WEBVTT - Bob Kolker 0:00:08.560 --> 0:00:13.000 Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to The Bob Left's podcast. My 0:00:13.080 --> 0:00:16.760 guest today is Robert cole Curl, author of the best 0:00:16.840 --> 0:00:20.200 selling book Hit in Value With Robert, it's great to 0:00:20.200 --> 0:00:22.040 be here, Bob. Thanks so much for having me on 0:00:22.079 --> 0:00:24.880 the show. Now you're like me. We're talking before we 0:00:24.920 --> 0:00:28.280 started that you're Bob. Were you ever? Robert? I was 0:00:28.400 --> 0:00:31.640 Bobby until I think the day I arrived for college 0:00:32.120 --> 0:00:35.760 and um, someone asked me my name and I tried 0:00:35.800 --> 0:00:39.920 to say Bobby, but I, um, I got stuck on 0:00:39.960 --> 0:00:43.879 the second syllable. Something kept me from saying Bobby, and 0:00:43.920 --> 0:00:46.400 I just switched to Bob immediately and that was it. Yeah. 0:00:46.479 --> 0:00:50.159 I was certainly Bobby growing up and occasionally in my family. 0:00:50.560 --> 0:00:54.280 Certainly by time I hit college, I was not Bobby either. 0:00:54.360 --> 0:00:58.920 But I have never been Robert. It's really kind of funny. Okay, 0:00:59.040 --> 0:01:02.040 So you wrote this book Kin in Valley Road. It's 0:01:02.080 --> 0:01:07.120 about a family, the Galvin family from Colorado Springs. There 0:01:07.120 --> 0:01:12.200 are twelve children and six of them get schizophrenia. How 0:01:12.200 --> 0:01:14.759 did you come and become involved with this story? Well, 0:01:15.200 --> 0:01:17.800 my career really took shape at New York Magazine, where 0:01:17.800 --> 0:01:22.000 I wrote a lot of true crime stories and other 0:01:22.080 --> 0:01:27.440 dramatic and vivid nonfiction tales. And I just tended to 0:01:27.480 --> 0:01:30.520 specialize in writing about people who never imagined that they 0:01:30.520 --> 0:01:33.680 would get news coverage. So not politicians or movie stars, 0:01:33.720 --> 0:01:38.920 but everyday people caught up in something extremely uh, you know, 0:01:39.319 --> 0:01:44.600 of human interest. And my longtime editor there, John Gluck, 0:01:45.600 --> 0:01:48.160 contacted me one day about four years ago. We both 0:01:48.160 --> 0:01:51.360 had left New York Magazine years earlier and had lunch 0:01:51.400 --> 0:01:54.680 every now and then. But he, uh, he contacted me 0:01:54.680 --> 0:01:58.360 saying that he went to school with a friend of 0:01:58.480 --> 0:02:03.040 his high school decades ago. Her name was Lindsay. They 0:02:03.160 --> 0:02:06.400 dated in high school. And it's just because I've read 0:02:06.440 --> 0:02:08.760 the book Is This Hot Kiss with referring to his 0:02:08.840 --> 0:02:11.960 high school, the prep school that she ultimately went to. Yes, 0:02:12.000 --> 0:02:16.040 they both were, um, you know, outsiders at Hotchkiss, sort 0:02:16.040 --> 0:02:19.200 of not part of the preppy set, and they dated then, 0:02:19.280 --> 0:02:22.080 and of course Lindsay wasn't really talking much about her 0:02:22.120 --> 0:02:24.280 home life or anything then. But as the decades went 0:02:24.320 --> 0:02:26.800 on and they stayed friendly, he learned the ins and 0:02:26.800 --> 0:02:28.840 outs of her family, and he got to know her 0:02:28.840 --> 0:02:32.400 older sister, Margaret also, and then one day in the 0:02:32.440 --> 0:02:35.920 sisters came to him and said, we've been thinking about 0:02:36.560 --> 0:02:39.079 for decades now, ways to try to tell the story 0:02:39.120 --> 0:02:41.240 of our family, ways to let the world know about 0:02:41.280 --> 0:02:44.640 our family. We believe scientists have been studying our family 0:02:44.720 --> 0:02:47.440 for decades. The things that happened to us as children 0:02:47.600 --> 0:02:50.120 are so extreme and unbelievable, no one would believe it. 0:02:50.520 --> 0:02:53.400 And we've struggled, but we've decided that the time is 0:02:53.520 --> 0:02:57.200 right to talk to an independent journalist about telling the 0:02:57.280 --> 0:03:00.120 