Emily Giffin, THE LIES THAT BIND: A Novel

[0:38]Zibby Owens: Hi. This is Zippy Owens, and you're listening to the award winning podcast, Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. I'm also the host of Moms Don't Have Time to Lose Weight, and I'm the editor of the anthology, which you should run out and buy, called Moms Don't Have Time to A Quarantine Anthology. All proceeds of that book go to COVID nineteen Vaccine Research. And I'm the editor in chief of Moms Don't Have Time to Write, a new publication on Medium, and we're accepting submissions, so please send your personal essays there. And if all that isn't enough, you can follow me on Instagram at Zibby Owens, and my website is zibbyowens.com. Okay, now back to this amazing podcast. Emily Giffin is the author of The Lies That Bind. She is a Chicago native and graduated summa cum laude from Wake Forest University and the University of Virginia School of Law. After law school, she moved to Manhattan and practiced litigation at a large firm for several years while she paid back her school loans, wrote a novel in her very limited spare time, and dreamed of becoming a writer. Despite the rejection of her first manuscript, Emily persisted, retiring from the legal profession and moving to London to pursue her dreams full time, which we talk about in this episode. It was there that she began writing Something Borrowed (two thousand and four), a story of a young woman who upon turning 30 finally learned to take a risk and follow her heart. One year later, her own gamble paid off as she completed the manuscript, landed an agent, and signed a two book deal on both sides of the Atlantic. The following summer, Something Borrowed hailed as heartbreakingly honest debut with dead on dialogue, real life complexity and genuine warmth became a surprise sensation. And Giffen vowed never to practice law again. Dubbed a modern day Jane Austen by Vanity Fair and a dependably down to earth storyteller by The New York Times. She has since written eight more New York Times bestsellers, including Something Blue in 2005, Baby Proof 2006, Love the One You're With 2008, Heart of the Matter 2010, Where We Belong 2012, The One and Only 2014, First Comes Love 2016, and All We Ever Wanted (twenty eighteen). All of her novels, filled with endearingly flawed characters and emotional complexity, have resonated deeply with both critics and readers around the world, achieving bestseller status in a number of countries including The United States, Canada, UK, France, Brazil, and Poland. The books have been translated into 31 languages with over 11,000,000 copies sold worldwide. In addition, five of her novels have been optioned for the big screen and are in various stages of development. The first, Something Borrowed, hit theaters in May 2011, starring Kate Hudson, Jennifer Goodwin, and John Krasinski. Emily now resides with her husband and three children in Atlanta. Her tenth novel, The Lies That Bind, was released on 06/02/2020. Welcome,

[3:20]Emily Giffin: Emily. Thank you so much for coming on Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. Thank you so much for having me. It's a real pleasure.

[3:26]Zibby Owens: Okay. So so much to talk about. Can we start by talking about your most recent book, which is so good. I am, like, obsessed with these characters still. Oh my gosh. Like, I feel like I am this girl in this book. Anyway,

[3:39]Emily Giffin: tell listeners what it's about and then we can talk more about it. Well, thank you so much, by the way. I like thinking of you sharing some things in common with our heroine, Cecily. Yeah. The book is about a a young reporter. She's in her twenties. She moves to New York from the Midwest. And, you know, she's trying to establish herself and and her career. And she breaks up with a guy and is is sort of, you know, not really sure what her life is going to be and what it's looking like when she meets this other guy and falls madly in love with him only to discover that she there's a lot of mystery to him. So she wasn't she wasn't really sure what he's all about. And so the book is really about uncovering and trying to figure out who this guy is, who he was, who he is. Spoilers. And and and so doing, you know, trying to figure out who she is, you know, because I think a lot of what we do in relationships is we get to know people, we get to know ourselves as well. So she ends up really trying to solve some mysteries about herself as well. Wow. Well, I mean, part of the reason I related is I was in my twenties

[4:44]Zibby Owens: on 09/11. I was right there. I lost my best friend. She worked in the North Shower. So I was posting those signs, like the ones with Grant. I mean but all your references, like, took me back in a way that I hadn't had before. Like having Dido on the first page of your book, was like, oh my gosh, I thought that was our song. Do you know I mean? And I eventually went to a Dido concert after and it was like this little Oh, did? Yes, it was at The Beacon on the Upper West Side, the Beakman, The Beacon. Anyway. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But you have like all these cultural I saw Tracy Chapman there. You saw Tracy Chapman? I saw Tracy Chapman there. Yep. Love her. So yeah, we really shared a time and a place, you and I. So were you you must have been there, right? I was. I was actually I was an attorney. I worked in the MetLife building and I practiced law for five years.

