Under the Influence (with Jo Piazza) - October 13, 2026


Everything Bookish： How to Read More, Find Great Books, and Write Your Own

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54 minutes

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10,283

Sentence count

450

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4

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3

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7

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Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
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00:00:00.000 Hey all, Jo here, and you are listening to Under the Influence.
00:00:11.020 Today we are talking about one of my absolute favorite things in the entire world.
00:00:16.580 Not cheese, although we will mention cheese, but no, we're going to talk about books today.
00:00:23.360 Books. All books all the time over here, at least right now.
00:00:26.920 I am about to zoom into my thousandth book club, which is kind of a crazy number of book clubs
00:00:34.700 to just pop on into, to just pop on into someone's living room. But I love doing it. I love it. And
00:00:43.060 if y'all are reading The Parisian Heist, I am happy to just show up on your screens. I am. So
00:00:49.940 talk to your book clubs, friends. Yeah. During those book clubs, I get a lot of questions and
00:00:55.720 they're not always about the books. I get a lot of questions about just how to be a reader in the
00:01:02.180 world, how to get out of a reading slump, how to read more, where do you get your recommendations?
00:01:07.840 Is it okay to DNF to stop a book halfway through? My answer is yes. Okay, your time is freaking
00:01:12.840 valuable. You deserve that time back. If a book is not for you, you put that book down.
00:01:17.460 Also, do audiobooks count? And my answer to that is also a big hell yes. So today,
00:01:23.060 we actually have three guests on. Three guests in two sections of this podcast. My first guests
00:01:29.700 are Lauren and Gary from the Every Girl Book Club. They recently started a podcast and it's awesome.
00:01:36.940 It's one of my new favorite book podcasts. These women adore books. They adore books. You can just 1.00
00:01:43.420 tell in their conversations. They're also the best and their recommendations are really excellent.
00:01:48.660 So I brought the two of them on today because I want to give you a little taste of what they do
00:01:52.600 and I'll put a link to the Every Girl Book Club podcast in the show notes, but also because I
00:01:59.080 want to ask them how they are able to build a bookish life. Gary joins us a little late in the
00:02:05.380 call because she has a new baby. Actually, the baby's not even that new, but babies are new to
00:02:11.920 me for about three years, to be honest. Gary is going to pop on, and she had a kid thing to do,
00:02:17.520 So I think she is one of the best people to ask, wow, how do you stay a bookish person after you have kids?
00:02:24.780 Because I know it can be really tricky, and that's also one of the things I get asked all the time.
00:02:28.480 So first we're talking to Lauren and Gary, and afterwards I am bringing on my co-author, Christine Pride, to talk about our brand new book that launches today, I Never Knew You at All.
00:02:39.800 But first, here's Lauren and Gary.
00:02:42.360 Hey, Lauren.
00:02:43.740 Hi, Joe.
00:02:45.340 Hi.
00:02:45.740 It's so good to have you here.
00:02:47.520 I am calling this episode Everything Bookish.
00:02:51.460 Oh, I love that.
00:02:52.600 Right?
00:02:53.080 I mean, I thought you might.
00:02:53.960 I thought that might be in your wheelhouse a little bit.
00:02:56.700 I love that.
00:02:57.060 That can be on my gravestone, Everything Bookish.
00:02:59.080 It's the perfect, all-encompassing title.
00:03:01.360 Everything Bookish.
00:03:02.440 Exactly.
00:03:03.040 Actually, you know what?
00:03:03.740 I want that on my gravestone, too.
00:03:05.260 OK, we can have matching plots next to each other.
00:03:07.000 Oh, my god.
00:03:07.380 So cute.
00:03:08.520 I love that.
00:03:09.480 Like Theo and Vincent Fangow.
00:03:11.260 Yes.
00:03:12.400 Adorable.
00:03:13.300 So I get a lot of questions from my audience.
00:03:15.940 And I zoom into so many book clubs.
00:03:18.620 I'm about to zoom into my thousandth book club.
00:03:21.560 Oh, wow.
00:03:22.560 I know.
00:03:23.480 Have you counted every single one?
00:03:25.000 Where do you keep track of these?
00:03:26.360 I do.
00:03:26.780 I have a spreadsheet.
00:03:27.660 I have a Google spreadsheet because I'm a crazy person.
00:03:30.720 I'm very impressed with your ability to keep count.
00:03:32.220 I feel like after 10, I'd be like, I've done 100.
00:03:34.860 I've done so many.
00:03:37.020 So many.
00:03:37.880 Yeah, well, you know, in the beginning, I was keeping track because it was the pandemic.
00:03:42.860 and I wanted to make sure to like thank them and check in with them afterwards and then I just had
00:03:48.140 this spreadsheet and I was like oh well I should just I should I should keep track and yeah we're
00:03:52.100 about to hit a thousand which I think is congrats that's so exciting bananas I know it's so cool
00:03:57.080 it's so cool because my favorite part of being an author is getting to hang out with readers
00:04:01.540 and talk to readers it's just the best and I get so many questions when I'm on these calls
00:04:07.100 most of them are about my books but not all of them and I wanted to go through them today because
00:04:12.300 I feel like you're going to have some great answers for them. It's just kind of all about
00:04:16.060 creating a bookish life, right? I love that. Like, how do we do this? And one of the questions that
00:04:22.340 I get asked a lot is, how do I read more? How do I make reading more a habit and more a part of my
00:04:29.280 life? And I'm curious how you do it. How I do it, I will say we're lucky in that work means you have
00:04:35.800 to read. It's kind of a double-edged sword there. So sometimes, even if you don't want to, there's
00:04:39.860 a deadline you've got to pick a book up but I would say in terms of becoming a reader I think
00:04:46.360 the beginning is all about finding what you like to read and taking everything else out of the
00:04:50.440 equation for some people that's a book that others would say that's a one-star read that is
00:04:56.360 a popcorn thriller I would take all expectation and judgment out of what you're reading and just
00:05:02.200 read what's fun what's entertaining and as you build the habit you'll start to get tired of
00:05:08.840 tropes that are maybe repetitive you'll refine your taste and reach for books that push you out
00:05:12.940 of your comfort zone but I think building the habit is all about reading what you like so you
00:05:17.620 look forward to it so it's not I have to read 10 pages before bed it's I want to know what's
00:05:21.660 going to happen at this thriller even if it's the most predictable thing ever that I picked up at an
00:05:25.820 airport great if you're entertained by it amazing I love that I love that you know I've I've thought
00:05:31.520 a lot about that over the years because I also think that sometimes books and reading have this
00:05:36.460 kind of level of snobbery attached to them. And people are like, well, I should be reading this
00:05:41.360 kind of book. No, you shouldn't. Reading should be pleasurable. It should be enjoyable. You read
00:05:47.480 whatever you want to read and test things out. I mean, this is going to get me to one of the
00:05:52.920 soap boxes. I love a soap box. I love a soap box. And one of the hills that I'll die on, which is
00:05:59.380 it's okay to DNF. It's totally all right. But I talk to so many people, but mostly women who are
00:06:06.320 like no I feel like the gods are going to smite me I feel like it's not okay or I'll feel ashamed 1.00
00:06:12.420 and I think it's a lot easier to pick up any book and to try something new if you know that you can
00:06:19.560 bail 50 to 100 pages in do you dnf I wish I was better about dnfing my thing one I do feel like
00:06:28.260 someone's gonna come out and yell at me from under my bed or I don't know where they're hiding but
00:06:32.480 You told me this.
