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03/14/2018 08:30 AMChandra Prasad’s latest work and first young adult novel, Damselfly, stems from an idea she had as a middle school student in North Haven.
“It has roots in North Haven because eighth grade was the year we studied Lord of the Flies (by William Golding) in English class,” says Chandra, an accomplished novelist. “Typically it’s middle school, sometimes high school, but it’s one of those classic books that everyone has to read.”
Chandra’s English teacher described the book as a “perfect microcosm.” Already as aspiring writer, Chandra respectfully disagreed.
“I remember thinking ‘no, it’s not because it has only boys in it.’ Only British boys with the same background,” she says.
This thought evolved into the premise of her new novel: a similar book starring a group of girls.
Damselfly is set in today’s world and the main characters are American teenagers from a New England prep school. Chandra says, as a woman who is also multiracial, she feels strongly about diversity and as such has provided the characters with varied backgrounds.
“It can be read as a stand-alone book,” she says. “The plot is completely unique, not the same plot as the original Lord of the Flies but it has enough overlap in allegory, symbolism, motif that you can read it with Lord of the Flies as a so-called ‘parallel read.’”
Chandra believes that students are sometimes disengaged from classics that are set in the past, and hopes that the contemporary setting of Damselfly makes it easier for readers to relate to the characters. She has received positive feedback from more than 15 teachers who read a pre-production copy of the book and hopes the novel will be included in curricula across the country.
“This was an unusual book in that, I probably wrote it over two years and I wasn’t exclusively writing just this, I was working on other things, too,” she says.
“Scholastic did purchase it; they just took a little bit longer than usual but it was worth the wait. I think this is the right fit for it because they have such great academic reach that the book will end up in a lot of schools.”
Growing up in North Haven, Chandra’s dream was to be a creative writer.
“I was always pretty serious about writing, I even found my first literary agent when I was sixteen,” she says.
“I actually was raised in North Haven so I went through the system. I went to Clintonville Elementary School, I went through the middle school and high school.”
After graduating from Yale University, Chandra lived in Washington D.C., Brooklyn, and Arizona before she and her husband returned to North Haven to raise their children; now aged 11 and 7, and both students at Ridge Road Elementary School.
Chandra says she recognized early that being a writer is a tough way to make a living, and she has balanced her time spent writing fiction with a variety of jobs.
“I worked at a nonprofit,” she says. “In the early days of the internet boom, I worked at an internet company...as I’ve had more success in writing, I’ve been able to turn that into a full-time career.”
Her novels for adults include On Borrowed Wings, a historical drama set in the early-20th century, and Death of a Circus. She also originated and edited Mixed, an anthology of short stories about the multiracial experience, and her shorter pieces have been published in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and The New York Times Magazine.
Chandra completed her second young adult novel during the production period of Damselfly.
“I think I’m going to stay in the young adult market for a while,” she says. “I might explore screenwriting, too, because that’s something I’ve been really interested in...and try to convert some of my books into screenplays.”
Damselfly is available in hard copy, paperback, and audio book on Tuesday, March 27.