Lisa Unger, LAST GIRL GHOSTED: A Novel

[0:49]Zibby Owens: Hi. I'm Zibby Owens, and you're listening to the award winning podcast, Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. If you like this podcast, you will love my new anthology called Moms Don't Have Time to Have Kids. Check it out, and you'll hear from 49 authors about all sorts of things moms don't have time to do. All the authors have been on this podcast. Also, check out my TikTok at withzivy and tracy, my other podcast, Sex Talk with Zivvyandtracey. Check out moms don't have time to write on Medium, and of course, my new publishing company called Zivvy Books. And now back to our daily author interview site and a quick hello from some of my kids. Hi. Hi. Hello. Enjoy the show. Lisa Unger is the author of Last Girl Ghosted. She is a New York Times and internationally bestselling author with books published in 30 languages and millions of copies sold worldwide. She is widely regarded as a master of suspense. Last Girl Ghosted is her latest novel. But Unger's critically acclaimed novels have been featured on best book lists from the Today Show, Good Morning America, Entertainment Weekly, People, Amazon, Goodreads, and many others. She has been nominated for or won numerous awards, including the Strand Critics, Hammett Prize, McCavity, ITW Thriller, and Goodreads Choice. In 2,019, she received two Edgar Award nominations. Her short fiction has been anthologized in the best American mystery and suspense, and her nonfiction has appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, NPR, and Travel and Leisure. She lives on the West Coast Of Florida with her family. Welcome, Lisa. Thank you so much for coming on Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books to discuss Last Girl Ghosted.

[2:24]Lisa Unger: Oh my gosh. Thank you so much for having me. And, you know, just kind of start off by saying thank you for everything you do for books and authors. You're such an amazing writer, publisher, entrepreneur. You know, it's like such an amazing gift that you're giving to people to reconnect them to books, you know, because it is such a true thing that, you know, for writers, especially like all writers are readers first. You know, it's that reader joy that makes us want to write in the first place. And so sometimes as writers, and then I know like as moms, you know, you can kind of lose touch with that really like joyful part of your life. So it's such an amazing gift that you're giving everybody to reconnect them to that space. Aw, thank you. And yes, of course you can start with that.

[3:07]Zibby Owens: Is it okay can Don't with stop. Let's just do that the whole time. Let's just talk about you. Yeah, great. Perfect. Thank you, Lisa. That is really sweet. And I really appreciate it. This all comes from such a place of love, you know, just like I you have such I just, you know, a huge reader and I just love this whole thing has been so much fun. Yeah. We all come to the business for that reason, right? Like,

[3:30]Lisa Unger: like, everybody comes to this for love, right? Like, all writers and, you know, editors, publishers, everybody comes from that place of that moment where you open a book and you read those first few sentences and you're like, this is going to be so amazing. Everybody comes from that place. And I think that's why it's such a joy it can be challenging, but mostly it's a joyful way to live and to earn a living and a joyful business. And there's so much excitement all the time for that new book. And it's kind of a blessing to be able to be in this industry.

[4:07]Zibby Owens: It's so true. And your mom is a librarian, right? Did she sort of inculcate this in you from a very Yes, early definitely did. She definitely did. My mom was a

[4:16]Lisa Unger: great lover of story, a librarian, of course, but also she loved all kinds of movies, theater. My dad was an engineer. And so he never wanted to do any of those things. He never wanted to go to the movies. He never wanted to go to the theater. So she just took me everywhere, even when things were, like, sort of wildly inappropriate for me. I just thought, you know, it would go over your head, you know, like, whatever you didn't understand, it wouldn't wouldn't matter. I was like, I'm not sure that's the way it works now that we know a little bit more about child psychology. But, you know, so we went to all these different, you know, all these different things together. And there was, you know, my dad, even though he's an engineer, like also a huge reader of nonfiction. So we always had shelves and shelves and shelves of books. And there was absolutely no censorship whatsoever. You know, if I could reach it, I could read it. Like, cared. Nobody was watching. And so I've just been this crazed reader, you know, like this literary omnivore kind of all my life, like reading wildly, like, across genre, you know, all the time and just wanting that big story, you know, that big sort of epic purple story, deep, raw, emotional, scary, usually, like, you know, always have had that, like, draw to the, like, dark side. So, yeah, I mean, definitely grew up reading always.

