Katherine Center, HELLO STRANGER
[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.
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[0:20]and memoir.
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[1:03]Catherine Center is the author of Hello Stranger, a novel book page calls Catherine Center,
[1:08]the reigning queen of comfort reads.
[1:10]She is the New York Times best-selling author of nine novels, including How to Walk Away,
[1:14]Things You Save in a Fire, The Bodyguard, and Hello Stranger.
[1:17]Catherine writes, laugh and cry books about how life knocks us down and how we get back
[1:21]up.
[1:22]She's been compared to both Jane Austen and Nora Efron, and the Dallas Morning News calls
[1:26]her stories satisfying in the most soul-nourishing way.
[1:30]Her books have made countless best-of-lists, including real symbols, best books, Amazon
[1:34]Top 100, Goodreads, and the movie adaptation of Catherine's novel The Lost Husband,
[1:40]starring Josh Duhamel, hit number one on Netflix.
[1:44]Her novel Happiness for Beginners just came out with Ellie Kempner.
[1:48]Catherine's summer book The Bodyguard was an instant New York Times bestseller, a people
[1:52]best new book spec and nominated for Book of the Year by the Book of the Month Club.
[1:58]If you're still not convinced, best-selling author Emily Henry calls The Bodyguard a shot
[2:02]of pure joy and best-selling author Helen Huang, calls it a perfect feel-good romcom.
[2:07]Catherine lives in her hometown of Houston, Texas with her husband, two kids, and their
[2:10]fluffy but fierce dog.
[2:12]Welcome, Catherine.
[2:13]Thank you so much for coming on Mom's Don't Have Time to Read Books to discuss Hello
[2:17]Stranger.
[2:18]Thank you for having me.
[2:19]I'm so excited to be here.
[2:21]Now, are these literally the flowers for the bottom of the book on the wall behind you
[2:26]or is it just a coincidence?
[2:28]So flowers have become quite a theme in my life since my book started to have flowers
[2:32]on them in about 2018.
[2:34]And now we always put flowers on the book somewhere, sometimes possibly even just the
[2:38]spine buffer.
[2:40]That background that you're seeing actually started when the pandemic happened, because
[2:44]I had a book that was supposed to come out in the summer of 2020, like a lot of people,
[2:48]and everything, you know, got canceled and we switched everything to Zoom.
[2:51]And I just thought, you know, I'm going to make something festive.
[2:55]So I made this.
[2:56]It's like those little trifold boards that your kids make like science experiment display
[3:02]projects on.
[3:03]So it's like from the drugstore, but I just painted it on the dining room table just
[3:05]to make it fun.
[3:06]But then I thought it would just be for the book tour, but then I liked it so much
[3:09]that I kept it.
[3:11]And so I just do it now for all book things.
[3:13]I think you should turn that into a wallpaper, because I would totally like smack that
[3:18]on here.
[3:19]I need to get some wallpaper in here.
[3:20]The thing about it actually is that it hides whatever like crazy mess is happening on
[3:25]the other side of that little green, you know, like, kids stuff everywhere.
[3:30]And it's totally fine.
[3:31]Although my kids are older now, so they're better at keeping their stuff in their
[3:34]rooms.
[3:35]Hello to your kids.
[3:37]I have a 17 year old son and a 20 year old daughter who's like, yeah, crazy.
[3:44]So yeah, they used to be a lot smaller.
[3:46]I would never know.
[3:47]I mean, you know, you never know.
[3:49]Okay, hello stranger.
[3:50]Yes.
[3:51]Tell listeners what it's about.
[3:53]And then how did you come up with this idea?
[3:55]So it's a story about a portrait artist who gets a condition, a neurological condition
[4:03]called face blindness, just as she is kind of getting the big career break of her life.
[4:10]And she has to paint the best portrait she's ever painted ever.
[4:15]And then just as that happens, you know, as you can imagine chaos ensues for her emotional
[4:20]chaos and, you know, physical chaos, everything is bonkers and upside down.
[4:26]And in the wake of that, she winds up having to kind of figure out what matters, what art
[4:30]is, what life is, how to really see people.
[4:33]And somewhere in all that she actually winds up falling in love with two different men
[4:38]at the exact same time and having to kind of figure out this love triangle.
