Amelia Possanza, LESBIAN LOVE STORY: A Memoir in Archives

2023-06-20  ·  24:23  ·  Amelia Possanza  ·  Podcast Audio

Clip this, please

[0:02]Hi, I'm Zippy Owens, and you're listening to moms don't have time to read books.
[0:06]This 30 minute podcast features a new author interviewed by me every single day, 365 days
[0:12]a year for about 30 minutes.
[0:15]I am also the publisher for Zippy Books, which publishes 12 books a year in fiction
[0:20]and memoir.
[0:21]Our books are already out now.
[0:23]You can check it out on zippybooks.com.
[0:26]And we have a magazine called Zippy Mag, where we have lots of wonderful essays and lifestyle
[0:31]features.
[0:32]That's at zippymag.com.
[0:33]We have classes.
[0:34]It's a B-Classist.com.
[0:36]And I recently opened a book store in LA called Zippy's Bookshop at 1113 Montana Avenue
[0:43]at 11th Street in San Monica.
[0:45]I hope that you are able to enjoy some of our other offerings.
[0:49]But this here podcast is the basis of all of it and started in 2018.
[0:54]And no matter what I do, this is basically my favorite thing.
[0:57]Enjoy.
[1:03]Amelia Pozanza is the author of Lesbian Love Story, A Memoir in Archives.
[1:08]A full-time book publicist and part-time writer, Amelia currently lives in Brooklyn with
[1:12]her cat.
[1:13]Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, BuzzFeed, Electric Literature, The Millions
[1:17]and NPR's in Visibilitya.
[1:19]Her first book, Lesbian Love Story, came out from Cat Bull.
[1:22]Welcome, Amelia.
[1:23]Thank you so much for coming on Moms.
[1:25]Don't have time to read books to discuss Lesbian Love Story and Memoir in Archives.
[1:29]Thank you for having me.
[1:31]So this is so fun because I first knew you as a book publicist trying to spread the word
[1:36]about other books.
[1:37]And then I said, you had a book coming out.
[1:38]I'm like, that is so exciting.
[1:40]And of course.
[1:41]And then I read your book and you're obviously a phenomenal writer and took us through
[1:46]this whole process of digging deep and learning about lesbian through history and developing
[1:51]like real attachments to a lot of them and sprinkling in little bits and pieces about yourself
[1:55]along the way.
[1:56]So anyway, this is just so fun.
[1:58]Thanks for coming on.
[1:59]Thanks for having me.
[2:00]to think that now I've become a publicist for lesbians.
[2:03]We need someone.
[2:05]We need someone to spread the word.
[2:07]Yeah, you've just hired yourself.
[2:09]They can't even fire you.
[2:10]They're stuck with you.
[2:13]Okay.
[2:14]Well, why don't you explain a little bit about your book for listeners?
[2:17]Yeah.
[2:18]Well, I love the way that you described it.
[2:19]I'm like, I'm going to have to write that down and use that my go ahead.
[2:23]But sort of it started out as the story of me trying to find the lesbian role models
[2:28]that I had never really learned about growing up because I see I'm such a big reader.
[2:33]I see reading as such a way to like understand the experiences that I hope to have.
[2:37]I'm going to have before they actually happen in my life.
[2:41]Like, oh, what's it going to be like to go to college or, oh, what's it going to be like to,
[2:45]you know, I think people feel the same way about like having a baby, getting married.
[2:49]I totally feel the same.
[2:50]And I just didn't have that.
[2:52]So I ended up finding seven couples, some of them kind of, I fudged it non-traditional
[2:57]couples, friends or people united in that political struggle.
[3:02]And I wrote a chapter about each of them and each one represents a different era and lesbian
[3:07]history from the 20th, from the chart of the century up until now with sort of me representing
[3:12]the now.
[3:13]And I used a lot of their original words.
[3:16]You know, I think originally I wanted to tell their stories in my own voice.
[3:21]And then I realized that they left us these words about like being queer and really difficult
[3:26]times.