[5:39]Zibby Owens: Can I just say that being a literary omnivore is the best expression I've heard in a long time? I'm literally gonna write that down because I love that. That is the coolest.

[5:49]Lisa Unger: Yeah. Well, wait. That sounded amaze I mean, I wanna talk about your book. But Yes. Like, have you had have you had that experience with a book yourself where you have felt that passionately about it? Like, does that happen? Does it happen all the time? Like, can you think of books that do that for you or that have done that Yeah. For I mean, you know, it's interesting that you ask that question because, like, you know, it is actually an occupational hazard as a writer that you have to read so much. You read so much for other people. Read, I mean, things that you wanna read, but things that you're doing, like, we get I mean, I have a stack of galleys for blurbs, and there's a lot of books that I read for research that I wanna read. But it's like, it's not that kind of, you know, it's not it doesn't necessarily always engender that type of reader joy. And so I was, you know, I was on stage a couple of years ago. I mean, who knows when it was now? Because with the pandemic, like, time has just, like, become this, you know, I don't know, house of mirrors. But I was on stage with Laura Lipman, and we started talking about blurbing and stuff. And she said that she had really worked hard to preserve her life as a reader, that she really made sure that she was always reading things that she loved and wanted to read. And I was like, oh my gosh, I wonder if I've done that. And so I really started to, I turned back at the Oh, there's my labradoodle. Sorry. My

[7:11]Zibby Owens: lab is on the couch. You might not be able to see You can't see him because he's couch colored. Yeah. Yeah.

[7:17]Lisa Unger: And so I was like, I thought I wonder I wondered if I had really done that. And so I started just go back to trying to find that reader, at least every month to have a book that I picked just because, oh, I'm excited. I wanna read that book. So, yeah, I really sort of gone back. The one that I read recently that really did that really transported me, you know, in that way, that that books do, Matrix by Lauren Groff. It was, you know, I mean, completely, you know, another universe, another world, and yet, you know, such deep, rich themes, brilliant characterization, just very atmospheric. It just felt immediately transported to this world that is utterly other. And that's the gift of reading, to open doors to every other universe. I just had that. I mean, most recently with, like, an alternate

[8:14]Zibby Owens: sort of life that you sink right into or you, like, fall I don't know. It's like a like, Tessa Hadley wrote a book called Free Love. I mean, not to say that your book wasn't amazing, but, like, in terms of see, we can talk about your book too, but Tessa Hadley's Free Love, you open like, right away, you open it's almost like a play. It's like you open onto the kitchen and dining room of this upscale home in London in the nineteen sixties with the young mother, like, at her vanities getting ready and with, like, all the scenes set. And then she ends up, like, leaving her husband. Anyway, I, like, I don't know. There's something sometimes about the setting itself. Yes. Yes. That it's like, okay, I am in this. I am in this like I'm in this space. Yeah. In this space. Feel it. Smell it. Hear it. I'm there. Yeah. For sure. Yeah. Of course, with your book, I was also in a bar that was very crowded and unpleasant. And then I was walking across the Brooklyn Bridge, and then I was in the car. And now I'm on, like, the corner of Broadway and 79th Street and, like, I don't know, all over the place. So thank you for that. I know. I was like, no. I was just on 79th Street. I'm like, perfect. Okay. Let's go back to your book for a second. Okay. Last Girl Ghosted. This is your 20 no. This is your nineteenth novel. Right? This is number 19, Oh my gosh. It's crazy to say. Yeah. Number 19. That's right. Nineteenth novel. Tell listeners what this book is about and how on earth do you keep coming up with so many plots?

