Podcast appearances and mentions of max cohen

In a bonus #amwriting podcast episode, host Jennie Nash talks with academic writing coach Kathy Mazak of Scholar's Voice (and host of Academic Writing Amplified) about how writers keep going after completing a blueprint and finish what they start. Mazak explains her mission-based work helping academics—especially women and non-binary scholars—publish their research by aligning time management and writing with an academic mission statement. She argues that big blocks of time are unrealistic and that one to two hours once or twice a week can be enough if protected and supported by project management systems. They discuss common obstacles like not honoring writing time, fear of disappointing oneself, and harsh peer review, and emphasize mindset work as at least half the solution. Mazak describes managing multiple projects by focusing on a top three, letting others “sleep,” and “killing” stalled “zombie projects,” plus recognizing stage transitions and solving the right problem at the right level. She shares details on her 12-week Navigate program (scholarsvoice.org/navigate) and why members stay for years.#AmWriting is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Learn more at http://scholarsvoice.org/.TranscriptJennie: [00:00:00] Hi, I'm Jennie Nash, and you're listening to the #amwriting podcast, the place where we help writers of all kinds play big in your writing life, love the process, and stick with it long enough to finish what matters most. Hey everyone, it's Jennie, and I'm here with a bonus episode of the podcast because a lot of our community has been working on their blueprints this summer to begin a new project, find momentum for one that's gotten derailed, or to work on a revision.And obviously stopping to think before you write is critical, but then the question is, what next? And how, how do we keep going? How do we finish what we started? And I invited my friend Kathy Mazak to join me today to have a conversation about this and to get her insights on this topic. Kathy, we're in a business mastermind together.That's how we met, [00:01:00] and we, um, immediately connected because Kathy runs a company called Scholar's Voice, which you can find at scholarsvoice.com. She has an incredible strategic mind, and her work focuses on helping tenured professors get their research and writing out of the endless backlog and actually submitted and published.So it's a different kind of writing than we normally talk about on the podcast, but I know we have a lot of a- academics in our audience, um, who are trying to write nonfiction or fiction or memoir, but also probably trying to publish the papers that are sitting on their desk. And Kathy helps so many people do that work and do it well, and she has really Amazing systems for doing that.And so she's gonna talk a little bit about her program and what she offers at the end, um, or maybe at the beginning too. But, [00:02:00] um, welcome Cathy.Cathy: Yay. Thank you so much for having me. So I know that we met in the business mastermind, but I've been following you for many years before that, and been listening to this podcast, and been subscribed to this podcast for, like, at least since 2019 when I started to, like, look at other writing podcasts.Jennie: Yeah.Cathy: And so it is ... It actually has been, like, a dream of mine to be on this podcast, so it's, like, so- Look at us ... great that we're doing this here today. Yes.Jennie: I completely forgot to say that you have a podcast as well. What is, what is the name of that?Cathy: Yeah. The podcast is called Academic Writing Amplified.It has, like, we're headed towards 350 episodes all about, like, getting your, uh, academic papers out there in the world when you're a busy professor. So yeah.Jennie: One of the things that I most like about your business is the way you describe it as it's really mission based. Yeah. It's, it's [00:03:00] really about helping academics take control of the narrative.Yeah. Right? Do you- Yeah ... do, will you tell us about that, ‘cause I love that.Cathy: Yeah. So for me, right, like, as a writing coach, so I was a full professor, like I went through, I have a PhD. I, I, I got my tenure track job. I went all the way through all the ranks, um, before I left and started this, uh, academic adjacent business.But I do it because, like, my big, like, mission is that the more, especially women and non-binary academics who get their papers out in the world, like, the more those voices are changing fields, and influencing research, and influencing thinking. And I just think, like, that is just so important. That's why the business is called Scholar's Voice, ‘cause it's about getting more diverse, typically marginalized voices out in these research spaces.Um, so [00:04:00] to me that's my mission, and when I have ... You know, when, when scholars come and do my program they write an academic mission statement, and really their whole time management, um, and writing project management, and sustainable writing practice is designed to, like, support that academic mission. So it's a very mission based, uh, business for me.But it's also, like, a, like my clients, like w- who take my programs are also, like, putting their academic missions, like, right at the center of their work. Which also puts writing at the center. Because to me, like, the writing is absolutely, is, is, like, the path to creating this better career, this focus on writing.Jennie: Well, and an academic has courses to teach and committees to go to, meetings to go to, and, you know, so many other demands on their time. And somebody trying to write a book has- Yep ... not [00:05:00] exactly those things, but probably a day job, and kids, and, you know, aging parents they have to care for, and the dog, and the car, and, you know, it's, it's writing in, in the real world.Mm-hmm. And the way you set your program up is you've honed this over so many years, i- and it's designed to, to help people actually get the work done. Yeah. So can you tell us a bit about how you structure that program? ‘Cause I think it'll be instructive to helping folks. Like, okay, here, you've finished your blueprint, now what?So- Yeah ... how do you, how do you get people to do it?Cathy: Yeah, yeah. So the first part is that I think that many people, when they think about writers, right, like if they just imagine themselves as a writer, they think that the ideal is, oh, I have like eight hours a day to dedicate to writing, or all my life, or whatever, you know, dreamy scenario we have in our minds.And I [00:06:00] think, like, for academics, i- the, the... it's like, oh, I need to be on a sabbatical, or I need to not be teaching. I need to... I cannot be doing any other thing. Um, or I can be doing other things, but I need like these big blocks of time to write. And the problem is, like you're saying, like writing in real life, like that just doesn't happen.And then when it might happen for academics is over the holiday breaks, like the semester breaks or the summer, but that also isn't true because you're also like, you know, being a mom and, and th- you know, doing things with your family, and managing your house, and maybe your aging parents, and whatever else.Like there's never a time where there's like nothing going on. So we have to stop thinking that that's the ideal and rather think, like what I tell my people, and they- Fight me on this, but at the beginning. But I tell them, actually one to two hours once or twice a [00:07:00] week is enough.Jennie: Ah. AndOutro: they'll be like, “No,Cathy: no,Outro: no,Cathy: IOutro: need-” Say that again.Cathy: Yeah, no. Say that again. One to two hours once or twice a week is enough, ‘cause remember, like, the low end of that means one hour a week, and the high end of that is four hours a week. And so a lot of times people come in and, and I'm, you know, for your, for the audience here, like, think about are you doing one hour a week consistently?Are you doing two hours a week consistently? If you're not, then let's just, like, back up and go there instead of thinking like, “Oh no, I need these big blocks of time that I can never actually get and hold.” ‘Cause that's the other thing, it's so hard to hold a big block. Um, like a four-hour block is hard to o- to hold.Uh, and alsoOutro: hard- Oh my gosh, four hours? ... to maintain your energy through.Cathy: No, no, people- What? No ... people haveOutro: all kinds of ideas.Cathy: And I'm like, and, and the other thing too I think is related to this idea, like for my people, right, that the work day is, like, this eight-hour day. [00:08:00] Like, but you can't ... I'm thinking you're not knowledge work for eight hours a day.Like, your brain can't do that, you know? So we really have to start, just, like, dial it back and start with, like, can I get consistency? Consistency doesn't have to mean every day. Could I get consistent with one or two hours once or twice, or twice a week, and actually do writing during that time so I have project management skills that mean when I sit down I know what to work on, and see how that works?Because guess what? If you did that, you would be ... Like, everything would be moving towards publication, and there would be many more words on the page.Jennie: Well, I love that so much because one of the things that I find is- Well, with writing or business or anything is I'll say, “Oh, I'm working so hard, and I'm so busy on it, and I'm spending all this time on it,” but really what I'm doing is sitting down at my desk and- Yeahrearranging, you know, [00:09:00] the folders on my desktop again. Or- Yeah ... um, you know, oh, I'll just go take a little peek over on Instagram, uh, to transition from... You know, like, it's just- Yeah ... I waste so much time. And-Cathy: Yeah ...Jennie: the- it's- if the, if the idea is, “Well, I got one to two hours, I'm gonna, I'm gonna use that time.”Cathy: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, and that's why you have a blueprint, right? Like, this is why you do the blueprint because every time you sit down, you are faced with either the blinking cursor, right, the blank page, or you're faced even before that with maybe, like, what do I wanna work on? And so for academics, we're always working on more than one project at once.We always have, like, most academ- some academics are book writers. Many academics are... Almost all academics are article writers, and so you always have... Like, you never just, like, start the research for an article and [00:10:00] then just only do that until it's submitted and out in the world. You always have things at these different stages, like I call it your publication pipeline, but, like, you have things that are in the idea stage, in the data collection stage, in the analysis stage, the writing up stage, things that are submitted, you're waiting to get editorial feedback on them.All of that is happening all the time. So you, when you sit down, you're making a choice between all of these possible projects, unless you have a great project management system, you know? Or unless you have a roadmap that says like, “Okay, well, here's my roadmap. Let me... You're my blueprint. Like, let me sit down and start here.”You know? You ha- you need to have that place to start, or you'll just wheel spin with those, uh, one or two hours once or t- once or twice a week.Jennie: So I'm curious about what other objections people bring to your method. You said the first- Mm-hmm ... objection was, “Well, I, I need these giant blocks of time.” Yeah.What are some of the other objections that you hear to it?Cathy: Yeah. I think a lot of them, and [00:11:00] I think this is so common in, in writers of all kinds, is like, “I'm, I'm gonna let myself down.” Like, the, the, the biggest kind of mental thing is like, “Oh, I've tried it. I've tried to hold that time before, but I've never been successful at it, so if I keep trying, I'll just keep disappointing myself.”Um, whereas, like, the more structures and systems you put into place, the better those things can hold up those one to two hours once or twice a week, and then potentially grow them even. But you have to have, like, it, it can't be just I put it on my calendar- Because there has to be, the mindset has to be in the right place.You have to be honoring that time. Like, you- finding the time on your calendar is problem one for sure, like, because people are booked up. But the second part of that problem is I found it, I [00:12:00] put it there, and then when a student tried to make an appointment with me and they just couldn't possibly find any other time, I put them right on top of my writing.Or what many of the other possible scenarios where you would just schedule over what you had held for writing, and I think that's a That's a situation that's common among everybody with a life, right? Like, “Oh, the plumber said they could come during that time, and here I am just writing.” Just writing. You know, like, that's the first thing that has to change.Like, you have to f- to honor that writing time just like you would honor that really hard to get dermatologist appointment.Outro: That's what it needs to be. That's the level of honoring that we're, that we're talking about.Jennie: I'm laughing- Am I- ... ‘cause I'm looking, I, like, literally have been thinking whilst on this, we're looking at video while we're recording this at how beautiful your skin is, so it's hilarious that you mention that.I'm like, “Oh, wait. Maybe I need to be centering the dermatologist more.” [00:13:00]Cathy: Listen, I don't have a dermatologist appointment. If I did, I would, I would hold that. The one that really resonates for me, and maybe with some other moms of, like, kids, like, school-aged kids, is the freaking dentist. Like, I can't get a freaking kid's dentist appointment.Like, I call and they're like, “Yeah, we're just all booked up.” I'm like, “How is this possible?” You know, and so if there's a dentist appointment, I hold on to that. That's the kind of tenacity we want around the honoring the writing appointments.Jennie: So I wanna stick with this concept a little bit more, because I, I actually was writing about this for the Write Big, uh- Mmbook that I'm working on. Mm. And this idea that the reward of writing is way down the road. It- Mm. We don't really have any evidence that it's gonna actually pay off. Yeah. And I think that that tends to be the reason why it's so easy to say, “Well, this doesn't really matter,” or, [00:14:00] “I c- shouldn't really commit to this,” or, “I shouldn't go all in on this.”And some of that pressure comes from our own selves, as you mentioned. Yeah. But a lot of it comes from the people who love us, who are in our homes even, or, you know- Yeah ... the pressure, like, if you're trying to protect that hour or that four hours in your week and it's, you know, “Well, can you do this errand?”Or, “This kid got sick,” or this. To be, to say, “Well, no, that's my writing time”-Cathy: Yeah ...Jennie: it, it's like, well, what evidence do you have that that's worth anything? Yeah. Right? Is ... Do you find that with academics too?Cathy: Uh, I think that, yes, 100%, um, because the payoff is really far away. Um, but even, like, I would argue that another thing happening in people's heads is that the payoff might be somebody read it and hated it.[00:15:00]Like, so you're also avoiding it because- You know, like the end result might be that you, like turn it into your book coach, and the book coach says you have to redo it all. Right. You know? Or like- You missedJennie: the mark. Right ...Cathy: you missed the mark. Exactly. And so, but like we just don't think of that, or so that fear of that we're gonna do this work, we're gonna hold our writing time, which feels very selfish and feels like who do you think you are that you're gonna hold time for your writing, you know?Like, who are you, Ernest Hemingway? Like, like, you know what I mean? Like we, we have these thoughts in our head, and then we, and then, um, the, the great payoff of all of that hard work of holding the time and actually doing the writing might be, in the case of my people, like that some real A-hole reviewer tears you apart.And-Jennie: Because your- Yeah ... people have to have peer reviews- That's right ... for everything, right?Cathy: For [00:16:00] everything. Even books. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So everything is peer reviewed, and I mean, I was just coaching somebody yesterday on like why are, why we have, I call it like submission friction. Like I talk about all these different points in the writing process, and how- Every point, there's like, there's friction to move the work from one kind of thing to another kind of thing.So there, like when you go from draft to like submitted article, y- it's becoming something different, and your job and your relationship to the, that piece of writing is different between when you've drafted it and when you've submitted it to a journal. Um, there's lots of other transition points, but I was coaching somebody yesterday who was like, “Yeah, I got all this really bad feedback,” like really badly worded feedback, right?Like, it wasn't just critical, it was also delivered poorly because peer review in academia is blind, so you don't know who read it, and so people say all kinds of things [00:17:00] without you, you know, without fear that you're g- they're gonna see you at a conference. So you know, supposedly they don't know who you are, you don't know who they are.And it can be like really horrible, and this, this client, she was like, “I just can't... I have trouble, I'm having trouble submitting anything from that study because that person's words are in my head.” Oh. So like, so we also have like for the great effort of holding the writing time and doing, we might get these terrible things that like stop us in our tracks, and then we have to like coach our own minds through like, okay, why is it true that submitting again won't necessarily have those same results, you know, and whatever else you need to, you know...Like I work with my clients on different things they can think to get over that friction of submitting and that fear. But, but yeah, like sometimes there's a payoff, and sometimes the payoff is like, “Congratulations, we're g- people are really mean.”Jennie: [00:18:00] Yeah. Yeah,Cathy: yeah. Yeah,Jennie: so how much time do you spend in your program, would you say, on You know, so there's the tactics and the- Mm-hmmsetting up the systems- Yeah ... versus mindset. Yeah. Like, what's the balance?Cathy: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So my program is set up so that you do the program in 12 weeks, and guess how long it takes to do the program every week? One to two hours. And you do it once or twice a week. So, like, if you take the program, it forces you to hold, like, an hour to do the material and an hour for a live call.So the live call is where we're really getting into the coaching stuff. Like, I, you know, there's only so much coaching you can do on, like, a prerecorded lesson, right? But we do talk about mindset, um, throughout the whole thing. But on the coaching calls is really when we talk about mindset and, and get to figure out, like, [00:19:00] is the problem that you're having actually a strategy problem, or are you having a mindset problem?Is it, like, something that's happening, or is it the way you're thinking about what's happening? So I would say it's, like, a half and half, um, kind of breakdown between strategies and, um, techniques and, like, here's processes, and let's get your mind right.Jennie: Well, I mean, that's, to me, a, a giant revelation. I, I believe that mindset is at least 50% as well.Yeah, yeah. And I think most writers don't have any idea that, how important mindset is. And the program you and I are in together, the business mastermind that we're in together, is hugely mindset focused, and it- Yeah ... it's hard to show up with your mindset stuff. It's embarrassing. Mm. Mm. And, you know, it's hard to get coaching on it, at least for me anyway, because it's, oftentimes it's like, “You're saying the same thing in a different way.[00:20:00] Like, that's just the same story, different words,” you know? You really have to confront the narratives that you have in your head, and where they came from, and what they're serving, and that's work too, right? Yeah,Cathy: absolutely. Yeah. Yeah,Jennie: absolutely. And I mean, that's, to me, the thing that I've, I've really learned, and your program honors that idea by half the time that people are spending is the, the mindset.Cathy: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And, and then we also... Like, the program is designed so that you take it once, and then you can keep taking additional rounds of the program. The content of the program doesn't change, but you continue to have these mi- these, these coaching calls, right? Where we talk about, there's kind of two part- like, two themes of the coaching calls.Like, one theme is like, oh, now I- my whole calendar is really mission aligned, and I'm holding my writing time and whatever. And then what is the series of problems that happens after that, [00:21:00] right? Like, what's the next level? Like, now that we've solved these things, ‘cause there's never no, there's never no problems.Like, like, the next set of problems, uh, presents itself. Um, so we coach on those things. But also, like, I've just been, especially this, in this next group, I've told people, like, I'm like, “We're gonna do more mindset than ever.” Like, we're just gonna really coach your brains on, um, you know, on perfectionism, on procrastination, on transition friction, on zombie projects, on like, um-Jennie: What's a zombie project?Cathy: Ooh, those are those things that are like, they're not going anywhere. They're dead, but you're holding onto them in your mind, like someday I'm gonna get back to that. And it is not healthy to do that. So we, I, when I talk about, like, um, how to manage multiple projects at once, like so think multiple articles that you're writing at once, people [00:22:00] have...Like, academics have, I don't know, like 10, 20 articles that they have, like that they're holding in their mind as like these are possible articles that I could work on or these are projects that... I call them projects in play, right? Well, a lot of times like five of those are like, “Oh, this is a project I started.There might be words on the page, but it stalled out.” We needed to do a reanalysis, and we didn't n- and, and it was gonna be a lot of work to go back and do that, so it's just kind of like alive but dead, right? Like a zombie. Yeah. So I tell people, and again, they fight me on this, like I'm like, “You need to kill them.”Like you need... Zombie projects aren't for resuscitating. They are for blessing and releasing. They are for like this is done. This is not going to... Because they're in the way of all of the other living projects. So I talk about the projects as like we have a top three that are kind of, that we're maybe rotating between or [00:23:00] that like once we, we, we submit something from the top three we can like promote something else, and then everybody else is sleeping.You know? Just tell them they need to take a nap. And then the zombie projects we're just, we kill them. You can, if you must, have a folder on your computer and put them there, but you need to get them out of like your working mind. They shouldn't be in your pipeline. They should be like they... Because we can only hold so many things, and we can only manage so many projects at once, so we have to create systems and processes to make it feel like we're only working on one thing at a timeJennie: Well, I think this idea, which I adore now that I know what it is-um, applies to book writers as well. Everybody has more than one book idea, and they have the book idea that they wanna write after the book that they're working on, or they started three at a time or s- you know, oftentimes there's a thing that happens, I think it happens about two-thirds of the way through a [00:24:00] book- Hmmwhere suddenly you have a great idea for another book that is shinier and prettier and brighter and better- Yes ... than the one you're working on.Outro: Yep.Jennie: And so this idea, I think, really applies to book writers, and most of us who are writing and sharing anything are also writing other content like- Yes. YesSubstack and, um, or a newsletter or a podcast or whatever th- whatever the content that we're working on is. So do you think that this idea of the zombie project- Mm-hmm ... or folder can apply there as well?Cathy: For sure, because here's the thing, right? The shiny object syndrome is really real be- and it, and it relates actually to the submission friction that I was talking about.Like, I did a call about that just yesterday. Like, it relates because- Before your project is done, right, before it's submitted, before it's turned in, whatever, [00:25:00] it has the potential to be the very most amazing, best book that has ever been written by anyone. And as long as I don't submit it, it is holding that potential.Jennie: Yes. Okay.Cathy: And so once the, so the more, but the more done the book gets, the less po- Like, almost like the less that po- the, the more that potential is kind of decreasing because it, it's not that it's not great, maybe it is that book, but like the potential of what it could become when it actually has become something is less, right, than the new shiny idea because the new shiny idea then has like all of this potential.So, so I think that's the, the newness of something like is, i- is very attractive, and it has so much to do with like our brains trying to avoid the hard work of the finishing and trying to... Like, [00:26:00] w- when something is new, you don't know what the writing problems are yet. Yeah. But what, what's existing, you have a lot of problems to solve.There's a ton of decisions to make.Jennie: Yeah.Cathy: And, um, and, and that, that feels hard and heavy.Jennie: So for our listeners who are finishing up their blueprints, they're coming across one of those friction points you talked about, where you're going from planning your book, thinking about it, solving some problems, to you're going back to writing ‘cause the- Yeahblueprint is a kind of a pause. Not kind of, it's a pause, and now you're going back to the writing, and that s- transition is something a lot of writers don't acknowledge- that it's a different thing. So that idea- Right ... you were talking about of, um, when your academic writers are shifting from, you know, one thing to another.They have a lot more shifts in a lot [00:27:00] more compressed period of time. But writers absolutely go through this, and then when they, when they call it done and get it to beta readers, and then they get it back and get it to, you know, going to pitch, those are all transition points. So a lot of our listeners are at one of those right now.Yeah. What is, what is the mindset work to, that you guide people for shifting from one, um, process to another?Cathy: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So your job changes. Like, that's the, that, that's the, you know ... Like, the job of, like, when you're doing the blueprint, right? It's a planning, it's a pausing, it's a thinking, it's aRight? The same thing we do, like, I teach a writing planning process, and that process is one kind of job, right? The job of, like, making decisions- And executing on those decisions. So the making decisions is another job, and the [00:28:00] executing on the decisions is another job. So just realizing, like, what is my job in this moment, that is a really powerful thing to think about and think like, “No, in the scope of this whole project, my job right now is to make decisions that then I can execute on.”Jennie: Yes.Cathy: And also... Yes. And not, and remember then, like, you execute on the decisions, and you might have to go back and make new decisions and execute differently. Like, that's what composition, that's what composing is, right? But you, you know, keep the job that you're, for the stage that you're at, and stop trying to solve the problems of another stage in the process.Jennie: So bleeding into other jobs sounds like it's a energy suck. So for, uh, a, somebody finishing the blueprint, it might be, “Well, now I'm gonna start researching agents and conferences I can go to to pitch at.” And it's like, “No, you gotta write the book,” right? Yes. Is that-Outro: Exactly, [00:29:00] exactly ...Jennie: is that the kind of thing- Yesyeah.Cathy: Yeah, and so, like, a- and it's also, I talk a- I talk in the program about, like, you're solving the wrong problem at the wrong level, right? Like, that's an in- perfect example of I'm solving the wrong problem. Like, I don't, I don't need to be, like, thinking about pitching agents. I need to be figuring out what my book idea is.Like, you know what I mean? And so for, like, in, in, in our, in my program, there's, you know, let's say I think that what I have is a writing time problem, but if I don't have writing project management, like if I don't know how to plan a paper and I don't know what the stages it needs to go through are, and I don't know how to manage it in relation to other papers that I have, I can have two hours of writing, and I will sit there and not know what to do with it.Jennie: Yes.Cathy: So, like, there has to be, you know, you ha- so solving, you have to solve the right problem. You know? Like I, okay, I have a backlog of papers. I think it's ‘cause I don't have enough time. Like, you probably don't have enough time, but that's not the [00:30:00] only problem, you know? And that might not be the most pertinent problem to solve first.Jennie: Right. I love this. I love this for our people finishing Blueprint. Um, and w- I'm curious just to sort of wrap up our conversation, why do you think... ‘Cause something that's remarkable about the program that you run, which is again at scholarsvoice.com-Cathy: It's actually .org, but yeahJennie: Oh, dang.Outro: Dot org.Jennie: I said it wrong. Don't worry about it. It's fine. Scholarsvoice.org. We'll put it down in the show notes. It'll go in the show notes. Yeah. Um, well, the remarkable thing is that people love your program. Like, once they find it, they don't leave. Yeah. They, they stay for a long time. Years. Yeah. Years and years and years.Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why do you think that is?Cathy: Because we're never done. We're never done as writers.Jennie: Yeah.Cathy: Right? Like, we're always developing, and we're always [00:31:00] changing, and we're always responding to new situations. And I just think, like, I think it would be terrible to think, like, “I've learned how to write a novel or a book or an article, and now I'm done.Like, and now I just, like, rinse and repeat for 30 years.” Like, no, that's not how it works. First of all, it's just not how it works, and also, would you really want it to work like that? Don't you want it to get more interesting, different, better? Like, and so that's why people stay, ‘cause the, the, the curriculum is...I- it's called, like, a spiral curriculum, where you could just, like, keep doing it again and again. And as you are going through your career, you are changing, and your situation is changing, and actually the demands of your career are changing. And so you can just continue to do this work over and over again, and, and many people do it and then come back after they've had, like, a little career change, and they realize, “Ooh, now all of these things have [00:32:00] shifted, and I need to, like, go back and figure all of this out again.”And that's normal and natural and fine and actually amazing.Jennie: Um, so how can... If people are listening to this, and they're like, “Wait, I wanna get in on this academic writing-” Yeah ... thing, I... So it's only for tenured professors. It's not- So- ... for people who want to be that, right? No.Cathy: Yeah, so we... It is really for academics.It's really geared towards people who are in academic careers, tenured or hoping, you know, tenure-track professors or whatever they call it in the country that you live in, ‘cause it's called different things. Um, it- we have a lot of people who are mid-career. Like, so it's not just for early career. Um, but we, we have people at all different career stages, including post-docs, including full-time researchers, and so...And even sometimes people from industry, like, or nonprofit who are doing research work and need to put out publications [00:33:00] into academic journals. So yeah, and you can go to scholarsvoice.org, and at the top navigation it says, “Publish your backlog,” and that is my Navigate program, which is really focused on helping you publish that backlog of papers and keep papers, like, flowing out into the world.Um, scholarsvoice.org/navigate is where you'll find all the information, and you can apply, and it's open until, open for applications until August 28th.Jennie: That is awesome. Well, if you're, if you're listening, um, now and that speaks to you, you can jump on that. If you're listening in the future, uh, there will be another opportunity, uh, to get into- YeahCathy's program. And if you're listening to the hashtag amwriting, uh, podcast and you're not an academic, and- You're finishing a blueprint or you're realizing after this conversation, “Gosh, I'm doing the wrong job at the wrong [00:34:00] time,” or, “I don't have a time problem, I have a mindset problem,” or any of these, these ideas that Cathy has shared with us.Put them into practice and, and I think that for writers listening to podcasts like this is part of the mindset work because- Yes ... you're listening to bigger conversations and bigger ideas, and you're getting something in your ear that counteracts that story you're telling your own self. So, um, I'm just grateful for you, Cathy, for sharing those stories and thoughts with us today, and for doing this amazing work that you're doing out in the world.So thank you for joining us.Cathy: Thank you for having me on the podcast.Jennie: And for our listeners, thanks for being here. Now let's get back to work and finish what matters most.Outro: The #amwriting podcast is produced by Andrew Perilla. Our intro music, [00:35:00] aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

Jennie Nash hosts a #amwriting podcast BookLab with guest Kathleen Barber, author of Truth Be Told and newly released Sisterhood Above All (co-written with Amayah Shaienne), and discusses Barber's range across thrillers and romance, her character-first approach, and how RushTok inspired an authentic sorority-rush thriller featuring Madison, Shay, and Ava as tensions escalate and someone dies. They define RushTok as viral TikTok coverage of University of Alabama sorority recruitment and note its broad international fascination. In the BookLab, they evaluate three first-page submissions by asking “Would we turn the page?” They praise Heather's Trust Me for strong voice, vivid Austin setting, and an intriguing problem hook, with minor notes about genre context. They decline Odeon Omega due to unearned logistics and too much dialogue despite an intriguing title/advert. They find Empty Spaces compellingly written but confusing from too many names and unclear stakes, suggesting more interiority and clarity.#AmWriting is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Connect with KathleenVisit Kathleen's website to find her books and more: https://www.kathleenbarber.comTranscriptJennie: [00:00:00] Hi, I'm Jennie Nash, and you're listening to the #amwriting podcast, the place where we help writers of all kinds play big in your writing life, love the process, and stick with it long enough to finish what matters most. This is a book lab session where we answer the most important question about your first pages.Would we pick up the book? Would we turn the page? Today, I have a really special guest with me. I have Kathleen Barber here, who is so many things. She's the author of Truth Be Told, which was adapted as a series on Apple TV, Follow Me, Both Things Are True, and just brand new, like it came out four days ago, Sisterhood Above All, with, I'm gonna try her name, Amaya Chen?How do you-Barbara: Yeah. Uh, um, yeah. That's, that's very close. I think it's Amaya Chen.Jennie: Okay. Yeah. Uh, so we're gonna hear about that in a minute. Um, I haven't, I haven't cracked it open yet, but I'm so [00:01:00] excited for it. Um, Kathleen's also an Author Accelerator certified book coach and a former attorney, and she lives in Washington, DC with her family.So welcome, Kathleen.Barbara: Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited to be here.Jennie: So I watched your unboxing the other day. It was so fun, and I didn't realize that we had scheduled this right on top of, like the actual- Oh ... launch of your book.Barbara: No, that, that's okay. It's, it's great. Um, it gives me something to think about that's not just, like, spiraling.Like, is anybody gonna read my book? Is anybody gonna like it? Um, so it gives me something else to focus on.Jennie: Well, it's so interesting you say that because I think of you as this really seasoned pro and, you know, it's been really interesting for me to watch your career because you've written some really different kinds of books.You did a ... Well, your first book was obviously a big thriller and a huge success, and at one point, you pivoted to romance, and now you're doing ... Well, I, I saw that book list [00:02:00] called Sisterhood Above All, a soapy thriller Yes. Yes ... which is such a great description, and you did it with a collaborator. So you just seem interested in story to me.Barbara: I, I am. Yeah. I'm always very ... I always start a story with the characters. Um, and so then their story kind of spirals out from there. Um, yeah, so I, my last book that came out before this one was, was a rom-com. Um, and I was really nervous when I started writing it. I was like, “How am I going to write this when I've been writing suspense and thrillers before?”And it turns out that, like, at the heart of it, stories are stories, and people are people, and, you know, in a romance, happy things happen. In a thriller, bad things happen, but things still happen.Jennie: Amazing. So give us the overview of the brand new book, ‘cause it's, it's really juicy.Barbara: Yeah. Yeah, so I'm really excited about it.Um, Sisterhood Above All is a thriller set during sorority rush, and so it follows three different [00:03:00] women who are involved there. There's Madison, who is the president of what's she perceives as to be the coolest sorority on campus, so she's kind of the gatekeeper, and there's Shay, who is the president of a rival sorority and trying to shake, shake up the Greek institutions, and then there's Ava, who is a potential new member.She's going through rush. She's desperate to join Madison's sorority, um, and she might be a little too desperate. Uh, so you know, it's a thriller. Bad things happen. Somebody dies, um, you know, and things kind of spiral out, spiral out of control.Jennie: But tell us about the collaboration, ‘cause it's- Yeah ... so interesting how that came about and how it went and-Barbara: Yeah.You know, it was, it was a lot of fun. Um, I, like many writers, write alone, and I had never really considered collaborating with anybody before, um, but- But when I was kind of talking about this, I, I'd been pitching my agent a sorority themed thriller for a while. [00:04:00] Um, and at one point when, when Rush Talk was getting really big a couple summers ago, she was like, “This is the moment.This, you should write this book, but I think that in order to make it feel more authentic, we should bring in somebody who's living this in this moment.” Um, so one of her colleagues found Amaya, who, um, was up until very, very recently an active member of a sorority at the University of Alabama, and brought us together.And Amaya and I got along right away, and we both had kind of the same vision for what we wanted the book to be, and so collaborating with her was, was a lot of fun in a way that I had been nervous that it wouldn't be. But it was, it was a really good time, and I'm really, really proud of the book.Jennie: So for those who don't know or weren't following, can you tell us what Rush Talk-Barbara: YeahwasJennie: or isBarbara: or- Yeah ... shall be? Yes, yes, yes. So, um, so if you're gonna join a sorority, um, you go through, you go through recruitment and which is very slangily [00:05:00] called rush. Um, and so on TikTok a few years ago, um, people started sharing about their experiences during sorority rush, but specifically, uh, during sorority rush at the University of Alabama.Um, and it really took on a life of its own, like people were watching it like it was, you know, a television program. Uh, they made a documentary about it, which, you know, I'll, I will let you make your own conclusions about the documentary. Um, but people just got really, really into it, and people... And it was kind of appealing to people who had gone through sorority rush at some point, were thinking about going through a sorority rush, or who were just invested in, you know, watching people have these kind of outlandish experiences and, and share them.So, um, itJennie: was a lot of fun. My understanding was that it got very, very popular in other countries?Barbara: I- it's definitely... [00:06:00] Yeah. You know, um- So sorority, some, some sororities are international. Not, not all of them are. Um, but by and large, when they say international, they mean that there are chapters in Canada, not that, like, there are chapters in, you know, like Europe or, or other countries.And so it just, it's something that is so unique and so, like, uniquely about, like, this type of college experience that I think it's been really interesting to people in lots of different places.Jennie: Yeah, yeah. Fascinating. So obviously the book has been out, like, mere hours here. But, um, how does it feel? Are you, are you- It's excitingyou said you were excited and proud and- SoBarbara: exciting. Yeah. I'm, I'm, I'm really, really proud of the book. I love it. I mean, I know everybody, like, loves their own books, but I do. I truly, like, love this book, and I just really hope that the readers do too.Jennie: You know, it's not true that everybody loves their book.I, I was dying to have somebody on the podcast who will never come on the podcast. But I- Yeah ... I heard a story about somebody who [00:07:00] got a seven-figure deal for a book that they really didn't actually love, and then- Oh, no ... they, they wrote it. It came out, and then when they had to co- come time to do the publicity, they just dreaded it.They, it was like a, just they did it for the money. They got the money, and then didn't, didn't wanna talk about it, like felt sort of ashamed about it. And I was like, “Oh, please, come talk about that.” But of course they, they won't. So...Barbara: That's wild. Isn't that wild? That's wild. Yeah. I just, I just can't even imagine how that would feel.Um, I mean...Jennie: I know. Well, I, uh, the cover of this, um, of this new book, Sisterhood Above All, is- is really cool too. So we will link to it in the show notes, and everyone can go read it and check it out, and, um, Kathleen's other books, I've read them all, and you have such range and, um, like I said, [00:08:00] interesting stories.So with that, let's get to our, our Book Lab entries. We just always wanna start by thanking those who submitted. It's not easy to do this, to put your stuff out there with no context and no ability to talk back or anything and have random s- people on the internet, you know, talk about your stuff. So really appreciate the, the risk-taking of doing that, and we do this in order to help us all get better and, and learn, you know, what works and, and, um, for your own self or your own writing, what, what you want it to be.So what we're gonna do, as always, is I'm gonna read the entry, and then we're gonna ask ourselves, would we turn the page? So, um, the first entry is Fiction and it is, uh, author's name is [00:09:00] Heather and the name of the work is Trust Me. So here we goI can't tell you whether it's the Johnny Cash mural, clusters of candles nestled into every corner of the long stone bar, or the smoky scent of Palo Santo that tucks Austin into my head the first night. Maybe it's the unexpected jazz trio on a Tuesday in a town built for blues, country, and rock, or it could be the two cowboys deep in conversation at a table in the back of the bar.I'll later, I'll later learn that making a hot Austin guy a cowboy because of his hat, faded jeans, and scuffed boots is the same as labing- labeling a frat bro in a hoodie and sweats an athlete. It's just how they dress. I can tell you I like the looks of Austin men a hell of a lot better, especially that wide silver belt buckle that dresses up the whole package in a bow.It's going [00:10:00] on nine PM when I arrive at Whistlers in East Austin, and the bartender hands, hands me a peach-colored mezcal craft cocktail. Fresh juice, pungent herbs, and the smoky sister to tequila are the perfect salve after what's transpired since my flight landed from New York two hours earlier. I follow the snake tattoo on his foreha- forearm as the bartender shakes another cocktail for the couple next to me.Damn, he's hot, too. The crowd starts to pick up, and I signal Snake Tattoo for another before I lose his attention for good. The warm agave liquor spreads through my bones, and I start to relax. Maybe this isn't the disaster I think it is. Maybe I can actually pull it off. I glance around at the mostly twenty and thirty-something crowd angling for spots at the bar.The women wear short dresses and long hair. The men, well, those jeans are something, along with their finely cut biceps and well-placed tattoos. Can't help but glance over at those cowboys again and get a warm smile in [00:11:00] return. Easy, girl. Back to business. I have a problem, and this second mezcal is going to help me solve it.All right. What do you think? What was your first impression?Barbara: I really enjoyed that. I would definitely turn the page there. I, I feel like there was, like, a really strong sense of, sense of place, and I, in particular, I really enjoyed the, the first line, not only because it gives us that sense of place, but it, because it also then tells us something about the narrator and how she perceives the world around her in that first line.Jennie: Yeah, and, and there's a good m- a, a good question at hand here, which is what's she doing here?Barbara: Mm-hmm.Jennie: She's come from New York. We get that. It's a little unclear how, how old she is, ‘cause she's referencing other people's ages, but not her own, so we, we don't really know what's happening or what, what's, what's about.[00:12:00] Um, I mean, I thought the writ-Barbara: Well, IJennie: agree. Yeah. I thought the writing was great. It sort of tripped along-Barbara: Mm ...Jennie: um, nicely. IBarbara: like at the end where... I'm sorry. I didn't mean to step on you. No,Jennie: no, go. Yeah. I like atBarbara: the end, I like at the end where, um, she says she has a problem, and the second mezcal is gonna help her solve it.I thought that was really interesting, ‘cause I, it piqued my interest, made me wanna know what the problem is, but it's also kind of funny. Like, the mezcal's probably not gonna help you solve your problem, but it's like...Jennie: Yeah. No, it's so true. I was longing for a little bit more of a sense of what's happening here.I mean, this could be any kind of story at this point. It could be she could be a spy. She could be an assassin. She could be trying to get a guy back. Like, we, there's really no sense of what the story's gonna be. I always like that on the first page. What about you?Barbara: Yeah. I, I agree with you. I, it, it could, it could go in any direction.I kind of [00:13:00] sense from the tone that it's, you know, it's going to be something, uh- Well, I guess I don't know. You know, honestly. Now, now that I'm looking at it again and thinking about it, um, you're right, it could be... The, the problem that she has could be a thriller problem, or it could be a romantic problem, since she's kind of made, made comments about the different men.I think that was a hint to me that it might be a romantic problem that she's having, but I actually don't know.Jennie: Yeah. The, the- obviously she's clocking all the hot guys in this bar, which tells us something, either about her or what she's up to. We don't know. Um, but yeah, it's, um, really good detail, like the, you mentioned that first line, and I liked the line about her sh- the self-awareness about, you know, she calls him a cowboy and then she says, you know, sort of like, “Oh, right, that's not really fair.”Mm-hmm. “We don't know.” [00:14:00] You know, that, I thought that was, made me think- Yeah ... this character's gonna know themselves.Barbara: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I agree with that. I, I also really enjoyed the kind of specificity that she uses in the descriptions, like when she talks about, you know, the, the cocktail that she's drinking, and the tattoo on the bartender's arm.Like, I just felt like those details really made the story come alive for me. So that, like, even if I didn't exactly know where we were going, I could, I could picture where we were.Jennie: Yeah. Yeah. That's really well said. Well, we like this. I think I would, I would turn the page.Barbara: I would, I would too, yeah. Mm-hmm.Jennie: We would turn the page. Um, I mean, the only notes I think for me would be, I mean, it's always so tricky, because if we were picking this book up, the title, Trust Me, doesn't really tell us anything, but the cover would.Outro: Mm-hmm.Jennie: The vibe of the cover would. We'd have a little more context for where we were and [00:15:00] what this was about, and that would probably help with the issue that, that I have, which is, well, what kind of book is this?We don't know. Um, and you know, now that I'm thinking of it, we don't even know whe- where we are in time. Um, I'm, I'm assuming modern day, but I don't know why I assumed that. It, maybe it's not. So maybe just a tiny bit more of a sense of- Uh, context for the reader. Mm-hmm. But that's my only note. L- do you have any notes?Barbara: Yeah. You know, I honestly don't think that I, I have any additional notes. I mean, I, I really enjoyed this selection, and I would definitely keep reading here.Jennie: Well, Heather, that's high praise, soBarbara: Yeah, I, I usually have ideas. I usually have notes but I don't.Jennie: Yeah, that's, uh, that's g- a good one for us to start with, and very fun, I hope, for you to hear that from Kathleen.All right, let's [00:16:00] go to our, our next one. This is fiction. It's called Odeon Omega, um, and the author is ... Well, the, the, um, it's coming across as, um, Sound Smith, but who knows what that is? So, um, Odeon Omega, they will know who they are, for sure. All right, here we go. “The grand O-O opening continues all month long at your new entertainment destination, the one and only, first of its kind on this or any other coast, the all-new, all-excitement Odeon Omega.‘Gah!' Emmy shrieked from the bathroom. ‘You can turn the TV volume down now, Seth. We're done.' Seth was still lying in bed, his naked body mostly covered with Emmy's cream-colored, satiny soft sheets. He chuckled while reaching for the remote. ‘I wasn't the one who turned it up.' ‘I know that. I have to [00:17:00] turn the TV way up like that, though.It's the only way to drown out the neighbors. The walls in this place are so damn thin, and they're always banging on them, disturbing me when I'm trying to have sex.' ‘Those b******s,' Seth chuckled. ‘I'm saying, I like ... I'm saying, like, what am I supposed to do? Not f**k? Hey, that is so not an option,' Seth p- Seth pressed the mute button, then went back to lying on his back, his hands behind his head.Another noise startled him, this one coming from Emmy's phone. A toneless version of Girls Just Wanna Have Fun blared from Emmy's clutch purse. ‘Turn that off, too,' Emmy shouted from the bathroom. ‘That's my mother's ringtone. I don't feel like talking to her right now.' Seth rolled over to the nightstand and opened her clutch and found the button to silence Emmy's phone.He lingered on the image of Emmy's mother. ‘Wow, Emmy, you and your mom could pass for sisters, easy.' ‘Ew, don't tell me that,' Emmy said. ‘Tell her that, but not me. Bet you're already imagining yourself in a threesome with her and me, [00:18:00] aren't you?' ‘Huh, what's that?' Seth was distracted by Emmy's driver's license in the clutch's interior pocket.He slid it out of the pocket and read what he assumed was Emmy's birth name. ‘Myrtle? What? Your re- your real name is Myrtle?' Emmy stepped out of the bathroom, still naked from their lovemaking, with a sky blue-colored towel clenched between her legs.”That's a vibe.Barbara: It is. It is, yeah. I mean, opening, uh, opening in the aftermath of sex is a, is a bold choice. I'll be honest, I don't feel like I have very much context for what's happening here. Um, it seems like Emmy and Seth don't know each other veryJennie: well. I got that sense, too. I got that sense, too, and that the sex that she has this system for turning up the TV has been for other people.Barbara: Mm-hmm. [00:19:00] Yeah. On, on that note, though, I did kind of have, uh, a fundamental disbelief about the setup that was giving me a stumbling block when I was reading this, just because it didn't seem to make a lot of sense to me that she would turn up the television to distract herself from the neighbors, when I would think that that would be more distracting or, you know, just use music or...And I didn't really understand why she would be explaining it to him after the fact instead of in the moment. Um, that felt like it was perhaps just put there for the reader,Jennie: so that we could be distracted. Yeah, it was a little explainy, a little... Yeah, like a, um, we use that term info dump, and an info dump doesn't have to be a whole scene.It can just be a line like that where I, I didn't buy it either that she would actually say that to him now. Mm-hmm. If... He probably would've said, “Why are you turning the TV on?”Barbara: Right.Jennie: Earlier.Barbara: Yeah. Yeah, [00:20:00] yeah, and it seemed like that would be the conversation that would have before we got to this moment. So that was something that, that I struggled with a bit.Jennie: I also didn't believe, it felt like, uh, unearned that he's pulling this license out of her purse. I could see, I could see that he might have seen something on her phone if he's turning her phone off. But-Barbara: Mm-hmm ...Jennie: to, to actually then see... I kept, like I was trying to think through the logistics. Like, okay, see one of those little slidey things inside a purse, but you can't see- Mmthe driver's license. Like, why would he reach in and pull it out? It felt like the author wanted us to get to this moment where- Mm-hmm ... Seth got this information.Barbara: Mm-hmm. Yeah.Jennie: It, yeah, it felt unearned to me.Barbara: Yeah. I, I agree, especially because it doesn't seem like Seth knows her very well, obviously. Then for him to be [00:21:00] digging around in her clutch purse felt- Untrue to the situation, um, unless something else was going on that we don't hear about.Jennie: Yeah, yeah. Um, this... When I said, like, “Well, this is a vibe,” this character has a, a tone or a style or sense about, like a sort of swagger about- Mm-hmm ... her that interests me. Um, I happen to be in the middle... I'm behind everybody else, but I'm in the middle of reading Yesteryear. Oh. Have you read-Barbara: Oh. Yes, yes.Jennie: Don't tell me what ha- I, I- Don't tell me ...Barbara: I w- I won't. I was also late to it, and everybody was trying to tell me about it, and I was just constantly walking around going, “No spoilers, no spoilers.” Yeah.Jennie: But the, that character has, has such a brashness- Mm-hmm ... of point of view and opinion in both, um, both parts of the story there, and there's something about this character that rem- reminds me of that.[00:22:00] There's like a, I don't know, um, a, just a brashness. S- And I, I've been enjoying that protagonist- Mm-hmm ... the Yesteryear protagonist, just ‘cause it's unusual. I've read a tiny bit, and I know people are saying, “Oh, she is so unlikable,” but there's just something of a character that's so owning their, um-Barbara: Mm-hmmJennie: way, and this woman's ownership of, of her sexuality, I guess, I, I thought was- Hmm ... interesting.Barbara: Yeah. No, I, I, I know what you mean, and I, I, I am intrigued by her as a character because, I mean, again, here she, she seems to have kind of an interesting setup in a, an apartment building that has thin walls, um, has this system of turning up her television, um, but not with Seth before.So, you know, it seems like she's had several partners back to this, this space. Um, but she seems very, very confident and, like you said, kind of swaggery [00:23:00] with him. Um, so yeah, I, I am intrigued to know more about, like, who she is and what makes her that way. Um...Jennie: Yeah. Uh, for me, probably not enough to turn the page.Um-Barbara: Not for, not for me either. I-Jennie: Yeah. And, and I have to say that the thing that intrigues me the most about this whole thing is that the title of this book is Odeon Omega, and that's the random, um- I think that's the random show on TVBarbara: Yeah,Jennie: the- Am I ma- am IBarbara: making that up? No, no, no, that, that, that's the first line.It's, um, it sounds like it's maybe like a commercial. I was kind of envisioning it from the way that it was spelled out as, you know, kind of like, uh, oh, the way that like a, a carnival or like a car salesman is like, “The grand o- o- opening.” Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, that's kind of how I was envisioning it.Um, so I, I didn't, I did enjoy s- seeing that right up front, um, [00:24:00] but I wanted more context to understand what it was, because without that, I, I don't know what that line means. Um-Jennie: And that just the author's choice, like, okay, the TV's on f- for a random reason- Mm-hmm ... or for her systematic sex reason, and, and she's hearing this show opening, and then that's the title of the book.Like, something about this, I, I thought of it as a, yeah, like a carnival or a show or something- Mm-hmm ... a theme park, um, that there's g- that's gonna become central to the story. It's kind of an interesting way of putting that in in, and presumably- Mm ... it will come back, um- Yeah ... in an important way. But I, I was intrigued by that most of all, actually.Barbara: Yeah. No, same, especially because that's the moment that Emmy says, “Turn the volume down.” So I was, uh, so it made it seem, to me at least, that there was something about that particular advertisement that she [00:25:00] was reacting to, and I wanted to know what that was.Jennie: Well, that's a really great point, and I think if we were to give this writer some guidance- Um, it might be to make more of that.Mm. If the character reacts more to that. Like, in, you know, that she can't hear it or that it's upsets her in a particular way, or she gives us some information or context about that so that we, I don't know, I guess we need to be more grounded in, in what's happening.Barbara: Yeah. And I also just feel like that would give us a little bit more s- because it, that's right there in the title, so it's obviously gonna be important to the story.And so like that would give us a little bit of curiosity about what it is and would propel us to try and understand why she's reacting the way that she is. Um-Jennie: Yeah. And just from a technical [00:26:00] standpoint, I'm looking at this entry, it's almost all dialogue.Barbara: Mm-hmm.Jennie: Which I think is hard on a, an opening page.Uh, don't you? I think-Barbara: I, I do. I, I would really have liked to see a little bit more interiority from Emmy here to kind of, I don't know, understand how she feels, not only about that advertisement, but about, about Seth. Like, did she li- does she like Seth, or is he just like a guy, you know? Um, I just wanted to know a little bit more about how she, who I'm presuming is the protagonist, is experiencing this scene.Jennie: Yeah. Um, yeah, there was even a moment when I thought, “Is she selling sex?” Mm-hmm. Is, is that... Is she a sex worker? Um, you know- True ... so too many questions about what's, what's happening here, which I think could be solved by, um, balancing out the dialogue, um, w- with some other information. [00:27:00] Mm-hmm. Um, yeah, I mean, I'm, um, I'm hoping that this character gets a story that we want, we want to read ‘cause I'm intrigued.Barbara: Yeah. Same. Same.Jennie: Yeah. All right. We have one more that we're going to, um, read. Do you wanna read this one? From your little, “Oh, oh, oh,” opening- ... I was like, “Oh, maybe you're a good narrator. I'm not.”Barbara: Sure. Sure. I'll, I'll read it. Um, so this one is called Empty Spaces. Um, it's fiction. I'm not entirely certain who the author is, unless I'm missing that in the spreadsheet.It looks like perhaps it starts with a T. Um, but here, here is the submission. “April 1st, 1995. ‘Please, please, please,' Corey sputtered, gripping the black receiver with both hands while the operator relayed her [00:28:00] request. ‘Person-to-person call for Tess. Will you accept the charges?' ‘No, she's asleep.' Corey knew her mother was at the beige phone on the kitchen wall a thousand miles away.Then her father's voice in the background. ‘Honey, let the girl talk to her dau-...' And dial tone. Corey slammed the receiver back into its cradle. ‘What the f**k?' She missed. Her knuckles scraped the chrome holder, and she unleashed her fury on the edge of the black payphone. ‘F**k, f**k, f*****g f****r.' The rain that had been collecting in the roo- in the rim of the payphone box was shaken loose by her tantrum and cascaded down inside the collar of her flay- flight jacket.Well, Charlie's flight jacket. ‘Skipper,' came Top's quiet baritone from behind her. ‘We're ready to roll.' ‘Thanks, Top.' Corey accepted the styrofoam cup of coffee he handed her, then sloshed her way to the lead truck, Arlo trotting at her heels. She hoisted herself up into the passenger side of the rig. Arlo curled up beside her and dug his head into her lap.Why did her mother have to be such a [00:29:00] little b***h? And on this night. Was it too much to expect her to remember that it was Charlie's birthday? No, Maria remembered. She was the one who kept a file of birthday cards, organized by month and paper clipped to envelopes, neatly stamped and addressed to the recipient.But nobody sends a birthday card to a dead person.” After a few minutes, Top started his status report. “Got word from the 24-hour man. The lot they gave us was too small and underwater. He put up a fuss and got us moved to the football field at the high school.” Corey took a sip. “It'll be nice to have a dry lot.Daisy's got that one nail that looks a little soft.” She fiddled with the radio, settling on a country station, what else was there, and yawned. “Where are we headed tonight?” And that is it.Jennie: Wow, well, author T., uh, Wood, what a treat to have Kathleen Barber read your, read your stuff like that. Gee, you, you sounded amazing.You sounded like you'd written that. That was so cool. Do you- I, uh- ... narrate your own books?Barbara: I, I do not, but I have [00:30:00] small children, and I read aloud every night.Jennie: Do you do the voices?Barbara: Oh, yes, I definitely do the voices.Jennie: Do you do all of them, like, in aBarbara: very- I do all of them.Jennie: You do?Barbara: Yeah, yeah. My, my kids were really into the Wings of Fire series, so I've read all of those books, and there are many, many dragons, and they all have different voices, and if I do not remember the different voice, my children will be like, “Mommy, that's not what Peril sounds like,” and then I'll have to remember and try again,Jennie: so.Take notes? Do you have, do you have a guide? Do you just remember? Um,Barbara: no, I just, I just try and remember.Jennie: Oh,Barbara: my. I should take notes, but I'm not that organized. I just go off.Jennie: That, that's amazing. That's amazing. Um, just while we're talking about it, is there audio already for the new book, for, uh, Sisterhood Above All?Barbara: There, there is. There is, yeah. Um, I recently got, uh, got a peek at it, and I am very, very excited. We have a different [00:31:00] narrator for each of the POV characters, and they are all fantastic. Super excited.Jennie: Amazing. All right, so back to this, back to this work. Um, I thought this was great. Uh, did you, did you, how did you feel reading it?Barbara: I, I, I enjoyed reading it. Um, when, when I was, when I was reading it the first time, I, I found myself getting stopped a few times because I felt like there were a lot of names, and I was confused. Um, you know, it's, it's in- I don't feel like an author needs to spell out for me who every single character is on the first page at all.Um, it just felt like in a small amount of time, there were a lot of names that I felt like I was trying to keep track of, and that was a bit confusing for me. Slowed me down a little bit.Jennie: I agree with that. Actually, the first time that I read it And [00:32:00] admittedly, I was scanning these really fast the first time I read it, but there, there's something to that, how things hit your head.But I thought that, um, I thought Daisy was a horse because I was like the one nail that looks a little soft, like is who, what- Yeah ... where would that matter that we need to be on grass? And, and, and then I was like, “Wait, who even is Daisy?” So I got stuck on that- Yeah ... for sure. And, um, and then the, um, there's a nickname that I think the main...I think Corey, the, the other character calls her Skipper, so I was confused by that. Right. So it, yeah. Yeah. Are those some of the things that you mean?Barbara: Yeah. The, those was... And I was also just a little confused when I first started reading that it starts out with person to person call for Tess, and then we're talking about her mother.And I, I thought at first that her mother was [00:33:00] named Tess, and that, and that the operator was trying to reach her, and that her mother was simply not, simply not wanting to talk even though she was by the phone. But then later on I realized that her mother is actually named Maria, and that Tess must be somebody else.Um, I think Corey's daughter, but I didn't, I didn't catch that on first reading. I had to read it again to be able to understand that.Jennie: Yeah. So there, there is a lot going on for sure. When I said that I thought it was great, I- I'm, I'm hoping that this character's some kind of trucker just because that's cool, and, um, it, it seemed like we have some tension both in whatever's happening around...You know, like, they have a 24-hour man. They're... Uh, so there's something afoot. Like, there's a pr- a project or something afoot that feels like it's not gonna go well or something's gonna [00:34:00] happen there. Um, and I also, you know, now we have the thing with the, well, we learn I think it's the mom. But, um, th- there- Yeahwere enough elements of intrigue, like, what's, what's going on here, what's gonna happen, that I... And I thought it was well-written.Barbara: Yeah. No, and I, one of the things that I really enjoyed was the way, the, the descriptions of what the, what the scenery looks like with the, with like the weather. So like there's, there's the rain, um, there's another line about how when they're like getting into the truck that like the lot is underwater, so I'm kind of like envisioning...I actually don't know what time of day it is, but for some reason I'm envisioning it being a little bit darker, but that might just be because of, of the rain that's happening. Maybe that's what's making me think that it's, it's a little bit darker outside, but I'm like envisioning the, the rain, and they're getting into the rig.But I, I didn't get that she was a truck driver. I, I, I think maybe... But I, but I, [00:35:00] I don't know. I don't know. I thought that maybe she was some sort of- Some sort of, like, news person. But I don't... ‘Cause I don't actually, I don't actually know what a 24-hour man is, so I think that might have... Okay. Yeah. No, I don't know.I was just like... So I, so I didn't know. Um, but I was, I was curious to know... Yeah. I was gonna say, I was curious to know why she was making this call to her mother at this moment, and why she was so desperate for her mother to answer the phone at this moment. Um, so yeah, th- those were, those are questions that I had.Jennie: Usually, back in the day, which this was, um, will you accept the charges was something you did when you had no money.Barbara: Mm-hmm.Jennie: You know, you would call home or wherever and, ‘cause you didn't have money to make a call, so the operator would place the call and ask the [00:36:00] person to accept the charges. Mm-hmm. And normally you would do that with somebody who knows you have, you're having a problem, or, you know.So, like, this is a very particular moment that led me to believe that she didn't, she didn't even have money for a call. So- Mm-hmm ... I don't know why I placed her as a trucker. Like, she climbed into the- Oh, okay ... the rig. She s- she sloshed her way to the lead truck. She's fiddling with the radio station. Like, what, where we headed?Yeah. Like, we're just on a job. I totally made her a truckerBarbara: and I- Yeah. No, no, no. I, well, I think maybe the reason I thought maybe she wasn't was because there were all these other... Because, like, Top is there, and the, it's, it's a lead truck, and she's, she's getting into the passenger side. And there's also a, a, a dog, I assume.I assume Arlo's a dog. I suppose it could be some other sort of animal that's, that's with her, but I, I assume Arlo's a dog. Um- Well,Jennie: so this is actually a really great [00:37:00] conversation for anybody listening, and particularly for this author. You can see that if you confuse your reader They're gonna spend their time with these kinds of questions.Like, is the mother Tess or is it Corey? Is this woman a trucker or not? Is... You know, and those are not the kind of questions you want to be leaving your reader with. Those are-Barbara: Yeah ...Jennie: um, I don't know w- how we would describe them, almost logistics. They're,Barbara: they're more like de- yeah, yeah, exactly. ‘Cause I mean, they're, I, I, I enjoy getting a good question at the start of reading something, you know?Like, you know, I mean, for example, it's, it's really interesting that Corey made what seems to be a collect call, and they didn't just not answer it. They answered it, and then hung up on her, which feels, like, very purposeful. And so, like, I'm very, I'm very curious about that relationship. I'm curious about the fact that, that Charlie is, is dead, um, and [00:38:00] who Charlie is to the, to the narrator.These are things that, like, have piqued my curiosity, and I would like to learn more about, um, would inspire me to read more, to learn more about those things. Uh, but then those other things that we were talking about, like, well, like, who is this? W- what kind of animal is Daisy? Like, what are, where are they actually going?Like, what, what is, what is the goal here? What, what is the deal about the, the lot and the, and the football field? The, w- what are we gonna do here? Those are questions that, that slowed me down, and made me less likely to want to keep reading.Jennie: Yeah. I loved that line, “But nobody sends a birthday card to a dead person.”Barbara: Yeah.Jennie: And I, I'm thinking- Really poignant ... that that's the center of this story, you know, s- who, who was Charlie? I think you said that. Mm-hmm. Was-Barbara: Mm-hmm.Jennie: And ‘cause she's got the jacket.Barbara: Yeah.Jennie: She's got Charlie's jacket, so- That, that'sBarbara: true, and sh- and she's wearing it, I think. [00:39:00]Jennie: Yeah, and, and so- I mean, I suppose Charlie could be a child if this person is older.Barbara: Yeah.Jennie: Like, you know, um, but y- I ... So I had this weird reaction to this, which is I thought it was fun, and maybe that was you reading it. I thought, I thought the writing was great, but I wouldn't turn the page. I'd be frustrated. You know, if, if there was another book or another story that was, um, didn't make me work so hard- Mmto figure out where I was or what was happening, I would choose that over this. So it's a weird combination for me of great job, but it's a no for me.Barbara: Yeah,Jennie: that- What about you?Barbara: That's, that's how I felt. There, there were a lot of elements here that I think are, that are intriguing and that if presented slightly differently would make me want to turn the page.But as, as it is right now, I, I would not. [00:40:00]Jennie: I agree with that. I think it feels close. Mm-hmm. Um, so how could we give this person some direction for, um- Yeah ... well, you talked about all the names, and I don't think the solution is ID all these names.Barbara: Right.Jennie: Mm-hmm. That's gonna be clunky. Or ID all these people. Um-Barbara: Yeah.I, I think for, for me personally, what I think would help was if we were to get a bit more of a peek inside the nar- inside Corey's head, so we could understand from her perspective why it's important that she's making this call, like, what the goal is with the truck. Um, if we just saw it a little bit more from her view and got to know a little bit more of the information that she already holds in her head, I think that would go a long way to making the story feel more accessible to the reader.Jennie: That's really well said, and [00:41:00] hopefully that helps the writer for your next pass to, to think about. But I- there's something, there's something good I think here going on. Mm-hmm. And, uh, I have the same, um, comment that I had earlier. I, I wanna know what kind of story I'm in, and I'm s- and I'm not sure. We were talking about sorting out these relationships and what's happening with the field and the truck and then the weather and all that, but again, is thisThere's no sense of what kind of story this is going to be. And, um, I, I always want a little more. And, and the title is Empty Spaces, which doesn't help, um- Yeah ... point us to that. I hear that. So just a little more, um, of a sense of what world are we? What, what problem do we have? What world are we in? Um, you know, and even just that last bit where the character turns the radio station on and yawns, “Where are we headed [00:42:00] tonight?”It- there's, there's not an urgency of It's, s- nobody's running from anything. There's no- Right ... threat, uh,except for the mom who won't answer the call.Barbara: Yeah, yeah.Jennie: Yeah. Um, so a little, a little more of a sense of what's at stake. Um, I know, we always are asking so much on a first page, but- I know ...Barbara: uh. I know, but e- you know, it's, there are so many things to read, you know, from, like agents, editors, readers, all have so many things to choose from, and so it's just so important to nail that first page, you know?Jennie: How many times do you rewrite your first pages?Barbara: Oh my gosh, so many times. So many times. Yeah. Yeah, well, um, ‘cause usually I write the first page, and then I write the rest of the book, and then I'm like, “Oh, like, the rest of the book does something different. I need to go back and, like, make this first page...”Also, I do, I often do the thing that I think a lot of writers do, which is, [00:43:00] once you've written a little bit further, you realize that, like, you've started at the wrong spot. Um, I mean, the, one of, one of the things that helps me when I, when I think to do it is to use one of the exercises that's in, that's in your work, where you, where you start what, you, you write the beginning and the ending before you even start anything.Um, and I, I, when I remember to do that the right way, that really, definitely helps me. Um, but I don't always remember to do that, and so I have, like, partway in, and then I'm like, “Wait, no, the first page.” So,Jennie: it's- Well, that, yeah, that's a, um, a step in the blueprint for a book book. Um, it's a good one, for sure.Uh, well, thank you so much for joining me for, for this, Kathleen, and congratulations on the new book. Um, for everyone listening, go check out, you can find everything at KathleenBarber.com. And, um, you can find Sisterhood Above All, which is brand new and just out and sounds like so much [00:44:00] fun. I, it's on my TBR, TBR.Yay. I just can't read, I just can't read thrillers at night. I get too scared. So,Barbara: um-Jennie: That'sBarbara: fair. That's fair ...Jennie: I, I have to wait till I'm, like, on a plane or, um, you know, somewhere where I'm reading during the day. Yeah. Is this one, is this one l- scary scary?Barbara: I mean, it's, it's not, like, scary scary. It's, it's not, like, uh- It's, it's not like there's someone who's out there to kill you for reasons that you cannot control.You know what I mean? Like, it's like- Yeah, yeah ... it would be scary to the people inside the book, but it should not be scary to you. ButJennie: I understand how- Well, we don't need to reas- We don't need to reassure me because people love these, love these- Yeah ... and, uh, what a fun, fun setting and setup for- Thank youa thriller. It's, it's exciting. Thanks. So can't wait to see how, how the world receives it. And- Mm ... um, I always hate to say this to somebody whose book just came out, but can't wait to see what you do next. [00:45:00]Barbara: Don't worry, I'm already writingJennie: stuff. Oh, yeah. Do you, ooh, do you wanna, do you wanna tell or no?Barbara: I, I do not, just ‘cause I get really superstitious about it, but, um, but I have something that I'm working on that I'm excited about, so you know, we'll see how it goes.Jennie: I love it. Well, thank you for joining us for Book Life, Jennifer.Barbara: Thanks for having me. That was a lot of fun.Jennie: For our listeners, let's get back to work and finish what matters most.Outro: The hashtag amwriting podcast is produced by Andrew Perilla. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output because everyone deserves to be paid for their [00:46:00] work This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

