Meredith Turits, JUST WANT YOU HERE

[1:47]Zibby Owens: This is Zibby Owens and you're listening to Totally Booked with Zibby. Formerly, moms don't have time to read books. In my daily show, I interview today's latest best selling, buzziest, or underrated authors and story creators whose work I think is worth your time. As a bookstore owner, publisher, author, and obviously podcaster, I get a comprehensive look at everything that's coming out and spend my time curating the best books so you don't have to. Stay in the know, get insider insights, and connect with guests like I do every single day. For more information, go to zibbymedia.com, and follow me on Instagram at zibby owens. Meredith Turits is the author of just want you here. Meredith's writing and interviews have appeared in publications including Vanity Fair, Elle, bbc.com, Electric Literature, The Paris Review Daily, and Bustle where she was a founding editor. She graduated from Tufts University and attended the Yale Writers Workshop. She lives in Connecticut. Welcome, Meredith. Thanks so much for coming on Totally Booked to talk about Just Want You Here. Congratulations.

[2:57]Meredith Turits: Thank you. It's still a little surreal.

[3:01]Zibby Owens: Tell listeners what your book is about. I'll put yours really fast.

[3:06]Meredith Turits: Right out of the gate. So I think of it kind of as a second chance coming of age story. It's about a girl named Ari. She's 28, has been engaged for a couple years to her high school sweetheart, they've been together for a decade. And the book opens with him breaking up with her. And she is left without a compass, she has no idea what to do. So she kind of blows up her life moves to Boston, and quickly gets in an affair with her new boss. And then he, she gets very closely entwined with his wife. And so the story is sort of about finding yourself trying to do as little harm as possible and, you know, looking at desire and love and kind of what we what we do to,

[3:50]Zibby Owens: you know, find ourselves in that. Love it. And we have the same editor with Carmen Johnson, who I love.

[3:58]Meredith Turits: She's just the best, I think. You know, the thing about Carmen is she really saw into the soul of this book, honestly, a way that I hadn't yet. And

[4:06]Zibby Owens: the work we did just made it so much better and so much more real. I feel really grateful. Oh, Well, I feel like you did a particularly good well, you did a good job with everything. But this this feeling where your life is pulled out from underneath you, like a rug being snatched out, and what do you do in every when the when the world just feels so wobbly, and how do you right yourself? And sometimes you don't get up all the way. Right? You make mistakes, and you're, you know, halfway there, but you're trying. And I feel like that's what makes your character so sympathetic. Right? You you you root for her even though she's doing things that maybe you don't necessarily think are the quote unquote right things and that she doesn't think are the quote unquote right things, but we understand it. Right? Was that part of the goal? Or tell me about that. Yeah. I think so. I mean, you know,

[4:56]Meredith Turits: for me, I'm really interested in these second chances. Like I was saying, you know, you feel like your life is going to go a certain way and you are, you know, ready to follow this linear path, then everything kind of explodes and you have no compass and the things that you thought were going to work out don't necessarily. And I think you have to really think about your life in a different way and take chances and get across your fingers that they work out. And if and when they don't, you got to pivot. And so I think that was one thing that I was really excited about exploring with Ari. She thought things were gonna, you know, work out in a really linear way, and they absolutely did not.

[5:32]Zibby Owens: Has your life taken a turn that you didn't expect?

[5:35]Meredith Turits: I think so. You know, I lived in the city. I thought I was gonna be, you know, the the Brooklyn for life. I grew up in the suburbs, and I just got to a point where my life didn't fit there. And I moved back to the suburbs, like three miles from where I grew up. I live in Connecticut now and just sort of didn't didn't think I would be that person. And, you know, moving away from the city, I figured out what my priorities were and was able to put my life together in a way that made a lot more sense for me. And I think, you know, having that change and sort of being like, alright, I'm gonna try something.

[6:10]Zibby Owens: You know, we'll see how it works out. That was something that definitely, you know, resonated with me in the book. So I read that you wrote a lot of this at Sterling Library at Yale, where I have also done a bunch of work in the past. Tell me about that and your process of writing this book and how you got this done and and why now? Why did you decide to write it at this time?

