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We are delighted that Alisha Fernandez Miranda made time to chat with us about her debut novel Someone’s Gotta Give, on sale August 5th.
Ingram Library Services: Can you give us the elevator pitch for your book?
Alisha Fernandez Miranda: Crumbling under the pressure of new motherhood and expat life in London, people-pleasing do-gooder Lucia gets a dream job advising the rich and powerful on their philanthropy. As she dives deeper into the excess of extraordinary wealth, she must find the difference between meaning well and doing good before losing herself in the process.
ILS: Over the last five years we’ve seen a surge in stories critiquing the grotesquerie of the ultrarich—books like Crazy Rich Asians and television shows like Succession and The White Lotus. How did your experience working in philanthropy inform the story?
AFM: I started working in philanthropy in 2005 and have operated from a range of different perspectives—I’ve been a fundraiser and a donor, advised tiny nonprofits and huge foundations, worked with royals, celebs, and everyone else. So while “rich people behaving badly” is among my favorite genres of popular culture to consume, I like to hope that Someone’s Gotta Give offers a more nuanced look at this world.
Philanthropy can often afford us the chance to see the best of the human spirit: generosity, love for your fellow humans, and a deep commitment to address injustice. At the same time, giving at this level can be full of contradictions. I have heard private jet owners passionately advocate for solutions to end climate change and attended fascinating talks about poverty followed by champagne receptions.
In 20+ years in this field, I’ve learned that most people mean well, but that doesn't always translate to doing good, which is a big theme in this story. And one I wanted to explore through fiction—definitely fiction, I assure you!—although I’d be lying if I said that many of Lucia’s thoughts, opinions and feelings weren't in some ways similar to my own.
ILS: This is your debut novel, but you published a memoir in 2023. Was it freeing, or scary, to write fiction?
AFM: It was both! When I read for pleasure, I mostly read fiction, and I have a deep and lifelong love for a funny, romantic, transporting novel. So the task of writing something similar to the types of books I like to read was completely daunting. Translating my own voice from my own head onto the page, like I did for My What If Year, felt very natural; but making up a story, and letting someone else’s voice exist in my head, was much harder than I expected. At every point I questioned my ability to actually do it, even after it was done.
At the same time, it was entirely freeing to write about this professional world I know so intimately as fiction. I got to know my characters, especially Lucia, and I was able to lean into the fun, the joy, and the humor of the universe they occupy, and reflect critically in a way I’d never have been able to do in memoir. Fiction allowed me to play with these experiences in a creative way, untethered from the constraints of reality.
ILS: Both your novel and your memoir look at the relationship between privilege and work—what work gives you access to, and what it doesn’t. How has becoming a writer informed how you think about this dynamic?
AFM: My father was a refugee from Cuba and, in many ways, he exemplified for me how work was a key to accessing privilege and social mobility. I watched this unfold in real-time during my childhood—as my dad ascended in his career, we moved to a nicer neighborhood, better schools, a bigger house. Then I went to Harvard and experienced a whole new layer of privilege that I didn’t even know existed; again, when I started working in philanthropy the same thing happened.
From day one, I was conscious that I came from a different world than my clients. I like to think that I have always thought critically about privilege in my work to some degree, but having to write about it—both in My What If Year and now Someone’s Gotta Give—has enabled me to reflect on it in ways that are both intensely personal and detached. When I wrote my memoir, it forced me, the writer, to ask some of these questions of myself, the narrator. And again, when writing Lucia’s journey, I had to get under the skin of this question of privilege to make her character real and authentic.
I think writing affords the ultimate insider-outsider perspective -- that in and of itself is a huge privilege!
ILS: What do you hope readers take away from this story?
AFM: I want this story to be an escape and entertainment for my readers, but also one that makes them think about what it really means to do good for others. This is such a personal story; Lucia isn’t me, but she and I share many feelings and emotions about new motherhood, being a fish out of water in the UK and the occasional too-crazy-to-be-true experience in the wild world of high-end philanthropy. I want them to enjoy my London, as well as the London of the uber-rich, and the London of those who struggle the most. I want them to love and treasure Lucia like I do, and ultimately have a great time doing it.
ILS: What’s the best book you’ve read recently?
AFM: In the spirit of Lucia and Sooz’s favorite author, Tilly Willington, I’ve been diving into new and old romances like Jilly Cooper’s Rivals and Elsie Silver’s Heartless, clutching my metaphoric pearls the entire time. But for pure pleasure, I absolutely loved The Wedding People by Alison Espach.
ILS: What’s next?
AFM: I remain obsessed with writing about women of a certain age—my age!—motherhood in all its beautiful, challenging and comical forms. I’m working on a novel about a CEO and mother of teenage twins that gently pokes fun at the self-care and well-being industry, and also lets me explore a little bit of my love for speculative fiction! And I think I want to write another memoir down the line as well, but I need to live a bit more first.
ILS: Can you share a favorite memory of the library?
AFM: It’s so hard to pick just one—libraries have been an integral part of every stage of my life from childhood to now. I spend twice a week writing from the National Library of Scotland’s reading room where they keep the most precious and rare books in their collection. A couple of years ago, while researching a piece about Jacobite heroine Flora Macdonald, the librarian found me a copy of her “autobiography,” written by her granddaughter in 1870. To my surprise, it was an original. The pages were so thin you could see through them. It was incredible just to sit there and read it; I felt like I was time traveling.