[3:27]And they sort of used different words that I would use to describe their gender identity
[3:32]or their sexualities.
[3:33]So I realized that like I just wanted to use their own words.
[3:36]So other people could meet them and maybe develop the attachment that I did or similar
[3:40]at that.
[3:41]You even have a moment where you convince your friend to take you to the grave site of
[3:47]one of the women you've been studying.
[3:50]And it was so moving and how she had different names on her grave stone.
[3:53]And oh my gosh, like you take us through it in such visual detail that it makes us feel
[3:59]okay, I won't speak for everybody.
[4:00]Makes me feel like I am there with you like as you go into the library as you and then
[4:05]I did this.
[4:06]And then I you know, like we're like, okay, where are we going to go next where she
[4:09]can take us?
[4:10]And the grave site for me was like, oh my gosh, just like you here now, her there.
[4:15]I don't know, like this sort of confluence of past and present and you know, passing the
[4:20]torch.
[4:21]I don't know.
[4:22]It was so vivid and moving.
[4:24]Yeah.
[4:25]Well, I think I just sort of want to pass the torch to readers in that way.
[4:29]You know, I think part of the reason that I included, you know, the diaries and the letters
[4:34]and the oral histories of these lesbians is because I want other people to go out and
[4:39]sort of find history, not necessarily of lesbian, but whatever their passion is because
[4:45]it's sort of like all around us, like the fact that the grave site you mentioned, May
[4:48]Volhampton's grave is here in New York City, like a 40 minute drive away from where
[4:53]I lived.
[4:54]And you know, it's totally unmarked.
[4:57]It's not like a national historic landmark or a celebrated place in the fact that I can
[5:01]just go and visit is kind of wild to me.
[5:05]So I really do want other people to go, I don't know, sort of find more things, more
[5:09]role models or kind of whatever type of human that we want to be.
[5:14]Yeah.
[5:15]Oh, it's amazing.
[5:16]And I kind of was like, sifting through because I really wanted to know more about you and
[5:20]loved the little bits where you had your own story come through.
[5:24]And then of course, like towards the end, you're like, and by the way, I don't know.
[5:26]Maybe I'm not a lesbian.
[5:27]I was like, are you kidding me?
[5:29]I just like learned about all these people.
[5:31]I'm kidding.
[5:32]But maybe talk a little bit about what that was like, even like that photo that you saw.
[5:37]It was so funny when you were supposed to identify who was beautiful.
[5:40]Oh, next to the one who lay and everybody was like, wait, she likes the one wearing like
[5:44]Doc Martens and, you know, cargo pants or something.
[5:46]And you're like, was I not supposed to think she was the most beautiful lesbian?
[5:50]As a kid.
[5:51]Oh my gosh.
[5:52]Yeah.
[5:53]It's funny what you say about like, you know, oh, by the way, I'm not a lesbian, which is kind
[5:57]of a joke.
[5:58]But also, I think I started out this project being like, what is a lesbian?
[6:02]I think it's a word, but I have a lot of people giggle when they say it.
[6:06]It's a funny sounding word, a lot of comedy shows that I've been to.
[6:10]It can be a little bit of like a like a punchline on its own, you know, like have you
[6:15]seen Bennett like Becca and the socks, of course, when the mom is like, get your lesbian
[6:20]feet out of my shoes.
[6:21]What's the joke there?
[6:22]Like just that she's saying the word lesbian.
[6:24]So I was very interested in that particular word and sort of like going from Sappho who gave
[6:29]us that word and not a lot is known about her up through kind of, you know, the turn
[6:34]of the century when there were other words that people were using to sort of it becoming
[6:38]a very politicized thing in the 70s and also a very exclusive thing like Sappho original lesbian
[6:45]had a husband and then in the 70s, we have people saying that you can only be a lesbian
[6:49]if you like never talk to men, you know, it's not even about having sexual relationships
[6:54]with them.
[6:55]You just can't even speak to them and obviously some people were really rejected that.
