Heart's Choice Author Interview: Cay Macres, "Witch's Brew: Love and Lattes"

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Originally published at: Heart’s Choice Author Interview: Cay Macres, “Witch’s Brew: Love and Lattes” - Choice of Games LLC

Witch's Brew: Love and Lattes

Will you spill the tea about the secret, cozy magical cafe on the college campus? Brew potions and romance on coffee dates with your new friends!

Witch’s Brew: Love and Lattes is a 426,000-thousand word interactive cozy romance novel by Cay Macres. I sat down with Cay to talk about their writing and upcoming game! Witch’s Brew: Love and Lattes releases next Thursday, October 23rd. You can wishlist it on Steam today, it really helps, even if you don’t plan to purchase on Steam.

This is definitely not your first time writing in the game-space. Tell our readers about your background.
My first step into games was working on game jams with friends, doing dialogue and narrative design. After that, I was a contract writer for StoryLoom, an interactive novel site by Pixelberry Studios. I had always been drawn to sci fi but, with StoryLoom, I discovered how much fun fantasy is!

How did you get interested in interactive fiction?
A lot of my favorite games are cozy RPGs with strong narratives. I also love reading fantasy and sci fi! I really appreciate that interactive fiction feels like the middle point between RPGs and traditional novels.

You’ve also got some novels under your belt?
I haven’t yet published any non-interactive novels. I have a couple in the works that I’m still editing. As a writer, it’s difficult to ever feel truly done with a project.

What was your favorite part of writing this game?
I’m a writer who loves describing things, so I had fun creating the cozy, coastal, autumnal vibes of Peridot Pines! I also enjoyed figuring out all the lore around magic. And, of course, I loved writing the cat’s snarky dialogue. I tried my best to channel my own two tabbies.

If you were the PC, who would you be romancing?
I think I would romance Mel. The type of romances I enjoy are usually the shy, will-they-won’t-they, slow-burns.

What are you working on next?
Next, I hope to wrap up editing and finally start querying agents to get my non-interactive novels published! I also want to write more flash fiction. I find that it’s a helpful warm-up that reminds me how much a single word can alter a story.

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Looks like a fun addition to the Heart’s Choice library! Cozy fantasy is delightful. Congrats on completing the project!

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I had so much fun testing this! It was so many things I love: cozy magic autumnal academia. I wish I could visit Peridot Pines and hang out with these characters for real. I’ll need to look up this author so I know when she gets one of those traditional novels published - if it’s anywhere near as good as this game, I know I’ll savor it!

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…Or, in the alternative, to self-publish them on Amazon, why not.

BTW, what is cozy fantasy?

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It’s a fantasy subgenre that focuses on relatively gentle, low-stakes stories.

Here’s a description from Pan Macmillan:

So, I would expect this game to be a sweet slice-of-life story.

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Cozy fantasy is a subgenre of fantasy that focuses on low-stakes, character-driven, feel-good stories, often with themes of found family. Some popular cozy fantasy titles are Howl’s Moving Castle, The House in the Cerulean Sea, and Legends & Lattes.

Witch’s Brew is a story about a character’s first semester of college, including studies, making new friends (and possibly falling in love), exploring the town, and working at a coffee shop. Instead of saving the world, slaying a dragon, or defeating an evil empire, the PC’s goals are are to pass their classes and keep the coffee shop open. That’s cozy fantasy.

As for how to publish, there are a lot of reasons why authors choose to pursue traditional publishing rather than self-publishing. There are a few authors who have made a good career for themselves self-publishing, but it’s very rare. Self-published authors obviously don’t get advances on royalties, and although they get higher royalty rates than traditionally published authors, that doesn’t mean much if they don’t get sales. Traditional publishers take care of things like cover art, editing, and promotion; self-published authors have to arrange all of that themselves (or it doesn’t get done at all). Traditional publishers have connections with booksellers, awards committees, film studios, etc., opening opportunities to their authors that are difficult or impossible for self-published authors to obtain. So … there’s a very good reason “why not.”

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Had much fun playtesting this tho I must disagree with the Mel romance when Rowan is right there! Very sweet and charming, with just the right stakes! Wishing it well.

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I romanced both Mel and Rowan during the beta, and I love them both so much. (I would have romanced Tomi too, but I got sick shortly before the beta closed, so I still have that to look forward to when the game comes out.) Mel is such a sweetheart, and so is Rowan under that rebellious exterior. I also really enjoyed the playthrough where I didn’t romance anyone at all and just ended up with an amazing circle of friends.

Side note: If writing doesn’t work out for Cay Macres, I hope she considers starting a fashion line. Usually it’s a little annoying to me when authors describe what every character wears, but reading this I usually just found myself thinking “Dang, I want that!” :joy:

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Hmmm… so, is there a corresponding category of YA Sci-Fi? Because I believe a story I am writing might qualify…

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Cozy sci-fi isn’t as big a thing as cozy fantasy, but it exists.

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Congrats on the launch! 400,000 words is a lot, and it’s something to be proud of! I’ll check it out :]

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Thanks for the info.

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Looks exciting. What’s the spicy level? I never know where to find that info.

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2 peppers (out of five)

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I just finished my first play through and went with Mel. I really appreciated the pacing. The “low stakes” nature of the story was actually a nice change of pace. As a relatively older guy, I found myself having to do searches on some of the clothing/appearance descriptions, but they were clearly chosen with care, and I appreciated the attention to detail. I did feel a bit bad as Ada described her status as going from “wing woman” to “third wheel”. I would have loved to have served as her “wing man” but understand that it was not really a story about her. Thanks for the story. It was a good read.

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I loved this book, I only wished that we would have had the option to have been able to romance Ada, don’t get me wrong, I loved romancing Rowan, Tomi and Mel but as great as they were, I also have that desire for the trope of best friends to lovers aspects. Other then that I loved this book/game.

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I really loved it. Please, make the second semester as a sequel. I believe the environment and the characters are perfect for storytelling. I finished the game with Tomi as LI and didn’t reveal the truth to him and things like that would be good enough for a sequel.

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That would be so awesome! Unplanned sequels are tough because they have to account for so many possible end states, which is probably why we don’t see them more often, but I could see this working well as a sequel, even if a couple of subplots have to be trimmed.

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