Raegan Revord, RULES FOR FAKE GIRLFRIENDS
[0:00]Hi, this is Zibi Owens, and you're listening to Totally Book to Zibi.
[0:06]Formerly, moms don't have time to read books.
[0:08]In my daily show, I interview today's latest, best-selling, buzziest, or underrated authors
[0:14]and story creators, whose work I think is worth your time.
[0:18]As a bookstore owner, publisher, author, and obviously a podcaster, I get a comprehensive
[0:24]look at everything that's coming up, and spend my time curating the best books, so you
[0:29]you don't have to.
[0:30]Stay in the know, get insider insights, and connect with guests, like I do, every single
[0:35]day.
[0:36]For more information, go to zibimedia.com and follow me on Instagram at zibi Owens.
[0:44]Reagan Revered is the author of Rules for Fake Girlfriends.
[0:49]Reagan is an actor, author, producer, and philanthropist, with nearly 8 million followers
[0:54]across social media.
[0:55]Reagan starred for seven seasons in the CBS hit series Young Sheldon, and it's
[1:01]been off Georgie and Mandy's first marriage, in the breakthrough role of Missy Cooper,
[1:06]a dedicated writer and avid reader, Reagan launched a hugely popular online book club at
[1:11]Read With Reagan in 2022.
[1:14]More than just a space for book discussions and author interviews, the book club fosters
[1:18]a dedicated community where young adults can cultivate a love of reading through monthly
[1:23]YA book selections.
[1:25]Reagan was also recently selected to be a member of the 2024-25 Hello Sunshine Collective,
[1:31]an initiative designed to empower and amplify game changers who share Hello Sunshine's
[1:35]mission to revolutionize the narrative for women.
[1:39]Reagan's philanthropic endeavors include creating homeless helpers, a local initiative aimed
[1:43]at providing small care packages, and necessary items for those who are currently without
[1:48]homes.
[1:49]She is a passionate and outspoken advocate for rescuing animals, and is a junior ambassador
[1:54]for children's hospital Los Angeles.
[1:56]A San Diego native, Reagan now lives in Los Angeles with five rescue pets.
[2:01]Welcome Reagan.
[2:02]Thank you so much for coming on totally booked to talk about rules for fake girlfriends.
[2:06]Congratulations.
[2:07]Thank you.
[2:08]Thank you so much for having me.
[2:09]I'm so excited.
[2:10]It's my pleasure.
[2:11]And your book was so good.
[2:13]There was so much soul to it, and like loss, and love, and parents, and families, and
[2:19]friendships, and you got everything in.
[2:22]And also the cleverness of the titles, and the book within a book situation with them.
[2:27]But the writing about it, I was actually quite blown away.
[2:31]I didn't know what I was expecting, but I was totally blown away.
[2:34]Thank you.
[2:35]You.
[2:36]I'm so glad you enjoyed it.
[2:37]I love whenever I'm such like a found family person, especially with that trope.
[2:42]And so anytime anyone mentions it, I'm like, yes, yes, you get it.
[2:46]Oh, it's really great.
[2:48]Well, okay, why don't you tell listeners what the book is about?
[2:51]So the book is about a young college age girl named Avery.
[2:56]And after Avery's mom passes away, Avery gets a scavenger hunt clue from her mom's will,
[3:03]which sends her to England, where on the train to her new college, she meets Charlie,
[3:09]who agrees to help Avery complete the scavenger hunt if Avery fake dates,
[3:14]Charlie to get her ex back.
[3:17]And it's sad and happy and it has a little bit of mystery in it.
[3:21]And yeah, it's just a fun, like feel good, a little bit of sadness, romcom.
[3:27]It's more than that.
[3:28]I think it's more, I'm going to beg to differ on this one.
[3:32]But yes, there's romcom elements, of course, obviously, with the fake relationship and
[3:37]everything.
[3:38]But I really feel like this is a story about a girl in her search for her mom.
[3:43]And to reclaim what's lost, and obviously there's so much else.
[3:47]But I don't know.
[3:48]Maybe that's just the piece that like really got me.
