Rebecca Serle, IN FIVE YEARS
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[1:34]niniestreats.com or go buy it on goldbellie.com. I got to interview Rebecca Serrell on her pub day which
[1:40]was really really exciting and she was like in the best mood and bouncing from the walls and it
[1:45]was before the whole coronavirus came out and now her tour has been cut short but I have very
[1:50]fun reminiscences of being able to celebrate her publication day with her publicist Ariel
[1:55]Fredman who I adore and my husband Kyle and we had a great day so try to take some of that joy
[2:01]away when you listen to this episode even though now we're in a very different time and here's
[2:05]her bio. Rebecca Serrell is the author of six books and she's a television writer. Her latest novel
[2:10]in five years is the Good Morning America book club pick for March of 2020 and by the way it was
[2:15]a bestseller on the New York Times list. Rebecca co-developed the hit TV adaptation of her YA
[2:20]series famous in love and is also the author of the dinner list and the YA novels The Edge of Falling
[2:25]and When You Were Mine. She received her MFA from the new school in New York City and currently lives
[2:30]in Los Angeles. Welcome Rebecca. Thanks for coming in with us now to have to read books.
[2:35]I'm so excited to be here with you. I use that so much fun. Ridiculous tone of voice because
[2:41]it's Rebecca's pub day today for in five years and there's like so much excitement she's like
[2:46]glowing and this beautiful like yellow and white dress and oh my gosh there's like so much excitement
[2:50]in the air so it's so fun to be here and to share this with you. Oh my gosh. So you came from Good
[2:56]Morning America this morning. Yeah the Good Morning America book pick. Yes. What was that like?
[3:02]Tell me like when you found out about becoming the book pick. It was pretty wild. I think the
[3:07]the craziest part of the whole journey was seeing the book up in Times Square on that Jumbo Tron.
[3:13]It's just I really just thought throws the whole thing into perspective. It was pretty wild.
[3:18]It's so cool. Yeah that was very exciting. And just so neat I was saying this earlier but just
[3:22]so neat to see any book like clustered all over Times Square and all over the billboards. Absolutely.
[3:27]A book especially your book. Yeah it's been really fun and I just feel like we've had so much
[3:33]support and so many like great early readers and people like yourself who are just really getting
[3:37]behind the book so I'm so happy. So now that we've talked about the celebration. Yeah go back in time.
[3:43]Yes so what please tell listeners what in five years is about? In five years is a story of Danny Cohen
[3:49]who's a corporate lawyer living in New York City who has a very airtight five-year plan and we meet
[3:54]her on the day of like her big job interview the place she's wanted to work forever. She nails
[3:58]the interview that night she gets engaged to her boyfriend. Everything is going exactly according to
[4:02]plan and she comes home that night and falls asleep on the couch and wakes up and lives exactly one
[4:07]hour, five years in the future and wakes up in a apartment she's never been before with a man
[4:11]she's never met before and then she wakes up in her real life four and a half years go by
[4:15]and she meets the man who was in that hour with her and everything starts to sort of both
[4:19]travel together and unravel to bring her towards that hour. Yeah I did not see where this was going
[4:25]but I mean I could not predict the ending. I could not like that's what in part you have to figure
[4:30]out what happens. It's like like a mystery almost right. That always makes me so happy because
[4:35]I feel like obviously I know where the books are going because I you know in some I'm not like a
[4:40]a super airtight planner but in some ways you know where books are going and so whenever anyone
[4:44]tells me they're surprised by something I write it just makes me so happy. Yeah I really guess
[4:48]yeah I kind of felt like I'm more on at the end because I was like oh I should have seen
[4:51]blah blah blah but you could never I mean you could I don't know well maybe if I read it it's
[4:55]actually very happy. So how did you come up with the idea for this book? I really think that
[5:00]all writers are sort of interested in exploring one or two themes over and over again
[5:05]and the theme that I'm really interested in exploring is the dialogue between fate and
[5:09]free will like how much is in our control and how much is going to happen regardless of what we do
[5:13]like how much is just predetermined in our lives and my last novel the dinner list I think was
[5:19]really about going back in time and kind of relitigating the past underneath that umbrella of what
[5:24]could we have controlled what could we have done differently what was always going to happen
[5:27]and in five years is very much about like the fantasy of getting to see what's coming
[5:32]and how even if we can see what's coming we can't see what it will mean. So it's sort of it's sort of
