Speaker 1: Hey fam, Hello Sunshine.
Speaker 2: Today on the bright Side, it's time for another edition
Speaker 2: of shelf Life. We're joined by Laura Taylor, Nami and
Speaker 2: Chatham Greenfield of Reese's Book Club's Lit Up Program, a
Speaker 2: fellowship that uplifts and supports underrepresented writers. It's Tuesday, October
Speaker 2: twenty second on Danielle Robe and.
Speaker 3: I'm Simone Voice and this is the bright Side from
Speaker 3: Hello Sunshine, a daily show where we come together to
Speaker 3: share women's stories, laugh, learn and brighten your day. Well,
Speaker 3: Bestie is if you've ever wanted to write a book
Speaker 3: but don't know where to start, You're in the right place,
Speaker 3: you know, Danielle. We talk a lot about the importance
Speaker 3: of storytelling and the power of putting pen to paper,
Speaker 3: but getting the resources you need as an underrepresented voice
Speaker 3: in the publishing industry can be really intimidating, and according
Speaker 3: to research by The New York Times, only eleven percent
Speaker 3: of books in twenty eighteen We're written by people of color,
Speaker 3: eighty nine percent were written by white authors, And when
Speaker 3: it comes to the content of books, representation is actually
Speaker 3: lacking there too. Research by the Cooperative Children's Book Center
Speaker 3: from twenty nineteen shows that only eleven percent of main
Speaker 3: characters were Black or African, five percent were LATINX, three
Speaker 3: percent were disabled, and just one percent were native or
Speaker 3: First nations.
Speaker 2: These numbers are so disappointingly low, and that's why programs
Speaker 2: like lid up are so important. Lid Up is a
Speaker 2: writer's fellowship for unpublished, diverse authors. It provides five emerging
Speaker 2: writers with a three month mentorship program with a published
Speaker 2: author in all expenses, paid retreat and marketing support from
Speaker 2: Reese's Book Club. So six fellows were selected from over
Speaker 2: eight hundred submissions this year, and one of our guests
Speaker 2: today was the very first fellow to have their book
Speaker 2: published through the program. Chatham Greenfield is a young adult
Speaker 2: author whose debut novel, Time and Time Again, is out
Speaker 2: now and that's in large part due to the lid
Speaker 2: up program and the guidance of their mentor and New
Speaker 2: York Times bestselling author, Laura Taylor namy Well.
Speaker 3: They're both here now to talk all about lit up,
Speaker 3: its impact, and Chatham's new book, Time and Time Again.
Speaker 3: Chatham and Laura, Welcome to the bright Side.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Thank you for having us.
Speaker 3: And congratulations to both of you for being recognized by
Speaker 3: Reese's Book Club.
Speaker 1: What an honor. Thank you so much. Absolutely so.
Speaker 2: One of the reasons that the program lit Up exists
Speaker 2: is to help bring underrepresented authors into the business side
Speaker 2: of writing. We often forget that it's not a strictly
Speaker 2: creative profession. And Laura, you're a mentor in the lit
Speaker 2: Up program. You've published multiple books, So will you take
Speaker 2: us inside of the publishing world in twenty twenty four.
Speaker 2: What are some of the key barriers to writers and
Speaker 2: particularly the underrepresented authors. What are they facing when they're
Speaker 2: trying to get published.
Speaker 1: Oh? Yeah, they're facing gaykeepers at every turn. So first
Speaker 1: you need to find an agent, someone who believes in
Speaker 1: you and is going to kind of take you under
Speaker 1: their wing. And then that age it needs to go
Speaker 1: and just present you to this group of editors and
Speaker 1: make you look amazing and get that manuscript ready. And
Speaker 1: so it can be hard because gosh, I think I'm
Speaker 1: not keen on all the statistics right now, but it's
Speaker 1: only like one percent, one or two percent of all
Speaker 1: querying writers right now will get an agent, and then
Speaker 1: it's like another one percent of those will sell. So
Speaker 1: it can be really challenging. And I think once you
Speaker 1: get in there and you get an agent and you
Speaker 1: get a first deal. It can be a little easier
Speaker 1: to catch momentum and to keep going, but it can
Speaker 1: be hard to break out, to break through. And then
Speaker 1: you're also dealing with everything going inside on inside of
Speaker 1: your own mind as a creator. You're dealing with self doubt,
Speaker 1: You're dealing with imposter syndrome, You're dealing with maybe you've
Speaker 1: shared your work with a lot of people with like
Speaker 1: lots of cooks in the kitchen telling you all these
Speaker 1: things about something you've created. So there's a lot of
Speaker 1: noise and it can be challenging just looking at peers,
Speaker 1: looking at authors that you emulate, and you see what
Speaker 1: they've done. You look at this and it's like, how
Speaker 1: can I get this little book of my heart, this
Speaker 1: thing that I've been spending one, two, three more years on,
Speaker 1: How can I get that to that level? And it
Speaker 1: can be daunting, but it does happen, for sure, and
Speaker 1: it is possible.