On the #amwriting podcast's Margin Notes, host Jennie Nash talks with Caroline Bicks, Stephen E. King Chair in Literature at the University of Maine and co-host of the Everyday Shakespeare podcast, about her book Monsters in the Archives: A Year of Fear with Stephen King. Bicks describes how she became the first invited into King's Bangor archives after King called to meet her, and how her sabbatical became a year of researching five formative works (including Carrie, Night Shift, The Shining, Salem's Lot, and Pet Sematary) to understand how horror language creates lasting fear. She explains choosing a first-person narrative that blends literary criticism, archival discovery, and her own anxiety, including eerie moments in the archive and insights into King's word-level edits, literary influences, and Shakespearean foundations, especially The Shining's ties to Hamlet.#AmWriting is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Read the Book* Monsters in the Archives by Caroline BicksTranscriptJennie: [00:00:00] Hi, I'm Jennie Nash, and you're listening to the #amwriting podcast, the place where we help writers of all kinds play big in your writing life, love the process, and stick with it long enough to finish what matters most. Welcome, everyone. This is Margin Notes, the part of the podcast where we're talking about the big decisions writers face in their work and creative lives.I'm here today with a super special guest. I'm so excited to speak with Caroline Bicks. She is the Stephen E. King Chair in Literature at the University of Maine, where she teaches courses in Shakespeare, early modern culture, and horror fiction. And she's the author of all kinds of very cool books ... about Shakespeare, including one on cocktails.Um, and, uh, is the co-host of the Everyday Shakespeare podcast, and we are here today to talk with her about her new book called [00:01:00] Monsters in the Archives: A Year of Fear with Stephen King. Welcome.Caroline: Thank you. Thanks for having me.Jennie: So this is gonna be the strangest interview you've probably ever done. ICaroline: don't know.Because- I've talked to a lot of people around the world about this Stephen King book.Jennie: I couldn't read your book. I, I couldn't read it. I can't read horror. Yeah. Which listeners of this podcast are gonna laugh about, ‘cause I'm actually coaching someone live and they're writing gothic horror, and they're probably like, “All you talk about is horror, Jennie.”But, um, it's actually the reason why I wanted to talk to you, because you made a decision in the writing of this book that I thought was super cool. Mm. Which was you put yourself in it.Caroline: Yeah.Jennie: And you're a scholar.Caroline: Yeah.Jennie: And you've written scholarly books, and you approach this with a scholarly perspective, but you, you really put yourself in it.And, and so [00:02:00] I was reading it for that part of the story and I had to skip over huge chunks of, of the, of the work. Because what you're doing in this book is you're getting at this question of- W- what, what is scary in writing? Like, how does it actually work? How does it act- what is the magic or the function that makes us feel this thing?And you actually feel it yourself while you're going through it, and I found it quite terrifying actually. So, um, that's kinda what I wanted to talk about is how did you make the decision? Well, first of all, you were the first person, I wanna make sure I get this right, ‘cause this is very cool. Yeah. You were the first person who was invited to the archives, the Stephen King archives.Caroline: Yeah. I mean, it's, it's a bit of a story, so I won't spend too much time on it, but just the mo- Oh, no, do. It's good ... when I ch- when I took this position... So I've been a Shakespeare professor my whole adult life, ba- as soon as I graduated from grad school in the late ‘90s, [00:03:00] and I was at Boston College for 15 years.I took this position at University of Maine nine years ago as a Shakespearean. Um, so it is an endowed chair in Stephen King's name because he's our most famous alum. So when I took the position, I, it was because I'm a Shakespearean, not because I'm a horror specialist. Um, I had always been a Stephen King fan since I read him when I was 12, and he scared the beje- Jesus out of me, um, with The Boogeyman story.Jennie: Right.Caroline: Um, so when I took this position though I was told, “You're never gonna meet Stephen King. Don't even make contact with him.” I'm like, “Fine, you know, this is still a great job. I'm excited.” Um- ThanksJennie: for the money. Yeah.Caroline: Thanks for... You know, no, it's a wonderful fund. It was funded by the Harold Alfond Foundation, and it's to support the public humanities, which is an incredible mission.So, um, I get to give money away to people. You know, it's a great, great position, but I was not a horror specialist. And particu- a- and as an adult, I actually wasn't reading horror because it scares me too much. You know? Yeah, yeah. Um, but it had grabbed me when I was a teenager. So it was about four years into the [00:04:00] job when I got a call at home from Stephen King, which just, uh, uh, my jaw hit the floor.And he said, “You know, I think it's time we meet.” I'm like, you know, I, I really fan-girled because I really, I have so much admiration for him and respect. Um, I invited him to come talk to our students. He was brilliant, generous, funny, kind, and I felt so at ease that I felt like I could ask... You know, and I got to know him professionally.We had a good professional relationship that developed from there. When I had a sabbatical year coming up the next year- I could have written another Shakespeare book. I had another one in my head. I've written a bunch of them but I knew that he and Tabitha had just collected all of his manuscripts and put them in a climate-controlled space attached to their home in Bangor, and I thought, “You know, this is an incredible opportunity.I would love to dig in there and be the first one in there, and just read those early drafts of the books that scared me so much when I was a teenager, and try to just explore why. Why were they sticking in my head still?” Um, again, I am not a specialist in... I'm not a cognitive scientist. I'm not a [00:05:00] specialist in horror literature, but I'm obviously highly trained in how to do literary analysis and how to do archival work, not Shakespeare, because we don't have any of his works, but, you know, I, I understand what that process is.So back to your question about why I wanted to bring myself into it, which was, you know, I had been experimenting with first-person storytelling after I got tenure. You know, ‘cause it's a long process, Kate. Right. And most of my writing had been academic writing, but I really had always loved storytelling And I got a piece into the Modern Love column.I started to have some success with publishing my first-person stories, and I was like, “You know, I love this.” So when I had this opportunity to go into his archives, they generously said yes, was amazing. I thought, “You know, I really wanna tell this story. I don't wanna write an academic book. I want this to be the story of a literature scholar, but really the story about a scared kid.”Jennie: Yeah.Caroline: You know, you, you never lose that scare, you know, I don't... This is the thing. Fear has stuck with me with those stories [00:06:00] for 40 years. So I was fascinated, and I just wanted to understand how he had crafted the language so that it was sticking in my head still. Because when I was talking to people around, you know, whenever you mention Stephen King to people, you know, if they've read him, they remember specific lines and specific words, and I was like, “That's an extraordinary, um, 50 years on to have that power.”So, um- Well- Anyway. Yeah. Go ahead. I, I could talk about this forever, so you tell me- Oh, no, it's- ... where you wanted to pick up from this.Jennie: It's so good. Well, I have to tell you this funny anecdote, which is that my college roommate was from Bangor, Maine, and babysat his kids in that house.Caroline: Oh, that's insane.Jennie: So when I went to visit her, she drove me by that house.There you go. And I was like, “Oh, hell no- Yeah ... would I ever babysit in that house.” Like, it's-Caroline: It's ‘cause it's like a gothic, it's like straight out of Haunting of Hill House ...Jennie: actually, and like these spiderweb gates that, and you describe that in the [00:07:00] book and, and the- Yeah ... archives are in that house. They'reCaroline: in the house.They're attached to the back. I know. And it, it was so, it was, it was insane. It was like a full-on 360 experience writing this book. Um, and I, I knew, like, so I did the research for a year. I didn't even know if this would be a book. I just knew I wanted to have the opportunity to be in there because it, I knew it was a great opportunity, and I was so curious, you know?Yeah. So I, I came out of the year with just tons of notes and observations, but I didn't have a book, you know? Yeah. And then I started experimenting with writing a chapter, and I just, the storytelling just came forward and then when I got an agent and she, you know, s- I, I, I was able to get a contract based on a proposal and that one chapter I had written and I was really fortunate to have a fabulous editor, David Ebershoff, at Hogarth, who is just such a wonderful writer himself, and he really encouraged me to bring my voice in and bring my story in even [00:08:00] more.Um, so that's- And- ... that's the story of that.Jennie: Was it hard for you as a scholar to do that?Caroline: You know what? It was so freeing and so fun that it actually wasn't, you know? Because I, I knew this wasn't going to be an academic book, so once I let go of that- Yeah ... um, I was like, wow, I have the, and yet I have this skill set I can bring forward, and I knew that's what would make this unique.Um, but I can combine my two favorite ways of writing, ‘cause I do actually love writing literary criticism. Like it's, I get a thrill out of it. I wouldn't be doing it this long if I didn't get a thrill out of it, but I also love telling my own stories and drawing a reader in. And so for me it was like just a circus carnival.Like it was so fun to be able to do it. Once I had the permission and I had a contract, I was like, fine, you know? I, I, who am I writing this book for? I'm writing it for me, you know? Like this is just something I wanna do because I'm so passionate [00:09:00] about it and I, and I love Stephen King. And, um, once I got into it that way and wasn't thinking about who's gonna criticize me for this, like how will academics view this, I was like, I don't care.I just don't care. I know I've got a great story to tell that people are gonna love to read because there's so many people that love not just Stephen King, but people who love reading about how great books get written, you know? Yeah. And so that was the audience I had in my mind when I, when I was crafting it.It was really, in my mind, anybody who cares about books and writing. It doesn't have to be... So when you say, you're not the first person who's said to me, “I can't read your book,” or, “I can't read-” Oh, I'm so glad. “... Stephen King books,” you know, and I'm like, “That's okay. You can skip, you know, the parts that really scare you,” because there's plenty about just like that first chapter I wrote about Pet Sematary, just his sticky notes back and forth with his copy editor, which is so fun I think.You know, it's just like, wow.Jennie: Totally. Yeah. But the thing that you do is you- Allow yourself to confront that fear-Caroline: Yeah ...Jennie: [00:10:00] that, that I feel that the people can't, that can't read horror feel. You know, anybody that even allows themselves to be scared feels. And-Caroline: Yeah ...Jennie: and you, you do some very specific things, um, which I, I found fascinating, including tracking down on eBay the original copy of that book you read as a- Yeah, I wanted-as a teenager.Caroline: Yeah, that was part of the process for me, was I wanted to make sure I was reading... So before I would go into the archives for each work, and I'd spent like two... I only picked five, because I wanted to... First of all, I knew I wanted to make this personal. Um, and those were the five that scared me the most when I was a teenager.So I grew up in the ‘70s and the ‘80s as a teenager, so for me, it was in real time when the books were coming out practically. So it was- Yeah ... Carrie, Night Shift, The Shining, Salem's Lot, Pet Sematary. Um, I'm forgetting one of course. Uh, but I went -Jennie: The other one.Caroline: The other one. Had a huge impact on me. [00:11:00] So it was those five, and I, I knew those were the ones I was gonna do a deep dive into, and that I wanted to really re-engage with, and bring my whole self to.So I wanted to find the copies that I had read in the ‘70s and the early ‘80s. And fortunately, it's pretty easy to find them. Uh, so yeah, but eBay sometimes I had to go on, or go into a used bookstore and, you know, find the like actual 1979 paperback, you know.Jennie: Um- I mean, that- Um ... I just, there's some, there's so much to say about that because-Caroline: YeahJennie: like, I just, um- We, we just had a new bookcase built, um, which is something I've wanted to do well for eight years in this house. But it's a thing I've always wanted to have, which is like a grand bookcase, and it just was finished last week, and we had all the books packed up in storage, and we brought all the books back.Then we went through this discernment process of what goes [00:12:00] on those shelves. And I, you know, I had all those books from when I was a kid, even when I was a kid-kid, and they're yellow, and moldy and falling apart, and the covers aren't on, and they're taped and-Caroline: Yeah ...Jennie: eh, but I cannot let them go-Caroline: Yeah ...Jennie: because those...that was the object.Caroline: That's the object. This is what I feel sad for kids now, because they're not gonna have those same memories, um, of books. Yes. You know? And I don't think they stick in your head the same way if you don't have the full sensory embodied experience with a book.Jennie: Right. You know? Even when you open...I read on Kindle, which I love for so many reasons. Yeah. But you don't even see the cover.Caroline: You don't see the cover, right. And for me, it's so much. Like, I remember going to the Scholastic Book Fair and being like- Yes ... “I'm getting Summer of My German S- Soldier because Christy McNichol's on the cover,” you know?Yes. Yes. So yeah, that was part of the journey for me was I did wanna just [00:13:00] reconnect with those books again, try to h- and as much as you can, you know, reexperience the feelings of f- like The Shining, I actually... the only one I still have from 1977 is the actual Shining that I read. Um, and that's, for me, that woman in room 217.Well, I know you haven't read it ‘cause you're probably... What? But, um, it, that particular one I still have from, from when I was growing up. Um, and I love that I still have it, and it still has the photo... You know, it's the version that has the photo inserts that includes the Kubrick film photos. Oh, okay.Jennie: Okay.Yeah, yeah.Caroline: And I read it before I saw the film, so I remember being- 15 reading it and then seeing the pictures and being like you know? And that's part of the experience, but it wasn't, it's different than seeing the film, you know? And I really, I wanted to write this book as a love letter to language and to books, and not to film.Like, there's, that's a whole other category I think that enters people's brains in totally different ways. It's a very different experience. For me it's about, like going back to your original question [00:14:00] about like why, why, why do stories cause fear, and like what's the value perhaps in that? Yeah. That was something I came to after this long journey really, and talking to people and thinking about why.And also by understanding and reading more about Stephen King's books and talking to him about them, and realizing for him how much these stories are rooted in personal experiences or fears of grief and loss. And- Yes ... that was really profound for me. And like The Night Shift, which is the ur-text that I start with, ‘cause that's the one I read when I was 12, and that's his first collection of short stories.It came out in 1978. It's 20 short stories. But he ends it with a story about his mother dying, and it's, I mean, it's thinly veiled autobiography. It's about a man who's watching his mother die in the hospital. Um, but it's clearly a mirror of his own experience losing his mother when he was 26. And I'm like, wow, what's that doing in a collection of horror stories?[00:15:00] And it's like, what? ‘Cause that is of course, at least for me and I think for a lot of people, that's the core fear we first have, is that where's mommy, right? Yeah. Right? You lose the person who's in charge of taking care of you, and if you're lucky, does it well and with care. Um, but even if it's not, like Carrie, you know, the more I was looking through the Carrie drafts, I was like, right, he's really homing in on Carrie calling out for her mother even though her mother's terrible and abusive to her, right?So it's, there's just this, I don't know. It's a long way around to say I think horror, and he writes about this really eloquently, is a way for us to metabolize our deepest fears. Um, and to look at trauma not head-on but sideways. Um, and he writes about that, um, a number of different places in a really powerful way.He's just such an extraordinary human. You know, he's been thinking about this and for so long.Jennie: Yeah. Yeah. So, so your willingness to [00:16:00] confront that, those particular fear, fears in your own self and on behalf of the reader, really puts you in it. I mean, like you, there's a really lovely moment where you are reading I think it's, I think it's Pet Sematary, reading the actual book, and you have to turn it over so you- Yeahdon't see, like on your nightstand so you don't see the cover. I'mCaroline: scared, I'm scared of the cover, right, still.Jennie: Yeah.Caroline: Yeah.Jennie: And then there's moments, se- several where you're driving And you're sort of holding your breath while you drive past a place that he writes about or, or- Mm-hmm ... you know, um, well you have to tell the story, I'm sure every interviewer asks you about the, um, the doorknob in the archive.You have to, like, I was-Caroline: Yeah, not too many people have asked me about that, but I'm like, that to me was the scary moment-Jennie: Wait, shut up ... the most, theCaroline: most sturdy. I'm like, wh- uh, why did that happen? But of course, I mean, there's a reason why it happened. It's, it's, it [00:17:00] automatically locks if, you know, the, if you- Okaydon't lock it So let's, let's play- So but it just happened that we were inside the archive room. It was me and, and Julie Ugli, who is their assistant, who was helping me through this whole process. And I know, and I was, like, literally holding the first page of the first draft of The Boogeyman, the story that had scared me so badly when I was 12, about a monster that comes out of closets, and we're like in this room.And the, the archive room, it actually, it almost feels like a closet. It's not huge at all. You know, it's just-Jennie: Yeah ...Caroline: top to bottom, ceiling to floor stacked shelving with, you know, boxes of materials. And yeah, and we were in there, and I'm holding the first page, and the lock closes on its own. It just goes...And I'm like, I'm looking at Julie, I'm like, “What is, what's happening?” We don't have our cell phones with us. I'm like, “Are we stuck in here? Like, what's gonna happen?”Jennie: In the scary archive- In this, I was terrified ... in the back of the scary house. Like-Caroline: I know, I know. It was like, you can't make this stuff up.That's why I was like, I [00:18:00] couldn't wait, when I finally got a chance to write the book and sit down and write, I was like, I can't wait to tell these stories, because they just... I, I'm not a fiction writer. Like, I, I have such mad respect for- I don't know about that ... well, I've m- We'll see I don't know. I have mad respect for people who can write fiction.For me, I only can write what I know and exper- So I'm like, ah. But these stories were just so amazing. Or like when I was reading The Shining, like the first draft of The Shining, which is crazy. I mean, it's so different from the published version. And like getting to the woman in room 217, and like reading th- and literally my head w- like I thought I was having a stroke.Like it was like, like... And it's like, and then I find an interview where Stephen King writes about how he was scared to go back to that scene when he was revising it, the book, because he was dreading it. And I was like, oh, my God, have I just like had some kind of telepathic experience with Stephen King?Like- Right ... across time, space, and yeah, it was amazing.Jennie: Well, yeah. I mean, [00:19:00] it's just, um, uh, I actually made myself go through the whole book skipping giant chunks.Caroline: I feel so badly I put you through this.Jennie: I know. I, I feel like why, I kept saying, “Why? Why did I think this was a good idea?” Um, and it- I mean, even just tangentially, I, I don't know.It's interesting. I have, I'm sure you have this too, anybody who reads a lot or spends a lot of time with words, you have a capacity to sort of pay half attention, if that makes sense.Caroline: Mm-hmm.Jennie: Um, like you c- could sort of look at it without letting it all the way in. Yeah. But I, I just was, I just was riveted by the thread of, of your story and your putting yourself through that as a scholar and a human.But, but then some really cool things happen, and I, and I have flagged, um... Do you, [00:20:00] w- would you mind reading a tiny piece? It's- No, not at all ... it's on page 82, and it's the p- the paragraph that starts, “These manuscripts.”Caroline: Yeah.Jennie: That would be amazing.Caroline: Absolutely. So this is actually the moment I just described to you, where my head was like, I got...Oh, actually, I had just discovered the last 150 pages of the original Shining manuscript in a random folder in the archives, and I was like, “What is this doing here?” And I was getting obsessive about the manuscripts at this point, clearly- Yeah. Yeah ... just like the main character in The Shining, Jack Torrance, who gets obsessed with the manu- with the papers in the basement of the Overlook Hotel.But here we go. “These manuscripts are definitely getting into my head, and not just its rational part. In his memoir, when King describes books as being a uniquely portable magic, he doesn't specify what kind of magic. What if manuscripts can absorb and store more than just ink and words? [00:21:00] What if their pages can pass on dark energy along with dark stories?Ghosts have more than one way of making sure their stories are heard, of ensuring that the past is not forgotten, but rather pressed into our minds, even if we wrench our heads off the pillow and refuse to listen.” And that last is a reference to my, I used to see a ghost when I was five, and I write about that in the book too.Jennie: I mean, when I read that, I was like, “That's, that's me.” Like, these ghosts and horrors are pressing themselves into my mind, and I'm refusing to listen, and they still, they still do. And, um, King's stories in particular are so iconic, you can't really escape them. Like, you, you know the scenarios, you know the characters, you know-Caroline: YeahJennie: you know. And, and so it was interesting for me reading this book that that described my [00:22:00] experience where I was both repelled and magnetized at the same time.Caroline: That's beautiful the way you just put that. I mean, I think that is exactly our relationship also, of course, to our own fears. You know, again, what makes these stories endure, and I didn't go into this book thinking like, “This is a book about promoting Stephen King,” and, you know- Rightlike, I don't work for Stephen King. I just want to put that out there. Right. He, you know, he graciously agreed to let me go into the archives. He's been very generous about answering all my questions I had about the manuscripts, but he never at any point was like, “You can't say this,” or, “This is how you're supposed to say this.”So, but what I came away with after this process was exactly what you're describing, why we need these stories, why they endure, actually, is because they tap into our very real human fears. It's not about the monsters. It's about the grief and loss that's coming for all of us if we live long enough, you know?So you, and you have to at some point confront that, you know? So if it's- Yeah ... you can [00:23:00] try to run away from it, but it's coming, and that's part of being human. That's the human experience, obviously. Not to be glib, but it's like-Jennie: Yeah ...Caroline: you will experience loss. You will experience grief. And if these stories help you metabolize that or have a cathartic experience with that feeling without having to actually experience your worst fear, right?Um, like Aristotle says, it's cathartic, right? It's you watch a play, a, a tragedy because you experience a catharsis.Jennie: And did you, did you get to that in your own process?Caroline: That's a really good question. Um- You know, I, I think I became more aware of it. You know, I am, you know, and I write about this very openly in the book, that I was an extremely anxious little kid, um, which is part of why I think the boogeyman triggered me in the particular way it did, you know.Um, and that I grew into a pretty [00:24:00] anxious adult, you know? Yeah. I think anxiety is one of those things that, you know, I... Again, I was born in the ‘60s, so we didn't have this language for this back then. Like, my parents wouldn't have known to call me an anxious child, you know? Right. They probably would've said, “Oh, she's shy,” or, “She's whatever.”Um, so I think I, you know, like, and I as an adult, I think I've, I've found ways to manage it pretty well, but I am definitely a control freak. Like, that's part of how I manage it. I shouldn't use that language, but you know, it's like I, I like to just control what I can control, and that makes me feel that I can put the anxiety at bay.So I will say I think it's been interesting for me, Nick, now when I have those moments that are my worst fear moments that sometimes still will creep up on me just even though when I think I've figured it out, like doom s- doom scenarios. I tend to go to doom scenarios. So, like, if I can't reach... Uh, I will say Life360 has been, like, the best invention on the planet for me-with my two kids [00:25:00] and my husband. I'm like, “I know exactly where everyone is.” Yeah. It has saved me a lot of worry. Sometimes Life360 doesn't work, or sometimes a person still doesn't answer the phone, and then I have to manage my anxie- And then it's like... So I will say it's been interesting going through this process and having to confront or revisit the core of what scares me and, like, why that impacts, you know, why certain moments come forward for me still.So I think, yeah, I think it has helped me to a degree. Like, I can recognize it more clearly now. I'm like, “Oh, right, that's why I'm scared of that,” you know? Um-Jennie: That's so cool.Caroline: Yeah.Jennie: And it feels like that's the, the, um, the transformation in the book is you're exploring how that actually works and the language and the stories.Mm-hmm. But you're, you're also exploring how it works in your own self, how it did when you were young, how it does now- Yeah ... these moments when you're scared. So it- Mm-hmm ... there's such [00:26:00] a depth to it and, I mean, I just, uh, even in my half reading of it, I just loved it. Thank you. And, um, there's something that happens That's kind of crazy, which is, so you're a Shakespeare scholarCaroline: Mm-hmmJennie: And I ha- I, I know from reading Steve, a- about Stephen King, from reading his book On Writing, of course, and, um, interviews and such that, uh, I'm, I'm probably gonna say this in a disrespectful way, and I don't mean it to be so, but the, the easiest way I can describe it is that he's always had sort of a chip on his shoulder that he's just a popular writer and not taken seriously in a literary way.Mm. I don't know if that's, if that is fair to say, but that's how I'm saying it. Uh,Caroline: yeah.Jennie: And, um, what, what I found incredible was that [00:27:00] here comes this Shakespeare scholar into his archives doing proper scholarly archiver, arch- archival work, and there's this moment when you begin to see Shakespearean themes in his, in his work, and you can't ignore it, and particularly in, in Carrie and- Yeahparticularly around exactly the thing you were wrestling with, which is like a young girl's- I don't know, sense of, of not being fitting in the world or, um-Caroline: Yeah ...Jennie: right? And so that, um, there's, on page, since you have the book in your hand, um, I think it's pageCaroline: 202. Mm-hmm.Jennie: And it refers back to that passage you just read about portable magic.It's the one that's I remembered.Caroline: [00:28:00] Right. Okay. So this is going back to when I first was, um, I was in the final round of the job for the Stephen E. King Chair in Literature, and I was working on a book about Shakespeare's, the girls in Shakespeare's plays and world and teenage girls and their cognition.Like, the how were people during Shakespeare's day thinking about girls' brains? Yeah. So I'd been working on this for 10 years. Um, and then I was getting ready to give my job talk. This was the first time Stephen King and Shakespeare came together for me, and it was getting ready, and this, again, this is an authentic story, like write what you know.So I was getting ready for the job talk. I remembered that King's 1974 novel, Carrie, featured a 16-year-old girl whose telekinetic powers are unleashed when she gets her first period in the school shower. I started rereading it, and within a few pages came across an uncanny phrase. When she's walking home after being dismissed early, Carrie feels her brain flexing in a new way, [00:29:00] as if her powers have been waiting below the surface for her to reach, quote, “mental puberty.”I couldn't have wordsmithed this dynamic cognitive change better myself. In the last part of my job talk, I used the phrase to connect the brain work of Juliet Capulet, who's described as being two weeks away from seeing the change of 14 years, to Carrie's newly activated adolescent mind. It felt like a moment of pure portable magic between Stephen King, Shakespeare, and me.Jennie: Ugh, so beautiful.Caroline: Oh, thank you. Yeah. I mean, that was just so gobsmacking. Like, when that happened, I was like, I ca- I can't believe it, but yeah.Jennie: And then, now I may be getting some of the things wrong here, but then you- You realize, is it Carrie that, that you realize he was, you thought he was emulating a play, a Shakespeare play?Caroline: I think you're thinking of Shining. I mean, definitely at the end of the Carrie [00:30:00] chapter I return to, I did notice echoes of Macbeth, and I was convinced that that must have been what he was thinking about. And, and what's funny is, so one of the conversations I got to have with him, I mean, he's so generous with his time, one of my last conversations with him was about the end of Carrie, and that's a book that he actually doesn't like very much.You know, it was his first published novel, he was 26, and he's like, “I think that was written by a young man who thought he knew more than he did.” So he's, it's not a book that he goes back to. He recognizes it's important, and it's important to him, but, ‘cause it started his whole career, his whole trajectory.Um, but he didn't particularly, he hasn't returned to it. Yeah. So that was a fun chance for me to sort of talk to him and say, “Hey, you know what? I think you should maybe go back,” ‘cause it's it's, there's a lot of Shakespeare in there. Anyway, but the Shining chapter, what was fascinating, so there's this first draft, which I, I write a lot about, called The Shine, that's in the archives, with a totally different ending.Um, and when I looked at it, [00:31:00] he'd also divided it into acts and scenes, like Roman numeral acts and little- Mm ... Roman numeral scenes. And I was like, “This, what is this? This is like a Shakespeare play.” Like, that's what it looked like. And then sure enough, I found out he was imagining, he was thinking of a Shakespeare tragedy when he wrote The Shining.And that was the first moment where I was like, “What? This is insane.” Like, this- Yeah ... like, ob- obviously that became, for me, the story I wanted to tell about that particular set of manuscripts, was sort of uncovering, like, what's the Shakespeare play? Like, what's the tragedy? And I didn't wanna ask him because I didn't want- I wanted to go in with my mind clear, like, of any outside influence.I just wanted to see what my Shakespeare brain, because I'm so embedded in Shakespeare. I also have a Shakespeare podcast I do with my best friend. Like, we're, I'm always thinking about Shakespeare and how it relates to everyday life. You know, and so I'm like, “Well, how does it relate to The Shining?” Which is, like, an ur-American text.Like, this, like, say what you want about horror, [00:32:00] like- I'd be shocked if people don't know what The Shining's about, even if they haven't read it even if they haven't seen the film. Like, you probably know something about The Shining, right? Right. So I was like, if there's a Shakespeare tragedy at the foundation of this, you know.And here's the thing about Stephen King that I came to learn, again, reading all of his notes and finding these edits, and I did find traces of Macbeth in the first draft of The Shine, um, that he ended up taking out. So I was like, “Oh, is it Macbeth? It feels like it could be Macbeth.” There's so many things it has in common with it, with hallucinations and with baby bashing.And, you know, all of these horrible things that are in Macbeth are certainly in that book. Um, but I really wanted to go in, like, just on an adventure, like, see what I saw. So I didn't ask him which chi- tragedy until I was fully done with all my research and I felt like I had it all done. And that's when he drops that he was thinking of Hamlet.And once he said that, of course, it became so ... I mean, I [00:33:00] had seen traces, there were references to Ophelia that also didn't make it into the final published draft. So you wouldn't know this. This is the beauty of archival work, like you're gonna see things that other people will never know about unless you tell the story.That's why I felt so passionate about this. Like, “I need to tell people-” Yeah ... “that Ophelia was in the first draft, that he was thinking of Ophelia.” ‘Cause of course, you know, again, even if you don't know The Shining, the woman in the tub, the woman in the bathtub, like a drowned woman in a tub, like ah, Ophelia.Yeah. Like Ophelia's another one of those ur, like she's so, she's such a part of our cultural air, right? I mean, like no matter what country you're in. Right. There's a reason Taylor Swift has a whole, you know, song The Fate of Ophelia. Like people know what that means. Um, so I was like, “Oh my gosh, this is, this is incredible.This is even deeper than I thought it was gonna be.” Um, but also it made me appreciate how much that book is about intergenerational trauma. Um, and it's not ... So he doesn't like the Kubrick film [00:34:00] for reasons that, you know, a couple different reasons. One is that it flattens out the character of Jack Torrance, and Jack Torrance is an abused child himself, and he passes on that abuse to his son, Danny, right?Um, but you wouldn't know that from Kubrick's film. While Hamlet, of course, is about a father's ghost coming forward. Like, “The past is a ghost,” King writes, which is so f- powerful, right? Um, here's this ghost saying, “You need to kill for me.”Jennie: Yeah.Caroline: Yeah. And that's what happens to Jack. Yeah, so anyway, that's a long way to say that wasEach chapter was my favorite in different ways, but that one I loved being able to do the deep Shakespeare dive.Jennie: And was that ... You know, so I started that question by saying I, I had heard or understood or maybe inferred that, um, you know, King himself had this sort of desire- Okay ... to be taken more seriously.Was that, that must have been, I don't know, powerful for both you and him, uh, to [00:35:00] come to that? Not like, “Oh, you're the only person that's ever made him feel that way” or-Caroline: Yeah,Jennie: no,Caroline: I agree ... or agree with that, but. Like I, yeah. And, um, I mean, I will say I think part of the reason he was always really ... I mean, first of all, he's just so generous, and any writer who's ever worked with him has the same experience.Like he just gives his time. He just loves writing and writers so much that he will just, he'll just t- like any email I would send him, he'd write back in like an hour with a response. The part about how he feels about academia, you know, and I never directly asked him that because I didn't wanna ... You know, if he wanted to bring it up, great.But I think- Yeah ... my, after going on this journey with him, he clearly loves talking about- literature. He's the most well-read person I've ever met. I'm just gonna say that hands down. Like, the guy reads- Really? ... cons- constantly and if you read his early works, like even when he was 17, he wrote The Long Walk, okay, which just came out as a film, [00:36:00] and in that, he's citing T.S.Eliot, he's cit- he's citing Poe at 17. Okay? So he's, he, he, this, he comes by this honestly. He's not just trying to seem smart. Like, he literally is constantly reading and it's clear when you read his manuscripts or when you read his published books, he's making references to all, whether it's Shirley Jackson or Wallace Stevens or, you know, uh, he's so capacious in his knowledge of literature.And, like, just a couple months ago, he sent me an email, I don't, I can't remember, we were talking about something about Salem's Lot, and he was like, “Yeah, when I was writing Salem's Lot,” which again, this is 1975 when he's writing Salem's Lot, so that's a long time ago. He's like, “I was really into James Dickey's poetry.”Jennie: Whoa.Caroline: You know, who was an American no, you know, poet laureate. Uh, he's like, “And I was reading everything I could read of, of his and then I read Deliverance, and then I went back to his poetry, and that really impacted how I wrote the chapters [00:37:00] about the Lot,” which if you've read Salem's Lot, has some very lyrical, poetic chapters about the town, like, “The town knew about darkness.The town had its secrets and knew how to kept it.” And then he, like, sends me the entire poem that he was thinking about that James Dickey wrote. So I mean, it's, he's, and it's not performative. He's not, like, he has nothing. He doesn't need to prove anything to me, you know?Jennie: Right, to anyone, yeah.Caroline: He just literally loves, he loves literature.Like, this guy, he loves poetry. I mean, he actually writes poetry. He wrote poetry as an undergraduate. Uh, it was actually the core start for him of The Stand, was a poem he wrote called The Dark Man one day when he was, like, hungover in the school, like, cafeteria. Like, so it's like he, he's been thinking about literature and living with literature and, uh, since he was a teenager, if not earlier.His mom brought him, uh, Bram Stoker out of the public library when he was nine, so I mean, the guy- Whoa ... ‘cause he asked for it. He asked for Dracula. [00:38:00] I wasn't reading Dracula when I was nine. Were you? I mean-Jennie: No,Caroline: no. I was reading Little House on the Prairie. I mean-Jennie: Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Wow. Wow. So- I mean, this book, again, it's called Monsters in the Archives: My Year of Fear with Stephen King by Carolyn Bicks.It's just incredible, whether you're a King fan, whether you're a horror fan, um, but for sure for all writers, which are all our listeners. If you can, if you can bear it.It's very specific, um, a very specific- specific exploration of, of how good writing works really. Yeah. Right. And, and how you... You know, there's always that perennial question of how do you get emotion on the page? How do you make your reader feel something? And you, you show it very specifically, and I wanted so badly [00:39:00] to, to get into the details, and I, and I, I just, I just couldn't.Um, maybe someday, but, um, I just, I just can't recommend it enough for, for, um, this audience and, um, you know, anyone who's interested in any of these things we've talked about.Caroline: Thank you so much. I really appreciate that. And I will say, like, the Pet Sematary chapter, which is the first one, that was the first day I was in the archives.One of the things I discovered about him day one was how much attention he pays to word sounds. So I think for any writer interested in sort of doing a deep dive into, like, how one word change, right- Yeah ... can make a difference, you know? Yeah. And I didn't appreciate that about his writing until I went in there and saw his notes to the copy editor where he's like, “Nope, the word's clitter, not clatter.This is why.” You know? Like,Jennie: he's- There's a, um- Yeah ... yeah, there's a book I love, it's probably right behind me, um, called The Artful Edit by Susan Bell, in which she [00:40:00] shows examples of that kind of very careful change in, um, The Gre- The Great Gatsby and The English Patient and various works of, of literature, and your, your whole book is like that.It's, it's just amazing. Um- Thank you ... so is the next book gonna be the Shakespeare one you had thought of before? Or are you gonna- ... go in the, in the personal direction?Caroline: You know, it's such a good question. I think right now I'm just taking a break, you know, because I'm the kind... Like, I immerse myself in a project, and this has been so all-consuming.Um, and I'm back to doing my Everyday Shakespeare podcast, which I love and I missed. Um, so I'm doing that. And I, I really don't like to think too far ahead about what I'm going to write. I like to have it come organically.Jennie: Yeah.Caroline: Um, so I could go back into the archives. I could write another one of these kinds of books, but I don't know if that's the [00:41:00] right thing for me right now.Jennie: Yeah.Caroline: Um, I want to make sure whatever I write next- You know, I loved writing this book so much. It's my favorite... I mean, it's, it was such a powerful experience for me, um, because I could bring my personal experiences into it and my scholarly self into it. I don't... You know, it's gonna be hard to recreate that.Yeah. I think it can be done, but I don't wanna force it. Yeah. So I'm gonna wait and see what the next, what the next oneJennie: is. Don't you, don't you love the interviewer who's like, “Hey, congratulations. You wrote a book. What, what's your nextCaroline: one?” What are you working on now? What are you doing now? I know. And I get that.I'm like-Jennie: So mean ...Caroline: I'm just, I'm just reading books I wanna read. I'm doing my laundry. I'm getting to know my dog again. You know?Jennie: Oh, wow. Well, thankCaroline: you. But, you know, it's a fair question. Yeah.Jennie: Yeah, yeah. Thank you for coming and chatting about this, and for writing such a cool book. And- Thank you ... um, I'm looking forward to seeing what you do next.Caroline: Thank you, Jennie. It was a [00:42:00] pleasure.Jennie: Well, for our listeners, until next time, stop playing small and write like it matters.The #amwriting podcast is produced by Andrew Perilla. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output because everyone deserves to be paid for their work This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