[5:38]sprung out of that my interest in that theme I think it's just the central question of the human
[5:43]existence I'm most interested in and it's something I'm always trying to figure out about my own life too
[5:48]like how what do I have to do to make things happen how much am I responsible for and how much
[5:53]is me just sort of greeting whatever's unfolding in my path. Have you always wondered like have you
[5:58]always been somebody who thinks that through yeah did something happen that may do sort of focus
[6:03]more on it or I think I've always been somebody who really thinks that through my first book even my
[6:07]first book when you were mine was a modern retelling of Romeo and Juliet from Rawson's perspective so
[6:11]it was like looking at what like the greatest love story but from like a different point of view
[6:16]was that always gonna happen where they always meant to die could things have turned out differently so
[6:19]I think I've I've always been really interested in that concept I come from like a very sort of
[6:26]spiritual household like my mother was very into astrology when I was very young so I think that
[6:31]dialogue around kind of fate and choice was something that I just grew up with. I like how you
[6:37]seamlessly woven the other book titles and oh shit that was so sorry but it really isn't when I
[6:43]look it I look it I mean you guys should definitely check those out but but I really do see I see my
[6:52]work as being pretty collected in like in that way. What's nice to even be able to articulate that
[6:59]and to see the common threats I mean I feel like so many authors it takes a while to figure out what
[7:04]their writing is about and why and what message they're trying to uncover so I think that's really
[7:10]interesting you say that because I think I didn't really realize it until I was writing the dinner
[7:13]list my last book I didn't realize that all of my books had been I knew that I was wrestling with
[7:18]that but I hadn't put together that they all were really at their core about that one thing. I
[7:24]spoke to the author Danny Shapiro about my latest book inheritance and she was like now that I figured
[7:29]this piece out about myself I realized that every book I've ever written is the same scene and it
[7:34]all goes back to this and she's you know absolutely she's very introspective and you can like
[7:38]write a console search but sometimes you have to wait till they all tilt them out or something I
[7:43]don't know why that happens but you can see them kind of lined and be able to like draw some
[7:47]conclusions yeah but I think it's just an interesting phenomenon that we really kind of write the same
[7:53]story in differing ways yeah and it's almost like it's you know in a way it's about control right
[8:01]because this book I mean when you start at Danny in her five-year plan and I respect that you know
[8:06]I'm a planner yes you know I change my plans but I'd like to have a plan which is why the current
[8:10]environment is sure you know that I relate to that like this is what you do to accomplish XYZ and
[8:17]then it will follow yes and then but it doesn't always follow and so was it never going to work out
[8:24]or might have worked out and you just I don't know I think that we because I'm I'm much like
[8:29]yourself I'm a person who really likes to have a plan I used to be probably way more of a planner
[8:34]that I am now because I think life has revealed itself to be very unpredictable and the way my
[8:40]life has turned out and what like what's come into it has always consistently really surprised me
[8:47]and so I think I hold less tightly to the idea of like this is what has to happen and more sort of
[8:53]okay these are this is like this is more the feeling of what I want in my life and I'm open to what
[8:58]that will look like because the picture can change but what I'm really after is the feeling of
[9:04]happiness or connection or peace or whatever it is and I'm I'm willing to let the vision of what
[9:10]I think that looks like go in favor of the emotion that I really want to experience because I
[9:15]think when we envision our lives a certain way what we're really saying is I want to feel that
[9:19]thing and I think this is the best way for me to feel that thing but we don't always know
[9:24]now right I like love the movie sliding doors yes it's like one of my favorites not that it's
[9:29]exactly the same but just your life can so easily absolutely just go in a different direction
[9:34]and you just don't know what moment it is it's gonna or was it all predetermined yeah I don't know
[9:39]I don't know I don't know we could talk about this I don't know I gotta read some more books
[9:45]I can't wait till your next five books on this topic I will be you know very avidly
[9:51]consuming them and everything so tell me about the writing process for this book did it differ
[9:55]from your other books did you know from the start did you have your characters picked out first
[10:00]What was the whole process?