[3:51]No, I had so much fun writing that because the whole, the main reason Avery leaves
[3:57]and like, abandons her life playing and goes to England is because her mom sent her there.
[4:04]That's where her mom grew up.
[4:06]And so like with Avery walking around Brighton and seeing the streets that her mom walked
[4:12]down in the coffee shops, her mom hung out with friends and like, it really does help
[4:17]her connect with a mom that she never really understood.
[4:20]And that was always, I feel like I would have those revelations with Avery, whatever.
[4:26]I would be writing and I would forget kind of like, oh, this is where how I grew up.
[4:31]And then I would think and I'd be like, wait a minute, like this is where she went to school.
[4:36]Like she also probably sat in these like greens and this like courtyard and hung out with
[4:41]her friends and Avery would also have those revelations.
[4:45]And so I feel like we were kind of like remembering and realizing that together, which
[4:50]was really interesting to experience.
[4:52]Yeah, it's so crazy thinking about how you, what if it, what if you were like the same
[4:56]age as your mom kind of thing.
[4:58]And I feel like when towards the end when she found, and I won't give anything away of course,
[5:02]but she found this one photo of her mom exactly her age from the lens of her dad, which
[5:08]was just like, I mean, it's just, indeed, it's like you finally can see your parents
[5:14]as people at, yes, these certain glimpses.
[5:17]But Reagan like, where did all the sadness come from?
[5:20]Where did this loss come from?
[5:22]It feels like you've totally like gotten the plot of life yourself.
[5:25]Where is, where is it from?
[5:27]I mean, how you said the plot of life, like that is what life is like.
[5:32]There's happy moments, there's sad moments, there's in between moments.
[5:37]And even though I was writing a rom-com, which is like a rom-com is technically very
[5:43]like happy and like cupcakes and rainbows, I didn't want it to just be that because that's
[5:49]not how life is.
[5:51]And so even though Avery is experiencing this really amazing, exciting thing, and
[5:56]for her first time too, which brings about whole other complicated emotions, it's also
[6:02]she's still grieving her mom, she's grieving her like growing up, she's moved to a new
[6:10]country on her own and she's grieving like her whole life plan that she thought and trying
[6:17]to figure out this whole new kind of path she's on.
[6:22]And so I really wanted to portray that because it is how life is, there's always different
[6:27]things going on.
[6:28]They're feeling different emotions and I've never experienced loss like Avery has.
[6:33]I thankfully have both of my parents with me.
[6:37]And so I've never known loss on that level, but as humans do, you lose childhood pets,
[6:45]you lose family members.
[6:48]And so I do know like while one thing may be happening, another sadder thing can be going
[6:54]on in the background even.
[6:57]So even though it's been months since Avery lost her mom, that's still always kind of
[7:02]in the background.
[7:04]And whenever she's realizing that this is where her mom lived to that kind of realization
[7:10]brings that grief to the forefront sometimes.
[7:12]Well, I feel like your ability to tap into grief, dovetails with your being an actor at
[7:19]the same time.
[7:20]I don't you have to just tap into all of that to even things that you haven't experienced
[7:25]to be able to portray something and like, yeah, were you an empath from day one?
[7:30]Where did this all come from?
[7:33]I, so with playing sad roles or like acting sad situations, what I always do is I, especially
[7:42]if it's something that like hasn't actually happened to me, like for example, at the
[7:46]end of the show, but I was on for so long, we were so close to all the cast and crew and
[7:53]the characters and everything.
[7:55]And spoiler alert, the dad dies at the end and like the urge to last episode.
[8:02]And like I said, I have my dad and so I never really experienced that.
[8:06]But on top of the show ending, which was so like sad because I grew up there, I also would
[8:14]pull from like sad situations that I've experienced to kind of compile all of that to the
[8:20]grief that you see in the episode.
[8:23]And I also used the show ending because that is a loss in itself.
[8:27]It is mourning something.
[8:30]And so I kind of used that loss to portray the sadness for losing the dad.
[8:38]And so that is kind of what I did for the book as well writing.