[5:35]Emily Giffin: And so in that sense, I could really sort of relate successfully. I was in my twenties, late, late twenties. And I had quit my job as a lawyer to I'd written a book. It took me five years because I was practicing law. So it took me like five years. Ultimately, it was rejected and I decided in really the summer of two thousand and one that I was going to quit, You know, my job as a lawyer, leave my law firm and go try to write another book. You know, if I had stayed at my firm, knew it was gonna take me another five years or more to write another one because of, you know, the the amount of time that you log as a young associate at a New York City law firm. Although I managed to write some of that first book while I was, you know, supposed to be billing GE and Philip Morris and all these other clients, I'd be working on my manuscript. But anyway, ultimately it was rejected and so I decided I was going to quit my job and then move to London and try again and write another, you know, write another book. So my flight was actually it was really crazy timing. Zivvy, it was 09/16/2001. So my going away party was, like, on that that Saturday night, which I guess is was that the ninth or the eighth? I'm trying to do the math on that, but the eighth that that weekend. And, you know, my last day of work was whatever the Friday before the eleventh was, so, like, the sixth or seventh. And my flight was on the sixteenth. And so, obviously, no flights went out on the twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth. But sixteenth was the first day they let, you know, they let flights go and had international flights. So it was one of the very first international flights. And as I, you know, boarded that plane, of course, you know, it was terrifying. Everyone was terrified. We were all sort of silent. But on top of it, I wasn't just, you know, flying somewhere for for work or for, you know, a vacation. I was I was moving and I was leaving the city. So I felt incredibly conflicted and and almost guilty. I mean, you know, rationally, knew that that nobody, you know, sure my friends were going to miss me or whatever, but New York didn't need me. New York doesn't need any one person. But I still felt this, like, sense of guilt that I was flying out of there, leaving my country, leaving my city. You know, you could still see smoke at that point, you know, ground zero as you, like, took off. And so it was a very bizarre time. And when I got to London, I just really threw myself into the writing of the book. I think we all escape, you know, these things in different ways to the extent we can. I knew some people too. I didn't have a best friend like you. I'm so sorry for your loss. I mean, can't imagine just having known a few people what it would have been like to actually be the person in charge of sort of those placards that people were hanging and some just I'm so sorry for you and so many others. But, yeah, it was just for me, was an escape. So I started writing Something Borrowed, which and that fall, so fall of two thousand and one, September 2001, I started writing that book. And, you know, one of the themes that of that first book, of Something Borrowed and also, I think, The Lies, The Bind is is is that feel feeling of, like, being in your late twenties and trying to figure out who you are and what you want. And sometimes we look for that in a relationship. I mean, we can do that at all in all ages. You know, I was about to say we make that mistake at all ages because I think I think in many ways, it it is a it is a mistake to, you know, try to find your identity in a relationship and have your life path kind of revolve around that. But there are times when that does work, so I shouldn't just I shouldn't be overly simplistic about that. But for me, it was, you know, I was about to turn 30. I was leaving a career that I did not like and that I was not fulfilled by and trying to write this book. So I could relate to Rachel and Something Borrowed on in those ways. And I think Cecily, it was the same for her. You know, she was, you know so I could I could very much relate to her and her journey of and that's sort of why I used, you know, nine eleven. And and and I should say, for for those who, you know, haven't haven't read the book, it's a small part of the story, and I really could have said it in any time. In fact, my real the real appeal of setting it when I said it was because of that sense of before and after. So, you know, really, some of the book takes place when when they when they met, when the main characters meet, Cecily meets Grant, it's it's the summer of two thousand and one, which, I mean, I'm sure you feel the same having lived it, but doesn't that feel like this last summer of innocence, like true innocence? You know? -Yes. -It's like before and after. I mean, I know in a lot of ways, we, you know, we recovered. Of course, we life always goes on. We move on. But to me, it's like that summer of two thousand and one and everything before. First of all, it dovetailed with what was happening in my life and my twenties. And so for me personally, that's how I see it. But, you know, when I think back to the places we went, the bars we, you know, we went out to, and the whole Sex and the City era. I mean, was, you know, the Sarah Jessica Parker and Sex and the City and getting together and what I mean, that was all it all felt changed after nine eleven. And it was weird too because the book came out last June in hardcover. It's out in paperback now, of course, but last summer, it came out in in hardcover on June 2. And, you know, I didn't know when I was writing the the book. I think I turned my final pages in to my editor in February, and I barely heard of, you know, coronavirus or COVID. And although, of course, Black Lives Matter has been something that's, like, even, you know, building in importance and, you know, something that's been, you you know, in our collective consciousness and that we've all been thinking about for years. I mean, it really sort of June June of last year is when this was really, you know, George Floyd and everything. You know, just the whole world seemed to be changing all at once with with COVID and, you know, worldwide pandemic and, you know, Black Lives Matter and everything else. And so I felt like once again, were in one of those moments of before and after. Like, when you think back to holiday parties in 2019, you know, getting dressed and putting on your heels and your red lipstick and going out without a mask, not you know, maybe you would see those signs at the airport that said if you've been to, you know, Wuhan, China. Like, it it just was so felt so removed from anything, you know, we we really were thinking about. And now, of course, you know, we're coming out of it, but I think we'll always all be able to look at the summer of twenty twenty and remember what we were doing. And in the sense that Cecily examined her life internally, like this big external thing happened with 09/11, but the book's really more about her internal journey after that. And I think that is so true for all of us. I mean, how many, Zippy? I have probably four or five friends who are getting a divorce, which is, you know, very sad that in some ways, it's like a fresh start, and it's what they should be doing. And it's wonderful news in some ways, but I feel like that happened and things were accelerated, you know, because of because there were so much, you know, time of self reflection and internal, you know, inward thinking about is is this the life we're meant to be living? And are we happy? And we're happy with our jobs and our careers? And maybe we don't wanna be going into work every day and to an office, or maybe we don't like our career at all, maybe we don't like our spouse, or, you know, maybe you're wanna jettison one of our friends who we thought was a real friend and they're not, you know, being sensitive enough to what was happening with the the George Floyd moment. Maybe they were trivializing it, or maybe they didn't post a black square, you know, or we thought that they were blowing things off. I mean, so many different things were happening that it was the world that that stage that things were happening in, but our lives, I think, changed because of it, because of that internal reflection. But did you did you find that to be true with with friends in your life and people in your life that a lot of people's lives kind of shifted direction