[4:43]So there's a lot going on.
[4:46]It's a very, it's not a slow story.
[4:49]It's like there's a lot going on and how did I get the idea?
[4:51]You know, years and years ago, I was listening to this American life and they had a Valentine's
[4:59]Day podcast where they were doing all these different little love stories.
[5:03]And one of them was about a woman who dated a guy who had face blindness, but she didn't
[5:08]know that he had face blindness when it started.
[5:12]And part of what attracted her to him was that she loved the way that he looked at her.
[5:18]You know, he looked at her like he kind of never seen her before.
[5:21]And he was really kind of always like sort of really looking at her face.
[5:24]And something about that stuck in my head.
[5:26]That particular love story did not end well, but this love story does end well.
[5:32]And you know, as I was stuck in my head and I found myself just kind of circling back to
[5:36]it over the years, like there's a really smoothie love story in there somewhere.
[5:40]And then last year I just decided I was going to write it.
[5:43]Oh my gosh.
[5:44]And then you just crank it up.
[5:46]Well, I did a ton of research.
[5:49]You know, that's like for me, that's always where the stories come from is like you have
[5:53]a vague idea of what you think it's going to be.
[5:56]And then you do all your research.
[5:57]And that's when the story sort of comes into focus of like what would really happen
[6:01]if this happened.
[6:02]You know, so I really, really took a very deep dive into prosapagnoja, which is the sort
[6:08]of medical term and interviewed people in red books and listened to podcasts and, you
[6:15]know, just did everything I could possibly come up with to like really get inside what
[6:19]it would be like to have this happen.
[6:22]So yeah, that's kind of the story.
[6:24]Well, one thing that I really loved about the book is your voice.
[6:28]Like your voice is so good, so funny that narrator like with the first, like you feel
[6:33]like you are this person and the way she even thinks about like her stepmom and her
[6:38]steps is to show us a fun phase time while she's in the hospital and like you have
[6:43]a fabulous writing voice.
[6:44]I love it.
[6:45]I really love your voice.
[6:46]So that's like something nobody can ever replicate and it's just always going to be great.
[6:52]But I also loved, you know, confronting after the loss of your mom, like she lost her mom
[6:57]and that is something many people sadly have shared and experience and what happens
[7:01]with the relationships with those who remain.
[7:04]And how do you come to terms with that?
[7:07]And, and also her need to, you know, get her dad's attention and like prove something which
[7:13]I also think so many of us are trying to do myself perhaps included there.
[7:17]So tell me a little bit about that dynamic.
[7:20]So I, well, I really, really love stories about people who get knocked down by life and
[7:27]have to figure out a way to get back up, you know, I'm not very good at that.
[7:33]Like I'm one dirty look in the grocery store away from just like curling up in the fetal
[7:39]position and lying on the floor for three days.
[7:41]Like I'm very tender-hearted and I don't bounce back quickly.
[7:44]But I want to be a person who's good at bouncing back like I'm so interested in resilience.
[7:50]And so, you know, I constantly find myself writing stories about people who have to face
[7:55]something genuinely hard, genuinely overwhelming.
[7:58]And then in the course of going through whatever that thing is, they come out better
[8:04]on the other side.
[8:05]You know, wiser, more compassionate, funnier, whatever it is, they learn some important
[8:09]thing.
[8:10]And so for Sadie in this book, yeah, her life went off the rails when her mom died unexpectedly.
[8:17]And I see this story, like I always try to write stories about sort of the most important
[8:21]moment in somebody's life, sort of the most important series of events.
[8:26]And in this moment, you know, this terrible thing happens to her, but it winds up being
[8:30]an opportunity to sort of circle back and correct a lot of lessons that she took from
[8:37]that moment when her life went off the rails back when she was a kid and reevaluate them
[8:41]and rethink them, right?
[8:43]And so I really, like I'm a huge fan of love stories and there's always a love story
[8:47]in anything that I write.
[8:49]And it's partly because I think they're incredibly nourishing and incredibly healing.
[8:54]And I love the way that love can inspire you to be emotionally courageous and to deal
[9:01]with your stuff.
