Live at Zibby's Bookshop: Kerri Maher and Kim Fay
[0:00]Talk to your mom the whole time.
[0:02]That's right.
[0:03]This is, I love getting in a book in advance.
[0:07]Yes, you have the little advance sticker on it.
[0:10]Oh, and it's like, this is not a secret paper bath.
[0:13]This is the advance copy, but, you know,
[0:15]to be able to read it and then to be able to love it.
[0:17]That's a more important part.
[0:18]Yes.
[0:19]Sometimes you get your advance copy and you're not so.
[0:21]That's so much.
[0:22]But I absolutely love this book.
[0:24]And I'm realizing before we start,
[0:26]did you want to give a very brief?
[0:30]Sure.
[0:31]A little description.
[0:32]We have some context for the first.
[0:34]Sure.
[0:35]So Summer of Love is a dual timeline novel.
[0:38]One timeline stays in the summer of 2015.
[0:42]And that storyline stars a woman named Don,
[0:47]who she has a couple of things going on in her life.
[0:50]She's kind of like struggling with whether or not she wants to quit drinking
[0:54]forever.
[0:55]She also goes on a quest to find an,
[0:59]we'll probably talk more about this,
[1:01]a famously anonymous author.
[1:04]So she, she's on a quest in her in her,
[1:07]the 2015 storyline.
[1:09]The,
[1:10]to the other storyline begins in the Summer of Love,
[1:14]1967 in San Francisco.
[1:17]Yes.
[1:18]We actually drove over it this morning.
[1:20]Did you?
[1:21]Yes, we did.
[1:22]I had to, we, we were in Napa and we returned the rental car at SFO.
[1:27]And so we drove over the Golden Gate Bridge.
[1:29]I want to woke up just a time to see it.
[1:32]So anyway,
[1:34]so that storyline begins into 1967 with the Summer of Love,
[1:38]all the things.
[1:39]And that, that storyline stars Winnie and Miranda,
[1:42]who are sisters who were raised on their Napa winery.
[1:46]But Winnie has just graduated from UC Berkeley.
[1:49]She moves across the Bay to San Francisco.
[1:51]She's an aspiring poet.
[1:53]She reconnects with her musician, high school boyfriend.
[1:57]And they're off to the races.
[1:59]And her sister, Miranda,
[2:01]who's a little bit more serious,
[2:03]is determined to run the family winery up in Napa
[2:06]that she inherited from her father,
[2:09]to make California wine that rivals French wine.
[2:12]And so if you know anything about California wine,
[2:14]the 60s through the 70s are a really exciting time.
[2:18]Like because people thought California wine
[2:21]was just jug-swill, right?
[2:23]But it became something very different in that.
[2:26]Those decades, which we get to follow in this book,
[2:28]some of it.
[2:29]As you can tell from this description,
[2:31]my first question,
[2:33]dramatically the book is very vast in scope.
[2:36]It covers a lot of topics.
[2:38]So one of the first things I want to know is,
[2:40]where did you start?
[2:41]Because it has a lot.
[2:43]Did you start in one place?
[2:46]What was the inspiration that got you going?
[2:49]So there's a longer answer to this question
[2:52]than there often is.
[2:53]So like with my first four historical novels,
[2:55]I kind of got the idea from outside of me.
[2:59]Like I was watching a documentary
[3:01]and I got the idea for one of the books.
[3:03]I read a memoir, I got an idea for another book.
[3:06]So those books sort of came from outside of me.
[3:10]This book came from inside of me in some crucial ways.
[3:14]Like I knew when I,
[3:17]my publisher wanted me for another book,
[3:19]which was really a beautiful thing.
[3:21]So I was thinking about what I wanted to write about.
[3:23]And there wasn't like another real person I wanted to write about,
[3:27]which I had been doing.
[3:29]So a friend, I knew I wanted to write a California novel.
[3:33]I knew that it would be partly set in the 60s.
[3:35]I wanted there to be a road trip component.
[3:38]I wanted there to be a sobriety storyline.
[3:41]But that's all I knew. Like that's all I knew.
[3:44]I did broad.
[3:45]Yeah, right?
[3:46]So a friend of mine suggested that I do the artist's way.
[3:50]Have you ever done the artist's way?
[3:52]Good morning.
[3:53]Good morning pages.
[3:54]So for those of you who don't know,
[3:56]the artist's way is a creativity,
[3:58]12-week creativity course in a book.
[4:01]And I had been avoiding doing it forever
[4:04]because the foundation of the morning pages
[4:07]is this journaling practice called morning pages.
[4:10]I hate journaling.
[4:12]But I was desperate, so I did it.
[4:16]And within obviously four to six weeks,
[4:19]the whole idea for summer of love came together.
[4:22]The characters, the basic story arc,
[4:25]all of it came together.
[4:27]You're doing the morning pages.
[4:29]So you were journaling your book.
[4:31]Well, so I was journaling about all kinds of things.
[4:34]People who do the morning pages,
[4:36]we talk about it mostly.
[4:37]It's a lot of complaining.
[4:39]But Julia Cameron talks about this.
[4:42]You're like, it's like a taking out the trash
[4:46]so that the good stuff can come to the surface.
[4:49]Well, clearly the good stuff came to the surface here.
