Quiara Alegría Hudes is a writer whose works include the book of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Tony Award–winning musical In the Heights and the Pulitzer Prize–winning play Water by the Spoonful. Her fiction debut, The White Hot (One World/Random House, November 11), is equally impressive—a “staggering gut punch of a novel,” according to a starred review from Kirkus. Hudes answered our questions via email.

Tell readers, briefly, about your book.

It’s the story of April Soto, a young woman in Philly, and how her white-hot rage ping-pongs against her playful spiritual curiosity. The book stems from my jealousy of the Buddha. He abandoned his family obligations to find the meaning of life. My jealousy of Don Draper from Mad Men. How breezily he left the domicile. I wanted to give a woman—a mother—such f*ck-all freedom. Her journey comes at a steep cost, and the book asks: Was it worth it?

I’m not trying to be salacious, though. The book is steeped in love.

What inspired you during the writing of The White Hot?

The Autobiography of My Mother by Jamaica Kincaid. The Door by Magda Szabó. Sula by Toni Morrison. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. Bad Girls by Camila Sosa Villada. Forbidden Notebook by Alba de Céspedes. Happening by Annie Ernaux. The Days of Abandonment by Elena Ferrante. I came out of that short stack as if tempered by fire, still me at the core but strengthened. Perhaps less likeable, definitely less permission-seeking. I suspect more honest.

Where and when did you write the book? Describe the scene, the time of day, the necessary accoutrements or talismans.

My writing studio has an old purple rug worn down to holes—salvaged from my childhood bedroom. My chair was a curbside trash find, an old wooden schoolhouse swiveler. The desk is luscious and small, hand-carved by my father.

There are plants propagated from my family’s farm in Puerto Rico. A cutting from my friend Amy Herzog.

My friend Vanessa gifted me the central tool of my writing life, a huge blue pinboard where I arrange scraps and ideas into some semblance of order.

What was most challenging about writing this book? And most rewarding?

I wrote it at a time of family crisis when I was essentially not functional. Things like washing a coffee cup or brushing my teeth became dissociative and alien tasks. But I discovered a heightened ability to read. A maintained ability to write. So this book, and the ones I read while writing it, saved my life. I still had a self.

What fall releases are you most eager to get your hands on?

Allen Iverson’s memoir, Misunderstood, comes out in October. I’ve read an advanced copy and it’s a jaw-dropper, an American story that pulls no punches. AI was a one-in-a-billion talent, dripping style head to toe, but he took so much heat for wearing braids, for having tattoos, for bringing his home friends along for the ride. Stuff that is commonplace now. He was wrongly imprisoned his senior year of high school. My husband, Ray Beauchamp, co-wrote the memoir with Iverson, and I got to read chapters in real time, as they were written. It was the first serialized read of my life, and I could hardly wait for the next installment.

Also out in October is Jaquira Díaz’s This Is the Only Kingdom, a very important addition to the Boricua diaspora library.

Nina Palattella is the senior editorial assistant.