[9:03]And so, you know, this hard thing happens to her and she has to sort of muddle through
[9:06]it, but she also finds this kind of, when he loves situation that also kind of inspires
[9:14]her to be brave her about figuring out her life and who she is and what she cares about
[9:17]and what really matters.
[9:19]So that's kind of where it all started from.
[9:20]I wanted her to have to reevaluate a lot of the assumptions she had made about how life
[9:28]works and who she has to be.
[9:30]And this, this story's a chance to do that.
[9:32]And she doesn't fumble it.
[9:33]She does great.
[9:34]I'm the same way by the way, that's why I love memoir so much, like, because it's always
[9:39]about, I'm like, I like memoirs about somebody getting through something, like it could
[9:43]be an addiction, it could be like falling off a mountain, it could be something tiny, but
[9:48]like, like you.
[9:49]Like, glom on to stories like that.
[9:51]And the way you said I was like, oh, maybe it is because I'm so sensitive and I'm not
[9:55]good at that.
[9:56]Maybe that's why I'm so drawn to these stories.
[9:57]So thank you.
[9:58]This is like his, you know.
[10:00]There's my reading habits.
[10:01]So for me, you said a minute ago that I thought was really important, which is that
[10:06]the way that I write the stories is in the first person, right? So it's always like, like,
[10:10]like your best friend is talking to you, like a three in the morning over a glass of wine or two,
[10:15]and just being really honest about her life. But I try to inside of that, I try to construct the
[10:20]story so that you don't just feel like you're kind of going through whatever the thing is
[10:24]that she's going through in the story. Like with her, I want you to sort of step inside her
[10:29]skin and go through it like as her. Right. So as she's struggling, you're doing the same thing.
[10:35]You're going through it too. You're feeling her feelings, you know, you're longing for her longings
[10:39]when she falls in love. You do too, right? Because I think that stories have this
[10:45]incredibly powerful ability to teach us things that we need to learn. And so if you can go through
[10:53]a kind of virtual hard thing with somebody else, it's not a real thing that you've gone through. But
[10:58]but you're stepping into their experience and going through it, like experiences where wisdom comes
[11:04]from, like, right? You're not going to get wisdom the way you multiply multiplication tables.
[11:09]It's not something you get from a textbook wisdom is something you have to pull out of real life
[11:12]experience. And stories are kind of like the next best thing to real life experience. You know,
[11:17]I mean, like getting lost in a story that feels very three-dimensional and very real,
[11:21]and that is emotionally resonant to you. The benefit from doing that means that on the other side,
[11:27]you get to pull all these, all these bits of wisdom out the way you would from your own real life
[11:32]experience. So I, yeah, I'm always trying to make stories that are inspiring, but also that
[11:39]allow us to have a little wisdom. So I do like a hard thing on one side. Like, yeah,
[11:43]let's do something hard. Like my first book to ever hit the New York Times list was about a
[11:47]woman who was in a plane crash on the day she gets engaged, right? And she gets a spinal cord
[11:52]injury. She spends most of the story in the hospital doing rehab. And every time I tell anybody
[11:56]about it, they're like, oh, that sounds really depressing. I'm like, no, but it's funny because
[12:01]the other side of the story is always like banter, comedy, yeah, hopefulness, love story. And
[12:08]the love story, so I always have like half struggle and half love story. And the love story part,
[12:14]for me is the healing and the hope, right? So the hard thing is the struggle. And that's where
[12:20]the wisdom comes from. You've got to figure out who you are and what really matters. But the love
[12:24]story is the fun part, right? The love story creates this sense of anticipation that like there
[12:29]is something good up ahead to move towards, right? So I always try to have a balance between
[12:34]both of those two things. Okay. So I'm embarrassed to say this is my first book of yours. Now I have
[12:39]to go back and read the rest. I don't even know how this has happened frankly. I mean, I'm like,
[12:43]where have I been like under a rock? Because you're describing the way you write is I love reading books
[12:48]like this. And the way you're described, like this is exactly this is my sweet spot. Where do you
[12:53]pin on my life? So anyway, take us through, because now I selfishly want to know about every other
[12:58]book you written. And I know there have been many. So was the bright side of disaster, what you were
[13:03]just talking about? That was my first ever book. And it was like a million years ago. It came
[13:08]on 2007. So yeah, I've been around a long time. I've been like a very slow burn my career. I was
[13:14]not like one of those people who was like an overnight success. I am very, very slowly
[13:17]found the people who like the thing that I do, who want stories to be kind of laugh and cry,
[13:23]you know, kind of heartbreaking and heart rending and also very funny and swooning and
[13:29]cheerful. So yeah, this is my 10th book actually. Oh my gosh. But my first one I hit the New York Times
[13:35]list was called How to Walk Away. No, no, they're, they're important even if I didn't hit the list.