00:06:33.380 Yeah, someone will yell at me.
00:06:34.900 The DNF monster.
00:06:36.040 Yeah, someone's coming.
00:06:37.380 Yeah, someone's coming.
00:06:38.280 But also, I feel like there's a part of me that's always like, I've had books that, like,
00:06:43.460 for example, one of my favorite series of all time is the Neapolitan novels, My Brilliant
00:06:48.700 Friend by Elena Ferrante.
00:06:50.140 And I didn't start liking those books until the second book.
00:06:53.260 Like, if I had stopped at the first book, because it was hard to keep all the characters
00:06:56.840 straight, I would have never found what grew to become one of my favorite series ever.
00:07:01.080 so there's always this kind of devil on my shoulder like well what if it's 75% in it becomes
00:07:05.840 your favorite book that has happened literally once in my life but you never know you never know
00:07:11.660 I think that the odds say and we've talked about this before where it could like it's a maybe a
00:07:18.240 not right now book you can dnf for now it does not have to be a hard dnf forever so I think I need to
00:07:23.260 practice that more to be like okay it's not black and white it's not you're reading it or you're
00:07:26.680 not it's not right now it's you're not right now a hundred percent and I think that almost makes it
00:07:31.660 a little easier too I kind of I kind of compare it to my writing in that I I used to never want
00:07:38.400 to cut anything and I was like no this is sacred I wrote these words oh my gosh like I can't how
00:07:43.580 could I possibly cut them and now I have a slush document where I put everything that I've cut in
00:07:49.560 it I met a woman the other night Kate Neal Cooper who works for WBUR and she calls hers the compost
00:07:55.520 I love that and I'm like oh compost is good because it might turn into something else yeah
00:08:01.480 right like I was like oh I'm totally stealing that but once I created that I was like oh
00:08:07.420 okay it it's not gone forever it's just gone for now and I I feel the same way about books
00:08:15.820 there are books that I've put down and have come back to them years later and it was the right time
00:08:21.380 so maybe it's a not for me right now and maybe also I always put these back in a little free
00:08:26.480 so they can find their person and then yes at the right time it could come back to you because
00:08:31.720 books are magic like that 100 and I'm curious about your compost document have you ever been
00:08:37.020 surprised at what makes it in to an unexpected book like you wrote this for a book like the
00:08:42.660 Parisian heist and it makes its way into something completely different and you're like oh I guess
00:08:46.400 you work there this is where you belong a hundred percent like things will find their way four books
00:08:52.340 later and so I have I have my slush now compost document for each book and then I have like a
00:09:00.320 long running one which is like I transfer it in after I've I've finished and like who knows I just
00:09:06.220 made one for my new middle grade for my bone crew book and that could end up in my book about the
00:09:11.060 Baroness Schrader that comes out in two years. We don't know. Why not? Some themes are just,
00:09:17.380 they span eons when you're working with dinosaurs. They span classes. You just never know when you'll
00:09:24.360 need it from the slush pile. You never know if you're going to need it from the slush pile. So
00:09:27.720 yeah. So because I DNF, I think maybe I take more chances because I'm like, okay, it's okay. This
00:09:33.980 doesn't have to be a multi-week commitment. We can see how this goes. It's like a first date.
00:09:39.080 when I was dating, I started making like speed first dates. Okay, we are going, I'm going to
00:09:44.940 line up five of them in an afternoon, coffee, bam, bam, bam, low stress. Of course, then I
00:09:52.320 ended up meeting my husband on a boat in the Galapagos. So none of those speed days worked
00:09:56.120 out. But just to leave me cute, though, just the cutest story ever. Just the cutest meet cute of
00:10:01.340 all time, my friends. But yeah, low stakes. And then and then you can experiment. There's some
00:10:08.240 kinds of books that I thought I would not be into and then I pick them up and I'm like oh my god
00:10:13.500 you where have you been all my life friend I think as long as you keep that sense of
00:10:19.900 try anything then you're golden as a reader I think that a lot of times we get stuck in our
00:10:26.860 algorithm loops or in our genre biases and then all of a sudden you're reading the same thing
00:10:32.540 you're like all books are the same now it's like oh you're actually picking up the same book over
00:10:36.020 and over completely of your own volition so maybe expand that but i think focusing on what appeals
00:10:42.700 to you right now not being afraid to try new things and not being afraid to set things aside
00:10:46.760 you're all of a sudden reading well you'll find what you like and it'll be like watching your
00:10:51.340 favorite tv show the hbo max sunday 8 p.m slot you will look forward to it all day yes yes yes
00:10:57.300 and and yes do you carry a book with you all the time because i have one on me i have one or two
00:11:01.680 on me all the time honestly I feel like I keep my kindle in my purse most of the time so there's
00:11:09.300 always a couple downloaded on there I feel like I I'm so scheduled I'm rarely just like find myself
00:11:15.720 places with unexpected time to kill it's like if I'm leaving the house I have to be somewhere at
00:11:20.320 this time I'm coming back at this time so I would like to be more whimsical and just have a book on
00:11:24.800 me but honestly I don't do that enough like I should but yeah I love I love a pocket book I do
00:11:31.480 love a pocket book yeah and not that's not a purse but a book that's in my pocket exactly
00:11:36.280 yeah there's actually a couple of publishers right now that are making very many books
00:11:40.680 I love that I know that do fit in your back pocket I just ordered some for our bookstore
00:11:45.460 and I was like this is this is great I love this is that Jacob Elordi inspired do we think wasn't
00:11:51.920 he putting books in his back pocket, but he's like a giant man. So his pocket size is just the size
00:11:57.080 of a book. Exactly. So he has a big butt. Yeah, exactly. Like my pockets aren't fitting an
00:12:00.820 actual book. Women's pockets don't fit keys yet. I don't know where we're getting room for books. 1.00
00:12:05.080 We fit nothing. Okay. It's not fair. It's the patriarchy is what it is. Exactly. Yeah. But
00:12:11.320 maybe I could see books being the change that all of a sudden there's a study done of average
00:12:16.880 jean pocket size and it's increasing due to the pocket books out there. Due to pocket books. Well,
00:12:21.100 Alex Mill, the clothing brand, did a collaboration with Joanna Goddard and Cup of Joe at one
00:12:27.180 point for the book sweater, where it has these pockets that fit a book, and I still have
00:12:32.180 one.
