Amy Fusselman, THE MEAN$: A Novel
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[0:58]Amy Fisselman is the author of The Means, a novel. Amy is the author of five books.
[1:02]Her latest The Means is her first novel.
[1:05]Her previous four books were all nonfiction, have been translated into several languages.
[1:09]Her work has been nominated for the Believer Book Award and the University of Iowa's Krause Essay Prize.
[1:15]Her essays and articles have appeared in The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Washington Post,
[1:20]McSweenie's Internet Tendency, Ms. Art News, Art Net, and many others.
[1:24]She lives in New York City with her family and teaches creative writing at New York University.
[1:29]Welcome, Amy. Thank you so much for coming on Moms. Don't have time to read books to discuss The Means, Your Novel.
[1:35]Yay, thanks for having me.
[1:37]Really happy.
[1:38]Your book was so funny and smart and just hilarious, and I like chuckled out loud over and over and over again.
[1:45]It's just so funny.
[1:46]I mean, your sense of humor is so great.
[1:49]Anyway, I totally enjoyed it. It was super enjoyable.
[1:53]Awesome. Why don't you tell listeners what The Means is about?
[1:56]Sure. Yeah, The Means is a tragic comic novel about a woman named Shelley Means, and she's a stay at home mom and Manhattan.
[2:06]She has two kids, and she's managing all her household stuff, and she gets this sort of being her bonnet, this kind of obsession that she really wants respite from her life.
[2:18]She wants to chill. And for her, that means lying next to her pool at a beach house in the Hamptons.
[2:25]And so she's married to a guy named George, who's a voice over artist, who's career is kind of on the downswing, as you can't properly voice the chicken, bacon,
[2:40]and so Shelley is actually, she's, she finds someone who can build a beach house for her for inexpensively on this little plot of land.
[2:51]They managed to buy in the springs and the beach house is going to be out of shipping containers and the housing association is up in arms about it.
[3:01]And so the whole book is basically the shenanigans of this woman who's trying in a really pretty subversive and intelligent way to get what she wants.
[3:12]And it's also, I mean, thematically it's, you know, it's very comic, it goes down easy, but it's also about the suffering inherent in desire, capitalist delusion, misogyny, and it's comics.
[3:26]So it goes wide. It goes wide. It goes fast, but it goes wide.
[3:31]Yes, comedy with a purpose, right, with a message.
[3:35]There were just so many funny lines about how she feels about her own life. She is always referring to all of the things on her plate with this aggrieved nature.
[3:46]Like, I have all these things and I have to add to my workload and, okay, well, I am a state home, but I also make lunch for Clementine.
[3:53]And I also, like, I do this too. And I also have to walk twigs and, you know, to finish time that she spends at Derby, the dog walker means that she has to take this on more and more.
[4:05]And everything she adds to her plate just seems like so hard to overcome, right. So she's so aggrieved.
[4:12]So I loved how you did that. Like, she and her childhood and her own relationship with money and how she views herself now. I don't know. It's, it's very, it was so interesting.
[4:24]So tell me, tell me about crafting her as a character because she's so multi layered and then the conversation she has with the dog. I mean, anyway, so how did you, how did you come up with her?
[4:34]Yeah. Well, I, I like that you are picking up on that thread because I did want to, I mean, I feel like Shelley was an interesting character to make because I knew from the get go that she's someone who's not generally portrayed as sympathetic.
[4:51]Like, I wanted to take a view into money through a portal that I hadn't seen or read about, whereas, you know, her kids are in private school in Manhattan. I mean, although they're on financial aid, they're in private school.
[5:05]You know, she lives near FIT like in the sort of downmarket part of Chelsea, but she's a stay at home mom, you know, she has a ponytail and these kids and I think generally the way to write about, you know, that kind of wealth in Manhattan is disdainfully and I really wanted a way into her that was about mothering and about caregiving and about that work.
[5:30]And even, I mean, I feel like the title of your podcast really is pushing against some similar thing of like moms don't have time to do anything, but you know, their mom work like moms don't have time for leisure mom don't don't have time for pleasure and I love actually that you name the like the fact that this podcast exists is your response to that.
[5:52]And for Shelley means in some ways, you know, it's a similar thing like she gets this beach out, I mean spoiler alert. She gets this thing built, you know, by hooker bike broke like it happens for her because she's, you know, she's determined and she's smart and I think she's just really interesting.
