“What if Nancy Drew had a Reddit account?” That’s the question Nikki Payne asked and answered in her latest novel, ‘The Princess and the P.I.’<\/p>\n
PHOENIX \u2014 What if Nancy Drew had a Reddit account?<\/p>\n
That’s the question Nikki Payne said she kept thinking about while writing her latest release, ‘The Princess and the P.I.’\u00a0<\/p>\n
RELATED: Q&A with author Aurora Palit on her latest book, ‘Honey and Heat’<\/a><\/p>\n Fiona Addai is an amateur online sleuth with a mission to honor her late brother and reclaim his invention from the corporation that has claimed it as its own. But instead of getting justice, she gets accused of murder.\u00a0<\/p>\n When Maurice Bennett sees Fiona’s dilemma, something clicks: the jaded P.I. is suddenly thinking more about her case than the cases he failed to solve for the first time in quite some time.\u00a0<\/p>\n As the case heats up and the pair grow closer, it gets harder to ignore their chemistry. Will the biggest gamble of the case be trusting one another? Or will they crack the case and their hearts?<\/p>\n Payne is giving you all of the details, from her start in writing to crafting her characters.\u00a0<\/p>\n >>This interview has been edited for clarity.<\/p>\n Question: First of all, congratulations on The Princess and The P.I.! It\u2019s such a great story, thank you for taking the time to chat with me about it. Can you tell me a little bit about how you first got started writing? And when I wasn\u2019t ruining Barbie-land, I was sitting next to my grandmother watching The Young and the Restless, completely transfixed by Victor Newman making women swoon with just an arched eyebrow.<\/p>\n Those moments shaped me. They made me curious about how stories connect people, how love and betrayal and family drama are both ridiculous and life-changing. I think that curiosity is why I became a cultural anthropologist\u2026and it\u2019s definitely why I write romance. Because stories help us make sense of who we are and what we want.”<\/p>\n Q:\u00a0I love that your first novel is a modern Pride and Prejudice retelling. What inspired you to tell the story of Pride and Protest, and what has it been like writing interconnected standalones since your debut?<\/p>\n A: “‘Pride and Prejudice’ is basically the Beyonc\u00e9 of romance novels\u2014iconic, timeless, and always reinventable. When I was researching desirability politics on dating apps, I kept running into the same depressing data: Black women and Asian men were consistently rated as the \u201cleast desirable.\u201d And I thought\u2014okay, so society is basically writing us out of the love story before it even begins? That can\u2019t stand.<\/p>\n As a cultural anthropologist, I\u2019m fascinated by how society decides who\u2019s worthy of desire, and how those unspoken rules get baked into our stories. Writing ‘Pride and Protest’\u00a0 was my way of flipping that script. I wanted to put a Black woman at the center of the romantic spotlight\u2014not as the sassy best friend, not as the tragic backstory, but as the one who gets the kiss, the joy, and the happily-ever-after.\u00a0<\/p>\n But \u00a0Jane Austen\u2019s ‘Pride and Prejudice’\u00a0still had a POV about women and their [place] in society. And ‘Pride and Protest’ is saying so much about issues that matter to women now. \u00a0Since then, writing interconnected standalones has been like building my own Marvel Universe, except instead of superheroes, it\u2019s messy, brilliant Black women and the men who are barely keeping up.”<\/p>\n Q: Talk to me a little bit about the upcoming book, The Princess And The P.I., what drew you to this story? How are you pitching it to folks who may not have read your books before? Then you pair that with my enduring love for sexually competent dirtbags with guilt complexes\u2014hashtag The Bear..wait, OMG, this is basically The Bear fanfic. I wanted to see what would happen if these two broken people, one hiding behind a screen and one hiding behind cynicism, stumbled into each other while chasing justice.<\/p>\n So the pitch? It\u2019s Only Murders in the Building if Selena Gomez was a Black Reddit detective and Steve Martin was a fine-but-sleepless Black PI who really needs therapy but keeps choosing Fiona instead.”<\/p>\n Q:\u00a0I love the premise of this book, especially because online sleuths and Reddit detectives are prominent today. Talk to me a little bit about writing Fiona\u2019s character. What was most challenging? What was the most rewarding?<\/p>\n A:\u00a0“Fiona\u2019s always been someone who lived in her mind\u2014her online world was safe, neat, she could control the narrative. Real-world detective work is bloody, imperfect, chaotic. It drags her right out of her curated safety and forces her to risk failing, risk looking foolish, risk getting hurt. Maurice, despite being a bit of a disaster himself, believes in her competence\u2014sometimes more than she does. That steady faith made all the difference for her.<\/p>\n The hardest part about writing her was making sure her brilliance as an online sleuth didn\u2019t overshadow her incredible vulnerability. The best part? Giving her the kind of growth arc where she learns that protecting herself doesn\u2019t have to mean hiding herself.”<\/p>\n Q: So, of course, we cannot talk about this book without talking about the love story between Fiona and Maurice. Talk to me a little bit about writing their love story. Were there any moments between them that surprised you? What\u2019s your favorite part of their love story?<\/p>\n A:\u00a0“What I love most about Fiona and Maurice is that they\u2019re both messy in really different ways\u2014she\u2019s brilliant but sheltered, he\u2019s street-smart but emotionally exhausted. And the magic happens when their flaws start rubbing up against each other (and not just in the fun way).<\/p>\n Because I don\u2019t believe people change in a vacuum. We become better because we\u2019re in community with people that make us see and want better. Maurice isn\u2019t magically redeemed; he just tries for her. I wanted to write a love story that says: yes, you\u2019re allowed to be flawed, and yes, you can still be someone worthy of love if you do the work.<\/p>\n My favorite part is when Fiona is bold enough to ask Maurice for what she wants. That moment completely flips the power dynamic on its head\u2014it\u2019s raw, it\u2019s sexy, and it\u2019s the kind of scene that reminds you love stories are rarely about who\u2019s stronger, \u00a0but who\u2019s willing to show up honest.”<\/p>\n Q: This book is also about family love, too, as the why behind Fiona\u2019s original plan is to honor her brother\u2019s memory. What was it like writing these family dynamics?<\/p>\n A:\u00a0“Family is the original crime scene, right? It\u2019s where the alibis and motives live. Fiona\u2019s love for her late brother is the heartbeat of this story\u2026it\u2019s why she risks everything. Writing those dynamics was tough because love and grief are twins. But they make characters move like no other impetus. \u00a0I love writing big chaotic families, there is so much insight into how the characters think.”<\/p>\n Q: The book is set to hit shelves soon. How are you feeling? What do you hope folks take away from this story?<\/p>\n A:\u00a0Gahhh!! \u00a0You know that feeling when you\u2019ve put on a party? That hour before anyone shows up, and you\u2019re like\u2026 dear god, please let people come. I want readers to walk away believing two things: one, Romance is better with stakes! and that Black women deserve to be the main characters in their own messy, swoony, dangerous, delicious stories.”<\/p>\n Q: For readers who are itching to read more from you, do you have any upcoming projects you\u2019d like to share?<\/p>\n A: “Yes! I\u2019m cooking up more romantic suspense, still with that Nikki Payne mix of high drama and cultural complexity. It’s a riveting tale of revenge with two old friends who think they know everything about each other. My goal is to make you laugh, gasp, and maybe text your book club, ‘Sis, we have to talk about this one.'”<\/p>\n To keep up with all of Payne’s latest projects, check out her Instagram<\/a>, where she posts “equal parts book chaos and social commentary,” and check out her cultural commentary Substack, The Payneful Truth<\/a>, where she dissects “cultural moments with [her] anthropologist\u2019s eye (and maybe a little side-eye).”\u00a0<\/p>\n For more book and literacy stories, check out “Reading Arizona” on YouTube and 12News.com. If you have a story pitch for Reading Arizona, email koconnor@12news.com or reach out via Instagram, @thatjournalistwhoreads<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n
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Answer: “Honestly? Barbie play. I was an absolute menace with a Barbie. There was so much unhinged storytelling happening in those tiny plastic rooms\u2014love triangles, dramatic deaths, surprise weddings, corporate espionage, all in one afternoon.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“This one grabbed me by the throat. I kept thinking: what if Nancy Drew had a Reddit account? I\u00a0was fascinated by how people curate these hyper-competent online personas\u2014Fiona\u2019s Reddit sleuthing is peak \u201cI have receipts for everything\u201d\u2014and how wildly unprepared those same people often are for the messiness of real life. That tension between online confidence and offline chaos was delicious to write.<\/p>\n
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