[9:46]Lisa Unger: How like, how? I have no idea. I wish I knew. I it's just that I've been doing this since I was a kid. So it's just kind of the way my brain works. You know, I think I've just been writing for so long that my brain, writing and reading for so long that I just kind of internalized the form of the novel. And it's just like constantly, there's always constantly something percolating. In the case of Last Girl Ghosted, when we open up, we meet Ren Greenwood. And she's an advice columnist. She's somebody who's come from a very dark past. She's kind of white knuckled her way into the light, and she's built a life for herself that she loves. She does this work of trying to help people through trauma and darkness, and it's a catharsis for her. She thinks that this is part of the way she's healed herself. And so she's pretty happy, but her best friend, Jax, is like, you don't have anybody. You're meeting not anybody. You're not dating. You know, you're alone. And she's kind of okay with that. But, you know, she sort of gives in to her friend and her friend pushes her into the world of online dating.

[10:49]Zibby Owens: Is Torch is not a real sight, is it? It's not. No. I'm like, I'm so out of it. It's my made up. It's my made up site. I don't think so, but you never know.

[10:59]Lisa Unger: Right. You never know. You could be something you've never heard of. Yeah. And so she kind of has these, you know, she has a few underwhelming encounters and then she meets Adam. And when she meets him, you know, she falls hard. She falls really hard. And part partially that's, you know, her naivety, her lack of connection, but she falls for him really, really hard. And then after a particularly romantic evening, he makes a request. He says, tell me something about yourself that you have never told anyone. And she does. And the next day, Adam disappears and his social media sites are gone and his cell phone has been disconnected and the place he lives or the place she thought he lived is just a vacation rental. And Ren is gutted. She is just wrecked. And she then, when a private detective shows up on her doorstep, she learns that she was not the first girl to fall for Adam and that all these other girls have disappeared. And so instead of kind of licking her brooms and being glad worse things didn't happen to her, she decides that she's going to chase his dark digital trail into his past and into her own. And that is the last girl ghosted. Wow. Very cool. Of course, it starts off with this very sad

[12:18]Zibby Owens: moment, right? With Claudia and losing her like in this, mean, I'm not giving it away because it's okay, but where she loses her mom and, like, curls up with her on the kitchen floor against her chest. I mean, that's so sad. And how, of course, and then you go into her, you know, addiction and recovery from addiction and where she is now. And this is all the very first moment. Immediately we're like hooked. Like, what's going to happen? What happens to Mia, Princess Belle, the whole thing. And like that sort of mother loss and,

[12:48]Lisa Unger: you know, even just the way you write about grief. Yeah. I mean, I think we all, as mothers, we all kind of connect to that. Like, you know, like everybody, you know, everybody feels like, oh, the worst thing that could happen to you would be to lose your child. But you know, there's another layer to that too. Like the biggest thing we fear is them losing us. Yes. Right? Like that's more, that's almost more frightening. I feel like I've always kind of wandered into those dark alleys. Like the thing that, I always think that there are things that I'll never write about and then I wind up writing about them, just because I kind of consider myself a little bit of a spelunker. I'm kind of shimmying into the dark spaces of the human psyche and that includes addiction and grief and trauma and mental illness and all that. And like, those are the, you know, that's my number one curiosity and fascination

[13:40]Zibby Owens: is the human mind and what makes us who we are. And so I tend to go into these sort of dark spaces, but always, you know, I hope headed towards the light. I mean, who was I just talking to who was saying that most writing is an exercise in trying to cope with some sort of pain in some way? And particularly for memoirists, that's why you're writing a memoir. Oh, this was Jenny Pentland yesterday. Anyway, but it's true. I feel like it's all exercises and working through our stuff. And I think about that all the time. Like yesterday,