Speaker 3: Chatham, did you experience any of the resistance that Laura
Speaker 3: is describing before you got into the lit up program?
Speaker 3: What was your perception of the industry and the barriers
Speaker 3: that exist.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, so the biggest thing for me was
Speaker 4: just that I didn't even know where to start. The
Speaker 4: litt Up fellows, we all have a range of experience.
Speaker 4: Some people were trying to get published before and being
Speaker 4: told no by gatekeepers. I hadn't yet sent my book
Speaker 4: out to agents because I didn't even know how to
Speaker 4: do that. I didn't know that anybody could send their
Speaker 4: book out to an agent. I didn't know how to
Speaker 4: get my manuscript ready enough. And that was how lit
Speaker 4: Up really helped me, because, like you said, you know,
Speaker 4: it's not just the creative side. We all wish it was,
Speaker 4: but it is at the end of the day of business.
Speaker 4: And I had just graduated college where I had really
Speaker 4: when all my classes they'd really focused on how do
Speaker 4: you write the best book possible, but not then how
Speaker 4: do you get that book into the world. Which I
Speaker 4: do think it's fundamental to get your writing to a
Speaker 4: solid place before you start thinking about publishing. So I
Speaker 4: don't have regrets about that, but it was definitely really
Speaker 4: important for me to just learn even the fundamentals of
Speaker 4: how do you publish your manuscript, how do you find agents,
Speaker 4: how does it work setting it out to editors. It's
Speaker 4: really helpful to have a mentor to help guide you
Speaker 4: through the process, because it can feel very daunting when you're.
Speaker 1: On the outside.
Speaker 2: Well having been through the process, I'm curious what you
Speaker 2: think authors should keep in mind in terms of positioning
Speaker 2: their work for publishers, and I'll give a little context.
Speaker 2: I know that one of the main things that you
Speaker 2: do as an authors you write a book proposal. Then
Speaker 2: when you submit the proposal, people bid on it, publishers
Speaker 2: bid on it, and that sort of determines what your
Speaker 2: advance is. And so it is an exercise in branding
Speaker 2: in some ways. What do you think people should be
Speaker 2: keeping in mind.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so in fiction you typically do write the whole
Speaker 4: book instead of just a proposal until you're later in
Speaker 4: your career. Book proposals are more for nonfiction, so definitely
Speaker 4: make the book as good as you can find people
Speaker 4: to swap manuscripts with if you can, or find an
Speaker 4: amazing fellowship like I did, where you get paid with
Speaker 4: the mentor who reviews it. I think it's definitely good
Speaker 4: to think long term and think what kinds of books
Speaker 4: do I like to write and what kind of career
Speaker 4: do I want, you know, and definitely get in the
Speaker 4: practice of summarizing your book in one sentence would be
Speaker 4: my advice. You know, I've kind of got my pitch
Speaker 4: down of it's basically a ya gay disabled spin on
Speaker 4: Groundhog Day. So that's definitely good practice because at every stage,
Speaker 4: from getting an agent, getting a publisher, and getting it
Speaker 4: to readers, you need to know what the heart of
Speaker 4: your book is and be able to summarize set in
Speaker 4: two seconds, because sometimes that's all you have.
Speaker 1: Laura, how about you? I would say one of the
Speaker 1: best things that you can do as an author trying
Speaker 1: to position a book is to find a book community.
Speaker 1: And that can be emerging authors, it can be established
Speaker 1: authors who are available on social media on x or
Speaker 1: on Instagram, on TikTok. We're always giving tips and always
Speaker 1: welcoming emerging writers into our space to help. And I
Speaker 1: would say befriend those people, ask questions, and then when
Speaker 1: you get some trusted people that you can get in
Speaker 1: some small DM groups with, you can ask like, what
Speaker 1: are the best agents for rom coms right now? Who's
Speaker 1: taking this? And have you heard of this agent or
Speaker 1: that company or anything. Just to vet people, just to
Speaker 1: bet experiences, because there's some scammers out there that are
Speaker 1: trying to take advantage of new and emerging creators. As
Speaker 1: established authors, we want to make sure that emerging authors
Speaker 1: are coming into this safely and with as much knowledge
Speaker 1: and empowerment that we can give them.