[10:01]I always start with a conceit.
[10:03]So for this one, it's, you know,
[10:05]the answer to the question,
[10:06]where do you see yourself in five years?
[10:07]And then I say, okay, who do I think would be best
[10:10]to tell this story?
[10:11]Mm.
[10:12]And then I usually like free right for about 30,
[10:15]20 to 30 pages.
[10:17]And then I'll stop down and think like, okay,
[10:19]what are kind of like the surrounding principles
[10:22]of this book that I'm writing?
[10:23]Like who are the characters?
[10:24]What does it take place?
[10:25]And then where do I think the arc is going?
[10:27]What are some plot points that I think I have to hit?
[10:29]But that's as far as I really go in outlining.
[10:32]I'm not like a super tight airtight outliner.
[10:34]I feel like, you know, people say this all the time,
[10:36]but I think that the best part about writing
[10:38]is when it feels a little bit like reading
[10:39]when you also are waiting to find out what happens next.
[10:43]So I'm not a huge plotter.
[10:45]This book, I wrote very quickly.
[10:46]This book took me about three and a half months to write.
[10:49]And for me, everybody has a different writing process,
[10:51]but for me, when I'm writing,
[10:53]I like to like stay in step with the work.
[10:55]So I'll try to write 2,000 words a day
[10:57]and do that pretty consistently until I'm through a draft.
[11:00]Because it's hard for me to step out of a work
[11:02]and then come back to it.
[11:03]I like to stay in line with it.
[11:05]And I feel like magical things happen for me
[11:08]when I'm just in the zone of the book.
[11:10]Like things come together.
[11:11]And I think seeds are planted that later,
[11:12]like manifest in the book when I'm really in it.
[11:17]So for me, it takes me about like three to six months
[11:20]to write a book and I'll write consistently
[11:23]that whole period.
[11:24]And so you wake up, where do you do it at home?
[11:27]Do you, I like paint a picture from a of your writing life?
[11:30]Well, so I lived in New York for 12 years
[11:32]and I just moved to Los Angeles,
[11:34]which is where we met in August.
[11:36]And I should thanks Sarah.
[11:37]Mine actually again for helping me with something in my life
[11:40]because she helps me with everything
[11:41]and introducing us was a mishap.
[11:44]So anyway, she met me when I was probably like 23 as long
[11:47]and was like, okay, here's what you have to do.
[11:49]She's very good, we love you Sarah.
[11:50]But so my life looks a little bit different than it did
[11:54]again, but actually in five years I wrote predominantly
[11:56]in LA because for four years I was living back and forth,
[11:59]I was by Coastal.
[12:00]I had a television show called,
[12:01]People in Love That Shot in LA.
[12:03]And we wrote the show there, so I was back and forth.
[12:06]And I was really nervous about leaving New York.
[12:08]I knew it was time.
[12:09]I knew I really wanted to be in LA,
[12:10]but I was nervous about leaving
[12:12]because I felt like maybe I don't,
[12:14]maybe the magic of writing books comes from New York City
[12:16]because all my books are about New York City.
[12:18]And they're so deeply rooted in the city and the restaurants
[12:21]and the places of this town.
[12:25]I was reading.
[12:26]I was like, is she gonna like have something based
[12:28]in my apartment?
[12:29]Like this is getting so close to me and like the Hamptons
[12:31]and I was like, oh my gosh, it's like she's following me
[12:33]around or something.
[12:35]But I love, I really love that this is so real.
[12:37]It was like, you know.
[12:39]And so I was nervous about that.
[12:40]And I actually, I wrote the majority of
[12:42]in five years in LA.