[13:52]Zibby Owens: last year? Or is that just a coincidence? I don't think it's coincidence. I think like all the data supports that that's happened far and wide in my immediate circle, not as much, but, you know, I found the biggest difference with my own, like, close girlfriends after nineeleven because like losing someone in our core group made all of us, like, rethink what we were doing. Right? Like I was at business school at the time and I thought I would have a marketing career. And I mean, I guess I kind of do in a way because you have to market everything you do anyway. But yeah, I mean, I just there were just so many parallels and not to like, I mean, that summer before I was in the city, I met this new guy at Tortilla Flats at like two in the morning. And we had like a summer whirlwind romance. And like, I was like, so I was like, oh my gosh, I could've been like Grant and me in this book. This is crazy. That really is wild. And like whisked off to Rio and like did all these weird things I've never done in the rest of my life. Not that that's weird, but just like spontaneous, you know? And then of course, life changed the way it did here. And I don't mean to overemphasize this element of your book because, you know, there's also these like romantic little jaunts, the jaunt that had first and the dating and but all of that stuff, it was like, you know, eating pancakes with Florent and the little bit. Anyway, all this stuff was just like, the I know. And then We could have been at the same places at the same That's crazy. Paths have probably crossed because there's much. Although then you left and I came back. And then I also did what you did. So after business school, I was like, actually forget it. That's not what I want to do. And I wrote a book. And then that book didn't sell. I was like, now what? Anyway, I just had like so many things. Of course, I did not go on to write something about I did not go on to have a best selling amazing podcast.

[15:35]Emily Giffin: So we're not best selling, but but yeah, things things just tend to, you know, to work out in interesting ways. But that really it really was a moment, and I love that we shared that and that you shared that with Cecily as you read the book. Were you not to ask your veiled way of asking your age, but how old were you that summer? I'm very open about my age. I'm 44. I'll be 45 in a craft in two months. Oh my gosh. I'm gonna have to start saying I'm 45.

[16:03]Zibby Owens: I'm 44 now, so I'm gonna just hang my hat on that. Okay. So we're five so you're born in '77? '76.

[16:08]Emily Giffin: '76. Okay. The bicentennial year. Yes. I have a little pillow still. Very cool. I was I'm five years older than you. So I was in the parade, the bicentennial parade. My gosh. Partying with my little red, white and blue drum and my bunny costume. For some reason, I have that. But so, yeah, I was turning you were 25 about that summer. I was about to turn 30. So you're about 45, I'm about to turn 50 next year. And I'm here to say don't worry about anything until you're 48. That's the real moment. You still have like a window.