[6:13]It's an interesting way in for me to write about these elements of money that I was interested in exploring.
[6:21]It seemed at many times that this house was not going to be made in any way and I think one of the themes is you have to have money to make money.
[6:30]I think that's sort of where it all like comes and then there's this whole other thread where you know towards the end where they're like, well, have you ever been in serious debt because once you are, then you can't get out of that.
[6:42]And if you were like, if your family was like that as a child and then here she is like taking the land and then like finding other opportunities which also were so funny to make money that way too.
[6:53]And it just all seems so unlikely. Like it just, it seemed like it was not going to work out and and yet once she did it, then it just could lead to better things, whereas her poor husband is like driving in the car and he's like, oh, no, they didn't choose me for this ad.
[7:10]So I feel like it is some sort of commentary on, you know, where do you start, like do you start in a place where you have the opportunity to really rise up or do you not are you doomed from the beginning and feels like that's being examined in part as well.
[7:26]Yeah, I mean, I was I wanted to sort of I really was interested in writing every scene to like locate where the money is in the scene.
[7:37]Where's where the resources because I think that happens, you know, in real life it's like who has what who, you know, who's offering what who's praying on who like, I mean it's kind of a it's not a you know, a rose tinted view, but it's it's interesting to me, especially because I feel like the money in that sense isn't often explored, especially for women.
[8:01]So Shelley in some ways is operating in like a shadowy economy because it's still, I mean, I cringe even saying this, but like the idea that is a woman entitled to her partner's income is, you know, still a question.
[8:17]And on the idea of like is stay at home mom like real work, I mean caregivers in this country are notoriously it was just in the times yesterday another feature on this like underpaid and undervalued and that's all part of, you know, what I wanted to examine in a system that I feel needs.
[8:38]Reevaluation like stat because it involves women's lives it involves some and how you know caregiving is huge it's one of the it's how we treat each other it's how we live it's, I mean it needs to be acknowledged and supported in my view.
[8:57]I mean if you hire a caregiver to do let's say you go to work and you have to hire someone to do the caregiving like that person that does have value like that's an actual job so if you decide to stay home it's not like you're not doing a job.
[9:10]I mean you're just doing the job of some like that would be your job you're just not getting paid for it.
[9:15]Yeah, I mean it's for women even I added these elements to Shelley's character because I knew that that would be, you know, part of the why she's contemptible in some ways it's like she has a dog walker she has a cleaning lady like oh how did you know how dare she.
[9:34]But and yet I feel like she she's a sympathetic character you she's she doesn't view herself she's an underdog and she's an underdog through the whole book so to play with those expectations was part of the pleasure and the writing of this for me.
[9:50]You even have the time where she gets a party planner you're like if that she's like if that's not the height of wealth like what is I have somebody to help me plan my parties in.
[10:00]I have.
[10:01]Well, I think that's it too, is that she has a lot of people who are sort of praying
[10:05]on her at the same time that she's, you know, she has a therapist who's also then becomes
[10:11]a real estate broker, which is, you know, highly like, yeah, all in.
[10:16]I mean, everybody is sort of out for a take.
[10:18]I mean, that's part of the landscape.
[10:20]Yeah.
[10:21]You have that one moment where when George has just lost his next gig and he thinks
[10:28]any opportunity to make more money and she's like, we're going to have to sell this
[10:31]land.
[10:32]And there's just the silence between them as they realize like, how am I going to keep
[10:36]paying for this CBT and then she's like, but wait, you know, always wait, there's always
[10:41]a way.
[10:42]Exactly.
[10:43]Yeah.
[10:44]So where did you come up with the idea for the whole book in general?
[10:48]I know we talked about Shelley, but I was researching your other books.
[10:51]And this seems like a pretty big departure from some of the other ones.
[10:55]I didn't read them.
[10:56]Although they look like, oh, I'm like, I have to go back.
[10:57]because I love the way you write.
[10:59]But where did this come from?
[11:01]Yeah.
[11:02]Well, I wanted to try writing a novel that was like, step one.
[11:08]And I knew I wanted to write something comic and I also knew I wanted to write about
[11:12]money.
[11:13]So that was like the three, the three things I was trying to hit.
[11:16]And so I do have a shipping container beach house in the Hamptons and I can tell you that
[11:23]yeah, my experience was not like Shelley's, but I could see that, you know, through a
[11:30]different lens, it could become comic.