[12:43]So it was a really good learning experience for me
[12:45]to see, okay, I can write a book there.
[12:48]And for me it's just a word count.
[12:50]So it's 2,000 words a day.
[12:52]And sometimes that takes, you know, an hour and a half.
[12:55]And sometimes it takes six.
[12:56]It just depends on what the mood is
[12:59]and how active I am on Instagram.
[13:02]It's terrible.
[13:02]I mean social media is just doing activity.
[13:04]It's so bad.
[13:05]But it's really like a double-edged sword
[13:07]because every author has to now be on Instagram pretty much.
[13:11]So it's like you're giving, it's like giving a dog
[13:14]like a distractable tool.
[13:16]I love that this is a bad analogy.
[13:17]I can't think of it.
[13:18]But you know what I mean?
[13:19]It's like taking my kid and putting him in a classroom
[13:21]and also putting like a phone in front of it
[13:23]or like putting like a fidget spinner.
[13:25]I know.
[13:26]And being like, okay, now focus on the teacher.
[13:27]Now focus on the teacher.
[13:28]Like how it's very challenging.
[13:31]So I need to get a little bit better
[13:33]about like carving that out in my life
[13:35]and having it just be a part of it
[13:36]and not sort of like this net that's over all of it.
[13:40]You have any tricks?
[13:41]No.
[13:41]You found anything that worked in them too.
[13:43]Please let me know if anyone does.
[13:45]Do you have the alert?
[13:46]Which is hilarious because it's like,
[13:47]let me know on Instagram.
[13:48]Let me know if you have any tips for not being on Instagram
[13:50]on Instagram.
[13:51]They're so sneaky because it's also like email.
[13:53]But do you get the alert that tells you
[13:55]how much you've been on a day?
[13:56]I get the weekly alert, not the daily alert.
[13:58]So I put something on Instagram
[13:59]where it tells me after an hour,
[14:01]like you've been on Instagram one hour today.
[14:03]And that's when I'm like, oh boy.
[14:05]That's helpful.
[14:05]Are you good at doing that after it says it?
[14:08]Are you good at being like, okay, this is a nash?
[14:10]Then I won't be on it that much longer.
[14:12]Right.
[14:13]Yeah.
[14:14]Sometimes like I mean, usually that's like a note
[14:16]to myself that I've been on my phone
[14:18]like too much that day.
[14:19]Yeah.
[14:20]Because if I'm on an hour in Instagram,
[14:21]I'm sure I'm on an hour of like email.
[14:23]I mean, you know, whatever.
[14:24]Yeah.
[14:25]It's just like, that's not all of it.
[14:25]So it's also just not, it's not just writing.
[14:28]It's I want to use that time to read.
[14:31]Predominantly it's an issue for me with reading.
[14:33]I'll get into bed and I'll say,
[14:34]okay, I have 45 minutes or an hour or whatever it is
[14:36]before I have to go to sleep.
[14:37]And I'll notice like 40 minutes goodbye.
[14:40]And I've just been on my phone.
[14:41]That's very valuable reading time.
[14:43]It's so true.
[14:44]And that's happened to me too.
[14:45]Yes.
[14:46]And it's the worst.
[14:47]So I have to like tell myself
[14:48]and just be so intentional with my time.
[14:50]Like, you can pick up your phone,
[14:51]but if you spend the next 10 minutes
[14:53]on your phone versus the tent and think about
[14:55]what you could read in 10 minutes.
[14:56]Yes. That might be enough.
[14:57]That might be the piece of the book
[14:59]you want to talk the most about.
[15:00]Like, and if you hadn't read it or if you hadn't read it,
[15:02]then or yes, completely.
[15:04]And books can get books can both get written
[15:07]in tiny segments and they can also get read in tiny segments.
[15:10]So even if you have 10 minutes,
[15:11]that's still what three pages,
[15:13]the three, four pages that you can get through in reading.
[15:16]So yes, I want to get better about finding those
[15:18]found moments not just for writing but for reading.
