto, Soul Eater, and Fullmetal Alchemist drove me to create a world of my own where powerful characters go on adventures that often result in life or death battles.
As for the sisterhood aspect. . .it’s more or less something that just happened. I have siblings of my own, and I’m close with all of them in a way, and most of them I didn’t grow up with. I can’t definitively say the relationship between Aurora and Polaris is based on any specific relationship I have with my siblings.
That said, the bond is easy to emulate in part because I know what it’s like to have a sibling and want to fight for them, or fight them in some cases. Aurora and Polaris’s ‘sisterhood’ could very easily be a ‘brotherhood’ with a simple gender swap, but that’s not necessarily what I wanted to portray.
Similar to Hiromu Arakawa’s Fullmetal Alchemist, with her characters Edward and Alphonse Elric, their sibling bond isn’t necessarily tied to gender, nor is it entirely divorced from it. Same thing goes for Aurora and Polaris. I wanted something strenuous initially, with mild punching and explosions through the midst of a journey, but ultimately heartwarming by the end.
What are the main themes in the Gorgon series, and did these evolve organically through the writing process, or were they deliberate choices?
So, certain themes were deliberate and planned. Aurora’s coming of age story definitely planned.
Another big one is Anti-Government. Yes, like every dystopian story ever.
In Gorgon, the world is divided, each country/faction ruled by a Demi-God. Demi-Gods have more magic than any other race, and most have lived well beyond two hundred years, some having ruled for over six centuries. The idea is that certain people have overstayed their welcome while holding seats of political power, and they’ve got to go and make room for a younger generation to clean up their mess. Sound familiar?
Themes of ‘sisterhood’ and friendship are also huge in Gorgon, and remain prevalent through the series.
However, a new theme made itself known to me through the writing of books three and four, one I never planned on but grew organically. Themes of reform, prejudice, and revolution. Especially revolution. While not spoiling much and keeping terms vague, a certain character with a former criminal background wants to make systematic change to benefit former criminals that would be better off with rehabilitation and integrating back into society instead of facing capital punishment, an end that’s commonplace for those who step out of line under the Demi-God regime.
So yes, fun stuff all around. I fell into this huge quandary by complete accident, but not at all bad about it. I’ll do my best to do right by these themes!
How did you go about worldbuilding for this series – can you share with us some examples of your process and research?
So this is an interesting one. So, I started building the foundations of this world back in high school, when I wrote short little adventure stories for fun. It was a hodgepodge of many different fantastical elements with little connective tissue initially. But overtime, as my ideas grew and Gorgon was born, I took to creating a world history (a timeline I’m still organizing to this day), a loose map that I could alter as I continued, and political factions (The Magic Nations and Allied Nations, for example).
I’m a graduate of YouTube University with a major in Writing Tip Video Essay Research, which greatly strengthened not just my worldbuilding, but writing overall (certain classes at Georgia State University helped too, I guess). I also take big inspirations from pretty much all the fiction I’ve consumed in recent years.
Percy Jackson has definitely been a big one, especially since most characters and concepts in Gorgon are loosely based off Greek Myth. There’s also some Arthurian Legend, and other bits of various folklore I plan to include down the line. Some of the various languages in Gorgon are also entirely based on Japanese, Arabic, Latin (for spells), and Spanish.
Gorgon is a hodgepodge of many different fantastical elements and cultural inspirations, kind of like Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball (before Z took everything to space). Mind you, new world-building elements come to me on a daily. While I have certain laws of magic and the world that I keep established, I allow certain things to be vague so it gives me flexibility for future ideas. So long as anything new I come up with doesn’t contradict established rules within the setting.
How do you handle the themes of monstrosity and self-acceptance/actualisation in the series, and why do you think these themes are important in YA fiction in general, and to your target readers in particular?
I explore these themes through the quiet scenes and moments wedged between moments of action and catastrophe, those moments specifically born from the ‘monster’ character in question. I think we all have a ‘monster’ inside us all (not to get cliche…).
We all have a side of us we’re not proud of. For some of us, we aren’t proud of our entire being, and sometimes it’s born from how we are perceived by others. But it’s important to not entirely reject one’s self, and that includes all the good and all the bad. That much is important for growth and moving forward.
More importantly, understanding one’s self, one’s monster, is important for embrace, and said embrace leads to self-love, self-care, and improvement where applicable. It’s something we all deal with at some moment through our lives, especially during adolescence.
Sometimes that ‘monstrosity’ is simply just being ‘othered’. That’s something no one should ever be ashamed of, and it’s especially difficult to deal with during youth. While this book isn’t meant to portray ‘monstrosity’ as ‘otherness’ in a direct way, it is meant to show that being different doesn’t mean you should go un-loved or despise yourself. That’s a lesson every young person should learn and hold dear. And it wouldn’t hurt if they got that lesson through a fun, action adventure with badass witches and princesses fighting vampires and Demi-Gods.
What is/are your favourite reader response(s) so far? (Use this space to quote some of the best reviews and blurbs)
“Aurora and Polaris are quite the pair! It had plenty of action, adventure, magic, and emotions!” -Bethany Bauerle ; Goodreads
“It’s an entertaining and interesting world, with a lead character that is fun to follow. I LOVED her “wanted” posters! Such a great element of the book. There was lots of different creatures and some good emotion added, especially between family etc” – Beth ; Goodreads
“The twists and turns kept me wanting to see what was next. I can’t wait to see what happens with Aurora, Polaris and Serena.” – Karen ; Amazon
“A stylized book resting in fast-paced, bloody action, and carried by its focus on family, specifically its unlikely sister pair. ”
Caroline Hamel ; Goodreads
Do you have any future publication plans, anything we can look out for?
Absolutely! In 2026, I plan to publish The Minotaur’s Wrath (Book II) and The Siren’s Voice (Book III) the following year, finances pending.
I’m also developing the first book of an entirely new series, Winter Fox Academy. It’s in the early draft stages, so official dates for that will come in due time.
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