Sara Seager, THE SMALLEST LIGHT IN THE UNIVERSE
[0:08]Hi, I'm Zibi Owens, and you're listening to the award-winning podcast, Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[0:13]Please sign up for my newsletter at zibiowens.com for weekly updates about my podcasts, events, and more.
[0:20]Also, follow me on Instagram at zibiowens and also at Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[0:26]And finally, join my virtual book club called Zibi's virtual book club, which meets every other Tuesday at 2 p.m.
[0:32]Eastern Time until 3 p.m. and features half an hour of book club discussion, followed by 30 minutes of Q&A with the author whose book we've just discussed.
[0:41]You can sign up on my website zibiowens.com under the virtual book club section or even on Instagram, under the link in my bio.
[0:49]I hope you'll find me in all these different channels and enjoy this podcast.
[0:53]Today's episode has been sponsored by SugarWish. SugarWish is an online gifting site that provides a delightful gift experience
[1:00]followed by delicious treats. They get to choose delivered directly to their dorm. Here's how it works.
[1:06]A SugarWish can be sent to anybody. So if you're the recipient, you open up an email and it says
[1:11]someone is sent you a SugarWish and you open it up, you click and it says pick any four of these
[1:16]delicious candies to fill your basket. So you get to look through everything from gummy worms and
[1:22]skittles and jelly beans and everything and you click and then check it out and it's sent to you
[1:30]in this beautiful box with all these candies inside and a ribbon and it's just beautifully packaged
[1:36]and sent right to your door and so somebody basically you get to customize your own gift and it's really
[1:42]awesome and I did this and I sent them to my son at boarding school and we got some here for Halloween
[1:47]and I highly highly recommend this company definitely go check it out sugarwish.com. Sarah Seeker
[1:55]is a Canadian American astronomer and planetary scientist. She's a professor at MIT known for her work
[2:01]on extracellular planets in their atmosphere. She's the author of two textbooks on these topics
[2:06]and has been recognized for her research by popular science discover magazine nature and time
[2:11]magazine. She was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 2013 citing her theoretical work on detecting
[2:17]chemical signatures on exoplanet atmospheres and developing low-cost space observatories to observe
[2:23]planetary trends. I really don't know what any of that means but obviously she's super impressive.
[2:27]A graduate of the University of Toronto with a PhD from Harvard. She is also the author of memoir
[2:34]the smallest lights in the universe memoir called a luminous memoir about how she had to reinvent
[2:41]herself in the wake of trout gd and discovered the power of connection on this planet as she
[2:46]searches our galaxy for another earth. Well welcome I'm so honored to be interviewing you today
[2:52]for moms don't have time to read books thanks so much for coming on. Thanks for having me.
[2:56]Yeah it's my pleasure. The smallest lights in the universe is perhaps one of my favorite books.
[3:01]I've read recently it is so good and the parallel lines of the basically the space race with your
[3:09]own grief are just it's just amazing so I just wanted to let you know how powerful I thought it was.
[3:15]Thank you I really appreciate that. So for listeners who don't know what the smallest
[3:19]lights in the universe is about would you mind telling them what it's about and then what
[3:23]inspired you to write this memoir? The smallest lights in the universe is about the journey of
[3:29]exploring outer space but also the journey of exploring inner space. By outer space I mean the stars
[3:37]and I hope you have a chance to look up at the dark night sky filled with stars because each
[3:43]one of those stars is a sun and we have evidence that each of them have planets. We're looking
[3:48]for another planet like earth one that might have life on it and the journey of inner space is
[3:56]by the way I just wanted to capture in the book that science is truly a journey of exploration
[4:01]just like the people who first went to the North Pole or to Antarctica and the South Pole
[4:06]we are trying to push the frontiers of exploration but you know all of us in our everyday life
[4:11]often eventually get to some kind of crisis and in my case this was a death in my nuclear family
[4:19]of my first husband and it was like falling it was like hiking in the outdoors and imagining
[4:26]falling off a cliff where at the bottom you're just broken and isolated and it feels like an
[4:34]incredible journey to have to make it back out of that lonely canyon and so in my book I
[4:40]interweave both of those stories and my goal is to just show people what science is like and
[4:47]how we can try to inspire ourselves to do big things. So you're one of the most
[4:53]preeminent astrophysicists and have just really blown the records off of so many things discovered
[5:00]new things achieved things throughout the course of your career. Now why am memoir too like why
[5:06]and when having read your story so I know how busy your life is when did you find time to do this?