00:12:32.700 Okay, I need that.
00:12:33.040 And I would like, it's, no, you know what?
00:12:35.100 I don't know if they're still making them.
00:12:36.300 We should lobby to have them come back because they are.
00:12:38.220 I'm sure I can find it on Depop, Poshmark, something.
00:12:40.600 Yeah, you can.
00:12:41.160 The book sweater.
00:12:42.280 It is bananas perfect.
00:12:44.040 And it's got two pockets.
00:12:45.220 You can put two books in there.
00:12:46.700 There you go.
00:12:47.280 You don't need a bag.
00:12:48.000 You have your pocket sweater or your book sweater.
00:12:51.100 I used it when I was postpartum I think for two of my babies and I put a bottle in one and a book
00:12:56.620 in the other and I'm like never have I felt so seen by a fashion brand. It's kind of like the adult
00:13:01.000 Snuggie like that's what they thought the Snuggie was doing but really we just needed for me it would
00:13:05.060 be like a snack in one pocket a book in another you just need one pocket for cheese yeah one pocket
00:13:11.920 for fuel one for entertainment exactly exactly all of the pockets I mean I'm such a pocket person
00:13:19.100 that I won't buy dresses without pockets anymore.
00:13:21.760 I'm like, I'm sorry, I love you,
00:13:23.580 but this relationship cannot continue.
00:13:25.580 I'm going to DNF this dress because I need a pocket.
00:13:28.800 As is your right.
00:13:29.640 I'm that way with dresses.
00:13:30.540 I always put shorts on under a dress
00:13:32.900 and it's like, just in case,
00:13:34.840 it's like, who's going to ask you to do a cartwheel?
00:13:36.600 You're not going to do a high kick at this dinner.
00:13:38.980 It's a long dress.
00:13:40.160 No one's going to see your underwear,
00:13:41.500 but I'm always like, well, just in case.
00:13:43.180 You don't know.
00:13:44.000 Apocalypse hits and I have to run like,
00:13:45.380 God forbid I'm stuck in a dress
00:13:46.660 that like I'm worried about something chilling the whole time. We've got to have shirts under here.
00:13:50.800 Yeah, you do. Yeah, you do. I love that. I love that level of preparedness, actually. Yeah. This
00:13:54.760 is why I also always have to have cheese in a book because I don't know if the apocalypse is going
00:13:58.420 to happen. Yeah, we don't know what's going to happen. I also get asked a lot where I get my
00:14:04.000 book recommendations. I get a lot from you guys. I get a lot from every girl. I get a lot from
00:14:10.780 friends and fellow authors. Where are you guys going for book racks?
00:14:14.320 I feel like these days it's honestly a lot of PR pitches so it's okay cool people in the industry
00:14:21.400 and they're working months out and just talking to book publishers and seeing what they're excited
00:14:28.240 about I get a lot of recs that way I also get a lot of recs through friends as well I feel like
00:14:34.380 it's word of mouth I want to talk about books all the time I know I know it's word of mouth and I
00:14:39.020 try I try my best to not get stuck in a social media loop of book recs I inherently do I mean
00:14:46.720 if fruit fly for example I read that book because it was all over my timeline and I loved it so
00:14:51.660 did you love it because it's all over my timeline right now too so I was about to download it I did
00:14:56.300 love it and if you like it's a very like if you like the unreliable narrator not even unreliable
00:15:02.260 kind of like unlikable main character you'll like it it's did you ever read a good person
00:15:07.640 yeah yeah it's very to me it's very similar to a good person totally okay very funny but i loved
00:15:14.220 it so i try not to be like so 100 about anything oh gary oh gary's joining us no no yeah um hold
00:15:25.260 on hold on we've got we've got gary here now lauren's co-host you've joined us see it's just
00:15:31.240 i mean you can just pop in this it's just like a ladies book chat right now exactly i'm so glad i'm
00:15:36.260 so sorry my daughter there's baby stuff happening and then yeah you never you never know I've got
00:15:43.580 a six-year-old downstairs who who's doing some throwing up so I know yeah you know she's fine
00:15:49.720 it happens and she's hanging with her grandma right now but yeah we do all the things we just
00:15:55.140 get it all done tis the season oh yeah they're just randomly throwing up and you're like that
00:16:01.460 doesn't really happen in adulthood you know it does when you become when you become a parent
00:16:06.600 then it does yes you loop back now you loop back and then it's surprising to you parenthood
00:16:14.420 yep yep and mine bled into my 20s i'm not gonna lie
00:16:17.960 there's some for sure in there yep um well this is a good point all right let's take a really
00:16:23.680 quick break and then we get when we get back uh we're we're gonna talk more um this conversation
00:16:29.000 let me fill you in, is about how to have a bookish life. I love it.
00:16:41.280 So this is the best, you actually coming late is the best lead in because one of the other
00:16:46.020 questions that I get a lot is, oh my God, I just have had kids. I don't know how to find time.