[14:12]Lisa Unger: literally I had to be like, you cannot die. You cannot die. Your kids need you. You have to slow down. Like, it's gonna be okay. Don't let yourself die. You know? Know. I know. I mean, it's such a weird thing. And I feel like it's like something that people don't ever really talk about, like that kind of that layer of like, you know, and then also just mortality in general is not something we ever really wanted to face. But now as a culture, we've had to face it in this really new way. Like everybody kind of knew in an intellectual way that, you know, you're pretty much out of control, right? Like, know, you can get very good at thinking that you control your life, especially if you're a certain type of person. And, you know, you can get very good at thinking that you're in charge of what's happening. Then all of a sudden, if you think about everything you're worried about in January 2019, not one of those things was a global pandemic that would disrupt your life and the life of your children if you're a parent for the next two and a half so far years, right? And so we kind of get into that idea that we're starting to face that idea that we're really not in control the way our modern lives have conspired to make us believe we are. Yes. And I think it is a lot of why I you know, like, all my life, I've, you know, I've been very fascinated with that type of thinking in those kind of dark spaces. And I do turn to the page to metabolize darkness for sure. And I think that a lot of people turn to thrillers and crime fiction for the same reason. I love that too. I turn to the page to metabolize darkness.

[15:45]Zibby Owens: That's so good. You like speak in these like awesome I mean, I hope you should write I mean, you should like put it on a pillow or something anyway. Yeah.

[15:55]Lisa Unger: Good idea. I turned to the page to metabolize darkness. I'm not sure how many people would buy that pillow, but maybe more I than bet you could most crime writers.

[16:06]Zibby Owens: Maybe it's not a yeah. It's like a gag gift for the Crime Writers Association. That's right. We just give it to each other. Yeah. Give it to each other. Exactly. Secret Santas or something. It's all everybody gives the same pillow. Exactly.

[16:19]Lisa Unger: Yeah. And I think it's interesting because Lee Child sort of famously gives this talk about the thriller being the first story ever told. And I had this conversation with a friend of mine who's an artist, we talked about the first story ever told was a painting on a wall of a cave. And these thrillers that we tell ourselves, the stories that we tell ourselves around the fire at night, it's about how like, the hero bested the, you know, the enemy or, you know, the hunter fell the beast that feeds the community for the winter. And it's like, you know, you tell each other these stories to make make everybody feel braver in the dark. You And then when you turn to a thriller or crime fiction, it's like, it's all very there's a beginning, there's a middle, there's an end. There's darkness. There's some type of justice, maybe not exactly in my book, maybe not exactly the type of justice you might be looking for. But some type of justice is going to be served even if it's just poetic justice. And that is not so in the real world. And so it gives us this place to be scared, to be intense, to be very involved in our character and what's going to happen to her or him and then resolved, like in a way that hopefully is satisfying. And so that, I mean, certainly we don't get that very much from life, right?

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[20:08]Zibby Owens: Oh my gosh. So wait. Tell me how so the ideas are continually percolating. You're there with, like, your pickaxe and, you know, the belay and like yeah, ready to dive into little headlight, ready to dive into the dark side. What do you do? Do you outline, like, what's your process? I know it's a boring question, but I'm actually fascinated by it.