[4:53]So we talked a little bit about this before.
[4:58]We started, but.
[5:00]book feels like a love song for California.
[5:04]um California serves as a character in the book
[5:08]very very strong character and you grew up here
[5:12]right or in Northern California. What is it? What is it like to write
[5:16]so intimately about the place you grew up
[5:20]and did it didn't pose any challenges for you?
[5:23]so maybe it should have posed more challenges for me
[5:29]but i had been wanting to write about California for so long
[5:32]i should also sit but i've been i've been out of the state for most of my life
[5:36]actually so this is where i came up at age we might say
[5:40]i you know i was born and raised here and i went to college in
[5:43]California and as soon as i graduated i left i went to New York
[5:48]and then i ultimately found my way up to massachusetts
[5:52]i do want to go back i want to come back um
[5:55]so i think i actually needed a lot of distance
[6:00]in order to write about it yeah i needed a lot of distance in order to write
[6:04]about it i don't think that i could have really written this book
[6:07]10 years ago um but i'll say this so you know the sixth the 1960s
[6:14]piece of it and in the berry bay area specifically
[6:17]that was really part of all those stories were part of my growing up because
[6:21]my parents who are here met at uc berkeley in the 1960s
[6:27]so i go bears um so i yeah and they're friends who are here met in
[6:35]1960s and that is not in the book
[6:43]that is not in the book but thank you for sharing
[6:47]so but but the point is is that like i really and my extended family
[6:52]lived sort of in and around the bay area in the central valley so i just
[6:56]this was all just part of my growing up you know um and so when i
[7:00]actually when it came time to do research for this book i didn't actually do
[7:04]very much historical research at all i did back checking
[7:08]i sent it to people who knew my parents and i was like do i get this right
[7:14]um yeah so it was really fun honestly it was fun to be able to to put
[7:20]you know i mean not nothing that happens in the book are the stories that i
[7:24]grew up with um but they're inspired by the stories that i grew up with
[7:28]and then i went to berkeley in the 90s which really wasn't that long after
[7:32]the 60s and the 60s were very much alive and well in berkeley
[7:36]in the 90s you know naked guy they're you know like peace signs and resistance
[7:42]posters and all that stuff i i i that's my understanding
[7:46]yeah what's interesting because the sense of place really
[7:48]informs what is happening in the book and there's you know what the
[7:52]west coast is a specific mindset it is
[7:57]so um there but there's so many fun aspects of the work
[8:01]but the book also dives deep into some pretty serious stuff
[8:07]and i wanted to talk to you let's see so i'm gonna say there
[8:11]you already mentioned there's there's any characters dealing with a
[8:13]fiction and recovery and i can hear any spoilers to say that
[8:17]you are four and a half years sober yes
[8:20]and congratulations thank you why did you want to write about that in this
[8:25]book and were there any times when you just thought
[8:29]i can't do this this is too hard because the character is
[8:35]yeah so okay so i did the artist's way three summers ago
[8:40]so i was earlier in my oh
[8:46]oh i'm sorry i i think i got this microphone which goes to their
[8:51]it's not rejecting forget so this question is asking
[8:56]karae about her journey she is four and a half years sober
[9:00]and um addiction and recovery plays a large role
[9:05]in this book and and i wanted to know why she chose to
[9:09]explore that and how hard it was yeah so when i started this book it was
[9:15]three three summers ago was when i did the artist's way and
[9:18]and came up with the idea and so i was earlier in my sobriety journey
[9:23]and it was like i almost just couldn't not write about it
[9:28]so even though i needed to get all this distance on california
[9:31]in order to write about california i was very inspired to write about
[9:36]the things that were the amazingly wonderful things that were
[9:39]happening to me since i stopped drinking right like the community that i
[9:44]had found like you know the the sort of like deeper
[9:48]self-work and self-knowledge that i had i had been able to
[9:54]understand so i really wanted to write about those things but i didn't want to
[9:58]write about myself
[10:00]So I wanted to be able to explore those ideas and those themes through fiction.
[10:05]That's interesting because I thought your answer would be more toward purging, but it's
[10:11]embracing.
[10:12]Yes.
[10:13]What came from it?
[10:14]Yes.
[10:15]Yes.
[10:16]Yes.
[10:17]Which is actually a really beautiful part of the book.
[10:18]Thank you.
[10:19]I won't spoil.
[10:20]Yeah.
[10:21]But yeah.
[10:22]I feel like in the popular culture of movies and books and television shows, when you
[10:26]get a story of addiction, it's usually the addiction part.
[10:30]It's all the bad, terrible stuff, and then they go to rehab and cut tape, like that's
[10:35]it.
[10:36]That's the end.
[10:37]But actually, that's the beginning.
[10:40]And that's what I really wanted to show.
[10:43]So that's part of the reason why we meet Don.
[10:46]She stopped drinking six months before.
[10:49]And she's struggling with whether or not she wants it to be forever.
[10:54]But she starts to see Glimmert of why it might be worth it.
[10:58]Mm-hmm.
[10:59]Yeah.
[11:00]I hadn't thought about that.
[11:01]It is for journey after.
[11:02]It is.
[11:03]So there's so much discussion in the book about the before, right?