story and following the story wherever it goes, and talking 0:03:00.160 --> 0:03:03.080 to everybody, not just making it a a story of 0:03:03.080 --> 0:03:05.560 the two sisters. And so I got on the phone 0:03:05.560 --> 0:03:07.720 with them four years ago, and this was the first 0:03:07.760 --> 0:03:10.000 I heard about any of it. This is a family 0:03:10.040 --> 0:03:13.640 with twelve children born during the baby boom. The oldest 0:03:13.680 --> 0:03:17.839 in nt the youngest in nineteen. And we're since we're 0:03:17.840 --> 0:03:23.240 being truthful, how old are you today? I am fifty one? Okay, 0:03:23.480 --> 0:03:26.520 So the children were born during the baby boom, yes, 0:03:26.600 --> 0:03:31.160 And a couple of years after the youngest was born, 0:03:32.200 --> 0:03:36.800 the oldest started to get sick, started to behave strangely, 0:03:36.920 --> 0:03:41.560 had psychotic breaks, was examined by psychiatrists. The parents were 0:03:41.600 --> 0:03:46.200 desperate to try to mainstream him and have him kind 0:03:46.200 --> 0:03:48.560 of grow out of it. And then another one got sick, 0:03:48.600 --> 0:03:51.920 and another and another um six of the twelve, and 0:03:51.960 --> 0:03:56.160 then there was abuse, and there were among the brothers, 0:03:56.160 --> 0:03:59.840 and there was a murder suicide with one brother. As 0:04:00.280 --> 0:04:02.640 sisters were telling me about this in that first phone 0:04:02.680 --> 0:04:05.640 call four years ago, I was simply stunned and really 0:04:05.680 --> 0:04:07.560 brought low. I thought to myself, how could all this 0:04:07.600 --> 0:04:11.720 happen to just one family? And then I wondered how 0:04:11.720 --> 0:04:14.160 they could even remain a family. You know, why would 0:04:14.680 --> 0:04:16.599 either of these sisters want to stay in a family 0:04:16.680 --> 0:04:19.839 like this given everything that happened to them. But they 0:04:19.880 --> 0:04:23.800 were not that way on the phone. They were ready 0:04:23.839 --> 0:04:26.240 to talk and to tell their story, and they believed 0:04:26.240 --> 0:04:29.680 that everybody else in their family would too. Um they 0:04:29.760 --> 0:04:33.520 felt like people could perhaps learn from their experiences. But 0:04:33.560 --> 0:04:35.000 also they had done a lot of work in the 0:04:35.080 --> 0:04:39.080 inter intervening decades. They had um a lot of therapy 0:04:39.120 --> 0:04:41.360 and a lot of internal examination to try to move 0:04:41.400 --> 0:04:43.480 through the traumas of their childhood. So they felt like 0:04:43.520 --> 0:04:45.400 that could be a big part of the book as well. 0:04:46.440 --> 0:04:49.760 I was more skeptical. I it took me some doing, 0:04:49.839 --> 0:04:53.040 but I what I said, what to myself was there's 0:04:53.080 --> 0:04:55.279 no way I would work on this unless every living 0:04:55.279 --> 0:04:57.800 family member was supportive of it. I didn't want to 0:04:59.200 --> 0:05:05.239 uh to suddenly being emotionally invested in writing this family 0:05:05.320 --> 0:05:07.800 story and then see that there was opposition within the 0:05:07.839 --> 0:05:10.840 family to even having it be out there. So I 0:05:10.880 --> 0:05:14.799 decided to go very slowly and talk to everybody very gradually. 0:05:14.839 --> 0:05:17.400 Let's let's let's go a little bit slower here. So 0:05:17.440 --> 0:05:19.920 at what point did you decide there's a book here 0:05:19.920 --> 0:05:25.320 and you wanted to do it? Um? It was about 0:05:25.360 --> 0:05:28.200 three months after that first phone call. What I did 0:05:28.200 --> 0:05:33.640 in those three months was very strategic, I said, um, 0:05:33.680 --> 0:05:35.640 And I was very open with the sisters. I said, 0:05:35.720 --> 0:05:40.200 let's let's take this slowly. Books take time, anyway. UM, 0:05:40.240 --> 0:05:42.000 what if once a week I get on the phone 0:05:42.040 --> 0:05:44.400 for an hour with a different family member of yours, 0:05:44.800 --> 0:05:47.799 and then also with a few