[13:39]Okay. Give me, give me, I'm going to, I'm going to go through my list from the book,
[13:43]The Bright Side of Disaster, one, one sentence, what are all these books about? And when
[13:47]we're going to write them, it's about a woman who's pregnant. And her partner leaves her, her
[13:51]man leaves her the night before she goes into labor. And she has to redefine love and what it all
[13:58]means and kind of do it all on her own. And I had just had a baby. So it's highly, highly autobiographical.
[14:04]I just liberally borrowed from my own life. Then I wrote a book called Everyone Is Late,
[14:08]where you let, did, did you get left when you didn't? No, no, no, I didn't. No, thank God. No,
[14:12]I have a very helpful husband who is still around. Okay, though I did get lots of notes from
[14:16]people when that book first came out that were like, sweetheart, I'll babysit for you.
[14:21]So then I wrote a book called Everyone Is Beautiful, which is how to be drag old mom, three boys
[14:27]under the age of three who moves away from home. And it's like alone. It's very sort of
[14:31]comical, but it's a lot about mom life. I was, as you can imagine, in the thick of mom life at
[14:36]that moment with little tiny kids that I wrote a book called Get Lucky, about a woman who offers
[14:41]to be a surrogate for her sister. That one's up being unexpectedly complicated, but lots of
[14:46]opportunities for growth. Then I wrote a book called Oh God. The last husband. The last husband,
[14:51]which became a movie in 2020, actually. And it starts Josh Dumel. And I always said it was pronounced
[14:58]Do Hamel. I know there's a lot of it's not. Is it okay? Now I know that's the first time I've
[15:02]heard it set out loud. I did some research early on because this is the name I've said a lot since,
[15:07]you know, 2020. No, I trust you. I think I'm right. I could be wrong. We'll check with you.
[15:11]I'm totally trusting you. I just realized I've been wrong this little time. Not that I say
[15:14]it's a lot of it. And how often do I say it in my mind to you. Okay. Anyway, so the last husband, Josh
[15:18]you about do I? Yeah. So I got to go to the set for that movie. And I got to be an extra. I got to
[15:23]oh my gosh, purchase goat cheese at a farmer's market for my own main character, which was totally
[15:30]trivial. And I got to meet Josh Dumel, which was bonkers because he is so handsome that I forgot
[15:36]how to speak. Like, lost all my words. I, you know, every time I saw the story, I'm like,
[15:41]I've never seen a man that handsome before in my husband across the room is like, hello,
[15:45]etc. But it was just, he like sparkled. He looked like the handsomeness just like rose off of
[15:51]him like steam. And he's asking me these like, he's asking me these like easy, you know, questions,
[15:57]like not, he was not asking me to do calculus. It was just like, so are you from Texas? Like,
[16:01]I know the answer to that question. Yes, I am. But I couldn't make any words. Like the whole quadrant
[16:06]of my right. It just shut right down. So that was Nettie. And that movie actually wound up hitting
[16:12]number one on Netflix during during the pandemic, you know, because everybody was like trapped in
[16:16]the house. And here was this comforting little movie from Texas about people who have to get back
[16:21]up after life has knocked them down. And people just started watching it. Oh my gosh. And the movie
[16:27]is also called the last husband. He's also called the last husband. I've been Catherine. I've been
[16:31]under a rock. Okay. I mean, also say that movie has one of the greatest kisses in movie history.
[16:37]Like there should be an Oscar for best kiss. And this movie should win it like every year for
[16:42]eternity, because it's really fantastic. I'm gonna watch it tonight. Yeah. Do it. Do it.