[11:33]So I took what I knew about the landscape and about that process and, you know, made it
[11:38]a completely different thing.
[11:40]But that's, I mean, it's grounded in my experience in that landscape for sure.
[11:45]Is your house in the springs?
[11:46]Yes, it is in the springs with the shitty cell phone service.
[11:50]Yeah.
[11:52]I mean, cell phone service is pretty bad everywhere at there, but that's great.
[11:57]So what was it like then tackling this project and maybe go back and tell me, like,
[12:02]how did you even get started as an author and how did all your projects build and maybe
[12:07]like the quick thing about each of your best.
[12:10]Sure.
[12:11]Yeah.
[12:12]I went to college.
[12:13]I got a degree in poetry.
[12:15]I've always, that was my first love was that sort of exploration of, you know, consciousness,
[12:23]sensory experience, you know, the eye of experience has always been interesting to me.
[12:27]And so I wrote these nonfiction books that are, that are not nonfiction in the sense
[12:33]of like my name's Amy and I scaled Mount Everest, you know, they're not really heroic
[12:38]about my life more, they're more like a poet's sort of perspective.
[12:43]Like, here's what I see, here's what I experience and I've tackled sort of different
[12:49]topics.
[12:50]A lot of about, you know, about motherhood because I am, I have three kids.
[12:54]I'm sober.
[12:55]You know, I'm, I was sexually abused as a kid.
[12:58]I mean, I've written about all that stuff.
[13:00]My third book was called, is called Savage Park and it's about a playground in Tokyo that
[13:06]I got pretty involved in, it's an adventure playground which we now have on Governor's
[13:11]Island.
[13:12]We have one of those.
[13:13]So I've, I'm really interested in, you know, in mothering and art making and creativity.
[13:18]Yeah, women's issues, children, all of that.
[13:22]That's my wheelhouse.
[13:25]And now, uh, fiction and money, how dare your kids.
[13:31]My, my oldest is a junior in college.
[13:34]My second kid just started college this fall and my youngest is a freshman in high school.
[13:40]So yeah, it's weird.
[13:42]It's weird.
[13:43]Like, I think your kids need you in a different way when they are teens, you know, they
[13:49]need you so intensely when they're small in a way that's like so physical.
[13:53]Like you have to be present, you know, you have to watch as that they don't scoot into
[13:58]the intersection, you know, but they need you in, in high school and college also.
[14:03]It's just, you know, in a, they need your, they need your presence in a different way.
[14:09]I have two, 15 year olds.
[14:11]Oh man, you're a little bit, but I also have a nine year old and it was eight year old.
[14:16]So we have, we run the gamut of, but I also loved your portrayal of, of Jack and come
[14:26]time.
[14:27]Jack, right?
[14:28]Not Jake.
[14:29]Jack.
[14:30]Yeah.
[14:31]And my son is applying out to boarding schools for high school now.
[14:32]So we're like deep in the test prep and you're like, oh, it's all of that with, you
[14:37]know, his applications and wanting your kids to be motivated and all of that.
[14:41]And ultimately that they're not, what their behavior is not anything you control and
[14:46]their preferences.
[14:47]Like, like the black room or whatever, you just don't know what they're, it's going to
[14:52]come out of their rest.
[14:53]Yeah.
[14:54]Yeah.
[14:55]Yeah.
[14:56]One of the, I mean, I feel like this, you know, I'm lucky to write and to have, you know,
[15:01]I learned from my writing and this book that I wrote about Japan really informed like
[15:06]a lot of how I deal with my kids because if they have this thing at this adventure playground
[15:12]called the playworker and this is a playground in Japan where the children play with like
[15:17]open fires, like that's not a hyperbole.
[15:20]So the playworker's job is to like witness and facilitate, but not to interfere.
[15:28]And it's so like, there's a lot of pressure.
[15:32]I mean, I grew up in the Midwest.
[15:33]There's a lot of pressure in this town to, you know, have achieving, high achieving
[15:37]children and to be high achieving yourself, of course.
[15:41]But I learned so much about just watching and responding to what is rather than bulldozing
[15:46]in and directing from that work and I, I feel like, you know, parenting is so humbling
[15:52]anyway, but it takes a lot of, you know, you can't control other people.
[15:58]It's just the bottom line and it's a painful lesson to learn.