[8:41]I would kind of use that technique that I learned in acting and apply it when I was writing.
[8:47]I would be like, this is how I felt in this specific situation.
[8:51]I can use that to help Avery, to help portray Avery's grief in this situation.
[8:58]Well, anytime, as you said, something not going the way you thought grieving and alternate
[9:03]ending, it can be a show.
[9:05]It can be anything.
[9:06]It can, you know, all of us feel so deeply and you really got all of that in here in such
[9:11]a good way.
[9:13]Talk about reading to write a book like this and to pick up on everything in such detail.
[9:21]You have to be, you can't just say you like books.
[9:23]Like you obviously have to read a lot of books.
[9:25]And obviously you have read a dragon and all of that.
[9:28]When did you fall in love with reading and what is your relationship to books and just tell
[9:32]me about your whole reading life?
[9:34]I literally always have a book with me.
[9:36]I'm traveling right now.
[9:37]So I'm in a hotel.
[9:38]And my computer is literally on like five books right now.
[9:41]So it's raised up.
[9:42]I always have books with me ever since I was little.
[9:46]I would constantly have a book in my arm, in my bag, anything.
[9:51]I have a lot of like librarians and teachers in my family.
[9:55]So like reading and just like literature in general was always.
[10:00]such a, at the forefront of my life.
[10:03]I like to joke.
[10:04]I literally was brought home from the house,
[10:06]but when I was born with a book in my hand,
[10:08]and I haven't like, I have one sense.
[10:10]I, I think my main thing that made me love reading
[10:15]was the book series, Aragon, which like that,
[10:20]let's like, I think it was like six or seven-year-old me
[10:22]just devoured that book.
[10:24]And then as many people can relate to Harry Potter
[10:28]was also such a big thing for me.
[10:30]Still is.
[10:31]I was literally watching one of the movies last night.
[10:33]And I've just grown up reading.
[10:36]It's always been such a big thing.
[10:38]I got banned from my school library
[10:40]because I would be in there too much reading
[10:42]instead of socializing.
[10:44]And so I would be in there during lunch and recess,
[10:46]and I got banned from the library.
[10:48]It was one of the worst moments of my life.
[10:50]I am so sorry.
[10:51]I was patient from.
[10:52]And then I found out,
[10:54]I found out like three years ago it was actually my mom.
[10:56]Who did that?
[10:57]I was so mad at the school for so long and blamed them.
[11:01]And then I found out it was actually my mom.
[11:03]My mom was like, you need to be around kids.
[11:06]And so my mom was like, hey, you can't let Reagan go
[11:08]to the library anymore.
[11:10]So I got banned.
[11:10]And then I found out it wasn't the school
[11:12]and they were wrongly accused for so long.
[11:15]But wait, how did you feel?
[11:16]Did you get into it with your mom about it then?
[11:18]I would have been so mad at my mom then.
[11:21]I was like, I feel like it had been
[11:23]because this was like three years ago.
[11:24]And I got banned from the library.
[11:27]Whenever I was probably like seven.
[11:31]And so it'd been almost like 10 years.
[11:34]No, no, like seven years probably.
[11:38]And I felt like it had enough distance
[11:41]that I was like, I'm not gonna be so mad at you.
[11:43]But like, I still can't believe you would do this to me.
[11:46]Yeah.
[11:47]When she's also such a big reader too,
[11:48]so I was kind of shocked.
[11:50]Like you, no, this is hypocritical is what it is.
[11:54]But so like I've just even not,
[11:56]you could tell I've always been reading.
[11:57]And then right before, I think of probably 2019,
[12:01]I started my own book club.
[12:04]And I've always been asked like,
[12:06]because I've always been telling people
[12:08]how big of a reader I am.
[12:10]And I've always been asked,
[12:11]what book are you reading right now?
[12:12]Is there anything you would recommend?
[12:14]And I always wanted to share my love of reading.
[12:17]I always have.
[12:19]I always want to show people why I love it so much
[12:21]and why stories are so important.
[12:24]And so I started posting a monthly book
[12:27]on my book club or on my Instagram,
[12:30]just like the Reagan one.