doctors who have talked 0:05:47.800 --> 0:05:49.359 to the family and might be able to give me 0:05:49.400 --> 0:05:53.000 some perspective on the medical side of things. And I'll 0:05:53.040 --> 0:05:55.560 be very open ended in these phone calls. I'll just say, 0:05:55.600 --> 0:05:58.880 so the sisters are interested in a book, what do 0:05:58.960 --> 0:06:01.200 you think about that? And then just see what they 0:06:01.279 --> 0:06:03.440 have to say. And I said to the sisters, we'll 0:06:03.480 --> 0:06:05.080 all know at the end of three months or so 0:06:05.120 --> 0:06:07.160 whether or not this is doable or not. And if 0:06:07.200 --> 0:06:10.200 it isn't, I'll give you the tapes of the conversations 0:06:10.279 --> 0:06:12.960 that that I've had with these folks, and you can 0:06:13.080 --> 0:06:15.520 write your memoir whether it'll be my good deed for 0:06:15.560 --> 0:06:18.159 the year, and and and they could go off and 0:06:18.200 --> 0:06:20.880 do what they needed to do in their own way. 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:24.880 But um, being opened this way and being kind of 0:06:24.920 --> 0:06:27.240 casual about it was helpful because I was able to 0:06:27.279 --> 0:06:30.520 really really hear what each individual family member had to 0:06:30.560 --> 0:06:32.520 say about their family, what had to say about the 0:06:32.520 --> 0:06:36.039 idea of the book, and everyone was comfortable enough with 0:06:36.080 --> 0:06:39.000 it so that a year later, when I got a 0:06:39.000 --> 0:06:41.840 book contract and started working on it full time, I 0:06:41.880 --> 0:06:44.520 really was up at full speed from the from the 0:06:44.560 --> 0:06:47.320 get go. Then okay, let's go. So you do this 0:06:47.520 --> 0:06:53.279 three month period of research, then what goes off in 0:06:53.360 --> 0:06:58.120 your brain, and then how do you get the book deal? Um, Well, 0:06:58.160 --> 0:07:01.200 after the three months, I thought, well, this is this 0:07:01.279 --> 0:07:04.200 is really doable. I should get to Colorado, where most 0:07:04.200 --> 0:07:06.599 of the family lives, and try to meet some people personally, 0:07:06.760 --> 0:07:09.000 and most importantly, I should meet face to face with 0:07:09.120 --> 0:07:11.880 Mimi Galvin, who was the matriarch of the family, who 0:07:11.960 --> 0:07:15.800 at that point was years old, I believe, and to 0:07:15.920 --> 0:07:19.040 start doing interviews with her to put together a book proposal. 0:07:19.920 --> 0:07:22.120 And um, and then I, you know, I reached out 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:24.160 to my agents, who I had been my agents for 0:07:24.240 --> 0:07:27.600 more than ten years, and were they really believe that 0:07:27.640 --> 0:07:30.680 this was something special? Um. The more I talked about 0:07:30.720 --> 0:07:33.000 it with them, the more I realized how unique this was. 0:07:33.520 --> 0:07:37.400 There are wonderful, wonderful books about mental illness out there, 0:07:37.440 --> 0:07:39.520 about the science and mental illness, and there are wonderful 0:07:39.560 --> 0:07:43.520 books that are memoirs about the experience of either having 0:07:43.560 --> 0:07:47.520 your own issue or um having a family member experienced 0:07:47.520 --> 0:07:50.360 that issue. But nobody, to my knowledge, had been able 0:07:50.360 --> 0:07:55.040 to do a three sixty degree omniscent you know book 0:07:55.120 --> 0:07:57.400 that would read like a novel where you have every 0:07:57.440 --> 0:08:00.480 input from every family member and everybody's perspective of woven 0:08:00.520 --> 0:08:05.400 together so that it it really reads like some ambitious 0:08:05.480 --> 0:08:08.680 narrative nonfiction. And so I felt like I had a 0:08:08.760 --> 0:08:11.720 unicorn here, you know, something something that nobody else had, 0:08:11.760 --> 0:08:14.600 and I wanted to see how far I could take it. 0:08:14.600 --> 0:08:18.000 It really was a mystery at the beginning, whether it 0:08:18.000 --> 0:08:21.160 would be a science book about an interesting case study 0:08:21.400 --> 0:08:24.280 or a story of sisters surviving trauma. But by the 0:08:24.360 --> 0:08:26.920 end of those three months I got invested in this 0:08:27.040 --> 0:08:30.520 being much more ambitious. This could be an epic, an 0:08:30.520 --> 0:08:35.480 intergenerational family saga that also is a medical mystery, a 0:08:35.520 --> 0:08:37.560 book about a family where you get to know the 0:08:37.640 --> 0:08:42.640 parents nice and slowly. You you walk in their shoes, 0:08:42.720 --> 0:08:45.360 You live with them for years as they raise a family, 0:08:45.440 --> 0:08:48.480 as they have dreams, as they realize some of those dreams, 0:08:48.480 --> 0:08:51.560 and then as things start to fall apart, and then 0:08:51.559 --> 0:08:53.400 in the whole second half of the book, the children 0:08:53.559 --> 0:08:57.040 start to grow up and get new perspectives on everything 0:08:57.080 --> 0:08:59.559 their parents have done. And because you've read part one, 0:08:59.640 --> 0:09:02.720 you have all perspective on on the parents that you 0:09:02.720 --> 0:09:05.640 wouldn't have otherwise had. And then interwoven you get a 0:09:05.640 --> 0:09:09.400 little bit of information about why this family mattered for 0:09:09.480 --> 0:09:11.839 medical research, which I think kind of raises the stakes 0:09:11.880 --> 0:09:15.240 a little bit. Okay, let's really good. Down to the 0:09:15.280 --> 0:09:18.120 nuts and bolts. You say this to your you tell this, 0:09:18.400 --> 0:09:21.560 give the picture your agents. They immediately say, we're in. 0:09:22.360 --> 0:09:23.960 They wanted me to do it before I wanted to 0:09:23.960 --> 0:09:27.920 do it. Um, they understood how how different this was 0:09:28.000 --> 0:09:31.640 and how potentially, um it could really connect with a 0:09:31.640 --> 0:09:33.600 lot of people. And how do you sell it to 0:09:33.679 --> 0:09:37.400 a publisher? Um, you write what's called a book proposal 0:09:38.000 --> 0:09:40.080 when you're a novelist, and you do this often, that 0:09:40.120 --> 0:09:43.320 means you've written half the book already, written some chapters already. 0:09:43.360 --> 0:09:46.160 Maybe you've if you've written the entire thing already. But 0:09:46.679 --> 0:09:50.480 with nonfiction, it's more of a perhaps you'd have some 0:09:50.520 --> 0:09:53.840 sample chapters, but really it's more of a a high 0:09:53.840 --> 0:09:55.760 speed version of what the book will be, like a 0:09:55.800 --> 0:09:57.800 flyover of I'm going to do this, and I'm gonna 0:09:57.840 --> 0:09:59.439 do that, and I already have done this, and I 0:09:59.480 --> 0:10:01.560 already have and that, and this is how I envisioned it, 0:10:01.800 --> 0:10:05.560 a little like a Hollywood pitch meeting. And I sent 0:10:05.640 --> 0:10:10.040 that to How long did it take you right there? Oh? Um, 0:10:10.080 --> 0:10:12.680 over Christmas time, so like a couple of weeks, and 0:10:12.679 --> 0:10:14.840 then it went. Then my agents helped me revise it, 0:10:15.080 --> 0:10:18.280 and then we sent it out in the spring. Um uh, 0:10:19.040 --> 0:10:21.720 the timing of it. There was some particular reason to 0:10:21.720 --> 0:10:25.960 send it out then, and um, something like a dozen 0:10:26.000 --> 0:10:29.840 publishers received it, and I took meetings with ten of them, 0:10:29.920 --> 0:10:32.560 and eight of them bid on it. And the interesting 0:10:32.600 --> 0:10:34.800 part was that I have a good friend, one of 0:10:34.840 --> 0:10:37.640 my best friends, Jennifer Senior. She she's an author and 0:10:37.840 --> 0:10:40.800 worked with me at New York Magazine and most recently 0:10:40.840 --> 0:10:42.839 has been a book critic and cultural critic at the 0:10:42.880 --> 0:10:45.360 New York Times. She's on the op ed page now. 0:10:45.679 --> 0:10:50.360 And she said, I predict that the people you meet 0:10:50.400 --> 0:10:52.439 with who have the most people in the room are 0:10:52.440 --> 0:10:55.000 the people who are going to bid the highest. What 0:10:55.120 --> 0:10:57.920 was the thought there? The thought was that they were 0:10:58.000 --> 0:11:02.400 so that there would be enough instito usitional investment in 0:11:02.440 --> 0:11:04.160 the idea of the book, that there'd be people in 0:11:04.200 --> 0:11:06.040 the house, would be so psyched about it that they 0:11:06.040 --> 0:11:07.920 would want to try and put on a good show 0:11:07.960 --> 0:11:11.520 for me. So um lo and behold, she was right. 