[16:01]Yes.
[16:03]Very true.
[16:04]Yes.
[16:05]Lots to fight against there.
[16:06]Oh, yeah.
[16:07]Oh, he's trying it.
[16:08]Well, I will not give up.
[16:09]Oh, I mean, you have to, you have to, uh, rule the boat.
[16:15]That's just your job.
[16:16]Yeah.
[16:17]So when you think about the means and sort of the message about money or wealth that
[16:23]you're trying to put out into the world, like if there's like a thesis statement behind
[16:27]it or what you really want people to know or believe or see because of this book, like
[16:32]what would that be?
[16:34]Well, I think how Shelley is, um, I mean, she's, she's someone who's sort of deep in capitalist
[16:41]delusion.
[16:42]Like she believes that she can make this happen.
[16:46]But in the, you know, against spoiler alert, like in the end, what happens is that she's
[16:52]taken out of sort of the shadow economy of being a stay at home mom and she gets a quote
[16:57]real job.
[16:58]You know, that's the, the purpose, like you don't actually get your beach house because
[17:04]you're having to run it out for porn films, you know, and you get a job, like, yay.
[17:10]So I mean, I guess I really, it's not a book that I wanted to, you know, it doesn't,
[17:18]it doesn't tell you how to feel and it doesn't, you know, spoon feed you in that sense.
[17:22]But I wanted it, I wanted it to raise questions about, you know, mothering us legit work
[17:27]about wanting about materialism about, um, you know, there's a lot of about the landscape
[17:35]of the Hamptons is insane.
[17:37]And I mean, as all, I mean, as it all, you know, the land itself is stolen.
[17:42]I mean, we're, that's, that's where we're at, you know, and that's, that should just be
[17:47]like a naked fact that we're dealing with all the time all over.
[17:51]I appreciated that bit of history too on the Chinacuck reservation and we're Montauk
[17:56]and all of that came from, you know, like that, you know, it's like that place where they
[18:00]say it's ocean view, but it's really not an ocean view, it's partial ocean, right.
[18:06]Yeah.
[18:07]Well, I don't know, there's so much anti-wealth sentiment right now.
[18:11]I literally on my way to school to drop my kid to school this morning, like this car had
[18:16]a huge bumper sticker that, from the Marines that said, you know, fight the rich, not
[18:21]their wars or something.
[18:23]And I'm like, okay, so that's where we are, right.
[18:27]Like what is that fair?
[18:29]Like what do you think?
[18:30]What would Shelley think about that?
[18:31]What do you think about that?
[18:33]I think that, I mean, that was part of what why this book isn't set in, you know, like
[18:41]the projects or whatever.
[18:43]I wanted it to be really a liminal space.
[18:46]I wanted it to be, well, I'm not, you know, to raise questions like, wow, I'm not sure
[18:51]about this.
[18:52]Like this is some seemingly someone I would hate, like what, but she seems to be, you
[18:58]know, be set with some of the struggles that are relatable to me.
[19:00]Like what does that mean?
[19:02]What, you know, it's not, it's not clear cut.
[19:05]I mean, we're all working within a system that I think most people acknowledge needs
[19:11]some powerful change.
[19:13]You know, how does that affect everyday interactions of, you know, invisible people who
[19:20]aren't heroic who are kind of invisible, you know, moms being one, what's that actually
[19:25]look like?
[19:26]How do I contribute to this?
[19:28]What are the things I can do?
[19:30]Yeah.
[19:31]Yeah.
[19:32]Yeah.
[19:33]A lot.
[19:34]Yeah.
[19:35]But the joy of the book is it goes down funny.
[19:37]So it does.
[19:38]No.
[19:39]It's so great.
[19:41]So I feel happy about that.
[19:44]No.
[19:45]The book is great.
[19:46]I love the book.
[19:47]It's, it's fast paced and entertaining and you just, you know, some of the scenes
[19:52]where she's throwing things and she's like, oh, no, I did it again, you know, like
[19:56]what is going on with her?
[19:58]Why is she, oh, you know, she seems.
[20:00]She's like, she has it all together.
[20:01]And yet you show all of her cracks,
[20:03]which are so obvious, right?
[20:05]But you don't even see them coming, but she's in a rage.
[20:08]She always in a rage and rightly so, you know?
[20:11]She's contemptible, you know?
[20:12]She feels it.