[5:12]Well the whole thing started actually when my first husband died which I can talk about now without
[5:17]being really upset about it because it was almost a decade ago but when I was going through this
[5:22]journey like this incredible journey of inter exploration I just was like wow why haven't I
[5:28]I've read about this or seen about it and I was so lucky to meet another group of moms widows
[5:33]and I asked them like well aren't you writing a book about this because it seemed like something
[5:37]the world should know about so that was partly my motivation and yeah you know it's funny because
[5:43]they see busy people can get more done and at one time it's sort of like in my field people
[5:48]are allowed to take us a radical like every six years or so you take some time off your everyday
[5:53]busyness and repeatedly those folks get less done on their own personal private work so I did
[5:59]have to squeeze things in on like evenings and weekends and it was definitely tough
[6:03]well I'm very very impressed you're writing on grief would you mind if I just read you this
[6:09]excerpt and maybe you could comment on it because I just thought it has stayed with me so much
[6:14]you write everybody dies instantly it's the dying that happens either quickly or over a long period
[6:20]of time then you go on and you say I understand intellectually the need for the distinction between
[6:25]you know dying and the instantly but a car accident and cancer are two different strains of death
[6:30]it's the difference between dying as a whole all at once and dying piece by lost piece then you
[6:35]say either way the building and I'm jumping around two pages because it's also good either way
[6:39]the buildings end up gone but the way it vanishes isn't the same and we need a word to make clear
[6:44]the difference in process it still felt to me as though Mike died instantly yes we knew his death
[6:49]was coming we could get his affairs in order whatever hollow comfort that is supposed to bring
[6:53]as of the most important thing when you die is that you die with a tidy desk and then you say
[6:58]the dying time that Mike and I shared didn't make his death any less of a horror and it didn't make
[7:03]my loss feel any less sudden Mike took a breath and then he didn't he was alive and then he wasn't
[7:10]in one moment I was a wife in the next I was a widow that is so powerful that's amazing so
[7:18]thank you tell me a little more about about that difference and how it felt in that moment and
[7:24]and the distinction that people tend to make as if the dying slowly will somehow blunt the trauma
[7:31]of having someone you love suddenly die I know no I do feel like crying so I'm sorry okay well
[7:37]what happened was he was you know diagnosed with cancer and he became terminally ill pretty quickly
[7:43]because the chemo didn't work and he definitely went on this downward slide where eventually
[7:48]he was bedridden we wanted both wanted him to die at home so he had set up like a hospital bed
[7:53]and we had home hospice and it was all very helpful but he was just hanging on like there's
[8:00]like you wouldn't believe it and his home hospice nurse Jerry had explained to me like what would
[8:05]happen and what to look for and Jerry would come back like day after day week after week and go wow
[8:10]you know we haven't seen like a 40 year old man do this before it's only the 20 year old
[8:15]who have a brain tumor whose body is so strong they'll hang on so I took care of Mike and I was
[8:20]just kind of waiting for him to die because he was basically dead like he couldn't communicate and I
[8:25]was just taking care of him helping him on that like final journey and I honestly expected that
[8:31]I had come to terms with his death already because of those extended days and you know few weeks when
[8:37]he should have already been dead he was just hanging on somehow but then after he died you know except
[8:42]for like a short period of relief my life just fell apart I'm so sorry and I'm so sorry for your
[8:47]loss and it's such a it's such a gift for you to be sharing it in this way really but you know one
[8:53]thing that I tried to convey in the book I'm not wanting people to have a lot of this level
[8:58]but sometimes a catastrophe can lead to new beautiful things like think about this okay the
[9:05]like in the sort of spirit of mixing science with personal when the dinosaurs became extinct
[9:10]we think like a giant meteorite hit earth and just destroyed not only the dinosaurs life but lots
[9:16]of other species you know by creating just pure chaos in our atmosphere and enabling volcanoes
[9:22]to spew out ash and like everything became darker and probably a lot colder well because of the
[9:28]dinosaurs dying out new life could flourish including what led to us humans being able to rise on our
[9:34]planet and so although as sad as my loss was with Mike it definitely gave me new opportunities
[9:40]that's a very healthy way of looking at it you know it's also that there's the difference between
[9:45]what you know intellectually and then the feelings that you have when you're going through it I
[9:49]know it might lead to something good but in the moment you know as you so I just grabbed so well you
[9:55]know it's hard to internalize I'll just read one more quote on the grief you wrote the tears
[10:00]Brand down my face and steady streams.