0:11:11.559 --> 0:11:13.640 Double Day had the most people in the room, and 0:11:13.640 --> 0:11:16.400 and and they won the auction. And I could not 0:11:16.480 --> 0:11:18.960 be happy. Or my editor, Chris Popolo, is one of 0:11:18.960 --> 0:11:21.280 the best in the business. It's been a wonderful experience 0:11:21.320 --> 0:11:24.840 the whole way through. Okay, how luquiative is a deal 0:11:24.960 --> 0:11:27.680 like this, Well, it had to be enough for me 0:11:27.840 --> 0:11:31.200 to work full time on it. Um Uh. That was 0:11:31.240 --> 0:11:33.880 not the case with my first book, Lost Girls, where 0:11:33.920 --> 0:11:36.800 I had enough time to maybe take six months of 0:11:36.880 --> 0:11:38.800 leave from my job at New York Magazine at the 0:11:38.840 --> 0:11:41.200 time and write it, and then I was working full 0:11:41.240 --> 0:11:44.240 time and revising the book for the next six months 0:11:44.280 --> 0:11:47.440 to a year. That that was difficult, But that would 0:11:47.480 --> 0:11:49.520 not have been possible with a book like this because 0:11:50.080 --> 0:11:52.720 while I certainly had access to the family and could 0:11:52.720 --> 0:11:55.120 go and interview them any time I wanted to, the 0:11:55.160 --> 0:11:58.680 science of schizophrenia was something I was starting at zero 0:11:59.160 --> 0:12:01.560 with and I really needed to hit the books and 0:12:01.640 --> 0:12:05.520 really need to needed to interview researchers and understand neurobiology 0:12:05.559 --> 0:12:11.000 and biology and genetics and psychiatry and brain chemistry and pharmacology. 0:12:11.120 --> 0:12:13.200 It was very daunting, and so there was no way 0:12:13.200 --> 0:12:16.280 I could do what so many people I admired you, 0:12:16.360 --> 0:12:17.920 which is, you know, wake up at four in the 0:12:17.960 --> 0:12:19.720 morning and write for three hours and then go to 0:12:19.760 --> 0:12:21.679 their day job. It just wasn't going to happen with 0:12:21.720 --> 0:12:23.760 a book like this, so that the advance had to 0:12:23.760 --> 0:12:26.120 be enough to sustain me for a few years while 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:28.960 I worked on it. Luckily, I had written one book before, 0:12:29.080 --> 0:12:30.640 so I had a bit of a track record. So 0:12:30.679 --> 0:12:33.880 I wasn't. Um, I wasn't somebody coming in out of 0:12:33.920 --> 0:12:37.080 absolutely nowhere saying I got a book idea and you 0:12:37.120 --> 0:12:40.920 gotta give me a lot of money. I had a 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:45.200 little legitimacy. I get it. Okay, did you do any 0:12:45.240 --> 0:12:48.080 other work while you were writing this book? No? It 0:12:48.160 --> 0:12:51.600 was all full time. And then if you say you 0:12:51.640 --> 0:12:55.400 started four years ago and ultimately the deal was six 0:12:55.440 --> 0:12:57.920 months after you started, how much time did you actually 0:12:58.000 --> 0:13:05.120 spend writing the book? I mean we start drinking in writing. Um. Well, um, 0:13:05.240 --> 0:13:08.440 the from the I I first met the Galvins on 0:13:08.480 --> 0:13:11.320 that phone call in the spring of and I handed 0:13:11.320 --> 0:13:17.800 in a manuscript in um September. Um. But it really 0:13:17.840 --> 0:13:19.480 was a year and a half of full time work, 0:13:19.559 --> 0:13:22.439 not two and a half years, because um uh, that 0:13:22.480 --> 0:13:25.280 first year I was still you know, talking to the 