Maggie Tokuda-Hall Books In Order

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Children's Books

Publication Order of Graphic Novels

Publication Order of Anthologies

Maggie Tokuda-Hall
Maggie has an MFA in Writing from University of San Francisco and a BA in Studio from Scripps College.

Maggie’s writing for adults can be found in her column for Catapult Magazine (Fear and Loathing in Utero), and her fiction in Joyland Magazine, Columbia Journal for Literature and the Arts, and The Rumpus.

She lives with her son, husband, and objectively perfect dog.

When Maggie was very small, her favorite book was “Maggie and the Monster” by Elizabeth Winthrop and illustrated by Tomie dePaola. Then it was anything Calvin and Hobbes. After that there was “Eating Ice Cream with a Werewolf”. Then any of the “Goosebumps” book, before she got into the “Fear Street” series. Then she liked the “Enchanted Forest Chronicles” and “Stardust” a lot. In high school, she liked “Slaughterhouse-Five”.

She never hid any books from her parents because she would just steal spicy books from her big sister and if they got left out her parents would probably only assume that she left them around. A win-win for Maggie. They weren’t aware that she was reading a sexually explicit graphic novel set in a harem, and also believed her sister was the one actually leaving the clutter around.

“Slaughterhouse Five” made Maggie want to be a writer. “The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing” made her want to write for teens. “Calvin and Hobbes” taught her the line between cruelty and mischief. While “I Want My Hat Back” made her want to write picture books. And “The Enchanted Forest Chronicles” made her a reader of fantasy.

She wrote “The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea” with a particular reader in mind, a girl named Clare that Maggie met while she was a bookseller when Clare was only nine. She loved sci fi and epic fantasy books, and they would talk extensively about how hetero these books all were. Maggie included all the things Clare liked the most: rules, magic, and mayhem, as well as what she was missing, which was a queer love story just as all encompassing and grand as all of the straight ones that she had read already.

Maggie began tutoring the girl in creative writing not too long after, and the two developed a wonderful friendship that has been quite meaningful to Maggie. The young girl is very smart and talented, and Maggie eagerly waited for the moment for Clare to read this book, as she held out on passing it to her until it is a finished copy, like some jerk.

Eveylyn, Alfie, and Flora all have traits stolen from a lot of people, things she has seen her friends go through, and feelings that she has had herself. However Rake is a tribute to her husband. He is deeply practical however and decidedly less cut-throat, and a lot more affectionate. Rake is like Adam if Adam wasn’t able to talk about his feelings. There are some things in there that are just private jokes only for him. Their physicality is entirely different though.

The book went through a lot of iterations. The first stab she took at the novel was a very British sounding, “Treasure Island” sort of thing. One version had Evelyn getting kidnapped by some mermaids in the first act. Xenobia is one of the few characters that has stayed pretty much the same the whole way through. Even Rake, as she began writing the novel before she even started dating her husband. Previously, the guy was a lot more of a jerk.

Maggie finds that writing a novel is more of a marathon than a sprint, so it required her to have daily discipline which her husband helped her develop. But the craft goals are still the same. In this way, a picture book is much harder since it must do all the work of a novel in just five hundred to fifteen hundred words. There were certainly times when she would get nostalgic for writing picture books, however these days were fleeting.

“Also an Octopus” won a Parent’s Choice Gold Award: Picture Books in the year 2017.

Maggie’s debut novel, called “The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea”, was released in the year 2020.

“Also an Octopus” is the first stand alone book and was released in the year 2016. Even the most incredibly awesome tale begins with just a bit of nothing. What happens next is up to the reader!

It starts with an octopus that plays the ukulele. Since this is a story, the octopus must want something. Possibly to journey to faraway galaxies in an incredibly awesome purple spaceship. Then the octopus sets off to build a spaceship out of glue, soda cans, waffles, glitter, and umbrellas.

OK, possibly the octopus may need a bit of help. Like from some adorable bunny buddy, and possibly that bunny is a rocket scientist? Probably not. But could something much more amazing come to pass?

“The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea” is the second stand alone novel and was released in the year 2020. In a world threaded with magic and divided by colonialism, one desperate orphan turned pirate and one rebellious imperial lady find a connection out on the high seas.

The pirate Florian, who was born Flora, has always done whatever she had to in order to survive, including sailing under false flag as a marauder, thief, and worse on the Dove. A highborn Imperial daughter (named Lady Evelyn Hasegawa) is on board too, accompanied by her own coffin. However Evelyn’s one-way voyage to this arranged marriage in the Floating Islands gets interrupted when the crew and captain show their true colors and enslave their wealthy passengers.

However Evelyn and Florian have always lived their lives by the rules, and the whims, of other people. Yet when they fall in love with each other, they decide they will take fate into their own hands, no matter what the cost is.

Filled with double agents, stolen memories, illicit mermaid’s blood, and haunting mythical creatures. All in this story about a couple trying to stay together in the face of myriad forces wishing they were able to control their destinies and identities.