J.B. Poersch, president of Senate Majority PAC, sat down with Jake Sherman and Anna Palmer to break down Democratic strategy, party leadership and the upcoming primaries. Stick around: CNN's Lauren Fox and our own Max Cohen swing by for That's Not Gonna Fly. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jennie Nash interviews author Meghan P. Browne about her journey from picture-book nonfiction to selling her first middle-grade novel, after participating in the 2022 Blueprint Challenge. Browne began the project in 2019, drafted it during her MFA at Vermont College of Fine Arts, then used the Blueprint framework to “reverse engineer” the manuscript and discover it lacked plot; the inside outline helped her connect scene events to emotional meaning. After tragedy and other commitments, she returned to revise intensively, resubmitted to her agent, and the novel later sold. Browne also describes submitting pages to the podcast's First Page Lab and learning to absorb both critical and positive feedback. Visit Meghan on her website: https://meghanpbrowne.comThanks for reading #AmWriting! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work.Join the Blueprint Summer ChallengeStarting a book? Stuck in a draft? Planning a revision?The Blueprint Summer Challenge is designed to help you make meaningful progress on your manuscript this summer.Over six weeks, beginning July 10, you'll use the Blueprint—a proven framework for developing stronger books with greater clarity, purpose, and reader impact—to move your project forward, wherever you are in the process.Whether you're writing nonfiction, memoir, fiction, or another genre entirely, the goal is simple: spend six focused weeks making your book stronger.Start with the Blueprint CourseWe're offering an all-new Blueprint course in Teachable, which includes:* The full text of The Blueprint* Fourteen video lessons covering every step of the framework* Real coaching examples that show writers applying the Blueprint to their own projects* Practical guidance you can use immediatelyThe course is designed to help you develop a stronger foundation for your book—whether you're beginning from a blank page, working through a draft, or planning a revision.Course enrollment: $19

HubSpot retired a 15-year-old word, and George B. Thomas wanted to be a fly on the wall in the room where it got decided. In this episode, he and Chad Hohn get the next best thing: a sit-down with Kat Tooley, HubSpot's VP of Global Events and Experiential Marketing and the architect behind turning INBOUND into UNBOUND.This is the untold origin story, the internal fears, and what UNBOUND 2026 actually means for the humans who built their businesses on the word INBOUND.In this episode:• UNBOUND started as a half-joke at an internal kickoff, then survived a multi-year planning cycle that could have killed it• Why Yamini stayed the path: "We have conviction and we know this name feels right. We've done the testing."• HubSpot didn't bury inbound. It outgrew the word. The methodology is still alive.• The thread tying Tom Brady, Cynthia Erivo, Mel Robbins, and Suni Williams to "unbound"• How HubSpot runs the whole event out of its own portal, with Breeze and a full ROI model: "its own little HubSpot within  HubSpot"• Kat's two-rule discipline for a rebrand that lands: evolution, not revolution• What's new for 2026: the Exchanges, the Spotlight keynote, and a new CPO on stageRegister for UNBOUND 2026 (September 16 to 18, Boston): https://unbound.hubspot.comRead the full recap: https://sidekickstrategies.com/podcast/hubheroes-inbound-to-unbound-origin-story

On the #amwriting podcast's “Margin Notes,” Jennie Nash talks with Dr. Diana Hill (author of Wise Effort) about how the urge to prove yourself—through resumes, accolades, or “pre-order my book” pleas—undermines authenticity and connection, especially when pitching ideas, proposals, or personal brands. Hill describes confronting this while rebranding her website and shifting from listing credentials to articulating the real user experience and who the work is and isn't for, using specific language that reflects her core value of awareness/attunement rather than generic, AI-like claims. They unpack the psychology behind proving (seeking safety, belonging, and autonomy) and suggest asking which need is driving the behavior, aiming instead to demonstrate value, embrace vulnerability, and rely on trusted “tough love” feedback.Books Mentioned* Wise Effort by Dr. Diana HillJoin the Blueprint Summer ChallengeStarting a book? Stuck in a draft? Planning a revision?The Blueprint Summer Challenge is designed to help you make meaningful progress on your manuscript this summer.Over six weeks, beginning July 10, you'll use the Blueprint—a proven framework for developing stronger books with greater clarity, purpose, and reader impact—to move your project forward, wherever you are in the process.Whether you're writing nonfiction, memoir, fiction, or another genre entirely, the goal is simple: spend six focused weeks making your book stronger.Start with the Blueprint CourseWe're offering an all-new Blueprint course in Teachable, which includes:* The full text of The Blueprint* Fourteen video lessons covering every step of the framework* Real coaching examples that show writers applying the Blueprint to their own projects* Practical guidance you can use immediatelyThe course is designed to help you develop a stronger foundation for your book—whether you're beginning from a blank page, working through a draft, or planning a revision.Course enrollment: $19

Iowa Democrats are dreaming big in 2026, aiming to flip the governor's mansion, a Senate seat and three House districts. Anna and Jake discuss Max Cohen's latest on-the-ground reporting on the Democrats' very tall task. Plus, who's up and who's down in this week's Punch Power Matrix. Watch this episode on YouTube here! Punchbowl News is on YouTube⁠. ⁠⁠⁠Subscribe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to our channel today to see all the new ways⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠we're investing in video.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Want more in-depth daily coverage from Congress?⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠Subscribe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to our free Punchbowl News AM newsletter at ⁠⁠punchbowl.news.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Punchbowl News Defense Reporter Briana Reilly joins Max Cohen to talk about drama on the House floor as Republicans postponed consideration of Rep. Gregory Meeks' (D-N.Y.) war powers resolution. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jennie Nash hosts a Write Big session of the #amwriting podcast introducing an “arena” metaphor for writers, inspired by Brené Brown's Daring Greatly (and Teddy Roosevelt's “man in the arena” quote), Priya Parker's The Art of Gathering, and Taylor Swift's Eras Tour. Jennie argues that writers, like performers, intentionally gather an audience and should be clear about who they want in the “seats,” what experience they want readers to have, and what energy and feedback they want in return. Using Swift's deliberate creation of emotionally meaningful, immersive moments and audience delight, Nash urges writers to stop playing safe, claim full creative power, and step into the spotlight with purpose. She emphasizes that internal satisfaction comes from making what matters first, and that external rewards follow from writing big, not the other way around.Books* Daring Greatly by Brené Brown* The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker#AmWriting is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.TranscriptHi, I'm Jennie Nash, and you're listening to the #amwriting podcast, the place where we help writers of all kinds play big in your writing life, love the process, and stick with it long enough to finish what matters most. This is a Write Big session, where I'm bringing you short episodes about the mindset shifts that help you stop playing small and write like it matters.Today I'm talking about a concept that I haven't spoken much about before, and it's a big one for me, and it might take a bit of explaining. The concept is a metaphor, and it has to do with an arena, with being a writer in an arena. And if the image that just came to your mind involves gladiators and bloody battles, that's not what I'm talking about.What I'm talking about is Taylor Swift. So think of someone who gathers the people to them, who owns the spotlight and captivates the heart and soul of their fans with [00:01:00] intentional content that they make, and who's so fearless about their work that they're not gonna let anyone or anything stop them from doing it.Writing doesn't happen on big stages or in big stadiums obviously, but we're gonna borrow this image because it's the vibe I want writers to cultivate, and it's the heart of writing big. My arena metaphor has a lot of origins. The most obvious one is the quote at the beginning of Brené Brown's book Daring Greatly, where she's referencing the Teddy Roosevelt quote about the man in the arena.That Roosevelt quote had to do with politics and not standing on the side and criticizing others, but stepping into the fray and being part of the mix. And what Brené Brown said was this: “If you are not in the arena getting your ass kicked on occasion, I am not interested in or open to your feedback.There are a million cheap seats in the world today filled with people who will never be brave with their own lives, [00:02:00] but will spend every ounce of energy they have hurling advice and judgment at those of us trying to dare greatly. Their only contributions are criticism, cynicism, and fear-mongering. If you're criticizing from a place where you're not also putting yourself on the line, I'm not interested in your feedback.”These are obviously powerful words, especially coming from a woman, because I think it's true that women who dare greatly get more criticism than men who do. So that's one of the influences for this metaphor. But another is the book The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker. If you haven't read this book, I highly recommend it.It's about this whole idea of gathering people, and she's talking about physically gathering them in meeting rooms and at weddings and at Thanksgiving and things like that. And her main point is that you have to be intentional about the purpose of your gathering. If you don't know why you're bringing people together and what experience you want them to have- They're [00:03:00] not gonna have an experience that's memorable or transformative.And when I read that book, I thought, “This is true for writers, too.” This is what my blueprint books are all about, being intentional about what you're doing with your writing, no matter what you're writing. You have to know why you want people to gather around your words and ideas. You have to know what you're bringing them together for.And as I began to think about Brené Brown's Daring Greatly and Priya Parker's idea of gathering, I began to think about this idea that writers are gathering people, too, and I began to think about an arena. What if you could picture your readers in an arena? And these thoughts were all going down in my mind around the time of Taylor Swift's Eras Tour.We were seeing these images of 50,000, 60,000 people in these stadiums just packed in with no seat empty, and the lights are low, and they're holding up their phones. And it [00:04:00] was obviously so moving for all the people in that audience who showed up there and experienced that and took the time and effort and energy to be there in that room or in that space.So Taylor Swift became the other thread of this idea that writers, too, are gathering people, and so you have to think about who you want to be in those seats of your arena. Who do you want to play to? Who do you want to speak to? Who do you want to create this experience for, and what do you want for them?But also, what do you want from them? I didn't go to one of the Eras Tour concerts, but I watched the six-part documentary about it and the last concert that she filmed as part of that whole endeavor, and there was such a through line about intention to what she was doing on that tour. She talks all the time about creating emotionally meaningful and immersive experiences for her audience, so she's not just [00:05:00] entertaining them.She wants them to feel something, and she's so deliberate about that. Her whole thing about secrets and surprises feeds into that, and I loved these parts of the documentary where, where she shows the behind-the-scenes work with the different guests that she would bring onto the show and how they tried to craft some sort of surprise for the audience and tried to keep it a secret, and there was just so much delight in the way that they were approaching this.Taylor Swift would always say things like, “People are gonna lose their minds.” That seems to be a catchphrase of hers, and it's what she wants. She's like, “They're gonna lose their minds, and it's gonna be so great.” And this joy in creating the experience for those people who have come and this dedication that...I think she did 149 shows on the Eras Tour, that every single one of them was going to be impactful to the people who came. Not just like, we're [00:06:00] gonna get out there and do a good show and give it our all and put our energy out there, but I wanna blow their minds. I want to make these moments of delight, and that intention is clearly what feeds Taylor Swift.She talks about that very specifically, that she loves the energy and feedback that she gets from that audience. So in the arena, you're performing or creating for the people you've gathered there, but you're also getting something back from them. You're getting this communication or this energy that reflects back to you or comes back to you, and that's obviously why performers do what they do.You would not get up on a stage 149 times in front of 60,000 people and put yourself out in that way if you didn't love that. And I think writers need to think about this, too. What are we putting out there for our fans or our readers? What do we want to get from them, and what do we want them to get from us, [00:07:00] and what is that energy exchange like?So I want you to think about the arena of your writing life. It's a place where you're gonna show up with your whole self with intention, and you're gonna do the best work that you're capable of. It's where you're gonna stop playing it safe and claim your full creative power. When someone writes with that kind of authority, they feel the satisfaction deep in their bones, the sweet reward in and of itself.It has actually nothing to do with the external rewards of the marketplace. It has to do with what you wanted to make and the fact that you went out there and made it and you called people, you gathered the people around to be part of it with you. And the paradox of this whole thing is that when you decide to step into the arena and play big, it comes across in the writing, and that leads to the exact external rewards that most writers crave.It doesn't work the [00:08:00] other way around. You can't go after those external things and feel the internal satisfaction. You have to do the work that's gonna feed that internal desire that you have and that thing that you want to make and that you want to create for yourself in order to get the things that you want from your writing.So this metaphor of creating the arena for your writing life and stepping into it in your fullest power and learning how to be the person in the spotlight is something that I want you to really think about. All of the 14 questions in my blueprint for a book process are really about this. Why are you writing a book is really why do you want to gather people to you?Why do you want to be heard and seen? And who are you writing for is who do you want to invite into that arena and put in those seats and play for? Your arena is going to be different from every other writer's arena on the planet because [00:09:00] no one is going to answer these questions the way that you are.Nobody's going to write what you are. So take this idea of daring greatly and being brave with your own life and putting yourself out there and marry it with this idea of gathering people around you with intention and designing the experience that you want them to have. And no matter what you think of Taylor Swift as a musician or a performer or a human, take from her this incredible delight in showing up and delivering something meaningful to your fans.And those things together are going to transform your writing life. There's going to be no way that you can't write big. And if you do that, there's going to be no way that you can't derive deep satisfaction from doing this work. Until next time, stop playing small and write like it matters.[00:10:00]The hashtag amwriting podcast is produced by Andrew Perilla. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein sits down with Jake Sherman and Anna Palmer to talk about data center impacts, a potential second term and what being close to President Trump means in his state.

The UNBOUND 2026 agenda just dropped, and after picking it apart live with Max Cohen and Chad Hohn, here's the short version: this year's lineup rewards humans who chase signal over hype. The sessions that matter most aren't the ones with the loudest titles. They're the ones that fix something specific in your business, deliver real ROI, and shift the way you think about HubSpot, AI, and the way humans actually buy.If you're going to UNBOUND and you're chasing the title, you're doing yourself a disservice. Go for the perspective shifts, the leverage moves, and the sessions that send you home with something you can ship Monday morning. That's the lens we used on this episode, and it's the lens we think every HubHero should use when building their personal agenda.

Episode 180: Modi and Leo sit down with Max Cohen (@murrayhillboy) to discuss everything from content creation, to dating in the city, and the importance of changing your internal dialogue. Modi's special "Know Your Audience" is available on YouTube now!For all upcoming shows visit www.modilive.com.Follow Modi on Instagram at @modi_live.Follow the AHM podcast on Instagram at @AHM_Podcast.Leave us a voicemail!Send us Fan MailSupport the show

Punchbowl News Defense Reporter Anthony Adragna joins host Max Cohen to discuss all the latest FISA drama. Plus, a recap of Anthony's trip to Philadelphia to host a bipartisan panel of governors on all things energy, gas prices and permitting reform. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this first installment of Margin Notes—a new series on the big decisions writers face—we explore a question many writers quietly carry:When life falls apart, do you keep writing… or step away?Jennie Nash is joined by clinical psychologist Dr. Diana Hill, author of Wise Effort, for a conversation about grief, illness, recovery and the psychology of returning to your work. Dr. Hill will help us explore the emotional and cognitive side of a creative life.Together, we discuss:* Why “little by little becomes a lot” matters in recovery* How grief, illness, addiction, or heartbreak reshape your creative capacity* The two common paths writers take: stepping away vs. writing to survive* What negativity bias is—and why it gets louder during hard seasons* When writing supports healing—and when it becomes avoidanceAt the heart of this conversation is a simple idea:You don't have to return to writing all at once.Sometimes, getting to the “mailbox and back” is enough.Whether you're navigating loss or a major life transition, this episode offers a compassionate way back to the page—on your own terms.Books Mentioned* Wise Effort by Dr. Diana Hill* Little by Little Becomes a Lot by Eric Zimmer#AmWriting is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.Transcript(00:00:03):Hi,(00:00:04):I'm Jenny Nash,(00:00:05):and you're listening to the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast,(00:00:08):the place where we help writers of all kinds play big in your writing life,(00:00:12):love the process,(00:00:13):and stick with it long enough to finish what matters most.(00:00:17):This is Margin Notes,(00:00:19):a new part of the podcast where we're talking about the big decisions writers face(00:00:23):in their work on creative lives.(00:00:25):I'm here today to talk about(00:00:28):this idea of recovery from illness or a breakup or a major life transition and how(00:00:34):you get back to your work.(00:00:36):And I have with me the most of special guests,(00:00:40):uh,(00:00:40):Dr.(00:00:40):Diana Hill,(00:00:41):who is my friend and my client and my colleague.(00:00:45):She's a clinical psychologist.(00:00:47):Who's the author of wise effort, how to focus your genius energy on what matters most.(00:00:52):And she's going to help us dig into this.(00:00:55):Welcome Diana.Diana (00:00:57):I am so glad to be here.Diana (00:00:58):And another form of recovery, recovery from addiction is another one.Diana (00:01:02):Like if people are prioritizing their health and recovery in that way,Diana (00:01:07):how do you write through that?Diana (00:01:09):So I'm super excited to talk with you because I think I've been through everyDiana (00:01:11):single one of those recoveries in some form or another.(00:01:15):Well, yeah.(00:01:16):And we don't have to get into it, but you have recently been through some big grief.(00:01:21):You've been through all these things in your life.(00:01:23):So how do you counsel somebody who's trying to get over something or get through(00:01:28):something and also doesn't want to abandon their writing?Diana (00:01:33):Well, there's a great book that's coming out.Diana (00:01:36):We have to mention a book, support our fellow writers by Eric Zimmer.Diana (00:01:40):And I always pick books by their titles in some form or another.Diana (00:01:44):And so there's a great, how about this?Diana (00:01:46):There's a great book title coming out, which is Little by Little.Diana (00:01:49):becomes a lot.Diana (00:01:51):And I think that's something to remember in recovery.Diana (00:01:54):I remember after I had a C-section,Diana (00:01:57):I had two C-sections with my kids and the little by little was,Diana (00:02:01):you know,Diana (00:02:01):first you make it up to the mailbox and back,Diana (00:02:04):right?Diana (00:02:05):You're trying to get back to that three mile walk that you used to do,Diana (00:02:08):but up to the mailbox and back was pretty darn amazing after you had a C-section toDiana (00:02:12):get to that milestone.Diana (00:02:13):And when you're in recovery from something, you need to shift thatDiana (00:02:19):the expectation to what is a lot.Diana (00:02:21):It's what is a lot in the context of what you are going through.Diana (00:02:24):When you've had a C-section, a walk to the mailbox is a lot.Diana (00:02:27):When you are in recovery from losing a family member,Diana (00:02:31):writing 10 minutes in the morning is a lot.Diana (00:02:34):And being able to shift that expectation would be the first thing and rememberingDiana (00:02:37):that little by little becomes a lot.Diana (00:02:40):That's how we grow it.Diana (00:02:41):That's one of the most foundational aspects of habit formation and psychology,Diana (00:02:45):And, uh, really is how I do most everything I do little by little.Diana (00:02:50):And then sometimes when I have a boost of energy, I do a lot.(00:02:54):And is that, do you think that that's true all the time?(00:02:58):Like,(00:02:58):does it become more true when something intends happens in your life or is it(00:03:03):actually true all the time,(00:03:04):but we don't quite see it so clearly?(00:03:07):Yeah.Diana (00:03:07):Well,Diana (00:03:08):I think it's all the time,Diana (00:03:09):but more so when you're in recovery,Diana (00:03:12):because when you're in recovery from something,Diana (00:03:16):you may get exhausted more easily.Diana (00:03:19):You also may have some shifts in the way that you see the world and the way you seeDiana (00:03:25):yourself that,Diana (00:03:27):um,Diana (00:03:28):That negativity bias may be extra strong or your threat system may be on extraDiana (00:03:34):alert so that you're a little bit more hypervigilant depending on what kind ofDiana (00:03:38):thing you're recovering from.Diana (00:03:39):And so in that sense,Diana (00:03:40):we do need to dial up the gentleness factor that,Diana (00:03:44):you know,Diana (00:03:44):other times in your life,Diana (00:03:45):you maybe just to brush off the intensity of something.Diana (00:03:49):But when you're in recovery,Diana (00:03:50):yeah,Diana (00:03:50):you need to be extra focused on little by little becoming a lot.(00:03:54):Can you explain what you mean by negativity bias, just so our listeners understand that?Diana (00:04:00):The negativity bias is just how our brains evolved.Diana (00:04:03):We evolved brains to keep us safe, not always to live our best lives.Diana (00:04:09):And so that means that you are the ancestor of people who were a little bit anxious.Diana (00:04:16):And when they looked out on the savannah and they saw some kind of obscure objectDiana (00:04:20):out there,Diana (00:04:21):they had a tendency to think that that object was dangerous or negative in someDiana (00:04:25):way.Diana (00:04:25):Yeah.Diana (00:04:26):And so they went back into the cave and that's how you came about because youDiana (00:04:30):We're born from that,Diana (00:04:31):but we've inherited these negativity biases and they get extra strong when we'reDiana (00:04:36):under threat.Diana (00:04:37):It doesn't mean that we can't override them.Diana (00:04:40):It's more that we learn how to notice them and in some ways allow them to be thereDiana (00:04:45):while you still move forward towards what your values are,Diana (00:04:48):what your goals are,Diana (00:04:49):what's important to you,Diana (00:04:50):even with that little bit of a chatter,Diana (00:04:52):that little what if mind in the background.(00:04:55):So I feel like when a writer is under the thread of something intense,(00:05:01):they tend to either take one of two paths in the recovery phase.(00:05:07):One path would be, I don't have the time, energy, bandwidth.(00:05:13):to add this in, I'm going to push this way off.(00:05:17):And the other is the opposite.(00:05:20):And it's this is going to keep me alive.(00:05:22):And I, I have to do it.(00:05:24):I have to keep my project going, keep my writing going, keep my voice up.(00:05:31):Can you help make sense of those that kind of binary response that I sometimes see?Diana (00:05:38):Well,Diana (00:05:38):like any kind of story,Diana (00:05:40):both of them are stories or frames or interpretations of your experience.Diana (00:05:45):There's usually some kind of nugget of truth in it.Diana (00:05:47):And then sort of like that yin-yang sign, there's also a nugget of not truth in it.Diana (00:05:52):So I don't have enough time is a classic one.Diana (00:05:54):I mean,Diana (00:05:54):that's again,Diana (00:05:55):whether you're in recovery or not,Diana (00:05:56):that's a classic writer's statement of I don't have enough time.Diana (00:05:59):And so we put it off.Diana (00:06:01):You know, we say things like in six months when I have things more in order, I'll get this done.Diana (00:06:07):Or I will, would I feel better?Diana (00:06:10):I'll start working on it.Diana (00:06:11):But the nature of our experience is that we really never have enough time.Diana (00:06:16):It's more about prioritization of our time.Diana (00:06:19):And we miss that reality that when we engage in things that are more meaningful toDiana (00:06:25):us,Diana (00:06:25):we feel like we have more time.Diana (00:06:26):So there's some research by Cassie Holmes out of UCLA that showed that folks thatDiana (00:06:32):devoted their time towards others or engaged in meaningful projects actually hadDiana (00:06:36):more what's called time affluence.Diana (00:06:38):They feel like they had more time.Diana (00:06:40):So if you have that feeling,Diana (00:06:40):if I don't have enough time,Diana (00:06:42):what you actually may find is if you prioritize your time towards writing,Diana (00:06:45):if that's something you care about,Diana (00:06:46):it's a value that you had prior to the thing that you were struggling with,Diana (00:06:50):you actually may end up feeling like you have more time or you may experience aDiana (00:06:54):shift in your perspectiveDiana (00:06:57):as a result of doing that writing.Diana (00:06:59):I find that all the time.Diana (00:07:00):There's something like exercise is the same thing.Diana (00:07:02):Like I don't really want to do it and then I go do it or I don't have enough timeDiana (00:07:05):for it and then I go do it and then I ask myself,Diana (00:07:07):why am I not spending more time doing this thing,Diana (00:07:10):right?Diana (00:07:11):So it can be, yeah.Diana (00:07:12):But then the second side of it is that I want to go do this because in some way IDiana (00:07:21):feel like it's going to either help me through or maybe even be a little bit of aDiana (00:07:24):distractorDiana (00:07:26):Sometimes our work can distract us from other parts of our lives.Diana (00:07:30):If it's aligned with your values, you need a break.Diana (00:07:33):So something like grief in particular,Diana (00:07:35):people wanna feel really obligated to not feel good or feel obligated to beDiana (00:07:43):grieving in a certain way or all the time or not go back to work right away.Diana (00:07:49):But the reality is that when you start toDiana (00:07:52):do things that bring you joy,Diana (00:07:54):it helps you,Diana (00:07:55):it gives you more resources for the recovery and the grief that you're goingDiana (00:07:59):through.Diana (00:08:00):It's not that we need to be in the bad, dark space all the time.Diana (00:08:05):So it can,Diana (00:08:05):healthy distraction,Diana (00:08:07):especially when it's aligned with your values,Diana (00:08:09):is in psychology,Diana (00:08:10):we call it productive procrastination.Diana (00:08:13):Maybe you're actually procrastinating on the grief a little bit by being productiveDiana (00:08:16):in other ways.Diana (00:08:17):And that can be a good thing.Diana (00:08:18):It actually can be a helpful thing.(00:08:20):Wow, there's so much to think about here.(00:08:23):So in your own experience, which path do you tend to take?(00:08:28):Or have you taken both paths at different times?Diana (00:08:31):I think I've taken both.Diana (00:08:34):This most recent round of recovery that I'm kind of a recent loss that I've had,Diana (00:08:40):I started out with just not wanting to do anything.Diana (00:08:45):That kind of like lead weight feeling of I can't,Diana (00:08:50):I'm like walking through molasses in my day and not interested in doing the thingsDiana (00:08:56):that I used to be interested in.Diana (00:08:57):I kept having a hard time even getting myself toDiana (00:09:00):get dressed,Diana (00:09:01):you know,Diana (00:09:01):kind of put on nice clothes,Diana (00:09:03):blow dry my hair,Diana (00:09:03):those kinds of things that I usually do.Diana (00:09:06):And what I have found in terms of the writing process for myself,Diana (00:09:11):I'm not writing a book right now,Diana (00:09:12):but I do write newsletters and I write preparation for podcasts and I write postsDiana (00:09:17):and things like that,Diana (00:09:19):is that led to me just not wanting to write.Diana (00:09:22):And what got me a little unblocked, I hadn't written my newsletter in quite a while,Diana (00:09:26):And I knew I had to do and I was like in the back of my head,Diana (00:09:28):like you're supposed to do a newsletter every month or every two weeks or everyDiana (00:09:31):week,Diana (00:09:32):whatever your cadence is.Diana (00:09:33):And so I knew that was in there.Diana (00:09:37):And when I,Diana (00:09:39):what kind of got me unstuck from that space was when I just decided,Diana (00:09:44):this is a little by little becomes a lot thing.Diana (00:09:46):When I just decided to take like, what's one thing I did today that IDiana (00:09:51):kind of felt interesting and was connected to a better bigger concept or belief.Diana (00:09:55):And I just wrote on that.Diana (00:09:56):And it was actually I wrote on doing push ups.(00:09:59):Because it was such a great newsletter.(00:10:01):I left it.(00:10:02):Yeah, it was so great.Diana (00:10:03):It was on push ups, because I had I was helping a client who was in their own form of recovery.Diana (00:10:07):And, and he's in was had make that made this goal for himself.Diana (00:10:12):And then he challenged me to doing push ups.Diana (00:10:14):AndDiana (00:10:15):This little pushup goal was really helpful for me because it was so orthogonal to my grief.Diana (00:10:20):It had so nothing to do with it.Diana (00:10:21):What does that mean?(00:10:22):I don't know what that means.Diana (00:10:23):It was so orthogonal.Diana (00:10:26):It's going in the opposite direction.Diana (00:10:28):It's not parallel.Diana (00:10:30):to my grief.Diana (00:10:32):And so my grief was like, had nothing to do with pushups, right?Diana (00:10:35):It had to do with friendship and loss and death and,Diana (00:10:38):you know,Diana (00:10:38):all those things and doing pushups feel so insignificant.Diana (00:10:41):But then I was able to,Diana (00:10:42):in this newsletter and in this teaching that I ended up doing for a talk that IDiana (00:10:46):gave,Diana (00:10:47):was able to connect that really small thing to something much bigger,Diana (00:10:52):but that came from writing on it.Diana (00:10:55):And I wouldn't have gotten there if I hadn't written on it.Diana (00:10:58):And then what I got to is like,Diana (00:10:59):oh,Diana (00:10:59):this,Diana (00:11:00):you know,Diana (00:11:00):doing something small in this way,Diana (00:11:02):if you can connect it to love or you can connect it to caring for someone else orDiana (00:11:08):supporting someone else or supporting yourself,Diana (00:11:10):these four kinds of love in Buddhism.Diana (00:11:13):that I wrote about,Diana (00:11:14):then you might be,Diana (00:11:16):you know,Diana (00:11:16):motivated to stick with it a little bit longer.Diana (00:11:18):So I guess I started out with the sluggish one of like running away from it,Diana (00:11:22):not wanting to feel it,Diana (00:11:24):needing to do little by little.Diana (00:11:25):And then I moved more into this is like actually a good distraction from my grief,Diana (00:11:28):but then it transformed into more meaning for me.(00:11:32):And it sounds like now you're feeling a little energized.(00:11:35):Yeah, I'm pumped.(00:11:36):I've been working today.(00:11:37):I like I was back at work and excited.Diana (00:11:40):It's funny because it's a Sunday, but I'm working and excited.Diana (00:11:43):But I was excited to get to work,Diana (00:11:45):to work on a project,Diana (00:11:47):a talk that I'm giving,Diana (00:11:48):which involves,Diana (00:11:49):I don't know,Diana (00:11:49):I guess in some ways,Diana (00:11:51):talks are a form of writing,Diana (00:11:52):like making out your slides.Diana (00:11:53):It's sort of like outlining a talk.(00:11:55):100%.(00:11:56):It's figuring out what you think, raising your voice, deciding what you want to say.(00:12:02):It's all good.(00:12:03):Well,(00:12:04):what would you,(00:12:05):what nugget would you give our listeners to take away if this is resonating with(00:12:09):them,(00:12:09):this idea of I'm recovering from something and trying to figure out where my(00:12:13):writing fits in?Diana (00:12:16):I think the nugget is that we're always in recovery from something.Diana (00:12:20):You know, sometimes it's big recoveries and sometimes it's small.Diana (00:12:23):And the beauty of recovery is that when something gets broken,Diana (00:12:30):you're not necessarily gonna put it back to how it was before,Diana (00:12:34):but you get this chance to rearrange it.Diana (00:12:36):It's sort of like if you throw a deck of cards in the air and they fall on theDiana (00:12:39):ground and you put them back in order in a different way,Diana (00:12:43):like what card do you wanna have on top?Diana (00:12:45):So you move from this harmony to disharmony to a new harmony.Diana (00:12:49):And if you do it in a way that has just like,Diana (00:12:51):go at the pace that you can go a little bit by little bit and sometimes a big bit,Diana (00:12:57):But trust that this recovery process is part of a new harmony for you.Diana (00:13:02):There will be magic that comes out of it.Diana (00:13:08):And we don't always get to control the pacing and timing of when that magic happens.Diana (00:13:12):But it'll come to you.(00:13:14):That's beautiful.(00:13:15):Thank you for that.(00:13:16):And thank you for joining me.(00:13:17):I hope you'll do it regularly.Diana (00:13:19):Thank you.(00:13:20):And thanks, everyone, for listening.(00:13:22):Now let's get back to work and finish what matters most.Jennie (00:13:33):The Hashtag AmWriting podcast is produced by Andrew Perilla.Jennie (00:13:37):Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen.Jennie (00:13:44):Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output because everyoneJennie (00:13:49):deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

This episode is connected to:* Hot Seat Coaching #1* Hot Seat Coaching #2When you find yourself spiraling over a structural choice—looping between two different plot points or debating a table of contents—it's easy to treat it as a technical puzzle to be solved with logic. But as book coach Jennie Nash explores in this episode, the hardest writing decisions usually aren't about craft; they are about courage.Inspired by a profound "hot seat" moment with writer Andrew Parella, Jennie discusses how the simple question "Why is this so hard for me?" can reveal where you are "playing small." Whether you're deciding the scope of a nonfiction argument or the emotional vulnerability of a memoir, being stuck often means you are hovering between a safe version of your book and the big, ambitious version that actually wants to be written. This session is a call to align your head with your heart and step into the bigger power your project is asking of you.#AmWriting is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.TranscriptJennie: [00:00:00] This is a right big episode where I bring you short conversations about the mindset shifts that shape the work. Today I am talking about something that Andrew said in our hot seat coaching session the other day. That's just really captured my attention. If you listen to that episode, which I'll link to in the show notes, you'll be able to hear him say this, but I wanted to take some time to talk about it on a right big session because the question was just so profound.What he asked himself was just simply, why is this so hard? So what was happening was we were talking through a writing decision he was struggling with. It's one of those decisions where as a coach you can feel the writer circling around it, going back and forth, trying one thing, then another just sort of spiraling and not sure about how to move forward.And I. Was prepared to say the thing that I always say as a book coach, which [00:01:00] is, okay, let's go through all the options. Let's make a pro con list of how to proceed with this, of what your different choices are, and we can step back and look at the possible directions. That's the analytic way that I was thinking to approach this decision.But Andrew had actually already solved the problem, and he had solved it not by going through all the options or using his mind. He had solved it by asking, why is this so hard for me? Which is a question of the heart. So what he did was he took it out of the intellectual sphere and he took it into this sphere.Of feeling I was there ready to start diagramming possibilities and using our head to figure this out. And he was the one who was like, well, wait a minute. Let me look at why this is hard. And what he realized was that the reason it was hard was because the decision was poking up against why this book so much to [00:02:00] him.What he actually said was he realized he was playing small. He was circling around a decision ‘cause he wanted to do the thing that would make the book big, but he felt like he should do the thing that would keep the book small. He was pinging back and forth. Between his desire and it was showing up as a structural decision in the book about how he would approach.In this case, it was the reality of vampires in his story. And one way would be, I can handle this. I'm capable of this. I can wrap up my hands around this. And the other way was, oh no, that's gonna be a big scary book that I'd be having to. Handle and tackle, and I'm not sure that I could do that. So by not making this decision, he was holding himself back.He was hedging his bets. He was not fully committing to the version of the book that he really wanted to write. And as long as he was stuck in that place, every single decision was going to feel wrong. He was never gonna [00:03:00] land on one that was like, yes, this is it. And this moment stayed with me. So hard because I think a lot of writing decisions that feel technical or structural are actually something else.They're about whether we're willing to write the book that wants to be written. So imagine for example, that you're writing a nonfiction book and it's about burnout at work, and you keep getting stuck on how to frame it. Is the book a step by step guide on managing stress? Or is it about something bigger about, say how the culture of work itself is totally unsustainable.The first version is contained, it's small, and the other version is making a much bigger claim, and it's asking that writer to step up into a much bigger kind of power. So if you're circling that structural decision endlessly, you might think that it's different choices about. What the chapters are gonna look like are the table of [00:04:00] contents.But the real question is, am I willing to say the bigger thing, am I willing to go out there and say this bigger thing? Or imagine this for memoir. Maybe you're writing a book about moving to a new city and the first year of showing up in a new place and building community, but there's something you keep avoiding, which is that there was a breakup that happened before you made this move and that precipitated your.Coming here and you keep asking yourself, does this even belong in the book? Will it derail the narrative? Is it taking it in a different direction? Should I have a prologue? Should I start it at chapter one with that breakup? Should I just assume that people are gonna know, should I not put in it at all?But the real reason that decision probably feels hard is that that decision changes what the book is about. Uh, it stops being a story about a new city and a new adventure, and it becomes a story about rebuilding [00:05:00] a life. So it becomes a bigger story. And in order to write big, you have to embrace that bigness of it.So what Andrew's question does, why is this so hard is shift. The focus inward to what you're hesitating about, to what version of the book you might be avoiding to what version of your own self as a writer you might be avoiding because every writer has a story about who they are and how they're showing up.There's the safer version of that story, and there's the bigger version. There's one that might be more honest or more ambitious or more emotionally exposed, and when we try to write the smaller version of that story, whatever it is, the whole project will start to wobble because we're not in alignment with our goal.So maybe your scenes don't quite land, or the structure of the book feels wrong, or every decision feels impossible. And it's not [00:06:00] because you don't know enough about your story or your material or craft, or your skills need sharpening. It's because you and what you're doing aren't aligned yet. So the next time you find yourself circling some decision about your work.Whether it's rewriting the same paragraph over and over, or asking everyone you know what they think, or debating some decision. It's definitely worth pausing and asking this question, which is not what is the right choice here, but why is this decision so hard for me? Odds are good that your project is asking you to step into a bigger power than you're comfortable with, and you're still debating whether you're actually willing to do that.You're debating the commitment of the whole thing. It's a really brilliant move to make. And I would urge you to listen to Andrew talk about asking that question on our coaching call because it was so profound to hear him talk about it, and it was such a good [00:07:00] reminder for me that I have to remember to help the writer get out of their head and into their heart.Thanks for listening. Now let's get back to work and finish what matters most.Outro: The hashtag am Writing podcast is produced by Andrew Parella. Our intro music Aply titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output because everyone deserves to be paid for their [00:08:00] work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