[20:30]Lisa Unger: So usually there's like a germ, right? There's one thing like a seed. Like for me, like reading, writing, and researching is a continuum, right? Like it's a never ending thing. You know, like inspire the writing, is going to inspire more research, is going to inspire more reading, is going inspire more writing. That's kind of my life as it is. And then sometimes they have these conversations, like in the case of Last Girl Ghosted, I had a conversation with a really young friend of mine. And she was talking about the dating apps, right? Like for me, I mean, I'm 105 years old. I've studied for a million years. I've never been on a dating app. When I was first dating you know, twenty one years ago before I met my husband, I, there were just like the online dating things like they had just kind of started. And so that's what I kind of had my experience with. So I kind of already had a sense of like, kind of the, the potential for it to be just very soulless and strange. It's a norm now. And so she was talking about how you just scroll and scroll and scroll. It's the next one's the next one's the next one. And she's like, how do you ever know if you've chosen the right person? And it just struck me as such a broken question. It struck me as like, okay, well, you're not shopping for a toaster. You're not like love is a head trip, right? It's not an algorithm. Right? And so she was like, so we kind of had this conversation. She goes on like to say, well, then if they turn up in your life, then and they're not what you think, right? Like you who is? Who is like, you know, compares to their social media feed, like they're not who you thought they were or you're not they thought you were. It's just so easy to ghost that person because there's no close tie connection. Like you're not going to wind up sitting next to your Tinder date's grandmother at church on Sunday. Right? So there's no external reason for you to be respectful, be kind. So that was the thing that got me that was the germ that got me interested. It's not so much that I was interested in online dating. It was that I was interested in how online dating rewrites the way we relate to each other. How does it rewrite this very ancient pursuit of finding a me, which is essentially what it is, right? So that's really kind of what interests me. Then I started doing my research, and it usually leads me to a sloth of research or like documentaries and reading articles and finding books and maybe somebody to talk to depending on how deep I want to go. And then if it all connects with something that's bigger, I think some bigger question, then I start hearing a voice or voices. And I follow those voices through the manuscript. I don't have an outline. I have a very vague idea of what my book is about. I have a very strong connection to the voice or voices that I have in my head. I'm very interested in them and what they have to say. And then the story and the characters evolve for me on the page much in the same way they will for my reader later. Like I have they reveal themselves to me in layers. And I've just written every single book that way. Wow. Which I'm sure there's an easier way to do it, but it's a lot of 3AM wake ups, you know, because it's a very subconscious process. So it's always like kind of going, going, going. And then like, you know, there's a lot of times where we just kind of wake up at three. I'm like, oh my god, that's it. That's it. And so then I'm up, you know, working. So that's kind of how that's kind of how it works for me. And, you know, I've never really I've never worked from an outline. I feel like if I knew how the book was gonna end, that there'd be no engine for me. I'm involved in the story the same way I write for the same reason that I read because I want to know what's going to happen to these people who are living in my head. And so that's the joy for me. That's the reader joy in the writing for me. Like, that's how you know, that's the full engine of how I just keep writing and writing and writing because I'm just in love with stories.

[24:35]Zibby Owens: Well, I know you're on your twentieth book, right? Writing your twentieth or you're finishing it? Done. It's done. Number 20. It's done. Yeah. So have you thought ever about some sort of like reunion tour where all the characters of all the books kind of get together and have a party?

[24:52]Lisa Unger: Like in a book? Yeah. That's a great idea, but that would be like a scary party because I have some very dark. It would be maybe it's like prison

[25:02]Zibby Owens: you have to go to. It's

[25:05]Lisa Unger: like Arkham Asylum or something. Right? Yeah.

[25:10]Zibby Owens: Would like, why don't you try it? That's a great idea. I'd love someone to try something cool with characters and like across books and across time and

[25:18]Lisa Unger: like, what would have been- I've done a couple of things where, you know, people have asked me to like interview one of my characters, like in writing, you know, and I've done a couple of things like that. And that's always like a very interesting exercise, you know, because they do, you know, they do live and breathe for me. Like they're as real to me as most of the people in my life, you know, and I feel that like, you know, deep connection to them. And then some characters have their story, and then they're gone. And then some characters just stay and they show up like in Last Girl Ghosted, Jones Cooper is a character that turned up first and fragile and dwells in this fictional town, the Hollows, where a number of my books are set. And so he just frequently just kind of turns up. And I feel like, oh, he's here because I need somebody to manage the crisis. I need a stabilizing influence. And he just kind of shows up and fixes the things that are broken or gives this kind of very practical Luddite perspective on the mess that people happen to be in at the moment. And so he kind of turned he turns up and bangs. And then, know, there's a number of characters that I maybe haven't had hasn't turned up, I still think about them, you know, I still think about, well, what if, you know, even characters that are no longer with us, one in particular, I feel like she's still around. So I'm just trying to figure out where she's gonna, or she's gonna show up again. So, you know, it's just kind of a, again, another, it's another one of those, you know, continuums. Wow. That's cool. Wait, so what's your twentieth? What's the premise of that book? Well, I'm not totally ready to talk about it yet because it's still in my kind of revision process, but you know, like the final like copy editing process. So when it's done, then I'm ready then I'm ready to talk about it. But I will say that, you know, it's a psychological thriller and, you know, bad things happen.