0:13:25.360 --> 0:13:28.440 family and putting the book proposal together and whatnot. How 0:13:29.000 --> 0:13:32.920 how come the book was turned in in September and 0:13:32.920 --> 0:13:36.200 didn't come out for another sixteen eighteen months. That's the 0:13:36.200 --> 0:13:40.200 book business. It's really unbelievable. Um. But but things moved 0:13:40.280 --> 0:13:43.880 very very slowly. The book was pretty much ready nine 0:13:43.920 --> 0:13:49.240 months before its publication date in April, UM what what 0:13:49.320 --> 0:13:54.079 the publisher needed was time to build buzz. Because this 0:13:54.160 --> 0:13:56.240 is a big book. It's a thick book. It has 0:13:56.280 --> 0:14:00.040 lots of footnotes, you know, it's it's heavily researched. It 0:14:00.080 --> 0:14:03.040 is not realistic to however, just saying people who have 0:14:03.040 --> 0:14:05.600 not read the book, it's not dry in any form 0:14:05.679 --> 0:14:07.600 or fashion. I don't want to make it sound like 0:14:07.640 --> 0:14:10.920 a toll. Oh yes, of course. Um and uh you know, 0:14:11.280 --> 0:14:12.800 god willing you read it and you think, oh, it's 0:14:12.800 --> 0:14:15.240 like a novel, you know, lifts off exactly. That's a 0:14:15.280 --> 0:14:18.680 great thing about it. Um. But it's an ambitious, big, 0:14:18.800 --> 0:14:20.960 big book of the year. And with an ambitious big 0:14:20.960 --> 0:14:22.720 book of the year, they don't want to just dump 0:14:22.720 --> 0:14:24.760 it on people and say, Hi, review this for next 0:14:24.800 --> 0:14:27.160 week please. They want to start building up interest and 0:14:27.200 --> 0:14:29.720 sending it out early and getting it to critics and 0:14:29.720 --> 0:14:33.680 getting it too bloggers and getting it to uh special 0:14:33.760 --> 0:14:36.600 readers on good Reads, just to get people starting to 0:14:36.640 --> 0:14:39.040 talk about it. Um. They put me in front of 0:14:39.040 --> 0:14:44.560 the media in December with people like um People magazine 0:14:44.760 --> 0:14:47.360 or the Wall Street Journal, places that plan their news 0:14:47.360 --> 0:14:50.640 coverage way in advance. So so it really is a 0:14:50.800 --> 0:14:55.160 function of the book promotion business. It's not about it's 0:14:55.160 --> 0:14:57.320 not about the physical act of publishing, which of course 0:14:57.360 --> 0:14:58.840 they could do with the push of a button and 0:14:59.600 --> 0:15:03.120 get it people's kindles tomorrow. To what degreed is the 0:15:03.160 --> 0:15:07.960 success of the book align with your personal expectations. It's done, 0:15:08.120 --> 0:15:12.120 it's it's it's it's been overwhelming. It's more than I 0:15:12.160 --> 0:15:17.480 ever could have imagined. I am. I had in my 0:15:17.560 --> 0:15:20.320 fondest dreams. I imagined it would be very well reviewed 0:15:20.720 --> 0:15:23.240 and respected, and everyone would say, oh, it's a very 0:15:23.280 --> 0:15:26.880 noble book, when very well intentioned, and how interesting that 0:15:26.920 --> 0:15:29.480 you did all this work. And the people in it, 0:15:29.840 --> 0:15:32.360 I'm sure they're very happy to tell their story told. 0:15:33.320 --> 0:15:35.720 But you know, big nonfiction books like this that are 0:15:35.880 --> 0:15:38.920 narratives that are about a specific issue, they all are 0:15:38.960 --> 0:15:41.600 like that. They're all big swings for the bleachers. And 0:15:41.640 --> 0:15:45.440 they either either get published and people say, oh, nice, 0:15:45.520 --> 0:15:47.360 good job, and then move on to the next thing, 0:15:47.880 --> 0:15:50.400 or they build up ahead of steam and momentum and 0:15:50.480 --> 0:15:53.680 really connect with a lot more people. And so I'm 0:15:54.040 --> 0:15:55.760 when I write a book. When when I write books 0:15:55.760 --> 0:15:58.240 like this, and this is my second one, they are 0:15:58.320 --> 0:16:00.680 bets at the big at the High State table for 0:16:00.760 --> 0:16:05.760 sure in that sense. Okay, Uh, what day did the 0:16:05.760 --> 0:16:09.720 book actually come out? April seven? Okay, so right in 0:16:09.760 --> 0:16:13.160 the heart of the COVID nineteen era. I've talked to 0:16:13.200 --> 0:16:17.120 other people whose books were in the pipeline, and they say, traditionally, 0:16:17.280 --> 0:16:19.240 other than the big media you're talking about, the Wall 0:16:19.280 --> 0:16:22.760 Street Journal, at the Times, Washington Post, they go on 0:16:22.760 --> 0:16:26.120 a tour, which, needless to say, you cannot do now. 0:16:26.840 --> 0:16:30.600 So was it a good or bad thing to put 0:16:30.600 --> 0:16:33.640 out the book then? And how did you promote it 0:16:33.680 --> 0:16:37.920 beyond the traditional outlet? Um? I had book dates set 0:16:38.000 --> 0:16:40.480 up at bookstores around the country. It was going to 0:16:40.560 --> 0:16:44.760 be a solid week of running around basically every region 0:16:44.880 --> 0:16:48.960 very quickly. UM. And of course all those dates got 0:16:49.040 --> 0:16:53.680 scrubbed as soon as the shutdown started happening. UM. I 0:16:53.760 --> 0:16:57.560 had one huge advantage and I and I don't want 0:16:57.560 --> 0:17:00.240 anyone who's listening to think that I would complain about 0:17:00.800 --> 0:17:02.880 publishing in the time of COVID at all, because I'm 0:17:02.880 --> 0:17:05.440 in a very privileged position. Because the book got selected 0:17:05.520 --> 0:17:09.720 for Oprah's Book Club, and uh that I knew about 0:17:09.760 --> 0:17:13.520 that a few weeks before it actually was announced. So 0:17:13.880 --> 0:17:16.720 I had a few weeks there where the pandemic was 0:17:16.720 --> 0:17:21.160 was coming, and without Oprah, I would have been very, 0:17:21.240 --> 0:17:23.520 very despondent and sure that my book was going to 0:17:23.600 --> 0:17:25.399 fall off the face of the earth. But because it 0:17:25.440 --> 0:17:27.119 was part of Oprah's book Club, I knew it was 0:17:27.119 --> 0:17:30.360 going to get a huge publicity push. No matter what 0:17:30.720 --> 0:17:32.680 that a lot of people would order it online. Even 0:17:32.720 --> 0:17:35.719 if Amazon wasn't shipping packages on April seven because of 0:17:35.760 --> 0:17:39.600 a world economic collapse, people could still read it on 0:17:39.640 --> 0:17:42.479 April seven. It gave me a bit of calm, and 0:17:42.520 --> 0:17:44.879 so I don't want to give anybody the impression that 0:17:45.840 --> 0:17:47.560 that I was cool in the pool while other people 0:17:47.560 --> 0:17:50.639 were sweating for for no good reason. There there was 0:17:51.200 --> 0:17:52.879 a very nice turn of events for me that I 0:17:52.880 --> 0:17:57.720 don't take for granted. Okay, in April um Amazon went 0:17:57.760 --> 0:18:00.320 out of a lot of physical bestsellers. Did that happened 0:18:00.359 --> 0:18:02.720 to you. There was a little bit of a lag 0:18:02.760 --> 0:18:05.119 at some point where, but but I think that was 0:18:05.160 --> 0:18:09.359 mostly because they were prioritizing shipments for essential supplies. So 0:18:09.480 --> 0:18:11.760 normally Prime members could get the book in a couple 0:18:11.760 --> 0:18:14.080 of days, but they were getting notices saying it's going 0:18:14.119 --> 0:18:15.840 to be a week or so because we need to 0:18:15.880 --> 0:18:20.160 send out hand sanitizer to people around the country. Um, 0:18:20.280 --> 0:18:22.960 And that that that subsided after a little while. But 0:18:23.520 --> 0:18:26.600 that was minor that issue, okay. And how did it 0:18:26.680 --> 0:18:32.399 become one of Oprah's picks? Well, as far as I know, Um, 0:18:32.520 --> 0:18:36.359 the books editor at Oprah Magazine heard about the book 0:18:36.359 --> 0:18:38.800 early during that press period that I was telling you 0:18:38.840 --> 0:18:41.520 about earlier, and she put it in front of Oprah 0:18:41.560 --> 0:18:46.679 because Oprah was planning to do a TV special for 0:18:46.960 --> 0:18:49.159 about mental health. She was going to work on it 0:18:49.200 --> 0:18:51.880 with