[6:58]So I think it's funny to me that it has shifted throughout the decades to include more
[7:03]people to exclude the very people that maybe gave us that word.
[7:08]And so I think by the end, I felt like, you know, what does it mean to me?
[7:12]I wanted to find it on my own terms and I felt like what was special or drew me to all
[7:17]the people, all the lesbians that I chose for my book is they all kind of lived their lives
[7:22]outside of the mainstream.
[7:24]They risked a lot to live their lives authentically, you know, one of them was sent to
[7:29]Bellevue Hospital and Manhattan for potential shock treatments.
[7:33]And you know, that didn't stop her from living her life the way she wanted.
[7:38]And I think to me, by the end, that was the definition of lesbian that I chose for myself,
[7:43]the sort of, you know, people who have the courage to just go out there and reject kind
[7:50]of the mainstream narratives for women or, you know, other trans and queer people.
[7:56]Yeah, who are just really inspiring to me for the normalcy that they reject.
[8:01]Amazing.
[8:02]It's sort of crazy how much digging you actually had to do.
[8:05]Well, I want other people to go out there and do it too.
[8:08]I'm like, I can't do it all, but I want more of these sorts, you know, I shared it with
[8:12]a bookseller and she wrote to me that her partner had been transcribing like a great-great-grandmother's
[8:18]diary about the great-great-grandmother's romance with another woman in like the 20s and
[8:24]30s.
[8:25]And I was like, oh my gosh, you know, like, your partner needs to keep doing that.
[8:29]Like we shouldn't have to dig for these kind of non-traditional stories, you know, they
[8:35]should be around to inspire everyone.
[8:37]What kind of world would we have if, you know, the heroes that we presented with were like
[8:42]military heroes and statesmen, but, you know, people who are daring at the other ways,
[8:48]like my cat who is there in perhaps this interview?
[8:53]Well, you also, you know, talk about the fact that the traditional like, sort of stereotypical
[8:58]lesbian is not how you are presenting, you know, you were like, that you were literally
[9:03]in a like queer swimming group and someone's like, well, you're not a lesbian, right?
[9:06]And you're like, I am literally in a queer swimming group.
[9:09]Like, what am I doing here?
[9:12]Yeah.
[9:13]When I was writing the book, I thought a lot about belonging, like, I think it's such a human
[9:18]thing to not want to feel alone to be part of a community, but I think that like with
[9:23]swimming and this queer swim team in particular, you know, I was like, oh, I want to belong.
[9:28]I just moved to New York.
[9:29]Here's a group that I could join and I think it's funny that even within communities
[9:34]like the queer community, there are then, you know, gradients and I found out that this
[9:40]team, which I had accidentally joined in this wonderful way, you know, that it was really
[9:46]a lot of cis white gay men and that's what being gay meant to them.
[9:51]They weren't thinking about like the L and the B and the T and the LGBT acronym.
[9:57]And I think it also, you know, going back to those lesbians.
[10:00]He's in the 70s who are very exclusionaries about them.
[10:04]For them, part of belonging was excluding other people.
[10:07]And that push-pull was something
[10:09]that kept coming up in my research,
[10:12]that as people who were marginalized
[10:15]or didn't want to participate in mainstream society,
[10:18]kind of found each other,
[10:20]they could belong to this little subgroup.
[10:22]But sometimes those subgroups existed
[10:24]by pushing other people out.
[10:27]And so, yeah, I don't think it's unique
[10:30]to the queer experience to want to belong to the community
[10:33]and find that, but still be as expansive as possible
[10:37]and not be leaving people out
[10:40]for these really persnickety reasons.
[10:43]Totally.
[10:44]No, that's, I mean, everybody wants to belong
[10:46]to something, right?
[10:47]It's like, you have to audition,
[10:48]you want to connect, you want to, all of that?
[10:51]Even if you weren't a lesbian,
[10:52]I would imagine that you would want to belong
[10:56]in something.
[10:57]Yeah, I would not want to necessarily
[10:58]belong to a queer swim group, but that's okay.