[16:46]It looks like it's one. Okay. Happiness for beginners going through the list. So then happiness
[16:50]for beginners is also about to become a movie on July 27th on Netflix. Wow.
[16:55]Last husband did so well. The same director writer, Vicki White, came back and did again. And this
[17:00]movie stars, Ellie Kemper from the office. And Luke Grimes, who's on Yellowstone. He's very
[17:09]smoothie. And Blive Danner is in it. So yeah, I was very excited to meet her. So I got to be an
[17:14]extra in that movie too, even though they were filming during COVID. And I got to spend the whole day
[17:20]pretending to drink champagne at a wedding with Blive Danner, which was pretty pretty great.
[17:25]Pretty bucket list level stuff. So, okay. So that movie I love. I'm so proud of it. I'm doing a
[17:31]buddy read of it right now. I'm like rereading it right now for the first time sort of in anticipation
[17:35]of the movie and doing a buddy read on Instagram. What's a buddy read? What is that?
[17:38]A buddy read is like when you all read a book together and you use the same hashtag and you post
[17:42]about it and like, you know, kind of it's it's on Instagram. So it's all virtual, but you're kind of
[17:47]doing it at the same time as buddies. Oh, I know. It's my first one ever. But I'm rereading this book
[17:53]came out in 2015 and I'm going and I'm annotating it because I'm going to give away this annotated
[17:57]thing at the end. And I'm reading along and I'm like, this is good. I love this book. So that's
[18:04]been fun. And then, okay, I'm trying to go through the list. Then you have How to Walk Away.
[18:08]How to Walk Away, which is about a woman who's in a plane crash on the day. She gets engaged and
[18:12]she winds up getting injured and has to kind of go through all that. And then, and there's
[18:16]a swimming love story in all of them. That's just a given. I'm not mentioning the love stories,
[18:20]but they're in there. And then the next book was book called Things You Save in a Fire,
[18:23]which is about a woman firefighter. And she is the woman firefighter who pulled the main character of
[18:29]How to Walk Away out of the plane crash. And my husband is a volunteer firefighter. So I really did a
[18:36]ton of research for that book because I knew it was a cold culture and I wanted to get the culture
[18:41]right. So I think I've heard from a lot of folks in that world that it's it's accurate. So that's
[18:47]good. That was a big for me. Okay, what's next? Okay, next you have what you wish for.
[18:52]Which for which came out during the pandemic? That is the book that's far into this lovely background.
[18:56]And it's about a teacher who gets a terrible principle at her school who's ruining everything.
[19:02]And then she falls in love with them. And I am from a family of teachers. My husband's a teacher,
[19:06]my sister's a teacher. So I felt like I was kind of going to represent that world pretty well.
[19:11]Well, she's actually a school librarian. So but it takes place at a school. And then,
[19:15]last summer was the bodyguard. The bodyguard was my pandemic book. I wrote it in the midst
[19:20]of all of the craziness of the pandemic when I was pretty sure we were all going to die.
[19:24]Like, I don't know what you were thinking during the pandemic, but I was like, we're doomed. Like,
[19:27]there's no way this is going to end well. And then, you know, at the same time I had this book to
[19:32]write. And so I was like, you know, faced with the end of human civilization. I think I will write
[19:37]the sweetest, swooniest, most charming, most romantic love story in the history of time.
[19:44]And so I so here's the log line for that book. It is a woman bodyguard has to protect a famous
[19:52]actor by pretending to be his girlfriend on a Texas ranch. And that's the story.
[20:00]And so it's very kind of fun and high concept,
[20:02]but it's also actually really grounded
[20:04]in a lot of very authentic things
[20:05]because I am from Texas and we have a ranch.
[20:08]It's my grandparents working cattle ranch.
[20:10]They've both passed away,
[20:11]but my mom still runs it.
[20:12]We spend everything's giving down there.
[20:14]I grew up going down there.
[20:15]And so when I was trapped in the house during the pandemic
[20:18]and feeling freaked out and desperate need of comfort,
[20:23]I just mentally went down to the ranch
[20:25]and wandered around and went to the Brazos River
[20:28]and had all kinds of fun with these very sweet cute characters.