[11:07]So how hard was it or strange was it to set a book in a winery and to write about
[11:14]winemaking and to write about the taste of wine and all of these wonderful things, it's
[11:18]around wine.
[11:19]Yeah.
[11:20]You are going through this process.
[11:23]You know, I did wonder about this when I went into the research process.
[11:30]So a couple of things.
[11:33]It was not weird, and I did not make me want to drink.
[11:37]I think it is partly because Miranda, the character who's making the wine, the one who's
[11:43]running the winery, isn't a big drinker herself, actually.
[11:46]And so what she's really into is the art and science of making wine.
[11:52]And that was interesting to me.
[11:54]I'm not a super science geek.
[11:56]Like I don't go all the way down the rabbit hole about how the wine is made, so you're
[12:00]not going to get those kinds of details.
[12:02]But I was also super interested in the history of the region, which was so without, you
[12:10]know, without sketching the whole history, you know, there's a kind of before prohibition
[12:15]history of California wine country and an after prohibition, you know, history of California
[12:22]wine country.
[12:23]Because a lot of the, there was a burgeoning California wine industry actually before prohibition,
[12:29]which came to like a screaming halt during prohibition.
[12:34]And a lot of the wines were ripped up and other things were planted there.
[12:38]Some of them went to seed.
[12:40]And then there was this amazing resurgence once prohibition was lifted.
[12:46]So that was just fast.
[12:47]I mean, like I love, I do love history.
[12:49]That's why I write historical fiction, right?
[12:50]So, so that was really cool to learn about.
[12:53]Yeah, that was fun.
[12:54]That was really fun.
[12:55]The vineyards have not come back in downtown Los Angeles.
[12:59]So, yeah, yeah, exactly, although they have crept down further south, yeah, so Passo
[13:07]rural Liz and stuff are a little bit further south.
[13:09]But yeah, it's a really fun historical aspect of the book.
[13:14]So jumping to another theme, yes, we're going to theme hop here today.
[13:20]Love.
[13:21]Okay.
[13:22]There are so many love stories in this book in so many different ways, not just romantic
[13:27]love, but there's friendship, there's community.
[13:35]You kind of really branch out.
[13:38]And I want to know, was that part of your beginning process or were those aspects that grew
[13:48]as you wrote the novel?
[13:50]Both.
[13:51]So, and you know, we had this title, Summer of Love, from very early in the process, actually.
[13:58]And that doesn't always happen, as I'm sure you know.
[14:02]Yeah.
[14:03]So I want to, I'll actually throw this question back on you in a second.
[14:08]So we, I pitched the book, I think, maybe as Summer of Love, not even sure if that would
[14:14]be the title, but it very quickly became the title with a love.
[14:19]I was lucky on this one.
[14:20]And I was lucky on the Paris bookseller.
[14:22]That was another title from the get go.
[14:25]And I actually at one point, someone got in my ear about this title and was like, do you
[14:29]you sure you want to call it Summer of Love, surely there are other books called Summer
[14:33]of Love, but there aren't.
[14:35]There really are not.
[14:37]I know.
[14:38]And so I actually went to my editor and I was like, should we change the name?
[14:40]She's like, no.
[14:42]This title says exactly what the book is about.
[14:45]And we're going to put something very California on the cover.
[14:48]So those of you who this is the Golden Gate.
[14:50]So like, together with the Golden Gate Bridge, we know pretty much what this is, like,
[14:55]a lot of the things where we are and kind of the period that we're in.
[15:00]So, so, okay, now I've lost a crack of your question.
[15:04]Fortunately, I have written that.
[15:06]Yeah, you've got to written down.
[15:08]Love.
[15:09]Love.
[15:10]You get the center of the book beginning.
[15:12]Love, love, love.
[15:13]Okay, yes.
[15:14]So, it was always the center.
[15:15]I knew that I wanted to explore love from both sides now.
[15:19]I had to do it.
[15:20]I had to say it.
[15:22]For many angles.
[15:23]So, I, but I didn't really realize how many angles until I really got deep into the
[15:29]writing of it.
[15:30]Like, you know, honestly, the sort of community love piece, the love for California
[15:36]piece, even though I did set out to represent the state in, you know, glowing terms.
[15:43]I didn't really think about that and now everyone's calling it a love letter to California.
[15:47]So, you know, love emerged in different places as I was writing.
[15:53]Okay.
[15:54]Yeah.
[15:55]You said something.
[15:56]You said, you know, looking at the cover, you can tell a lot of what is in this book.
[16:01]One thing you can't tell, you will never guess is there's a children's book.
[16:06]Yes.
[16:07]Also, yes.
[16:08]Swoven into the dual story lines, not just one of the stories I did off a lot.
[16:16]You did.
[16:17]And it's really an interesting aspect of the book.
[16:20]Can you talk about where that came from?
[16:23]Yeah.
[16:24]Okay.
[16:25]So, there is, so I mentioned Don at the beginning of the talk.
[16:29]So, Don goes looking for the author of these Vine Land Books.
[16:33]It's a series of like, it's like a Harry Potter type series, you know, the character start
[16:38]when they're like 10, 11 and then they grow up over the course of the books.
[16:42]But the author of these Vine Land Books is famously anonymous, like Eleanor Ferrante,
[16:48]like no one knows who it actually is.
[16:50]And Don has never read the books until the beginning of my novel.