[11:01]You know, that's because I don't really
[11:03]want to be swimming in New York City.
[11:04]But anyway, you should try it.
[11:08]I don't know, I feel like all the pools are so cold.
[11:10]Aren't the pools like freezing?
[11:11]I don't know, I do actually love to swim,
[11:13]but I don't know, every time I've tried to swim in New York,
[11:15]I'm like, this is freezing.
[11:16]You know, I'm outside of my hair's wet, and I don't know.
[11:18]I don't know.
[11:20]And I want people who swim this time of the year,
[11:23]you know, who are like the ocean,
[11:25]below 50 degrees, and they jump in,
[11:27]and they say it has all these, you know,
[11:30]health benefits and healing properties,
[11:33]but I am too much of a win, but it's not for me.
[11:35]Oh, yeah.
[11:36]No, I'm a complete win.
[11:37]Like 90 degree pool.
[11:38]All right.
[11:39]Maybe not that long.
[11:41]Yeah, exactly.
[11:43]Let me just wait.
[11:44]You had a funny moment where you told your college
[11:48]you made that you were a lesbian, and she was irritated at you.
[11:52]And she was like, oh my gosh,
[11:53]like, I don't want to have to shave my legs either.
[11:56]And you were like, fuming.
[11:58]You're like, that is not, you're like, I shave my legs.
[12:00]Like, that's not what it is.
[12:02]How do you deal with like crazy comments
[12:05]that you get like that even now?
[12:06]Or do you get comments like that now?
[12:08]Yeah, that is such a funny question.
[12:10]Well, like, I feel like the book kind of started
[12:12]from a place of anger, like what you mentioned
[12:14]of someone sort of seeing me and being like,
[12:16]you're on this Christmas team, but you're not a lesbian.
[12:19]Like, what do you mean?
[12:21]I think it's funny that it ended up being,
[12:23]you know, having love in the title
[12:24]when it started from this place of anger.
[12:27]But I think now with comments like that,
[12:29]I do have a little bit more grace for people
[12:33]who say things like that, especially way more grace
[12:36]that I did when I was, you know, a college student
[12:38]trying to come out and it was met with kind of,
[12:42]I don't know, this total misunderstanding.
[12:45]But I think now I see when people say things like that,
[12:48]like a lot of us don't want to have to conform
[12:53]to these rules like shaving your legs.
[12:56]And I think for women and, you know,
[12:58]a lot of people like my gay male fans talk about this too.
[13:01]There's all these beauty standards that, you know,
[13:04]we don't want to live up to and it's hard to toss out.
[13:07]And I think now if that same roommate came back
[13:10]and said that to me, I would like to think
[13:13]that I'd have a more gracious answer of like, you know,
[13:16]come on in, stop shaving your legs.
[13:18]Like, we want to have a real lesbian to do that.
[13:22]I do think that all, yeah.
[13:23]All of these lesbians that I studied
[13:25]just had a wonderful way of rejecting mainstream norms
[13:30]and I think if someone made a comment like that to me today,
[13:32]I would just be like, yes, like you don't have to be a lesbian,
[13:35]but come on in, let's all sort of live lives
[13:37]on our own terms.
[13:39]Amazing.
[13:40]Well, I feel like next time I have a research topic
[13:43]I need covered, I'm going to you.
[13:46]Your research prowess is pretty awesome.
[13:49]My mom is a librarian.
[13:51]I am totally not surprised to hear that.
[13:54]So I cannot take a full credit on my own.
[13:58]It's in your blood, you can't help it.
[14:00]Tell me about like how you got here
[14:02]and becoming a book publicist and then deciding to write a book
[14:04]and how did you get into the literary world
[14:06]to begin with and all of that?
[14:08]I think I'm going to say again, my mom's a librarian.
[14:11]Yeah, okay, yeah.
[14:11]So that's, I feel very lucky.
[14:13]like when I was in the middle of my house
[14:14]was just like covered and covered in books.
[14:18]And my mom actually had this card catalog.
[14:20]Do you know what that is?