[6:29]Meredith Turits: So I had been working on a book for ten years before this, and we finally went out with it and got this close to selling it and then did not. And it was devastating. It was, you know, I put my heart and soul into this book. This was a story I had to tell, and all of a sudden, it wasn't out there like we thought it might be. And so I thought about what was next. And while I was thinking, I had this story that I just sort of started casually writing, and all of a sudden, it just took over. It was the only thing I can think about. And my writing process is very absorptive. It's pretty manic. I don't sleep when I'm writing. And I just got into this groove that I never had with the book before. And the draft came together in six months, which is just like mind blowing considering it took me ten years to get the other one together. So I had a draft in six months, I sent it to my agent, but at the same time, I got into the Yale Writers Workshop, which is a week of really intense work on the Yale campus, which I'm about forty five minutes from. And I had, you know, 10 people introduced to this character that no one had met before. And it was just so interesting to see them latch onto her and understand her immediately. And I was like, oh, I have something here that I just didn't have with the first book. Wait. So what was the first book about? The first book was about a very rough marriage. It was a woman who was about ten years younger than, a man she'd met, and he kind of brought her into this life that she really didn't want to live. She wanted to live in the city and, you know, do young people things. And he was set on, you know, working in finance in the suburbs, having a family, and she found herself really suffocated by this marriage that became abusive. You know, and it was tough to swallow. And, you know, the market was not super looking for stories that were suffocating and emotional and in ways abusive, especially right after COVID, you know, and so it's definitely not the market forces. Like I stumbled over the book a lot, you can tell them the pros when you go back to it, but it wasn't the right fit for me, it wasn't the right fit for the market. And then all of a sudden I had this new book, this new idea that I didn't even know would be a book, and just everything about it clicked in terms of timing and my writing and my process and the market, and it just ended up where it needed to be. That's amazing.

[8:47]Zibby Owens: Yeah. I mean, I know everybody has a novel in a drawer, but, like, my novel in a drawer was like that represented so much pain. Know? It's not just like an inanimate object. It's like, oh, there were look at all those hours that are now just, like, on these pages in my cabinet. Do know what mean? Like, that was so much time, but you could never have written the next book had you not written the first book. So I try to remind myself of that, and I'm sure you do as well. Like, it all works out if but, you know, sometimes it does. And

[9:17]Meredith Turits: I really believe in that. You know, that book, I rewrote from scratch eight times. My husband was is just like, you just keep throwing it out and writing it from scratch. Like, why don't you edit it? And I was like, Nope, that's just what I'm doing. And I must have written hundreds of thousands of words. And even actually before, you know, the new project I'm working on, I wrote 200 pages of a new book. And I sent it to my agent, and she was like, this is great. It's not your book. And I had kinda I plucked two characters from that, you know, 100,000 words that I had written, and they're the you know, I I learned about them through that draft, and now I have a a fun draft I'm working on, and I think you never throw out words. Mhmm. They just live in you kind of a different way even if they don't live between the covers of a book. Right? Yeah. Although I'm always like, well, is there anything I could cut and paste to just, like, speed this next draft along?

[10:12]Zibby Owens: Even a scene, even, like, five lines of dialogue. And then I'll spend so much more time looking for a discarded five lines of dialogue that I could have just, like, easily rewritten it. But it's like it's like the, you know, the principle of the thing.

[10:25]Meredith Turits: But that's fair too because it's like, if you write a line that sticks with you, like, maybe it does belong in the new draft. Right? You know, you are like, oh, that's the distillation of the feeling that I want on the page. And maybe it's in a different context, maybe a different character is saying it, but like, if nothing rings true to you, like, put it back on the page and see if it fits, you know? Yeah.

[10:47]Zibby Owens: So what did you want to be when you grew up, when you were young? Did you always want to be a writer? Like, where how did your life path take you here?

[10:55]Meredith Turits: I think I I was not one of those children who was like doctor, lawyer, astronaut. I was just always a writer. And I think as you kind of go through life and you figure out, like, hey, that can be a career, I just kind of started following that path. I'm a journalist by trade. I started in digital journalism, in women's magazines, like Glamour. I founded a website called Bustle. And now I am in sports business journalists journalism. And I think what's been cool is that from a path perspective, I was able to just learn about myself through writing, and that was the right path for me, whether it was fiction or whether it's, you know, writing about hockey, which is what I do to pay the bills.