[16:54]She has to read the first one for a work thing.
[16:57]And she reads it and she's like, this person knows the vineyard word that I grew up on.
[17:04]Like, she knows certain things about the drive up to the vineyard, like the creek of the
[17:11]fourth stair, which is an idea that I got from a friend sitting in the audience.
[17:17]So, so, so that's kind of the, this thing that Don is doing is she's looking for this,
[17:25]this author who she suspects knows something about her, her family's vineyard.
[17:31]And she's asking her mom, mom, like who is this person and mom is like avoiding the question.
[17:37]Mom is, her mom is Miranda, who is running the vineyard up in Napa.
[17:41]And you know very quickly that Miranda has been wildly successful with this vineyard, like
[17:46]she's become a famous female vintner in Napa, you know, their wine is, you know, the best
[17:54]of California in Napa wine.
[17:57]So, in early iterations of the book, the children, there were like excerpts of the children's
[18:05]book kind of plunked in elegantly down in chapters.
[18:11]And my editor was sort of like, do we need these?
[18:14]I was like, yes, we do, yes, we need them.
[18:17]And so, but then it was, the challenge was to figure out how to weave it in in a way that
[18:22]was lighter and more satisfying.
[18:25]And so, one of the things that I came up with is at the beginning of each Don chapter,
[18:29]you get a short, like, sentence or two from the Vineland books.
[18:34]And so, you get to like sort of follow the, the trajectory of what happens in the books
[18:40]through these very, very short quotes.
[18:43]And then there are maybe two short excerpts that are read by the characters.
[18:49]Yeah.
[18:50]Yeah.
[18:51]Yeah.
[18:52]Yeah.
[18:53]It was just an interesting choice and then also to have them, the book moves quite seamlessly.
[18:59]Thank you.
[19:00]All of the fact and forth and in and out of the story.
[19:04]So, it's, that just lends another layer to the story.
[19:10]It was really fun.
[19:11]Like, people sometimes people ask me, are you going to write the Vineland books?
[19:14]And I'm like, no, no, I'm not going to write those books.
[19:18]But it was fun to sort of do it light.
[19:21]Yeah.
[19:22]You know, it's, you know, it's, it's a very, it's, it's very tropey.
[19:25]You know, Phoebe is the main character and she is the chosen one who must save Vineland.
[19:29]And you know, it's like, it's, it's, you've heard the story before.
[19:33]It is.
[19:34]It is.
[19:35]Absolutely is fun.
[19:36]Um, you kind of answered this question for me before, but I'm not hot back to this
[19:40]in case because you said because you know the area so well, because you, you knew so
[19:44]much about your story.
[19:45]You didn't do a lot of research.
[19:48]Was there any place you did do a deep dive?
[19:51]So I took my own little California Broad trip.
[19:54]So I actually, so this audience will understand how far this distance was.
[20:00]Okay, because in Massachusetts, when I tell this story, no one really understands how far this drive really was.
[20:06]I borrowed one of my parents' cars in Irvine and drove all the way to Mendocino.
[20:12]And then I drove back down to San Francisco, parked the car, and you guys picked up the car at the San Francisco airport because you were coming into SFO for something else.
[20:22]Anyway, it was nuts.
[20:24]Did you take the one?
[20:25]Okay.
[20:26]I took the one for a very short piece and thought in my whole life flash before my eyes.
[20:35]And I was sweating on the steering wheel, and I was like, and then as soon as I possibly could, I got off of the one, I was like, I've done it enough.
[20:44]And so I was able to write authentically about driving on the one.
[20:49]Yes.
[20:50]Yes.
[20:51]That is in the book.
[20:52]Yes.
[20:53]Well, you know, also, I set the vineyard on Spring Mountain Road because on this road trip that I, it was by myself.
[21:01]I took it by myself and I have friends all the way up and down California.
[21:05]So I stopped and like visited friends and it was a great, it was a great solo trip.
[21:11]But one of the things that I did, I went to Napa and St. Helena and I wound up, I don't know why on Spring Mountain Road, which is treacherous.
[21:24]Again, I thought my, I thought my whole life flash before my eyes, but I also realized it was stunning.
[21:31]I mean, just like absolutely gorgeous.
[21:34]And, you know, like every once in a while, it would all open up and you get this amazing view of like vineyards and like distant mountains and all, and, you know, the light coming into the window and there were redwoods.
[21:47]And I mean, it was just, it was amazing.
[21:50]And so the getting lost proved to be great.
[21:53]I was like, well, I have to set the vineyard here.
[21:56]And so that's how I picked, that's how I picked it, the location.
[22:01]And what are you doing the summer of love tours?
[22:03]You know a book, they do tours.
[22:05]Oh, I should, right?
[22:06]Yeah, I know.
[22:07]I don't want to go back there though.
[22:09]Maybe if someone else is driving, maybe if someone else is driving or not.
[22:13]So this, you also touched on this a little bit.
[22:17]But your previous novels are, you would fall very directly into the historical novel.
[22:24]Yes, that's true.
[22:25]Yes.
[22:26]And this has a large historical aspect.
[22:30]But it's very contemporary as well.
[22:33]You go back and forth.
[22:35]What did it feel?
[22:36]Did it, did you feel comfortable in these spaces?