[16:41]Zibby Owens: And it's like you you fall off the cliff after that. So I just read like this morning, there's a new book coming out in January called Midlife Bites, like a play called Reality Bites by Jen Mann who wrote, I just like, people I want to punch in the throat. Anyway, it's all about what to expect in the most sort of irreverent way. I was like, oh, okay, thank you. I'm now warned of everything. Some has already started, some has not, but thank you for that.

[17:06]Emily Giffin: Yeah. I feel like there's not a lot of you know, there needs to be more solidarity as we all I know. I know. I take great comfort in certain I mean, I think we all, depending on our age, have certain celebrities that we kind of look to and be like, It's all gonna be okay. Because Jennifer Aniston turned 50. Right. Exactly. And she's happy. You know? And she looks great, so there's always still hope. Halena Pardescova.

[17:29]Zibby Owens: She's, like, in her bathing suit all the time. Look at her. I know. I know. Not that I looked like her before, but somehow when I get that age, I'm gonna turn into her. Oh my gosh. I wish. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, the part of your story though that I really that really struck me is you're like, okay, well then my book didn't sell, so I decided to write another one. Like, I was not as brave and did not I actually ended up ghostwriting a book after that because I was like, okay, well, that's fine, then I'll write, but I don't have to, put my heart on the line again. How did you, like, steal yourself and how do you even maybe, you know, how do you where did you find that Yeah. Determination,

[18:04]Emily Giffin: I guess? Yeah. I don't I don't know. You you characterized it as brave and I really think that that's I don't think that's a fair characterization because it was really more about how much how much did did I hate what I was doing versus how much did you hate what you were doing. Sometimes, like, misery can be really, you know, motivating. It's almost like the people who you know, if you leave a relationship where the guy is, like, shooting on you left and right and he's terrible and he makes you miserable and he degrades you and, like, yeah, that's, like, great that you liberate yourself from that. And it's great if you liberate yourself from a job where you're really miserable, like, that still, you know, requires some level of gumption. But I think the real kind of bravery is when you leave those just good enough situations, you know, when you're getting a really nice paycheck and you don't hate what you're doing, like, but you also don't feel super fulfilled or you're with the guy who's, like, perfectly nice and great on paper, but you don't, you know, feel necessarily in love and you feel like you're at the right age and you get married anyway. I think the people who walk away from those careers and those relationships are really they're really the brave ones compared to, you know, what I was doing at the time. But, you know, it did I will I will omit it did take a certain amount of determination. So and, you know, and a certain amount of, you know, I guess, like, having some faith in myself. And, you know, I'm and I'm grateful looking back that I had that, like, you know, disappoint crushing disappointment really of working for something for five years and getting an agent, which they always say is the hard part, you know. Well, they they say, like, oh, if you get an agent, like, you're in really good shape to get published. Well, I got an agent and and it wasn't published. But I'm grateful now for that because I feel that I appreciated it so much more when it did happen Mhmm. With something borrowed. And also, you know, as a parent, you have three children. They're teenagers now. They were my twin sons were born in New Year's Eve o three, so just six months before Something Borrowed came out. And then my daughter's, you know, a few years younger than that. But you have that built in story of, you know, the disappointments that have come along the way. And the older you get, the greater the disappointments in some way. I mean, I guess it's all relative. I remember my son George had a own goal in soccer, and he was so happy because he thought he had, like, scored a goal for his team and and it's sinking realization that it was an own goal and oh my gosh. And, you know, he's like, I've never felt worse in my whole life, and I'll never get over it. And I'm like, yes. You will. You will. You will get over it. Like, but it was a good reminder to me as a mother that things are so relative.

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[22:42]Emily Giffin: was what what month were they your twins? June. They just turned 14. Okay, right. My daughter Harriet just turned 14 in May. Oh, Okay. We were pregnant at the same time. We should get them together. I have a I really good know. Okay, right. So he's Okay. And Harriet's, well, I shouldn't say anything about I've made an effort not to say anything about their personal lives. I know. Should But I think I think everybody thinks their son and daughters are cute. So I'll just leave it Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think we should introduce him. Is he on Instagram? Yes.