[11:40]Zibby Owens: So you founded Bustle, like, the bustle? Bustle mediocre Oh

[11:44]Meredith Turits: my gosh. That's amazing. It started in my studio apartment, basically. It was a lot of right place, right time, fifth employee, first editorial hire. And I just remember sitting in my studio apartment in Park Slope, like, the router because there were way too many. There were, like, five of us trying to, like, build a website on it. You know? And I stepped back, and I'm like, oh, that was that was really cool to be a part of. Wow. That's amazing. I mean, it's grown so much and to be at the beginning and shaping

[12:14]Zibby Owens: the content site like that. That's really awesome. Wow. Thank you. Yeah. Very cool. Today's episode is sponsored by Quince. Summer always makes me rethink what I'm reaching for every day. Lighter fabrics, better materials, pieces that just feel good the moment you put them on and look effortless. That's why I keep coming back to Quince. They focus on high quality essentials. Think breathable linen, soft organic cotton, washable silk, but without the luxury markup. It's that rare balance where everything feels elevated, but still easy. Quince has beautiful everyday pieces like 100% European linen pants, dresses, and tops with styles starting at $32. Their denim is soft and easy to wear. I wear my jean jacket all the time. And their organic cotton sweaters are perfect for layering on cool summer nights. Everything at Quince is priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. Quince works directly with ethical factories and cuts out the middlemen, so you're paying for quality, not brand markup. And it's not just clothing. Quince has really become a destination for elevated essentials across home, kitchen, bedding, and beyond, making it easy to bring a more premium feel into everyday life. In addition to my jean jacket, I recently got a white tank top dress with a beautiful cotton skirt that is absolutely gorgeous, and I can't wait for it to be warm enough so I can wear it every day, but it has been a cool spring. Elevate your summer wardrobe. Go to quince.com/zippy for free shipping on your order and 365 returns. Now available in Canada too. That's quince.com/zippy for free shipping and three hundred and sixty five day returns. Quince.com/zippy. I'm hoping that you didn't have a boss like well, you were kind of the boss at the time, but have you had these types of experience or are you drawing more from the Me Too movement in general? Not that it was that because it was consensual, but I don't know, blah blah blah. Anyway.

[14:13]Meredith Turits: I think desire is just what I wanted to mine. And I, you know, I think in college it was, had this, like, weird emotional something or other with a man who was fourteen years older than me, and it never went anywhere, but it taught me a lot about desire and kind of things you shouldn't have and how this like incredible feeling that burns is compatible and incompatible with, you know, something that that is just not gonna pan out. And I think it was really interesting to kind of pop inside Ari's head and be like, well, what if it did happen? And what does permission look like? And what does longing look like? And how can and can't it live in your life? Kind of want to know more about what happens to Morgan after the book.

[15:01]Zibby Owens: Me too. Did his story end up?

[15:07]Meredith Turits: So the funny thing about Morgan is I was most comfortable inside his voice of the four voices. And he has the fewest pages. He only has two sections. And I just spend so much time with him in my head still in the post publication process, because I love him, I connect to him, and I just didn't get the chance to explore. So, you know, for me, I think it's really important that readers take what they take from the end, you know, including the path of Morgan. But, like, I have the same questions. I really wanna know what happens to him too. I think it was, like, the cocoa puffs that endeared me to him.

[15:46]Zibby Owens: Like and how he was embarrassed to eat them in front of his friends. I mean, that's that's sweet too. I don't know. Very funny. Yeah. Oh my gosh. And I also, you know, when she I don't think this is too much of a spoiler, but I mean, I don't think it is. But when Ari goes to Morgan's mom, Kathy's, funeral, and, you know, she can barely stand seeing Morgan so upset, and she ends up leaving without saying anything or, you know, that wanting to do right again and not knowing the right thing and not even sometimes being able to do the right thing or, you know, socially appropriate or whatever. That moment and also the loss of someone who was so important to her in her own life too, I felt like was such a poignant scene. Thank you. And it's funny because I rewrote that a lot. You did? One of the things yeah. One of the things that Carmen pointed out, I'm trying to think, she never went to the funeral in the first draft, in the draft that sold to Carmen. And she was like, that's not Ari.