[20:14]She's, her works on a knowledge.
[20:16]You know, she's trying to negotiate these systems
[20:18]that are bananas, you know?
[20:21]Yeah, it's, you know, God bless her.
[20:24]Yeah, growing shit.
[20:26]She got kicked off the PTA.
[20:27]Yeah.
[20:29]So what kind of feedback are you getting since this book has been out?
[20:33]Like where, like tell me about that?
[20:36]Well, I'm not, I mean, I'm not somebody who's like googling
[20:40]my reviews all the time or so I can only like untoward.
[20:46]Yeah, I mean, you know, I'm trying to show up.
[20:49]And it's become, I feel like it became increasingly clear
[20:53]that I didn't need to talk more about
[20:56]what that it's more than a funny book.
[20:58]Yeah, that it's, there's more going on there.
[21:01]I'm grateful that people are finding it funny
[21:03]because that, you know, again, it's not easy to write funny.
[21:07]And that was one of my primary goals.
[21:09]So that people find it funny is like super win.
[21:12]I'm very, I'm very happy about that.
[21:15]But I also wanted it to start talking about the fact
[21:18]that it goes, it goes a little deeper than that.
[21:21]Yeah, I'm grateful, you know, for whatever, again,
[21:25]with the not being able to control people.
[21:26]Yeah, it takes from the book what they will.
[21:29]And there's really not a lot I can do about that.
[21:31]But I didn't want to start just talking about like, yeah,
[21:34]these are other elements, you know, other facets of it
[21:37]that I crafted.
[21:38]So it's important.
[21:40]And so what are you working on now?
[21:42]Oh, well, I'm about to leave tomorrow
[21:44]for the fabulous Texas book fest.
[21:47]And then I have a reading in Chicago
[21:49]and a couple like college things.
[21:52]So that will be fun.
[21:54]I hope.
[21:55]Mee ha.
[21:56]And I'm working on another novel because why not, you know,
[22:02]so keep going.
[22:04]Yeah, mom still don't have time to write novels.
[22:07]Yeah.
[22:08]Right.
[22:11]How long did this one take?
[22:12]Like how long does a book typically take you?
[22:14]Or I know they're all different, but yeah, probably took
[22:17]the longest just because I was, you know, not,
[22:20]I didn't know what it was.
[22:22]And I had, you know, I worked pretty closely
[22:26]with my agent, Monika Woods, who's input
[22:29]I'm grateful for and who I really enjoy working with.
[22:33]So to prepare the book and to, you know,
[22:36]I was also not, some of my previous stuff
[22:39]has been pretty experimental.
[22:40]And I wasn't interested in playing with form in this at all.
[22:44]Like it had a, you know, big enough burden
[22:48]to just become a can to be about money.
[22:50]You know, I didn't want to throw anything else at a reader
[22:52]like, oh, it's going to be have weird line breaks like no.
[22:56]So just to give it a, you know, a solid structure
[23:01]to give it a beginning, middle and end, you know,
[23:03]all that stuff was enough of a challenge for me.
[23:06]So it took, it took about three years, really.
[23:09]Yeah.
[23:10]Wow.
[23:10]I hope I can introduce you at some point.
[23:12]We, so I started a publishing company also called
[23:14]to be best.
[23:15]Congratulations.
[23:16]And that's your name show, yeah.
[23:18]Shelly and I bow down.
[23:20]That is, yeah.
[23:22]And get, but one of the books we acquired
[23:24]that's coming out in 2024 is also said in East Hampton
[23:27]and has this similar, something kind of similar in the,
[23:32]in the observational nature of the craziness there.
[23:36]And it's called, I want you more,
[23:37]but it ends up being a little bit of a thriller.
[23:39]But anyway, the author is Swan Huntley and she's amazing.
[23:42]So anyway, I feel like you guys have some really interesting
[23:44]conversations and good and be on the beach
[23:48]yeah, be it on the beach or walk or something.
[23:51]What advice would you have for aspiring authors?
[23:54]Ooh, that's so good.
[23:56]I mean, I do, I teach at NYU, but that's not,
[23:59]it's about, that's about crafting more than about,
[24:02]I mean, the publishing, I love that,
[24:04]I mean, I could talk to you for a long time
[24:05]about your publishing company.
[24:07]I just, I think it's always good to have more
[24:11]venues and more women, it's good.