[23:13]Zibby Owens: Yeah. Okay. We'll have to do this privately because I need like, tag him or anything. Yeah. So the book that I wrote right after nineeleven was very similar sort of to this, although not as interesting a plot, but it was about like a couple that sort of gets together on the with nine eleven sort of at the centerpiece of it. And I did get an agent like you and we sent it out. Although in retrospect, if I could like go back to myself then, well, first of all, don't think the book was good enough, but I would have sent it out to more people because a lot of the agents, a lot of the publishers at the time said that it was too soon, that nobody wanted to read about nine eleven in fiction. And now I'm like, okay, twenty years later, I'm reading your book, which is amazing, and I'm totally ready to read about it in fiction. And now I actually have a memoir coming out next September or year from September called The Book Messenger. And I just, like, finished writing, like, all of the stuff that happened to me at this time. So I'm like, oh my gosh. It's like the real That is wild. I love that. Anyway, I'll have to send to you. Well, would you would you ever,

[24:15]Emily Giffin: you know, pull that manuscript out and work on and and and resubmit it?

[24:19]Zibby Owens: You know what? I included, I feel like, enough of the pieces that were at the center. Well, I turned it into a novel. I wrote it, like, four times. Because I shouldn't make this movie. But anyway, wrote that book No. No. It's I'm wrote that book like four times. I wrote it first as a memoir, and then I wrote two separate drafts of it as a novel. And I've tried that actually. I ended up like getting married. I got divorced. I started a new relationship who I then remarried this guy. So then I wrote another memoir that I turned into a novel called 40 Love about finding love again at 40. Both of those like deep Wait. Words Did you remarry the same guy? No. I remarried a new guy. Okay.

[24:54]Emily Giffin: I I have a Carriet has a friend who's who's whose mother got a divorce and then married the same guy. I married a new guy. Not I mean, I remarried in general.

[25:03]Zibby Owens: Anyway, point is I've I keep trying to like turn memoir into novels to like disguise things, but it's not working. I am just like writing fiction. I just am not I'm just much better writing real life.

[25:20]Emily Giffin: Well, for now. You never know though. For now. You could take some of those parts of the that didn't deal with nineeleven and rework it into a novel. Think

[25:30]Zibby Owens: would be Anyway, all to say, I took bits and pieces of both of those abandoned projects and threw them into my memoir. So for the parts that were true. So we'll see. Here's another similarity

[25:41]Emily Giffin: and something that I don't think I've ever talked about this in an interview ever and whatever this is fifteen years, but I got a divorce too after a year of marriage. No way. Fun fact. So we have we have that in common too. Oh my gosh. What else? Are you a Leo?

[25:56]Zibby Owens: No Pisces. Okay. Alright. Fine. Summer camp? Yeah.

[26:02]Emily Giffin: We could go there. We could work on that. We can take it off. Maybe we could write a novel together about summer camp and you could I'd be the counselor since I'm five years older. Perfect.

[26:11]Zibby Owens: I'd be the camper crying and wanting to go home. Same. Eating too many cookies. Perpetually homesick. Oh my gosh. I was just saying because my kids are not going to sleep at wake camp this summer and they're all gonna be at like day camps and counselors and stuff, that I got like so sad my first summer at sleep away camp because I was eight years old and I went away for eight weeks and that was like not good for my personality in any way. And I learned how to make butter and sugar sandwiches. So I would take the like white springy wonder bread and like put all this butter on and then slather on the sugar and I could like still feel the like crystals of sugar. Anyway, that's how I got through sleep boy again.

[26:48]Emily Giffin: That sounds so incredibly comforting. It was. Yeah, it was great. Who wrote that book? I can't think of her name Quiet about introverts. Maybe Susan. Yeah, I think that sounds right. Susan, one syllable last name. And if you haven't if our your listeners haven't read that, definitely pick it up. But also she had she does a podcast or Ted Talk about it, so sort of condensed version. But in that, she talks about summer camp and how some kids are just not meant for summer camp and I was not meant for it. And I that's why I've never you know, my daughter Harriet's at camp today, but it's like day camp. Know, she comes home at night, gets her own bed. Are you an introvert?

[27:30]Zibby Owens: I am not. Okay. I think I am an extrovert, but I have a lot of social anxiety or I used to at least. So I've been very shy my whole life until now, I guess. I like to be around people like, but then I do need to regroup. I don't know. I feel like I'm, I don't have a clear cut answer. Keep taking quizzes and it's not clear.