[10:02]I knew intellectually that the widows were right.
[10:04]I needed to make forward progress.
[10:05]I couldn't spend the rest of my life drowning in grief.
[10:08]I had to kick my way back to shore.
[10:10]But when you lose someone,
[10:12]you don't lose them all at once.
[10:13]And their dying doesn't stop with their death.
[10:16]You lose them 1,000 times in 1,000 ways.
[10:18]You say 1,000 goodbyes.
[10:20]You hold 1,000 funerals.
[10:22]Oh, no, I'm crying.
[10:23]Oh, my gosh.
[10:24]Oh, this book.
[10:26]Tell me a little more about that passage.
[10:28]Well, as you go through grief and life starts to rebuild,
[10:32]there are sometimes constantly other times occasionally
[10:36]like striking reminders that you've lost your loved one.
[10:39]So you're sort of going along, you know,
[10:41]I was taking my kids somewhere to stay overnight,
[10:44]still really depressed and back then.
[10:46]And just seeing like the happy families,
[10:48]or you know, going to take my two boys to soccer,
[10:50]where it's all coached by mostly soccer dads
[10:53]and just seeing all these healthy dads
[10:55]like supporting the boys,
[10:57]you just feel the loss all over again and again and again.
[11:01]I wish there was some way to make sure that it happened.
[11:04]But you know, I think that's part of why grief
[11:06]is so unpredictable because it comes in, you know,
[11:08]clocksy on the head when you are least expecting it,
[11:11]like even if you're having a good day
[11:12]and then something happens.
[11:14]That's true.
[11:15]And the widows of Concord,
[11:16]I felt like that could have been a name for a book as well,
[11:19]the widows of Concord.
[11:20]It just sits in perfect thing
[11:23]and that I loved how your sons got so into it,
[11:25]that at one point when you started dating,
[11:27]one of your sons said,
[11:28]no, you can't get married again
[11:30]because then he'll be out of the group, you know,
[11:32]the widows group.
[11:33]Right, right.
[11:34]So I know you touched on this earlier,
[11:35]but tell me just a little more about the power
[11:38]of getting involved in a group like this.
[11:40]And I know you were so initially resistant,
[11:42]thinking everybody was so much, you know,
[11:44]in a bunch better shape and all the rest,
[11:46]but the power of being with people in a similar spot
[11:49]tell me how that works for you.
[11:50]Well, it was just an incredible experience, honestly,
[11:53]when I talked about how death could give rise
[11:56]to beautiful things.
[11:59]This small group of women in my town,
[12:01]my town only has about 20,000 people,
[12:03]but there were six,
[12:04]and then we had one woman from a neighboring town.
[12:06]And what was amazing is that,
[12:08]at least for the first couple of years,
[12:10]our mindsets were all so similar.
[12:12]I mean, admittedly, we're the same kind of demographic,
[12:14]but we all had kids ranging an age from about four years old
[12:18]to 13 at the time.
[12:20]And it was amazing with these women
[12:22]because they didn't judge.
[12:25]And no matter what our differences were,
[12:28]our widowhood, our fresh grief,
[12:30]was so common that it brought us together.
[12:33]And the widows were so funny.
[12:35]You don't really associate humor with grief,
[12:36]but you kind of have to counterbalance
[12:39]with the huge depths of despair.
[12:41]And these women had like a shocking sense of dark humor.
[12:44]The stuff we joke about,
[12:45]sometimes we're in situations
[12:46]where there'd be other people who weren't widows,
[12:47]and you should have seen the way they looked us.
[12:50]Joking and everything.
[12:52]And yeah, so we got together really regularly
[12:55]on the so-called, quote, important holidays,
[12:58]like Father's Day, Halloween Valentine's Day.
[13:02]And then we'd meet for coffee
[13:04]where our first topic would be
[13:05]how to stay afloat financially.
[13:07]I was the only working widow at the time,
[13:10]but it's still tough actually.
[13:11]And then the second topic was equally treacherous
[13:14]was on dating because you've got a lot of baggage.
[13:18]Well, a lot of any single person at that age usually
[13:21]has some baggage, but I feel like we had more heavy baggage.