Producer Andrew Parrella Claims His Own Gothic WorldIn this follow-up session, Jennie Nash checks in with producer-turned-novelist Andrew Parrella, who returns to the “hot seat” with a major breakthrough. After a week of “staring at the screen and walking the dog,” Andrew realizes he has been “writing small” to keep the project manageable. By leaning too heavily on the existing framework of Bram Stoker's Dracula, he was inadvertently stifling his own creativity. He decides to “embrace the big,” shifting the story from a cautious tribute into a standalone Historical Gothic Mystery. This evolution includes a high-stakes world-building choice: making vampires a known, though unaccepted, part of the public consciousness in 1920s London, adding a layer of modern resonance and social tension to the atmosphere of dread.The duo also digs into the “glaring holes” that surface when a writer decides to expand their narrative scope. Andrew identifies a need for deeper research into the Suffragette movement to ensure his protagonist's familial history feels integrated rather than “tacked on.” By connecting the mystery of the protagonist's mother to historical activism, Andrew finds a way to ground the supernatural elements in a more 3D reality. As they grapple with the structural puzzle of Point of View—weighing the benefits of including voices from the past versus staying close to the present—Jennie challenges Andrew to choose the perspective that best amplifies the protagonist's transformation and the secrets hidden within a mysterious Gladstone bag.Visit Andrew on the web: https://www.andrewparrella.comListen to the first session with Andrew:#AmWriting is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.TranscriptJennie: [00:00:00] Hi, I'm Jennie Nash and you're listening to the hashtag am Writing podcast, the place where we help writers of all kinds play big in your writing life, love the process, and stick with it long enough to finish what matters most. This is a hot seat coaching episode where we work through a real writing challenge in real time.Today I'm talking again with Andrew Perella, the hashtag am writing podcast producer who stepped out from behind the mic to work on his novel. He completed our winter blueprint challenge and is now working on blueprint revisions, which is such an important stage in the writing process, digging into what you really want the book to be, what you really wanna say.And Andrew's told me he just had a revelation, which I'm dying to hear about. But um, before we get to that. Um, when we're talking here today, the first episode where we did hot seat coaching launched out into the world, and I wanted to ask how [00:01:00] you're feeling about that.Andrew: Um, it feels a little weird. Um, you know, I'm used to being behind the mic.I'm used to, um, helping obviously produce a lot of audio over the years and, and, and helped get a lot of podcast episodes out into the world. It's strange to. Kind of be featured in a podcast episode. Um, that is a new experience for me. Um, uh, you know, when we recorded it, it was just you and I talking, but now it's like out in the world and, uh, and, and people can listen, um, and, uh, and, and, and judge, um, which of course they're welcome to do.Uh, but uh, but yeah, so it's a little, it's a little weird, but it's fun. It's fun.Jennie: Yeah, that's, that's you, you hit the nail on the head, the, the judge part. As soon as you put anything into the world, you put yourself up for judgment. And what we're doing here in these sessions is, is really, in some ways so intimate because we're getting to watch [00:02:00] somebody's thinking as it's unfolding, as it's progressing before they know what they want it to be.And we're watching someone hopefully, um. You know, hone in on their, their voice, their story, their point, their whole thing. And it's, um, it's really special to get to see it unfold, I think. Um, so thank you for. Putting yourself out there.Andrew: I'm, I'm happy to do it. This is, this has been a really value, this is a really valuable exercise for me personally.So, uh, happy to, happy to share that with folks.Jennie: So what happened last time was you left with some, uh, homework, which you did. Mm-hmm. And what was interesting from my point of view was when I. Looked at what you did. My first thought was, well, he didn't do very much. And I, I sort of thought, uh, okay, that's funny.Andrew: I kind of felt the same way.Jennie: Oh, that's really funny. But then when I read it, it was like, oh no, you worked out a [00:03:00] lot of things that we had been circling around. And primarily the, um, I would say the. Personal familial history of abriana and her connection to this famous vampire hunter. So that all got really sorted.Um, but the, the one that really made me chuckle was you have this beautiful description of your ideal reader in the blueprint, and it, it's probably. I don't know, it might be 500 words. It's, it's like, you know, this ideal reader really well, and I can tell that you actually really love this ideal reader and want to I do, I do.Yeah. It's really sort of beautiful, um, the specificity of, of who she is, but you added like three lines to the end of that. That was part of what you, what you did. And, um, [00:04:00] one of those lines was. In response to something we talked about, which was, does your ideal reader, are they familiar with Dracula? And you said, now, no.So that was really interesting to me. Do you wanna talk a little bit how you landed on that? Because I, I do think it might impact the genre.Andrew: Uh, yeah, I agree. And I, I saw your note about the genre too, which, which, um, I'm, I'd be eager to talk more about, but yeah, I mean, as, as I was thinking about this, I say I feel like I didn't do much.I spend a lot of time staring at the screen, uh, over the last couple of weeks and like. Walking my dog and thinking about these questions that you were posing. I feel like I spent hours doing it and like it, like, and, and like the words on the page since we last spoke, don't, I don't know, have reflect like the number of, the number of new words on the page.Don't reflect that. But I spent, I spent a lot of time thinking about, about that question and [00:05:00] some of the other questions that, that you posed. And I think for a long time I wanted to presume a familiarity with Stoker's Dracula, um, because it made my job easier. And, and so I think I, I kind of had to come to terms with the fact that though it is a popular book, not everybody has read it.And while many people, because it's a popular book, many people have some. Passing knowledge about the structure, about the plot, about some of the characters maybe, but they won't know. They won't know the level of detail that I do having read it many times. And so I need to create, I need to expand the world.I need to create my own world. I can't just live in Stoker's world. I need to create my own world. These characters, while they have the same names as the characters in in Stoker's novel. They are, they become different characters in my world, the [00:06:00] world I'm creating. And so I need to, I need to kind of accept that.And so it doesn't matter if you've read Dracula before you pick up this book, and these, these characters have a rich backstory that I will allude to. And if you've read Dracula, you might pick up on some extra, some extra bits, but this is still going to be a cohesive, discreet novel that you'll be able to enjoy.Regardless of, uh, whether you've read the, the, the original or not.Jennie: Okay. That's huge. Is that the revelation or is there something else?Andrew: No, that is notJennie: theAndrew: revelation.Jennie: Okay. So we'll get, wow, okay. We'll get to that in a minute. But that, the reason I said it impacts the genre is that you said your ideal right reader wouldn't describe herself as a horror fan and that her.Most, she's, she loves this, um, period of time. She loves London. Um, you know, there's a lot of things that [00:07:00] connect her to this story, but not horror. And so my thought was, should, should it still be classified as horror? Uh, there are lots of other ways to classify it, you know, historic, um, a historic thriller, a historic mystery.You know, gothic could be in there, but what, what are your thoughts at this point about that?Andrew: Yeah, and I, I, I think we've, we've, we've used the term horror when we talk about it, but when I, when I, when I did the blueprint challenge, I think I did kind of identify more like historical gothic as the genre.And, and, and as, as you say in one of your notes, this is feeling more like a mystery, a murder mystery than it is horror. Like, I feel like the horror genre leans into the gore, and I don't know that that's where. My book lives, I think, I think the gothic kind of sense of imminent doom, pervading, you know, every page is definitely something I wanna lead into.So, so I think gothic is, is [00:08:00] relevant, historic, gothic, and ultimately it is a murder mystery. And so who, and so, and so solving that mystery is the protagonist's kind of ultimate mission.Jennie: Right. So the, the sort of moodiness of the world and, and something, yeah. The dread, uh, that's out there. Right. Um, which fits really nicely, uh, with what you're doing.Okay. So what's the revelation?Andrew: So it came from the question that you asked me last or two weeks ago now. Um, and one that I've been asking myself, which is. Are vampires part of the public consciousness in this world that I'm building. And for a long time I've been saying, no, no, no, no. They're not part, they're still, they're still a secret society.They're still a secret community. They're still a secret species. They're, they're, and nobody knows about them. And, and anyone who talks about vampires is seen as being a [00:09:00] lunatic. Um. And I was realizing, and, and as you probably saw in the, in, in the, in the document, I was, I, I was trying to explore both, both possibilities.There's a possibility where, where the public understands vampire exists and then there's a, a, a possibility where that it doesn't, where they don't understand they exist. And I've been leaning towards maintaining the secrecy of vampires among the public. And I think the reason I've been doing that, it ties back, ties into what we were just talking about in that I was, I saw that creating like a whole vampire society that, uh, that human, that human society has been interacting with for a number of years, it felt like a distraction from the primary.From the primary plot, but I've been struggling because it does offer some really nice motivation for my murderer.Jennie: Yeah. [00:10:00]Andrew: SoJennie: you've been flip flopping back and forth in your mind.Andrew: I've been flip flopping back and forth in my mind until last night. And I was, I was reading, I was reading some of your comments, uh, on my document and I was like, why am I stuck on this?Why am I hung up on this? Why can't I make a decision about this? Um, and it's because. I was writing small, I was trying to keep it, you know, this is something I could manage. Like I was trying to keep it, I was trying to keep it like manageable. I was trying to keep it, I, I don't know. I was trying to give my, I was trying to like pen myself in, I guess, and lean.More heavily on the work of Stoker. And it's like he's already done his work. He's already So the, so the, the, the, the revelation I said he's already done his work. He's already created his book. Mine is a different book. Mine is, is, uh, a different [00:11:00] world and like. As we have been saying, I need to write big, so I need to embrace the big.And so that gonna, that's gonna mean creating more characters. That's going to mean creating, uh, more exposition. That's going to mean creating, um, more interactions between these communities. Creating a lot more than I had initially been thinking about. I feel like my original idea was a nice idea. You know, I'm, and I'm using air quotes with a nice idea, but like, I feel like this is now.Becoming a novel by, by choosing to, by choosing to go big here.Jennie: Well, you're, you make me like actually wanna cry because of happiness, because you've obviously been listening to the right. Big episodes and Yes. That whole um, thing and winter blueprint, um, listening to me hammer away at. Uh, [00:12:00] that this is all we have.This is all a writer has, is what is in their heart and mind mm-hmm. And comes from their experiences and interests. And it is so crazy how we shy away from that. We tamp it down, we hide from it, all the things because it's, it's terrifying in many ways. And for you to just get that and in both. The conversations we've had this morning already, like, like the, um, you were afraid.Yeah. Afraid of your own creation, which is actually very sort of, I guess that's more, um, well, more Frankenstein, more Frankenstein than Dracula, but, but you know, it is like the monster of our own creation. Mm-hmm. You know, like, oh, I wanna write this book. There's a kind of dread in just even saying that.Yeah. And then, oh, I [00:13:00] wanna write this book andRight.Jennie: And that question of am I up to it? Am I capable of, it lies at the heart of. So many problems that we make for ourselves because, you know, we tell ourselves, no, I couldn't do that or that Yeah, that's too, I just, I, you know, that's for somebody else, or I, I'll keep it small, I'll keep it mm-hmm.Attached to this other, I'll keep it easy. That was what mm-hmm. You know, and, and what you're saying is, okay, now I'm gonna. I'm gonna write the book I wanna write.Andrew: Yeah.Jennie: Oh man, that's so big. So that,Andrew: yeah, that was my, that was my big revelation last night as I was, ‘cause I still didn't have an answer for you on that question as late as last night.And I was like, I don't know what to say. And then I was like, why is this heart so hard for me? And so that was, that was, that was really nice to kind of make that, find that understanding and that gave me peace and like. I started, I started just throwing words on the page [00:14:00] last night about what that meant.Um, what that will mean for the story, what that will mean for the, for the characters. So,Jennie: well, I'm gonna write down this question ‘cause I wanna, I wanna explore that more. Why is this so hard for me? That's such a good question because what I was doing last night after I wrote that note to you was I did a whole pro con thing.You know, pro, um, the vampires are here and present and known, or, you know, be, they're not like, you know? Mm-hmm. Or even c nobody knows if they're real or, you know, like I was trying to parse out what do I have to do to guide Andrew toward. A decision. So I was thinking more what's gonna prompt your brain to decide, and your question, why is this so hard for [00:15:00] me is really what the right question is instead of the pro con list.So that is brilliant. Um, I'm, I'm writing down so good. Um.Andrew: Well, thank you for pushing me.Jennie: Oh, well that's my job. So, um, it's fun. I mean, it's fun. And what's interesting, particularly with this project is as we know, I don't know Dracula, I don't read a lot of horror. And so I'm, I am, I am reacting to you more than this story, you know?So that was, that was why, how am I gonna get Andrew to. Figure this out. I have absolutely no, you know, opinion or, or you know, um, any reason why we choose one or the other. Uh, sure. You know, it's really what you want. So once you decide that, then does that help with. Other open questions? [00:16:00] Does it sort of have a domino effect in your mind on some of the other things?Andrew: I think it, yeah, it, yeah, I think it's gonna affect, I mean, it's gonna affect, so it's gonna affect the whole tenor of the book. Um, I think it, it's, it's going to change the motivations of so many other characters. It's going to change. The relationship between, um, uh, between all of the characters. Um, it's going to change the politics of the moment inside this world.Um, and it's going to kind of raise the stakes, uh, a little bit more. And I think in, in, in another way, it's going to make it resonate more with a modern audience. Um,Jennie: Ooh. Say more. Why do you think that?Andrew: Well, I think, uh, I think. Just because the vampires are no longer a secret, uh, society, just because they are, um, part of the public zeitgeist, that doesn't mean they are accepted by the public.Um, and so there's going to be [00:17:00] misunderstanding and fear, um, and uh, and violence all around this, uh, group of individuals, which I think. Again, as I, as I said, resonates with, with, with modern, with a modern audience.Jennie: Wow. That's, that's awesome. Um, so I'm also curious, one of the questions I had, you did some work around a Brianna's mother whomm-hmm.Jennie: Died in childbirth, giving birth to her. Mm-hmm. And, um. She was involved in this whole previous generation's relationship to the vampire hunting andmm-hmm.Jennie: Um, all of that. And it, it's been a little vague. Um, we've talked about it a little, but it sounds like that is becoming more of a connection for, for two things, both for a [00:18:00] Adrianna's motivation, um.To, to solve these murders, but also her connection to the suffragette movement, which prior to this draft, I kept feeling a little bit like it was shoehorned in there, likemm-hmm.Jennie: Oh, there's this vampire story and it's London and it's at this time, and there's this young woman in suffragette. You know, and, and now that small change really locks the, the suffragette movement into Aub Brianna's world and life.Um, so what do you now know about the mother that feels new or, um, that you've pinned down more because of these thoughts?Andrew: I'm still fleshing that out. But let me, let me say, one of the reasons I think that the suffragette movement element of the book feels a little tacked on is I have not [00:19:00] yet done my research there.And so it's like, that's a really, that's a, that's a glaring, that's a glaring hole right now that I need to fill with more research. I've been doing a lot of vampire research now. Um, and, but I need to switch. I need to switch tax and start and start doing more, uh, suffrage, uh, research. Um, but that said, yeah, I think.A Brianna's mother, Mina, um, was involved briefly in the suffrage movement because she dies or does she? And um, and, and I think she continues, she continues to play a role in the suffrage suffrage movement. What. What I've been grappling with now is how much of that does abriana know how much of that has her father told her?And I could see that being another point of contention between the two of them. If she discovers later that this was [00:20:00] another, another piece of information that was, that was hidden from her. And so,Jennie: Ooh, that's so good. It's so good. This, this young, yeah, this young woman. All these things stacked up against her that she, yeah.Sort of knows about or maybe suspects. Um, right. So you're right. The work is, there's always in any story who, the question of who knows what, when. Mm-hmm. I mean, particularly in a mystery or thriller, obviously.Andrew: Right.Jennie: Yeah. But who knows what, when, you know, can. Change who you choose to be your narrator. Who, who has right point of view, um, who gets point of view in the story.Uh, you know, do we go to a chapter in somebody's point of view? You know, all of those, all of those questions hang on. This idea of who knows what went. So, you as the author, are the first person that has to know. Everything. Right. And [00:21:00] then choose to, you know, how like, like putting little breadcrumbs or, you know, planting little seeds, ummm-hmm.Jennie: That you have to manage that material. Um, so that's a big question. And here's a question. Do you think you need those answers before you can pin the whole story down, or do you feel like. You can pin the plot down and that that is, gives more texture, more, more to a Adriana's motivation. Maybe it'll move certain scenes about her discovery of certain things, but do you, what do you feel about that research?Andrew: About the suffrage research they needJennie: to do? Yeah, yeah,Andrew: yeah. I think it's going to get, I think it's gonna open avenues for me. To identify what Mina's role was, what her mother, what, what breanna's mother's role was in the suffrage suffragette movement. [00:22:00] Who some of the players were, who some of the, some of the larger names, the, some of the larger, um, protesters and advocates for it were.Because the, you know, being a historical novel, I do want to incorporate some historical figures, which I, I think, um, is always a kind of a fun element of, of, of a novel. And so being able to incorporate some of that, I think will lay out a lot of avenues for a Brianna's story arc.Jennie: So I just wanna point out for our listeners that what is happening here, um, is that every question we ask or we pose.Is work, right? So some of it is, you know, work of walking the dog and thinking and saying, well, I don't know. Or Why don't I now? Or why is this hard for me? Or, uh, or, you know, all of that. And then now we're talking about. This question is work, um, figuring out research and, you know, at every turn it's, [00:23:00] when you do the thing that you wanna do, when you really lean into that, it, it gets harder.I mean, you're making it harder for yourself. So,yeah,Jennie: I just wanna point that out. ‘cause it, it's so interesting here as this is unfolding, um, that, that, that is just a, a truth. And the other thing I wanna point out is. Where this story started is where every story starts, which is you have this idea, it's a really cool idea.You have this sense of a plot. And, and in some ways, that very central idea of the plot is never gonna change. No matter what you do to this book, it's, it's a, mm-hmm. It's a murder, you know, there's murders and this young woman's gonna solve it, so. Mm-hmm. Like, that plot's not changing, but the, where it started was.These kind of card work cutout characters, kind of placeholder characters. And if you leave it at that, you can see where that would go, you know? Mm-hmm. It's like, [00:24:00] oh, mother died in childbirth. Of course child's motivated to, you know, something. Um, or Oh, distant and emotional dad, you know, you sort of start, start there.But now by understanding. The whole life that her mother lived and the whole role that she played, and is she even dead or not? You know, like huge, huge questions. Yeah. Make the mother a fully fleshed out 3D character. You know, that's where you're gonna go. And then you can see how that will make a Brianna.A more fully fleshed out 3D character. So instead of, instead of the tropes or the expected things, there's gonna be these nuances to it andmm-hmm.Jennie: Um, specific things. And then your question of what, how much does she know and, and what does she find out? [00:25:00] Um, there's gonna be plot points that come from that.Right. You know? Uh, do you have a sense. At this point, are there letters, are there diaries? Is there a friend who hasn't spoken? Like is there some source of information in your mind that Abriana might encounter?Andrew: Yes. And I think, and, and I think there are a couple of different sources. I think, I think her mother Mina will have had diaries, um, and potentially letters.I think also Van Helsing will also certainly have papers. Um. And letters. Um, and, uh, there's a, there's a, there's a prop. He, when he dies, he bequeaths to abriana his Gladstone bag. Um, and I think there's going to be some sort of revelatory piece of information in the Gladstone bag, and I haven't figured [00:26:00] out what that piece of information is.So,Jennie: is that black bag that doctors hadAndrew: that doctors carry around? Yeah. That the old time, that old, that old timey doctors carry?Jennie: Yeah. Why was it ca called that?Andrew: You know, that's a good, that's a good question. I don't know where, uh, what the etymology for, for, for the Gladstone bag is. I don't know why that is.Jennie: Interesting. So that's like a toolbox basically. Yeah. It's filled, filled with things and,Outro: yeah. Yeah.Jennie: Uh, that's cool. That's cool. Um, that, I love that. So this is a silly thing. I was so confused. And I know you told me this, um, but that there's a character, John Seward, who's a character from Dracula. Mm-hmm.And Abriana refers to him as her uncle, but he's not her uncle. Correct. But the reason I continue to be confused is that her dad's name is also JohnAndrew: Jonathan. Yeah.Jennie: Jonathan.Andrew: Yeah.Jennie: Does it have to [00:27:00] be or is that just like, oh, Jennie, come on. Surely the reader can handle a John and a Jonathan.Andrew: Well, I mean, no, that's a legitimate question because, um, can they, um, especially if we've got two characters named Abraham and Abriana, right?And so like, and so now I, I, I've been struggling with that too. I think I've been, I've been trying to carry forward some of, some of the characters from Dracula. I think I like the character of Seward because he is a protege of Van Helsing, but perhaps the protege bit is important and not the actual name of the person.So maybe it's another character that I've, that I'm introducing here who was a protege of Van Helsing.Jennie: Oh. But see, I think that's where you get into. So your ideal reader you've established may not know Dracula right. Inside and out. Right. But you will have a lot [00:28:00] of readers who do.Yes.Jennie: And there is a world of people who really love this stuff and who really.Right. You know, and if you were to change an actual charactermm-hmm.Jennie: And give it, give him a different name or a different whatever, people will come after you.Yeah. People will be obsessed.Jennie: And that's fine. Right. Butyeah.Jennie: Is, is that one of the things that could be in the book that those readers. That would delight those readers.Andrew: Right. I like, I feel like there are a lot of ways I can leave Easter eggs for Dracula fans.Jennie: Yeah.Andrew: Um, that aren't, that aren't germane to understanding the plot of the motivations of the characters, but that, like a Dracula fan will appreciate, oh, I see what you did there. That was a nice touch. Um,Jennie: and soAndrew: I,Jennie: oh, I think they, they're gonna love that andAndrew: Yeah.Yeah.Jennie: You know, there's also then. This is just where my brain goes in terms of marketing. There's also then a whole [00:29:00] thing of, you know, a connection to a literary, uh, to literature readers, which could potentially be students and scholars and, you know, that sort of thing. Yeah.Andrew: Yeah.Jennie: So I don't, I don't think you should so quickly dismiss.John Stewart, but it's a Adrianna's father being named Jonathan, I was wondering about.Andrew: Mm-hmm. Okay.Jennie: And, and you do not have to care that Jennie can't keep him straight. Uh, I'm, I'm 62. My brain doesn't work the same way it used to, but I can't tell you the number of times. I'm like, wait. Was that like I wasAndrew: right.Jennie: Really snagging on that. So, um, just a point of information.Andrew: Gotcha, gotcha. No, it's worth thinking about though. It's worth thinking about. But I, I had a, I had a question for you.Jennie: Yeah.Andrew: If now is an appropriate time to ask it.Jennie: Ask it. [00:30:00] Yeah.Andrew: I've been, I've been spending a lot of brain power on the question of POV.Jennie: Yeah,Andrew: and I've been go like, and going back and forth about whether this is going to be a single POV, uh, and Abriana is, Abriana is our narrator, or if it's more third person omniscient, or maybe this is a dual POV. And I think most recently I've been thinking this is a dual POV between Abriana and her namesake Van Helsing, and like.Which is also create some time traveling, uh, mechanisms because we'll be, we'll be talk, he'll be talking about his experiences, uh, before Abriana was born and as she, as she's a child, and she'll be talking about her experiences as a young woman. And so, but now as we're talking about a Adrianna's mother, I'm more, I'm wondering like, do I want the dual POV to between, between Abriana and her mother?Um. What question should I [00:31:00] be considering to help me make that decision?Jennie: Uh, well this is a huge question, Andrew. Um, there, I feel like you just named so many excellent structural ways forward, right? And the question of what do you ask yourself? You're asking such good questions, like what do you ask yourself to make that decision?And. I'm gonna, my answer's gonna be something really unsatisfying in many ways because it's, you gotta go back to your why, why are you writing the story? Mm-hmm. Okay. Why does it matter to you? Mm-hmm. What is your point? Who do you, who do you want to speak to? Uh, those fundamental questions are going to inform the POV because if you, well, I know you originally had an idea about the brother.Um, her brother being a narrator, and you didn't mention him this time, you mentioned No, [00:32:00] the mom. So a story in which the mom and daughter are narrating and the mom and they're never going to meet.Mm-hmm.Jennie: Those two people in, I don't think, well, no, that's not true. Uh, uh, an unden person could meet a, a human walking the earth, um, right.Andrew: And that may be, that may be part of the climax.Jennie: Yeah. SoAndrew: of the novel. ButJennie: that, um, that a mother daughter who, who don't think that they can, maybe the daughter doesn't think that they will ever meet, you know, that's a real particular. Kind of a story. Mm-hmm. So I do think, going back to your why, why do I care about this?Why, you know, I, I asked you in our, our initial conversation, you know, you're, you're a man. You're writing about [00:33:00] suffragettes, you're writing about a woman protagonist, a young woman, protagonist, and you talked a lot about your sister.Mm-hmm.Jennie: Understanding those motivations and interests and passions because that mother-daughter story will carry a certain kind of weight.The, if we think of the, the Van Haling being a narrator, that taps into what we were talking about before. How connected is your story to that lineage ofright,Jennie: of that one. ‘cause now you're. Not only having Bram Stoker's character, you're giving that character a POV voice. Mm-hmm. Which is another level of connection to that mm-hmm.Literary lineage. Mm-hmm. Um, so that would take it in a different, you can see how that would take it in a really different direction. So POV is, [00:34:00] you know, in some stories it's quite. Instant. Um, you just sort of know, um, in other stories it's not, and this one, it, it is not. Um mm-hmm. I think it's, it's clear Abriana is your protagonist.It's her our core following. Mm-hmm. It's her. Transformation. We're interested in her, uh, solving the murder, her understanding her legacy, her coming into her own power. Those are the things we want to see resolved. Um, so whether or not she is a POV though, because there's a, then there's, there's third person.Mm-hmm. I mean, third person has different, you know, there's different permutations of it. There's third person close mm-hmm. Which is sort of functions in some ways, like first person, because in third person close, you don't go into anybody else's head. Mm-hmm. Um, I, I sometimes don't understand why, [00:35:00] why that is even a choice.Then I read books that do it, that work beautifully, and it's like, oh, okay. You know? So, uh, you know, everything can be a choice, but, um, you know, so we know that she's at the center. So then the question I'm circling around to answering your question, how do you help yourself solve this? What other voices would amplify?Mm-hmm.Jennie: Her transformation, that's really what it is, is it's her story. You know, the, the mother, POV would take it in one direction. Van Helsing would take it in a different mm-hmm. Uh, third person where we're,I don't know, a third person narrator that goes back in time feels odd to me.Andrew: Okay.Jennie: I think if it's, and I'm just talking out loud here. I think if it's third person, it, it, we could go into all the heads of everybody. Walking the earth [00:36:00] right now. But I feel like if you go into someone you can see I'm betraying my not understanding Vampire vampires very well.They never die, right?Andrew: Yes. They're undead.Jennie: They never die. So. Okay, so I think, ignore what I just said, A third person, omniscient narrator, could go into their heads as well. Um, right. And go back in time as well. But your time travel, like, like actually having that, that's a really different story, so.Mm-hmm.Jennie: Um, how you're going to answer is you're gonna sit with that question of what is gonna make a adrianna's story resonate the most at that end, right? What, mm-hmm. What knowing is going to, to amplify that the most. And then the second thing to ask yourself, and you might need to do a little more work, uh, in order to answer [00:37:00] this once you get the inside outline done.Looking at the key scenes. Yeah, you may just see, oh, there is no way that this is gonna work in a certain POV, or I have to have this other POVI can't convey. I can't go to that scene. I have to go to that scene. Or alternatively a scene that you can't go to. Then you think, alright, how will I get this?Into How do I convey this? I'm thinking of that. Um. You know, there's so many, uh, there's so many, uh, what's the word I'm looking for? I'm thinking of JK Rowling and Harry Potter and all the things that she did, you know, the mirror Yeah. That shows Harry or his parents and the pen sea that, you know, gets the memories outta somebody's head.Like all these, um mm-hmm. Mechanical ways Yeah. Of show, showing us what happened.Yeah. [00:38:00]Jennie: Back, back in the day. You know, that's a particularly kind of story with particularly kind of magic. But there, there, you don't know. You might have this, they're devices.Yeah,Jennie: that's the word I was looking for. Devices, yes.That you might have one or two scenes, it's like, do I need a whole POV just to convey these scenes or is there another way I could get this information in? So it's two parts, it's both. Um, I would say heart a heart. A heart-centered thing. What, what do I want? What will amplify my why and my point the most?What, what I think would be interesting and fun to write the question of, um, then Helsing, do I want to embrace that? Mm-hmm. For some reason I'm thinking of that, um, novel, um, the Hillary Clinton alternative history novel. Um. Called Rodham, uh oh, by, [00:39:00] is it Curtis Sittenfeld, I think. Um, Rodham, but so courageous and daring.She, yeah, she imagines, um, what would have happened had, had Hillary not married Bill, and it follows the, their lives and their meeting and their love story and all this whole thing, which he just chooses not to marry him. And, you know, like. That's a certain kind of bravery as an author to, to take that sort of a character.And you'd be, you'd be doing that. So do you, do I wanna do that? So it's all those hard questions and then there's plot questions, so Right. I'm gonna say that for the next, your next bit of homework. Mm-hmm. Um. Is to, I would go to the inside outline and start trying to pin this plot down and noodling around with it.And we know that it's going to change based on your research. Mm-hmm. Based on the fact that it always changes. [00:40:00] Um, but just noodle around with it and try it from different POVs. See, see what happens. You know? Take, take the, um, this is the reason, by the way, listeners, why I insist that the insight outline at the beginning is only three pages because Andrew can do one that is a Briana's, POV only.What does that look like? Uh, AA and her mom, what does that look like? Abriana and um. Van health sink, what does that look like? Uh, third person, what does that look like? You could do four, three page outlines and it's not gonna kill you. Right. Right. You could just to sort of get a feel for it, and I promise you mm-hmm.That what's gonna happen is one of ‘em is gonna feel more alive.Andrew: Right.Jennie: So that's the sortAndrew: of, okay,Jennie: unsatisfying [00:41:00] answer is one of them is gonna feel more alive. So you're gonna start with your why. Start with your point. Try to sit with that, then try those things on. One of them's gonna feel more alive.Okay.Andrew: So you're not just gonna tell me which POVs to use then?Jennie: No, it'sAndrew: not. That's not how thisJennie: works. I know, it's such a bummer. Um. I mean, it's such a, such an important question and people often skim past it, butAndrew: mm-hmm.Jennie: You know, take, I think it's the time, like dig, dig into the outline with the intention mm-hmm.Of landing on POV. How about, how about that for your homework?Andrew: Okay. That sounds good. That sounds good. I can do that.Jennie: Okay. Well, I can't wait to hear how it goes. And for our listeners. Until next time, stop playing small and write like it matters.Outro: The hashtag am [00:42:00] Writing podcast is produced by Andrew Perilla. Our intro music aptly titled Unemployed Monday was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

After ten years of the #amwriting podcast, KJ, Jess, and Sarina are marking a milestone—and a transition. In this episode, the longtime hosts reflect on what the writing world looked like when the show began and share their best advice for writers trying to do meaningful work. They also pass the microphone to Jennie, who will carry the podcast into its next chapter.Moving forward, Jennie will keep the show focused on helping writers do their best work and make smart decisions about their writing lives. Expect familiar features and new conversations, including Write Big solo episodes, Book Lab breakdowns of listener submissions, coaching sessions with writers across genres, and Margin Notes exploring the thinking behind creative choices. The mission remains the same: helping writers play big in their writing life, love the process, and stick with it long enough to finish what matters most.#AmWriting is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.TranscriptJennie: [00:00:00] Hi, I'm Jennie Nash and you're listening to the hashtag am Writing podcast. The place where we help writers of all kinds play big in your writing life, love the process, and stick with it long enough to finish what matters most.KJ: Hey everyone. I'm kj and you are listening to the hashtag am Writing podcast, the place where we help writers of all kinds play big in your writing life, love the process, and stick with it long enough to finish what matters most.So today is a big day. We're we'reJess: big day.KJ: Yeah. We're celebrating the 10th year of the hashtag am writing podcast, which I have to say is officially the longest I've been able to sustain any job-like thing. Um, and we're announcing that we're going in a new direction. So this is really cool. After a decade of talking to y'all, um, Jess and I and then [00:01:00] Sarina, who is at minus a decade. I don't wanna, um, have decided to step back and hand over the reins to Jennie.Jess: YeahJennie: It is, it is such a big milestone and such a big deal. And before we. Actually say goodbye to the three of you. I mean, it's not forever. You're coming back as guests, all of you, all the time, hopefully.KJ: Oh, heck yes. Absolutely. You, you, you and I have already planned all the things, so don't get too excited and, and weepy here folks, but things are just, things are gonna be. New and fresh and more interesting and, uh, more craft filled and more inspirational. When I need inspiration to write, I look for one of our episodes.That's Jennie. So I think this is gonna be, this is gonna be great.Jennie: I think it's gonna be great too. But before we actually say goodbye, I mean, 10. Is a long time and I thought it would be fun to ask you all what it was like 10 [00:02:00] years ago when you started, and Sarina 10 minus whatever the time is, but what was the writing landscape like as a whole maybe for you, and then all this wisdom, all these years that you've shared.What's, what's the thing that sticks in your head the most is what you would want to leave with, with the listeners, what is the your best piece of writing advice from all of this time? So. Jess, why don't you start? You're the og.Jess: Well, I, I definitely wanted to start. For those people who have not been around since the very beginning, you have to understand that it's really horrifying when people say they go back and like start from the beginning because, um, and we'll be posting pictures in the show notes.I have a ton of pictures throughout the years, but we originally, um, we, we would go into this little, I had a tiny, tiny house and we would go into the eve space off of my daughter's room. And it was raw insulation with a light bulb, and we sat on the floor and it was [00:03:00] like. Maybe at the tallest point, maybe four feet high, so you had to kind of crawl in.And I have a picture of us, um, podcasting from inside there. And it was, and it was very hot in the summer. It would get very, very hot. My house did not have air conditioning and um. But it was delightful and it was this thing that we had talked about doing for such a long time, and I was so proud of us.And mainly it was kj. KJ was the one who said, we're not gonna talk about this anymore, we're just gonna do it. So she got us into gear and just brought her stuff over to my house in her basket and said, let's go. Let's do it. And we bought microphones and everything and it was. It was a big new adventure.And if you had said, then, how long do you think this is gonna last? I don't know that I would've said 10 years. But there's, you know, then Sarina came in and, and Sarina has, has been a part of this as a guest since the very beginning too. And a couple of things that I wanted to share were that one time Sarina and KJ and I, uh, were doing a [00:04:00] double, a double header episode and I forgot to hit record for both of them.And so. We did this incredibly fun, very long episode, broken into two pieces that, um, it went off into the ether and. I did learn from that. And then at the same time, by the time we were sort of on our game enough to be able to really interview people, we went up to Maine to interview Richard Russo and we went to record at his daughter's wonderful bookstore in Portland, Maine.And um, I had three modes of recording. I had, um. Two microphones and I had a handheld digital thing that I had on the table between us and, um, mode one failed and mode two failed. And so the only thing we had was, you know, our little digital handheld on the table in between us. So. There's a lot of stuff like that.There was the moment I got to text KJ and tell her that we were getting David [00:05:00] Sedaris, there was the day she emailed me to tell me that we were getting Anna Quinlan. You know, and I just so many cool things that, um. It makes me so happy that we've produced something good out of all of that. And one last thing.The, the, the thing that I think I've learned the most is there is no one right way to do this. That every single time I hear about, like whether it's the, you have to write, writer write every day, you have to write every day, or you have to write in a certain way, or you have to write in a certain place, or you have to write with the door closed, or you have to write with the door open, all of those things.Um, none of those are rules. None of them are rules. They're things that people do and I'm really glad that I've had the opportunity to talk to a lot of people about all the different ways they do it.Jennie: That's amazing. Um, kj, do you remember this, uh, light bulb and no insulation time? KJ: Oh yeah. I don't remember the time you didn't record particularly just ‘cause it happened more than once. And [00:06:00] the other thing I would throw in is that the more famous, the guest, the. Less interesting. They were, it was almostKJ: always true. Jess: It wasn them. It was, yeah. I think we got all jacked up about like, I don't know. It just,Jess: I don't know.Wasn David Sari's advice to young writers was the worst.KJ: Yeah. It advice really wasJess: anyone has ever given, itKJ: was,Jess: yeah, a writer. He said, don't submit your work. Don't ask. Don't try to get you, wait for people to read it. Wait for people to ask you if they can read it.KJ: Yeah,Jess: that's which this, this is, KJ: this worked for him. He is an NF one and it will not work for you.Jess: Right. Yeah, I think thatKJ: my favorite, I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna lay it out there. I'm not even gonna put any caveats on that. That won't work.Jess It won't work.KJ: No. I think it's always been the most fun when we get in deep into the craft and anytime someone is too practiced with their answers or it's the same answer they've given a million times.You're [00:07:00] right. It was cold and it was, um, it just wasn't good.Sarina: Yeah. So the more fun people were always the people who were really in it with us.KJ: Yeah. Yeah.Jennie: So, Sarina, do you know when you came in, do you know what the, the n minus number is?Sarina: No, because I was a guest star even before we got out of the, the, um, kgs closet.It's true. It's true.KJ: One of those not recorded episodes was recorded in the eve space. That's true. We had, we roped during fairly early.Jennie: Yeah. In that 10 years, you've probably written more. More than, well, how many books have you written in that time? Sarina, I mean,Sarina: um, 50. At 50 50 ish.Jennie: That's crazy. That's crazy. So what do you know now that you didn't know then?Sarina: Oh, so much, so much that, like giving advice, you know, I, I [00:08:00] now feel like less qualified to give advice than I did then, you know how that goes. Like, the job gets harder, not easier. I have a, a good working vocabulary for why, but it doesn't make me feel like anybody's, you know, special savior.Jennie: Yeah. Yeah. What do you remember about starting in and the, the, um, all these episodes? What sticks in your mind asSarina: you know? Um, I loved the opportunity to talk to people who I think are fantastic. I also learned that I am not a fantastic interviewer and that, and that, um. That isn't a skill of mine that I, it's, there's so many things, like I'm so busy, I write so many books.I can't learn to be the interviewer that you deserve. So I only. Did interviews selectively and sometimes they were just so fun. Like, [00:09:00] um, the, the person who broke broke the mold about the interview being interesting, the more famous they are was Emily Henry. ‘cause she was Oh yeah. She was fun to talk to.She was just right there with us and, and ready to have a good time and, and so wise and also so, so nice. And that, that's really great when you can talk to somebody who's killing it in your own genre and you know, they're just so wonderful about it. Um, and then, you know, then we had the odd, very sweaty interview where nothing seems to go according to plan.And I won't name the author because I do admire this person very much, but they were not. Willing to take any expertise onto themselves. So KJ and I just sweated all the way through this interview trying to get this person to, to tell us KJ: Say something. Say anything.Sarina: Yeah. Tell us how you feel, you know?KJ: Yeah.Sarina: And it could not be done.KJ: Nope.Sarina: So, you know, that one, I, [00:10:00] I will never re-listened to that one, but, um, but I really, what I got out of it, honestly, was spending time with all of you guys, and you teach me things every single day. And another thing about this job is that I find that I have to relearn the best lessons over and over again.And when you are compelled to speak lucidly about your job, you know, a couple of times a month, um, it forces a certain reckoning with your own skill and expertise. Like I might say that I, you know, don't want to be anybody's, um, masterclass, but I really do know a lot at this point and, um, every time I talk to you guys and we'd, and we gathered together like this, I always learn something.Jess: I love, I think Sarina is the most amazing explainer and teacher. And so getting to learn, um, especially, you know, in these [00:11:00] recent, uh, nerd Corner Publishing Nerd Corner episodes, it's been so cool to just learn from her. It's really, really fun. And, you know, if, if we take it all the way back, like the first, your first romance novels, you know.We're just coming out when we just, when we started this thing. It's just been such an incredible journey from there to where we are now. The other thing that's been really cool is that this podcast has made me really accountable to my goals and to, you know, not that. You guys also do that for me. But saying things out loud in front of other people has always been my, the thing that has saved me, whether that's about my recovery or, um, you know, whatever it is.Um, people talk to me all the time and say, you know, was it hard to come out publicly about, you know, being an alcoholic? I'm like, absolutely not. It's what's kept me sober. And I feel the same way about the writing, that when I talk to, um, the listeners that I, I feel like. Someone may [00:12:00] come along someday and ask how that, uh, that goal of mine is going. And, and I like that.Jennie: Yeah. That's so good. Kj, what, what are your best memories and, um, best, best advice that you've gotten or, or given?KJ Well, you know, spend 10 years, so it is a long time ago, but I do remember the time Jess was riding her dinosaur to my house to record and got hit by a snowplow. Mm-hmm. Um, that was, that was good times.Jess: Yep.KJ: We have Snow Fred Dinosaurs up here. Yep. In New Hampshire. Um, the Sedaris thing that was, that was just funny and also really cool ‘cause I have such deep admiration for, for him, and I'm quite certain that if somehow he ever heard. I, he would not care. We think that was terrible advice.Jess: What's also really was really funny about that one is this is an only David Sedera sort of situation where, oh Lord, he, he has said very specifically that he, during COVID, he refused.To get Zoom, any [00:13:00] kind of zoom sort of situation. So we had to, we went all the way to Concord to,KJ: this wasn't Coco COVID, this was before that. No, no, no. I, I know, but I'm saying like, he has, this is not new information. He has said very publicly that he doesn't do likeJess: Oh, yeah. So he wouldn't even, even let us have somebody bring him a laptop to his apartment.Right. And set it up for us, which we were like, happy to do, butKJ: Yeah. Yeah. We had to go there.Jess: So he called and yeah, we went to NHPR in Concord and, uh, our, and our wonderful producer Andrew was. Able to get everything connected for us. Um, but it was one of those moments where, you know, we are constantly talking about how to like bend over backwards to get marketing and get people to listen to what we have to say.And yet, even though he puts obstacles in the path of people who want to hear what he has to say, they will gladly jump through those hoops, uh, for him.Jess: Yeah. Crazy. Yeah. I mean, you know, so kind of him to do it.KJ: Yes. Anyway, I mean, that was super funnyJess: and, and I am looking at my wall that [00:14:00] has the postcard, the thank you postcard that he sent us.So when he says he sends thank you notes to everyone, he sends thank you notes to everyone because we got one. And from what I understand, he sends them to every bookseller, every person who drives them everywhere. He sends thank you notes to everyone.Jennie: Wow. That's what I think of when I think of you, Jess.mThat's a thing you do too. You're so good at that. Well, I, I have to say that I have been a listener for this whole time, and the thing that you all brought was. This authenticity, this sense of what it's really like to do this work. And you all are writing such different things and so accomplished at those things, and your willingness to kind of just open, open it up and share what that looks like with no, you know, varnish over it or, or you know, polished.Just like, this is what it's really like and this is who we are and this is how it happens, and [00:15:00] that the work gets done in such. Messy circumstances and, um, that lesson and, and that generosity of showing people that that's true. Which kind of goes to what you were saying, Jess, like there is no way, but, but also just doing the work is the way and.That's what you have all modeled and continue to model, and obviously,KJ well, that's what I want people to take away from this. Mm-hmm. Is listen. Okay. We're joking that 10 years is a long time and 10 years is a long time. It's a long time to do anything. But also 10 years ago I had one book to my name. And you've never heard of it.It was called Reading with Babies, toddlers, and Twos, and it got me all my other jobs. Jess had no books to her name. Mm-hmm. 10 years ago, Sarina Couple not, you know, just, just, just barely getting started. Jennie actually had a ton of books to her name, but that's, you know, that's a different story. So here we were.10 years ago sat down and said, [00:16:00] we are gonna do these things. And we did not all, I mean, it wasn't, nobody came and asked us for it. All of David Saris. Um, nobody had, none of us had instant success. You know, no one called up and said, Hey, can I do this? And like immediately got articles in the New Yorker or whatever.Uh, publishers were not banging down our doors. We. We were banging down theirs and we were all very determined to, um, to make this a professional endeavor. The, the podcast and the writing and the books and all of it. And so I guess what I'm saying is I don't know where you are listener, but wherever you wanna be in 10 years.Uh, you know, maybe you won't get exactly there. I wouldn't say any of us has gotten exactly there ‘cause we're not done. But still, we came a long way in 10 years and I would like to see other people, [00:17:00] um, sit down and actually do the thing so you can go to the place.Jess: That's been one of the big joys, I think, also of this podcast is seeing other people's work happen.Like hearing from listeners that, oh my gosh, I hadn't started my book. I was trying to get motivated to start my book, and then I created this proposal and now the book is coming out, and that's, I, I, I just, I can't, I can hardly wrap my brain around that. Um, it's been a really amazing progression and the, the group of people that have sort of coalesced around listening to this podcast and getting in, in touch, some of them have become friends and that's been really amazing too.Sarina: I hope what some people will take away from this, um, is that very few people who do what we do are truly trained for it. You know, I don't have an MFAI don't KJ and just don't have journalism degrees. They have law degrees instead. But, um, you can, you can [00:18:00] do this on the job training. That's what we did.That's what you listened to us do. And I'm reminded of that, um, quote by El Doctoral. You know, writing a book is like driving at night with the headlights on. You can. You can't see the whole distance, um, but you can still get to your destination. And there was this Time when KJ and I were debating this quote on this podcast and KJ said, yeah, but the last time we went driving at night, we almost hit a bunny.And it was true. And I think that what might be the, one of the times I laughed the hardest on this podcast.Jess: You know, it's also interesting, I was thinking that, um, you know how I said that there isn't one way to do things, and even the way that we do things has evolved over time and like Sarina has learned how to, has become a coffee shop writer and has learned how to write in other places.And I've learned how to write in other places and I never used to be able to do that. Um, [00:19:00] so how we get the work done really has. Uh, evolved with the needs of what's going on around us and what our career needs from us, and, and that's been really pleasant. Pleasant to watch too.Jennie: Well, it's been an honor to listen to you all and to be, uh, working alongside you.And I am, I'm thrilled to be carrying the show forward. I have lots of big ideas to bring to these episodes To continue to center the writer and the writing and getting the work done in authentic conversations about what it takes, both from a craft perspective and a mindset perspective. So I'll be reaching out soon for submissions to book Lab because that's gonna continue with a twist and I will be letting you know about what's coming. Um, for sure. New episodes with our producer Andrew, who's stepped out from behind the mic, um, as you heard last week. And I'll be continuing to coach him forward, which will be really [00:20:00] fun. So lots of good stuff coming and I appreciate your ongoing support and I appreciate.Getting you to stand on the shoulders of these three incredible writers and entrepreneurs and thinkers and friends, and, um, thank you all.KJ Thank you. I'm just so glad. Thank you guys to see this, uh, keep going and to become a little bit more of a passenger. I have very much been the driver for the past few years.Um, Jess had her turn in the, in the driving seat and Sarina said from day one, no, no, I am buddy, humble guest. So, um, I'm so thrilled that you're taking over and I am excited to listen when I am not part of it, and to also continue to be part of it. Yay. Thank you guys.Jennie: Thank you all so, so much.Hey, why don't you, uh, why don't you take us out?KJ No, no. Jess has to take us out. It's cool. That's the tradition.Jess: Alright. And actually coming up with our, this little bit of the show happened in the eve space, so [00:21:00] it's a very. Yeah, that's a sentimental phrase for me too. So until next week, everyone, keep your butt in the chair and your head in the game.Jess: The hashtag am writing podcast. Is produced by Andrew Perilla. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