[24:13]So for, I guess the thing that I've been thinking about lately
[24:18]is that there's so many different ways to be a writer.
[24:21]Like, I don't participate, like,
[24:23]I'm going to the Texas Book Fest,
[24:24]which is the second, it's really,
[24:26]this is the only book fest I've been to, I think.
[24:28]And this is the second time I'll be going there.
[24:31]But a lot of writers who've, you know, written five books
[24:35]as I have like participated in what I think of
[24:37]is like the writing economy.
[24:39]Like they, they go to Book Fest, they teach at colleges,
[24:43]they speak at colleges.
[24:44]Like all those things are, you know, their income.
[24:48]And that's how they make it work.
[24:49]They're kind of like, they're a little bit, I think,
[24:52]kind of like traveling salesmen in a,
[24:54]I don't say that in a derogatory way.
[24:56]It's just like they have their product
[24:58]and they go out there with it.
[24:59]And that's, it's awesome.
[25:01]It's, that's never been a way that was open to me
[25:05]because of my kids and my choices.
[25:07]So I guess for a long time, I felt like there was something
[25:11]wrong with me that I couldn't do that.
[25:13]You know, that I, and I feel like that's,
[25:15]there's so many ways to be a writer.
[25:17]If you just write, you know, you don't have to be
[25:21]at every festival or teaching or doing anything,
[25:24]except writing and trying to find a way to be published.
[25:28]And even, you know, I mean, I think of Louise Worshaw
[25:33]like lived 16 blocks from me and raised three kids.
[25:35]So I think about her a lot.
[25:37]She was also in technical terms, stay at home mom.
[25:40]So like, I think about her a lot.
[25:42]And she would say that she was grateful for the, you know,
[25:46]the art, the critics that really gave her like,
[25:49]I think a decade or two of basically ignoring her, you know?
[25:52]So to just write and that's what makes you a writer,
[25:57]in your, there's a zillion ways to, you know,
[26:00]dance with the industry, like, don't be,
[26:03]don't be discouraged if you're not doing the primary way.
[26:06]I like that.
[26:07]I know any events I have to schedule around my custody schedule
[26:11]and I'm like, hold on.
[26:12]I have to check and I can't switch this day.
[26:14]And of course.
[26:15]Yeah.
[26:16]Cause you're joking that you're just been in a place.
[26:18]Yeah.
[26:19]Yeah.
[26:19]But I love to make time for it all, Zippy.
[26:21]I think that's awesome.
[26:23]Well, you too.
[26:24]I didn't start a publishing company or a podcast,
[26:28]but I appreciate it.
[26:30]No problem.
[26:31]I do it all from home.
[26:32]You know, that's cool.
[26:33]I love that.
[26:34]I think that's really just saying that to my kids before.
[26:37]And I was a stay at home mom for like 11 years
[26:39]where like, you know, I did other things.
[26:41]But yeah, I'm like, don't you think it's great
[26:43]that I figured out a way to do all this in our house?
[26:46]Like, what did they say?
[26:47]I know.
[26:48]They're like, yeah, it's so cool.
[26:50]Oh, my daughter like comes up from school
[26:52]and sits in Desert Homework with my team
[26:54]at the dining room table.
[26:55]Like it's really cute.
[26:56]That's the best.
[26:57]That's the best.
[26:58]Yes.
[27:00]Yeah, we just all have to find ways to make it work.
[27:02]Exactly.
[27:03]Yes.
[27:04]All right.
[27:05]Well, I hear your twix in the background.
[27:07]I'd be, but thanks so much for chatting.
[27:10]I really, really enjoyed your book
[27:12]and like hearing all the extra layers and, yeah,
[27:15]I hope we can connect.
[27:16]Cool.
[27:17]I would love that.
[27:18]Thank you.
[27:18]Thank you.
[27:19]Appreciate it.
[27:20]Have a good one.
[27:20]You too, bye-bye.
[27:23]Thanks for listening to this episode of Moms Don't Have Time
[27:25]to Read Books.
[27:26]Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at zebi Owens
[27:29]and at Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[27:31]Also sign up for my newsletter at zebiowens.com
[27:34]and sign up for my virtual book club
[27:36]and meet lots of authors on Zoom every other week.
[27:38]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound
[27:41]for the Sound Editing.
[27:42]And thank you to Morning Moon Productions
[27:44]for providing this fantastic intro and outro music.