[13:24]Wow.
[13:25]Well, I love the continuous proof
[13:28]that there are beautiful things that come out of this.
[13:30]And your friendships, I know you wrote a lot
[13:32]in the book about your difficulty sort of finding
[13:35]your crew basically in the past
[13:37]and how you were sort of almost relationship averse
[13:41]that it was like a fluke that you kind of fell in love
[13:44]with your husband and that you could connect in that way.
[13:46]Do you feel like now this has opened you up
[13:48]to all new kinds of friendships?
[13:50]Or are you just like committed to your widow's group?
[13:52]And that's kind of it, you know what I mean?
[13:54]Oddly enough, the widows group kind of dispersed
[13:58]because we had a lot in common
[13:59]for the first couple of years,
[14:00]but we all kind of went back to our new normal.
[14:03]You know, so the mom, whose kids are in college now,
[14:05]they're kind of like doing different things
[14:07]than those of us who still have kids in high school.
[14:10]And people seem to get busy with their own hobbies.
[14:13]But ironically, we started meeting again.
[14:15]They had a kind of socially distance outdoor book party for me.
[14:19]And I gave each one, each widow a copy of the book.
[14:21]And we had, and now we're going to,
[14:22]well, release planning to start meeting regularly again,
[14:25]but we'll see how those go.
[14:27]So I'm trying to be open to new experiences.
[14:31]That's amazing.
[14:32]And let's talk a little bit about your
[14:34]really unbelievable and inspiring career
[14:37]because I had never really read anything
[14:40]about what it's like in this industry.
[14:43]And especially as a woman in this industry
[14:45]and all the discoveries
[14:46]and how people sort of doubted your research at first
[14:50]and yet you kept at it.
[14:51]And your have post article when you were pointing out
[14:55]to people who didn't realize it,
[14:56]that the demands of having to meet,
[14:58]they quarterly in person is really tough
[15:01]for a working mom who lives across the country.
[15:03]So just tell me a little more about
[15:06]how you keep finding the resilience to like,
[15:09]and the confidence, I guess,
[15:11]to just keep plunging forward
[15:13]into literally the biggest unknown there could possibly be
[15:17]in the universe and not letting the naysayers
[15:20]and the setbacks throw you off course.
[15:23]Well, there's a few different things.
[15:25]One is I've always loved exploring.
[15:27]When I was younger, I grew up in Canada
[15:30]where canoeing is a thing.
[15:31]We don't have mountains in Eastern Canada.
[15:33]So if you're going to take up an outdoor sport,
[15:35]it's gonna be something other than mountain climbing.
[15:37]And we would go canoeing
[15:40]and do big, adventurous trips in the north of Canada.
[15:44]And so I always feel like science has that same spirit
[15:46]of wow, wanting to do something new.
[15:48]But I'm the type of person like,
[15:49]don't you hate it when you wanna do something new?
[15:51]Like, whether it's smaller, big.
[15:53]And someone says, oh, you're never gonna be able to do that.
[15:55]Like, has that happened to you?
[15:57]Yes.
[15:57]Yes.
[15:58]How does that make you feel?
[16:00]Actually, it happened with this podcast.
[16:02]Here we go.
[16:03]There you go.
[16:03]And does it feel like angry?
[16:05]Like, I'm gonna do it.
[16:06]I don't care what you say.
[16:07]Like, just to spite them.
[16:08]I'm like, yeah, I'm not, yeah.
[16:10]Like, we'll watch me go.
[16:12]So kind of this feels the fire,
[16:14]if someone says, no, I don't think that's a good idea.
[16:16]So yeah, I think a lot of people share that feeling.
[16:19]And finally, I do have like a specific kind of visualization tool
[16:23]to do this because I, and I do share this with women,
[16:26]like younger women I work with,
[16:28]like it's very common in my field,
[16:29]to have the imposter syndrome, you know,
[16:31]where you think you don't belong
[16:32]and you don't have belief in yourself.
[16:34]And what I tell them, I also do myself,
[16:37]but I try to focus on viscerally,
[16:39]like on my past accomplishments,
[16:41]to give myself that confidence,
[16:43]that inner confidence that I can succeed at anything.
[16:45]Cause, you know, how many times as women or moms
[16:47]or whatever are we always kicking ourself
[16:50]or berating ourself or just saying,
[16:52]you know, I could have done that better.