[20:33]So that was my last book.
[20:34]Now it's Hello Stranger.
[20:35]And I've just turned in my next book for next summer,
[20:37]2024, which is actually a connected story
[20:40]to the bodyguard because the bodyguard actor,
[20:44]Jack Stapleton, who's a famous actor,
[20:46]he got famous in a movie called The Destroyers.
[20:49]And the book I just wrote is about the screenwriter
[20:52]of The Destroyers.
[20:53]So it's like a little connected, little connected story.
[20:56]I love all of us so much.
[20:58]That was a mouthful.
[20:59]That was a lot of books to do.
[21:00]I literally don't think I've ever done that before.
[21:02]I asked someone to describe every book.
[21:05]So thank you.
[21:06]Well done.
[21:07]Well, I hope it was not boring because it was a little-
[21:09]No, I'm totally fascinated.
[21:12]So when you describe yourself,
[21:14]I know there's like this compulsion
[21:16]in the publishing industry to sort of pigeonhole
[21:18]everybody, romcom, women's fiction, blah, blah, blah, blah,
[21:23]like where do you call yourself?
[21:25]Because I feel like this is not romcom territory
[21:27]because where do you see yourself?
[21:29]Yeah.
[21:30]Yeah, it's a good question.
[21:31]I think maybe part of the reason
[21:33]that it's been such a slow burn is because I don't fit
[21:35]into an easy category.
[21:37]All my training early on was very literary.
[21:39]I have a master's in creative writing.
[21:41]I went to Vassar and did creative writing there.
[21:44]And it's been this kind of journey in a much more
[21:46]romance-y direction over time,
[21:49]which has been very joyful and very satisfying.
[21:53]But so I think, I would say that I write a hybrid
[21:56]of women's fiction and romance
[21:58]because I really, really love romance.
[22:00]It is my favorite thing to read,
[22:02]like given it free Saturday and a bubble bath,
[22:06]I will read a romance novel.
[22:08]Like a traditional romance or a modern romcom
[22:11]or like a fobbyo romance or how I'm so glad you're asking.
[22:18]Actually, my favorite kinds of romance novels
[22:21]are historical sort of fobbyo romances.
[22:24]And I think it's partly because they're different
[22:26]from what I do, right?
[22:27]So it's, I can relax a little bit.
[22:28]I can turn off that like editor in my brain.
[22:30]When I read sort of contemporary romcoms,
[22:33]it's close enough to what I do that I'm constantly like,
[22:36]mmm, was that the best choice?
[22:37]You know, I don't want to have to do that
[22:39]if I'm really trying to relax.
[22:40]So historical romances are just a different category,
[22:43]but they still give you that swoony rising sense
[22:48]of anticipation and longing that is so much fun.
[22:50]And so addictive.
[22:51]So they are fobbyo romances
[22:52]and I have really struggled with that emotionally.
[22:55]And actually, I can't, like some people love the covers
[22:58]they lean in, they go for the camp.
[23:00]They're like, it's fine.
[23:01]I have never been able to warm to the covers
[23:03]and I put duct tape over them
[23:05]because I just like, it's just like so humiliating.
[23:07]You know, I have children.
[23:08]They're like, what's going on with you?
[23:09]I'm like, I don't know.
[23:11]But yeah, I love them though.
[23:12]I mean, I love tape.
[23:14]Literal duct tape.
[23:15]Like the gray.
[23:16]The gray.
[23:17]Yeah. Oh my gosh.
[23:18]It's brightly colored, brightly colored duct tape.
[23:20]That's very make all kinds of fun duct tape in the world.
[23:23]So that's my favorite thing to read.
[23:26]And I have actually at the end of hell of stranger
[23:28]in the way back there's a little essay
[23:30]and it's kind of a defensive romance novels
[23:32]because I think there is something uniquely nourishing
[23:36]about romance novels.
[23:37]And you know, I think they're judged by the wrong standards.
[23:40]You know, we roll our eyes at them
[23:42]and we call them predictable.
[23:44]First we call them unrealistic
[23:45]and then we turn on another zombie apocalypse movie
[23:48]but then secondly, we call them predictable
[23:50]but the point is with a romance novel,
[23:52]nobody's trying to surprise you.
