For Cassandra Davis, the F-word is fraternity—specifically Delta Tau Chi, a house on probation and on the verge of being banned from campus. Accused of offensive, sexist behavior, they have one year to clean up their act. For the DTC brothers, the F-word is feminist—the type of person who writes articles in the school paper about why they should lose their home.
With one shot at a scholarship to attend the university of her dreams, Cassie pitches a research project: to pledge Delta Tau Chi and provide proof of their misogynistic behavior. They’re frat boys. She knows exactly what to expect once she gets there. Exposing them should be a piece of cake.
But the boys of Delta Tau Chi have their own agenda, and fellow pledge Jordan Louis is certainly more than the tank top wearing “bro” Cassie expected to find. With her heart and her future tangled in the web of her own making, Cassie is forced to realize that the F-word might not be as simple as she thought after all.
Your first book was published a few months before you graduated college. What was it like finishing college and gearing up for the book's release at the same time, and what strategies, if any, help you find balance when things get hectic?
It was challenging, but it was also very exciting to still be at Stanford when the book came out, because I had all my college friends by my side to celebrate this milestone. That being said, I definitely had to practice time management both when I was writing Frat Girl and my second book, The Dating Game, while in college, and when preparing for the launch. One strategy I used was making sure to set aside certain times during the weeks for writing. I put it in my Google calendar and treated it like another class I had to go to. If I just waited until the end of the day to write, I might’ve watched Netflix or gone to sleep instead. But if I set aside 12:30-2:20 between classes to write, I would do it.
Sounds like a good strategy. And I love the voice in FRAT GIRL. What do you think makes a good writing voice?
I think honesty and authenticity. In my writing, I always try to reflect the way my friends and I speak. My advice is to trust yourself and try to tell it how it is—like you are talking to your best friend. I had an amazing English teacher my sophomore year of high school, Ms. Garcia. She told us that great writing expressed complex ideas in an accessible way. She advised us to aim for that, rather than making our writing needlessly complex with unnecessarily large words or ambiguous phrasing. I have tried to follow that advice in all my writing since.
Such great advice. My English teacher in high school was also a big proponent of EUW (Eliminate Unnecessary Words). Completely changed the way I wrote. You've also written pieces for the SF Gate and the Huffington Post. What do you love most about journalism work?
I love meeting new people and hearing new perspectives. Whether it be a light story about a new movie or concert or something more serious, like religion, flooding, or body image, I learn so much every time I talk to a source. It is a great privilege to get to talk to people who have direct experience with something, learn about it, and then write about it.
Indeed. What are some of your current projects?
My second book, The Dating Game, will be out March 26! It’s the story of three Warren University freshman, Sara, Robbie and Braden, who create a dating app for a class project. The app becomes wildly successful on campus and beyond and even draws the interest of investors. But as it grows the creators start to question if the platform, which ranks users by desirability, is really a good idea after all. To make matters even more complicated, they also find themselves in romantic entanglements of their own. Think The Social Network, with a romantic twist!
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