[27:20]Zibby Owens: I watched, like, a short not interview because you were just really talking little video that you did about people when people were asking you if you'd, like, if you'd written your best book yet or something like that. And you were like, you always like to think that your writing gets better every single time and that your best book is always gonna be your next book, which I thought was so interesting. I love that. I do hope that's true. I do. You know, that's like my number one driver. You know, I've been writing a long time and,

[27:46]Lisa Unger: you know, you've had a long career and either the things that are great, exciting, great reviews or bestseller lists and all that, that's wonderful. And it's such a blessing to be able to have those things happen. But the thing that gets me out of bed every day is that I think I can be a better writer today than I was yesterday. I really do believe that. And I believe just in the doing of it makes you better every day. And so I hope always that I feel like I'm always operating at the pinnacle of my ability at that time, right? Like there's never a moment where I've done less than I thought I could do. I'm always like heart and soul involved in what I'm doing. And so I hope but I always hope what comes next is better, is more exciting, more involving, more, I don't know, more careful with my words, in scene, giving more to

[28:49]Zibby Owens: my reader. So that's definitely a major driver for me. In your acknowledgments, you thanked your family and said it's really hard to live with the writers. So what do you think the hardest part is for them?

[29:01]Lisa Unger: Oh my gosh, I'd have to ask my husband to come on to give that answer. I think it's just, you know, you know, my daughter is 16 and so she's grown up like this is all she knows is like, you know, there are these moments where you're like, Oh my God, everything's fantastic. The pages are flowing, you know, it can't, couldn't be better. And then there's like the days where like things are not going well and you can't, you can't get into it. And you like, and your manuscript kicks you out and you're like, you know, that's it. It's wrong. It's all wrong. It could never be right. You know? Then you're like, oh, I'm back in. And like, my husband is very good at being like, I know this is horrible. You know, you're okay. Yeah, it's going to be okay. You know, say this every year, right? Like, you know, we do this every single year. And I'm like, No, this time it's really true. It's horrible. And I can't fix it. And he's like, Just go back up to your office. And I'm like, Okay. And I go back up and, you know, I mean, the writing life is, you know, it's a little bit roller coaster y. You know, there are these like sort of dizzying highs and these crushing lows and, great things happen and bad things happen. And the work is organic. You know what I mean? It's not like you have a job with a specific list of tasks and you go and you do it and then you punch out. It's always with you. It's always with you. And my husband and I have worked together for a really long time. So we like to say he manages the corporation, but just like all the stuff that surrounds the business of being an author. So we've been doing that for a really long time, about fifteen years now. And so, that's all the joys and wonders of working with your spouse. So there's all that great stuff. Ocean, my daughter, she's been on now she's older, not so much. But when she was small, she came on every single book tour with me. And so that would mean if it was 10 cities in twelve days, that meant that I did that with my baby and my husband and sometimes my parents, which we always joke is like the worst entourage ever. It's like the worst entourage of where is that Dylan And this scene, you know? And you're like, what? Are you guys not supposed to be helping me? So it would be like, my dad was there to take care of my mom so that my mom could take care of Ocean so that Jeff could take care of me and we could go out and do Oh our my gosh, I love it. It feels like chaotic and crazy. And I look back and think, how did we ever do it? But, you know, honestly, I wouldn't

[31:40]Zibby Owens: done it any other way. Oh, that's so I love it. Lisa, this has been so fun. And in the back of my head this whole time, I'm trying to figure out where I'm gonna put, I turn to the page to metabolize darkness, but I'm going to find a place and I'm gonna send it to you and I figure it out. Okay. Perfect. And some swag related item.

[31:58]Lisa Unger: I love that. I I love that. That is really exciting.

[32:02]Zibby Owens: Thank you so much. It's been really fun getting to know you, and I hope our paths cross in real life. It's been amazing. Thank you so much. Thank you. All right. Have a great day. Bye bye. Bye. Thanks. 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 up 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 for providing this fantastic intro and outro music.