[27:51]Emily Giffin: How about you? You know I mean, I guess there has to be someone that's truly right smack dab in the middle. So maybe that's you, but I do think, like, I've described myself as a socially adept introvert. Like, I've hopefully, for the most part, I'm socially adept, but I feel like I can fake it really well. And so people sometimes are like, how you're not an introvert. You know? You're talkative. I'm like, that's not the definition of an introvert. Right. So maybe it should come down to do you like summer camp? Maybe

[28:20]Zibby Owens: it should come down to that. Yeah. I was like I, like, was reading the whole time at summer camp. I mean, maybe I mean, I have a lot of like independent tendencies. Like, I love to read. I love to write. I would be fine spending the entire day by myself. Like Okay. You're an introvert,

[28:34]Emily Giffin: Zippy, for real. Like, you have to watch this. Either read quiet or watch her TED Talk. I think there's a whole section on that. Okay, when you were growing up, did you like the project, the group projects? Hate. Hated, right? Hated group projects. Hate that. Yeah, you're an introvert. Yeah. You're just fooling yourself because You can go out and, like, have a good time and be social and but that's not what the definition is. It's it's more about, well, just watch I'll do more research on it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then come back for me. Yeah. Because I like to think of you as a as a kindred spirit on this one. I mean, I definitely

[29:09]Zibby Owens: you know, now that there are, like, things opening up, I'm not like, oh, thank god. You know? I'm like, oh. Oh, no. Really? Oh, no. Do I need to do that? Like, how many of these things do I need to do? I like to I like to plan it. Like, if I'm the one I like to throw parties. I like to be in control of everything. Like to be like, okay, come at twelve, leave it to you. You know what I mean? Like that's enough for me. Maybe you're right. Do you debate ever? Well, maybe 02:30. Of course. Do I debate ever? I did this literally yesterday

[29:38]Emily Giffin: for my daughter's birthday party. I'm like same with my daughter. Okay. So she's like, it's not your birthday party. You don't have to do anything anymore. I'm 14. And I'm like, well, still, there's gonna be parent pickup. -And I have to know, like, you know, what's the window and how much small talk will there need to be? So, yeah, that's very interesting. Yeah. But the pandemic in that way, I mean, feel guilty saying it. I mean, I wanna make it clear, like, there's no nothing good about what we've all been through. But there have been some silver linings, I guess, you could say. And I think one of them for me has been that time where you don't have to do those things, and you can read more, and you can think more, and, you know, and I don't know about you, but just we we never really we had dinner together as a family loosely, it was more like standing around the kitchen counter and, like, you know, serving yourself and maybe three people were sitting down and someone else was off at a piano less dinner. And since really since the spring of last year, we we eat dinner together as family, you know, five days a week. And so that's all, our case, just pretty much all pandemic driven, all COVID driven. So yeah, I mean, obviously, I would gladly give up all the family dinners to have all those, you know, people not have had to suffer the way they have, but there have been some silver linings, and I'm not looking forward to this fall of, like, the full on return to

[31:09]Zibby Owens: to all of that. My husband's mother and grandmother passed away from COVID, and we were, like, in charge of their care. And it was, like, his mother had this six week protracted horrific illness. And, anyway, it was awful. And then, of course, you, like, finish all that, and we were still in the middle of the pandemic too. So, anyway, but not to say I know. Now I'm like spilling my life story. Feel so bad. I should like not even It's be recording like a conversation just between the two of us, but No. But anyway, but yes, I still feel the same as you do. Like there were benefits to sort of taking up time out from life for everybody on the planet. Like, how can we not be especially for people who are, like, happy to think things through and, like, regroup and figure out what's important and what gives our lives purpose and meaning. And I don't know. I started, like, driving my little guys to school and, like, doing, like, the school drop off recently. And I was just like, this is what I'm so excited about? This is back to normal? Like, what why I missed this? This is terrible. Like, like,