00:16:51.440 How can I still read? How can I still have a bookish life when I have these people that I
00:16:56.200 have to take care of all the time like how has the transition been for you oh gosh that is something
00:17:01.920 I had to really prioritize for myself immediately postpartum because reading has always been the way
00:17:09.020 that I relax and decompress and de-stress it's always been the thing that's always been for me
00:17:15.320 um but obviously when you have a baby it's there's so many things going on it's impossible
00:17:20.560 It took me a good few weeks to get a routine down, but then, you know, in the midst of
00:17:27.200 holding my baby while she's napping because she only wants to nap on you or nursing, I always have
00:17:33.420 my e-reader with me. I have the Kindle app on my phone. I have a book with me during those moments
00:17:39.040 when like I feel otherwise trapped with her. And as she's gotten older, it's still go, go,
00:17:46.540 go all the time and I've really learned leaned into audiobooks actually which I had never been
00:17:53.240 an audiobook listener before I get distracted too easily but now it's great because I can do it while
00:18:00.660 I'm doing chores if she's you know playing in her play area or at the park like I can have an
00:18:06.360 audiobook in and still be able to be fully engaged or at least mostly engaged with her and get my
00:18:12.600 reading time in um and then it's always always read before bed put the phone down I have my book
00:18:19.260 and that's how I I de-stress I've actually surprisingly surprisingly been able to read a
00:18:24.960 lot more I think in the past year just because I feel like it's more special to me and I know I have
00:18:33.780 to put in so much effort to to make that time so I've been able to like really utilize it and
00:18:40.620 truly just audiobooks because you're busy all the time your hands are full audiobooks audiobooks
00:18:45.780 audiobooks yeah I love that you said that because I was not an audiobook person until I had my kids
00:18:52.140 and then all of a sudden I was like oh my gosh I like this has changed everything for me because
00:18:57.940 I can multitask and I would have the audiobooks queued up when I was up in the middle of the
00:19:02.980 night breastfeeding and I didn't want to turn on a light and you know I only had one hand free
00:19:07.620 um the kindle's also great for that having it within reach right like of my like feeding station
00:19:13.500 or like wherever i'm gonna be i was pumping a lot too so i always had the kindle ready for the
00:19:19.320 pumping and but yeah the audiobooks because also the playground is so boring i hate the playground
00:19:24.620 more than any place on earth i hate it okay yeah like you also you also don't want to be on your
00:19:31.020 screen because you're that mom and so with the audiobooks with the headphones on i'm like yeah
00:19:35.660 i'm totally paying attention to everything i'm my my i'm not staring at my phone but i'm also
00:19:41.420 listening to this very spicy scene or this murder right now while all these kids are running around
00:19:48.440 and i'm getting my books in so yes audiobooks for the win i also i mean i hear from again i think
00:19:54.540 that women have so many hang-ups and guilt around reading it's like we can't dnf audiobooks aren't
00:19:58.740 really reading and i'm like no no and no you are consuming amazing stories and just you know do
00:20:05.500 what you enjoy and what works for you because life is hard and you're still you're still getting it
00:20:10.000 in yeah the audiobook conversation is always so funny to me because it's like we're in the midst
00:20:15.540 of a literacy crisis and I don't think we should be gatekeeping what reading is like if you have
00:20:20.660 time if you can only do audiobooks because you're so busy with life that like your commute and your
00:20:27.400 chore time and you're making dinner is the only time you can read then listen to the audiobooks
00:20:34.340 Who cares? Who cares? I know. We should not be gatekeeping these stories in any way, shape or
00:20:41.400 form. My audio books, I mean, my listeners are actually pretty, my listeners slash readers
00:20:45.900 are pretty well split evenly between e-hardcover and audio. And I know that's high on the audio
00:20:52.700 side, but I think it's great because I know that I have so many readers in a certain stage of life
00:20:57.480 where they're busy and I'm like, but you're still committed. You're still getting this done. And I
00:21:01.160 love you for that yeah I also think that I know back when audiobooks were books on tape growing
00:21:07.160 up we would always when we were doing a road trip with my parents it was the big thing to pick like
00:21:11.340 what book are we gonna listen to we got to get our book on tape from the library so I feel like
00:21:15.740 there is a distinct purpose audiobooks serve even in creating a bookish life for like the next
00:21:20.700 generation it's like just the idea that you want to listen to stories like you want to listen to
00:21:25.240 music it's not something associated with work or homework or something you have to do it's just
00:21:30.840 that's the same thing as picking out well now all cars have like tvs in the back so it's probably
00:21:35.320 picking out a movie which love movies too but love movies too guys i also love movies love movies too
00:21:40.200 but lauren you make such a good point audiobook becomes audiobook listening also can become like
00:21:47.340 a community experience too and it's a way to make reading something you do with other people like
00:21:53.720 my husband and i do the same thing we drive from our home in oregon to california a lot and it's
00:21:59.460 a long drive but we pick an audiobook every time and it's a way for us to like read something
00:22:03.960 together at the same time and have our own little book club in the car and it's so fun
00:22:08.260 my family always references my brothers were obsessed with the Ian Ryder books growing up
00:22:14.480 and one of my brothers swore up and down that it was Land Ryder because the font that they used the
00:22:20.200 capital I I guess he thought it was a lowercase l it shows our age and we were all sitting there
00:22:25.200 ready with the audiobook about to play the first line. It's like, welcome to Ian Ryder. We're like,
00:22:30.160 we told you. Who's Lan? And we'll always reference Lan Ryder now. We're like, yeah,
00:22:35.120 that was stupid. Why would it be a lowercase L? I love this. Who knows? You know what? Lan Ryder. 0.99
00:22:40.500 Lan Ryder. Lan Ryder. I know. He was the older brother, so it was like the one time I got to
00:22:43.980 pick on him. Oh, so good. Yeah, I think I also, I will say, you know, books are such a communal
00:22:50.080 experience. And people also say to me a lot, they're like, I don't have time for a book club.
00:22:54.920 like especially how do you schedule something I can't do it I'm like a book club does not have
00:22:58.680 to be 15 people a book club can be you and your mom a book club can be you and a friend you don't
00:23:03.840 have to meet in person you could just be texting about a book my husband and I now do a book club
00:23:07.700 together like it can be any kind of community around a book it doesn't have to look a certain
00:23:13.860 way I love that my um my husband and his two best friends from high school started a book club
00:23:21.200 but they're all busy they're also in different states and they read one book a quarter and they
00:23:26.600 take turns picking it and they get on their like they don't even like really have an official
00:23:32.220 meeting they just text about it and then they play video games and while they play video games
00:23:36.400 I hear them chit chat about the book too and then also like rib each other for not picking or being
00:23:41.400 behind or whatever yeah um nothing has ever made me so happy about the state of men right now
00:23:46.820 actually there's a good few yeah at least those four yeah those four seem like they're gonna be
00:23:55.800 all right yeah yeah okay so we just have you know a few billion to save yeah to go nbd nbd um
00:24:04.780 yeah i again i think so much of this is just you create the kind of bookish life that you want it
00:24:10.820 doesn't mean that you have to be lighting a candle and like creating the perfect cozy nook you can do
00:24:15.140 this anywhere anytime I mean it's so gross I still keep a good book in the bathroom all right
00:24:19.660 because I know that I'm gonna have some quiet time away from my kids um I also one of the things that
00:24:25.840 I do try to do as like a good habit is when I'm eating lunch I leave my desk I don't let myself
00:24:30.840 eat at my computer anymore I take a book even if I'm just moving somewhere else in the house but
00:24:36.300 I read while I'm eating if I'm eating alone I love that I need to be better about stepping away
00:24:42.380 from my desk yeah it's hard guys it's hard yeah it kind of is a lot with like the reading and the
00:24:48.180 hand movement it's like patting your head and rubbing your stomach or something sometimes i'm
00:24:51.820 like i need a youtube video for this it's just training you just have to train for it yeah um
00:24:59.040 but i also like the audiobooks because i listen when i run or when i'm on on the peloton so again
00:25:04.240 it's like i'm banging out all of the things yeah while you work out is a great one how do you i'm
00:25:09.680 always interested in the audiobooks while running because how do you pace yourself or are we not
00:25:14.040 are we not pacing i so i still use my app so i still use my because i do couch to 5k all the
00:25:22.420 time even though i've already run a 5k i like it because i'm a run walker i'm a very slow runner
00:25:27.340 um and so yeah the app just chimes in over the audiobook oh that's neat yeah cool yeah yeah yeah
00:25:33.880 I downloaded the couch to 5K multiple times.