Jennie Nash launches a brand-new Hot Seat Coaching series on the podcast—real, on-air coaching sessions where listeners get to hear a story develop in real time.In the first episode, Jennie brings #amwriting podcast producer Andrew Parrella out from behind the microphone as he begins work on his first novel. Fresh off completing the Blueprint challenge, Andrew shares his gothic horror premise: a Dracula-inspired story set in 1920s London, where Abriana Harker—the daughter of Mina Harker—faces a string of mysterious deaths unfolding against the backdrop of the suffrage movement.Jennie and Andrew pressure-test the blueprint together, refining the novel's central point, exploring how Van Helsing's legacy shapes the world of the story, and identifying ways to strengthen Abriana's role so the plot is driven by her choices. Andrew leaves with clear next steps—and this is just the beginning: he'll return in future episodes as Jennie continues coaching him through the process of developing the novel.You can connect with Andrew via his website AndrewParrella.com#AmWriting is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.TranscriptJennie: [00:00:00] Hi, I'm Jennie Nash and you're listening to the hashtag am Writing podcast. The place where we help writers of all kinds play big in your writing life. Love the process, and stick with it long enough to finish what matters most. Hi, I'm Jenny Nash and you're listening to the hashtag am Writing podcast.This is something new. It's a hot seat coaching episode where we're gonna work through a real challenge in real time with a real writer. And today. I'm joined by a really special guest. His name is Andrew Perella, and he has been the producer of this podcast for many, many years and is stepping out from behind the microphone to write his first novel.Andrew participated in the Winter Blueprint challenge that we recently completed. Which is to say he answered all 14 of the blueprint questions during our challenge and, and produced a [00:01:00] finished blueprint. And so I wanted to get on with him and talk about what do we do next? How do we go from there to the next thing?And he agreed to do that to help show our listeners how it goes. And I'm so excited about it because. He just did incredible work and also has so much work to go, so hopefully we're gonna get to, we're gonna get to follow Andrew as he does this for a few episodes and bring you along on the journey. So welcome Andrew from Behind the Microphone.Andrew: So much work to go. Thank you, Jenny. I'm really excited to be here.Jennie: So Andrew is, has a long career in public radio and is a producer of podcast for many people and is a storytelling guy, you know, as well as a sound guy. So this is, this is a big move. I feel like this is a right big move for you for sure, for deciding.This is the time to embrace the fact that you wanna do this thing. Does it [00:02:00] feel like that to you?Andrew: It, it feels like a right big move for me that I'm kind of prioritizing now this writing project for me. I'm prioritizing my project, um, over, over, uh, the projects of others whom, whom I help with projects.Yeah. So this is a big, big a right big moment for me.Jennie: It is totally a riping moment and. You're in the hot seat personal coaching, which I, I really appreciate you being willing to do So, um, where we stand today is, as I said, you, you finished the blueprint, you did all the work, you did the thing. So I'm just curious to sort of check in.How do you feel? Do you feel like that's an accomplishment? Do you feel some momentum? Like, what, where are you feeling, what are you feeling? Um,Andrew: I, I feel like it is a, a really big accomplishment because as we were working through the blueprint, I was getting feedback, uh, from you and KJ Dium about, uh, about, uh, how I was, how I was creating my [00:03:00] blueprint.It got me, it forced me to think about the book in some very real terms, in ways that I hadn't yet, and in ways that, you know, I had been kind of thinking about the book in more abstract notions. Um, and like this was putting pen to paper, uh, on so many things to think about, you know, beyond the, beyond the simple plot structure.Um, and I realized as I was going through this. How much I hadn't yet considered, and I think this helped to show me where the holes in my story were. Um. And he, even, even as I've finished, quote unquote, finished the blueprint, it's like I finished one inter iteration of it and like already the story has changed since I first started work on the blueprint.And so already I know I gotta go back and start reiterating on, on, on this, uh, uh, as we go along here.Jennie: Yeah. I mean, and that's the point, right? Yeah. Is the whole point is this is a tool that reveals. [00:04:00] What's working and what's not working? Is this what I want? Does this reflect my vision? And you get to, to play with that wet clay of the idea.So that's really what what we're doing. But the reason that I thought you'd be such a good candidate for coaching live in this way is your story. It really hangs together in so many ways. It's so great in so many ways and it, it would be easy to feel like, oh, I'm, I'm not that far. I got this. I could, I could start right?I can start writing. Yeah. But I hope, I hope what we're gonna show is, is really pushing yourself to answer core questions is gonna just make it so much stronger.Andrew: Absolutely.Jennie: So, um, all that being said, do you. What do you think the best way to share what you're writing with our listeners is? Do you think reading your book jacket copy feels good or do you wanna just say it out [00:05:00] loud?Andrew: Um, I feel like the book jacket copy, I. Um, that I, that I wrote doesn't quite, doesn't quite capture, I think in many ways what I think the book is going to be so Well,Jennie: and we're gonna actually getAndrew: to that. So I, and we're gonna get to that, I think. Yeah.Jennie: So why don't you just, just share what, what it is.Andrew: So, uh, the premise of the book is this happens, uh.Uh, the, the novel, it happens 20 years after the events of, uh, Bram Stoker's Dracula. Um, and so. It involves some of the same characters, and then it also involves the next generation of these characters. So these, those characters children. Um, the, uh, our protagonist is a Abriana Harker, who is the daughter of Mina Harker, who was, um, kind of the female, uh, lead in, in, in Dracula.And she was, she was bitten by Dracula in, in the original novel. [00:06:00] Um, and she is, uh, someone who is defended, um. Uh, by her, uh, by her friends and, and counterparts in, in that story, Abriana is her daughter. And Abriana is now facing a similar challenge. There are bodies that are turning up around her circle and uh, they appear to have similar injuries that Dracula's victims had 20 years ago, and some people recognize that and are.Going to begin trying to unravel the mystery. And this is all set against the backdrop of the universal suffrage movement, which is also happening in, uh, you know, 1920s London, where, where the novel is, novel is set. And so in broad strokes, that is, that is the, the, the primary premise of the book.Jennie: So the genre is horror.Gothic and I, I did some, some digging. I'm not a big reader of horror, so I did some digging into the genre to make sure that that was right. Because there [00:07:00] there's also thriller elements. There's mystery elements. Mm-hmm. There's, you know, there's other elements and it is, I always liked to, to test. Is this right?Is this right? Could it be tweaked? Could it be better? And it feels, it feels like there's really no question about the genre. Right. Do you feel thatAndrew: I, I feel that, I feel definitely, definitely feel that. And I think I, I, like gothic is, is, is a genre that I really enjoy and I want to develop some of those gothic themes in the story a little bit more than I have so far.But yes, I think gothic and, and horror is very much where, where this, where this book lives. Yeah.Jennie: Yeah. And that is something I wanna talk about for sure when we get to the inside outline. But I wanna start with, um, the second question of the blueprint is what's your point? And I know this is something you've struggled with a little bit.Yeah. Um, but so the current point that you have here is. I feel like maybe this came from me. So, [00:08:00] uh, I, it's, you can't change the world without upsetting people. The more you want to change, the more people you upset, and that's fine, but it, but it doesn't, it does, it doesn't feel like it captures. There's a real moral, philosophical debate at the center of your story.Right.Andrew: Yeah, absolutely. I think, you know, the, the characters are certainly, uh, in the midst of a paradigm shift, you know, there's the, there, the, the world order is changing as, uh, as suffrage is, is being opened to more and more people. Um, and times a world order like that changes. There are people who are for it and there are a lot of people who are against it.And so I think that's. That's an element in, in play here in the, in the novel. And that, and that's something that I wanted to explore. And obviously there are parallels in current times as well for, uh, for this, for this sort of change. So I think that's, I think that's, that's certainly, that's certainly part of, uh, of, of [00:09:00] the story.Yeah.Jennie: So I was, when I, when I review a blueprint, and for anybody who's, who's got one all on the page and, and you, you like it and it feels pretty good. The step is to, to really pressure test everything. So I, I read through the whole thing. I love looking at a blueprint. A blueprint as a whole rather than piece by piece.And in this particular case, it's like this. Yeah. This point feels bloodless, which is something we definitely don't want in this story. So I went back to your why and your why is really powerful and really personal and really political. Um, it's, it's fiery, it's articulate, like there's so much about your why that I.You can see my comments on the page. Mm-hmm. Not the listener, but Andrew can Right where I was going. Great. Yes. Very powerful. Awesome. You know, it's just, it's excellent. And you had some lines in there [00:10:00] about the, the monster in this story is not the vampire, but a man who is refusing to change with the times basically.And. That felt to me, given everything else you're saying about the parallels between this, the milieu of this story and the milieu we live in right now, the, the fraught. Climate, political climate. Cultural climate that felt more potent as a point. And I, I wondered what you thought about that.Andrew: Yeah, I mean, I think that that is as mu that is as much a part of the, the premise as I've conceived it, as, as anything else that I've, I've said, um, you know, the, the, the.Spoiler alert, the the murders aren't being committed by, by the vampire, uh, or vampires. Uh, the murders are being committed by an old white dude who is not [00:11:00] happy with how the politics are shifting under his feet and how the world is changing around him, um, and is trying to, at all costs, prevent that from happening, even sacrificing a bit of his own humanity in, in the process.And so I think that is. Is is something that certainly resonates, but I think it yeah. Is, as you say, there's a passion, there's a blood there that in in, in the why that didn't quite make it to my point. Um,Jennie: yeah, yeah, yeah. So I would suggest for the next iteration mm-hmm. To, to really push that point and.It's gonna keep changing, it's gonna keep, um, you know, getting refined as you go. But I think it's important to move it forward as you keep writing. So the, um, yeah, something that's, that's fiery and that's, um, about, ‘cause that's a, that's a, you're flipping an important trope in a. In a [00:12:00] classic novel, right?Mm-hmm. That it, it's not the vampire. So like, why that? Why, why are we flipping out? What is that showing us? What is the point of, of doing that in the story? That, so I would really play with that. Um, does that make sense? Mm-hmm.Andrew: Yes, it does. Okay. Yes, it does.Jennie: Okay, so the next thing I wanna talk about is your super, your super simple story.Mm-hmm. And. What's interesting about the super simple story is, I mean, I love everybody always. Here's me say this, who's listened to me for very long, but I love a constraint on in creativity. And this, trying to get this story in a really short space often reveals something. And what it, when it was revealing to me is, so you've got, you've got a abriana, she wants to, uh, become a doctor.Because of her mother's, [00:13:00] her mother died in childbirth with her. Um, so that's the, that's the storyline. You've got the murders that are happening and, and then you've got the universal suffragette movement, this political debate that's going on. So there's these three threads and. Even in the super simple story, it was feeling a little bit like they're disconnected.I don't think they're disconnected in your mind. I think they're disconnected on the page.Andrew: Okay.Jennie: So I wanted to just ask you to articulate that a little bit more. ‘cause you hint in the um, book jacket copy later, AA has things in common with Finn halting who's. Her uncle, the Vampire Hunter. Are you comfortable sharing what those are?Andrew: Yeah.Jennie: What those commonalities are?Andrew: Yeah, I think, I think, [00:14:00] um, uh, Abraham Von Helsing is, is a character from the original novel, um, and he helps guide the team to, uh, uh, find, track down and destroy Dracula. Um. In the world of my novel, his understanding of vampires changes as he's, as he continues to do research on them.And so he's discovered, he's discovered more about them. That will spell out a little bit more in the, uh, in the novel, but. First and foremost, and one of the, one of the primary roles he plays in the, in, in the original novel is a, as a doctor. And that's one thing that Abriana really admires about him. He becomes a bit of a, a, um, a surrogate.Parent to her with her mother dying and her, uh, her father's grief, turning into a little bit of emotional distance from, uh, from Abriana. And so von uh, van Helsing kind of fills that gap and so she associates her. I think her desire [00:15:00] to become a doctor stems from both her birth, you know, ultimately killing her mother, but also because, and, and, and wanting to prevent that from happening to other women, but also because she's seen, you know, van Helsing.Perform his, his service as a doctor. He, she's seen it in action and what it can do and wants to, and wants to, wants to emulate that. And so, and, and I think one of the, one of the things that, that I get excited about is incorporating a little bit of like historic realism into, into the novel as well. And there was in, uh, the 1920s a, a medi, the London School of Medicine for women.Um, it had it, it had been. Open for a, a decade or so. It was still a fairly new school at the time. And so that there was an, uh, a real place that she would've been able to go and get an education is something that, uh, is something that I'm, I'm excited to have part of, part of the novel and like that school wouldn't have been possible if it was not for the Women's Liberation [00:16:00] Movement, which resulted obviously in the universal.In the universal suffrage movement. And so all of that I feel, kind of ties, ties together in a way that I haven't explained very well in my super simple copy, super simple story explanation there.Jennie: So, so that's what I'm trying to get at is Adrianna is not just some random young woman. No, I mean she's, she's very clearly descended from.A, a particular, uh, family who's had a particular thing happen and you know, there several generations. So have you designed her as a protagonist using those elements of the family yet, or, or is it more kind of just convenient that she's there? Does that make sense?Andrew: I think so, [00:17:00] and I think it's probably somewhere in the middle.I think I like the idea of tying her into these characters that who have an existing history, and it then gives her a little bit of, a little bit of, uh, gravitas for the listener when they, when they start digging in that maybe they, maybe they, maybe they have read Dracula, are familiar with those characters and so, okay, this is the next, this is the next generation.But yeah, I mean, I think Abriana reflects. A lot of other things that, that aren't in, that aren't represented in the original novel. Um,Jennie: I guess what I, I guess what I'm saying is it feels, one of my concerns is it feels as if you could write this story about Adriana and not have her beat from this family.She could, she could be kind of. Anyone Gotcha. In this [00:18:00] situation? Gotcha. Does that, am I, am I missing, am I missing that? What would make, you know, let's just, um, I know there's, there's several women in the novel who have, have important roles. So I'm gonna pick a name that's not them. Let's say that, uh, there's a young woman, Catherine, you know, not connected to, um.Ben Helsing not connected to her mother, not connected to that whole thing. And same time period, same motivation. She wants to be a doctor. Maybe she had someone in her family die, and that's her motivation. You know, like suffrages, like that whole story could still play out with Catherine. Uh, am I wrong? I want you to prove me wrong.Andrew: So like, yes, it could, I feel like, I feel like one of the things I like about tying in Van Helsing is it, it presents a red herring, um, in the sense that it's like, oh, we all think. [00:19:00] That we're gonna find out vampires are responsible for all of these deaths. Um, like, I don't know, like, and I, and I can kind of slow burn the, you know, the reveal of vampires in general and, and, and how they end up not actually being the antagonists in this By, by which is So by borrowing, by borrowing his name and sharing his glory a little bit.Yeah.Jennie: Right. But back to Catherine, our, our mm-hmm. Mythical protagonist.Andrew: Yeah.Jennie: Same thing could happen there. Everybody thinks, oh, the vampires are back. Um, Catherine, you know, they, they keep happening around her. She's gotta figure it out. You know what I mean? So,Andrew: well, so, soJennie: isAndrew: Yeah,Jennie: no, go ahead.Andrew: The question, the question I, I think that I've been grappling a bit with too is do we exist in a world where.Is, does the novel, does the world of the novel, a place where people [00:20:00] have recognized the efforts of Van Helsing and that vampires exist? Is that, is that common knowledge in this world, or is all of that still unknown to folks?Jennie: Okay, this. Is the piece that I've been missing.Andrew: Okay.Jennie: That's exactly the piece that I've been missing.That's totally it. That, so here, this is world building. If anybody's writing anything with magic, fantasy, sci-fi, even just straight up history, and maybe it's a retelling or a re um, imagining, you often know those, those questions for sure. And especially for where for. My understanding, I, I'm, like I said, I'm not a horror reader, but I do know a little bit about Dracula, but the, it was a, a sort of science versus, um, like science played a big role in that.What [00:21:00] can we know? Mm-hmm. What can we prove? What is, what is unknowable?Andrew: Mm-hmm.Jennie: Those sorts of things. Absolutely. So that, you've gotta know that here. Mm-hmm. Has it been proved? Is it. Accepted knowledge. Is Van Helsing a hero who's locked away in his lab continuing to, you know, with funding and whatever to research his thing?Or is he some. You know, recluse who was shamed in the public eye and people think he's crazy, like that's gonna color everything. Mm-hmm. Okay. And that's gonna be, that's gonna then be the answer I'm looking for. Like, why Adriana as our protagonist and not Catherine. Right. So she's gonna have that, you imagine her going to medical school with.Those two different stories behind her, how different it's [00:22:00] gonna be when she shows up in the classroom and people know, you know, or when they know who she is.Andrew: Right? Yeah.Jennie: So there, there's a real, the reveal to the reveal to the reader about her connection and who she is and then her, her reveal to the society she lives in about.Who she is and you know, the meaning she makes from all that you know, and did, no matter what you decide about Van Helsing, she then you have to all just also decide about her. Does she agree with the prevailing wisdom? If everybody thinks he's a hero, does she think he, he is too? Or does she think he's kind of whacked and then, um, learns otherwise or, you know, like the or, or the other wayAndrew: around?Jennie: Yeah. Or the other way around. Yeah. Yeah. Right. So yeah, this is the piece that's missing is I feel like you have, and this is what I felt the second I heard you talk about your story. I'm like, oh, this could be so [00:23:00] good. Like, this is so potent, but you're like, you're missing it. You're just, it's like it's, it's like it's not landing as as solid as it should, and I think this is why.Right. I had not been able to figure it out, but. And you have, so I gotta make sure I understand the character. So a Adriana's dad is the brother of Van Helsing.Andrew: Uh, they're not related in the original, in the original novel. They're, they're, uh, they're just friends. Okay. Okay. But they're, but they're clo Okay.They're, they're close friends. And because Van Helsing ultimately saved both of their lives, uh, he is kind of a, a, a surrogate uncle. So, uncle, uncle in quotation marks. Yeah,Jennie: yeah, yeah. Uncle is Is an honorific.Andrew: An honorific, exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Yep.Jennie: That confused me. Okay. So I thought that there was a direct lineage there.Andrew: Right.Jennie: But there's not No,Andrew: no genetic link. Yeah, yeah, yeah. [00:24:00]Jennie: But a link through. Her mother a link to Van Healthing Through the mother.Andrew: Yes.Jennie: Um, and, and what happened to her. So, okay. Yeah. We have to understand his role, who he is, what he's doing in the world, what people think of him. Mm-hmm. Um, and also this is important for.Just the environment of your story, because we've got this division, political division around the suffragette movement. Is there, is there o, are there other, um, like, I wanna say mood, like what's the mood of the place where she's, this story's taking place? Is it, you know, a creeping sense of doom on many levels?Uh, is the do the vampire, like, is the fact, oh, maybe the vampires are [00:25:00] back. Does that make sense for the times? Um, like you and I are talking right now in 2026, um, during very extreme political upheaval and also during the time when there's this been this kidnapping of this prominent. Um, media personalities, family member that hasn't been solved.And there's this sense like, well of course this is happening now. Like this, you know, is there a weird, are we gonna have a, um, famous serial killer? Story unfolding in our time. Right. Like, that's what I keep thinking, right? Like there's a sense of, of course these things are going to start happening now ‘cause things are, feel so unstable and unsettled.Andrew: Yeah.Jennie: Is that what's going on there? [00:26:00]Andrew: I mean, I think potentially yes. I, I've, because yeah, I feel like this, it, it, it, it was an unsettled moment politically. And also a little bit medically as they as like the medical establishment is transitioning from miasma theory to germ theory. And that was kind of late, late, uh, 19th century, early 20th century.But like there's, there's kind of been a, a paradigm shift there. So I think, I feel like yeah, there does wanna be, as you were saying, kind of like this constant, creepy. Creepy feeling. Yeah. I'm like, I'm like to lean into the gothic, like I thought, like, I really want that to pervade every, every chapter, every page.I want that kind of like creeping sensation that that doom is around the corner. Um, that, thatJennie: Right. And doom for many sources. Right. Because I think that that's kind of one of your points.Andrew: Mm-hmm.Jennie: Is well, what I'm going back to what [00:27:00] the point, point was. The point we're kind of, um. Leaning toward is people who review, refuse to evolve.When the world demands, it can become monsters. So the world is evolving in many different ways and probably getting the opportunity for a lot of different people to have to evolve in a lot of different ways. It's not just one way. It's not just like, oh, get on this bus, or you're missing. Get on, you know, what's the metaphor?Like you'll miss the boat if you don't get on the boat. But it feels like there's all kinds of boats one, one might miss here, right? Um, I think so. And so that's that. Yeah. Okay, so, so in terms of what to do next, I think your, your homework here is you've gotta get to know Van Haling. Yeah. And the, and the world a little bit better.So I would do some character [00:28:00] development work on, on him and what the world thinks of him and what a Brianna's stepping into the, the light by. Insisting on going to medical school does to Van Haling. Does it delight him? Does it challenge him? Does it, um, you know, what does he think of that? I think that's important.Andrew: Yeah.Jennie: Um, to know too.Andrew: Yeah.Jennie: Um,Andrew: a couple, a couple of things that are occurring to me. I think I had taken for granted the reader's knowledge of the events of Dracula, and I don't think I can do that. I think I need to. To develop these characters for my own, as you're saying, I, I gotta, I have to develop Van Van Hels, the Van Helsing character.I have to develop him for, for my own purposes for this novel. Um, which makes a lot of sense.Jennie: Well, that's actually a really good question. You defined your ideal reader in a way that I thought was. [00:29:00] Completely delightful. Like she was so fleshed out. She felt like a, a full on character and I was like, oh, I know that.I know that woman. I loved it. It was great. But an important piece you missed in that is you said that she enjoys books about. London, the city and maybe some horror and gothic, but what is her relationship to Dracula, your ideal reader? You need to know that.Andrew: Yeah. Yeah.Jennie: My, you know, this is what's funny sometimes about being a book coach is I always say that the, the writers, the god of their own story, I can't possibly know everything that the writer knows about what they're writing about, what they've read, what they've thought, how they've lived, any of it.And, and in this particular case, I don't read. I don't read horror. I, I, I could barely tell you the, the bear outlines of Dracula if, if press, [00:30:00] um, I mean, I know the, you know, cartoon, the cartoon version. I, I, I could tell you a little more about Frankenstein only because I, against my will, watched the recent, um.Retelling.Andrew: Oh yeah. I haven't actually seen that yet.Jennie: So I say against my will because I was like, oh my gosh, this is too much for me. But um, you need to know if, so here's a perfect, let me finish my sentence. You need to know if your reader is a fan, is a reader, is a immersed in the gothic world, is gonna know all these things.Know all the tropes and know all the connections or not. And the, um, perfect example of that is, remember that book, um, pride and Prejudice and Zombies?Andrew: Yes.Jennie: So that appeal to people who love Jane Austen.Outro: Mm-hmm.Jennie: Like, you're probably not gonna read that book if you're not a Jane Austen [00:31:00] fan, but if you are a Jane Austen fan, you're, you cannot wait to get your hands on that.And. Also probably if you're a zombie horror fan, you know, you would delight in that even if you didn't understand the depths of the Jane Austen piece. But that book spoke to such a very particular audience that turned out to be a massive audience. Right, right. So, yeah,Andrew: yeah, yeah.Jennie: You know, I think you need to make a decision.Are you writing for someone like me who's, who's like, I don't know, like I think when I first read it, I was like. Who's Ben Sing? And you're like, he's the famous guy from the thing, right? So are you writing for someone like me or does your, a avatar, your ideal reader hear, you know, does she watch the movie?Does she, does she read the books? Does she gobble that stuff up?Andrew: Right? Yeah.Jennie: What, what is your instinct right now?Andrew: Singling out one or the other is going to, is going to change [00:32:00] how I write the book. Um. What is my instinct? Uh, I dunno. When I think about the character that I, that the character of the reader that I fleshed out in the blueprint, um,Jennie: yeah,Andrew: I don't think she necessarily would have read Dracula.She might be familiar with the story, but she might not have, um, uh, have read, uh, Dracula itself.Jennie: Okay. So yeah, let's get to, let's get really clear on that. Mm-hmm. Because it's gonna really change. And for those listening. The ideal reader. Oftentimes people think it's just a throwaway part of the blueprint because they kind of can just picture, you know, generally who their reader is.I mean, first of all, no part of the blueprint is the throwaway. Uh, something really important can come from any one of these. So really go back to your ideal reader. And think about them in relationship to their story. ‘cause this [00:33:00] conversation reveals how drastically you would change the writing of this book, depending on your ideal reader's relationship to the, to Dracula.Andrew: Yeah.Jennie: And, and there's no right answer. Either answer's. Great. Right. So, um, so that's, I just put that on the list of, of things too, um, that you're gonna be thinking about. Um. So once you get that, so yeah, the understanding of of Van Healthy's re reputation in the universe right now is going to be the way that you bring your reader up to speed a little bit.Right? Like famous Vampire Hunter still doing his thing or, or. Famous vampire hunter, you know, shamed and, uh, not doing his thing. Um, that's, those are gonna tie [00:34:00] together,Andrew: right? Yeah, yeah, yeah.Jennie: And cement down the world that we're coming into, um, more.Andrew: Absolutely. No, I can, I can see how that will change things.Yeah.Jennie: Okay. So, um. We're not gonna have time to dig, to dig into this yet, but I just wanna touch on it so that, um, when you're doing this work, you can be thinking about, um, thinking about this piece, but the, um, there's a cause and effect trajectory that's obviously what the inside outline is. And at some really key places in yours, you miss an opportunity to to tie in.So we always want our protagonist to have agency to be making the [00:35:00] decisions that cause things to get worse or cause them to be in a worse position or, um, and, and there's several places in your inside outline where. Things just sort of happen, which is the plot, and then she sort of happens to be there.But if you understand better these parts of her and her connection to this, uh, the not her uncle now, uh, her, this guy, uh, and her connection to what's happened with her mother and those things, then we wanna use that to push the story. To push the, so the plot has to serve the story. So the things that happen are gonna push your character in ways they don't wanna be pushed to make decisions that are gonna then push them further and, and they're gonna get deeper and deeper each time.And [00:36:00] you have a murder mystery. So each murder, we wanna feel more and more as if. She is boxing herself in by what she does. By what she thinks. By what she believes, by what she wants. And the, the CLO is gonna squeeze her to the point where she asks to make a, a big decision, you know, comes, that's the climax, comes to that like, will I, in this case, um, confront.Uh, both the murderer and her father is kind of where it all ends, so,Andrew: yeah. Yeah.Jennie: You know, it's not gonna be just like, and now we arrive at a place where she confronts the people. It's gotta be like. Gut wrenching along the way. Right,Andrew: right.Jennie: So, um, there's a lot to say there, and I made some comments on the outline, which, which you'll see [00:37:00] sort of my thoughts and thinking there, but I actually think that this conversation we've had is gonna be the solution because the, the big question I had was, is it coincidental that Adriana is.These murders are sort of following her around and people think that it, she might be responsible. Is that coincidental or is there something real there? Yeah. Do you know the answer or not?Andrew: I, I, I'm, I've been thinking about that and I think there are ways that it's not entirely coincidental. I mean, obviously she's not causing the murders, but I think, I think yes, I think there are things that she does that prompts these.That prompts these women to become targets of the murderer.Jennie: That's what I hoped you were gonna say. Yeah, because that's what's gonna, that's like, it's, I think this was on the page and maybe you didn't realize it, but. [00:38:00] Being friends with Adriana is a little dangerous,right?Andrew: Yes. Yes. I think that could be, that could definitely be part of the part, part of the, part of the theme there. Yeah.Jennie: So that, that shouldn't, that shouldn't be coincidental. Well, and this is what's so, so great about the blueprint and showing it to a critique partner or a writing group or an editor or a book coach, is.Somebody else can say, do you see that you're doing this thing that's actually really cool? Or do you, do you see that you're not doing this? Like it's things are just revealed. So,Andrew: yeah. Yeah, yeah. Absolutely.Jennie: So let's just wrap this up. Your next iteration, you're gonna work on sharpening your point. You're gonna work on sharpening the super simple story so that the Dracula connection is clear.Dracula connection to your [00:39:00] protagonist is, is more clear and you're gonna under in order to do that. You're gonna understand then Helsing, the world that we live in and what his relationship of that world is 20 years after Dracula. What, what is happening with him? What is happening with the world? And and that's gonna help inform the connection between your.Protagonist in these things. And then I think you already answered the ideal reader, but just make sure that you're comfortable with that, that she's not a super fan. This is not a insider. Um, folks who know and love and read Dracula, it's, it's more someone like me. He was a little clueless. And then if you have time to dig into.How that all plays out in the cause and effect of the inside outline. That's, that's where I would go. [00:40:00] So it's, um, I had an agent, my first agent, way back in the day, used to say, run it through the typewriter one more time because we were actually writing on typewriter. Yeah. Right. Back in the day. And, uh, that's kind of what I feel, you know, with these ideas in mind, like, run it all through one more time and let, let it all flow through One more time.Um, and we'll see where it goes.Andrew: Excellent. No, this sounds good. This is, this is some good homework. I'm looking forward to, to digging into this now.Jennie: I know. I can't wait to see too, and I hope our listeners have enjoyed, uh, going along on this conversation and gotten some inspiration for what, how to pressure test your own, uh, blueprint.And if you're not doing the blueprint. Uh, also fine, but pressure test what you're writing. Uh, this is just a tool for doing that, but there's this kind of questioning and making sure that things are not [00:41:00] assumed. That's, that's the key, right? It's that you, you sort of make these assumptions, but we have to articulate them and pin them down so that we can use them to make a much better story.Well, thank you Andrew. Really thank you for being willing to, uh, expose yourself in this way. Come out from behind the mic, uh, share your journey. It's not easy to do that, and I appreciate it.Andrew: Well, it's, it's fun. Thank you for pushing me outside my comfort zone. Uh, I've really enjoyed this.Jennie: I have too. So, uh, for our list.Thanks for joining in. Now let's get back to work.Outro: The hashtag am writing podcast is produced by Andrew Perilla. Our intro music aptly titled Unemployed Monday was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output because everyone [00:42:00] deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

It's very rare for me to demand that the readers of my #AmReading substack pre-order something. And the bar to be my “Just One Book” is high. But here we go: The book is The Fountain—debut speculative fiction from Casey Scieszka—and you'll want to read it, but even more, you'll want to hear us talk about what it took to pull this big, beautiful novel from her Tuck-Everlasting-loving soul. And here's the question her agent asked her that is now stuck on a post-it on my computer and may be my next tattoo: How can you reveal these things in action?Casey is reading:Open Throat by Henry Hoke (“It's funny and deeply tender and unlike anything I've ever read.”Follow Casey on Instagram and Substack: Spruceton Inn.Transcript Below!EPISODE TRANSCRIPTKJ Dell'AntoniaThis is the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast, the place where we help you play big in your writing life, love the process, and finish what matters. I am KJ Dell'Antonia, and today we're talking with Casey Scieszka. And I meant to ask Casey how to pronounce her last name before we started. How'd I do?Casey ScieszkaI think you did great. Especially over in Poland, we say “SHESH-kah” over here, but I've been corrected many times. I think it's supposed to be more like what you said. So… bravo!KJ Dell'AntoniaOkay… SHESH-skah… SHESH-kah… all right, off we go. Y'all, you're going to want to know how to spell it, because you're going to want to order Casey's debut novel, The Fountain, and it is spelled S-C-I-E-S-Z-K-A. But to carry on with my introduction, Casey is a ridiculously well-traveled innkeeper in upstate New York, and we are just going to let that fantasy sit there for a minute without talking about the amount of snow she's going to be shoveling tomorrow, because we're recording this in January and are talking about the fact that I can see her and she is wearing a full-on puffer. So… romance, Hallmark, innkeeper, debut novel—all the things—and also a puffer and snow shovels and pipes and, yeah. You will hear this episode just as Casey's first book, The Fountain,, comes out, and that is what we're here to talk about, because I happened to have gotten an advanced copy of it, and I happen to actually have read it—which does not always happen—and even more relevantly, loved it. Therefore, here we are. And Casey, welcome to Hashtag AmWriting.Casey ScieszkaThank you so much. I am so thrilled. I'm like really just beyond that you enjoyed it so much.KJ Dell'AntoniaAh, I'm so—I'm, I really did. I will be encouraging everyone to pick it up. It's mind-boggling that it's not… and it is your debut. So I'm going to go ahead and—is it, is it really? Like, I mean, I know it's your debut, but like, is it the first book you've written? Oh no, you've, you've got a kind of a memoirs situation out, right?Casey ScieszkaI wrote like a young adult travelogue with my now husband that he illustrated about when we lived like in China and West Africa and wound up literally out in Timbuktu. So I had some experience that way, but that was nonfiction and for a totally different audience. All that said, this novel is my first published one, but you better believe I have a bin in the drawer.KJ Dell'AntoniaThat's what I meant.Casey ScieszkaDrawer. (laughing)KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah. Yeah. So, The Fountain, is—just as briefly as possible—it's the story of an immortal woman who really would like to die, for excellent reasons, because immortality is a weight that is really, really heavy, and you convey that beautifully and wonderfully in this book. And so I want to just start right off—I maybe should let you describe the book—and then I'll just warn you that my next question is going to be, “Man, how did you have the guts to swing for the fences like this?”Casey ScieszkaWell, I think it probably began when I read Natalie Babbitt's Tuck Everlasting as a fifth grader in English class, which is about a family that—or a little girl who comes across a magical spring that an immortal family is guarding, and then she has to decide, ultimately, throughout the book, what she's going to do with this information and this knowledge while other people are hunting it down as well. And those questions just haunted and delighted me for decades, and I kept returning to them, and at some point I was working on a novel, had a whole manuscript going, was deeply frustrated, and I started a little something on the side where I was like, this will just be a short story. We'll see where this goes. This is nothing, and I think, because… I don't know, maybe you've experienced this before too, where if you're not looking it directly in the eye, sometimes it can just take off, and it all of a sudden had a life of its own. Essentially, this grown-up version of Tuck Everlasting, where it's about a woman who has come back to her small hometown in the Catskill Mountains, where she was born in the 1800s, 214 years later, to figure out what did this to her so she can reverse it and finally be released.KJ Dell'AntoniaWow, you really have the… the short pitch. What's your book about? Down! Congratulations! That's a tough one. Yeah, you, you nailed it. That is what it is about. And I will say that it took—one of the things that I loved about it, and that I like in a book—is that not only was I not sure at some points what the protagonist wanted for herself, I was not sure what I wanted for her. All I knew was that I wanted “something” for her. And that makes for a really interesting reading experience. Because normally, you know, you find yourself sitting there going, well, just, you know, just tell the person, or just, you know, kiss them or accept your reality, or you'd normally—you know what you want—like, take the ring, Frodo, or whatever. Or don't take the ring, Frodo. And now there's no book. But, and in this one, we didn't. How hard was—was that for you to write—sort of, I don't know… did you know what you wanted the protagonist—or what you wanted the reader to want for her? Or…?Casey ScieszkaYes and no.KJ Dell'AntoniaHow did you feel about that?Casey ScieszkaRight. Yes and no, and yes and no. I think when you're writing, ultimately, later on in draft, you have to be very clear about what your character wants. But in the early process, I had no idea. The whole thing, like I said, began as a short story, and that's really just the first chapter or two, and then I was essentially hunting with her. When I was writing that first draft, I was like, what are we looking for? What has happened in the past 200 years in your life that would make you feel one way or another? And then every time I had a different little angel or devil on my shoulder, whatever you will, who was the—well, what about this point of view? What if? Wouldn't this type of—wouldn't someone say, well, living forever would be amazing, because you could share that type of science with other people, and you could, you know, have these wonderful medical advances or, you know, things like that? I could then have other characters essentially embody those, those other points of view as well. Although, I'm really glad that you say that in your reading experience, you still weren't quite sure what she wanted, because I definitely didn't want, you know—I mean, no, no author wants characters to just be symbols for points of view.KJ Dell'AntoniaOh yeah, no, absolutely not. And I should say that I know that she wants to reverse this. That's never in question. But this sort of—there—you're always aware of the question of what does she really want? Because that's kind of only part of it to want…Casey ScieszkaRight.KJ Dell'AntoniaAn end to this pain, but, but why and what other alternatives there are. And then, of course, I just—I did not know how you were going to end it. I could not imagine how you were going to land that plane. It must have been a tough one. Did you always know where you were going? We will not in any way spoil this.Casey ScieszkaRight. No spoilers.KJ Dell'AntoniaNo, no spoilers.Casey ScieszkaI'd say that about halfway through my first draft, I just saw the ending. I was like, “Oh, this is…”KJ Dell'AntoniaThat's amazing.Casey ScieszkaThis is like that very last moment. I was like, this is where I need to get. And those handful of chapters before the penultimate one, whoa, boy, those were the ones that are like I wrote, like seven different books, you know?KJ Dell'AntoniaOh yeah.Casey ScieszkaCompletely different versions to actually get there.KJ Dell'AntoniaSo what was your… what's your hope for the reader experience of this book? Besides, you know vast entertainment and pressing it into the hands of their friends.Casey ScieszkaRight. Naturally.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah…Casey ScieszkaBeyond that…KJ Dell'AntoniaWe love that.Casey ScieszkaUm, I mean, I love books that essentially look at what it means to be human and what makes a life worth living. And those are the type of questions that I hope someone would then linger on in their own life after putting down the book. Even in between chapters, you know? That you would be able to reflect on the choices that each character is making and think, like, oh, I would do this. I wouldn't do that. Or, you know, to kind of just bring that back into your own life that way. Because… I don't know. Time is perspective, like ever—what is—what does it mean to live forever? What is a long life? Is it? You know, when you're when you're little, a summer lasts an eternity. I guess what I'm saying is like our perspective of time is always bendy, and that was an interesting challenge in trying to write a 214 year old woman, where it was very tempting to just turn her into a superhero, where I'd be like, “Oh, well, she'd know 10 language.”KJ Dell'AntoniaShe'd know things, yeah.Casey ScieszkaAnd she'd be like, amazing at all these things. And I had to be like, Casey, you have a lot of time on your hands as well. Like, you're, you know, you're 40 years old. And do you know 10 languages? Do you know five languages? Like, what are, like what are we talking about here?KJ Dell'AntoniaOn that ratio you should at least know two. (laughing) Uh, maybe three. If we're going to say 200 is 10… you know you got, yeah, you should have at least two.Casey ScieszkaExactly. So just kind of examining, like, why would I—why would I have expectation, different expectations for someone simply because they've lived longer, and, you know, those types of things?KJ Dell'AntoniaSo you mentioned that you had a bunch of books in a drawer. So what's bigger about this project than maybe the thing that you put aside to focus on it? Is it bigger?Casey ScieszkaI don't know if it's bigger. I think I just had, I had better tools in my toolbox at this point. Like I might return to that other one, but I didn't have the full heart of the question I was getting at there. I think I had more of a premise, or something like that. Whereas this one, when I was writing, I felt like the problem was I had own—like in the writing was like I had too much meat, I had so many questions, I had so much I was wrestling with. And then it also really helped that, I mean, it's, its set in a small town in the Catskills, and, spoiler alert, that's the type of place that I now live.KJ Dell'AntoniaRight.Casey ScieszkaAnd knew. People always tell you like, write what you know. I am, I am not, secretly, 214 years old. I know you can't see me on camera, guys.Multiple Speakers(both laughing)Casey ScieszkaMy skin's not that great for a… you know? But, but I do know what small-town life is in the Catskills. I do—there are some characters who are opening up a business. I know what it's like to open a business. Like, it was really fun for me. I felt like I had this endless well of inspiration to keep pulling from that way. And that was something I couldn't have written 10 years before. You know?KJ Dell'AntoniaYou also handled the depth of the questions that you're dealing with remarkably tightly. Did you have to clear away a lot of like… asking for a friend…(laughing). Did you have to clear away a lot of mulling over these questions by people or? I guess what I'm getting at is these are really deep and big questions, like you said, but I don't feel—you did not Atlas Shrugged these. You know, there's not like a 20-page dissertation by John Galt in the middle of it. How hard was it to keep that from happening? Or did it come a little more easily for you?Casey ScieszkaI think, nothing, nothing, none of it comes easily. We know this.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah.Casey ScieszkaI mean, sometimes you reach the flow state, you know? And it is funny to even think back on these things, because I have a, like, a willful blindness, almost in the same way that, like, I have given birth to two children, and, like, I can't believe I did it a second time, you know? But it's by, you know, it's by design, some—perhaps similar with writing. Once you know how the sausage is made, sometimes it can be hard to do again. But anyway, all of this is to go back and actually answer your question. I was very wary of doing the… this is how I feel about something info dump. And one of the things that my agent as an editor has been helpful with from early drafts was, how can you reveal these things in action? So anytime I was tempted to just start explaining things, I was like, Casey, is this happening in action? Like, is this a character actually finding something out? Like from another character in a natural way. So that…KJ Dell'AntoniaThat's a great question.Casey ScieszkaRight. That really, that really helped me. And then also sometimes with the writing I did, just let myself write a whole bunch, you know, because sometimes, especially if you know it's the beginning of your writing day, maybe it's, it's that equivalent of the throat clearing—you're just or the dog who's doing circles before they sit down, like you're, you're getting around to the thing that you actually want to say. And then when you re read it, you're like, “Oh, well, those first four paragraphs can go, and here's where I actually start to say…”KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah, here's what i meant to say.Casey ScieszkaYeah. Yeah.KJ Dell'AntoniaTake this. Put it up at the front— delayed all this. Yeah. No. I get it. So how long did this take you?Casey ScieszkaWell, I started the short story in 2021 and then it comes out now. I will say we had, like; everything was in the can, if you will, at least, like a year and a half ago, just kind of waiting for this springtime pub date. But, yeah, it's a journey. That's a—I feel, you know, like another thing you don't want to hear when you're like, 25 and are like, I'm going to write a book, and you hear an interview with someone who's like, it took me 10 years, and I was like, my god. And I'm like, well, girl.KJ Dell'AntoniaI can do it faster than that.Casey ScieszkaThis one is five years. But…KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah, yeah, no, it takes, it takes a long time, and it's hard, and it takes a lot of painful thinking, and yeah, all of those things are true. So now, now that you can look back at this project with hopefully a little bit of distance, and you're about to be talking about it a lot, I suspect. What do you love most about it?Casey ScieszkaOoh. I love most that these characters feel so real to me still that I sometimes catch myself wondering, like, what they're doing. You know?KJ Dell'AntoniaThat's amazing.Casey ScieszkaLike I lived with them, and I just, I'm so excited that I actually, like made—was able to make that for, you know, not just myself, though, that I surely entertained myself in the process. But it is such a humbling dream that this story is now existing in other people's brains, that these are characters who have felt real to other people as well.KJ Dell'AntoniaWhat, as you look back, what would you say was the hardest part of the process?Casey ScieszkaAside from all of the waiting?!KJ Dell'AntoniaAll of it! Aside from all of it.Casey ScieszkaWhich felt like…KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah I was going to say aside from…Casey ScieszkaIt felt eternal.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah. Yeah.Multiple Speakers(both laughing)Casey ScieszkaI think the very hardest part is early on, when you don't know—well, the earliest, earliest is delightful, because you're in just your little creative cocoon, and you're having these wonderful ideas, and you don't have to solve any of the plot problems yet, or things like that. You know, you're just like being your own little creative genius for yourself. But then it's I feel like that, that first real revision phase when you don't know fully if this is actually going to become a book where you're—and time, you know, to talk about time again, is precious, like I, you know, I run this other hotel. It's open half the year. But when I began it, it was open seven days a week, all year long; I had two children under the age of four at the time. Like, time was precious. I was writing during nap time, like things were being sacrificed in order for me to do this. And it is. It just feels audacious and possibly insane to be doing it when you're in it, and when you're on the other side, you're like, oh, but the road was always pointing here, and you just, you just don't know that when you're in it.KJ Dell'AntoniaNo.Casey ScieszkaYeah.KJ Dell'AntoniaYou could easily have, really think, you know, you could easily still be sitting on this going, well, I'm going to finish this…Casey ScieszkaExactly. And, you know…KJ Dell'AntoniaWhen the kids are… you know… or whatever.Casey ScieszkaYeah, exactly I have these other, you know, unfinished or manuscripts that haven't seen the light of day. But, at this point, I tell myself, and I 99.9999% believe it that those were necessary to write in order to write this.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah, I sure hope so.Multiple Speakers(both laughing)Casey ScieszkaThere's just that other point 0.0001 that's like—KJ Dell'AntoniaWhat?!Casey ScieszkaYeah, it's like, no, no, it really was necessary.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah, no, you have to. You have to do it. Well, I hate to be, you know, not trying to raise the bar here, but, but what is next after, you know, a topic like this and a big book like, like this? Do you know yet? Are you, are you thinking about it? Where are you in your process?Casey ScieszkaI have been working on something else which is fun. And I definitely have, like, you know, while as much as I know how, how wild it is with how the sausage is made and what I'm, you know, the many revisions and things I'm looking down the barrel at, I also have another level of excitement, because I know, like, wow, I have an agent this time who's actually excited to read it, and I have a working relationship with an editor. Like, I'm trying to appreciate that…KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah, because it's what you wanted before.Casey ScieszkaAnd it can be so easy to just, you know, slip back into the like; you know, I don't know, the chaos feelings. But, I will say, I'm not going to say much about the project, other than historically, for everything I've ever been drawn to, and including stuff I love to read. I always love when character, when there's a character who knows like way too much or way too little, like in their situation.KJ Dell'AntoniaThat's a very like tempting pitch without having anything you'd like to put your fingers in.Casey ScieszkaWithout…KJ Dell'AntoniaThat's good. That's good, that's clever.Casey ScieszkaI told you nothing.KJ Dell'AntoniaYou told me nothing, and yet I'm like, ooh yeah, that does sound… that does sound interesting. Well, I as I've as I've said I wholeheartedly enjoyed this. It was twisty. You had me thinking things that were not what was so at many, many points of the book.Casey ScieszkaI love to hear this. Love to hear.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah and when we are off, off recording, I'll tell you some of them, because that is always kind of fun. I really feel like this book is such an achievement. For someone who's just getting started, it's great. I can't wait to see what you do next. And I guess, on that note, what's something you have read recently where you also felt like the writer was, was really big, really playing big. Is there anything that you would like to press on into people's hands the way I want to press The Fountain, into their hands?Casey ScieszkaI've loved this. Thank you again. One book I keep pressing into many people's hands is Open Throat by Henry Hoke.KJ Dell'AntoniaOkay.Casey ScieszkaIt's very slim. You can read it in like a day, although I recommend taking a little bit longer, because you'll want to enjoy it. It is told from the point of view of a mountain lion who lives under the Hollywood sign.KJ Dell'AntoniaOh, I—I think I've heard the description, even if I don't remember the—okay.Casey ScieszkaIt's so funny and so deeply tender, like and just unlike anything I've read recently, and I just really felt like, like he was swinging for the fences with this, like it's from the point of view of an animal, which should be ridiculous, but after…KJ Dell'AntoniaAnd not just an animal, but an animal that lives under the Hollywood sign.Casey ScieszkaYeah, like that's a mountain lion who's—it open up or he's overhearing like you know hikers discussing therapist, you know? It's just, it's so silly, but it's also so deep and kind of truly experimental, but still so accessible and I just feel like it's the type of thing that I don't know. Maybe when he sat down to write it, he was like, this, someone's going to tell me, I'm nuts, but I just connected with it so much.KJ Dell'AntoniaI…yeah. Alright I love that then, and that is a great response to the question, because that really is somebody else swinging for the fences, and that's what we're just trying to talk about here for everyone. So where? Well, listeners can find you, obviously they can, they can buy The Fountain,, and they should. You're inn is called?Casey ScieszkaThe Spruceton Inn, a Catskills Bed & Bar. We're a little nine-room hotel.KJ Dell'Antonia(laughing) Bed and bar. That's awesome.Casey ScieszkaYeah. I mean, I don't, I don't really mess with breakfast. I mean, you get very nice coffee and some pop tarts. I love a good highbrow, lowbrow, and we are five miles down a seven mile dead end road in the middle of the mountains.KJ Dell'AntoniaOkay, I love this for everyone. And is there any particular social media where you are fun and joyful?Casey ScieszkaYeah, you can find us on Instagram at sprucetoninn. That's also like some writing stuff and same with Substack. Only other thing I'll say about the inn is we also run an artist residency program, an annual one. So every August we open it up to folks, writers, 2D artists. Basically, if you can make it in a motel room without disturbing your neighbors, come on and make it with us, and you get, you get, like, a week-long stay. No cost, in the month of November.KJ Dell'AntoniaThat is so fun and so cool. And I bet you're going to get a lot more applications than you can handle this time around. Alright, well, thank you so much for spending this time with me.Casey ScieszkaThank you so much for chatting.KJ Dell'AntoniaAnd amazing best of luck with the book, which I loved. All right, kids, I'm signing this off with our new sign off. Until next time, stop playing small and write like it matters.NarratorThe Hashtag AmWriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perrella. Our intro music, aptly titled, Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output, because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

California Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna stopped by the townhouse to talk with Jake Sherman and Anna Palmer about his Iran war powers resolution, the latest on the Epstein files, AI policy and MUCH more. PLUS The Boston Globe's Jackie Kucinich and our very own Max Cohen join in to break down the conversation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Republicans on Capitol Hill are about to give President Donald Trump a major boost — a green light to conduct a war against Iran without worrying about Congress, at least for now. Punchbowl News' Max Cohen breaks down the latest on a pair of bipartisan war power resolutions. Plus, it's primary day in Texas and North Carolina. Here's what we're watching. Punchbowl News is on YouTube⁠. ⁠Subscribe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to our channel today to see all the new ways⁠⁠ ⁠we're investing in video.⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Want more in-depth daily coverage from Congress?⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Subscribe⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ to our free Punchbowl News AM newsletter at punchbowl.news.⁠⁠⁠⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

PHASE IV (1974)—strange cosmic event triggers a rapid evolution among Earth's ants, transforming them into a collective intelligence with plans far beyond human comprehension. Isolated in the Arizona desert, two scientists attempt to study—and contain—the phenomenon, only to find themselves drawn into the insects' mysterious and terrifying design.  PI (1998)—mathematician Max Cohen believes that everything … Continue reading Ep. 08-24: Phase IV (1974) & Pi (1998) →

Our Goals for 2026: Jess is gonna finish a novel.Sarina is going to figure out what she wants a long haul writer career to looks like.KJ is going to write this book as hard as she can and for as long as it takes.Jennie is going to claim her authority in the writing space.Our Words of the Year are …Meanwhile: Fan of Heated Rivalry? You'll want to read these books by Sarina Bowen!Ready to talk about your own goals and words? COME ON IN. We are here for that!Hey - if you've been curious about becoming a book coach, Jennie'd like to invite you to a live training she's doing on February 4th, at 5pm PST / 8pm EST. She's going to be talking about how to become the kind of book coach writers love to pay. You can sign up at bookcoaches.com/liveWOTYs … in the episode! If you want to know what was so funny, you'll have to listen.Transcript Below!If you love us enough that you got this far…SPONSORSHIP MESSAGEHey, it's Jennie Nash, and if you've been curious about becoming a book coach, I'd like to invite you to a live training I'm going to be doing on February 4th, at 5pm PST, which is 8pm EST, and I'm going to be talking about how to become the kind of book coach writers love to pay. You can sign up for that at bookcoaches.com/live. That's bookcoaches.com/live. (bookcoaches.com/live) I'd love to see you there.EPISODE TRANSCRIPTJennie NashHey everyone, it's Jennie, and this is the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast, the place where we help you play big in your writing life, love the process, and finish what matters. All four of us are here today to talk about our Word of the Year for 2026 and our goals. This is one of our favorite episodes to do, and we've all been kicking our words around, and we're ready to share them with you. So Sarina, do you want to go first?Sarina BowenOkay!Jennie NashI just know you are kind of ready.KJ Dell'AntoniaRight off the diving board. No throat clearing, no chit chat. Yeah, we're just alrighty.Sarina BowenAll right, so I'm Sarina, and I write novels, and pretty much that is all I write. So my goals tend to look kind of the same from year to year, but my, but how I feel about them, changes. So in 2026 I plan to write two to three books, and when I do, I will be rolling off of two contracts with two different publishers. So that means that the other part of my 2026 is really asking myself what I want to do next. Because, you know, finishing energy is a really hard thing, but I'll be like extra super finishing energy here, because I'm finishing a commitment. And, you know, I used to have goals, like, I'm going to write more books. I'm going to write all the books. And I don't anymore, because there were, there was a while there where I only wrote books, and then last year, I did a really nice job of meeting my goals that I would also go and have more fun and take more vacations. And it worked. I did that. It turns out that planning fun takes a lot of energy and time. Oh my goodness, it was I, you know, I so I was either off having a wild time, or I was like, you know, nailed to my desk, and, yeah, so I need to do a slightly better job of that this year. Although looking at the schedule, it's a little hard to see how, because I'm spending a big chunk of March and part of April in Australia and Hong Kong, and then...Jennie NashWait you can't just throw that in and not say why. [laughing]Sarina BowenOh, well, I'm, I'm visiting. I'm doing four reader events in Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne and Perth.Jennie NashIt's so exciting, so exciting.Sarina BowenAnd you know, time will tell if accepting this invitation was, in fact, a good idea. When I get home, I will be—it'll be June, and I will be launching my second book of 2026, which is a romance and so, but, but then, you know, I will have turned in half of what I'm turning in this year, and I will be able to have big thoughts about what I do next. And that is the thing that is going to be hard about this year, not turning in files, but, you know, deciding what does it mean to me? And also a thing that I realized last year, while balancing my busy life is that in this job, there is no summit. It's not like you climb that big hill and then you stand there and you hear an angel choir, and then you know that the only thing that greets you after writing a big novel is that you will pretty soon, eventually write another one. So you have to enjoy the hike itself. And I am really working on that.Jess LaheyI actually have just—I have just to address what you just mentioned Sarina, I have put in my calendar in June. Since we love to—I happen to love the mid-year check-ins on goals. I put a little note to self, to future Jess to revisit Sarina's goals at mid-year so that we can talk about maybe what that second half of the year, what comes next, stuff is going to look like. So, expect that to come back around.Sarina BowenOkay, I hope there's some clarity by then, so I'll get right on that.Jess LaheyWell, and I would also like to mention that you mentioned, you know, all the work you're doing and doing fun and stuff like that. You also went back to skating this year, and you, I have loved watching you learn, relearn something fairly new, and gain skills and get determined to like, be able to do that. What's it called, when you change the side of the blade you're on? When you turn?Sarina BowenYeah, all that edge work...Jess LaheyIt's very exciting.Sarina BowenAnd those three turns. Yeah. So that is part of my leave the house and have fun plan, and that has worked out really well. It—when you do something that's so outside of your usual, like, we could just stipulate by now that I'm pretty good at writing a novel, because I have turned in a number of them and sold a number of them, but I am really not good at skating. So when you take yourself so far out of your element, and you do something that is so foreign to you, you learn, relearn all those weird little tricks about how you learned anything, and the fact that last year I could not do a three turn to save my life, which is where you turn around on one foot. And I tried and I tried and I tried and I tried to trick myself into it. And I'm like, okay, I'll take off on two feet, but land on one. I just every single thing didn't work. And then this year, now I can do it. And also, I woke up at four in the morning once and thought I could do a waltz jump tomorrow, and then the next day I did, in fact, just do a waltz jump. And I hadn't even been thinking about it. It wasn't even on my list of things I was going to try that week. So learning something really, really new is really just great for your brain and your attitude. And I don't know what the next thing that I do like that will be, but, yeah, I'm a fan.Jennie NashBut I must reflect back to you that a few years ago, you were, I think the goals had to you were working so hard and just, you know, book to book to book to book and, like, look at you now .You're going on all these trips, and you're learning to ice skate, and I know you and KJ are learning Mahjong.KJ Dell'AntoniaMahjong, yes.Jennie NashAnd you write in coffee shops like, you've kind of really changed that, that vibe. It's cool.Sarina BowenI have! I did it right? Like I said, I'm going to have more fun. I'm going to learn to write out of the house. Like I sat in a room and said to you that this was going to happen. And I did, right? But the, but then, but then, writing the actual books, it magically did not get easier. So I am having more fun, but it's still hard, and that's how I'm coming to this new realization that, like you know, I need to stop being surprised that the actual job is hard, but it's just like a piece of the fun that I'm having, and if and I can only write books that I'm probably going to enjoy, because it's still hard and it still takes a lot of hours.Jennie NashThat's amazing. I feel compelled to ask you, what are you most enjoying about what you're writing right now?Sarina BowenWell we are at maximum finishing energy, because I am finishing a revision, which is scary, right? Because then you're sending it off into the world of telling yourself that it's done. And I have to say, I have not enjoyed it all that much. This has been one of the more one of the more stressful weeks. But, yeah, I—but there are moments as I look through this manuscript, because I've just reached that point where you hate every living word of it, right? Where I read a line and I laugh, and then that's just a good sign.Jennie NashLike I'm so clever, look at me.Multiple Speakers[all laughing]Jess LaheyI actually just, just for fun. I just dropped—I got to go—I traveled an hour and a half to go so that I could go sit in a coffee shop and work with these guys, because I miss them so much. And I took two pictures of Sarina while she was working there, and in one, she had this look on her face... I just dropped it in our group text just now, where she's got this look on her face like this is the hardest, worst thing I've ever done. And then I also took one of her smiling and looking like her usual happy self. But it was—I love having those two pictures together on my phone, because it's so representative of the slog. How there are these moments of really having fun and engaging with the book and loving it, and then there's those moments of editing where you're trying to just finish it and get all the words in the right order.Sarina BowenYep, it's, it's, you know that the push and pull and the trick to liking this job is that when you're in that trench of I have to be finished with this. I have to love it, and I have to set it free. You have to remember that the other side is out there. That like the drafting happy, I haven't made any big mistakes yet, I haven't sealed off all the x's yet, like that's waiting for you on the other side of it. You know, if you get too deep in one place or the other, so that you can't remember, the other one is out there for you. Then, then that's a trap. It makes the job harder.Jennie NashWell, thank you for that. Jess, do you want to go next?Jess LaheySure! Yeah, so last year, last year was weird. Last year, my, my, I'm going a little bit into what my word was last year; it was ‘amplified' because it led, it sort of guided a lot of my goals last year, which had to do with just reaching more people, but during the year, during the course of the year, reaching and educating more people on the topics that I feel really strongly about, like mental health wellness, the specifically substance use prevention, as it relates to things like self-efficacy in kids and feelings of competence in kids. I realized sort of part way through the year how much more I was enjoying and feeling engaged when I was talking to the kids, and how much more impactful I felt when I was talking to the kids, and that shouldn't be surprising. But, if you're not a speaker, and if you don't spend your time speaking to adults and kids and especially teens, you should know it takes, you know, maybe three to four times as much energy to talk to the kids as it does to the adults. In fact, yesterday, I was trying to explain to someone why a virtual event to a lot of kids, doesn't work. I can't project that much energy through a screen to captivate a big room of kids. It's just it's really hard to do. And anyway, so I realized about halfway through the year that I really wanted when I when I thought about the word amplify and expanding on the number of kids that I reach per year, and the depth to which I am able to reach some kids in particular, it comes it comes down to not just people, but just kids specifically. So I talked with my agents, and we've agreed that I'm going to try to incorporate more kids this year. That even if it's more exhausting for me, it's more fulfilling, and so that's one of my big goals for this year, is to figure out how—yes, I still have to talk to adults, and I have to help them understand how to talk to their kids about substance use and mental health and how to see, know, love, support the kids you have, and not the kids you wish you had and all that stuff. But when it comes down to it, I have to figure out ways to get in the room with kids more and...KJ Dell'AntoniaYou're a kid-travert!Jess Lahey[laughing] Apparently.KJ Dell'AntoniaWhich some people get their energy from being with people, and some people get, you know, it takes—that's extroverts and introverts. So you're a kid-travert, you get your energy from talking to kids. That's delightful!Jess LaheyIt's in the moment. In the moment, it's much more exhausting. But there was a—I spoke at a school in Los Angeles. It was one of the best days I had in front of kids. And the number of emails I got afterwards explaining why it was meaningful to them. You know, I love when the kids, anytime a kid reaches out, it's this huge honor, because, you know, I'm, who am I? I'm some adult that comes into their school because their teachers say that, and now their teachers say they have to listen to this bozo. They don't know who this person is. But over time, I've figured out ways to help them trust me a little bit more, even before I get there. Like creating these videos where I introduce myself ahead of time. So I'm trying to figure out all the ways in to getting being a trusted adult, becoming a trusted adult to more and more kids, is something that's incredibly important to me, because that's where the great education stuff lies. So that amplify word changed for me over last year, and it's reflected in this year's goals as well, which is, get in front of more kids. I track those numbers really carefully. Last year, I was in front of just shy of 10,000 people generally, and a couple of 1000 kids. And I just want to change that ratio a little bit so that it's have more heavily in the kid direction and less heavily in the adult direction. Just because it's fun and really interesting and challenging. That's the other thing is, when you've been doing something for a long time, there are some talks I can do in my sleep, because I've done them so many times, and I don't want to do that, like, why would you want to come and spend time with someone who's asleep in front of you? But you know, they look good and it sounds good, but they're not totally invested. And I think everybody can feel that. So I've had to find ways to change things up, to reevaluate my content from other angles, so that I'm not getting sick of myself, and so that I can be fresh and new and useful to people. So, and then, like, I have small goals, you know, Sarina was just talking about her skating and looking, you know, trying to do something completely new that makes you a little nervous. You know, the beekeeping thing still makes me super nervous. And as I mentioned in another episode, I think Tim saw me emotionally preparing to do something I needed to do with the bees and he said I have never seen you so nervous and so doubting yourself about your ability to do something, and I realized how good that is for me. And so we will see at the end of this winter if my bees actually made it through the winter, and if they did, I'll have a hive of bees to deal with, and if they don't, I'll have to get a new hive. But that's been really, really good for me. Sarina, did you want to add something?Sarina BowenI have a question.Jess LaheyYes, ma'am.Sarina BowenDo we have a writing goal for this year?Jess LaheyYes, we do. And that's actually at the bottom of my list, because it's new. So I've been attending this weekly, really interesting virtual Blueprint for a Book Fast Track. What is it? Jumpstart you guys? With Jennie Nash, this really great book coach and founder of Author Accelerator, and KJ Dell'Antonia and I have been actually writing—working on this novel that I've been working on for ages and ages and ages and thinking about at a minimum once a week, and I'm going to finish it this year. 100% I'm going to finish it this year. And I'm really grateful to Jennie and KJ, because being in that, in—being in there, is forcing me to ask me all kinds of questions about, why am I even bothering to stick with this thing that has stymied me for over a decade? Like, why bother if it's been that hard and I haven't ever gotten it done, why am I even doing it? And I love asking myself those questions. It's been really fun. Plus, there's like 100 other people in that virtual session asking themselves the same questions and coming up with really cool answers for why they're even writing something in the first place. And it gets at all these fundamental questions of why we do what we do. So yes, I will be, I'm researching a nonfiction thing still. I have a—I'm looking at a stack of books behind me, and but I'm going to finish this YA novel this year period, full stop, it's going to happen..Multiple Speakers[Unintelligible] [several speaking at once]Jennie NashWell what's cool is, is, I mean, YA is not children, but it's young people. So that's kind of cool. It goes with your other thing.KJ Dell'AntoniaThere's a trend there.Jess LaheyYeah. And it was funny, because when you were asking the why the other night, and one of my things was, oh, because these characters speak to me, blah, blah, blah. And KJ mentioned, oh, I do know what Jess is talking about. And maybe it's, you know, she wants to write a coming of age story, and that's 100% it. I think I have, I have. I very much love that coming of age space and the struggles that middle school and high school kids go through in that coming of age space. And I think I have an interesting insight into it, and an ability to, an ability to make it come alive on the page. And I, for me, really want to do that. I really want to see it on the page, and I'm really excited about it.Jennie NashYou do have such a compassion for that age and what people are going through and how hard it is and it's...Jess LaheyAnd I love these characters. And I said I love these characters, and I want to do right by them. And that's true too. I do love these characters, and I can't stop thinking about them.Sarina BowenThat is the best reason to finish any piece of fiction. You know?Jess LaheyYeah, no, I really it's like they're stuck until I help them get to the other side. And I would hate to leave them there. I would it would make me feel really bad.Jennie NashI love it. Well you know, committing to something that you've been working on for that long, that's a that's a big deal.Jess LaheyYeah, it's also one of those. I know it's going to feel really, really good when I finish it. It'll be like, oh my gosh, I've been harping on that for whatever it is now 12 or 13 years, and I finally finished it. So I know it's going to be one of those. I'm going to be very, very glad I did it when it's done. And is it super hard? Yes, I've, you know, bitched and moaned about this in the past, that fiction is really hard for me and dialog is so hard for me, but that's what I'm writing right now.Jennie NashThat's another, another learning edge, right?Jess LaheyYep. Yep.Jennie NashAwesome. KJ, what about you?KJ Dell'AntoniaMy only goal this year with respect to writing is to write this book as hard as I can for as long as it takes. That's all I got. I got a couple other goals. I'd like to get my Christmas tree down at some point during the year. It seems like a plan. I was pretty excited about the Valentine's Day concept a few years ago, but I don't know, people have been really negging on it. Easter also, apparently not tree material. I mean, come on the fourth? I'm seeing it. No one else is. So there's that. No, my and my big life goal is to leave more white space for myself in my day and in my calendar, to do things, to not do things, and for the unexpected things, both good and bad things. I have a real tendency to be like from 11:30 to one I'm doing this, and from 1:30 to 2:30 there's this, and hey, at three there's this. And that is, in fact, an excellent description of my day. And sometimes I like it, but I just do it to myself constantly, and I need to stop.Multiple Speakers[all laughing]Jennie NashThat's all? Okay. Mic drop. I'm just thinking about that white space. What? What happens when you have white space?Sarina BowenYou know what happens to me when I have white space, because I'm actually pretty good at keeping it in my calendar, is that I get an email that's like, and today, we will be choosing among these eight narrator auditions. And then you will decide who is the narrator for this book that you haven't been thinking about for four months since you last did the copy edits, and then my whole day just explodes in a little puff of admin, like trying to get out of my own inbox is killing me. So, yeah, I don't, I don't. It's not even that I planned it. Other people are making this my, my problem, and I wish I had a 2026, goal for how to fix it.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah, there's that. I mean, to some extent, I think that's my point. Is that I would like to stop doing it to myself, because I mean it through exactly the thing it is was not my was not my idea, nor was the thing, the unexpected event at eight o'clock this this morning, or the one when I walked in from the expected thing from nine to 10. I need to do a little less of it for myself, to allow for the fact that the other things in my life, I think, and I did this to some extent last year too. My final kids have actually all left for college this year, which is great, but there's still a lot of trouble. And also I have a lot of pets, and also just, there's a lot going on. So I sort of thought, and I really made this mistake in the Fall pretty hard. I thought, oh, I should probably fill like I should put some things on the calendar because I might feel sad. A, I still felt sad, and that was okay. And B, I put way too much on the calendar, given the number, amount of time I had to spend on... I'm just yeah, and here I am thinking I didn't do it in the spring, and I didn't, but I sort of am doing it on a daily basis, like, oh, look. And some of that is just that this was, what am I wrong? Was this the longest holiday season ever in the history of holiday season? Like it was still Christmas on January 17, I swear to God. And so a lot of it, I think, is I'm feeling a little dejected, because my days are really packed, because I had the sense not to put everything in the week of January 6, but I put a lot of things this week and last week. So hopefully I'll, but, but having done that, and now feeling it, I think, I hope, will inspire me to block off more time that, no doubt, will get filled with things. But that's better than it getting filled with things and my having already filled it.Jennie NashYep.KJ Dell'AntoniaIt's not going so great.Jennie NashI get that. Okay, so, so for me, I made some really big moves in my business in 2025 and they worked, and that was great. And I made a decision toward the end of the year to make even bigger moves, and did some thinking about, I wouldn't say, an exit strategy or a succession plan, but I'm 62 this year, and I'm working really, really, really hard in my business day to day, running, you know, pretty big small business, and I really want more time to create. To create curriculum, to, I just like making things. You know, to work on the podcast, to work on my own book, and I'll talk about that in a minute. And so I made a training plan to teach my team to take over the things that they are fully capable of taking over, if I just get it out of my head and onto a page to teach them how to do it. So it's a really big move for me, and kind of a terrifying move. It means trusting people. It means handing over some things. It means there's some ego-y things involved in that, the idea that nobody can do it as well as I can. And so, yeah, that's, that's big. It's big mindset. It's big actual shifting of duties. It's, it's kind of the white space idea writ large. What, what would it look like for me to have more white space? And it is, it is not retiring, it's not stopping. It's just, can I do more of what I want to do and less of the—of the day to day of this business? I am constantly surprised by the thing I have made. Author Accelerator has more than 375 certified book coaches now, and it's this huge community, and they're having a huge impact. And a lot of my coaches are becoming huge their own selves and doing really well, and just we're becoming known. And all of that takes time to manage, like the, I don't know, I wouldn't call it the brand, it's, it's the community. It just takes a lot of time to manage and the kinds of inquiries that we get and that sort of thing. And I, it's a thing that needs care, and I'm the one to give it that care. So just meeting the moment, I guess, is what my goal is for the year, and as part of that, the Write Big Sessions that I've been doing here at the podcast are my stepping into that space of thought leadership and creation, content creation in a different way. And haven't talked about this a lot, but I am writing a Write Big book, and I went out and found myself a brand new agent. I did my search from scratch. I did it cold. I tried to find the perfect agent for this book, rather than somebody that I knew, because I know a lot of agents, and I don't want to, I don't want to talk about a lot of specifics at the moment about who that person is, or what's happening really, but I will say that it's taken a little minute to get it together, because that's how it happens sometimes. But the book is out on submission, even as we speak, and I was telling KJ, this agent does something that I've never heard of and never seen, and I love it so much, which is that she shares a spreadsheet of the submissions and puts the responses right in there so I can log in, you know, 10, 12, 25 times a day and...Multiple Speakers[all laughing]KJ Dell'AntoniaJust normal, healthy behavior, right?Jennie NashWhich is so fantastic. Rather than, like, why isn't she telling me, or how come we haven't heard or whatever? But it's very, very early days, and so all that's coming in are the no's, because that's, that's what happens. But the no's are so great. I love them so much. They're totally boosting me up. Because, like, people know me. They know my work. They like my work. Like I, I don't know. I'm just so delighted by the nature and quality of the no's, which is just a funny place to be, but that is, that is where I am so...Sarina BowenJennie, it's a fantastic place to be. Like I have never heard another author say the no's make me happy. Like that is not a sentence I have heard in my life. And I know a lot of authors, so the fact that you know that that's, I just have good, good feelings and good thoughts about this project, and you are amazing.Jennie NashWell, thank you. And that is not by accident. That's what Writing Big means, right? It's like I own this idea. I'm not waiting to be picked; I'm not waiting to be anointed. I'm not waiting for somebody to say, you know, good job. But, when they do, and you know, these no's are just indications, like I self-published the Blueprint Books and I sort of think of them as this little thing that I made. I made them for my coaches to use in their coaching, and I made them to, it's a model that I teach. I didn't ever think of it as a thing, but I've sold more than 20,000 copies of the Blueprint Books my own self, and, but I just didn't think like editors would know what they are. They would use them with their own authors. They would know my company. They would know my coaches, and that's what all the no's are showing me. And that I'm just, I'm just like, when do you get a mirror into your impact? It feels like the no's a mirror into my impact, and I feel, I feel like there's no doubt that something great is going to happen with this book. I have no doubt. So bring on the no's and have them be awesome, because I know good things, great things are coming, and whether, who knows what path that is going to be, but that, that is where I am, and that sharing of the spreadsheet that this agent has done is just feeding right into, I mean, for other people, it might be the biggest disaster in the world, but for me, I'm like, this is so fun. I love it. My goal is for the year to lean into this bigger vision of what I can be.KJ Dell'AntoniaThat's a good goal.Jennie NashThank you. Well, I'm going to share my word first, because it just goes so well with what I've just been saying, and it's so obvious, and it's so great. And my word of the year is ‘play big'. Play big.KJ Dell'AntoniaThat's two words.Jess LaheyThat's two words.Sarina BowenI get two words.KJ Dell'AntoniaShe's allowed to have two words because she's playing big.Multiple Speakers[all laughing]Jennie NashAll right, we have to go in reverse order then so KJ, what's your, what's your word?KJ Dell'AntoniaOh, my word of the year is, is ‘alive'.Jess LaheyOh, dear. Okay, that's a... quite a goal you got there missy.KJ Dell'AntoniaIt's a good word... laughingJennie NashCan you explain?!Sarina BowenShe can't, because she's laughing really hard right now.KJ Dell'AntoniaUm, it was going to be enthusiast, because I wanted to be sort of a welcoming both the challenges and the excitements of my life. But I really just feel like, and then it was going to be relish, but, but that's pickles, and I hate them. And then I'm just, I just feel really good about just letting it all come and, and being a part of it.Jennie NashOkay, good word.Jess LaheyOh, Sarina?Sarina BowenI've used a lot of the words.Jess LaheyOh, not yet. Sorry.KJ Dell'AntoniaShe said, reverse order.Jennie NashI'm laughing so hard that I'm crying.Jess LaheyOh, she said, reverse order. That's right.Sarina BowenWe have done this so many times, and we have never laughed all the way through it. Okay, okay.Jess LaheyKJ is right though we have used all of the words, I actually considered reusing one of my words this year, but then I thought maybe that was a cop out. So I did come up with a new word.Sarina BowenI considered it, and then I was too lazy to go look them up.Jess LaheyThat's quite a statement there, Bowen.Sarina BowenI know!Multiple Speakers[all laughing uncontrollably]KJ Dell'AntoniaI know I had savor before, that was kind of where I was going, but...Jennie NashI can't stop laughing.KJ Dell'AntoniaI don't know I feel very gritty about my... [unintelligible]Jennie NashI'm like snort laughing over here at the idea of I'm never going to not hear relish and pickles. [laughing uncontrollably]Jess LaheyI know, I know, I like it so much. I love it.Sarina BowenWell, she really doesn't like pickles. KJ is that friend where if she is served a pickle with her lunch, you can take it.Jess LaheyYeah. Absolutely.KJ Dell'AntoniaAnd the bit of bread that it touched.Sarina BowenOkay Jess? Jess, I don't know how you're going to follow this, but do you have a word?Jess LaheyI do have a word, and I'm really excited about this word, because years ago, when I did a really cool conference in Abu Dhabi, I met this woman that I was shocked I hadn't met before. But her name is Elke Govertsen, Elke, and she has a Substack. Her Substack is just, it's @ Elke, is her. She managed to snag @ Elke. She has a newsletter. She has something called Open Nesting. She's got older kids. Anyway, I subscribed to her Substack. I love it. She's one of those people that when she walked down on stage to give her talk, she just glowed from inside, like she was one of those people that you just, I felt really drawn to. So I started following her and her year, her word for this year I really liked, although I thought about it in a different way than she did. Her word for the year is ‘allow'—a, l, l, o, w—and so that is my word for the year, to allow myself to do some things. For example, finishing this book, and just realizing, allowing myself to be really bad at it and hoping that I can pull it off, allowing myself to look really dumb doing stuff like the beekeeping, allowing myself some grace about the fact that I'm probably killed my bees this winter because they're not insulated enough, all of the things. But I just really liked her word allow. So that's where I am. That's my word. I was going to redo evaluate, because I really did like that one, because that the emphasis there was, like, figure out what's valuable to you, but whatever, I've used that one before, so I'm going to give credit out to Elke and go with allow.Jennie NashOkay, Sarina, what about you?Sarina BowenWell, you know, I picked a word, and I usually really struggle with this, and I never feel quite comfortable with it, but I pick something, or it just picked me one day, and that word is ‘esteem'. And my little job, my little job is having a strange little moment of esteem, because there's this show that's at the tippy top of HBO right now called Heated Rivalry. And Heated Rivalry is a book that is a queer hockey romance, which is something that I have also written since 2014, and it has; strangely, some of my best performing books ever over the last decade fall into what I thought was a niche. So I write this niche thing, and people read it and they love it, but you know, it has always stayed in its corner until now. And Rachel Reid is the author of the book called Heated Rivalry, from which this TV show was made very faithfully. And Heated Rivalry is a fantastic novel, by the way. Fantastic conflict, and an interesting story structure. So it has been quite a revelation to watch her book and story reach an audience that I did not feel it was capable of. And there is something about that, that really spoke to all the parts about my, of my business, where, for example, sometimes I have to do research. And early on, I almost felt apologetic about asking an orthopedic surgeon to talk to me about something for a romance novel, because I just assumed that they would roll their eyes. I did it anyway. Thank you, Mark, Dr. Mark, for explaining knee surgery to me. But um, so esteem is a couple of different things. It is choosing projects that I esteem and that I care about, not because I think they'll sell, but because I love them, and also just realizing that the esteem that comes to various things that we do is not always predictable or measurable or something to rely upon. So I have to esteem it all on my own before I commit the time to do that. And that is how I ended up picking this word that I that I really like. It's kind of a quiet word. It doesn't, it isn't sexy, I guess is, is a word I would describe it, not really, but, um, but it is a, it's like asks you to pause and measure how we feel about something before we commit. And that is how I ended up there.Jess LaheyI love that meaning to the word. I love it.Jennie NashSomething that also occurs to me is you spoke with such esteem about this other author and the work that that she's done, and that's something that you often do, and you lift up all the writers in lots of different ways. And that esteem you have for the process of writing and the publishing business and the hard work of it comes across as well. So I like that meaning too.Sarina BowenWell thank you. I had an interesting conversation with my 22 year old son, who is quite a reader. Right now he's trying to get to the end of Crime and Punishment before his semester really kicks in. And he asked me over drinks, on a trip to Boston that I was making time for, so go me, if I could write like anyone, like if I could suddenly have the skills of any author, dead or alive, who would I pick? And I instantly gave him a couple of names in contemporary fiction that he has never read and never will, because there are people who write books that are not for 22 year old nerds. And, um, and he, he sort of blanked and he's like, no mama, like you could have, you could be Tolstoy, you know, like you could pick anything. And I'm like, no, I'm serious. I have esteem for the things these people are doing in contemporary fiction. And it's like that, um, that George Michael quote, like, when are you going to make some serious music? And he says, you don't understand, I'm very serious about pop music. And you know, it's my right to esteem whatever I choose. And I really do choose this. It's not; it's not a runner up thing for me. This is my interest, and I'm going to value it.Jess LaheyHell yeah,Sarina BowenYeah. Woohoo!Jennie NashI feel like we should end on that.Jess LaheyYeah. I think that's a good place to stop.Jennie NashThat was some power, power language there. We would love our listeners to share in the chat your goals for the year, your words for the year, how you feel about pickles and their touching a bread. [laughing] We would love to hear all the things from you, and until next time, keep your butt in the chair and your head in the game.NarratorThe Hashtag AmWriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perrella. Our intro music, aptly titled, Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output, because everyone deserves to be paid for the This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

Punchbowl News founders Anna Palmer, Jake Sherman and John Bresnahan join Max Cohen to reflect on the company's fifth anniversary. They share some stories from over the years and what they are looking forward to. Want more in-depth daily coverage from Congress? Subscribe to our free Punchbowl News AM newsletter at punchbowl.news. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Most writers start revision by re-reading their manuscript from page one — but that's the least effective way to improve a book. In this episode, Jenny explains a clearer, more strategic way to revise using the Blueprint and the 3D Revision Process. You'll learn how to step back, see your book with fresh eyes, and create a plan that actually moves your manuscript from good to great. We also invite you to join the upcoming Blueprint Sprint.In this episode you'll learn:* Why a full-manuscript read is often the wrong first step in revision* The mindset shift every writer needs before diving into revisions* How to use the Blueprint to create a clear, confident revision plan before touching your pagesJoin the Blueprint SprintStarting January 12 and rolling though February, KJ Dell'Antonia and Jennie Nash will lead you through the 14 foundational questions that every writer should ask of themselves and their book, whether you're just getting started, are mid-draft or starting on on the whatever-number revision with weekly assignments, live events, workbooks and updated access to all the Blueprint resources. All you need to do is be a paid subscriber and stay tuned—we'll let you know how to get signed up.I NEED a January Blueprint!What if you want even MORE? Then you could be one of a very few #AmWriting subscribers who join our first ever Blueprint Sprint cohort. 6 weeks of working together and write-alongs, 5 group-only live sessions, which will be recorded for anyone who can't attend and a members-only community dedicated to helping you create a Blueprint that leads you to the book you want to write, ending with direct feedback from me and from Jennie on your flap copy and 3 page Inside-Outline.We're keeping this small on purpose—we max out at 10 and we might drop that down—so applications to join this group open today and will be evaluated on a first-come, first serve basis. Once we have 10 people, we will close down the application, so get yours in early! Early-bird pricing is $1000 until December 22, after that the price goes up to $1200 (if there are spaces left by then).What are we looking for? 10 writers who are prepared to commit to the process and to the cohort, who do what they set out to do when they set out to do it, who welcome constructive feedback and are willing to do what it takes to build a blueprint for the book they want to create. Writers who know that sometimes you must look a hard truth in the face and cut your losses, that what goes in the scrap heap is rarely resurrected but that the scrap heap is a necessary part of the work. Writers who won't take no for an answer, but can hear “not this” and feel both disappointment and a burning determination that the next effort will be the one that gets there.Also: no a******s.What will you need to apply? We want to hear about your professional and publishing backgrounds, but no publishing experience is necessary. We want to know where you are with this current project, but “still noodling” is a fine answer. The primary requirements are first, a readiness to do the work and second and more ephemerally, our sense of what makes a cohesive cohort.If that sounds like you, here you go—the time to apply is now.Links & Resources* Learn more about the Blueprint tools* Substack about how each genre has a different primary goal in the Blueprint * #amwriting Episode about the Blueprint origin story and why it's such a powerful tool: Transcript Below!#AmWriting is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.“Revision means stepping back, thinking big picture, and being brave enough to rebuild.”SPONSORSHIP MESSAGEHi writers, the Winter Blueprint Challenge 2026 is on, and I can't wait to do it, and I can't wait to tell you about it. Okay, so this time around, we're going to have two ways to play. First, we'll run the Blueprint for supporters, 10 weeks of Blueprint assignments, live events, and encouragement starting January 12, 2026—or, and this is the big news, apply to join our very first Blueprint cohort—10 of you will become a small group that receives direct feedback from me and from Jennie on flap copy and the three page Inside-Outline, and joins five group only live sessions and becomes a part of a members-only community dedicated to helping you create a blueprint that leads you to the book you want to start and finish. Applications to join this group open December 15, 2025 and will be evaluated on a first come, first-serve basis. Once we have 10 people, we're going to close down the application. So get yours in early. Early-bird pricing for the small cohort is $1,000 until December 22 after that, the price goes up to $1200 (if there are even spaces left by then). I am so excited about this. So get your application in early. The regular Blueprint will run for supporters at the usual supporter pricing, but this other cohort is going to be really special details on how and where to apply are in the show notes, or they're going to be pretty prominently displayed at AmWriting podcast.comEPISODE TRANSCRIPTMultiple SpeakersIs it recording? Now it's recording. Yay! Go ahead. This is the part where I stare blankly at the microphone. Try to remember what I'm supposed to be doing. All right, let's start over. Awkward pause. I'm going to rustle some papers. Okay. Now, one, two, three.Jennie NashHey everyone, it's Jennie Nash, and this is the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast the place where we help you play big in your writing life, love the process, and finish what matters. Today, I want to talk about why most writers approach revision the wrong way, and how to use the Blueprint to do it right. Most people think revision starts with reading the whole manuscript, but the truth is I think that's the last thing you should do. Before we dive into why I think that, and what I think you should do instead, I want to talk a little bit about what I call the “revision mindset.”When you finish a manuscript, it's really tempting to think, okay, I've got it, I did it, I'll just polish it up a little and be done. But real revision requires openness—being open to seeing the strengths and the weaknesses and the changes that you need to make in the manuscript to take it from good to great. This can feel really vulnerable. I know for me, at this point, I worry that changing one thing is going to break everything else. You feel so close to the finish line that you don't want to touch anything. But holding that tightly—that kind of clenching—is exactly what stops the revision process from working. It's important to remember that revising is big-picture work. It's not line editing. Revising is stepping back, seeing what's really on the page, and being willing to reshape it. So a “revision mindset” is that openness and that willingness to look at it, to be real about what's there and what you want it to be, and to be willing to do what it takes to get it there. So a good revision is going to start with that mindset. And if we start there, you can begin to see why doing a full manuscript read-through from page one, marching straight through all the way to the end, is going to lead to trouble. There are two particular things that happen if you approach revision in that way.The first problem is when you go to read the book from page one chronologically all the way through—maybe you wrote it that way, maybe you didn't—but in any case, if that's how you approach revision, what tends to happen is that you fall into line editing instead of big-picture thinking. You begin to think, oh, this line is really great, or maybe I should fix that line, or maybe the flow here is a little off from this line to the other. You stay in the weeds, and you lose sight of structure and purpose and the big arc of your story or argument. The second problem with starting revision with a full manuscript read is when you ask somebody else to do that reading for you. Basically, what you're doing is handing over your power to somebody else. You're saying you look at this, tell me what you think, tell me how to fix it, tell me what's wrong. And the problem with that is the tendency to get feedback and then just do everything they ask without thinking strategically through what you want to do or what you want your revision to accomplish. And a corollary of that problem is that usually when people are doing that full manuscript read for you, they're just dumping all this stuff on you. They're giving you this long litany of things that they see in the manuscript, or things that they think you should fix, and that list might include small things and big things and important things and not important things. It's so easy to just get overwhelmed with the process.As a book coach, that's what I see all the time. People get into revision, they get overwhelmed, they freeze up, they don't know what to do first. It's so easy to feel defeated. And that's the moment when so many writers stall out and shelve the project. They put it in a folder on their desktop—the proverbial drawer—and it's just away, and they're done, and they can't face it. And then the idea of going back to that huge amount of work and trying to figure it out becomes too daunting, and they just don't. So I don't recommend starting your revision with the full manuscript read.I have a different approach that I teach book coaches at Author Accelerator, and it's called the “3D revision process.” It has three parts. The first is a process of inquiry. We use the Blueprint to ask key questions about the project. The second step is mapping everything out using the outline at the end of the Blueprint in a specific way. And the third step is strategizing. We look at that outline and we prioritize what changes need to be made using the stoplight strategy. I'm going to explain all these things in a minute, but the point is that this process gives you clarity, confidence, and a specific, actionable plan for approaching your revision—which is the dream.Okay, so let's walk through it. Step one is this process of inquiry, and using the Blueprint to walk us through that. In an earlier episode, which I'll link to in the show notes, I talked about why I created the Blueprint and why I refer to it as a process of inquiry, rather than a story structure method. The process of inquiry allows the writer to look at the foundational aspects of what they're writing and to look at the work from this big-picture angle that usually they skip. There are 14 questions no matter which genre you're working on, but they all start with these really basic questions, like, why are you writing this book? What's your point? Who's your reader, and what do they want? And are you giving it to them?Using the Blueprint to start a project, and answering these questions before you begin, is a really powerful way to think about what you want to do in the book, and a powerful way to get your vision clear. But when you have a finished manuscript and you go back to these questions, it's a whole different ball game. It's almost like a test. Can you answer these questions clearly and confidently based on what you know is there? Have you, in other words, put on the page the vision that you had in your head? So you go through the 14 questions honestly, answering them based on what you actually have, and it becomes this kind of assessment or challenge or test, like, did I do what I wanted to accomplish? And it's really easy in those 14 questions to see if you didn't. If you can't confidently answer one of the questions, you know that that's pointing toward a potential weakness in the book.If I give the 14 Blueprint questions to somebody who has written a manuscript that they love and that is close to the vision that they had for it, they're able to knock those questions out and answer them with such authority and power, and it's just an amazing thing to see. And when they can't, and they're coming to the questions with that openness I talked about before, then it's like, okay, look, we still don't have this piece nailed down. We still have to figure out this part of the story or the argument that you're making, so it becomes a first pass at what is really there and what strengths and weaknesses are on the page.The second step in the “3D revision process” is to map out what you have, and we do this with the outline that is at the end of each of the Blueprints. If you've gone through the previous questions in the Blueprint, you're looking at those foundational aspects, the structural elements of the story, all the things that hold up what you've written, and then the outline is, okay, here's what I've actually written. If you're at the start of a project, you want that outline to be no more than three pages. I'm very strict about this, and there's a reason for that. It's because we need to contain or constrain the creative process so that we can see what it is you're wanting to make or to build. If someone goes on and on at that stage of the writing process, they're not making good decisions and they're not thinking about the big picture. But when you keep it to three pages, you're forced to do that, and it's a really awesome process.With revision, I loosen those rules, and the reason is that for revision, I want this outline to be what I call an “as-is outline.” So this is not what you intend to write, or what you hope to write, or what you plan to write, which is what it is at the beginning of a project. Now it's what is actually there. So the as-is outline is capturing what you actually wrote, not what you intended to write. So you use the manuscript, obviously, to get this information and to pin down an outline of what is actually there. And there's still a constraint. I suggest that you keep this as-is outline to about 10 pages, and you absolutely need to follow the rules of the genre that I outline in the Blueprint. Each of the genres has a specific outline and a specific thing that we're looking for in that outline, and I designed that to solve for the things that people most often get wrong in that genre.I wrote a Substack post, which I'll link to in the show notes, which explains what each of those things are, and I'll link to that in the show notes. But you want to follow the rules of the outline, so that you make sure you're not making the foundational problems of that genre. But then you have these 10 pages to capture what you've actually done on the page, and this as-is outline is where the big insights happen. When you step back and you look at this as-is outline, you can see where the momentum drops, where scenes or chapters repeat themselves, where your structure might be broken, where a subplot might take over, or, in nonfiction, where you veer off in some other direction. You can see where two memoir scenes are doing the same emotional work, or where a nonfiction chapter doesn't drive towards the outcome that you're leading your reader to. You can see so much in this outline, and that's why this process is so powerful. The outline becomes a kind of X-ray of what you've actually written on the page.And that leads us to step three of the “3D revision process” which is you're going to analyze that outline. You're going to bring some strategic thinking to what you have there. Each of the Blueprints has a checklist for their particular outline, and you want to go through those checklists and really ask yourself, have I done this? Have I done that? Have I done the other? The kinds of questions that checklist asks are things like, am I giving the reader what they want and expect? Does my outline include the essential elements of my genre or category? What's missing, what's out of order, what's unclear, what's unnecessary? So it's strategic thinking about the material that you have created.One of my favorite books about the creative process is Creativity, Inc., by Ed Catmull. It's the story of the creation of Pixar, the company, and in that book, he talks about the Brain Trust, which is a very small group of writers who help each other to create the best possible stories. And they have this process in the Brain Trust that's called giving good notes. And good notes are clear, they're factual, they're strategic, and that's what you're doing here for yourself. You're giving yourself good notes. And if at this point you want to bring in a trusted partner to help you brainstorm and to help you look at your material and look at your notes and help you brainstorm solutions, this is a great time to bring in somebody to help you brainstorm and to look at your as-is outline and look at the notes that you've made for yourself, because instead of just handing the job over to somebody else, you're saying, I have done this work of looking at my work in a strategic way. I know what I've done well, I know what my weaknesses are, and now I'm ready to solve those problems.So a great critique partner or a trusted beta reader or a book coach…obviously, are great people to bring in at this stage of the process. And what's awesome is you're not asking them to sit down and spend 15 or 20 hours reading a whole manuscript and trying to figure out what you want or what you were trying to do, or how it all lands for them, and giving you this info dump of information. You're asking them to look at your Blueprint, to look at your answers to the 14 questions, and your as-is outline, and your analysis of that outline. And what you'll be doing, either on your own or in partnership, is prioritizing what needs to happen in the revision.The tool that I teach coaches to do this is called the “stoplight strategy.” And what we're doing is we're trying to categorize the problems that we see in a manuscript by their severity. So red light problems are major structural issues, yellow light problems are medium-level issues, and green light problems are line-level edits. I designed the stoplight strategy because so many writers think that revision is about green light issues. So many of them start with line-level edits. And as I spoke about before, the tendency if you're doing a full manuscript read is to fall into that rhythm of just seeing the green light things, or maybe a few yellow light things. But it's very hard to see the red light things, which are the things that are going to bring your book down. They're the fatal flaws, and most writers never find the time to actually look at those things.So they might be things like, I've got to start this novel in a totally different place, or I have to chop off five chapters of my memoir, or I have to restructure my entire nonfiction argument in a different way to make it land. But if you've approached the process that I'm explaining with that openness, that revision mindset, and that curiosity about how can I make this better, and if you've gone through it in this systematic way, and you found some red light issues, they tend not to sting quite so much. They tend to feel manageable. Okay, I can fix this one big thing. And if I fix this one big thing, the next thing that I need to fix is probably going to be obvious, and then the next one is going to be obvious. So you're leading yourself to a prioritization of what needs to happen in the revision, rather than looking at everything in the same way, meaning every little green light issue has the same weight as the yellow light issues and the same weight as the red light issues.When we step out of doing the work chronologically, and we approach it in this more strategic way, we tend to focus on the red light issues. And again, they just tend not to feel quite so awful.So the next step in the process is you take that as-is outline, and you turn it into a “what's-next outline,” a map of what the book is going to become in revision. On that outline, you mark what gets cut, what gets moved, what needs to be added, what shifts are you going to make because of the big changes, and you actually make them in the outline, so that the outline reflects where you're going with your revision.And that's how we close the gap between what you've written and what you want to write. That's where you get closer to your vision of what you want this book to be. And that's why this process is so powerful, because now you have a clear map of what you need to do in revision. You have a clear plan for how you're going to go execute those things, so you're not guessing and you're not lost in overwhelm. You have this what's-next outline that you're going to go in and follow. And if you want to start at the beginning and make all the revisions in chronological order, you can. Or if you want to go in and fix the big red light issues first, you can. And you can use this what's-next outline as a kind of external hard drive to hold all the changes that you want to make in your revision, so that you're not holding them all in your head.Doing the revision in this way might actually mean going in and working on, let's say, chapter 10, 11, and 12, and not touching anything else. It might mean going in and working on chapters 13 and 27 and not touching anything else. It's not necessarily a chronological process. You're going to follow the what's-next outline and do what needs to be done in the manuscript.And once you do that, now is the time when a full manuscript read can make a lot of sense. Now you can go through from beginning to end knowing that you don't have any big structural issues. There are no red light issues in this manuscript anymore. There are no yellow light issues. You don't have to think about those or worry about those. You can go through and do the thing that most people do at the beginning of their revision process, which is polishing the prose and making everything sing and working on the line-by-line writing. You've already done the heavy lifting.If you're excited about using the Blueprint in your revision and you want to work through it with a community of other writers who are doing it too, we'd love to have you join our upcoming Blueprint Challenge. You're going to go through the Blueprint step by step along with people who are revising their books or people who are starting from scratch. It's the same 14 questions, and people will be working on fiction, they'll be working on memoir, and they'll be working on nonfiction. KJ is going to be leading the charge of this Blueprint, and she's going to be doing some write-alongs and AMAs and different things to support people while you work through those Blueprint questions. And I'm going to be in there a few times as well.This is the fourth time we've done the Blueprint Challenge at the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast, and it gets better and better every time as more and more people do it. And you can find critique partners in there to help you with your Blueprint questions, maybe to look at your as-is outline, because they understand the process. They understand what's going on. They understand what this is all about. And it's just a really fun and powerful way to approach either a new book or the revision of a book that you want to work on.You can check the show notes for details on how to sign up for the Blueprint Challenge. This challenge works if you have a new idea that you want to work through, or a new-ish idea. You can be a little bit into it, and the Blueprint process is still really effective. And it also, of course, works really well if you're revising something, or maybe you're stuck revising something, or overwhelmed by the revision process that you're in.You can start at the beginning of the Blueprint process and go through what I've just described here, and at the end of the challenge, be in a really great place to move forward with your project. We'd love to have you join us. So again, check the show notes for details.We give everyone who joins the Blueprint Challenge a downloadable copy of the Blueprint book and a workbook to work through. But if you're not able to do the challenge at this time and you want to go through this process yourself, you can just grab a copy of my Blueprint book at any bookstore and work through those 14 questions and your outline at the end. However you do it, we're excited to support you on your way.So until next time, keep your butt in the chair and your head in the game.NarratorThe Hashtag AmWriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perrella. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output, because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