[32:02]Emily Giffin: is this how there is now that life is back that I have to cross this park like a thousand more times this year? I don't know. It's like it makes you wonder. No. I know. Have you read Amanda Klutz's book yet? I'm interviewing her tomorrow on Instagram. Oh, you are? Yeah. I know. Is today Wednesday? Yeah. Tomorrow at, like, five or six or something. How about you? Did you read it? I'm I'm in the middle of reading it. I just I just got it. So I'm I I adore her and talk about finding the silver linings and and the positive, and she and her sister are just both so amazing and such an inspiration. So, yeah, I mean, for her to be able to well, for you to have lost people and for her to be able to say, you know, that there were there were moments of beauty over the past years, like, really, it says a lot about how strong you how guys are. Yeah, she's amazing. So that's going to be a great interview. I'm excited for you to. Yeah, I'm excited for that too. Anyway, back to your career and So what are you working on next? What books do you in the pipeline? Like what are you excited about? Well, let's see. The Lies of Bind is actually we're working on making that into a a limited series. Nice. So with the same producers who who did something borrowed, Molly and Rachel Smith, Black Label Media. So we have an actress, and I guess for some reason, it's not time to announce that yet. But an actress, I think, is wonderful and will really nail Cecily. So really excited about that. Just kind of putting some of the pieces of it together. And so that's that's one thing, you know, that project. There's a few other sort of film and TV things I'm working on. But for the most part, I'm always most focused, you know, other than than my motherhood sort of duties. And that part of my life, my my main focus is always just the next novel. You know, I I really admire these authors who are able to write their book and adapt something that they wrote before and, you know, be have sort of one hand in in LA and be working that. But I'm more like calling my producer the producers and my friends and saying like, what have you guys done? Like, what's the next step? For me, that's you know, I I just prefer maybe, again, it's that introvert piece, but just working on my next novel. So I'm you know, that's what I'm mostly doing is writing right now, And that'll be due in the fall and the book will come out next summer. So relationship driven story as all of mine are about the messiness of relationships and, you know, finding yourself as you fall in love and fall out of love and fall back in love. And so a lot of those themes are, you know, ones that I often explore, along with, you know, this idea of forgiveness and forgiving ourselves and forgiving others and that we're all you know, the characters in The Lies That Bind, of course, did some things that some some people can't forgive them for. Some readers are, you know, saying, oh, I couldn't stand like, I didn't I didn't like him or her at the end. And, you know, that's always I know a risk that I'm taking with this kind of stories that I tell and the situations that I put my characters in. I feel that they're good people and that they're you know, they make unsympathetic choices at times, but I think they've all are like good people at heart, which really is how I think of people all of us, you know? Like, if you line up all of our choices that we've made, I mean, there's some really, you know, unsympathetic ones. And there are times that we needed to be forgiven and other times where we're forgiving others and think that's sort of the journey of what it's all about. This life is just so, you know, messy and complicated and, you know, we're all sort of these works in progress. So those are always, you know, the things I like to explore with my characters even at the risk of sometimes making them unlikable. But the way I see it is if I could write a story about a girl falling in love with her best friend's fiance and having an affair with him in the months leading up to a wedding and having the groom to be have an affair with his, you know, fiancee's best friend, and I can make people like them more than they liked the bride to be, then, you know, I'm always hopeful that there's there's help for for for all of us and any one of my characters. So that's always in the back of my mind. Mean, people forgave Rachel, so it surprises it always surprises me, though, what people are more judgmental about, you know, readers and people in real life. You know, my sister and my mother and my friends and I are harsher critics about. And the two books that I wrote where I feel like they were the very harshest about my heroines were baby proof where the first line of that book is I never wanted to be a mother. And I remember, you know, that book came out in 2007 when my or yeah. 2007 when my daughter was born. So I had three under three. And, you know, it begs the question, why was I writing about a woman who didn't wanna be a mother? Right? Because I could certainly relate to the value of having a child free life rather than a childless life. But, no, I remember my editor saying, you cannot make Claudia, you you cannot redeem her past after that first sentence if I never wanted to be a mother. Like, she's she's unlikable from the out of the gate. I'm like, well, you know, that's what that story's about, and I'm gonna try to make her, you know, likable. But that to me was so interesting and said so much about sort of the last taboo. Not to talk about a book that came out in 2007, but I am working on the the film version of that with some friends. And I think that's changing a little bit how we've how we view that statement and our reaction to that statement. But I I think in many ways, we still have that sort of bias against women who feel that way. And it's like one thing if you can't have them. Right? And then you're sort of like this object of, oh, you know, she wasn't able to, she did in vitro five times, didn't work out. But the women who are just like, no, not interested. I feel like we're still judging them more harshly. But to think that that woman could have been judged more harshly than the woman who's having an affair behind her best friend's back. I don't know. Was that was interesting. And the other one was a girl who fell in love with her best friend's father. Just like but there was no infidelity in that book because the mother had died, but people were like, oh, that's so gross. You know, they're twenty years age difference or whatever. And that one surprised me too. But that to me is really the fun as an author in in many ways. Like, other than just, like, creating this world, this fictional world where you don't have to do an end time. You don't have to say twelve to two, Zippy. You just close your laptop, and you're done with them for the day. You don't have to do the endless goodbyes and, okay, well, it's good seeing you. You just close the laptop. Yeah. But the other, I think, really fun part about writing for me is that that whole thing of, life is messy. Let's explore it. Maybe they won't be redeemed in the eyes of all readers, but hopefully, at the very least, I'm able to make people see their point of view a little more, which I think, like, it all comes down to that, right? I mean, empathy in life and

[39:08]Zibby Owens: fiction is just sort of like seeing things from another point of view. So, so yeah. Awesome. Well, first, nobody knows what people are really going through. I mean, in real life. Right? You can only judge on the surface. Okay. What last question because we could like continue this for way too long. What advice would you have for aspiring authors? Okay.