[22:39]Was it, did you have to kind of make a hard right turn in order to write this book?
[22:46]Okay.
[22:47]So this is, this is a big departure in a bunch of ways, right?
[22:51]So it's not about any real people.
[22:53]Whereas my first three historical books were about all about real people.
[22:58]My fourth, all you have to do is call was loosely based on real people.
[23:03]And then this, the only thing that makes it historical is that one of the timeline starts in 1967.
[23:10]So I don't know how it's been for you.
[23:14]But like once you have some some even modest success in one genre,
[23:19]the publisher really wants you to stay in that lane.
[23:22]Yeah.
[23:23]Have you, so have you tried to get out of your lane?
[23:25]I've got out of my lane for my first, my first novels was published up 15 years ago.
[23:30]Oh, okay.
[23:31]Super historical novel.
[23:32]Because now I write now novels and letters and so good luck getting out of that.
[23:36]I want it.
[23:37]Okay.
[23:38]Can we take, can we put a pin in somewhere a while for a second?
[23:40]Has there been a resurgence with these, so she's written these two gorgeous epistolary novels.
[23:46]And in both, we actually have a character from Southern California and one from the Pacific Northwest,
[23:53]although in Kate and Freda, one of them is actually living in Paris most of the time.
[23:59]Have you been rediscovered since the correspondent?
[24:03]Yes.
[24:04]When people, because people are like, I want more novels and letters.
[24:07]I, I think her for something my books.
[24:11]We thought we all, we went.
[24:13]Oh, sounds really coming.
[24:15]Oh, the correspondent.
[24:16]Oh, the correspondent.
[24:17]Oh, thank you, Virginia Evans.
[24:19]Yeah.
[24:20]Well, also thank you booksellers who knew like for people who come into the store and are like,
[24:24]I love the correspondent, which I read next and they knew to hand them.
[24:28]Well, this is when we do our shot up to the Indian book.
[24:30]Yes, exactly.
[24:31]Because I was an independent bookseller for years, there's no better place in the world than an independent bookstore.
[24:36]100%.
[24:37]And authors, we just wouldn't.
[24:39]I mean, they're the ones who really keep our books out.
[24:42]100%.
[24:43]You're going to have people who want to read that.
[24:45]Right.
[24:46]There's not hype.
[24:47]It's just they know how to find the right book and the right reader.
[24:50]Yeah, 100%.
[24:51]Yes.
[24:52]But the Paris bookseller is a lot about that.
[24:55]I didn't mention that.
[24:57]Okay.
[24:58]Yeah.
[24:59]Okay.
[25:00]go we lost trust so yes I'm just trying to try something new so if we did your
[25:05]publisher kind of no so so historical fiction was having a little bit of a
[25:11]lag and so my publisher was open to a dual timeline do dual timelines in
[25:16]general do pretty well so they were open to me doing it but I kind of feel
[25:22]like so going back to the sting in your lane metaphor like I'm putting on my
[25:26]blinker to maybe to maybe just move into another lane like so that so
[25:33]maybe no one's honking me yet like maybe there's a contemporary maybe we
[25:38]can go some contemporary I could go back you know this is possible yeah
[25:43]like I'm just slowly merging onto a different lane yeah the one stays in
[25:54]2015 does it's like the before times yeah yeah I know like my editor
[26:00]actually said it's not right yes yes she's like the way we you know the
[26:07]voice of contemporary contemporary literature now is different than it was in
[26:13]2015 I'm like okay I can't win but anyway yes I have a friend who wrote about
[26:21]it's called a novel it's called marriage and monuments about the taking down
[26:25]of the Confederate monuments in Richmond Virginia which I don't remember the it
[26:30]was it was it in 2020 time has just gone it was within the last 10 years and
[26:36]she calls it historical fiction of the very recent past because it does it
[26:41]does feel like a long time ago but it wasn't right
[26:47]time just move all over the place correct yeah yeah well I do have check
[26:53]over here I've got I do that okay I've got a couple of questions about no we'll
[26:57]open up a couple extra question that means we had time about your process oh yeah
[27:02]aside from the artist way yes I now know I find very interesting it's been
[27:07]around a long time 90s it was it yeah it was popular yes yes yes yes I do know a
[27:13]lot of writers who still don't go back to it and use it and by the way it's not
[27:18]just for writers if you have any I'm plugging the not that you need me to plug
[27:22]it but any if you have any creative pursuit knitting ice skating you can do
[27:31]the artist way I have friends who aren't writers who do it right to just as a
[27:36]part of their life to get in touch which that's right yeah exactly yeah so
[27:42]beyond that so what is your process like are you there's there turns
[27:48]called a cancer and a flatter and a cancer someone who writes by the seat of
[27:51]their pants and a plotters someone who plots yeah cancer or plotter I'm a
[27:57]pantser what are you a cancer if you're a pantser but but I have another pair
[28:03]of pantses I'm kind of putting together at the same time okay really did like
[28:06]you're writing two books at the same time no it's like as I'm kind of
[28:10]of pantsing it I'll be scouting a little bit ahead oh okay a little bit ahead
[28:13]and then pantsing and then get a little bit ahead and kind of I think most
[28:17]panthers kind of know generally where you're going but not necessarily how
[28:22]you're gonna get there right but so the the thing about me being a
[28:26]pantser and fiction fiction writing is it's weird actually because I am a
[28:31]plotter in real life I like my to-do lists I like to know what's gonna happen I
[28:37]do not like limbo maybe that's why we can't I it's like the one place yes
[28:44]that we can be truly free but sometimes it does feel like I'm hanging on by
[28:50]a tool window so by my fingernails true but when I plot things out too much it
[28:54]feels forced yeah oh yeah if I have a really concrete idea I'll try to fit
[28:59]everything into that idea and then I eventually end up throwing it out because
[29:04]it feels too artificial I just had this experience and I had to like say
[29:08]goodbye to a drought yeah yeah and it wasn't because of plotting it was
[29:13]because I was trying to use a historical template that ultimately didn't
[29:17]work offline conversation yeah all right so let me see here so again more we've
[29:30]talked about some of this but did were there any elements of the story or
[29:34]character that came toward the end like that you've been writing you had your
[29:41]story down you had a lot of this built out and then something popped up and
[29:44]surprised you nothing popped up and surprised me I wish I wish I had a better
[29:49]answer for this one so but I will say this Dawn went through many many big
[29:56]changes like which was interesting she's the one who's
[30:00]basically the same age I am, I gave her a lot of sort of thinking the same kinds of thoughts
[30:05]that I had about sobriety, and those were not the things that changed. But like, there
[30:11]were things about her career that changed. Like, I can't tell you what they are because
[30:18]they are spoilers. But there were just a lot of things about Don that needed to change.