[15:20]Sometimes I try to do it like in a taxi or something.
[15:22]Yeah.
[15:23]Because like, I mean, I'm going, you know,
[15:25]especially like long drives where I'm like,
[15:26]oh, I don't want to go to like this meeting down here.
[15:29]Yeah. I'm like, well, I read 30 pages.
[15:30]I might forget where I even am.
[15:31]Right. Although one time I did end up
[15:33]in like completely wrong place
[15:34]because I never even looked up.
[15:35]Yeah.
[15:36]Anyway.
[15:37]We're reading time.
[15:38]What do you like to read?
[15:39]What are your favorite types of like?
[15:41]I like to read.
[15:42]I like to read like women's,
[15:44]whatever we're calling it women's art market
[15:46]commercial fiction.
[15:47]It has like 12 qualifiers, which is a whole other conversation.
[15:50]But I love, you know, Curtis didn't tell it.
[15:52]And I'm a straw.
[15:52]I love Sally Rooney's books last year
[15:54]and normal people and conversational friends
[15:56]and out there are both excellent.
[15:57]I just read one day in December, Josie Silver.
[16:00]And right now I'm reading Evie Drake starts over,
[16:04]which I'm, let's just a lot of fun.
[16:05]It's with me on, on tour.
[16:07]Amazing.
[16:08]Yeah.
[16:09]Have you ever had a thing just sort of related to this book
[16:13]where maybe you had feelings for a friend's boyfriend
[16:18]or spouse, not for this necessarily happened,
[16:20]but it's just, no, that has never happened to me.
[16:23]But I will say that I had,
[16:25]this book is in part inspired by a very interesting
[16:30]second prophecy I had about my love life like eight years ago
[16:33]that ended up in, I won't go totally into it,
[16:37]but I ended up in part coming true,
[16:39]but it was a part that I hadn't gone into it.
[16:43]When you mean I won't go into like a psychic prophecy
[16:45]event you're loving.
[16:46]It was, it was, it was complicated and sort of odd,
[16:49]but I, but I had this, I had this reading like eight years ago
[16:51]and the woman told me like, go back,
[16:53]is this like something common?
[16:55]Do you frequently go to readings or was this out of the blue?
[16:58]It was gifted for me for my birthday.
[17:00]Okay.
[17:01]And so I had this reading and she told me a lot
[17:03]of like very interesting and valuable stuff
[17:05]that was relevant in my life.
[17:06]And she also told me about my like future spouse
[17:10]and a lot of qualifiers as to like who he would be.
[17:13]And the age that I would be and the age that he would be
[17:16]and there were a lot of like just sort of determining
[17:18]factors of this.
[17:20]And I met him and like I won't get into this part of it
[17:25]but it was nothing was as it seemed.
[17:27]And so it got me, it really got me thinking about
[17:30]how interesting it is that maybe we can see like,
[17:32]I said like maybe we can see what's coming
[17:34]but we can never see what that will mean
[17:37]until we're in that moment.
[17:39]And in this and in five years,
[17:41]Danny gets to live that one hour, five years in the future
[17:44]and that hour from the first time she lives it to the second time
[17:46]she lives, it doesn't change.
[17:47]But the entire surrounding context as to what that hour means,
[17:51]why she's there, all of it is entirely different
[17:54]than what she thinks in the beginning.
[17:55]So I was really interested in that idea.
[17:58]We can, you know, and it's, I mean, it's not a new idea.
[18:01]This is back to like, you know, Greek and Roman writing
[18:04]and Shakespeare, the idea of prophecies coming true
[18:07]but in a very different context than what we think they are.
[18:10]But yeah, so I have a little bit of personal
[18:12]grounding experience in this whole thing.
[18:14]Get together with the guy that the psychics thought
[18:17]you were gonna get together?
[18:18]No.
[18:18]No.
[18:19]But he was in your life in some way.
[18:21]Yes, I met him.
[18:22]You met him, but nothing happened.
[18:24]No, I'm just gonna keep digging.