[39:26]Emily Giffin: So one thing that I hear a lot of writers say is like, I'm an aspiring writer. And I'm glad that you said aspiring author. Because if you're writing at all, you're already a writer, you know? And so I think it's important to remember that getting published is sort of, you know, it's it's it's a lot of, like, dumb luck involved with that, you know? It's you've we've all read books that we think are terrible or that we didn't like. And for every one of those books, there's this, like, sparkling near perfect manuscript that just never saw the light of day because, you know, maybe the editor who read it had already bought something like that the, you know, month before, and she didn't want two books about a cheating fiance or you know, and and the person gave up, or they got married and had a kid and they didn't, you know, return to it or something. You know, there's just so many I guess what I'm saying is, you know, if you're rejected along the way, you're still a writer, but your voice is still valid and important. And, you know, if it's important to you to get published, like, pursue it. Like, continue it. Like, be dogged about it. Like, the people who run a marathon, you know, if we lined up our friends I've never run a marathon, Zebi, have you? Okay. Good. Another thing, I was like, if you please say no. Please say no. No. No. But, you know, some some of our friends who have run a marathon aren't necessarily the most, like, athletic, you know, or the most Right. You know? But they do it because they decide to do it. So I feel like that analogy is important. Like, if you really want to publish, just stay after it and believe in yourself and don't let your sort of identity turn on these artificial answers that you're getting from other people because it's not it's not like, they're not they're not turning you down, and they're not even turning, like, your writing down. They're just saying this isn't this isn't commercially viable for me this week. You know, it's really I think that's important to to remember that for for those that for those who wanna be published. And there's so many writers out there who that's not terribly important, you know, to to get that, you know, the validation or the or to share the story with the world. They're doing it for themselves. So I would say that's probably my biggest piece of advice to just believe in yourself and keep writing and do what you love no matter what that is. But like you're doing, Zevgen, I cannot wait for your

[41:50]Zibby Owens: book. Oh, thank you. So excited. Oh my gosh. I just recently this is my last thing and I'll let you go. But I just joined Noom, the like weight loss app. Don't know if you've heard of it. Oh yeah, of course. Anyway, whatever. I just decided to try it. Anyway, they said like the number one predictor of whether or not it would work for you is if you believe it will work for you. And I was like, and that's it. That's all you have to do is believe it. And how easy is that? So I felt like that was so applicable to writing. I mean Yes. If you believe at one point you are gonna publish your book, you probably will. Like you but you have to believe it. And if you don't, then forget it. Then you probably won't. Then you almost definitely won't. Like, you don't believe it. You you might. You might. You might. Because

[42:31]Emily Giffin: I don't know that I believed that I would publish something bad, but but I hoped and occasionally believed it, which might be good enough. Occasional.

[42:41]Zibby Owens: Yeah. Well, you believed you believed you would write something that was worth seeing because that's why, like, you just knew it. Like On some level. But now I check out Noon too for this. Noon is great. Yeah. I don't know. Just it's been five days, but so far so good. But the

[42:56]Emily Giffin: pandemic, maybe it's also just like the amount of wine that I've consumed in the past year is maybe if I just quit with that, that would be a great start.

[43:05]Zibby Owens: That's why I started moms don't have time to lose weight because I had like all this pandemic weight and I was like, I can't be the only one, am I?

[43:12]Emily Giffin: Turns out no. No. Anyway, you're not.

[43:15]Zibby Owens: Anyway alright. Well, this was so fun. Thank you. I feel like I just, like, hung out with a new friend or whatever. I know. I feel the same.

[43:23]Emily Giffin: You can be my mentee since you're five years younger. I will gladly be your mentee. You can show me the ropes. I would love it. Totally kidding. I can learn so much more from you. But thank you so much for having me on. I enjoyed it so much. Until Amanda I said hi. I will. Okay. Okay.

[43:39]Zibby Owens: Thanks, Debbie. Bye. Bye bye. Thanks for listening to this episode of Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at Zibby Owens and at moms don't have time to read books. Also sign up for my newsletter at zibbyowens.com and sign for my virtual book club and meet lots of authors on Zoom every other week. Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Texture Sound for the sound editing, and thank you to Morning Moon Productions for providing this fantastic intro and outro music.