[14:21]Of course I know what that is.
[14:23]I'm probably, well, I'm going to explain in case,
[14:24]you know, listen, I still know what it is,
[14:26]but it's, you know, before you could go
[14:29]on like the New York Public Libraries
[14:31]online research catalog and just type in like,
[14:34]oh, I want to read like a little life, right?
[14:37]Do they have any copies?
[14:38]They were a little drawers and you would pull them out
[14:40]and it index cards with the call numbers.
[14:43]And there was one like in our dining room growing up,
[14:46]right?
[14:47]Pull out the little drawers.
[14:49]And I think that that made me such an eager reader
[14:54]and want to tell other people about books.
[14:55]Because a huge part of my mom's role
[14:57]is the life of him was recommending books to people.
[15:00]Like, oh, you are, I think it was for young people.
[15:03]So oh, you're interested in sea turtles.
[15:06]Here are some suggestions about what to read about sea turtles.
[15:09]And I think that that same,
[15:12]sort of spark easily led to being a book publicist, right?
[15:15]Talking to journalists and reviewers,
[15:17]like, oh, we liked, you know,
[15:19]such and such book two years ago.
[15:21]I have another one for you or I have the same author comment,
[15:24]you know, I work a lot with Angie Crew
[15:25]that it's always really fun to be able to say like,
[15:28]oh, we have another book from Angie Crew
[15:30]that kind of go out to all of her supporters.
[15:33]And I stand by what I said in some ways writing this book
[15:37]feels like being a publicist for these forgotten lesbians,
[15:41]you know, like the first chapter about Mary Casal
[15:44]is me just reading her memoir and trying to hopefully
[15:49]retell it in a way that's a little more exciting
[15:51]than her memoir, no offense, Mary.
[15:53]But then it wasn't the most beautifully written book
[15:57]I've ever ever encountered.
[15:59]I spent the last two nights at Aspen words events
[16:02]for Angie Crews.
[16:03]Oh, yeah.
[16:04]There were, you know, I was out of town.
[16:06]I just got back.
[16:08]Well, she did great.
[16:09]She was amazing on two nights ago.
[16:11]She did a reading from How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water
[16:14]and she just was so dramatic.
[16:16]She's like the only actress persona.
[16:19]You know, oh my gosh, she was amazing.
[16:20]And she spoke beautifully last night
[16:23]at the Aspen word ceremony.
[16:24]I'm sorry she didn't win the literary prize, but you know,
[16:28]she wrote, she's just, she's really impressive.
[16:30]And I had her on my podcast, but after the last two nights,
[16:34]I feel like I know her much better.
[16:35]So maybe I did a bad job.
[16:36]I don't know, but I should probably go back
[16:38]and listen to that one.
[16:39]But anyway, so I'm a fan.
[16:41]Yeah, I mean, it's, yeah, it's so fun to be like,
[16:43]here are books that you might enjoy, you know?
[16:45]Yes.
[16:46]Whether they're books that I'm working on for my job
[16:50]or their books that I've read and then I'm sort of writing
[16:52]about it being totally nerding out about
[16:54]what books are you working on for your job?
[16:56]We've got a debut novel coming out in the fall club
[16:59]where there was fire by John Manuel Arias
[17:01]about multiple generations of women
[17:04]and Costa Rica who are affected by a banana plantation
[17:08]like an American banana plantation that comes in
[17:12]and employs a lot of the men to work there
[17:14]and to a lot of nefarious and bad things.
[17:18]But there are ghosts and old letters and mystery.
[17:23]It kind of opens with the night that one of the characters
[17:27]father disappears, the banana plantation burns down.
[17:31]And so you're kind of unspooling a mystery,
[17:33]but also with these like strong women characters throughout.
[17:39]And now that you've written a book,
[17:41]do you have like do you want to write more books?
[17:44]Do you like how did you feel about the whole process?
[17:47]And how is that now informing your work
[17:48]as a publicist being on the other side?