[16:47]Meredith Turits: She wouldn't do that. And, a reader wouldn't believe that she would do that. And I was like, I think you're right. And I think, you know, Kathy was a mother figure to her. Her home life was bad, her mother was so distant from her, she's not even named in the book, you don't even know what her name is. And I think thinking about, you know, this idea of what is right and doing as little harm as possible and, you know, balancing sort of how you hurt or do not hurt others while taking care of yourself. That moment was really interesting to me because she was there as much as she could be, You know? And it really felt more like Ari to do that instead of having her not show up. Right? Yes.

[17:31]Zibby Owens: I also felt the pain of her broken ankle and the surgery needed and that whole mess very acutely as well. And honestly, the future sort of medical related stuff, which I won't go into, you know, but all of that felt so moving and real, and you could, like, feel all that pain as well.

[17:53]Meredith Turits: Thank you. It's funny. Funny, I guess. It is what it is. But my mother, fell down our front steps on Christmas Eve Oh, no. A couple years ago, and she broke her ankle. And I was like, I guess I'm gonna take this because I knew all the details of healing and all that. And it's funny because she is one of my earliest readers. She always is. And I was like, there's gonna be something in here that's like a little familiar to you. And she got there and she's like, are you kidding? So, and that was taken from personal experience. Then I had an absolutely wonderful friend named Jinsi Thankachan, who is a cardiologist. She literally works with heart transplants. She's just like this incredible human being who actually read an early draft to make sure that, you know, the medical stuff was believable. And even, you know, Luke and Summer as doctors, you know, that that fell into place. I think I'm so fortunate to have these readers who are invested in drafts before they even, you know, become books.

[18:55]Zibby Owens: Yeah. That's smart. I know you mentioned Luca. He's like on his feet ten hours a day or something like that. It's like, I'm just thinking, wow. Like, it's not enough that they're geniuses. Right? They also have to, like, I don't even stand up. I haven't stood up in hours.

[19:11]Meredith Turits: My husband made me a, like, hacked together this standing desk for me. He, like, bought a standing desk and kind of adhered it to my regular desk. And he was like, you are in front of the computer all the time. Like, when I am not writing for my job, I'm writing fiction. And he was just like, you have to stand up. Yeah. It's so true. I mean, a bit I'm like, my knees are cracking. I feel like I'm much, much older than you, but, like, I feel like I'm now like,

[19:36]Zibby Owens: the the the creaks and crags. This is not good. Not good at all. So wait. Tell me a little more about your day job and the type of writing or editing and all of that that you have to do, and how does that type of journalism inform narrative fiction?

[19:52]Meredith Turits: So I currently am in sports business. So basically, that's looking at, like, not like reporting on the score of the game. It's sort of like, what is the sports doing to grow? Or what were the ratings? Or who's hosting what? And so it's a really, really different part of my brain. And I think I have always considered journalism as a different part of my brain. I've kind of gone in and out of writing journalism versus editing journalism. And I think it's interesting because I think a lot of people are like, Oh, you're constantly writing isn't exhausting. And for me, they've just never been the same thing. It's just, you know, part of your brain A and you turn off the journalism when you want to go to part of your brain B. You know, that said, anything you put on the page, anytime you spend time with your writing or even anybody else's writing, you're constantly learning. So, you know, even if I think from a compositional perspective, they are two totally different worlds, just that that muscle and kind of how I was talking about, like, you never actually, like, throwing out words. It just builds and builds and builds.

[20:51]Zibby Owens: Did you have someone in mind? Like, was there a visual for you for some of these characters, like actors or actresses? Like, I'm thinking in particular of Leah and, you know, what it is to be this, like, jilted wife, but she doesn't feel like some sort of dowdy wife that you would think of in, like, old, you know, eighties literature or something like that. You know what I mean? Like,

[21:14]Meredith Turits: hot wife has got a Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. That's that's I guess I could have just said that. It's funny because I am not a real, like, film watcher. Like, I watch television, but everyone actually makes fun of me that they're like, oh, you've seen, like, you know, insert classic movie here that literally every human has seen. And I'm just like, what's that? So so it's funny because, like, these characters have always just been very visual to me outside of kind of, you know, who people are on screen. You know, that said, I think of Wells as like a Theo James. I loved Light Lotus, of course, and a little obscure, but Search Party. Of course, I can't think of the name of the extremely tall blonde character, but, like, that that was Luke. And it's interesting because they are a lot more visual to me in terms of, like, somebody tangible in the outside world than the women. The women just, like, are fully formed to me, and they just are their own people, which is interesting.