Rachael Herron's latest: The Seven Miracles of Beatrix Holland, is, truly and in so many ways, the book only she can write. It pulls from every part of her life: identity, spirituality, a love of what's magical in the world, her joy in crafting and her understanding of community and family. I, of course, wanted to know: how did you find the guts to put it all on the table? We talked about vulnerability, the challenges of writing the book of your heart, and learning to play with what you fear. Rachael says, “I'm spoiled for any smaller kind of writing. I'm not sure I can go back.”You're gonna love it. Links from the Pod:The Seven Miracles of Beatrix HollandInk in Your Veins podcastRachel's website: https://rachaelherron.comThe Jennifer Lynn Barnes “take my money” list.The War of Art, Steven Pressfield#AmReading:Careless People, Sarah Wynn-Williams This Is Not a Book About Benedict Cumberbatch, Tabitha Carvan Transcript below:EPISODE TRANSCRIPTMultiple SpeakersIs it recording? Now it's recording—yay. Go ahead. This is the part where I stare blankly at the microphone. I don't remember what I'm supposed to be doing. All right, let's start over. Awkward pause. I'm going to rustle some papers. Okay, now—one, two, three.KJ Dell'AntoniaHey, listeners, this is the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast, the place where we help you play big in your writing life, love the process, and finish what matters. I am KJ Dell'Antonia, and today I am bringing to you an interview with Rachael Herron. I just finished talking to Rachael, and I really enjoyed this. We talked about vulnerability. We talked about the challenges of writing the book of your heart. We talked about what should show you where that book is, the idea that the fear is where you should play. It's, it's a really great interview, and I know that you are going to enjoy it.Let me tell you a little bit about Rachael. She is the author of so many, so many books, thrillers and romances, and most recently, in the book that we are talking about, The Seven Miracles of Beatrix Holland. And I have to read you—Rachael's going to describe this to you, but I got to read you the very short thing that basically made me say, take my money. And it went like this. A psychic tells Beatrix Holland that she'll experience seven miracles and then she'll die. No problem, though, Beatrix isn't worried. She is above all things pragmatic. She vastly prefers a spreadsheet to a tall tale. Then the miracles start to happen.It's a really great book, and more importantly, it's a big book. It is a book where Rachael is writing what comes from deep inside, and it is a book that only Rachael could write. And that is why I asked Rachael to join me today. I hope that you enjoy this interview, and before I release you to it, I just want to remind you that the place to go to talk more about writing big and playing big in your writing life is anywhere that we are: the AmWriting Podcast, Hashtag AmWriting, AmWritingPodcast.com. Find us on Substack. Find us by Googling. Grab those show notes—you should be getting them—and join us for all the different ways that we need to come together in a community to give each other the strength to do our very best and biggest work.So I'm going to ask you to describe The Seven Miracles of Beatrix Holland to me. But also before I even do, I want to say how much I enjoyed it. And also so we have been spending most of our time on the AmWriting Podcast lately talking about writing—writing big and striving big and trying to do something different and bigger and better than what you have done before. We, I think as writers, we're always trying to up our game, but there's upping your game, and there's reaching for the stars. And I felt like this book reached for the stars in a way that you maybe didn't even set out to because to me, as someone who has read much of your work and followed your career and listened to a lot of the Ink in Your Veins Podcast and sort of just knows what's going on with Rachael, this is the book that only you could write. So when I say this is your big book, I don't mean, you know, that this is, is going to be a—I'm sorry—I don't actually mean that 200 years from now, people will be passing this around.Rachael HerronExactly.KJ Dell'AntoniaWhat I mean is that this is you. This is and it's you. All of your books are you, but this was really you in a way that felt downright magical to me. And it's a magical book. So can you tell us a little bit about Beatrix Holland? And I will also say that even before I read it that you had me at the premise. So give us that.Rachael HerronWell, I don't know how to talk about it now that you've talked me up so well. But thank you. Thank you for, you know, being honestly an ideal reader for this book. The Seven Miracles of Beatrix Holland is about a woman who is pragmatic and sensible and doesn't believe in, you know, mumbo jumbo, not really worried about that kind of thing. But she is told by a psychic that she will experience seven miracles and then she will die and whatever, that's not a big deal. It doesn't bother her, because none of it is true. She doesn't believe it. And then, me… miracles start to occur; things that even she cannot say are not miracles. And so therefore, maybe, what about that death thing that's going to be preying on her mind?KJ Dell'AntoniaSo on top of that…Rachael HerronWho likes what the book is about…KJ Dell'AntoniaWe're on an island, and there's family secrets being revealed. And there are amazing family secrets that I think many of us would, I mean, they're kind of awful, and I've talked to some people, and some people would be thrilled by them, and some wouldn't, but yeah, just it just kind of keeps giving and giving and giving. And it's funny because you say I'm the ideal reader, and actually, I don't know that I necessarily would be…Rachael HerronOh, that's even better…KJ Dell'AntoniaExcept, if somebody else had written this, I would not be the ideal reader. And I don't think that's because I know you. I think it's because of the way that you wrote that. And when what I when I say, I wouldn't be the ideal reader, I am getting a little tired of books that are giving me certain specific elements that are very trendy right now and that people feel obliged to give me. And you know you have, certainly, you've got LGBTQ characters in this, but also you have LGBTQ characters in your life. You are yourself such a character.Rachael HerronAs my wife is one of them over in the other room.KJ Dell'AntoniaAnd this isn't me saying I will only read books about queer people by queer authors. No, no, no. It's that these are the thing, the elements of this book that sort of fall into that, that are just there, because that's your life and what you see…Rachael HerronRight. Right.KJ Dell'AntoniaAnd it just is perfectly natural. And of course, you have a lot of—and it's in the sort of the same way that, of course, there's a lot of witchiness and spirituality, because it's part, it's part of you and part of who you are. So it's, it's, it reads as authentic.Rachael HerronOh, that's such a, that's such a—that's such a huge compliment. I wrote this book to please myself.KJ Dell'AntoniaThat's what… that's my next question. Don't make me. Don't make me interrupt you. What? That was my question. What was your intention? What did you set out to do with this book?Rachael HerronI—so this is my sixth genre, and I've been writing for—I've been published for 15 years, and this is my 26 or 27th book. I've lost, I can't remember, maybe more. I have a list somewhere. And I have always thought about, you know, the market and what people want to read and what people want to hear, as you know, as you know this, you've been, you've been doing the same thing a long time.KJ Dell'AntoniaAnd there's nothing wrong with that.Rachael HerronThere's nothing wrong with writing tree, market around market, exactly. But, but in this case, I wanted to write a book, and I wanted to have fun, and, and, and to be honest, I talk about this regularly is that I was going to self-publish it. I didn't even want to deal with my agent coming back and saying, oh, you should edit it this way. Or, you know that this or that editor doesn't want it, or they wanted to change in some way. I wanted to write a—I wanted to write a series of about found family, and I did, I did the Jennifer Lynn Barnes thing, the adored Taylor, where I just, I just made the list of everything I love the most. You know, I love witch stuff. I love practical magic. I love sisters. I love twins separated at birth. Why wouldn't I? I love grumpy, grumpy, older women and fireflies and all of the things that I love the most. And I and I wrote that book, and it was one of the fastest books I've ever written, and not because I was rushing, just because it came easily. I was following my heart and following my gut, and I was also following my tarot cards. When I would get stuck, I would just pull a tarot card and see what it did with my subconscious and moved me forward, and I it was just play. And then I revised it quickly. I hired my favorite editor, edited it, got it copy edited, and then I decided, oh gosh, I don't think I want to do a whole series, and I'm not sure if I want to self-publish, because that's a lot of work, so I'll just let my agent have it and to see if she could sell it. And she said, okay, I'll take a look at it and see if I could sell it. And then it sold at auction because it was, I don't… there's no because there it was just no surprise. There's no because there's no because there's never a because in publishing. You can also write the book of your heart.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah, and then this—the rest of the story wouldn't fall that way and it would never sell that way…Rachael HerronExactly. So it happened to go this way. And of course, a lot of it is a lot of it is luck. Cozy, cozy, queer fantasy is, you know, on an upswing right now, but that wasn't, you know, a couple years ago. It took a couple years for it to come out.KJ Dell'AntoniaWhat do you love most? Yeah, what do you love most about this book and the experience?Rachael HerronThe thing I love most about the whole experience is that it has spoiled me for any other kind of writing; I think now, which may be a good or a bad thing. Ask me in a few years. But I kind of refuse now to write a book that I don't desperately want to write, that I can't stop thinking of. Because I've written a lot of books that I love, but they were, you know, what they were, they were my job. They were the book I sold. And now I will write the book that I sold. Now I will do, do what the contract says. And I don't want to do that anymore. I just want to write the books that grab me and fascinate me and keep me in their thrall and what that means is that I have to, you know, focus on other ways to bring in money and to support. And really, I'm now, I'm supporting this writing passion with things like teaching and with, you know, you know, old backlist books. But I'm not, I'm not sure if I can go back. I don't want to, I don't want to be a work a day writer, writing to a contract that I don't maybe love as much as other contracts I've had, right?KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah.Rachael HerronSo, yeah, it's spoiled me a little bit that way.KJ Dell'AntoniaSo are there other ways that this book feels bigger than things that you have written before? And this is again; we're not denigrating our old work. We're not…Rachael HerronNo, of course not. Of course not. I think that every—for me, it's always been a goal that for every book that I write, it needs to be me playing bigger. It needs to be me playing truer, more, more free. And in this book, it's only recently come up in my in my consciousness that I think that I needed to leave the United States and move around the world to New Zealand. And one of the reasons we left the states was because we were scared of the way LGBTQ rights are, are trending. There's 867 pieces of legislation that are anti LGBTQ on the dockets right now in the United States, and that's, that's up by like 700% in the last four years, and it's and it's terrifying. But it I didn't strike me until recently that this is my first novel that has a queer love story. It's not a romance, but there's a queer, queer love story inside it. And I finally, perhaps, felt safe enough to do that, you know, because it and when I came into the industry, I came in writing straight romances, because that's what would sell. And when I would ask to write other things that was turned down by traditional publishing because they thought it wouldn't sell. And then, you know, obviously self-publishers came along and said, oh, there is a market. Wow, look who wants to read these books. But, and so it was me kind of exposing myself in that way, and also me exposing myself in in the way that Beatrix does is that I always, I also just want to believe in magic. I want to believe I want to believe in things out there that I can't explain, that are bigger than me, that I don't actually need a name for or to understand. Because if I could understand something that is that big, something that is powering the universes, I can't be expected to understand that. But can I, can I engage with it? Can I play with it in the in the exact same way that that Beatrix does? I think the answer is yes. And I did. When I would pull the tarot cards to help me write the next chapter if I got stuck, it was an actual process of engaging with a larger thing, saying, I don't know how to write this book. Help me write this book. Asking for help in writing this book from, from whatever is out there. I don't have, I don't have big ideas about it, but yeah. So that was, that was, it was scary, and maybe that's why I originally wanted to self-publish it, because then it, it felt like I could keep total control.KJ Dell'AntoniaSure.Rachael HerronIf I did that,KJ Dell'AntoniaOf course, you could keep anyone who wouldn't like it from reading it then.Multiple Speakers[Both laughing]KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah, okay, so maybe not so much. But no, I get it. It must have felt…Rachael HerronYeah.KJ Dell'AntoniaLess vulnerable. So I was going to ask you next, what was hard about it. And I guess that's, is that what was hard? But maybe something else was.Rachael HerronLet's see, what was that? So that was hard, being that honest and vulnerable. And you know how when we write our novels, the thing that we want to do is be as truthful as possible, even though we're just making up a pack of lies. It's it feels more true often than even memoir can when we're when we're doing this. What else felt hard? Not much felt hard about this book. And I have had books that I have struggled with like I am wrestling muddy alligators for decades at a time. It feels like those that's what those that's what those books feel like. And there's nothing wrong with those books. They were just; you know where I was at the moment. But this book, I it's one of those gift books. It just, I must have struggled, and I do not remember. I honestly do not remember struggling.KJ Dell'AntoniaWell… I wish for…Rachael HerronI just remember it being joy.KJ Dell'Antonia…all of us. I wish that. I wish that journey for all of us. Oh. Yeah, yeah…Rachael HerronAs usual, I struggle whenever I get copy edits back. When I get copy edits back, I realize I don't know how to write a sentence.KJ Dell'AntoniaSo if any of our listeners are sort of trying to find within themselves the freedom to write what they really want to write, and maybe can't even figure out what the heck that would be, what would you say to them…asking for a friend?Rachael HerronI would encourage them to do one of those “ID lists”, to sit down and write a list of the thing that if you saw that something about it was on the box of the of the video cassette at the video rental store, because that's how old I am, if you saw that listed on there, would you pick it up and rent the movie? Write down all of the things that you love the most and then actually use it as an exercise in creativity within constraints. How many of those things can you actually shove in there? Can you get them? Can you get them all in there? The other thing I like to ask myself when this question comes up is, if I am alone—well, it doesn't actually matter if I'm alone or not—but if I, if I walk into the bookstore, any bookstore, and and I reject any “shoulds,” you know, should I look for that cookbook I was thinking about, or should I look for that new nonfiction I heard about on the podcast, if I'm if I'm released of all shoulds, where will I want to—and say somebody tells me you can only look at one section of the store today. What is the section of the store that I will go stand in front of and pull books off the shelf and look at? And perhaps that is a clue as to where you should be writing.KJ Dell'AntoniaAnd how about freeing yourself up to actually do it. We can't all move to New Zealand, Rachael.Rachael Herron[Laughing] Freeing yourself up do you mean to write the book, to write that book?KJ Dell'AntoniaTo write that book. I don't. Yeah, most of my listeners—well, most of our listeners aren't you know, we tend to be a podcast for professionals or people that are playing professional so, you know, these aren't people who can't put their butt in the chair, but to be vulnerable and admit that you want to go bigger and then do it. That's a different question. Got any advice for that?Rachael HerronI do like to think of Steven Pressfield's advice from his book The War of Art, where he talks about resistance with the capital R. And the place where you feel the most resistance, that's your that's your compass that is pointing north to what you what, what you are meant to do. And a lot of times when we think about these bigger stories that we may want to write someday, the someday, right when I get there, I'll write it someday, that you've already got this compass pointing you there, and it is terrifying. And the fear of how can I do that now is maybe the thing that says that you do not need to put aside the fourth book in the series that you're writing that you need to finish before you write this next series. You can do that. But maybe listening to that resistance, listening to that fear, and dedicating 15 minutes, three times a week, to playing with the idea of this book. If you were to start to write it anytime in the future, you can, you can at least be courting it and flirting with it, making it know that you are going to be available to write that, that book of your heart, because everybody, every we all need that. We all need that. We also need to pay the bills and do the professional writing and do all that too.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah, yeah.Rachael HerronBut…KJ Dell'AntoniaWe got to; we got to try to do the biggest things we can. All right. Well, that's a great place to lead into my next question, which is, what have you read recently where you really thought the writer was playing big?Rachael HerronCan I give you two?KJ Dell'AntoniaOf course!Rachael HerronOkay, the first one, and strangely, these are both nonfiction. So make of that what you will, Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism by Sarah Wynn-Williams, who is a QE. Have you heard of this one?KJ Dell'AntoniaOh yeah. This is the…Rachael HerronOh yeah, the Facebook book.KJ Dell'AntoniaThe Facebook book. We moved fast, and we did indeed break things.Rachael HerronWe did move fast. We broke things. And Sarah has a uniquely Kiwi sense when she's looking at them, because she goes in and she's really watching it all happen. And I don't care about Facebook. I don't actually engage with all of the stuff that said about it. And this book is written basically it felt like a thriller. It was—I couldn't put it down. And she was fearless, the things that she said. No wonder Zuckerberg wanted to silence it. He looks like a moron. And she was absolutely fearless. And it was one of those schadenfreudy, why am I reading this? Why can't I put this down? But I can't put it down. And I think it was because of her bravery.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah.Rachael HerronSo I really enjoyed it for that. And then the other one I want to tell you about is kind of on the flip side. And you may not have heard about this one. It's called This Is Not a Book About Benedict CumberbatchKJ Dell'AntoniaNot only have I heard about this one, it's entirely possible that I sent it to you.Rachael HerronReally?!KJ Dell'AntoniaI love this book! All right, go on. Go on.Rachael Herron…The Joy of Loving Something--Anything--Like Your Life Depends On It, by Tabitha Carvan. Oh, my god, isn't it brilliant? She writes about how, yes, she does love Benedict Cumberbatch, who I'd really never considered very much in my lifeKJ Dell'AntoniaNo, I couldn't pick him out of a lineup of youthful-ish…Rachael HerronYeah.KJ Dell'AntoniaBritish-ish…Rachael HerronYeah.KJ Dell'AntoniaActor-ish,Rachael HerronAnd she loves him, loves him, loves him, no, no joke, loves him. And the whole book is about recovering from any shame around loving the thing that you were put on this earth to freaking love with your whole heart, no matter what anybody says. And I really think the Benedict Cumberbatch is a really great thing to tie this whole book in.KJ Dell'AntoniaIt had to be something like that, because if it was like knitting, I mean,Rachael HerronRight, exactly.KJ Dell'AntoniaOkay, that's fine, honey, you can love your knitting. And you know it also is…Rachael HerronExactly,KJ Dell'AntoniaYou know, it also is…Rachael HerronThis is not a book about yogurt. Who cares, you know. But Benedict Cumberbatch is funny to say. He's actually kind of funny to look at when you do look at him, when you do look him up. And it's so evocative, and it is, and it is something that people would snicker at.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah.Rachael HerronRight? People would snicker.KJ Dell'AntoniaStill even… yeah, it's like, she snickers it herself. But also she's like, okay, why? Why is that, you know? Why would it be? What if I were super obsessed with the stats of some obscure ball—baseball player, no one would mock that. If I wanted to watch every football game played by, you know…Rachael HerronThat blew my mind when she said that, of course, of course. So, and she goes deep. She's again, she's so brave. She plays big. She goes into what it means. How does it like? How does it affect her husband? What does she think about how it affects her husband? Like she goes all of the places. I'm so, I bet you did tell me about it, and I'm so glad that you did.KJ Dell'AntoniaI love, I love. I keep extra copies to force people to read it. I tie people up in like, you know parts of my house and force them… no. I don't really do that.Rachael Herron[Laughing] I love that. But, and what are those all have in common? I think that what are, the both those books have in common? Is these women who, who, at any point, anybody in the whole world could have told them that's not really a good idea to write.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah, no, that's exactly right.Rachael HerronAnd it would've been true.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah. It would have been true. It would have been excellent advice.Rachael HerronExcellent advice not to write that book.KJ Dell'AntoniaReally, you should not admit that you love Benedict. Or really, I mean, you're never going to work in this town again, man.Rachael HerronYou're never going to work in this town again. And the whole, during the whole book of Careless People, she's talking about being inside, she is inside the beast that is doing the damage. And that's and that's brave too. And I don't think Seven Miracles is as brave as those books, but there was, but there was bravery and resistance around moving, moving toward, really putting yourself on display.KJ Dell'AntoniaRun towards the fear.Rachael HerronAnd that's what we writers do.KJ Dell'AntoniaThat's our theme.Rachael HerronYeah, run towards the fear. Even if you can only give it 15 minutes a day or so, three times a week, that's enough. That's good enough to tell your bravery. It should come back more.KJ Dell'AntoniaYes.Rachael HerronScooch, door bravery, little scooches.KJ Dell'AntoniaEdge towards the fear. Tip toe.Rachael HerronOh, that's beautiful. I love that you're doing this series.KJ Dell'AntoniaWe love it too. So, yeah, it's going great. Well again, thank you. I was really excited to talk to you about this book. I was really excited to read this book. I enjoyed the heck out of it, and I think, listeners, that you would too. You should absolutely check it out as well as all the rest of Rachael's work. Links of course, as always, in the show notes, and follow Rachael in all the places. Although, to me, the best thing to do is to go and listen to the Ink in Your Veins Podcast. Because obviously, people, you're a podcast listener, you wouldn't be here. Where do you most like to be followed, Rachael?Rachael HerronAt Ink in Your Veins or on Rachaelherron.com/write, if you are a writer and want to get on the on the writing encouragement list. But I just want to thank you for doing this amazing show and for having me. I feel very, very honored to be here.KJ Dell'AntoniaWell, thank—thank you. All right. And as we say in every episode, until next week, kids, keep your butt in the chair and your head in the game.NarratorThe Hashtag AmWriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perrella. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output, because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

In this Write Big session of the #amwriting podcast, host Jennie Nash welcomes Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Jennifer Senior for a powerful conversation about finding, knowing, and claiming your voice.Jennifer shares how a medication once stripped away her ability to think in metaphor—the very heart of her writing—and what it was like to get that voice back. She and Jennie talk about how voice strengthens over time, why confidence and ruthless editing matter, and what it feels like when you're truly writing in flow.It's an inspiring reminder that your voice is your greatest strength—and worth honoring every time you sit down to write.TRANSCRIPT BELOW!THINGS MENTIONED IN THIS PODCAST:* Jennifer's Fresh Air interview with Terry Gross: Can't Sleep? You're Not Alone* Atlantic feature story: What Bobby McIlvaine Left Behind* Atlantic feature story: The Ones We Sent Away* Atlantic feature story: It's Your Friends Who Break Your Heart* The New York Times article: Happiness Won't Save You* Heavyweight the podcastSPONSORSHIP MESSAGEHey, it's Jennie Nash. And at Author Accelerator, we believe that the skills required to become a great book coach and build a successful book coaching business can be taught to people who come from all kinds of backgrounds and who bring all kinds of experiences to the work. But we also know that there are certain core characteristics that our most successful book coaches share. If you've been curious about becoming a book coach, and 2026 might be the year for you, come take our quiz to see how many of those core characteristics you have. You can find it at bookcoaches.com/characteristics-quiz.EPISODE TRANSCRIPTJennie NashHi, I'm Jennie Nash, and you're listening to the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast. This is a Write Big Session, where I'm bringing you short episodes about the mindset shifts that help you stop playing small and write like it matters. This one might not actually be that short, because today I'm talking to journalist Jennifer Senior about the idea of finding and knowing and claiming your voice—a rather big part of writing big. Jennifer Senior is a staff writer at The Atlantic. She won the Pulitzer Prize for feature writing in 2022 and was a finalist again in 2024. Before that, she spent five years at The New York Times as both a daily book critic and a columnist for the opinion page, and nearly two decades at New York Magazine. She's also the author of a bestselling parenting book, and frequently appears on NPR and other news shows. Welcome, Jennifer. Thanks for joining us.Jennifer SeniorThank you for having me. Hey, I got to clarify just one thing.Jennie NashOh, no.Jennifer SeniorAll Joy and No Fun is by no means a parenting book. I can't tell you the first thing about how to raise your kids. It is all about how kids change their parents. It's all like a sociological look at who we become and why we are—so our lives become so vexed. I like, I would do these book talks, and at the end, everybody would raise their hand and be like, “How do I get my kid into Harvard?” You know, like, the equivalent obviously—they wouldn't say it that way. I'd be like; I don't really have any idea, or how to get your kid to eat vegetables, or how to get your kid to, like, stop talking back. But anyway, I just have to clarify that, because every time...Jennie NashPlease, please—Jennifer SeniorSomeone says that, I'm like, “Noooo.” Anyway, it's a sociology book. Ah, it's an ethnography, you know. But anyway, it doesn't matter.Jennie NashAll right, like she said, you guys—not what I said.Jennifer SeniorI'm not correcting you. It came out 11 years ago. There were no iPads then, or social media. I mean, forget it. It's so dated anyway. But like, I just...Jennie NashThat's so funny. So the reason that we're speaking is that I heard you recently on Fresh Air with Terry Gross, where you were talking about an Atlantic feature story that you wrote called “Why Can't Americans Sleep?” And this was obviously a reported piece, but also a really personal piece and you're talking about your futile attempts to fall asleep and the latest research into insomnia and medication and therapy that you used to treat it, and we'll link to that article and interview in the show notes. But the reason that we're talking, and that in the middle of this conversation, which—which I'm listening to and I'm riveted by—you made this comment, and it was a little bit of a throwaway comment in the conversation, and, you know, then the conversation moved on. But you talked about how you were taking a particular antidepressant you'd been prescribed, and this was the quote you said: “It blew out all the circuitry that was responsible for generating metaphors, which is what I do as a writer. So it made my writing really flat.” And I was just like, hold up. What was that like? What happened? What—everything? So that's why we're talking. So… can we go back to the very beginning? If you can remember—Jess Lahey actually told me that when she was teaching fifth and sixth grade, that's around the time that kids begin to grasp this idea of figurative language and metaphor and such. Do you remember learning how to write like that, like write in metaphor and simile and all such things?Jennifer SeniorOh, that's funny. Do I remember it? I remember them starting to sort of come unbidden in my—like they would come unbidden in my head starting maybe in my—the minute I entered college, or maybe in my teens. Actually, I had that thing where some people have this—people who become writers have, like, a narrator's voice in their head where they're actually looking at things and describing them in the third person. They're writing them as they witness the world. That went away, that narrator's voice, which I also find sort of fascinating. But, like, I would say that it sort of emerged concurrently. I guess I was scribbling a little bit of, like, short story stuff, or I tried at least one when I was a senior in high school. So that was the first time maybe that, like, I started realizing that I had a flair for it. I also—once I noticed that, I know in college I would make, you know, when I started writing for the alternative weekly and I was reviewing things, particularly theater, I would make a conscientious effort to come up with good metaphors, and, like, 50% of them worked and 50% of them didn't, because if you ever labor over a metaphor, there's a much lower chance of it working. I mean, if you come—if you revisit it and go, oh, that's not—you know, that you can tell if it's too precious. But now if I labor over a metaphor, I don't bother. I stop. You know, it has to come instantaneously or...Jennie NashOr that reminds me of people who write with the thesaurus open, like that's going to be good, right? That's not going to work. So I want to stick with this, you know, so that they come into your head, you recognize that, and just this idea of knowing, back in the day, that you could write like that—you… this was a thing you had, like you used the word “flair,” like had a flair for this. Were there other signs or things that led you to the work, like knowing you were good, or knowing when something was on the page that it was right, like, what—what is that?Jennifer SeniorIt's that feeling of exhilaration, but it's also that feeling of total bewilderment, like you've been struck by something—something just blew through you and you had nothing to do with it. I mean, it's the cliché: here I am saying the metaphors are my superpower, which my editors were telling me, and I'm about to use a cliché, which is that you feel like you're a conduit for something and you have absolutely nothing to do with it. So I would have that sense that it had almost come without conscious thought. That was sort of when I knew it was working. It's also part of being in a flow state. It's when you're losing track of time and you're just in it. And the metaphors are—yeah, they're effortless. By the way, my brain is not entirely fogged in from long COVID, but I have noticed—and at first I didn't really notice any decrements in cognition—but recently, I have. So I'm wondering now if I'm having problems with spontaneous metaphor generation. It's a little bit disconcerting. And I do feel like all SSRIs—and I'm taking one now, just because, not just because long COVID is depressing, but because I have POTS, which is like a—it's Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome, and that's a very common sequela from long COVID, and it wipes out your plasma serotonin. So we have to take one anyway, we POTS patients. So I found that nicotine often helped with my long COVID, which is a thing—like a nicotine patch—and that made up for it. It almost felt like I was doping [laughing]. It made my writing so much better. But it's been...Jennie NashWait, wait, wait, this is so interesting.Jennifer SeniorI know…it's really weird. I would never have guessed that so much of my writing would be dampened by Big Pharma. I mean—but now with the nicotine patches, I was like, oh, now I get why writers are smoking until into the night, writing. Like, I mean, and I always wished that I did, just because it looked cool, you know? I could have just been one of those people with their Gitanes, or however you pronounce it, but, yeah.Jennie NashWow. So I want to come—I want to circle back to this in a minute, but let's get to the first time—well, it sounds like the first time that happened where you were prescribed an antidepressant and—and you recognized that you lost the ability to write in metaphor. Can you talk about—well, first of all, can you tell us what the medication was?Jennifer SeniorYeah, it was Paxil, which is actually notorious for that. And at the top—which I only subsequently discovered—those were in the days where there were no such things as Reddit threads or anything like that. It was 1999… I guess, no, eight, but so really early. That was the bespoke antidepressant at the time, thought to be more nuanced. I think it's now fallen out of favor, because it's also a b***h to wean off of. But it was kind of awful, just—I would think, and nothing would come. It was the strangest thing. For—there's all this static electricity usually when you write, right? And there's a lot of free associating that goes on that, again, feels a little involuntary. You know, you start thinking—it's like you've pulled back the spring in the pinball machine, and suddenly the thing is just bouncing around everywhere, and the ball wasn't bouncing around. Nothing was lighting up. It was like a dis… it just was strange, to be able to summon nothing.Jennie NashWow. So you—you just used this killer metaphor to describe that.Jennifer SeniorYeah, that was spontaneous.Jennie NashRight? So—so you said first, you said static, static energy, which—which is interesting.Jennifer SeniorYeah, it's... [buzzing sound]Jennie NashYeah. Yeah. Because it's noisy. You're talking about...Jennie SeniorOh, but it's not disruptive noise. Sorry, that might seem like it's like unwanted crackling, like on your television. I didn't really—yeah, maybe that's the wrong metaphor, actually, maybe the pinball is sort of better, that all you need is to, you know, psych yourself up, sit down, have your caffeine, and then bam, you know? But I didn't mean static in that way.Jennie NashI understood what you meant. There's like a buzzy energy.Jennifer SeniorYeah, right. It's fizz.Jennie NashFizz... that's so good. So you—you recognized that this was gone.Jennifer SeniorSo gone! Like the TV was off, you know?Jennie NashAnd did you...?Jennifer SeniorOr the machine, you know, was unplugged? I mean, it's—Jennie NashYeah, and did you? I'm just so curious about the part of your brain that was watching another part of your brain.Jennifer Senior[Laughing] You know what? I think... oh, that's really interesting. But are you watching, or are you just despairing because there's nothing—I mean, I'm trying to think if that's the right...Jennie NashBut there's a part of your brain that's like, this part of my brain isn't working.Jennifer SeniorRight. I'm just thinking how much metacognition is involved in— I mean, if you forget a word, are you really, like, staring at that very hard, or are you just like, s**t, what's the word? If you're staring at Jack Nicholson on TV, and you're like, why can't I remember that dude's name?Multiple speakers[Both laughing]Jennifer SeniorWhich happens to me far more regularly now, [unintelligible]… than it used to, you know? I mean, I don't know. There is a part of you that's completely alarmed, but, like, I guess you're right. There did come a point where I—you're right, where I suddenly realized, oh, there's just been a total breakdown here. It's never happening. Like, what is going on? Also, you know what would happen? Every sentence was a grind, like...Jennie NashOkay, so—okay, so...Jennifer Senior[Unintelligible]... Why is this so effortful? When you can't hold the previous sentence in your head, suddenly there's been this lapse in voice, right? Because, like, if every sentence is an effort and you're starting from nothing again, there's no continuity in how you sound. So, I mean, it was really dreadful. And by the way, if I can just say one thing, sorry now that—Jennie NashNo, I love it!Jennifer SeniorYeah. Sorry. I'm just—now you really got me going. I'm just like, yeah, I know. I'm sort of on a tear and a partial rant, which is Prozac—there came a point where, like, every single SSRI was too activating for me to sleep. But it was, of course, a problem, because being sleepless makes you depressed, so you need something to get at your depression. And SNRIs, like the Effexor's and the Cymbalta's, are out of the question, because those are known to be activating. So I kept vainly searching for SSRIs, and Prozac was the only one that didn't—that wound up not being terribly activating, besides Paxil, but it, too, was somewhat deadening, and I wrote my whole book on it.Jennie NashWow!Jennifer SeniorIt's not all metaphor.Multiple Speakers[both laughing]Jennifer SeniorIt's not all me and no—nothing memorable, you know? I mean, it's—it's kind of a problem. It was—I can't really bear to go back and look at it.Jennie NashWow.Jennie NashSo—so the feeling...Jennifer SeniorI'm really giving my book the hard sell, like it's really a B plus in terms of its pro…—I mean, you know, it wasn't.Jennie NashSo you—you—you recognize its happening, and what you recognize is a lack of fizzy, buzzy energy and a lack of flow. So I just have to ask now, presumably—well, there's long COVID now, but when you don't have—when you're writing in your full powers, do you—is it always in a state of flow? Like, if you're not in a state of flow, do you get up and go do something else? Like, what—how does that function in the life of a writer on a deadline?Jennifer SeniorOK. Well, am I always in a state of flow? No! I mean, flow is not—I don't know anyone who's good at something who just immediately can be in flow every time.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorIt's still magic when it happens. You know, when I was in flow almost out of the gate every day—the McIlvaine stories—like, I knew when I hit send, this thing is damn good. I knew when I hit send on a piece that was not as well read, but is like my second or third favorite story. I wrote something for The New York Times called “Happiness Wont Save You,” about a pioneer in—he wrote one of the foundational studies in positive psychology about lottery winners and paraplegics, and how lottery winners are pretty much no happier than random controls found in a phone book, and paraplegics are much less unhappy than you might think, compared to controls. It was really poorly designed. It would never withstand the scrutiny of peer review today. But anyway, this guy was, like, a very innovative thinker. His name was Philip Brickman, and in 1982 at 38 years old, he climbed—he got—went—he found his way to the roof of the tallest building in Ann Arbor and jumped, and took his own life. And I was in flow pretty much throughout writing that one too.Jennie NashWow. So the piece you're referring to, that you referred to previous to that, is What Bobby McIlvaine Left Behind, which was a feature story in The Atlantic. It's the one you won the—Pul…Pulitzer for? It's now made into a book. It has, like...Jennifer SeniorAlthough all it is like, you know, the story between...Jennie NashCovers, right?Jennifer SeniorYeah. Yeah. Because—yeah, yeah.Jennie NashBut—Jennifer SeniorWhich is great, because then people can have it, rather than look at it online, which—and it goes on forever—so yeah.Jennie NashSo this is a piece—the subtitle is Grief, Conspiracy Theories, and One Family's Search for Meaning in the Two Decades Since 9/11—and I actually pulled a couple of metaphors from that piece, because I re-read it knowing I was going to speak to you… and I mean, it was just so beautifully written. It's—it's so beautifully structured, everything, everything. But here's a couple of examples for our listeners. You're describing Bobby, who was a 26-year-old who died in 9/11, who was your brother's college roommate.Jennifer SeniorAnd at that young adult—they—you can't afford New York. They were living together for eight years. It was four in college, and four—Jennie NashWow.Jennifer SeniorIn New York City. They had a two-bedroom... yeah, in a cheaper part... well, to the extent that there are cheaper parts in...Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorThe way over near York Avenue, east side, yeah.Jennie NashSo you write, “When he smiled, it looked for all the world like he'd swallowed the moon.” And you wrote, “But for all Bobby's hunger and swagger, what he mainly exuded, even during his college years, was warmth, decency, a corkscrew quirkiness.” So just that kind of language—a corkscrew quirkiness, like he'd swallowed the moon—that, it's that the piece is full of that. So that's interesting, that you felt in flow with this other piece you described and this one. So how would you describe—so you describe metaphors as things that just come—it just—it just happens. You're not forcing it—you can't force it. Do you think that's true of whatever this ineffable thing of voice—voices—as well?Jennifer SeniorOh, that's a good question. My voice got more distinct as I got older—it gets better. I think a lot of people's—writers'—powers wax. Philip Roth is a great example of that. Colette? I mean, there are people whose powers really get better and better, and I've gotten better with more experience. But do you start with the voice? I think you do. I don't know if you can teach someone a voice.Jennie NashSo when you say you've gotten better, what does that mean to you?Jennifer SeniorYeah. Um, I'm trying to think, like, do I write with more swing? Do I—just with more confidence because I'm older? Being a columnist…which is the least creative medium…Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorSeven hundred and fifty words to fit onto—I had a dedicated space in print. When David Leonhardt left, I took over the Monday spot, during COVID. So it's really, really—but what it forces you to do is to be very—your writing becomes lean, and it becomes—and structure is everything. So this does not relate to voice, but my—I was always pretty good at structure anyway. I think if you—I think movies and radio, podcasts, are, like, great for structure. Storytelling podcasts are the best thing to—I think I unconsciously emulate them. The McIlvaine story has a three-act structure. There's also—I think the podcast Heavyweight is sublime in that way.Jennie NashIs that Roxane Gay?Jennifer SeniorNo, no, no, no.Jennie NashOh, it's, um—Jennifer SeniorIt's Jonathan Goldstein.Jennie NashYes, got it. I'm going to write that down and link to that in our show notes.Jennifer SeniorIt's... I'm trying to think of—because, you know, his is, like, narratives, and it's—it's got a very unusual premise. But voice, voice, voice—well, I, you know, I worked on making my metaphors better in the beginning. I worked on noticing things, you know, and I worked on—I have the—I'm the least visual person alive. I mean, this is what's so interesting. Like, I failed to notice once that I had sat for an hour and a half with a woman who was missing an arm. I mean, I came back to the office and was talking—this is Barbara Epstein, who was a storied editor of The New York Review of Books, the story editor, along with Bob Silver. And I was talking to Mike Tomasky, who was our, like, city politic editor at the time. And I said to him, I just had this one—I knew she knew her. And he said, was it awkward? Was—you know, with her having one arm and everything? And I just stared at him and went one arm? I—I am really oblivious to stuff. And yet visual metaphors are no problem with me. Riddle me that, Batman. I don't know why that is. But I can, like, summon them in my head, and so I worked at it for a while, when my editors were responsive to it. Now they come more easily, so that seems to maybe just be a facility. I started noticing them in other people's writing. So Michael Ondaatje —in, I think it was In the Skin of a Lion, but maybe it was The English Patient. I've read, like, every book of his, like I've, you know— Running… was it Running in the Family? Running with the Family? I think it was Running in the—his memoir. And, I mean, doesn't—everything. Anil's Ghost—he— you know, that was it The Ballad of Billy the Kid? [The Collected Works of Billy the Kid] Anyway, I can go on and on. He had one metaphor talking about the evening being as serene as ink. And it was then that I realized that metaphors without effort often—and—or is that a simile? That's a simile.Jennie NashLike—or if it's “like” or “as,” it's a simile.Jennifer SeniorYeah. So I'm pretty good with similes, maybe more than metaphors. But... serene as ink. I realized that what made that work is that ink is one syllable. There is something about landing on a word with one syllable that sounds like you did not work particularly hard at it. You just look at it and keep going. And I know that I made a real effort to make my metaphors do that for a while, and I still do sometimes. Anything more than that can seem labored.Jennie NashOh, but that's so interesting. So you—you noticed in other people what worked and what you liked, and then tried to fold that into your own work.Jennifer SeniorYeah.Jennie NashSo does that mean you might noodle on—like, you have the structure of the metaphor or simile, but you might noodle on the word—Jennifer SeniorThe final word?Jennie NashThe final word.Jennifer SeniorYeah. Yeah, the actual simile, or whatever—yeah, I guess it's a simile—yeah, sometimes. Sometimes they—like I said, they come unbidden. I think I have enough experience now—which may make my voice better—to know what's crap. And I also, by the way, I'll tell you what makes your voice better: just being very willing to hit Select Alt, Delete. You know, there's more where that came from. I am a monster of self-editing. I just—I have no problem doing it. I like to do it. I like to be told when things are s**t. I think that improves your voice, because you can see it on the page.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorAnd also, I think paying attention to other people's writing, you know, I did more and more of that, you know, reverse engineering stuff, looking at how they did stuff as I got older, so...Jennie NashSo I was going to ask a question, which now maybe you already answered, but the question was going to be… you said that you're—you feel like you're getting better as a writer as you got older. And you—you said that was due to experience. And I was going to ask, is it, or is it due to getting older? You know, is there something about literally living more years that makes you better, or, you know, like, is wisdom something that you just get, or is it something you work for? But I think what I'm hearing is you're saying you have worked to become the kind of writer who knows, you know, what you just said—you delete stuff, it comes again. But tell me if—you know, you welcome the kind of tough feedback, because you know that makes you better. You know, this sort of real effort to become better, it sounds like that's a practice you have. Is that—is that right?Jennifer SeniorOh yeah. I mean, well, let's do two things on that, please. I so easily lose my juju these days that, like, you've got to—if you can put a, you know, oh God, I'm going to use a cliché again—if you can put a pin in or bookmark that, the observation about, you know, harsh feedback. I want to come back to that. But yes, one of the things that I was going to keep—when I said that I have the confidence now, I also was going to say that I have the wisdom, but I had too many kind of competing—Jennie NashYeah. Yeah.Jennifer SeniorYou know, were running at once, and I, you know, many trains on many tracks—Jennie NashYeah, yeah.Jennifer Senior…about to leave, so…, Like, I had to sort of hop on one. But, like, the—the confidence and wisdom, yes, and also, like, I'll tell you something: in the McIlvaine piece, it may have been the first time I did, like, a narrative nonfiction. I told a story. There was a time when I would have hid behind research on that one.Jennie NashOoh, and did you tell a story. It was the—I remember reading that piece when it first came out, and there you're introducing, you know, this—the situation. And then there's a moment, and it comes very quickly at the top of the piece, where you explain your relationship to the protagonist of the story. And there's a—there's just a moment of like, oh, we're—we're really in something different here. There's really—is that feel of, this is not a reported story, this is a lived story, and that there's so many layers of power, I mean, to the story itself, but obviously the way that you—you present it, so I know exactly what you're talking about.Jennifer SeniorYeah, and by the way, I think writing in the first person, which I've been doing a lot of lately, is not something I would have done until now. Probably because I am older and I feel like I've earned it. I have more to say. I've been through more stuff. It's not, like, with the same kind of narcissism or adolescent—like, I want to get this out, you know. It's more searching, I think, and because I've seen more, and also because I've had these pent up stories that I've wanted to tell for a long time. And also I just don't think I would have had the balls, you know.Jennie NashRight.Jennifer SeniorSo some of it is—and I think that that's part of—you can write better in your own voice. If it's you writing about you, you're—there's no better authority, you know? So your voice comes out.Jennie NashRight.Jennifer SeniorBut I'm trying to think of also—I would have hid behind research and talked about theories of grief. And when I wrote, “It's the damnedest thing, the dead abandon you, and then you abandon the dead,” I had blurted that out loud when I was talking to, actually, not Bobby's brother, which is the context in which I wrote it, but to Bobby's—I said that, it's, like, right there on the tape—to his former almost fiancée. And I was thinking about that line, that I let it stand. I didn't actually then rush off and see if there was a body of literature that talked about the guilt that the living feel about letting go of their memories. But I would have done that at one point. I would have turned it into this... because I was too afraid to just let my own observations stand. But you get older and you're like, you know what? I'm smart enough to just let that be mine. Like, assume...Jennie NashRight.Jennifer SeniorIt's got to be right. But can we go back, also, before I forget?Jennie NashYeah, we're going to go back to harsh, but—but I would just want to use your cliché, put a pin in what you said, because you've said so many important things— that there's actual practice of getting better, and then there's also wisdom of—of just owning, growing into, embracing, which are two different things, both so important. So I just wanted to highlight that you've gone through those two things. So yes, let's go back to—I said harsh, and maybe I miss—can...misrepresenting what you meant.Jennifer SeniorYou may not have said that. I don't know what you said.Jennie NashNo, I did, I did.Jennifer SeniorYou did, okay, yeah, because I just know that it was processed as a harsh—oh no, totally. Like, I was going to say to you that—so there was a part of my book, my book, eventually, I just gave one chapter to each person in my life whom I thought could, like, assess it best, and one of them, so this friend—I did it on paper. He circled three paragraphs, and he wrote, and I quote, “Is this just a shitty way of saying...?” And then I was like, thank God someone caught it, if it was shitty. Oh my God. And then—and I was totally old enough to handle it, you know, I was like 44, whatever, 43. And then, who was it? Someone else—oh, I think I gave my husband the intro, and he wrote—he circled a paragraph and just wrote, “Ugh.” Okay, Select Alt, Delete, redo. You know, like, what are you going to do with that? That's so unambiguous. It's like, you know—and also, I mean, when you're younger, you argue. When you're older, you never quarrel with Ugh. Or Is this...Jennie NashRight, you're just like, okay, yep.Jennifer SeniorYeah. And again, you—you've done it enough that, you know, there's so much more where that came from.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorWhy cling to anything that someone just, I don't know, had this totally allergic reaction to? Like, you know, if my husband broke out in a hive.Jennie NashYeah. So, circling back to the—the storyline of—you took this medication, you lost your ability to write in this way, you changed medications, presumably, you got it back. What did it feel like to get it back? Did you—do you remember that?Jennifer SeniorOh God, yes, it was glorious.Jennie NashReally?!Jennifer SeniorOh, you don't feel like yourself. I think that—I mean, I think there are many professions that are intertwined with identity. They may be the more professional—I'm sorry, the more creative professions. But not always, you know. And so if your writing voice is gone, and it's—I mean, so much of writing is an expression of your interior, if not life, then, I don't know some kind of thought process and something that you're working out. To have that drained out of you, for someone to just decant all the life out of your—or something to decant all the life out of your writing, it's—it's, I wouldn't say it's traumatic, that's totally overstating it, but it's—it's a huge bummer. It's, you know, it's depressing.Jennie NashWell, the word glorious, that's so cool. So to feel that you got back your—the you-ness of your voice was—was glorious. I mean, that's—that's amazing.Jennifer SeniorWhat—if I can just say, I wrote a feature, right, that then, like, I remember coming off of it, and then I wrote a feature that won the News Women's Club of New York story for best feature that year. Like, I didn't realize that those are kind of hard to win, and not like I won... I think I've won one since. But, like, that was in, like, 99 or something. I mean, like, you know, I don't write a whole lot of things that win stuff, until recently, you know. There was, like, a real kind of blackout period where, you know, I mean, but like—which I think, it probably didn't have to do with the quality of my writing. I mean, there was—but, I mean, you know, I wasn't writing any of the stuff that floated to the tippy top, and, like, I think that there was some kind of explosion thereof, like, all the, again, stuff that was just desperate to come out. I think there was just this volcanic outpouring.Jennie NashSo you're saying now you are winning things, which is indeed true. I mean, Pulitzer Prizes among them. Do you think that that has to do with this getting better? The wisdom, the practice, the glorious having of your abilities? Or, I guess what I'm asking is, like, is luck a part of—a part of all that? Is it just, it just happens? Or do you think there's some reason that it's happening? You feel that your writing is that powerful now?Jennifer SeniorWell, luck is definitely a part of it, because The Atlantic is the greatest place to showcase your feature writing. It gets so much attention, even though I think fewer people probably read that piece about Bobby McIlvaine than would have read any of my columns on any given day. The kind of attention was just so different. And it makes sense in a funny way, because it was 13,600 words or something. I mean, it was so long, and columns are 750 words. But, like, I think that I just lucked out in terms of the showcase. So that's definitely a part of it. And The Atlantic has the machinery to, you know, and all these dedicated, wonderful publicity people who will make it possible for people to read it, blah, blah, blah. So there's that. If you're older, you know everyone in the business, so you have people amplifying your work, they're suddenly reading it and saying, hey, everybody read it. It was before Twitter turned to garbage. Media was still a way to amplify it. It's much harder now, so passing things along through social media has become a real problem. But at that moment, it was not—Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorSo that was totally luck. Also, I wonder if it was because I was suddenly writing something from in the first person, and my voice was just better that way. And I wouldn't have had, like, the courage, you know?Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorAnd also, you're a book critic, which is what I was at The Times. And you certainly are not writing from the first person. And as a columnist, you're not either.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorSo, you know, those are very kind of constricted forms, and they're also not—there are certainly critics who win Pulitzers. I don't think I was good enough at it. I was good, but it was not good enough. I could name off the top of my head, like, so many critics who were—who are—who haven't even won anything yet. Like Dwight Garner really deserves one. Why has he not won a Pulitzer? He's, I think, the best writer—him and Sophie Gilbert, who keeps coming close. I don't get it, like, what the hell?Jennie NashDo you—as a—as a reader of other people's work, I know you—you mentioned Michael Ondaatje that you'd studied—study him. But do you just recognize when somebody else is on their game? Like, do you recognize the voice or the gloriousness of somebody else's work? Can you just be like, yeah, that...?Jennifer SeniorWell, Philip Roth, sentence for sentence. Martin Amis, even more so—I cannot get over the originality of each of his sentences and the wide vocabulary from which he recruits his words, and, like, maybe some of that is just being English. I think they just get better, kind of more comprehensive. They read more comprehensively. And I always tell people, if they want to improve their voice, they should read the Victorians, like that [unintelligible]. His also facility with metaphor, I don't think, is without equal. The thing is, I can't stand his fiction. I just find it repellent. But his criticism is bangers and his memoirs are great, so I love them.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorSo I really—I read him very attentively, trying to think of, like, other people whose kind of...Jennie NashI guess I was—I was getting at more... like, genius recognizes genius, that con... that concept, like, when you know you can do this and write in this way from time to time anyway, you can pull it off.Jennifer SeniorYeah, genius as in—I wouldn't—we can't go there.Jennie NashWell, that's the—that's the cliché, right? But, like...Jennifer SeniorOh no, I know, I know. Game—game, game recognizes game.Jennie NashGame recognizes game is a better way of saying it. Like, do you see—that's actually what the phrase is. I don't know where I came up with genius, but...Jennifer SeniorNo, it's fine. You can stick anything in that template, you know—evil recognizes evil, I mean, you know, it's like a...Jennie NashYeah. Do you see it? Do you see it? Like, you can see it in other people?Jennifer SeniorSure. Oh yeah, I see it.Jennie NashYeah.Jennifer SeniorI mean, you're just talking about among my contemporaries, or just as it...Jennie NashJust like anything, like when you pick up a book or you read an article or even listen to a storytelling pack podcast, that sense of being in the hands of somebody who's on it.Jennifer SeniorYeah, I think that Jonathan Goldstein—I mean, I think that the—the Heavyweight Podcast, for sure, is something—and more than that, it's—it's storytelling structure, it's just that—I think that anybody who's a master at structure would just look at that show and be like, yeah, that show nails it each and every time.Jennie NashI've not listened, but I feel like I should end our time together. I would talk to you forever about this, but I always like to leave our listeners with something specific to reflect or practice or do. And is there anything related to metaphor or practicing, finding your voice, owning your voice, that you would suggest for—for folks? You've already suggested a lot.Jennifer SeniorRead the Victorians.Jennie NashAwesome. Any particular one that you would say start with?Jennifer SeniorYeah, you know what? I find Dickens rough sledding. I like his, you know, dear friend Wilkie Collins. I think No Name is one of the greatest books ever. I would read No Name.Jennie NashAmazing. And I will add, go read Jennifer's work. We'll link to a bunch of it in the show notes. Study her and—and watch what she does and learn what she does—that there it is, a master at work, and that's what I would suggest. So thank you for joining us and having this amazing discussion.Jennifer SeniorThis has been super fun.Jennie NashAnd for our listeners, until next time, stop playing small and write like it matters.NarratorThe Hashtag AmWriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perrella. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output, because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