[23:53]Like you know where it's going.
[23:55]The story question is not, will they get together?
[23:58]They will, they will get together.
[24:00]It's a romance novel.
[24:02]The story question is how will they get there, right?
[24:04]And what romance novels do because of that guaranteed
[24:08]happy ending is they give you this joyful sense
[24:13]of anticipation, this positively
[24:15]and very balanced sense of intuition.
[24:17]You're moving towards something better.
[24:19]That's a guarantee of the genre.
[24:21]Nobody's gonna get hit by a bus on the last page.
[24:23]Like it's gonna be okay.
[24:25]So they can go through all kinds of struggles
[24:27]and all kinds of hardships.
[24:29]And it's never totally going to destroy us
[24:33]because we know they're gonna figure it out.
[24:35]But in the back of your mind, you know.
[24:36]And so it creates this, it allows you to access
[24:40]this feeling of bliss that you can't get
[24:42]in a different kind of novel
[24:43]because in a different kind of novel, you don't know.
[24:46]It's uncertain, you know, there's an uncertainty there.
[24:49]With romance novels, there's like a safety that you get
[24:51]because you're like, okay, I'm okay.
[24:53]It's all gonna be okay.
[24:54]And I very badly need a sense of safety.
[24:56]Like I'm a total warrior is very easy for me
[24:59]to go to, you know, we're all gonna die.
[25:02]Like that's always my starting place is death.
[25:04]And then I work my way back.
[25:05]So I love that feeling of safety.
[25:08]And I love that feeling of positively
[25:10]and feeling of violence moving towards something better.
[25:13]Bliss, it's so fun for me.
[25:14]So for me, that's what I love to do.
[25:17]And so I always, always,
[25:18]I'm going back to your original question
[25:19]because I veered off for a little while.
[25:21]I always always have like half the book.
[25:24]Be like, not just of romance.
[25:25]I'm not just like throwing it in there.
[25:28]Like so I can say I did it.
[25:29]I love romance actively.
[25:31]And I admire it and I study it.
[25:33]And I always try to figure out how it works.
[25:35]So I put a seriously swoony, like I am trying very hard
[25:38]in my books to make you swoom
[25:41]and to make you long for these two people to get together
[25:45]in this really visceral, super satisfying, delicious way.
[25:50]And then I'm gonna make you, if I can,
[25:52]I'm gonna make you long for it.
[25:53]And then I'm gonna give it to you at the end.
[25:55]Always, always, I'm never gonna like give somebody
[25:58]surprise cancer and kill them at the end.
[26:00]That's never gonna happen.
[26:01]It's like a Catherine Center guarantee.
[26:03]But I also love to see people struggle
[26:07]and have to figure out what that struggle means
[26:08]in their life.
[26:09]So the other half is always getting through something hard,
[26:13]coming to the wisdom that you only get
[26:15]when you've earned it by going through that stuff.
[26:17]So it's like half and half, right?
[26:19]It's like women's fiction, personal growth on the one side.
[26:21]And then super swoony, delicious,
[26:25]and very PG-13 romance on the other side.
[26:28]And it has to be PG-13
[26:30]because my husband is a middle school teacher.
[26:33]And all of his kids read my books like they get their parents
[26:37]to give them to them for Christmas.
[26:38]They want to see what Mr. Center's wife is up to.
[26:41]So it feels like a lot of pressure.
[26:43]Last year when the bodyguard came out,
[26:44]there were a lot of romance readers
[26:46]who found me for the first time.
[26:48]And a lot of them were expecting
[26:50]that there would be spice, spice and story.
[26:52]And there were many who were disappointed
[26:54]that they did not get quite as much.
[26:56]We will always get very 3D, very,
[26:58]hopefully very visceral and delicious kisses,
[27:01]but we're not gonna like all go to bed together
[27:03]because of the middle schoolers,
[27:05]that's kind of a limitation in my life.
[27:07]But it means these are books you can give to your grandma.
[27:09]So you have to write an essay called Mr. Center's wife
[27:12]because that's awesome.
[27:14]You just have to write a story or an essay
[27:16]because I don't know.
[27:18]That just sounded so great.