[16:53]And how many times do you say, you know,
[16:55]this is what I tell my kids,
[16:56]I did the best job I could with the skills I have.
[16:59]And then how many times do we say, wow,
[17:01]wow, I did a great job, like never, right?
[17:04]Not fair.
[17:05]We have to like spend,
[17:07]we should be spending as much time or more, right?
[17:09]Being proud or being complimentary to ourselves
[17:12]is being hard on ourself.
[17:13]And I feel like doing those things consciously
[17:14]really helps me reach my goals.
[17:17]Yeah, it's funny.
[17:18]Someone who would help me do something
[17:19]asked afterwards how it had gone.
[17:21]And I said, I typed like in a text,
[17:24]I did a really good job.
[17:25]And then I like sat there with the fun of my hand
[17:27]and the cursor blinking, being like,
[17:28]should I delete that?
[17:29]That sounds terrible.
[17:30]And then I was like, well, I don't know.
[17:32]I feel like I did do a good job.
[17:33]And I like, I want to thank this person
[17:35]and let them know that I didn't let them down.
[17:36]So I don't know.
[17:38]But yeah, there's all this inner critic
[17:40]not allowing ourselves to say that things went well.
[17:42]And you're right.
[17:43]I mean, how much better off would we be
[17:45]if our inner voices were constantly encouraging
[17:49]rather than discouraging us?
[17:50]We really think that's important.
[17:52]Like as a mom, I know my kids wanted, okay,
[17:54]I don't know how it's going to sound
[17:55]good or bad, but like my kids wanted to be more nurturing.
[17:58]And one of them would always say mom.
[18:00]You know, mom's make chocolate chip cookies.
[18:02]And mom's do this and mom's do that.
[18:04]And you know, instead of feeling bad, I would just say,
[18:05]no, well, I don't do that.
[18:07]But you know what, even though I don't make cookies,
[18:09]we do all these other things.
[18:12]Yeah, so it's not just, it is praising ourselves,
[18:15]but it's also sort of, you know,
[18:17]not beating ourselves up for something that isn't who we are.
[18:20]That's true.
[18:21]And that's such a good idea to show that to the kids, right?
[18:24]Like, because otherwise they'll think they can do everything.
[18:27]Right.
[18:28]Like, it's impossible.
[18:29]So why set them up for failure?
[18:31]Like, one time this big tree branch had fallen on our garage
[18:36]and I had to get rid of it.
[18:37]I remember my kids expressing doubt that I could do it.
[18:40]And one of the widows had come over very fashionly dressed
[18:43]in like leather pants and the high heel boots
[18:45]with a chainsaw and instructions on how to use it.
[18:48]Well, I decided not to use the chainsaw
[18:50]because I wasn't totally sure I could do that safely.
[18:52]But you know, that's the widows, right?
[18:53]Empowering each other.
[18:54]And so I did have a handsaw.
[18:56]So I saw it, saw it, saw it, and yeah, finally it came down.
[18:59]And it was so heavy.
[19:00]Honestly, I could have really got hurt.
[19:01]You know how heavy like even a tree branch is so heavy?
[19:04]Yeah.
[19:05]I jumped out of the way just in time.
[19:06]And yeah, that helped I think the kids
[19:07]because they were skeptical.
[19:09]I could actually take care of that.
[19:11]Wow.
[19:11]Yeah, I feel like a chainsaw is one of those things
[19:13]you should not be reading instructions for.
[19:16]Yeah, I think it should come with some required training
[19:19]instead of like a YouTube video.
[19:21]Oh my goodness.
[19:25]So how long did it take you to write this book?
[19:26]And I know you said you did it like in found time, basically.
[19:29]But you know, what was it like going back
[19:31]and reliving all those emotions again?
[19:34]Well, took a few years to write.
[19:35]And it was definitely cathartic.
[19:37]Like it was incredibly emotional times.
[19:40]And wow, I mean, I would just cry my eyes out sometimes.
[19:44]But it was a good feeling, really good.
[19:46]Would you want to write another book on any topic or?
[19:49]Maybe someday.
[19:51]Yeah, I mean, it was really, it was one of those things
[19:53]that brought, you know, there was like a creative process
[19:57]and narrative process, a storytelling process.
[19:59]It was.
[20:00]definitely a lot of work though.
[20:01]And I had a fantastic team set up by the publishers.