[12:32]And then in 2022, I think it was around that time.
[12:37]I started my own reader, Reagan and socials.
[12:40]And then it's just grown so much.
[12:43]It's so crazy to me.
[12:44]I've had people now come up to me like just in the streets
[12:48]and be like, I love your book club.
[12:50]The book you recommend, it is now like one of my favorite books.
[12:53]And that's so insane to me because I like little nine year old
[12:59]me or whatnot.
[12:59]No, like 10 year old me probably never thought
[13:03]this is what it was going to turn into.
[13:06]And I'm so insanely grateful.
[13:08]And I just love having such a good community of readers
[13:13]and just sharing literature is sharing stories
[13:17]and how important they are is like my life goal.
[13:20]I feel like and to be able to contribute a little bit
[13:24]of why someone might have a favorite book is so cool to me.
[13:27]This is like music to my ears.
[13:29]I feel like this is why I do everything that I do.
[13:32]And when someone says I wouldn't have read that aside
[13:34]for me, like if you hadn't recommended it,
[13:36]I wouldn't have read it.
[13:38]Yes, that's the best.
[13:39]It's the best.
[13:40]It really is the best.
[13:41]I was literally talking to a friend the other day.
[13:43]I was over at her apartment and shared a book
[13:46]on her like coffee table or whatever.
[13:47]And I was like, oh my god, I didn't know that book.
[13:49]And she was like, yeah, I'm reading it
[13:51]because I saw it on your book club.
[13:52]And I was like, you are like, it's so crazy to like see it
[13:57]like in the wild, I guess.
[13:58]And not just like someone commenting being like,
[14:01]oh my god, I read this because you recommended it
[14:03]like seeing that the person actually got the book
[14:05]and is reading it is so insane to me.
[14:07]But like, so cool.
[14:09]So how do you pick which books to recommend?
[14:11]Because I have trouble with that too.
[14:12]I'm like, I like all these books and like, but which one?
[14:15]Which one would they like?
[14:16]Which one, you know, for what reason?
[14:18]I always have such trouble as well picking whatever I'm reading.
[14:22]I, cause I read so many books in a month that it's not like,
[14:26]oh, I read one book.
[14:28]I could pick that book.
[14:29]There's too many.
[14:30]I'm also a re-reader.
[14:32]I am such a bad re-reader.
[14:33]And this is why I have so many books because I can't get rid
[14:36]of them.
[14:37]Yeah, I can't.
[14:38]I re-read them.
[14:39]And so I can't get rid of them.
[14:42]But I normally pick books that I just really enjoyed,
[14:46]that I found like have a good message.
[14:48]And then also if it's like Pride Month or Black History Month,
[14:51]then I'll pick a book that relates to that month.
[14:54]But also still has really good story, really good message.
[14:57]I read probably any genre.
[15:00]I always say I'll give a book a first chance.
[15:02]I will read anything that is put in front of me.
[15:05]So my book club isn't one specific genre.
[15:08]It's YA, but like that's really like the limitations.
[15:11]I will read anything.
[15:12]I will recommend anything.
[15:14]I read how I write, which is really anything.
[15:18]I do have a love for fantasy.
[15:20]I feel like fantasy, but I'm calm and mystery.
[15:22]I like my top three.
[15:23]Like I'm a good murder mystery, which is probably reflected
[15:26]in the book club.
[15:27]If you go back and look, probably in there a lot.
[15:30]But yeah, picking the book of the month is so difficult.
[15:33]I found like a little loophole where it's like,
[15:36]if you liked white lotus, then read these books.
[15:39]So I can like recommend more books
[15:41]because I can't pick just one.
[15:43]It's so difficult.
[15:45]I like that.
[15:46]That's kind of my little like loopholes.
[15:48]Like, but there's these other books to runner runners up.
[15:52]Okay, I might have to steal that as a, as a tactic.
[15:58]So young you is this huge reader.
[16:02]That's all you want to do.
[16:03]And yet you end up on young Sheldon for like your whole childhood.
[16:07]How did that happen?