[18:25]Oh, I feel like there's nothing good there,
[18:28]but that's okay.
[18:29]I can maybe look.
[18:30]Yeah, no, it was a very, very, it was a very interesting thing.
[18:35]And I think on like a more macro level,
[18:38]we were talking about this a little bit before,
[18:40]but I was thinking about that last week, you know,
[18:43]in the lead up to the publication of this book,
[18:45]how differently my life has turned out
[18:46]than what I thought it would.
[18:48]And then I started to think, well, you know,
[18:50]if it had turned out exactly as I thought,
[18:52]this book wouldn't exist.
[18:53]This book is like an actual physical manifestation
[18:56]of my life looking so different than the life
[18:59]that I thought I was building.
[19:00]What did you think you were building?
[19:02]I mean, I had like such an airtight vision for my life.
[19:04]Let me hear it.
[19:05]What was it?
[19:06]I wanted to like be married by the time I was like in my mid 20s.
[19:09]I wanted to have like two kids by the time I was 30.
[19:12]I was writing children's books.
[19:14]And why I really thought I would stay there.
[19:16]Never imagined myself.
[19:18]I mean, it was a dream of mine,
[19:19]but never really imagined myself like creating
[19:21]and running a television show.
[19:23]Didn't really think about a career in Hollywood.
[19:25]You know, and now I find myself in this adult space
[19:27]which is really where I belong
[19:28]and where I want to make my permanent home.
[19:30]And I feel so lucky to publish here.
[19:32]But all of life has looked very good.
[19:34]Thought I would never leave New York City
[19:35]that I would have here forever.
[19:37]Yeah, none of that.
[19:39]None of that is where I am now.
[19:40]And yet life is so good, right?
[19:41]That's the thing is we don't always.
[19:43]I think we are not the best.
[19:45]My friend likes to say you can't be your own control group.
[19:48]Like we're not always the best judges
[19:49]of saying what it is our happiness needs
[19:53]or what we need for happiness.
[19:55]I think sometimes we have these plans
[19:57]and then life delivers us something else.
[20:00]and it's about just moving with what that is
[20:02]and embracing it.
[20:03]Yeah, good or bad, good or bad, yeah.
[20:05]Yeah, do you know, here we are.
[20:07]I mean, and then there's good in there,
[20:08]like, you know, we're in the middle of this very odd moment.
[20:11]You know, we're in New York City,
[20:13]this very odd health stuff is going on,
[20:15]yet here we are having this moment of connection
[20:17]and putting art into the world.
[20:18]And so everything is everything, right?
[20:21]Like, that's kind of how it is.
[20:23]I love this whole philosophical
[20:25]art of this conversation.
[20:27]So you wrote a fantastic proposal scene
[20:29]with all the classic New York bells and whistles and everything.
[20:32]And then, of course, you fast forward to the scene.
[20:34]And in this, you say, everything goes according to plan,
[20:36]everything, except that David and I don't get married.
[20:39]There are always reasons and good ones too,
[20:41]but none of them are why.
[20:42]The truth is that every time we get close,
[20:44]I think about that night, that hour, that area, that man,
[20:46]and the memory of it stops me before I've started.
[20:49]What I loved about this is like,
[20:52]sometimes we don't make decisions
[20:53]and we think we don't know why, but really do down.
[20:55]You kind of do know why, and yet you don't say it.
[20:58]So I was just wondering,
[20:59]have you had that type of experience?
[21:02]Yeah, in your life?
[21:03]I've definitely had experiences,
[21:05]I think particularly in my personal life
[21:07]where my brain is trying to rationalize,
[21:10]like, no, this is good, this makes sense, this fits.
[21:13]And yet, like, somewhere down in your core,
[21:15]like, when you sink low into yourself,
[21:18]there's something that just says, like, no, it's not.
[21:20]You need to leave or you need to change
[21:22]or this isn't the thing.