Prince Harry And I don't know if she's done 0:18:51.920 --> 0:18:54.640 that yet or that's still in the works. Her deal 0:18:54.720 --> 0:18:57.920 is with Apple Plus, the streaming service, and so she 0:18:58.119 --> 0:19:00.919 was going to put together a special for Apple Plus. 0:19:01.359 --> 0:19:03.560 And so this is the way it works. Apparently people 0:19:03.560 --> 0:19:05.520 put books in front of Oprah and she has a 0:19:05.560 --> 0:19:07.919 bunch of them, and then one of them, you know, 0:19:08.000 --> 0:19:09.960 she just says, let's make this the book club book. 0:19:09.960 --> 0:19:11.680 And that's what she did this time. She went back 0:19:11.720 --> 0:19:14.600 to Lee Haybor at Oprah Magazine and said let's make 0:19:14.640 --> 0:19:17.520 this the book club book. And Lee said okay, And 0:19:17.560 --> 0:19:20.520 she okay. In talking with me, she said, I mean, 0:19:20.960 --> 0:19:22.960 mental health is a big issue for her. It's important. 0:19:24.359 --> 0:19:30.000 You spoke with Oprah? What what was that like? Well, I, Um, 0:19:30.040 --> 0:19:32.760 I did not have one of those moments where she 0:19:32.920 --> 0:19:35.280 called and I said, you're kidding, it's not you know, 0:19:35.359 --> 0:19:37.480 your your friend playing a joke on me, Like she 0:19:37.560 --> 0:19:40.840 sounds exactly like Open Winfrey. So I immediately knew who 0:19:40.840 --> 0:19:42.880 she was. And as I said, I was sitting there 0:19:42.920 --> 0:19:46.720 at home sweating out pre publications. So the minute she called, 0:19:46.760 --> 0:19:49.240 I started laughing. I burst out laughing because I knew 0:19:49.440 --> 0:19:51.560 there could only be one reason why she was calling 0:19:52.160 --> 0:19:56.600 and um and uh, and that I was suddenly being saved. 0:19:56.640 --> 0:20:00.679 I was being being really helped out tremendously by a 0:20:00.720 --> 0:20:03.719 tremendous act of kindness by her. So I was I 0:20:03.840 --> 0:20:07.639 was hyperventilating, and I was laughing, and then I was 0:20:07.680 --> 0:20:09.440 thanking her a lot and telling her how much it 0:20:09.440 --> 0:20:13.560 would mean to the family too, you know the family. Uh. 0:20:13.640 --> 0:20:17.040 The girls say that they would watch over show as kids, 0:20:17.040 --> 0:20:19.199 and they would say, the people on the on her 0:20:19.240 --> 0:20:21.960 show have nothing on us, like we should really be 0:20:22.080 --> 0:20:24.600 on her show. So I think that might be why 0:20:24.680 --> 0:20:27.359 Oprah was interested too, because it is that the family 0:20:27.560 --> 0:20:29.600 at first glance would be a good subject for the 0:20:29.600 --> 0:20:33.920 Oprah Winfrey Show. Okay, did you have a substantive conversation 0:20:33.960 --> 0:20:36.919 with her, or was just basically I'm calling to congratulate you. 0:20:38.040 --> 0:20:42.359 She um, she was calling to congratulate I. Um. I 0:20:42.400 --> 0:20:45.639 said to her that, you know, I love I said, I, 0:20:46.320 --> 0:20:48.280 but I was extremely grateful, and I said, it was 0:20:48.440 --> 0:20:51.359 the challenge of a career to be able to weave 0:20:51.400 --> 0:20:54.960 together so many different perspectives of so many different people, 0:20:55.200 --> 0:20:58.600 to to juggle so many characters, if you will, it's 0:20:58.600 --> 0:21:01.679 not characters because it's nonfiction. A juggle twelve kids and 0:21:01.760 --> 0:21:04.240 two parents in a book and have readers actually be 0:21:04.320 --> 0:21:07.240 able to keep track of it all was a huge challenge, 0:21:07.680 --> 0:21:09.800 and that I wanted to try to make it like 0:21:09.880 --> 0:21:11.879 something like East of Eden. And I mentioned East of 0:21:12.000 --> 0:21:13.479 Eden to her because I know that that was an 0:21:13.480 --> 0:21:16.080 Oprah's Book Club pick a couple of years ago, and 0:21:16.080 --> 0:21:18.520 that she liked it and that was an influence on 0:21:18.600 --> 0:21:21.120 me as well. And she got it. She said, Oh, yes, 0:21:21.160 --> 0:21:23.280