[27:19]We have to collectively come up with a new name
[27:21]for this category of book
[27:23]because some of my favorite books are this way
[27:28]and it's hard to explain
[27:30]and it should be easy to explain
[27:32]because there's a huge audience.
[27:34]So I don't know.
[27:35]It's just like a little like variation on the name.
[27:38]What I've been calling them and,
[27:40]but I don't know that this is the answer to this
[27:42]because I've been helping out for years now.
[27:45]I've been calling them bittersweet comedies
[27:47]or romantic comedies
[27:50]because they're both very joyful and very bittersweet.
[27:54]Bittersweet comedies.
[27:56]It comes.
[27:57]Okay, there was a phrase that came out a few years ago
[28:04]where they were calling it up lit,
[28:06]which is like, no, I don't like opening it.
[28:09]But anything with lit in it,
[28:10]I always, I don't know,
[28:11]I kind of never really jump in too hard on that,
[28:13]but we'll come up with something out.
[28:16]If you don't mind being in charge of that,
[28:17]just kidding.
[28:18]Could we just call them like happy sad or something?
[28:21]Yeah, I mean, my editor definitely calls them laugh
[28:24]and cry books, which I think yeah, capture
[28:26]because I am definitely mean to make you like laugh
[28:30]or loud, right, in the middle of the night.
[28:32]And I also would love to make you cry a little bit,
[28:34]but we're gonna be okay in the end.
[28:36]Okay, so maybe there should just be a section.
[28:38]I'm gonna add a shelf in my store then for lack of outcry
[28:41]because I have books that make you laugh
[28:42]and I have books that make you cry,
[28:44]but I don't have books that make you laugh and cry,
[28:46]which is a subset.
[28:47]So why don't we test it out of the store?
[28:50]You can come do an event.
[28:51]I have a store in Santa Monica.
[28:53]I know, it's adorable.
[28:54]I follow you guys on Instagram.
[28:56]You have to come.
[28:56]And so do you don't still live in Texas or you do?
[28:58]Where are you?
[28:59]I do, yeah, I do live in Texas.
[29:01]Well, you know, oh, we're having a retreat in Austin
[29:04]next year.
[29:05]You live near Austin.
[29:06]I live close enough.
[29:08]I'm in Houston three hours away.
[29:10]Oh my gosh.
[29:11]You should come because then at least I would love to.
[29:13]We have, we're recruiting authors.
[29:14]I'm excited.
[29:15]And I have to send you two books after this,
[29:18]what knowing what you love.
[29:20]One is the last love note, which we're publishing by Emma Gray.
[29:22]Perfect cry book.
[29:23]You're gonna love it.
[29:24]Just for fun.
[29:25]And then I'm gonna send you my college friend Danielle's book
[29:28]because it is a historical romance.
[29:30]It's called the last season.
[29:31]Spoonworthy, like a stable boy named Crispin.
[29:34]You're gonna love it.
[29:35]Oh.
[29:36]I'll send it to you with like color duct tape.
[29:38]If I remember, if I don't, this is what I want to do.
[29:41]And you will like them both.
[29:43]And there you go.
[29:45]Thank you.
[29:46]I will like them both.
[29:47]I already like them.
[29:48]I'm in.
[29:49]All right, amazing.
[29:50]Well, I am gonna go like deep dive into your back list
[29:52]when I have a minute because I am really excited.
[29:55]And I'm sorry that I haven't discovered you sooner.
[29:58]And I'm just so delighted.
[30:00]to be in touch with you. Thank you. I'm so glad that you found me now. I'm very grateful that you
[30:07]let me come on. I had so much fun talking to you. What a treat you too. Thank you for taking me through
[30:11]your entire career and having hours. Okay, hope you enjoy your next batch. Thank you, I definitely will.
[30:19]Okay. Bye. Bye. Thanks for listening to this episode of Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[30:26]Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at Zebioans and at Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.
[30:31]Also sign up for my newsletter at zebioans.com and sign up for my virtual book club and meet lots
[30:36]of authors on Zoom every other week. Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound for
[30:40]the Sound Editing. And thank you to Morning Moon Productions for providing this fantastic intro and
[30:45]now trim music.