[21:24]And I think that's really something
[21:26]that Danny's wrestling with, sort of,
[21:28]a little bit of like, what's coming up from her
[21:30]from her inner voice versus this, like, very, very, very,
[21:33]air type plan that she's held to so strongly for so long
[21:36]and how those two things are talking to each other.
[21:39]So, yes, I very much relate to that.
[21:41]I think that as I've gotten older,
[21:42]I've gotten better at listening to the voice inside me
[21:44]and recognizing it for what it is
[21:46]and not trying to mask it, or trying to pretend
[21:49]that it's saying something different than what it is.
[21:51]But, you know, I think sometimes it takes a lot of courage
[21:54]to listen to that voice,
[21:54]and what that voice is saying is like,
[21:56]change your whole life.
[21:57]Yes, but that's when you have to listen
[21:59]kind of the most, I have to say.
[22:00]Yeah, I know.
[22:02]I feel like if Danny was a friend of mine,
[22:04]I would have sat her down and been like, okay.
[22:07]You obviously don't want to do this.
[22:08]It's been like four and a half years.
[22:10]Like, what is the deal with the wedding?
[22:11]I could plan it for you in like a week.
[22:13]You know what I'm talking about, right?
[22:14]Like, what's going on?
[22:15]Yes.
[22:16]But, I don't know.
[22:17]Anyway, but to each his own, you know,
[22:19]right, even fictional characters.
[22:21]Five years from now, do you have any idea?
[22:24]And you've given up on a vision, right?
[22:26]Yeah, I've given up on a vision, except for the way
[22:29]that I want to feel.
[22:30]Okay.
[22:31]So, I would love to keep, you know,
[22:33]I would love to keep feeling really fulfilled in my career,
[22:36]which now what I imagine is, you know,
[22:39]publishing more books, creating another television show,
[22:42]writing my first film.
[22:44]But I'm not so attached to what those,
[22:46]like I'm not attached to those things.
[22:48]I'm more attached to the fact that I want to keep being challenged.
[22:50]And I want to keep feeling fulfilled in my career.
[22:52]And I want to keep feeling like I'm reaching new heights
[22:54]and challenging myself in different ways,
[22:57]in different areas.
[22:59]And in my personal life, I'd love to just feel peaceful
[23:02]and connected and settled.
[23:05]I don't know.
[23:05]Yeah.
[23:06]That's so nice.
[23:07]That's so nice.
[23:08]That's so nice.
[23:09]Yeah.
[23:10]Yeah.
[23:10]I wish that for all of us, you know, particularly now.
[23:13]I think that I think calm is really important.
[23:16]I think we were talking about this a little bit earlier,
[23:17]but Elizabeth Gilbert, who I also love,
[23:20]Instagram something this morning.
[23:21]And she said something like, remember
[23:24]that to be powerful, you must be calm.
[23:27]And that's really, I think, of the motto of the week.
[23:31]I like that.
[23:32]And I'm trying now to think, of course,
[23:33]to think of examples of people who are powerful,
[23:36]but not calm.
[23:37]Sure.
[23:37]Yeah.
[23:38]You know, anyway.
[23:39]But I think the real, I think about the point of work.
[23:41]Yeah, totally.
[23:42]So you have to stay centered to be able to.
[23:46]Yeah.
[23:46]So yes, I'd like to be in five years.
[23:48]I'd like to be more centered.
[23:51]Well, I like the goals.
[23:53]I like it.
[23:54]Do you have any idea for your next book yet?
[23:57]Like, yes.
[23:58]I finished a draft.
[23:59]Oh, already.
[24:00]Of course, because you do them in like two minutes.
[24:02]Well, yeah, it's weird.
[24:03]I tend to write a book a year.
[24:06]And I'll draft it pretty quickly, and then it'll
[24:08]take me, you know, another maybe six months to edit.
[24:11]So yes, I just finished a new one.
[24:14]But I haven't even really talked to my publisher
[24:15]about it, so I probably shouldn't talk about it here.
[24:18]But still on the adult space.
[24:19]Yeah, in the adult space.
[24:20]Yes, it's very much in the vein of the dinner
[24:24]list in five years, for sure.