[22:12]Zibby Owens: Wow. Yeah. I feel like I always have to have some sort of general reference point to describe someone. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. So what advice do you have for aspiring authors? I think

[22:25]Meredith Turits: it's important to examine the feeling inside yourself as you're writing. The best writing advice I ever got was from Meg Wolitzer, who a billion years I interviewed her for a publication called Book Slut that doesn't exist anymore. And we were just kind of casually talking. And one thing she said to me, and this feels so obvious, but she said to me, if you are reading back your work and you skip something on the page, whether you're like, Oh, I've read this a million times, or, you know, I know how the scene works or whatever. If you physically skip something on the page, the reader is gonna do it too. So I think that's a really important thing to think about. And, you know, I think about the ten years that it took me to struggle on that first novel, right? And something just like, was off and I had all these questions and I didn't know how to solve them. And then this thing came together in six months, and I just was like, Oh, there's a different feeling in me. And as I'm working on this new draft, the reason I think it's gonna work is because there's that same, you know, manic desire to write and continue to be in that world and tell tell that story that I had with Just Want You Here. And it's not just about production. It's about how you listen to yourself during the writing process. And you have to be really honest with yourself if something just doesn't work.

[23:40]Zibby Owens: Yes. Good advice. Very good. Have you read anything that you love or are there books that are some of your favorites or just recent reads that you could recommend?

[23:50]Meredith Turits: So the best book I have read in eons, is Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. You know, just this masterful book that touches every literary device and every voice and, you know, I actually didn't pick it up at first because I was like, video games, not my bat and ball. And everyone was like, take it, pick it up. It's about relationships. And it was. So I feel, you know, grateful to have picked up that book. I love that sort of like, sad millennial women canon. You know, so I've read a ton of Sally Rooney and Nisa Dolan. She gets a lot more kudos for exciting times, but I loved The Happy Couple, which I read recently, and Megan Nolan also. I think there's a lot to learn from those books if you are a writer who writes a lot of interiority, you know, a woman kind of at a turning point because those, like, sort of girl walks around books can get really suffocating. So you can learn a lot from how to make people care about a character even if not a lot happens.

[24:54]Zibby Owens: Love that. That's really funny how you said sad millennial characters. I feel like I might need to make that a shelf in my bookstore. That's really funny.

[25:04]Meredith Turits: And it's funny because so much of it is, like, Irish and British writing. And, like, obviously, there's a lot of, like, sad girl walks around books, you know, here. But I just

[25:13]Zibby Owens: I don't know. There's something about it. Would sorrow and bliss fall in that category? Have you read that?

[25:18]Meredith Turits: Uh-uh. No? Okay. I don't know. Maybe that's maybe she's too old. I don't know. Now I'm gonna think about who I would put in that category. That's funny. I mean, the other two books by American authors that I've read during this process that I think really helped me were All This Can Be Different by Sara Thakan Matthews. I thought that was beautifully done. It's just a look of like, what am I doing with myself? And I loved Acts of Service by Lillian Fishman, which I think should get way more kudos than it does because as you're thinking about desire and interiority, that book just knocked it out of the park. So I think those kinds of books really appeal to me. You know, I've read different kind of stuff. I just read Madwoman by Chelsea Beaker, which I love. Yeah, that was The Wedding People. Not read something so funny in such Me a long too. Love. Yeah. But you think about kind of the books that, like, inform your own writing, and you're just like, oh, there's definitely a theme. Mhmm. I love that. Thank you. Good recommendations.

[26:12]Zibby Owens: Well, Meredith, it was lovely to meet you. Thank you for coming on, and congratulations on just letting you here. Congrats. Thank you. I really, really appreciate it. Okay. Alright. Take care. Bye. Thank you for listening to Totally Booked with Zibby, formerly moms don't have time to read books. If you loved the show, tell a friend, leave a review, follow me on Instagram at Zippy Owens, and spread the word. Thanks so much. Oh, and buy the books.