00:25:38.300 I've never even been on one run, but I've made the step of searching it on the App Store.
00:25:42.920 That is step one, my friend.
00:25:44.660 That is step one.
00:25:45.660 Yeah.
00:25:46.140 Well, we reward ourselves.
00:25:48.320 Nick and I do mini triathlons.
00:25:50.380 They're very small.
00:25:51.060 It's like a 5K, a 10-mile ride, bike ride, and then a 500-meter swim.
00:25:55.560 But we do it in places that are beautiful and warm in the winter and that have a nice indie bookstore.
00:26:00.580 So we're going to Key West to Judy Blume's bookstore in a couple months.
00:26:05.180 So I'm going to have to go get a run in it.
00:26:06.380 That's amazing.
00:26:07.380 I know.
00:26:08.200 I know.
00:26:08.800 Yeah.
00:26:09.380 We know how to reward ourselves at this point.
00:26:13.080 That's important.
00:26:14.160 Yep.
00:26:14.600 I love that you, like, build these, like, little rituals and routines around books, too.
00:26:20.680 Like, I feel like it's a good way to, like, we're saying, like, live a more bookish life.
00:26:26.160 Yeah.
00:26:26.340 I always, I hit up, whenever I'm going somewhere, I'm looking up the independent bookstores.
00:26:31.380 I want to try to hit them all as many as I can.
00:26:35.220 And it's, I collect bookmarks from them.
00:26:38.160 It's a big part of my like traveling life as well.
00:26:41.880 Same, same.
00:26:42.520 I mean, I'm not going to any town and not finding the indie or the used bookstore there.
00:26:48.180 It's usually like an indie bookstore because I used to travel for work all the time too, right?
00:26:52.400 And so I'm like, where's the indie bookstore and where can I get an excellent burger?
00:26:56.340 yeah that's all you need that is all you need to be happy it truly truly is yeah because I was on
00:27:03.000 a campaign trail for a long time when I was a political journalist and I'm like all right this
00:27:06.460 could be exhausting and I could burn the f out or I could spend an hour in an indie bookstore every
00:27:10.100 day and I would always choose that always yes it becomes a really easy decision when you put it
00:27:16.780 like that yep yep exactly exactly I love it I love your podcast guys I'm so excited to tell
00:27:22.920 my listeners about this, because I think it's such a great place to get book rags, but then also
00:27:28.840 to just talk bookish, to listen to two women who are so committed to books and reading and having
00:27:35.880 conversations about them. How has it been going so far? Are you enjoying podcasting about books?
00:27:41.220 Well, that's so sweet, first of all. We love your podcast. This is like me and Gary's pinch
00:27:46.760 me moment, I feel like, that we're on a podcast with you. Yeah, we're the guests.
00:27:49.960 When you are our guest, too.
00:27:52.280 It's you, yeah.
00:27:53.340 But, I mean, Gary, I feel like it's literally recording what our one-on-ones were.
00:27:59.180 It really just feels like we're talking about books.
00:28:01.360 Yeah.
00:28:01.980 When we have an author on, sometimes I'm like, okay, remind yourself, this is an interview,
00:28:05.860 and you're not just, like, kiki-ing with the author.
00:28:08.440 Chit-chatting.
00:28:09.040 Yeah, I'm like, they don't want to just, like, chit-chat.
00:28:10.340 But it feels like we are.
00:28:11.660 It feels like we are.
00:28:12.740 It feels like you are when I listen, too.
00:28:14.260 That's the thing.
00:28:15.220 I know.
00:28:15.680 But that's great.
00:28:16.540 I think that's what people want.
00:28:18.440 Yeah.
00:28:18.720 I really loved it.
00:28:20.260 Like Lauren said, Lauren and I have worked together for a couple of years.
00:28:23.480 We've brought our book conversations to an official public platform.
00:28:27.900 But I think the reason it's worked so well is because it's not really different from
00:28:32.260 how we like interact and talk all the time.
00:28:35.540 Like our slacks, our text messages, our Instagrams, like they're all always been about what we're
00:28:41.700 reading.
00:28:43.360 And now we're just excited to share those conversations with everyone else.
00:28:48.280 And now we get to call that part work.
00:28:49.860 We're like, oh, that's awesome.
00:28:50.700 Yes, now we do.
00:28:52.820 I'm working.
00:28:53.680 It's like, I don't know.
00:28:54.700 It sounded like you were just talking about a book for 20 minutes.
00:28:57.300 Yeah, that's work.
00:28:58.180 That's work.
00:28:58.840 That's your work.
00:28:59.400 Same as, I mean, now that Nick and I run a company together, I'm like, we're going to
00:29:02.440 do a triathlon and then we're going to bars in Key West and that's work.
00:29:05.540 Okay.
00:29:05.860 It's work.
00:29:06.120 It's work.
00:29:06.720 It's working.
00:29:07.340 Expensive.
00:29:08.120 It's a write-off.
00:29:09.580 We're very busy talking about work.
00:29:12.300 Yeah.
00:29:13.620 Oh, I love it.
00:29:14.480 will you tell everyone where everyone can find you and find your wonderful show yes so we are
00:29:20.480 the every girl book club you can find us on instagram the every girl book club sub stack
00:29:25.360 tick tock all of the places the every girl book club and then on spotify and apple the every girl
00:29:31.480 book club podcast and we have new episodes every other wednesday brilliant thank you guys so much
00:29:38.360 trivia and on thank you for having us so much fun so much fun bye guys bye bye I love those ladies 0.65
00:29:47.140 I could listen to them talk books all day long and I do because I got them in my ears when when
00:29:53.340 I'm doing my run walking and training for my my mini triathlon that I'm gonna do in Key West
00:29:58.620 before I go try to hang out with Judy Blume next up we have a woman that I love so so much she's
00:30:05.860 been on the show before, you know her name very well. Christine Pride has been my co-author for
00:30:12.140 three books now. We have our final book out together today. I Never Knew You at All. It is
00:30:19.340 a domestic thriller-ish book club pick. It's a delight. If you are a fan of We Are Not Like Them,
00:30:27.380 our Good Morning America book club pick, you are going to love this one. And I want to bring
00:30:31.180 Christine on today just to talk a little bit about the book, but then also the process of
00:30:35.620 writing together. I also get asked a lot, should I write a book with a friend of mine? And that's
00:30:42.800 a tricky question, y'all. There's a lot that goes into writing a book. So Christine and I are going
00:30:47.300 to dig into that, as well as what we think makes a really good book club pick. And the crazier
00:30:53.900 question, what makes a book marketable?
00:31:05.620 Okay, we're back. Now I am bringing on my co-writer, my friend, my occasional soulmate,
00:31:14.560 Christine Pride, co-author of the brand new book, I Never Knew It All.
00:31:20.000 You and I have a new book out today. Could you please tell our audience what it is and what it
00:31:26.780 is all about? Absolutely. So I Never Knew It All continues our series. I would say this is our
00:31:35.040 third book that's about race and intimate relationships so in this case we have an
00:31:40.100 interracial marriage we have a black woman named simone who's married to a white man named alex
00:31:46.700 who was raised by his grandfather and as the novel opens alex is about to inherit and start running
00:31:53.600 this lucrative chain of grocery stores so everything seems to be going well for simone
00:31:59.660 and Alex and Ollie Upswing and then enter Kwame who is both a journalist investigating a story
00:32:09.220 that will hit close to home and he is Simone's ex-boyfriend from college um and the story that
00:32:17.160 Kwame is investigating is about the disappearance of a young black boy teenager uh from a prestigious
00:32:25.580 school, the Tate school, a little like five decades before. And Simulan's father-in-law,
00:32:34.300 Alex's father, may or may not have been involved in this mysterious disappearance,
00:32:40.040 and he may or may not be racially motivated. There's a lot going on there. There's a lot
00:32:44.340 going on there. And this isn't a thriller, but I think it has a lot of hallmarks of a domestic
00:32:48.860 thriller as well as a lot of good things for book clubs to be chewing on. Mainly, how well can you
00:32:56.960 know your spouse? How well can you know the person you're married to? What are the secrets we choose
00:33:02.320 to keep from each other? What are the secrets we subconsciously keep from one another? And then
00:33:07.060 what are the secrets that we keep from ourselves? What are the things we're not willing to admit to
00:33:10.920 ourselves? You and I grappled a lot with it while writing this book. We also, we have three
00:33:15.900 perspectives in this book we usually have two and two of them are men what was it like for you to
00:33:21.300 write from the male perspective it was actually it started nerve-wrackingly right because i had
00:33:29.140 never done that before right from a male's point of view i mean it helped that it was we'll still
00:33:34.200 have third person voices so there was like a tiny bit of objective narrator distance but then i i
00:33:41.340 was into it i really liked the challenge and i think as a writer we're always trying to
00:33:48.320 get into our characters heads and make them obviously three-dimensional interesting people
00:33:54.960 and that's a challenge that you rise to meaning like you don't want to just keep writing the
00:34:01.680 same characters over and over again that are exactly like you are right um and so it really
00:34:07.600 was both a like a challenge in the best possible way. Although we joked a lot at the beginning as
00:34:13.760 we started writing that you can only say like, dude, man, so much. Um, and not, I mean, we didn't
00:34:20.920 want to obviously sound like caricatures of men. Which I think is hard. I actually don't read a lot
00:34:26.140 of books written by men. And I think men, I actually do believe the majority of male authors
00:34:30.640 do not write women that well. There are some who do it beautifully, but not a lot. And, but then
00:34:36.000 it was indeed challenging for me to write, to be inside a man's head, to try to have that distance
00:34:42.120 and also that closeness, and then not to let it fall into a caricature, right? So it was a new
00:34:51.720 challenge. It was a very new challenge. I don't know if I'll do it again. Can I add to that? I do
00:34:55.960 think it's a new challenge, and it's so funny, the intersections of these two things, because 0.90
00:35:00.320 i think there's a race component here too right totally that obviously a black man is going to
00:35:09.400 think differently sound differently you know everything than a white man so i'm i felt more
00:35:14.860 comfortable writing kwami because i know intimately you know and i've had many more conversations with
00:35:23.120 black men than white men you know just the way life shakes out um and so that that uh familiarity
00:35:32.080 helped uh in a way that i i didn't have it as much obviously with with writing a white man
00:35:39.780 yeah i actually i i there were times when i was like i may i i maybe i shouldn't be in this black 0.51
00:35:47.160 man's brain at all and it's i'm i'm very happy we're writing this book together because then
00:35:51.700 we're also writing from the perspective of a white man in present day and then we have another
00:35:57.540 character we're not it's not his perspective per se but a white man in his 80s and then on another
00:36:04.500 black man in his 80s and then we were doing a lot of stuff that i think we hadn't done before
00:36:08.060 i think i also think that i never knew you at all was maybe do you think it was the easiest
00:36:14.960 collaboration that we've had maybe because i've like you just get into like we were in a flow
00:36:20.960 by the time we got to book three meaning we'd worked out a lot of the kinks well we knew how
00:36:28.380 to work we know how to work together matter what the subject matter was in other words right it's
00:36:32.640 just more like the kinks had been worked out that made it easier as opposed to the story itself i
00:36:37.040 don't know yeah yeah well we get asked a lot how do you write together and at book events everyone
00:36:42.760 is always like i want to write a book with my best friend or my husband should i and most of the time
00:36:47.600 I'm like no no you shouldn't it's hot because it's hard I think it's a really hard thing I love
00:36:53.580 doing it with you but I think that it can definitely be a test of a friendship and a
00:36:58.500 relationship and people often think it's going to be all fun and games even fun and games aren't
00:37:03.920 fun and games anymore even fun and games aren't fun and games anymore exactly well we sometimes
00:37:10.180 talk about that it was um that we were like a little bit naive i think even going into we are
00:37:19.340 not like them which was five years ago came out so you know seven and a half eight years ago when
00:37:25.500 we started rating which is crazy um we were a little naive going into it for better or worse
00:37:31.240 like if we had known more we might have been more reticent about it but we were sort of like
00:37:36.680 with this you know and then i think i speak for both of us but tell me if you feel differently
00:37:41.820 that we were both a little bit caught off guard by you know how hard it ended up being i mean
00:37:48.780 probably like the way they say motherhood is so hard or marriage is hard and you're like no but
00:37:53.560 i'm like so in love you know how hard can it be and then you hit the inevitable bumps in the road
00:37:58.440 and you're like oh this is what they were talking about this oh yeah well because relationships are
00:38:03.680 hard. Right. I think that writing is also so subjective. And so you could love a sentence
00:38:10.060 for no reason whatsoever. And you could hate a sentence for no reason whatsoever. And those
00:38:16.020 are not always the same sentences for each of us. Right. And so I think we had to learn early on to
00:38:22.320 communicate like almost the way that you would in a marriage to be like, OK, I'm cutting this
00:38:27.340 because this, this and this. And then having to defend something can also be exhausting. Right.