[24:26]Very cool.
[24:27]Yeah.
[24:28]Do you have any advice to aspiring authors?
[24:32]I always say read as much as you possibly can.
[24:34]Like, apprentice yourself to books.
[24:35]I think it's the best advice that anyone could give.
[24:38]Parent other people's voices until you find
[24:40]sort of the amalgamation of them.
[24:41]And then you, that amalgamation becomes your own.
[24:44]That's what I did.
[24:45]I used to read.
[24:46]I used to read like JD Salinger's short stories.
[24:48]And it was really how I found my voice.
[24:50]I was a short story writer first.
[24:52]I went to the new school, actually, for my master's
[24:54]infection.
[24:56]And I wrote magical realist short stories.
[24:58]Like, that's what I did.
[24:59]And so I think apprentice yourself to books.
[25:01]And then I would really encourage anyone
[25:04]who wants to be a writer.
[25:06]If you want to be in publishing, I really
[25:09]do feel like getting to New York is important.
[25:10]And if you want to work in Hollywood,
[25:12]I think getting to LA is important.
[25:13]I really do feel like immersing yourself
[25:15]in the industry that you want to be a part of,
[25:17]being here, understanding how it works,
[25:19]and being a part of the dialogue is just important.
[25:22]And then also, if you have a finished manuscript,
[25:24]going to bookstores, looking in the books
[25:27]that you think are comps to your book,
[25:28]seeing who represents them, because agents are always
[25:31]that thanked in the backs of books, and then looking up
[25:34]their guidelines online and seeing how to submit to them
[25:36]is the best way to find representation.
[25:38]I love the acknowledgement sections.
[25:39]Yeah, books.
[25:40]Like, my favorite part of the book.
[25:41]Me too.
[25:41]I love it.
[25:42]Sometimes I just start there.
[25:43]I love it.
[25:44]I love writing them.
[25:44]I love writing them.
[25:45]I love reading them.
[25:46]I think they're so intimate and personal.
[25:48]And it's also such a nice way to end a book
[25:51]in getting a little taste of the author's world
[25:54]after you've just finished there.
[25:55]Make believe once, totally.
[25:56]Yeah.
[25:57]I feel like that's my hope.
[25:58]But I feel like when you know the author more forms,
[26:01]you're reading the book, makes it deeper.
[26:03]Maybe you think of different things
[26:04]that you might have.
[26:05]Yeah.
[26:06]Yeah.
[26:06]Sometimes you have to just glom on to the acknowledgement
[26:08]if we can't do it.
[26:10]Yeah, so much to do it.
[26:11]So much to do it.
[26:12]OK.
[26:12]Well, thank you so much for coming on mom's time to read books.
[26:14]Thank you so much for having me.
[26:15]Thank you so much for that.
[26:16]Congratulations again.
[26:17]Thanks for coming here on your publication day.
[26:18]I can grab some all of your accolades more to come.
[26:21]I'm sure.
[26:22]Yay.
[26:22]Thank you.
[26:23]You've been listening to moms and have time to read books
[26:25]with Zibi Owens.
[26:26]Please make sure to sign up for my newsletter
[26:28]at zibiowens.com to get more updates about episodes like these
[26:33]and also lots of live events.
[26:34]Thanks so much for listening today.
[26:36]Again, please go check out WeFoundTime.com.
[26:39]WeFoundTime.com for this week's new five essays
[26:43]from authors who have been in the podcast.
[26:46]And also go to goldbelly.com and order some
[26:49]ninnies treats crumb kicks.
[26:51]They are so good and you will not regret it
[26:53]although your clothes might be a little tight next week.
[26:56]I hope you all have a great week.
[26:58]But bye, thanks.
[26:59]You can follow me on Instagram at moms don't have time
[27:02]to read books.
[27:03]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound
[27:06]for the Sound Editing.
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[27:09]for providing this fantastic intro and outro music.
[27:11]Thanks for listening.
[27:12]You could always email me at zibiatzibiowens.com.