Speaker 3: Chadam, how did this even get on your radar? How
Speaker 3: did you get involved with lit up? Yeah?
Speaker 4: I just saw a post about it on social media
Speaker 4: and when I had applied, you know, it was the
Speaker 4: first year that they were doing it. You know, I
Speaker 4: didn't see other authors who had done it, but I
Speaker 4: just saw an author or I didn't even follow that
Speaker 4: many authors at the time, but I saw like the
Speaker 4: one author I followed thankfully posted about the fellowship, and
Speaker 4: I just thought like, wow, this sounds like the perfect
Speaker 4: opportunity for me. I had just graduated in twenty twenty is,
Speaker 4: you know, not a fun year to graduate, but I
Speaker 4: immediately had started writing time and time again, and so
Speaker 4: I had a draft completed when I found out about
Speaker 4: the program, and I was like, you know, I think
Speaker 4: my book could be a good fit for this. Let's
Speaker 4: find out you know, there was I think another thing
Speaker 4: that's great about lit up is there is no application cost,
Speaker 4: which can be another really prohibitive aspect. Of it doesn't
Speaker 4: cost money to query agents, but sometimes with fellowships and retreats,
Speaker 4: it does cost money to apply and then to pay
Speaker 4: for the program. So having it be a free program
Speaker 4: with no application costs was kind of like, Okay, all
Speaker 4: I have to do here is invest my time and
Speaker 4: working on my manuscript, which I want to do anyways,
Speaker 4: and filling out a few asked me questions. So I
Speaker 4: did that, and then like six months later or so,
Speaker 4: I found out I'd been accepted, and I screamed at
Speaker 4: the top of my legs.
Speaker 3: Naturally, how do you participate in other writing workshops or
Speaker 3: retreats like this before, and if so, how is this different.
Speaker 4: I hadn't gone to a retreat before. Now, I had
Speaker 4: done workshops. I studied writing in college, and I'd done
Speaker 4: some workshopping programs. I think what's different about lit up
Speaker 4: is that you're working one on one with a mentor.
Speaker 4: Workshops can be helpful, but they can also pinder the
Speaker 4: process because, like Laura mentioned, sometimes there's just too many
Speaker 4: cooks with the workshops. Sometimes it's too much feedback. And
Speaker 4: I also had a lot of issues when I went
Speaker 4: to workshops with people who didn't quite understand what I
Speaker 4: was doing writing marginalized characters. So having a mentor who
Speaker 4: also writes marginalized characters and who really understood what I
Speaker 4: was to do with my book just was really helpful.
Speaker 4: And just having someone who's dedicated, because in a workshop,
Speaker 4: you're reading ten fifteen, however many stories versus. Laura was
Speaker 4: only working with me for that cycle and was able
Speaker 4: to dedicate time to go through my manuscript twice, provide
Speaker 4: notes that I really needed and really teach me how
Speaker 4: to form a final manuscript. I'm working on my second
Speaker 4: book now and there definitely things that I learned from
Speaker 4: Laura that I still employ. So yeah, I think that
Speaker 4: one on one help is what makes Slit Up really special.
Speaker 2: We have to take a quick break, but we'll be
Speaker 2: right back to Shelf Life with Laura Taylor, Namey and
Speaker 2: Chatham Greenfield. And we're back with Laura Taylor, Namey and
Speaker 2: Chatham Greenfield. Laura, when you begin working with someone or
Speaker 2: a mentee, I should say, where do you begin?
Speaker 1: Is it a focus on story? Is it structure? I
Speaker 1: like to go in just straight away. I open the book,
Speaker 1: and I just love to get a solid first impression
Speaker 1: of a baseline of where this author is. Mainly, I
Speaker 1: love to start with voice because we can work on story,
Speaker 1: we can work on beats and are things in the
Speaker 1: right place, the mechanics. I can line at it you
Speaker 1: for two weeks and I'm a good line at it.