00:38:31.840 to be like but i love this because of this this and this uh and so i just i want people to go into
00:38:37.760 the writing process together with eyes wide open i think it can be beautiful i also think that
00:38:41.880 sometimes it's easier if each person picks a character and they they have like ownership
00:38:46.540 over their own character i know that jody and jenny did that for mad honey and sometimes that's
00:38:52.860 a little bit easier because you're not both writing all of the things and trying to make
00:38:57.240 your writing styles mesh except that I mean I agree with that but one of the things that we
00:39:02.600 are really trying to do is make sure for all three books they were coherent right totally
00:39:08.740 exactly don't ever want to read a book that you feel like is is almost like Frankenstein together
00:39:14.180 in some way where you know it's so obvious that two people wrote it um and so that like seamless
00:39:19.480 blend was really important to us too yeah yeah so can I go back to characters for one yeah you can
00:39:26.500 Yeah, please, please do.
00:39:28.040 I do think this is a good PSA and maybe I'm putting on my editor hat here a little bit.
00:39:33.200 But, you know, I get asked by a lot of people as a coach and editor or whatever, you know, like whose voice am I allowed to write in?
00:39:41.780 And we were so what I tell people is, why are you doing it?
00:39:46.740 You know, really ask yourself and, you know, have you are you prepared for the challenge of and do you respect the challenge of it?
00:39:55.660 And that's what I meant by us having all those conversations about really taking it seriously that we were going to, you know, take a lot of care in writing as a white man or as a black man for the two of us.
00:40:09.940 And so I really want to make sure that people know that we weren't blight about that, because if a white man, for example, came to me and said, oh, I want to write a book, you know, from the point of view of this black woman, you know, I'd have some questions about that.
00:40:23.260 I think you'd be like, well, I need to know a lot more. 0.84
00:40:27.220 How are you going to pull it off and do not want to be black women, et cetera, et cetera. 1.00
00:40:30.840 So it's not a definitive yes or no for me for people when people ask me for that advice. 0.96
00:40:38.520 But it really is about interrogating why you want to do it and how the lengths that you're going to go to to get it right and to be respectful of that.
00:40:47.900 So that's my character POV.
00:40:51.500 Yeah.
00:40:52.340 Love that.
00:40:52.740 Love that. All right. Let's let's take a quick break. And when we get back, I do want to dive
00:40:57.860 into a little bit about your editing and book coaching, because I know that we have a lot of
00:41:02.960 aspiring authors that listen to this podcast that would just love to hear some tips from you.
00:41:15.120 OK, we are back. The number one question I get asked all the time when I'm on my own at book
00:41:20.380 events is how do I start writing a book? And for me, I say you get your butt in the chair and you 0.95
00:41:25.140 write a certain number of words every day and you keep going because writing is a muscle. But I'm 0.84
00:41:30.160 curious what your advice is for that. It's very similar. I mean, it's funny because when we were
00:41:36.440 on tour and we're doing a lot of press events where we are not like them, I don't know if you
00:41:41.340 remember this, where a lot of times people would ask me like what was surprising about becoming
00:41:46.960 a writer after being an editor for, you know, working in-house for 20 years and making this
00:41:52.320 transition. And I'd always say, which sounds like a joke, but I was being very serious, is
00:41:56.900 like, I was shocked by how hard it is to write a book. The discipline involved, the emotional
00:42:03.060 tenacity, the, like, it's just a very, very, very difficult endeavor, which made me respect
00:42:10.860 writers and the process of writing even more and the discipline that it takes. And so that would be
00:42:18.920 my advice too, that you just have to do it. There's no way to get to the goal that you want
00:42:27.400 without having to somehow amass 70,000 to 100,000 words on the page. And my other bit of advice
00:42:36.040 along those lines is you can't not show people your work, right? Like that is such a vulnerable
00:42:42.460 process. But the only way you get better at your work is to have an editor or a beta reader or
00:42:51.260 your book group or your writing group, whoever it is. But you really have to, you can't leave a
00:42:59.820 novel in a drawer forever. In other words, like you really have to, nor should you go straight
00:43:05.220 to an agent without any feedback, straight querying. So you really have to have the vulnerability for
00:43:12.120 that interim step to get real, honest feedback. Talk to me a little bit about what questions do
00:43:17.760 you get asked the most as an editor? Oh, that's a really good question. Does this book work?
00:43:23.940 Is it going to sell? Is this book good? People are really obviously eager to get feedback both
00:43:32.920 about the content of the book but also just professional reactions you know people almost
00:43:37.700 want to grade for their drafts and I also get asked a lot like is this ready meaning am I ready
00:43:44.080 to query am I ready to go to agents with it and the answer to that is obviously so dependent on
00:43:49.120 the project and I always say you know every book I pretty much believe can get there
00:43:58.160 it's just a matter of how much the author is willing to put it right some books start a little
00:44:04.120 farther along the spectrum rawness wise and just have more of a ways to go to get to something that
00:44:10.160 editors and agents would deem publishable um and so it just really to our full circle to our
00:44:17.620 conversation about hard work a lot of it is is is how bad you want to invest in this draft in this
00:44:25.840 process um which is not easy it's round after round after round but then there's also is this
00:44:31.940 a marketable idea and that that's both subjective but i got paid to to decide if this was a
00:44:41.360 marketable idea or not right like are readers going to be interested uh in this idea and so
00:44:47.640 that's a big that's a big factor too well i think that's really interesting right like
00:44:53.420 What does marketable mean in the publishing industry?
00:44:58.280 Yeah, it's the big question.
00:45:02.520 And I always remind people that publishing is a business.
00:45:06.460 And I did not create post-capitalist, you know, post-capitalist notion.
00:45:13.460 But these are the waters that we all swim in.
00:45:16.020 And publishing is a part of that.
00:45:17.680 Meaning publishing houses are global conglomerates who operate with shareholders and bottom lines.
00:45:23.420 and need to make money. And so there is this idea that or inherent tension, right, between
00:45:30.200 this is art, it's subjective, we want to give voice to people, we want to change lives, touch
00:45:37.840 readers, et cetera, et cetera. And all of that over here is really important. But also the bottom
00:45:43.580 line is actually really important, right? If the publishing industry is going to keep on existing
00:45:49.540 and paying editors and paying authors, frankly, right? That said, it is subjective what will
00:45:58.720 sell. But as editors, the job is to figure out what has mass, mass appeal. And I think that's
00:46:07.160 something that people can sometimes underestimate is that we are not in the business, at least at
00:46:13.800 the big five. We are not in the business of reaching 1,000 readers or 5,000 readers, right?