[16:08]And how do you feel about how that all unfolded?
[16:12]It was completely by accident that I even started acting.
[16:16]My mom had a friend, who had a friend, who ran an agency.
[16:20]And that friend was like, can I represent Rayan?
[16:23]And we had no idea like what that meant.
[16:26]We had no idea anything about the acting world.
[16:29]We were like, yes, sure, this would be a fun hobby.
[16:32]It'll last like a year.
[16:34]I was four years old.
[16:35]Did not last a year.
[16:37]I'm now 17, been doing this all my life.
[16:40]But yeah, it was completely by accident.
[16:43]It entirely snowballed.
[16:44]I got like a commercial and I saw the commercial.
[16:48]Probably when I was like around like six, like five or six.
[16:51]And I was like, I love this so much.
[16:53]I want to like, I want to be in like movies.
[16:55]I loved being on set.
[16:57]I crave being on a set.
[16:58]It's my favorite thing.
[17:00]I did, I think the first time I really realized
[17:04]how much I loved it was I was on modern family.
[17:07]And I was on it like a good few times.
[17:10]And I didn't have to audition every time I went back on.
[17:14]And I loved that because I'm not a big fan of auditioning.
[17:16]Like I said, I love being on the set.
[17:18]And so I loved that.
[17:20]And I told my mom, I didn't know what it was called,
[17:22]which I now know it's a series regular.
[17:25]But I said, I want to be on set every day
[17:27]and not have to audition.
[17:28]That's what I told my mom.
[17:30]And then a few years later, I auditioned for young Sheldon.
[17:33]And I just remember being so obsessed with Missy.
[17:37]I, it was during when we had a thing called pilot season
[17:41]when a bunch of shows are basically auditioning
[17:44]and they're starting and they have their first episode.
[17:47]And that's whenever all those shows are auditioning
[17:49]in those few months.
[17:50]And I was doing that.
[17:52]And I had so many different like new shows and stuff
[17:56]that I fixated on Missy.
[17:57]And I kept asking my mom and my agents.
[17:59]I was like, have you heard anything about this?
[18:02]Like I need to know.
[18:04]I was so like I loved it so much.
[18:06]And then I got the role.
[18:08]And then eight years later, here we are.
[18:12]And the show ended a year ago.
[18:15]Like I think it was a year in April.
[18:17]And it's so crazy to look back on like nine, eight-year-old me,
[18:23]like not knowing what we were getting into.
[18:26]It's so funny because Annie Pots, who plays my grandma,
[18:29]always said, like whenever we started the show,
[18:32]I was on set and looking around.
[18:34]And I knew this was going to be great.
[18:36]But little, little me had no idea.
[18:39]And I was just so excited to be there.
[18:41]And I had no idea what it meant.
[18:43]And now like older me is like, oh my God, like,
[18:47]like a holy little me knew, because it's so cool.
[18:49]It's so crazy.
[18:50]And I'm like so grateful for it.
[18:52]I did not ask answer your question about-
[18:54]No, no, no, no, it's so exciting.
[18:57]But I do think they're very similar
[18:59]in just the storytelling aspect,
[19:02]because even though one's paper and one's screen,
[19:05]it is very similar because you are communicating
[19:08]a different story that someone might not be able to
[19:12]have compassion for or to relate to.
[19:15]But then whenever you're reading or watching
[19:18]a piece of media, you can kind of step into those shoes
[19:22]and feel for a character
[19:25]and see whether it's across the continent
[19:29]or in a different world, in a different galaxy,
[19:32]you can kind of learn more and have more empathy.
[19:36]And so I think even if it's acting or writing,
[19:39]storytelling in that regard is very similar.
[19:41]And so that's why I have such a love for both.
[19:44]I get it.
[19:45]I love that.
[19:46]So I don't know if you've read Alison Stoner's upcoming book
[19:50]called semi-well-adjusted despite literally everything
[19:52]about growing up as a child start.
[19:55]And the structures that were in place
[19:57]and the lack of protections about child start
[19:59]is particularly similar.