In this Write Big session, Jenny Nash shares a story from her business mastermind about what it looks like to “play big.” From asking for help to boldly joining the conversation, Jenny shows how these small but brave moves apply directly to the writing life—and why writers need to see themselves as entrepreneurs. A quick dose of inspiration to stop playing small and write like it matters!SPONSORSHIP MESSAGEAre you staring down a holiday shopping list with a haunted look in your eyes? My great big guide to holiday under-the-radar book-giving perfection can help. Maybe you think not everyone in your life wants a book, but honestly, they are just wrong. I've got a book on my list for the therapy-speak-loving teen who's glued to TikTok, a book for your mom whose book club just forced her to read Emily Henry and just wants a protagonist with a little seasoning. One for your dad, who thinks TV hasn't been the same since The X-Files. And a few for your book-loving bestie, who's read everything already, and all you have to do to get the list to drop right into your phone for your shopping pleasure is join my newsletter, Hashtag AmReading, at kjda.substack.com—link in the show notes and pretty much anywhere where you can find me, which is easy.EPISODE TRANSCRIPTJennie NashHi, I'm Jennie Nash, and you're listening to the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast. This is a Write Big Session where I'm bringing you short episodes about the mindset shifts that help you stop playing small and write like it matters. Today I want to share with you a specific example of what writing big could look like for you. Something happened to me in my business mastermind that was so cool. This is a mastermind that meets every week, and its business people who are running businesses just like mine. You submit questions about challenges you're facing in your business, or decisions you have, or mindset shifts you need to make, and we get coached. And there's also a lot of activity in the chat. Oftentimes, people are chiming in with things that they've tried or opinions or cheering people on or lifting people up. It's a very engaged and active chat.This is actually my second year in the mastermind, and I happen to be one of the people that a lot of other people look up to. This morning, in the middle of a conversation, somebody admitted that they had been studying my funnel and stalking my offers to see how I was doing what I was doing and to try to emulate it. She then said something along the lines of how she was obsessed with what I was doing and wanted to know how I made it happen. So this, to me, is a moment of playing big, because she's new to the mastermind, and she's looking up to me, and yet she was willing to make that comment and engage with me in that way, and she didn't ask for anything specifically. She just commented that she admired what I was doing and was studying what I was doing. And so it gave me the perfect opportunity to say, would you like to get together offline — meaning, in a separate call from the mastermind some other day — and I'll show you inside my funnel, and I'll show you what I'm doing. I'm happy to help show you the architecture of the whole thing. And she, of course, was thrilled and accepted. And in my mind, even as she was doing it, I thought, this is exactly the way that you ask for help.She didn't come after me and say, will you teach me all your tricks? She didn't even assume that I would answer any question in particular at all. She just made a comment and engaged with me in a very kind and thoughtful way and allowed me to make that offer. So I thought that was really cool. But then a second thing happened that amplified that moment, and I thought that was really cool too, which is that a third person saw this chat going on between us and jumped into our thread there and said, I would really like to join that call if it's okay with the two of you. And again, this was such a bold move. So many of us would think, oh, I don't want to horn in on their thing, or oh, maybe that's piling on too much, or oh, I shouldn't take up that much space, or be that forward, or whatever we might tell ourselves. And this person just very kindly— think she actually used the phrase; can I crash your party?—so she did it with a sense of humor and self-awareness.And again, it allowed me and this other woman to say, of course, that would be amazing, no problem, let's do it. And so the three of us made a plan to get together and do this work separately. Now it's not just totally altruistic on my part. I love business models, and I love learning from other business people, so getting to see what they're doing and inside their structures and thought processes is really useful for me as well. So you may be sitting here thinking, what on earth does this have to do with writing? And it has everything to do with writing, because every single one of us who are writing things are also entrepreneurs. And this term gets thrown around a lot — the author entrepreneur — or, you know, you're starting a business, or whatever the words that people use are, but I don't think writers take it seriously enough.This idea that writing a book is launching a business—you are making a product, and you want people to buy that product. And I think more writers need to think of it like that, because nobody would launch a business with a product and not expect to invest in it and not expect to spend a lot of time, effort, energy, and money to bring that product to market. So often, writers think all we have to do is write the book, and our work here is done. We think that marketing is not our job, sales is not our job, thinking about the business is not our job, but it absolutely is our job. You absolutely have to learn how to think like an entrepreneur.And so the lesson here for writers is, make sure that you're part of communities where people are doing the work that you want to be doing around your book. That could be people who are doing things on TikTok or YouTube or Instagram or have really cool newsletters on Substack that you follow, but you want to get into communities where people are taking action and making moves, so that you can study what they're doing, follow what they're doing, maybe engage with them if there's a particular situation in which that engagement is welcome, and then you need to put yourself out there and ask for help and ask for coaching and ask for guidance.The thing about the business mastermind that I'm in is that it's very expensive. People have committed a lot of money to it, and I think when people commit money, the energy follows. So people in this group are very engaged. They show up for the calls all the time. It is not a random group of strangers. And so there's a sense inside the container that we're all trying to do the same thing—we're all trying to reach the same levels of success, we are all kind of in it together—and that's a huge part of the reason why I was able to make this offer to these other people, because they're not just random strangers coming at me from social media. I get those kinds of requests all day long. People who want to pick my brain—they literally say that—people who want answers to questions that really they shouldn't ask, who make audacious asks about things. This is different because we're all in a container together.So if you're thinking, I want that kind of mentorship, I want that kind of camaraderie, I want that kind of engagement so that when my book comes out, I will have a plan and a strategy and support in place to get it out into readers' hands. And it may be that you have to find a community to invest in, or it may be that you have to invest your time in a way that you haven't yet been investing—but playing big means putting yourself in the right spaces where you can ask these kinds of questions, make these kinds of connections with people, and ask for help. There were so many playing big moves in what went on this morning, and I just loved seeing it, and I loved being part of it, and I wanted to share that all with you in hopes that it might be inspiring. Until next time, stop playing small and write like it matters.NarratorThe Hashtag AmWriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perrella. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output, because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

Hi all! In honor of Thanksgiving, we decided to share what we're doing to get MORE of what we're grateful for in our writing lives—as in, try not just to give a nod to gratitude but actually increase the things we do to feel it. Enjoy! Are you staring down a holiday shopping list with a haunted look in your eyes? My great big guide to holiday under-the-radar book-giving perfection can help. Maybe you think not everyone in your life wants a book, but honestly, they are just wrong. I've got a book on my list for the therapy-speak-loving teen who's glued to TikTok, a book for your mom whose book club just forced her to read Emily Henry and just wants a protagonist with a little seasoning. One for your dad, who thinks TV hasn't been the same since The X-Files. And a few for your book-loving bestie, who's read everything already, and all you have to do to get the list to drop right into your phone for your shopping pleasure is join my newsletter, Hashtag AmReading, at kjda.substack.com—link in the show notes and pretty much anywhere where you can find me, which is easy.EPISODE TRANSCRIPTMultiple SpeakersIs it recording? Now it's recording, yay. Go ahead. This is the part where I stare blankly at the microphone. I don't remember what I'm supposed to be doing. All right, let's start over. Awkward pause. I'm going to rustle some papers. Okay, now—one, two, three.KJ Dell'AntoniaHey kids, it's KJ, and this is the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast, the place where we help you play big in your writing life, love the process, and finish what matters.Jess LaheyI'm Jess Lahey. I am the author of The Gift of Failure and The Addiction Inoculation, and you can find my work at The New York Times and The Washington Post and The Atlantic.Sarina BowenAnd I'm Sarina Bowen. My newest novel is called Thrown for a Loop, and you can find it at bookstores everywhere.Jennie NashAnd I'm Jennie Nash. I'm the founder and CEO of Author Accelerator, a company on a mission to lead the emerging book coaching industry. And I'm the author of the Blueprint books that help you get your book out of your head and onto your page. And today, the four of us have gathered to talk about gratitude. It's the week of Thanksgiving, and we've been thinking about the things that we're grateful for in our writing life, and how we want to celebrate that and amplify that. So we thought we'd share that all with you today. KJ, do you want to start by talking about what you're grateful for?KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah, I actually managed to give this some thoughts. Since we did, we did talk about it. And I should say we kind of got the idea from Laura Vanderkam's newsletter, which is really great, and you should subscribe. She was just talking about how, you know, it's one thing to be grateful for things like, “Whoo, I'm grateful that I live in such a beautiful place,” but it's another thing to say, “And because I'm grateful that I live in such a beautiful place, this week I will make a point of going for a walk, you know, tonight with my dog, in a place that I love,” or something along that. Her point was: come up with something and then actually do something to amplify that for yourself. So you're not just sitting around, you know, writing a gratitude journal. You're actually trying to do something about it. So having announced that I am totally prepared for this—I'm not really, but I kind of am. Okay. So one of the things that I am grateful for this year, a little weirdly, is AI, and it is not for the reasons anyone might think. I'm primarily grateful—I'm grateful that the spurt of AI in everything that I read, from Goodreads book reviews to things in my inbox to, I'm sorry, actual articles in actual newspapers… it's become so recognizable. The stuff that is written, the pattern, the three examples, the particular words that are invariably used. Oh, somebody threw one out the other night—oh, in the real estate world, if it says something is “nestled between two things,” that's AI. Anyway, that made me realize that the last thing I want is something else to do any of this for me. I just don't. I just, you know, sometimes you sit around going, “Oh, somebody just write this book for me—” you know what? No. No. Because I don't want my book to be nestled between a rock and a hard place or whatever. So, so no. So what I'm doing to sort of bring that home for myself is I'm actually trying to be more present, in particular within the AmWriting—the AmWriting universe. So I've been doing something that I'm calling Hashtag AmWriting ‘Almost' Every Day. It's really nowhere close to every day. Don't worry about getting your inbox full. But I am—you know, that's actually me. If I have time and something to say, or something to whine, or some write-alongs to share, or an idea, then I'm going to put that out there for y'all. And hopefully you're going to comment back, and you probably won't bother to use AI to do that, because that would be really silly. So that's a thing I'm doing, and a thing that I'm grateful that I've suddenly come to the realization of.Jess LaheyWhat's funny, KJ, is that I can absolutely tell when you're really enjoying writing, because it—it just comes through, as it does with most people. But it's been… your newsletters have been really fun, and you're really in it. And I love reading them. I absolutely love reading them.Jennie NashIt gets a little sassy.KJ Dell'AntoniaThanks!Jess LaheyShe does. She does get a little sassy.Jennie NashI love it.Jess LaheyYep, the Shirley Jackson comes out in her, and it's really fun. I like that a lot.Jennie NashJess, do you want to go next?Jess LaheyYeah. Sure. So newsletters have come to mean a lot to me. I have a lot of drafts sitting there, some of which I don't think—I may never publish. But I'm really, really grateful that writing has, for my entire life, been the way that I process what I'm thinking about. I do it a lot by talking, but when I'm alone in the woods, like I am right now in Vermont, writing is how I figure things out, and I'm so grateful for that, because, you know, as I wrote about in my newsletter, I'm dealing with breast cancer, and I'm about to have surgery, and some of that stuff is really, really scary. And how I think about it, and how I manage it, is through writing about it. And I'm just—I've never been so grateful to have, even if it never goes out into the world, a place to write about that stuff. And, and, yeah, I'm so grateful for the words. Absolutely.Jennie NashThat's so beautiful, that in the scariest, most difficult time, it's the most natural thing that you turn to.Jess LaheyYeah, I think there are some people who pour themselves out in watercolors, or some people—whatever. The words, man, they're the best.Jennie NashVery cool. Sarina, what about you?Sarina BowenYeah, well, as always, my gratitude runs toward the granular and the practical. I guess I can't ever get away from that. So I am grateful to deadlines. Last month, I had a really difficult deadline. I had to scramble and set everything else aside and keep myself from panicking. And I did it. I actually—I turned it in, and then I immediately went on a book tour for a different book. So that was a difficult experience and a difficult month, and I'm not used to quite so much deadline pressure. But the wonderful thing is, is that I have these deadlines because of the work that I have placed with publishers, and I wouldn't want to change a single thing about that. So even if I need to get a little better about my timing, I recognize that—even in the darkest day—that it's a gift to have this problem. And then I'm also grateful for coffee shops, because that has been a place for me to work this year. And I never did this before. I was one of those people who had to be at home, in a room all by myself, in the quiet, writing. And suddenly that became really difficult for me. The quiet was too much quiet. There was too much doom scroll, there was too much self-reflection. And it really started the day after the election, actually. Like, I sort of ordered KJ to meet me out at a coffee shop because I needed to be where other people were. And it was really grounding—like, there we were, and the barista is a familiar face, and everything was fine inside that shop, you know, which was, in itself, a little bubble of privilege. But, but just being out in the world, seeing the rest of the world keep chugging, has really focused me. And I've spent a lot of time in a lot of different coffee shop and library settings in the intervening couple of months—and, well, almost a year now—and it's felt fantastic. So I am excited that there are places where I'm allowed to go pay way too much for a cup of coffee and then sit there for two hours, and I will continue to do it.Jess LaheyCan I add a layer to the Sarina—to the Sarina stuff? Because I got to go to, as some of the other people talking today did, got to go to one of Sarina's events. And, you know, we love Sarina, and we just rave about Sarina, and I think she's a genius, and I think her writing is wonderful. But I was in a room of people who knew her work. Like, at one point, someone asked about whether or not she was going to be writing more in, like, The Company Series, which is one of the series she started to write. And there are a couple books—in that one. And then when she's like, “Oh, I don't—I think the time for that is over,” and people were like, “Awww,” and they were sad, and they knew characters really well. There was a die-hard fan of one of her books—I think it was Stay. And I just—I'm so grateful to be able to go to those events and see that other people love Sarina as much and respect Sarina's work as much as I do. And my whole family was there. So my kid, who's been hearing about, you know, my friend who wrote—writes “kiss me” books, he was like, “Man, people are into her books.” And I'm like, “Yeah, I told you. I've been trying to tell you.” And it was great. It was really fun to see people that into it.Sarina BowenWell, the thing is that romance readers really are special. I'm not saying there aren't—there aren't fandoms in other genres as well. But it's something about a romance novel involves characters that aren't afraid to say how they feel, and that is how romance readers are about the books. They are not afraid to say what they feel, and they are there for all the feelings in the first place. And it is really a great spot to be. So for every writer who ever looked down at the romance section of the bookstore, I got news for you. It's really nice over there.Jess LaheyIt's great. The people were so great.Jennie NashAnd we have gratitude for the romance—the romance readers too.Jess LaheyYeah.Jennie NashI love all of your—your gratitude's. Mine is—I guess I would say that I am grateful for having the identity of a writer as a thing that I take with me wherever I go. And what I mean by that is I have been traveling to see family, and there were airplane troubles, lots of different airplane troubles, actually, on this particular trip, and lots of delays, overnight delays, sitting in airports for long periods of time, all of that, and I am never sad about those things. I'm almost never at a total loss. Like, you tell me that I have to spend six hours at the San Francisco airport, and I'm fine, because I can fill the time—not just, not just fill it like, “Oh, I can get through this,” but I can actually have really productive, useful, awesome time for six hours in the San Francisco airport. And if I have to spend a night at a terrible airport hotel, and, you know, just all the things—and I was so grateful when I thought about it in that way, that here's a thing that I can take with me wherever I go, that all I need is something to write on. Could be my phone. It could be a piece of airport hotel notepad and paper. It could even be a torn-out page of a magazine that I bought at the airport. And I—I can be somebody. I can be somebody doing something that I find interesting and good and useful. And I just am so grateful for that. What an amazing thing to be. And obviously holiday travel is a special kind of thing, but just the thought that—that that comes with me, no matter where I go or what I do or what happens in my life—I have that, and I'm very grateful for that. So I don't know, KJ, in terms of how am I going to bring that forward or exercise it or do it? I guess—I guess I've got to hope for smoother travels.KJ Dell'AntoniaYou should just get stuck in more airports, but you don't want to get stuck in more airports? I feel like that should be your goal now.Jennie NashI guess if you take it to a very granular, practical level, like Sarina does—always have a notebook with you, man. That's what I got to say, and a working writing implement. It saves the day.Jess LaheyAnd then you text the word “sticker” to the rest of us, and we know, “Oh, man, those travel stickers—those are worth double stickers.” We always say that travel stickers are double stickers.Jennie NashIt's so true. It's so true. Well, we just wanted to pop in here today to share this gratitude episode with you all and to give you some things to think about, about your writing life and your writing practice. And we hope that everyone is having a day filled with gratitude. KJ, do you want to say other things?KJ Dell'AntoniaI wanted to say that I think we're all grateful for the way this community is slowly but steadily growing. I've been doing Write-Alongs with a bunch of people lately. We've been seeing people in the actual Substack chat, which, if you…Jess LaheyThe chat is fun.KJ Dell'AntoniaUse Substack chat, that's great. And you know—you know what it is, and if you don't, that's fine. You can totally hit the same results by talking to us in the comments, which is the same as comments on anything. I just—I just really like sort of seeing the same people and faces pop up over and over again, and feeling the same kind of “less alone” about this that I used to feel back in the early days of blogging. I don't know about the rest of you, but I have pretty much, you know—I'll put a thing on Instagram, and then I'm out of there because, again, it's—there's, there's so much slop now. I'm not really doing a lot of other things. But I am here, and there are other people here, and I think that's so fun.Jennie NashIt's really fun. And we will continue to be here with—with lots of offerings, from Nerd Corner episodes to Write Big episodes to KJ Writing Along episodes, and we're in the chat to help and answer questions, and we have other things up our sleeves too. So keep tuning in.KJ Dell'AntoniaYeah. All right.Jess LaheyAll right, everyone until next time around, keep your butt in the chair and your head in the game.NarratorThe Hashtag AmWriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perrella. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output, because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

Jenny Nash builds on her conversation with Mary Laura Philpott to highlight a crucial truth: writing for yourself and writing for readers are two very different things—and they need to happen at the same time. Start from passion, but bring market intention in early, because it shapes everything from structure to genre to how your book will sell. Define your goals up front, so you're not left frustrated later.Transcript Below!SPONSORSHIP MESSAGEHey, it's Jennie Nash, and I wanted to remind you that while you're shopping all the sales this week, think about investing in your writing. Author Accelerator book coaches are offering a Black Friday special for writers who are ready to move forward on their books. It's called the Mini Blueprint Strategy Session, and you get a focused one-on-one experience that helps you see what's working in your manuscript and what to do next. Eighty-six of our certified book coaches are offering this special for a limited time. You can go to authoraccelerator.com/black-friday to check it out.EPISODE TRANSCRIPTHi, I'm Jennie Nash and you're listening to the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast. This is a Write Big Session—a short episode about the mindset shifts that help you stop playing small and write like it matters.Today I wanted to do a second episode about some of the things that Mary Laura Philpott shared in our last episode. I thought that conversation was just rich with incredible meaning, and something she said has really stuck with me—that I want to amplify here today.And it's this idea about the difference between what you want to write for your own self—and writing for readers in the marketplace. Mary Laura articulated so well that these are two really separate parts of the process. You have to write what you want to write from your heart. You have to bring your heart and your soul to your work—because first of all, writing a book is a really long undertaking. You're going to spend a lot of time with this story or this content and material, and you want to make sure that you're doing it from love.You want to make sure that you're doing it from some deep creative well within yourself—and tapping into that place that is rich and full and makes you feel alive. That's the only book that's worth writing, and many people do that kind of writing and do that kind of work—and don't ever want to cross over to that other place where now they're doing the work of making that ready and accessible for a reader.And Mary Laura talked about how that second shift in the book-writing process is so weighty for her—and it is for everyone. The difference between writing something for your own self and writing something that bubbles up and springs up from inside you, and writing something with the intention that it's going to be bought and sold by strangers—and read by people that you don't know—that's what strangers are, I guess—the difference between those two things is really huge. And I think too many writers make the mistake of doing the first part and thinking that's enough--that they don't have to think about, well, what does my reader want? Where does this book fit on the shelf in a bookstore? How is this going to be bought and sold?What is this book's relationship to the marketplace? They don't make that leap into that second way of thinking—and then they get frustrated when the marketplace rejects their work. It's the work of their heart. It's the work of their soul. They brought their whole being to the page—but they didn't do that second part.But here's the key about that second part—It doesn't usually come after. It's not chronological. You don't write the thing and then think about the marketplace. Sometimes that happens—but it's actually really rare.You have to do those two parts of the work at the same time—they have to overlap. You start a project out of the love and the passion and the yearning and the desire, but the intention that it's going to be for the marketplace needs to come pretty soon thereafter, because it's going to impact your structure.It's going to impact your genre. If you're writing fiction, it's going to impact the length of what you write. It's going to impact all kinds of decisions that you make about that book, and if you leave those decisions until after you've written a draft, you're likely going to be very disappointed.So what this is really about is understanding your intention for the work as soon as you can. So again, you might start with the love and the desire and the yearning and the passion, but once you start thinking… I would like for this to be read, I would like for this to be in the marketplace. My intention and ambition is for it to be read. Then you need to stop and start asking yourself some of these core questions about: how is it going to be read, how is it going to be in the marketplace? My Blueprint books were designed for this exact thing. They offer a 14-step method of inquiry that helps you think about these core questions at the beginning of a project before you write too far.This isn't an advertisement for my Blueprint books. I think they're great, but there's a lot of other ways to get this work done as well. There's some other methods—there's other systems and processes. You might have a framework for doing it as well, but it's something that we really need to think about—is these two different pieces of the process. So my reflection for today is to go back and listen to that episode with Mary Laura Philpott and listen for the words that she says around this, because they're so good—and I think she just pinned it down so well—and I just want you to spend some time reflecting on these two phases of the process and these two parts of making a book that readers are going to love.Until next time, stop playing small and write like it matters.The Hashtag AmWriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perrella. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output, because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

In this #amwriting podcast Write Big session, Jennie Nash talks with author Mary Laura Philpott about the surprising choice she made after her acclaimed book Bomb Shelter—to stop writing on purpose. Mary Laura shares how, after pouring everything into that project, her gut told her she didn't need to rush into another, despite the pressure of “what's next?” from the industry and readers. This conversation reframes writing big not as chasing ambition, but as honoring your gut and giving your whole heart to whatever season you're in—even if that means not writing at all.TRANSCRIPT BELOW!THINGS MENTIONED IN THIS PODCAST:* Mary Laura Philpott's website* Bomb Shelter* The New York Times ReviewSPONSORSHIP MESSAGEHey, it's Jenny Nash, and if you've been writing a new book through the month of November and wondering if it's any good, this might be the perfect time to work with an Author Accelerator certified book coach to get a professional gut check. Eighty-six of our certified coaches are offering a Black Friday special. For just $299, you get a mini blueprint strategy session, which includes a one-on-one call, some feedback on your pages, and the kind of insight and inspiration you need to write forward with confidence. Visit https://www.authoraccelerator.com/black-friday to find the book coach who's a perfect fit for you.EPISODE TRANSCRIPTJennie NashHi, I'm Jennie Nash, and you're listening to the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast. This is a Write Big Session, where I'm bringing you short episodes about the mindset shifts that help you stop playing small and write like it matters. Today, I'm talking to Mary Laura Philpott about the idea of trusting your gut. This is a critical component to writing big, and I asked Mary Laura to come speak to us because a very interesting thing happened to her after the publication of her second book, Bomb Shelter: Love, Time, and Other Explosives. This book is so good. It's a book about being a parent and a daughter and a spouse and a person in the world. And what happened was that she stopped writing—on purpose. Her gut told her, “I'm done now.” And it struck me that if we could understand what makes a successful writer choose not to write; maybe we could understand better what makes us each choose to write big. So welcome, Mary Laura.Mary Laura PhilpottHello, friend. Thanks for having me.Jennie NashAh, I'm so excited to have this conversation. I've been wanting to have it for a very long time.Mary Laura PhilpottOh, good.Jennie NashSo thanks for joining us. This is maybe your second, third, fourth time on the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast—you're a fan favorite. So welcome back. To set this conversation up, I'm going to read a little snippet from The New York Times review of Bomb Shelter, which was written by Judith Warner, and in which she called your book a “master work.” I'm going to read the end of her review, because it really sets up this question that we're going to be talking about.So she writes: “I want to say something negative about this book. To be this positive is, I fear, to sound like a nitwit. So to nitpick—there's some unevenness to the quality of the sentences in the final chapter—but there's no fun in pointing that out. Philpott already knows. I'm telling this story now in present tense. She writes, ‘I'm still in it, not yet able to shape it from the future's perspective. The story is still being written, and that's all right. The only problem is having to wait to read what comes next.'”So—you wrote this book, which was your second book…Mary Laura PhilpottSecond book of this type—yes, kind of second, second memoir.Jennie NashSecond book of this type. And you get this beyond rave review in The New York Times by this luminary reviewer, in which she says, “I can't wait to see what you write next.” And here we sit some years later, in which the answer is—there is nothing next. So can you talk about that? Can you talk about how you—first of all, what that feels like?Mary Laura PhilpottYeah, it's—I mean, you know this feeling of before a book is even on shelves, people are already asking, “So what's next? Like, what are you working on?” You know? And then you go on tour, and every question everywhere is, “So what are you working on now?” There's this relentless, kind of—this churning wheel of productivity behind it all. And so I'm used to that, and I was used to that feeling of, okay, the book is out, people are talking about it, but I need to be working on something next, because that's always been how it is. But I was tired. That was a really—I love that review so much, and I love the way this book was received—but it was a really emotional book to write, and it was a really emotional book to tour with and go out and talk about for several weeks on end. And so when I came back home, I was like, you know, I get to decide how this little hamster wheel of productivity goes—and I have decided I need a break, and I'm going to focus on, you know—I had, like, one or two years left with my kids at home before they left the nest. I was like, I'm just going to be at home. I'm going to focus inward. I'm just going to be kind of living life on my own terms. And I did that for about a year—and then another year—and now it's been... let's see... here we are in 2025... It's been three years since that book came out. I have not written another book, and I have never been so calm about not being in the middle of writing another book. It just feels like I don't have something I urgently need to say.Jennie NashYeah.Mary Laura PhilpottAnd I also feel—there's something rebellious in the beginning about saying, “I'm not going to do it.” But once the rebellion kind of burns off and you realize, actually, I don't owe anyone anything—like, I'm not under contract for another book. I had the sort of miraculous timing of my editor for Bomb Shelter and for I Miss You When I Blink retiring right after Bomb Shelter came out, so I don't even have an editor breathing down my neck going, “Come on, what's your next thing?” So I've been experimenting with saying I'm retired. When people ask me, like, “What are you working on?” I say, “I might be retired. I don't know if I am. It might be temporary. It might be—this might be like Ross and Rachel: are we on a break, or are we broken up? I don't know.” But I am so calm and happy with the decision not to be getting up every day and sitting at my desk. It's like a cord has been cut in me—and I don't feel any guilt about it.Jennie NashSo you said you feel that you don't have anything to say. When you started these books and your other books and projects, did you feel that?Mary Laura PhilpottAlways! Yes. Like, I—for myself and for other people—like, I need to get this on paper. There's that therapeutic part of writing: I need to get this on paper and organize it so that I can understand what it is I think. That's not enough of a reason to go through the misery of publishing a book, but it's something. And then there's the other part—where you, or for me, where once I figure out what it is that I'm thinking as I'm putting it on paper, I realize there are other people who may feel this way, and translating it into words is a gift. And it's something that I want to be able to do for readers, and I want to enter into that two-way conversation with my words and my readers. And it's not that I don't have anything interesting to talk about right now—it's just that I don't have anything keeping me up at night, begging to be translated and, therefore, you know, urging me to the page. I've started and stopped little—not books, but like other little projects here and there—where I'm like, oh, maybe I want to play around with this idea. And then I put them down, and I just feel... it's honestly the first time in my life I have felt no guilt about not working on the thing that everyone thinks I should be working on. And it's so weird because other people seem to have really strong feelings about it.Jennie NashI was going to say, what are people's reactions when you say, “I might be retired”?Mary Laura PhilpottThe other day—okay, so I'm going to tell you about this event I went to the other day. It was a book event for a woman who we all know, who's pretty well known, and this is her—I don't know—fourth or fifth or sixth book and it's very much anticipated by its readers. And she's exactly my age—she's 51—and when I went to this event, I ran into a lot of other book people who I know, and of course, the first question everyone asks: “What are you working on?” So I decided to test out my line, and I would say, “I think I might be retired.” The vehemence with which people go, “No, you're not! Like, shut up!”—I got told “Shut up” so many times. Like, what? Why? Why do people have this strong reaction? But then—and then, you know, I'm such a people pleaser that if enough people say, “Shut up. No, you're not,” I start to question myself. I'm like, maybe I should try? I don't know. I don't want to disappoint everybody. But then we sat down for the discussion part of this event, and someone in the audience asked this fellow writer, “Where do you want to be in ten years? Look ahead ten years and tell us what you see.” And she said, “In ten years, I will be in my early sixties, and I think by then I'd like to hang it up and live life just for me.” And I felt so viscerally and instantly—oh, no, I do not want to wait ten years. I wanted to yell out, “You don't have to wait till then!” But, you know, to each her own—and she may have ten years more of wanting to be out and about and hustling and doing this.Jennie NashYeah, yeah. So it sounds like you wouldn't characterize what you're feeling as burnout. It's not—it's not like, “Oh, I burned out, and I'll get back to it someday.” It feels really as if you arrived at a different place.Mary Laura PhilpottIt feels like—yes, it feels more like closure than like burnout. And that has changed. That feeling has changed over the last two to three years. In the beginning, it did feel like burnout—like, when I came home from that book tour, I was wrung out. I mean, I was thrilled, it was—it was amazing—but I was tired. And I thought—I remember you and I talking about this and saying, “You know what? I've just—I left it all on the field. I'm exhausted, and I need to take a year-long nap.” And then, over time, it became more of an “Okay, I'm not burned out. I actually feel fine. I'm just taking a break.” And I've talked to—you and I have a good friend in common, Laura Vanderkam, who writes a lot about productivity, and she and I had a conversation once where I was like, “I think what this is, is a break. Just—I'm going to take a pause, and I'll decide when I'm done pausing. When I'm done pausing.” And that may be what it is. I do tend to live life kind of cyclically, so I might cycle back into “Now I want to do this,” or “Now I've written that.” But right now it feels like this really peaceful closure. And even if I do write something again—which, come on, I mean, I probably will at some point—the part that feels closed is the hustle part. The part that—a lot of us don't actually really enjoy that much—which is not the writing of the book or the, you know, nice conversations with the readers, but the part where it's like, okay, you've got to put together this tour schedule, and you've got to answer all these questions for these promotional essays, and—and now you've got to—you know, this promotional machine that—“Go get your photo taken again.” I'm so sick of my face...Multiple Speakers[Both laughing]Jennie NashRight?! It's the performing aspect of being a writer.Mary Laura PhilpottYeah.Jennie NashDid—does any of this have to do with the fact that Bomb Shelter...? I know we talked about it at one point—that you felt, while you were writing it, that this—that it was good. Like, you knew that your vision was matching the execution. And then the world reflected back to you that yes, it is good—you did do that, and at a really high level. Particularly that one. There were a lot of reviews like that, but that sort of was the shining—you know, shining star. Was there a—do you think that the fact that you wrote the book—you know, we're always trying to write the book that we envision, and we don't always get there—and it feels like you got there. Does that have to do with this feeling, do you think?Mary Laura PhilpottMaybe—because there—I mean, you're right, there is almost always a gap between—before we write the thing—this wonderful, amorphous idea in our head where it's like, “This is just a shining galaxy of thoughts,” and then you get it on paper, and its like, “Oops, I killed it. I flattened it.” And there's always this gap between the two. And with Bomb Shelter, I really did—it has the smallest possible gap of anything I've ever written. And so maybe, you know, maybe that is part of it—that I feel like, what else am I waiting for? Like, what else could I want to do? If you get down to the pure reason of why we do this and what draws you to the page—and also the part of my personality that is, for better or for worse, kind of Type A and achievement-driven—this is... maybe I got to that point where I was like, well, I got the A-plus-plus-plus. What else could I try to get? I don't think that's entirely it, because it's not the whole reason that I write. I don't think it's like, “I got the A-plus-plus-plus, now there's nothing left to say.” When there's something to say, I'll say it. But I do—I think you're right that that's part of it.Jennie NashAnd the idea of writing for other people—that there's the writing, and then there's the connecting with other people, knowing that you're doing it for other people, then being out there in the world with those people— Is there a world in which you would write something that doesn't go into the world? Or is that not... I feel like that's something I would not be able to do at this point in my— But I'm so wired and attuned to writing for consumption.Mary Laura PhilpottYeah.Jennie NashI mean, I write for myself. Of course I write the things I want to write—you know, all those things are true—and, yes, for other people.Mary Laura PhilpottYes. Well—and I tend to be similar to you in that regard. And there's so much—you know, we talked a couple minutes ago about the difference between the therapeutic reasons why you start writing and then the actual hard, somewhat miserable work of getting it from the therapeutic version to something that is publishable. And that takes such discipline and real care for the art of it—of turning this thing that was helpful for your own brain into a piece of art that is worth someone investing in and putting out there in the world. I think—I do—I mean, in a way, I kind of write all the time, and you are similar to me in this. Like, we email, we—you know, we're very communicative people, so the writing part of my brain is doing something all the time. And I have started a few little weird projects here and there where I'm like, “Oh, I've had an idea for this,” and I'll, you know, write a few pages and then just kind of set it aside—without feeling like I've got to go attack it with that discipline that turns it into something.Jennie NashYeah.Mary Laura PhilpottAnd maybe that's the part of my brain that's just tired—that's like, I'm still tired. And when I am untired, I will go back and pull those things out and play with them some more. I don't know.Jennie NashYeah, yeah. Well, I love your characterization of that, because I have been talking about this—this newish idea—or I have newish words around this idea of calling it “Write Big”. And people often, I think rightly so, mistake that for big ambition, big goals, big wins, big success, big money—you know, all those things. And it's not that at all, actually. It's the doing the thing with your whole heart.Mary Laura PhilpottYes!Jennie NashNo matter what the thing is.Mary Laura PhilpottAnd not holding back.Jennie NashAnd what you're saying is that the cost of that for you—you're not going to do something. It's not that. And the cost of that for you is too high.Mary Laura PhilpottAt the moment it is. At the moment, when I think about—when I look around at the life I'm in—and this is professionally and personally—there's this interesting confluence, which is, I'm in my... I've just finished my first year of empty nesting. So this has been the first year of my life since I, you know, first had a baby, where my days do not in any way revolve around a school schedule, a nap schedule, a feeding schedule, etc. And then I did maybe the dumbest thing ever—and I adopted a puppy, who does have feeding and nap and all this other stuff. And so all my displaced maternal energy has now been funneled into this puppy, whom I absolutely love—but he is a wild and crazy ‘Looney Tune'. And when I look at the way my days look right now—which is the get up, make my coffee, walk the puppy, feed the puppy, you know, teach the puppy how to sit—and I think, do I feel like trading that right now for getting a dog sitter and going into my office and writing for multiple hours? I don't. I don't want to trade that right now. I may change—I fully reserve the right to change my mind and be like those, you know, sports players who are like, “I'm retired,” and then the next season, they're like, “I'm out of retirement.” Maybe I'll come out of retirement. But right now, what I want to do is feed my puppy, teach my puppy, be available on a moment's notice. If a kid says, “Hey, I was the understudy for this play, but I got called up to be in a performance this weekend,” I want to be able to jump on a plane and go and not have other commitments. I'm enjoying that. And I do fully recognize—I should give this disclaimer—that this is a very privileged situation I am in. My income from books is not what paid our mortgage. I'm married. I have a spouse with a job that has health insurance, you know, so I'm able to make decisions. And I do feel the financial consequences of these decisions. Like, it's not a small deal for me to be like, “I'm not going to write another book,” because that would have been important income—but it's not the only income in our house. So I'm not—if I had still young children coming up, lots of tuitions to pay, mouths to feed—this might not be so easy for me to just be like, “I want to play with my puppy.”Jennie NashRight, right. Well—the idea we started with, of writing big, is trusting your gut. Not writing is trusting your gut. All of this starts and ends with: what do we think, what do we feel, what do we want to say?Mary Laura PhilpottYeah.Jennie NashThose are such hard things to know, and it feels like you're just really tuned into that right now. And you talked at the very beginning—you said that it feels peaceful. Can you just maybe, to end our conversation, describe that feeling? Because that, I think, is what we all are looking for with our work—whether we're doing it or not doing it—is peace around it.Mary Laura PhilpottYeah. I think a big part of the peace—and I wish I had found this earlier, when I did still have things to say and I was writing—because I think it could have removed a lot of distraction for me in writing big, the way you say—is tuning out other people's voices. And if you are the type of person, as I am, who—like, when the Olympics are on TV and I see the person doing the high jump, I'm like, “I bet I could do that if I went and—” like, which obviously I cannot. But I have that part of my brain that's like, “Should I try to do everything I'm capable of doing? Like, I can't. I can't leave anything undone. I should. I should go try to be the best at everything I could ever be the best at.” Because, you know, other people expect me to work hard and produce things. And to be able to tune out that inner voice and other people's voices—those voices that equate productivity with worth—and, you know, “If people aren't talking about the new thing you've done, then how do you even prove you're worth the air you breathe?” Disconnecting from those voices is what led to the peace. And I think I was beginning to disconnect from that while I was writing Bomb Shelter. I think that's why that book worked, in some ways—because I really—I mean, remember, I wrote it during the pandemic. I wrote it when I was stuck at home. I had less contact with the outside world than ever before. We did not know what book publishing was going to look like. We did not know if there would ever be another book tour. So I really did write that book in a bubble of having as little outside input as possible. So I think that's the—maybe, if there's any key to peace—it's tuning out voices that you just don't need.Jennie NashI love that. I love that so much. And I think we will end our conversation there, because it's so profound and it's so good.Mary Laura PhilpottThank you for having me.Jennie NashWell, for our listeners—until next time, stop playing small and write like it matters.NarratorThe Hashtag AmWriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perrella. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output—because everyone deserves to be paid for their work. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe