Soman Chainani: Let the Book Find You
In this interview, internationally bestselling author Soman Chainani discusses having to find a new writing style for his new YA political thriller, Young World.
Soman Chainani is the author of the School for Good and Evil series, which has sold over 4.5 million copies, has been translated into 35 languages across six continents, and has been adapted into a major motion picture from Netflix that debuted at #1 in over 80 countries. Together, his books have been on the New York Times Bestseller List for more than 50 weeks. He graduated from Harvard University summa cum laude with a degree in English & American Literature, and an MFA in Film from Columbia University. He lives in St. Louis, Missouri. Follow him on Twitter, TikTok, Facebook, and Instagram.
In this interview, Soman discusses Chainani discusses having to find a new writing style for his new political thriller, Young World, his hope for readers, and more.
Name: Soman Chainani
Literary agent: Peter Knapp, Park Fine Brower
Book title: Young World
Publisher: Random House
Release date: May 5, 2026
Genre/category: Political thriller
Previous titles: The School for Good and Evil series; Beasts & Beauty
Elevator pitch: House of Cards meets Hunger Games in this global thriller, about 17-year-old Benton Young, who against all odds, gets elected President of the United States. Soon, one election becomes a worldwide movement, ushering in the party of Revolting Youth. But when the new teenage leaders meet for the first time at a G-8 summit, things turn deadly—forcing a young American President to not just clear his name, but also save the world from ruin.
What prompted you to write this book?
I spent 12 years writing a fairy tale series that became a global franchise. It felt like being the Fairy Tale Guy would be the natural, expected course for my career. Except as I traveled the world, going into hundreds of schools to visit with young readers, I could see their stresses and anxieties mounting—about their futures, their planet, and the way they were expected to operate in adult spaces. They’d lost the right to be young. I started realizing that maybe I wasn’t meant to help people keep escaping to fairy tale worlds. Maybe I was meant to help them transform this one.
How long did it take to go from idea to publication? And did the idea change during the process?
It took two full years to write Young World and then a full year of “post-production,” because the book has over 120 pieces of neon-color visual media. Imagine The Da Vinci Code but with visual interstitials that provide the clues and details to the larger mystery. It’s truly a multimedia novel, meant to replicate the way we process information in today’s world. Coming from a film background, I wanted a book that felt like you were “reading” a movie.
Were there any surprises or learning moments in the publishing process for this title?
We wanted to invent a new color for the book that would represent the third party of Revolting Youth, the way that red represents Republicans and blue represents Democrats. I came up with the idea of “Nuke”, a fluorescing, almost radioactive orange that screams youth power. This would be the color for the book cover and all the interior media. But how to actually find this color? Random House and I spent months finessing production with overseas printers to synthesize the precise shade and bring it to life. The results are extraordinary.
Were there any surprises in the writing process for this book?
Coming off 13 years of writing The School for Good and Evil, a very lush romantasy series, I had a writing style that felt intrinsic and permanent. Except that writing style didn’t work at all for Young World, which is meant to be fast, fractured, first-person, not to mention a teenage boy’s diary, all hormonal id, while my previous books had been mostly lyrical, female-POV, wish-fulfillment fantasies. I had to embrace a completely new voice, which meant locating it inside me. That was a surprise: that I had a teenage boy’s language and rhythm somewhere in there.
What do you hope readers will get out of your book?
That young people are the true moral conscience left in this world. They also have the energy, the optimism, the capability to do impossible things. We need them to stand up and take ownership of the future.
If you could share one piece of advice with other writers, what would it be?
Let the book find you. Trying to control your career path or your work from the conscious mind keeps you in a cocoon and prevents you from becoming the writer you’re meant to be.