[30:25]And I do wonder sometimes if it's because she was the closest to me.
[30:28]It's the closest to you. It's closer to you. It's harder to use your imagination.
[30:34]Yes. Yes.
[30:35]But we can both answer this question. So with the dual timeline, I'm always, you don't do
[30:41]a timeline, but you do two points of view. I tried writing it like going back and forth.
[30:50]But I ultimately wound up writing the whole historical storyline, and then the whole
[30:56]contemporary and then braiding them together. So with your two points of view, did you
[31:02]just write them back and forth? I guess because they're letters and so they were really
[31:06]responding to one another. That's a good point. Okay.
[31:08]So you, boy, you've got to be so careful writing letters because if you ship one thing
[31:13]in one letter, you're on it. You've got a time. Yes. And you ship this. Everything
[31:20]shifts in both directions. And so God is really hard to, it would have been really hard
[31:27]to do them separately at all. Yes. Do you use word or do you use the, what's the, the one,
[31:33]the fancy software like Microsoft Word to write in? Just right. Yes. I just write. Okay.
[31:38]Have a typewriter. Oh my God. You use a typewriter? Not for all of it. Not for all of
[31:43]it. But when I'm feeling, because I'm writing letters and I'm writing in a different time
[31:46]period and so, and they talk about using typewriters. Sometimes I'll sit with, well, I
[31:50]have the typewriter from the woman who inspired love and saffron. So I know for very first
[31:56]typewriter. And so sometimes I'll just get that out. And I might, and Emma's typewriter
[32:02]who was in me. Oh. So I have the typewriters of the two women that inspired the first
[32:08]novel. So sometimes I'll just get that out. And just really just slow myself down. Yeah.
[32:12]You know, because when you're on a computer, you can get going so fast. Are they like
[32:16]electric typewriters? Oh, no. Are they like, do you have to really press like, one of those
[32:21]are really nice from 1961. And it's, oh, wow. The laptop of it's time about this big. She's
[32:27]to travel with it. She was a journalist. Wow. And she carried it everywhere. Wow. You've got
[32:32]a lot of pushing. There's only one typewriter repair person in our area anymore. And
[32:38]he only comes in once a month to the shop. So you have to hit him at the right time.
[32:45]You have to hit him at the right time. Something that I absolutely love about your books
[32:47]that we haven't really talked very much about. I'll put, I know. But well, but I'm going
[32:52]to put in a plug for both, both of our books on this is a lot about food, which is,
[32:58]so love and saffron, which is the book that predates Kate and Frida takes place in the
[33:04]1960s. And it is letters between a woman who lives in Los Angeles and one who lives
[33:08]in the Pacific Northwest. And I, even though, you know, my family is not from Southern
[33:15]California, so much of what you talked about with the Mexican food in California. I learned
[33:21]from my grandmother and like her siblings. And you know, I mean, she definitely did some,
[33:27]like, you know, some, like 1950s, casserole versions of Mexican food. But she also like appreciated
[33:33]and knew where to get a good tamale. Yeah. Right. Because it was actually here because
[33:37]it was here. Right. Right. Right. Right. Right. Yeah. And yeah. The main character in
[33:40]love and saffron, she was based on Barbara Hanson, who was the first food writer for the
[33:46]LA Times writing about international foods. Yeah. She was in the 60s. She was out there
[33:51]actually tracking all these places down. She was the very first person who really did that
[33:56]in an English language paper. Oh, that's so cool. And she was really a very close friend.