[20:00]back in the day, sort of similar in the Jeanette McCurdy genre of I survived this. How do you feel
[20:06]looking back? Because now I'm like, well, I know what they did. I can do a little bit of go
[20:10]because she's much older than me. How do you feel like the industry treated you as a child? Although
[20:16]this is, of course, totally off topic of the book. But, you know, do you feel, because it seems like
[20:21]you've escaped completely intact. You're like completely like self-possessed and doing something
[20:28]so cool writing really good books, not just like fluffy, whatever, like books with soul. Like,
[20:34]how did you do that? And others didn't. And how did you find the whole experience?
[20:38]I just got, I got really lucky. Honestly, I had such a great experience on young Sheldon. My mom always
[20:47]says it takes a village to raise a kid. And my village was the casting crew of the show. I always
[20:54]have a second mom who played my mom or a second dad or an older brother to go to. And just
[21:01]everyone on that casting crew, I have so many ants and uncles now because that's just how they
[21:07]feel to me. And if my actual mom was ever busy and I couldn't go to her for advice, I had 200
[21:15]family members always on set that I could always go to and ask. I really just got so lucky.
[21:21]I know a lot of good actors don't have a good experience or as good of an experience as I did,
[21:29]but I do think they really prioritized our safety, especially the kids' safety. On the show,
[21:36]we were just allowed to be kids. We would have Halloween parties and we would play hide and seek
[21:42]and we would prank each other and we would play games. And it was always just such a fun experience.
[21:48]I said from the time I got the show to now that it never felt like going to work. It felt like
[21:54]coming home. So I never hated coming to set. I lived on that set. I would find reasons to stay
[22:03]after I'd finished working for the day. I would stay two hours after because I would just want to
[22:08]hang out. I loved being there. I love being there. And I'm so grateful that there's this spin-off now
[22:16]because I like to say it feels like going off to college and coming home for the weekend.
[22:22]I get to guest star on Montana show because it's a very similar crew, same cast. And it's coming home
[22:31]because I get to see my family again, even if it's been however many months. I just love them all so
[22:39]much and I miss them and I'm excited for the new season start because that means I can see them
[22:44]all again. I just went to Montana's wedding and I saw some of them and I was like I miss you guys
[22:49]so much. But yeah, I had the best possible experience and I just love everyone. They're so very
[22:57]much. If you could tell by how passionately I'm talking about this, it's very sweet. I love it.
[23:02]It's so nice. Okay. So on the writing side, what is the plan? How are you doing more of these?
[23:08]Are same genre? How did you do this? How long did it take? When did you know you were going to do
[23:14]this? My dream has always been to write a book ever since I knew how to write. I would write
[23:21]little books for my parents. I wrote like an American girl doll super power book during recess
[23:28]of one of my friends when I was in school. Whenever I was on set, I would write books and I would
[23:33]hand them out to people and be like hey this is the next book in the series. I've always been writing.
[23:39]Whenever I was 12, I got a book agent and that was whenever I was like I want to take this seriously.
[23:47]Like this is something I want to do and I have been working with him ever since. Before I started
[23:53]working on girls for fake girlfriends, I was working on a fantasy series that I still want to work
[23:59]on one day. There were some technical difficulties with it where I was going to take really long to
[24:06]fix something and I told my book agent I was like I might want to kind of switch gears and work on
[24:14]a different idea. And so I gave him an idea for a rom-com set in England and he was like I love this.
[24:21]Let's do this. And so we sent it out, sent it to McMillan which is the publisher I'm with,
[24:27]got with my editor and it took us probably around two years to I got with my editor July 2023
[24:38]so like around two years. Exactly. Actually that's crazy. And it's coming out in September and here
[24:44]we are which is insane. I wish I could tell like five year old me you did it like you have a book
[24:50]coming out but I yeah I want it I obviously want to keep writing books. I love acting but writing
[24:58]is my baby it's my dream and I have a book idea that I'm working on right now. I'm kind of revisiting
[25:06]the fantasy series that I abandoned. We're going to see how that works out. I was working on it
[25:11]when I was like 13 so there's things. I'm in a different like stage of my life where like
[25:17]the writing is younger, the story is younger. So I kind of want to transition it a bit to more
[25:23]like YA but yeah I could never stop writing. I fear if someone was like what do you give up?