00:46:21.200 The premise has to really be based or predicated on this idea that we can reach hundreds of
00:46:26.620 thousands of people. Is every book going to do that? Of course not. But you have to feel like
00:46:32.060 you have a path to that. And that does mean, to some degree, what is going to appeal to the
00:46:39.260 widest possible denominator. And then, of course, you get into questions about then who is in that
00:46:44.780 widest possible denominator, right? Then who is the audience for books that are going to sell
00:46:51.100 what we hope are, you know, we were talking about lessons in chemistry, right? Or, you know,
00:46:57.360 yesteryear or strangers or, you know, just think Theo of Golden. I mean, I'm thinking of books,
00:47:04.080 just recent books that have been such sales blockbusters um you know identifying what is
00:47:11.060 marketable about those stories and why they will work is part of the job right but they won't those
00:47:16.420 stories won't necessarily work again and so i think for sure that's the really interesting thing
00:47:21.820 here right because it does take so long to publish a book and so all of a sudden now we're seeing
00:47:26.480 kind of a spate of new trad wife books and i'm like i don't i don't know if more are going to
00:47:30.660 work or if it's you know lightning in a bottle uh i do because because i know that the writing life
00:47:37.200 and the you know path to being an author is littered with so many rejections i like to talk
00:47:41.200 about mine so many editors turned down sicilian inheritance saying it wasn't marketable that made
00:47:46.800 no sense to me there's so many italian americans people love reading about italy and that book has
00:47:51.020 sold more than 150 000 copies so i think that yes editors are looking for something marketable
00:47:58.800 and the idea of what's marketable is really hard to pin down.
00:48:03.360 Yes, but I would argue then that is still a success story
00:48:06.420 because you got an editor to believe in it and publish it, right?
00:48:11.260 So that is not actually a combination.
00:48:13.160 If you had told the story a different way and it said everybody rejected it,
00:48:16.880 I ended up self-publishing it, and, you know, this is what happened,
00:48:21.680 that's a very different trajectory.
00:48:23.560 But not all editors are going to fall for a book, right?
00:48:27.980 Some of that is subjective, but there's a lot of different factors that go into an editor potentially passing on a project. But I would argue that publishing as a whole, meaning you have one editor, right, who believed in a book and made it work, right? So that is actually how the business works. That is a success story, right?
00:48:46.480 That's not an anomaly. You don't necessarily have to have this, I don't know, dream but almost fantasy scenario where every book is a seven-way auction, right? And everybody wants it and there's this like group think around it. That's not, I mean, certainly that happens. But that's not, that's the exception rather than the rule. You just need one editor to believe in a book.
00:49:11.820 It's true. It's true. And Maya did. And Maya is great. And I want to write books with her and Dutton until the end of time. And they're great. They're wildly supportive. I do find publishing such a fascinating industry. I want to write books forever. And, you know, so much goes into being able to do that. There's so much hustle. I mean, I think my audience is also like exhausted from me being like, order, pre-order, do this. But I do want to get, you know, good books into people's hands.
00:49:36.780 one thing that does tend to make a book marketable is the fact that you know if it's book club
00:49:42.600 fiction i think any book can be good for a book club to be honest but i do think that the three
00:49:48.380 that we've written which kind of feel like a series uh work really well in book clubs because
00:49:53.700 our readers can use our characters as proxies to have these hard conversations often about race
00:50:00.120 social justice how how these things present in intimate relationships uh without having to feel
00:50:07.880 like they're burying their own souls even though they eventually do right yeah no i mean i think
00:50:14.280 book club fiction you know to the degree that and i always tell readers like not to get so caught up
00:50:20.020 or writers not to get so caught up in these upmarket commercial crossover book club i mean
00:50:26.080 Now, all of these are kind of arbitrary designations, but if we're just talking about the type of book that a book club would want to pick up, the general profile of that book is that there's a lot to talk about in that book, right?
00:50:40.200 It's less about it just being inherently entertaining as a solo read, which many books are, but that they have these threads that inspire questions and conversation and to some degree as, you know, I would always think about it as an editor.
00:50:54.680 And I know you think about it as a writer, too. You engineer those things as part of the story, right? Like you want to give readers different juicy, meaty topics to talk about throughout a book. Because to me, the beautiful part about writing is building community, right?
00:51:15.640 I want people to read and discuss in community. And that's not a knock on any of the escapist reads or any, you know, any books that people just want to, you know, read on their own. But I like books that spark those kind of conversations. And so it's really been a gift that our books have resonated with readers in that way that we get to go to so many book clubs and participate in these conversations, which to me is kind of the best part of the job.
00:51:44.240 So this is a lesson I had to learn as an editor. And I think it's a lesson that, you know, I'm learning as a writer, too, which is a different I mean, it's like a different career. So it's a different evolution. But that's you can only control so much, right?
00:52:02.420 There are plenty of smart, talented, wildly savvy authors and books out there that do not get the attention they need and deserve.
00:52:15.940 And, you know, there's only so much we can control on, you know, in any point in the process.
00:52:23.720 and part of my mission in life both personally and professionally these days if we're going to
00:52:32.080 get personal uh and why not is to i really accept that i might drop my friend right like i never
00:52:40.160 knew at all there are many parts of life and other people but i never knew you at all he's
00:52:46.680 publishing
00:52:47.180 I'm so excited
00:52:48.460 for everyone to pick it up
00:52:49.460 and we will see you
00:52:51.460 on a Zoom
00:52:52.180 in person
00:52:53.180 at a bookstore
00:52:54.580 all of the places
00:52:55.520 I don't know that it helps
00:52:55.540 but it's really
00:52:56.280 go out
00:52:56.960 grab a coffee
00:52:57.560 tell a friend
00:52:58.140 you cannot
00:52:58.960 maintain that illusion
00:53:00.520 of control
00:53:01.240 for that white knuckle 0.99
00:53:03.500 grip on it
00:53:04.180 and so it's liberating
00:53:06.080 to let it go
00:53:06.680 we did
00:53:07.280 we did
00:53:07.800 it's a lot of talking
00:53:08.500 a lot of talking today
00:53:09.300 always a pleasure
00:53:15.220 lfg lfg
00:53:21.180 thank you for having me it's really fun we did kind of a crossover event with our
00:53:39.920 two interviews so this has been really and well our yeah or so of conversation i'm by always a
00:53:48.280 pleasure and i'm really excited to do this with you and let's go one one week to go i as you're
00:53:55.640 talking but when people are seeing this books will be in stores and that's always really exciting and
00:54:02.320 so i want to thank everybody in your community uh for their support
00:54:06.460 Thank you.