[20:07]So once the first draft is done,
[20:09]the book is only half done actually
[20:10]because they come back and like reorganize it
[20:12]or say, do this, do that, do that, do that.
[20:15]Like total reorg.
[20:16]And then that happens two or three times actually.
[20:20]And then the editor or the, you know,
[20:22]will go through it with a finer tooth comb.
[20:24]And finally, we had this absolutely outstanding copy editor.
[20:27]That's the person who's just checking for grammar.
[20:30]And that person went so far above and beyond
[20:33]and would say, well, this sentence makes no sense
[20:35]because a few paragraphs before you said this.
[20:37]So it's not just a writing itself,
[20:39]but as you know, you know, it's kind of the last
[20:41]a publishing process took way longer
[20:43]than I ever expected.
[20:45]And your publisher is crowned, right?
[20:47]Crown, right?
[20:48]Great, wow.
[20:49]I mean, not everybody has such a great experience
[20:51]with their editors and publishers and everything.
[20:53]So I'm glad that that worked.
[20:55]So I mean, a lot of people do, but not everybody.
[20:57]Well, I think I was of the mindset that they know more.
[20:59]So I should just do whatever they say.
[21:01]And I, like I did push back on a few,
[21:03]there's a few specific sentences they really didn't like
[21:06]because they weren't literal.
[21:07]They were just sort of figurative.
[21:09]Like there's one where we're describing this incident
[21:11]where at one of our widows get together,
[21:13]one of them is telling us this crushing story
[21:15]that her husband who had died of cancer.
[21:17]Like the day before he started chemo,
[21:20]she had found like in his pile of stuff,
[21:22]he had bought tickets to go to Paris.
[21:24]And that goes into that part.
[21:25]Yeah, fair praying tickets and like hotel.
[21:28]And he never told anyone because it was like a bet
[21:30]against cancer, you know, people do these defined things
[21:32]like my own husband.
[21:34]He never cared about good clothes.
[21:36]His once and only suit was given to him by his father
[21:39]who happened to be the same size
[21:41]and who had worn it like for a few decades.
[21:43]But for some reason when he, my husband was terminally ill,
[21:45]he went out and bought a brand new suit.
[21:47]Does that make any sense?
[21:48]Because it's like defying against, you know,
[21:51]that prediction of death.
[21:52]So she found all this literally like,
[21:54]I think it was just a few days.
[21:56]So she found all this stuff.
[21:57]And the date on the ticket was like a few days
[22:00]after he had died.
[22:01]And so, you know, we wrote this,
[22:03]when I wrote this part in the book,
[22:05]there's a, like it's one of my favorite senses in the book
[22:08]because the kids were just playing
[22:10]and they didn't notice that we widows were telling the story
[22:12]and crying.
[22:14]And it ends the paragraph saying,
[22:16]well, it's something like, you know,
[22:18]Paris was in full flood.
[22:21]Like that means like we were crying so much
[22:22]about this trip to Paris.
[22:25]And the editing team didn't want that sentence
[22:28]because like it doesn't make sense really,
[22:30]like we were crying, but we're not in Paris
[22:32]and there's no flood.
[22:32]Right, right.
[22:33]It's just so poetic like I,
[22:35]so rarely did I really push back.
[22:36]So I think my experience was good
[22:37]because I mostly just didn't ever they requested.
[22:40]But by the way, the widow in question later on in her life,
[22:43]she actually did manage to take her two kids to Paris
[22:46]and had a great time.
[22:47]Aww, that's such a great sort of code as
[22:49]that the right word to the story.
[22:51]That's amazing.
[22:52]I know your kids must be older right now.
[22:54]I mean, I know how old they were in the book,
[22:56]but like 17 or something.
[22:58]That's right.
[22:59]Yeah, the older boy is 17 and the younger one is 15.
[23:03]So have they read your story?
[23:04]Have you shared it with them or have you feel ahead of them?
[23:07]So I actually ask them not to read the book
[23:09]until they are adults like 21
[23:13]because it's pretty upsetting.
[23:15]And kids actually are resilient, right?
[23:17]I mean, people have died, parents have died for millennia
[23:21]and kids get over it.
[23:22]And I really believe having gone through this
[23:24]with not only my own kids,
[23:25]but watching my widow's friends kids as well,
[23:28]that in order to be resilient,
[23:29]kids' brains are designed to forget.
