Meet Felicia Davin
My hearts, I’m so excited to introduce you to Felicia Davin! Her queer romantasy The Anonymous Letters of C Forestier was nominated for the 2025 Indieverse Awards, and I’m on a mission to interview every nominee in the Best Romance category. I’ll let Felicia officially introduce themself.
FELICIA: I got a PhD in French literature and then quit academia to write romance novels. I’m self-published. It allows me to write the books of my heart without worrying about whether they're too niche. And I get to design the covers or have a lot of input on the cover if I hire a designer who's not me.
JEN: I design my own covers too—it’s stressful and a little unhinged but deeply satisfying. So, tell me: what genres do you gravitate toward, both as a writer and a reader?
FELICIA: Romance! Especially if it's mixed with fantasy or sci-fi elements and especially especially if it’s queer. But I love to read all kinds. Some books I've read lately and loved? Juniper Butterworth writes really wonderful fantasy romance—there's intrigue, there's yearning, there's the best talking horse you've ever met. It's queer in a variety of flavors and it has such lovable characters. And I love the work of Iona Datt Sharma, who writes both sci-fi and really achingly beautiful queer contemporary romance, like Blood Sweat Glitter, about two women on a roller derby team, and Division Bells, about two men trying to make policy changes.
JEN: Those sound amazing! What fellow artists or authors keep you inspired—or keep you going when the work feels hard?
FELICIA: I sometimes do writing sprints online with Claudie Arseneault, Juniper Butterworth, and Ceillie Simkiss, and I really appreciate them keeping me going. I've also been writing in person with Liz Alden, which has been wonderful.
JEN: Let’s talk soundscape—do you write in silence or with music? And what’s on your favorite playlist right now?
FELICIA: I love music, but I'm so easily distracted that I need silence to write.
JEN: Same! Okay, picture this: you’re in the writing zone. What snacks or drinks are within arm’s reach?
FELICIA: I always have a bottle of water and very often have a cup of not-tea “tea,” like turmeric ginger or pomegranate.
JEN: I love a hot cup of … well, anything! When do you do your best creative work?
FELICIA: Left to my own devices, I'd be a night owl, but I have a small child at home, so we're up early every day. I create best when I can carve out some time and space without distractions.
JEN: I’m a night owl living an early bird lifestyle myself. What’s your go-to joy when you’re not writing?
FELICIA: I sing in a chorus and I bake.
JEN: The themes in your stories are often deeply thoughtful. What big questions or ideas do you find yourself returning to again and again?
FELICIA: Love, of course, since I write genre romance (or sci-fi/fantasy with romance in it)—what forms it takes, what happiness looks like for different characters. And how can we find happiness in our flawed, unjust world? I think it often comes down to that line from Pirkei Avot: you are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to desist from it. I usually need about 100,000 words of novel to rephrase that. I like to write characters who've suffered and made mistakes, but who haven't given up trying to make things better.
JEN: Let’s show off your shelf! What have you written and released so far?
FELICIA: I've written nine novels as Felicia Davin and I've co-authored five novellas under the pen name LK Fleet. I like to move between genres a little bit and to write different kinds of relationships, as you can see.
FANTASY (a trilogy following the same f/f/x relationship): Thornfruit, Nightvine, Shadebloom
SCI-FI ROMANCE (each book has a different m/m couple): Edge of Nowhere, Out of Nowhere, Nowhere Else
HISTORICAL FANTASY ROMANCE: The Scandalous Letters of V and J (x/x), The Mischievous Letters of the Marquise de Q (m/f/x), The Anonymous Letters of C Forestier (f/x)
FANTASY, co-authored as LK Fleet: Errant (a series of five f/f novellas)
In my work, you'll always find bisexual characters and people trying to figure out how to do right in an unjust world.
JEN: My FMCs are all bisexual, too. Write what you know, you know? [laughs] What are you working on now? Any upcoming releases we should watch for?
FELICIA: I just finished a draft of a novel that's sort of a sci-fi spy thriller. It has a romance in it—a very messy one between two men and a woman—but it's a little bit of a departure from "romance" as a genre because the characters don't find their happily ever after within one book. They will eventually, but I need another book to get them there.
JEN: How has your past life—as a student, a scholar, a professional—found its way into your fiction?
FELICIA: The Anonymous Letters of C Forestier and the other books in the French Letters series are set in 1820s France because I have a doctorate in French literature and have read a lot of 19th-century fiction. I'm not in academia anymore, so I don't get to use that knowledge much, but it was fun to set a piece of fiction then and play around with it.
JEN: Be honest—what’s been your toughest moment as a writer? And what’s the compliment you still hold close to your heart?
FELICIA: I don't think I can talk about the toughest criticism without wanting to lie down in a bog and not come out for a few thousand years, but the biggest compliment is always when somebody contacts me—by email, or social media, or in person, or anything—to say that they loved a book. That means the world to me every time. I've gotten fanart of characters a few times and that makes me over-the-moon happy. And this makes me feel like a monster, but I absolutely love it when people tell me I made them cry. That's the dream.
JEN: Thank you for taking the time to share with us, Felicia!
FELICIA: Thanks so much, Jennifer, for asking these questions and thanks to everybody reading this!
My hearts, you can find Felicia on feliciadavin.com and on Bluesky as bsky.app/profile/feliciadavin.com. Please support her work, check out The Anonymous Letters of C Forestier, and mark your calendars for the Indieverse Awards. Voting runs Nov. 7–10, 2025—don’t miss your chance to show some love!
Are you a human author? A human who narrates audiobooks? A human who designs book covers? Or a human who does PR and promotion for other authors? I'd love to interview you, too. Let me know when you’re ready!