Speaker 1: I love to get in there. Are we using language
Speaker 1: to the best of our ability. But voice is something
Speaker 1: that's very important to me, and it's important to readers.
Speaker 1: And that is just the way you present your story.
Speaker 1: It is the style, it's more than that is just
Speaker 1: how the story comes across. And I noticed when I
Speaker 1: opened Chatham's book, didn't know anything about this story other
Speaker 1: than just the brief pitch. And I read three paragraphs
Speaker 1: and I had to stop, and I'm like, who is
Speaker 1: this person and where did they come from? Because the
Speaker 1: voice was so gorgeous and so engaging and so interesting
Speaker 1: and full of like all the things that we try
Speaker 1: to teach to help develop voice, because it can be taught,
Speaker 1: but it is harder. It's hard. It's voices something it's
Speaker 1: so innate, and it's really like there's a talent. You
Speaker 1: can have a knack for it, and a talent in
Speaker 1: Chattham just showed me, like this is a person who
Speaker 1: is a talented author, who has the basic skills and
Speaker 1: really knows what they're doing with self expression and expression
Speaker 1: of the characters. The characters jumped off the page. It
Speaker 1: was witty, it was fun. So I was just like, oh,
Speaker 1: my goodness, this is going to be the best book.
Speaker 1: It's going to be so much fun. And it was.
Speaker 1: And then it made it so much easier for me
Speaker 1: because then I was able to just tune and pull
Speaker 1: Chatham and pull the story threads, pull the characters, challenge
Speaker 1: them with motivations, and pay off all the things that
Speaker 1: we as authors that were trained and we do over
Speaker 1: and over again. Just using those things to pull that
Speaker 1: through Chatham's manuscript. That's kind of where I start. But
Speaker 1: I really just love to get that first impression and
Speaker 1: like to see like it's like Clay, like what am
Speaker 1: I working with here? And I love to meet an
Speaker 1: author where they need me most. So with Chatham sounding
Speaker 1: so great and coming across is so polished already, I
Speaker 1: knew exactly what this story needed and I could focus
Speaker 1: my energy on those things, and that book sold right away.
Speaker 1: So I think we did a good job, right, Cheam,
Speaker 1: I think so? Yeah?
Speaker 4: Okay, So That's so nice to hear because I look
Speaker 4: back and I'm like, oh my gosh, that I don't
Speaker 4: know what that book was before we revised it. But
Speaker 4: you know, it's nice to remember I did.
Speaker 1: I did.
Speaker 4: I think you're right. I did have some sort of
Speaker 4: you know, a natural talent and natural voice. But I
Speaker 4: think what we worked on was really what makes the
Speaker 4: story a novel, and what makes a protagonist a protagonist,
Speaker 4: you know, in figuring out what our phoebe the main
Speaker 4: characterist motivations, and what does her character look like, and
Speaker 4: really developing what was already there. Because I think what
Speaker 4: makes you so good as a mentor, Laura, and so
Speaker 4: good as an editor as you understand how to work
Speaker 4: with what's already there. You know, you don't want to
Speaker 4: really take feedback for people if they don't understand the
Speaker 4: heart of your book and are trying to get you
Speaker 4: to write it how they would write it, and trying
Speaker 4: to get you to write it in their voice. But you,
Speaker 4: like you said, kind of met me where you were
Speaker 4: at and understood the story and just said how do
Speaker 4: we polish and develop what's already here? And in this case,
Speaker 4: I think that was really adding to and fleshing out
Speaker 4: the character arc.
Speaker 3: Chadam, it sounds like you entered this process on really solid,
Speaker 3: strong footing. But if you had to pinpoint one significant
Speaker 3: way in which you personally transformed as a writer, what
Speaker 3: would it be.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think it was really to me, it felt
Speaker 4: like this whole journey has been going from being a
Speaker 4: writer to an author, Like I had never really revised
Speaker 4: a book over and over again like I did with
Speaker 4: Time time again. You know, I revised it twice with
Speaker 4: Laura and then with an agent, and then multiple times
Speaker 4: with my editor, and I had never gone through that process.
Speaker 4: So I think the biggest thing was just learning what
Speaker 4: it takes and learning what the process looks like, and
Speaker 4: having some sort of inside information from Laura, who's someone
Speaker 4: who's you know, already been there and his steps ahead.
Speaker 4: Now that I'm working on my second book, I have
Speaker 4: a much clearer idea of what to expect out of
Speaker 4: the process and out of the publishing industry as a whole.