[34:01]And so no, pretty much it was all based on her. Like, if she did anything in the book,
[34:05]it was based on an interview with her and some food lies what she'd done. Yeah. Yeah. So it
[34:10]was all, it was super fun to write about all the food. And I did get hungry. I did get hungry
[34:14]writing about writing about I do drink wine. So I do get thirsty. There you go. Well, good. I'm
[34:19]glad. It's just enjoying that really nice glass of wine from a nice winery. Right. It was
[34:24]those descriptions. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so should we open up for questions? Yes. Anyone have
[34:30]questions? I mean, I know usually my mom, if you think that's a lot of questions. Even though
[34:35]she knows everything, she knows all the answers or, or my daughter, she, she, she's like,
[34:42]I didn't know that about you. She, she's heard that she's heard a few of these events so far. So she's
[34:49]like, okay, mom, we've heard this story. We can also wrap early. We can.
[35:00]So I know there were a lot of drafts, but what do you feel like, I think I should know
[35:08]this, but I'm listening to like, what would you feel like staying throughout the classroom?
[35:15]What was the like, what started at the beginning and never left?
[35:23]So, okay, so a lot of those things that I had in my mind before I did the artist's way,
[35:28]like the road trip, even though the road trip came more abbreviated,
[35:32]I kept it on some level, you know, the 1960s California stuff.
[35:38]And there's some, as you know, because we had many conversations about it.
[35:42]There are some structural things about the book, even separate from the Vineland things.
[35:49]Well, there's the reveal at the end.
[35:52]There's a structure reveal at the end that I, it was in the first draft.
[36:00]And I really think that my editor kept saying to me, why do we need it to be this way?
[36:07]And I just kept saying, isn't it, I feel like it's clear, you know, and she was like, I really just don't understand it.
[36:14]And so, and I think that if she honestly, she never said I want you to cut it,
[36:19]and I think that's really what she wanted me to do.
[36:22]But I was, so I really just had to take it as a challenge.
[36:25]Like, how was I going to make it work?
[36:27]I was determined to make that work.
[36:30]Because an editor will at some point say cut it.
[36:33]Right.
[36:34]You know, she would have, she would have gotten to a point where she would have said.
[36:37]We did have a few uncomfortable phone conversations.
[36:40]Yeah.
[36:41]Yeah.
[36:42]So, we hadn't really had very many of those before this book, but we had a few.
[36:46]So you've done, so make me feel better.
[36:49]Well, but it's, you know, your editor thinks one thing.
[36:51]You think another thing.
[36:52]They have to give their case.
[36:54]Yeah.
[36:55]You know, you're in the court of literature.
[36:56]Yes.
[36:57]You need to give your side.
[36:58]And you have those hard discussions sometimes just because, you know,
[37:03]your editor has, as your book's best interest at heart.
[37:07]But sometimes you have the heart of your part.
[37:11]Right.
[37:12]But it's, I think it's a fun part of the process.
[37:15]I actually really love it.
[37:16]Yeah.
[37:17]In retrospect, I like it.
[37:19]Well, I'm in it.
[37:21]There's a lot of teethnashing.
[37:23]I'll be honest.
[37:24]Like, and it's not, I think it's, when it's particularly hard is when I just don't know how to do the thing.
[37:32]Like, I feel, and I really feel like I'm at the limits of my ability.
[37:37]And then a friend will say, but you're not, you can figure this out.
[37:43]Do figure it out.
[37:44]And I did figure it out.
[37:46]You would think after this many books, we would also know that eventually figure it out.
[37:50]But also, I think that, but the flip side of it is you also know when to let something go.
[37:55]So like, so the, so the book that I'm writing next, I did actually scrap a whole draft because I just was like,
[38:02]this is not, this is not working.
[38:05]And I don't want to make it work.
[38:07]I don't want to make it fit.
[38:08]It was going to be forced.
[38:10]Oh, my gosh.
[38:11]Oh, my gosh.
[38:12]Let anything go.
[38:13]And finally, when I gave a friend a 600 inch fruit.
[38:16]Oh, my gosh.
[38:17]She's like, no, you've got to do something about this.
[38:21]Did, did that wind up being your first book?
[38:23]It did.
[38:24]Not at 600 pages.
[38:25]Oh, my gosh.
[38:26]I'm always, I'm always amazed by writers who spend that long with any book.
[38:31]Because I would burn it.
[38:32]I didn't get a lot of other things.
[38:34]Okay.
[38:35]I was writing other things.
[38:36]I was experimenting with other things.
[38:37]But I was trying to find my way.
[38:39]Yeah.
[38:40]Yeah.
[38:41]And I was floundering.
[38:42]And so it did.
[38:43]But then it took me 10 years after that to write love and fashion.
[38:47]Which is.
[38:48]And then I found my way there.
[38:49]I found my voice.
[38:50]Right.
[38:51]Which is lovely and brief.
[38:52]And like you say in your author's note, you want people to sort of.
[38:55]Is it really?
[38:57]Like just very short than the Bella.
[38:59]So I listened to it because I'm a big audio book person.
[39:02]And it is only like four or five, like hours or something.
[39:05]And I thought, is this abbreviated?
[39:07]I kept looking for the word a bridge.
[39:09]And I was not there.
[39:11]And so, and I listened to it.
[39:12]And I was like, this does not feel a bridge.
[39:14]And then you say in your author's note that you, that it was
[39:17]purposefully short.
[39:19]To read in one afternoon.
[39:20]Yeah.
[39:21]Yeah.
[39:22]Yeah.