[17:51]Well, it's funny because I actually think
[17:53]I enjoyed writing a book more than I am currently enjoying
[17:57]having written a book.
[17:58]I think that having written a book is very similar to my job
[18:01]but the writing a book is very different.
[18:03]So it does feel like the only thing to do now
[18:06]that was the part I enjoyed is to go do it again.
[18:09]And I'm thinking that maybe if I wrote all of this stuff about
[18:12]we are history, I kind of want to write a novel about
[18:16]like what would a weird, clear future look like.
[18:20]Oh, I think so fiction but probably still inspired
[18:24]by lots of other source material
[18:26]because I think that's just the way that I work.
[18:28]Getting excited about other source material
[18:30]and wanting to tell people about it.
[18:32]Amazing.
[18:33]I interviewed Judy battalion about her book in the light of days
[18:37]and she had been inspired to do that
[18:39]because she was digging deep in the library
[18:41]and found like a journal written in Yiddish
[18:45]by someone in not a concentration camp in a ghetto
[18:49]who like helps with an uprising
[18:50]and found these secret historical documents
[18:53]that showed how women actually had been
[18:55]so much part of this movement.
[18:58]I'm not explaining that very well
[18:59]but it's like a similar thing.
[19:01]So she had it translated
[19:03]and just couldn't believe it.
[19:04]And then she went on this deep dive.
[19:05]I feel like the two of you should like go together
[19:08]and you can do like a TV show like, you know,
[19:11]deep dive or something where like you take three people
[19:14]and like different like put them in the library
[19:17]and they're like find everything you can about this.
[19:18]Go.
[19:19]Did you ever watch that show on PBS history detectives?
[19:23]No, but look, good.
[19:24]Someone already did it.
[19:25]It was on the 12 seasons and I watched it growing up
[19:29]and I think in the back of my mind I was like,
[19:30]oh, I don't need a real career.
[19:32]I can like grow up and be a history detective.
[19:34]And it was like a professor, like an auction appraiser
[19:39]and someone else who like just would go in
[19:43]and someone would be like,
[19:44]I have this pocket watch and I think it belonged
[19:46]to Mark Twain.
[19:46]Like the family lore is that it belonged to Mark Twain.
[19:49]Can you go out there and figure out
[19:51]if it belonged to Mark Twain?
[19:53]And it's a lot of footage of like people reading stuff
[19:55]and libraries and using those microfilm machia.
[19:58]Yeah.
[19:59]I did it.
[20:00]Cypher handwriting.
[20:00]So yeah, I think I mistaken and was like,
[20:02]oh, this is what I'm gonna do when I grow up.
[20:04]I'm gonna do it.
[20:05]You can reboot the show.
[20:07]It's perfect.
[20:09]I didn't establish that.
[20:10]I would want it to be like,
[20:11]we are history-detect.
[20:14]It's all right with you.
[20:16]I'll take it.
[20:17]It's fine.
[20:17]It's fine.
[20:18]It's fine.
[20:21]Oh my gosh.
[20:21]Okay.
[20:22]So what advice do you have to aspiring authors
[20:25]for aspiring authors?
[20:26]So much of my advice is centered on the,
[20:28]like the promotion process.
[20:31]That's fine.
[20:32]I'm sure people would love that kind of advice.
[20:33]Oh yeah.
[20:34]From a big house publicist.
[20:36]And maybe I'll do one of each.
[20:38]I think my non-promotional process,
[20:40]piece of advice is like find the thing
[20:42]that you cannot stop thinking about.
[20:45]I've definitely had friends who are writers
[20:47]sort of pitch me like high concept ideas
[20:50]that sound really cool.
[20:51]And I'm like, oh, knowing you deeply as a friend,
[20:54]you know, could you really write about like,
[20:56]you know, high society models and talk about it
[21:02]for the next five years.
[21:03]Like I don't think that you could do that.
[21:06]So maybe that's actually a piece of advice
[21:08]that bridges writing and promotion.
[21:10]You need to find the idea
[21:10]that's gonna like haunt you and stay with you.