[23:32]And so a lot of the details in the book,
[23:33]they won't remember and it might be upsetting for them.
[23:36]But a couple other things.
[23:38]Before I submitted like the book or at some stage,
[23:42]I went over, I told them everything
[23:44]that was in the book about them.
[23:45]And in one case, I toned something down
[23:48]because the kid requested it.
[23:49]It's the opening where he has them melt down
[23:50]on the sliding hill.
[23:51]He didn't want it to sound,
[23:53]I don't know, he thought it sounded worse than it actually was.
[23:56]Yeah, I kind of went through just sort of as a courtesy
[23:59]because I didn't want them being embarrassed
[24:00]by anything that was in the book.
[24:01]And then another thing was that one of them,
[24:03]after I said, look, I think you shouldn't read this
[24:05]until you're 21,
[24:06]because you know how kids push back?
[24:07]Like if you say, oh, you should read it.
[24:08]Like they'll never read it.
[24:09]And it don't read it, they'll not read it.
[24:11]He just said, well, mom,
[24:12]if everyone else in the world gets to read it,
[24:14]isn't that kind of weird that your own kids
[24:15]who are in the book aren't supposed to read it?
[24:17]And I said, sure, okay fine.
[24:20]Cause we go by logic.
[24:21]So if my kids have a logical argument,
[24:23]like I don't say no, you can't do it cause I said,
[24:25]I always respond to logic.
[24:26]So I'm like, you know, you could.
[24:28]Sure, I mean, I'm not gonna prevent you from reading it.
[24:30]But I just want you to know that sometimes things aren't
[24:32]as upsetting to people if it's not about them personally.
[24:35]That's true.
[24:36]What advice would you have for aspiring authors?
[24:40]I do have a piece of advice that someone gave me early on,
[24:44]which is for your story, you know,
[24:46]whether it's fiction or nonfiction,
[24:48]there has to be an arc to the story.
[24:50]Like this might sound obvious,
[24:51]but it's really harder to implement than it sounds.
[24:54]Like there has to be a start and an end,
[24:55]but also kind of a rise and a fall and then a rise.
[24:59]Like there has to be some kind of, you know,
[25:02]like in a mystery novel, there's a plot
[25:03]and something happens and the characters are trying
[25:05]to solve the mystery.
[25:06]Well, they can't solve the mystery at the beginning
[25:08]where there's no book.
[25:09]They have to solve it towards the end,
[25:10]but not right at the end.
[25:11]And so it's the same thing.
[25:12]Whatever the story is in the narrative,
[25:13]there has to be an arc to it.
[25:15]Interesting.
[25:16]Well, I actually, one of the things I loved
[25:17]about your book is the way you use time
[25:20]and like how you went back and forth in time
[25:22]and the how you structured each chapter.
[25:24]So I don't know.
[25:25]I think however it is you did it.
[25:27]It really worked well in propelling the narrative arc forward.
[25:31]Okay, thank you so much.
[25:32]I really appreciate you having me on your call.
[25:35]Oh, I absolutely loved your book.
[25:37]And just sort of that I wasn't dressed.
[25:38]Like I got the time mixed up
[25:39]and I just wasn't ready
[25:41]because I wanted to be able to say hi in person.
[25:42]And I wanted to say,
[25:43]I'm just so, I know your mother-in-law died
[25:45]and it must have been like a really crazy,
[25:47]few weeks and I'm sure it's tough.
[25:49]Well, thank you.
[25:50]Well, honestly, your book really helped.
[25:51]It's one of the things to help the most.
[25:52]So thank you.
[25:54]You're welcome.
[25:55]Okay, all right, bye bye.
[25:56]Bye bye.
[25:58]Thanks again to today's sponsor SugarWish,
[26:01]send a surprise SugarWish to somebody you love
[26:04]and check it out yourself, sugarwish.com.
[26:07]Thanks for listening to this episode
[26:08]of Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[26:10]Don't forget to follow me on Instagram,
[26:12]at Zippy Owens and at Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[26:15]Also, sign up for my newsletter at Zippy Owens.com
[26:18]and sign up for my virtual book club
[26:19]and meet lots of authors on Zoom every other week.
[26:22]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound
[26:25]for the Sound Editing.
[26:26]And thank you to Morning Moon Productions
[26:28]for providing this fantastic intro and out trim music.