[25:30]I was like oh they're this to me writing is my baby. I could never I love it so much so very much.
[25:36]What if somebody said you had to choose writing or acting? So my friends have asked me this before
[25:42]and I could not tell you. I do think if it was a life or death situation I would have to do writing.
[25:49]No one understands how much I love acting and how much I love being in that world and being on set
[25:55]but I say that whenever you're acting you get to bring to life a character and someone else's
[26:01]universe but whenever you're writing you get to create that universe and so there's more freedom
[26:07]to writing a book at least from my experience but I love both so much. It probably would have to
[26:14]be writing. Don't tell anyone I've ever acted with her. But it probably would have to be writing
[26:21]because it's just been my lifelong dream. It's amazing. Well you're really good at it and I'm
[26:27]excited for all the things to come. I am so much older than you. My twins are 18 so they're about
[26:33]your age and we by the way watched young Sheldon and watched her up and everything so anyway this is
[26:38]very very nice but I related to this book me like at my age and found so much in it that that's
[26:48]I mean that's hard to do right like I didn't read it like as if I was a kid. I'm like no no this is
[26:53]actually really getting me in the most emotional way possible. I mean I feel like the book at its
[27:01]core even though it is about like an 18 19 year old I feel like the book at its core is just about
[27:08]a person who's trying to find their place in the world and trying to figure out what she wants to do
[27:12]what she wants with her life and especially as a new college student that is kind of what
[27:19]going off to college is you figure out your path and if you're however old anyone can relate to
[27:27]that everyone I feel like at some point in their life is trying to figure out who they are you're
[27:31]always changing you're always evolving and I feel like anyone can relate to that so even if there
[27:36]are aspects or tropes or elements to the book that does make it seem like if you're reading it in
[27:44]your older and you're reading it and it's a teenager but there's elements to it that you can relate
[27:49]to which is what I really appreciate the book about the book because I love whenever I'm reading a book
[27:55]and anyone can relate to it and so I was like I want to write a book like that and I could
[28:01]do that I hope I did that this is like you have a new target audience because it's not just YA it's like
[28:07]people like me who are parents if it's going off to college it's the same thing we're just freaking
[28:11]out here so I also think anyone can read YA I know so many adults who are like I just read YA
[28:19]right YA is for anyone it is yeah it really is it's such a broad genre because it really does go from
[28:27]like around like 13 and like up anyone can really read YA and I know so many people who do well I
[28:37]think sometimes I think I mean I won't get into it but the whole category seems bizarre like
[28:40]catcher in the rye is what YA like no no it's not I mean I'm just saying if it came out today it's
[28:46]like yeah it would be like in a different section of the bookstore I don't know I I don't know
[28:52]but anyway all to say it's fabulous you're fabulous I really am rooting for you you're such a nice
[28:58]person and just someone else who loves books I feel like nobody could love books more than me
[29:04]and yet you do so I don't know I at least were tied I feel like maybe we're tied we look
[29:08]next to neck like we like yeah yeah I don't think however much you love a book shouldn't be a
[29:14]competition I just think if you love a book you love a book and if someone loves reading a lot
[29:20]then you're an amazing person yeah obviously I'm too competitive it's the problem I'm also really
[29:25]competitive don't worry I get it my mom and I are both so competitive we're both reading books
[29:31]right now and we're like who can finish it first yeah we're both very competitive I totally understand
[29:38]all right well thank you so much for all your time and again I'm just so excited for you
[29:43]thank you so much I appreciate it I was so lovely talking to you too I hope you stay in touch
[29:47]thank you okay take care bye you can bye thank you for listening to totally booked with
[29:53]Zibi formerly mom's don't have time to read books if you loved the show tell a friend leave
[30:00]Follow me on Instagram at zippyowans and spread the word.
[30:04]Thanks so much.
[30:05]Go and buy the books.