[39:23]Yeah.
[39:24]And I want to say that I read it.
[39:26]Oh.
[39:27]And immediately sent it to my aunt.
[39:29]Oh, thank you.
[39:31]Carrie also used as a foil in writing her book.
[39:36]Well, I made a stop in sermons.
[39:38]She lives in San Francisco.
[39:39]Yeah.
[39:40]And has always lived in San Francisco.
[39:41]Right.
[39:42]And she's so she, so she made some space for me.
[39:45]And we had lots of good conversations.
[39:47]Yeah.
[39:48]But we both loved your book.
[39:49]Oh, thank you so much.
[39:50]She was that.
[39:51]Yes.
[39:52]So I'm hearing from others.
[39:54]And I'm just curious because you obviously,
[39:56]seems to me have the, well, you definitely have the relationship.
[39:59]Yeah.
[40:00]have editors. I'm hearing from people and having been at one point in publishing that there
[40:08]aren't as many editors as there are writers. It's always been somewhat the case, but it's beginning
[40:14]fewer and fewer. And you can see the impact on books that would have been good to have that push.
[40:22]Yeah, another, another, you know, everything gets my observation is everything gets copied
[40:28]nothing's popping out with a lot of typos or that kind of thing. But the someone kind of working
[40:35]with you over time to have you shape your voice. Have you had the same editor? Just what you how
[40:42]your experience about it is my impression from your other author's friends. Is it wrong that
[40:50]as publishing has had to find a way to stay economically viable. That there has been a loss of people
[41:00]that would hang with someone to, uh, through, through decades. I have actually had the same editor
[41:09]the whole time, which is, which is great. And many though of my sort of author, historical author
[41:17]friends, many of whom have the same agent that I have, have had a similar experience. But others
[41:25]have moved. Um, part, some of them have actually moved with their editor to, to other houses.
[41:32]And sometimes, and then sometimes you do get orphaned, right? Like your editor takes, like,
[41:37]gets promoted. I don't know. There's all kinds of reasons. I do think that that problem of
[41:43]I'm not sure. I feel terrible saying this, but I don't know if it's a
[41:50]dearth of editors so much as there is a super abundance of books. Well, those don't, but those
[41:58]aren't impinging on the editors, right? Like, you know, so hard. But I think about the day when I
[42:04]sent out my first book and in the mail, and I boxed it up and I had it. I did that. So it takes
[42:11]a lot of effort to do that. It does not take a lot of effort to email a book, to set to an agent. And
[42:17]you know, people are throwing things out to see what sticks. What I'm finding is a lot of editors,
[42:23]I think they have more authors than they would probably like to have. I mean, they have
[42:27]other writers authors, but they have so many. Yes. I mean, I have, I don't have the same
[42:33]editor I had for my first novel, but that was kind of a deliberate choice all the way around.
[42:39]It was a very different kind of book. Okay. And so she was the one who read love and
[42:45]saffron. Okay. This, you know, this isn't what I do. Okay. And I wouldn't be the right person
[42:51]for it. Okay. I've had the same editor for love and saffron and Kate and Frida, and I'll have it for
[42:56]the next book. And having that continuity is incredible. Yeah. Where were you with? Oh, you're a
[43:03]a putnam. So yeah, Berkeley putnam and Dutton are like, we're like, they're like a little mini
[43:09]yeah, kin within the giant behemoth that is, you know, we're like Penguin Random House, tiny
[43:15]publishing houses within a big umbrella house. Right. Right. Yeah. But yeah, but it's hard because
[43:22]you do. I read books. I do read books and I think, oh wow, this would have been great.
[43:28]If 100 pages was cut from the middle. But that too, but you know, but if an editor had taken time
[43:34]with the person, yeah, because you can see, you know, you'll read somebody who you know has
[43:39]been working with an editor for a really long time and like, and Tyler, she was with Judith Jones
[43:45]almost entire career. And her books show because her editor grew with her, well, she grew with
[43:53]yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yeah. I, I, I, I've had this one experience and it's been great so far.
[44:02]But my editor is definitely overworked. She is definitely, I mean, she takes months to get back to me
[44:08]on a manuscript months. So, and she has, she has a lot of authors. A year and a half in advance,
[44:14]just so they have the time to it's, yeah, it's rough. Yeah. Yeah. Well, let's wrap it up with that
[44:21]ultimate last question. Okay. What is this? What did you throw away? Okay. What am I working on next?
[44:27]So I'm going to be, I'm going to be like annoyingly big. I'm going to be annoyingly big. Because the
[44:33]book is now, this is, so it is, it is basically a contemporary novel. So I, but with significant
[44:41]historical elements, it's about a magical book and an epic love story. That is all I can say.
[44:52]Thank you. Thank you so much. I did too. Thank you so much for talking with me today. Absolutely.
[44:58]And thank you all. Yes. Thank you.
[45:00]for coming through. Thank you so much for being here.
[45:06]Thank you so much for being here. What a great summer read if you don't have a copy. Please
[45:12]buy one if you do. Get one for a friend and we also have Kim's book, Kate and Freda. Another
[45:18]warm. Yes. Flies for you. Oh. For being here and you love them for everything else.
[45:24]Thank you. And yeah, it's feel free to...
[45:54]you
[46:24]you