[21:14]Or even someone like Angie Cruz
[21:16]that who we're just talking about.
[21:17]You know, people are gonna ask her about
[21:19]how not to drown,
[21:19]but also Domenicana.
[21:21]Or like I think of Harry Styles
[21:23]and how it is concert.
[21:24]He still sings what makes you beautiful.
[21:26]Like a original one direction song that made them so famous.
[21:29]And I'm like, if you're gonna have a hit,
[21:31]you need to like be able to bring new energy to it
[21:35]for decades to come.
[21:37]You can't be like, oh, I'm so embarrassed about
[21:39]what makes you beautiful.
[21:40]And I never wanna hear it again.
[21:42]Interesting.
[21:44]That's similar too.
[21:45]Did you read romantic comedy by Curtis in Philadelphia?
[21:48]No, not yet.
[21:49]So one of the stars of the book,
[21:52]I say stars cause he's a music star
[21:55]who has like a really big pop song.
[21:57]But then it's kind of embarrassed by it.
[21:59]And he's like, no, but really I'm kind of more like poetic.
[22:01]And this is the kind of stuff I really like to do.
[22:03]But he's known for like this big pop song.
[22:06]Yeah.
[22:07]So anyway, funny.
[22:09]And was that your promotional advice too?
[22:10]Or did you have a second piece?
[22:12]I think that was also my promotional advice, right?
[22:14]If you're gonna write something or if you're gonna have
[22:15]to promote it, like you've gotta be able to talk about it
[22:18]for years and years to come.
[22:20]Like gonna be the thing you think about
[22:22]when you wake up in the middle of the night
[22:23]when you get up in the morning when, you know,
[22:26]if you eventually have an agent and an editor,
[22:29]like it's just gonna be the thing
[22:31]that everyone wants to talk to you about.
[22:32]So you've better find the most fascinating thing in the world.
[22:36]And I also like to imagine that when I read,
[22:39]I can tell, you know, like if the person
[22:42]the author writing is excited about it.
[22:44]Like one of my favorite books is Moby Dick
[22:47]and everyone makes, which I managed to sneak a reference
[22:50]to in the introduction to lesbian love story
[22:53]in spite of the fact that it's a story written by a pun
[22:56]predominantly featuring only men out at sea
[22:59]without any women.
[23:01]But I feel like I love that book
[23:03]just because like Melville seems like he's having so much fun.
[23:06]Like even at the moment, I'm like,
[23:07]dude, you've gone so far into whale history.
[23:10]I have no idea what you're talking about.
[23:12]I'm like, but you're still having fun.
[23:14]So I'm having fun.
[23:15]There you go.
[23:16]Yep, Melville, the most fun guy around.
[23:19]That's, that's what we all think all the time.
[23:23]All right.
[23:25]Well, Amelia, thank you so much for coming on.
[23:28]This is really great and congratulations on your book
[23:31]and start working on the reboot of that show.
[23:33]I actually think you can start.
[23:35]I think it would be really fun.
[23:36]Thank you.
[23:36]The queer history to tell.
[23:37]Yeah, I'm going to start my pitch here.
[23:39]Thank you so much for having me.
[23:41]It was really fun to sort of get to know you
[23:42]and this other other role.
[23:44]You too.
[23:44]Yes, I'm not just on email.
[23:45]It's beautiful library.
[23:49]Thank you.
[23:49]Yes, I do.
[23:51]All right, thanks a lot.
[23:52]Take care.
[23:53]Okay, bye bye.
[23:55]Thanks for listening to this episode of Moms Don't
[23:57]Have Time to Read Books.
[23:59]Don't forget to follow me on Instagram, at Zibi Owens
[24:02]and at Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[24:04]Also sign up for my newsletter at Zibi Owens.com
[24:07]and sign up for my virtual book club
[24:08]and meet lots of authors on Zoom every other week.
[24:11]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound
[24:13]for the Sound Editing.
[24:15]And thank you to Morning Moon Productions
[24:16]for providing this fantastic intro and now trim music.