Speaker 2: I think that social media has taken the mysticism of
Speaker 2: things away, like we have an inside look into so
Speaker 2: much now that we didn't before. But one of the
Speaker 2: things that is still mysterious is how to write a book.
Speaker 2: If you put a book out, people are like, how
Speaker 2: did you do that?
Speaker 1: You know, like it still holds this mystery, you know.
Speaker 2: Speaking of social one of the technologies that is upending
Speaker 2: the book publishing industry is TikTok and more specifically book talk.
Speaker 1: It has over one hundred and one billion impressions.
Speaker 2: How do you think authors can lear average social platforms
Speaker 2: to their advantage.
Speaker 1: The thing that I want readers to know is that
Speaker 1: we are authors and we're not all social media experts.
Speaker 1: We love book talk. I'm on book talk, I'm on TikTok.
Speaker 1: You can follow me and say hi, and we try
Speaker 1: with just this goal of celebrating the things we love
Speaker 1: about our books and our friends books. That is really
Speaker 1: what I do. And so other than that, I will
Speaker 1: be honest. Sometimes it feels like you're just screaming into
Speaker 1: the void, and that one hundred and one billion impressions
Speaker 1: just feels like this never ending lake of question marks
Speaker 1: and emptiness sometimes, and it's hard to know what to do,
Speaker 1: how to brand yourself quickly, how to celebrate, And so
Speaker 1: I've tried to let myself go with that and just
Speaker 1: celebrate the books that I have coming out the things
Speaker 1: that I've done have fun, be playful with my books
Speaker 1: and with music or pop culture references, just with my
Speaker 1: own writing day showing things like that. But I just
Speaker 1: want readers to remember that, above all, we are authors,
Speaker 1: and the pen is our greatest gift and tool, and
Speaker 1: the computer and the phone is not always where we're strongest.
Speaker 1: So what you can do to help authors is to
Speaker 1: amplify the ones that you love best, because we are
Speaker 1: really trying to be accessible to you, to be exciting
Speaker 1: for you, to be relevant for you, to be celebratory
Speaker 1: for you. But we're also trying to write that next
Speaker 1: book and that next book, and there are only so
Speaker 1: many work hours in the day.
Speaker 4: So yeah, I think that's well said Laura. I like
Speaker 4: the framing of it as celebrating the book because it
Speaker 4: can sometimes be hard because you just want to be writing,
Speaker 4: and social media promotion can be fun, but it can
Speaker 4: also be time that you feel is kind of taking
Speaker 4: away from writing. I think the most valuable aspect of
Speaker 4: social media to me has been being able to connect
Speaker 4: with other authors, and like Laura said, just finding that
Speaker 4: community and amplifying each other's books rather than just shouting
Speaker 4: about your own can make it feel less lonely. Laura
Speaker 4: and I always shouting about each other's books, and you
Speaker 4: know that's just that's really great. But yeah, I mean,
Speaker 4: I would just say, yeah, don't put the pressure on
Speaker 4: yourself to be like a video editor and an amazing creator,
Speaker 4: because if you can do social media, it's a plus,
Speaker 4: but it's not an absolute necessity, Like you don't need
Speaker 4: to be a TikTok star to get a book deal.
Speaker 4: And I think there's a big misconception that you do,
Speaker 4: but you don't. It helps, of course, I think that
Speaker 4: the way that I look at posting on social media
Speaker 4: is just about using it as a way to connect
Speaker 4: with my readership and carry them through books, rather than
Speaker 4: thinking of it as I'm going to go viral and
Speaker 4: I'm going to be the next big book on book talk,
Speaker 4: because really we have no control over that. A lot
Speaker 4: of times it's the readers who push that rather than us.
Speaker 4: So I like to think of it as I post
Speaker 4: consistently on social media and I have the same handle
Speaker 4: across all platforms because I want people who like my
Speaker 4: books to be able to come to those spaces for
Speaker 4: updates and for connection.
Speaker 3: It's time for another quick break we'll be right back
Speaker 3: with Laura Taylor, Nami and Chadam Greenfield, and we're back.
Speaker 3: I'd love to dive into your writing and genre a bit,
Speaker 3: because you both have written why novels and have a
Speaker 3: special connection to coming of age stories and Chatham, you
Speaker 3: said something interesting earlier, which was that lid Up really
Speaker 3: taught you how to distinguish what makes a novel and
Speaker 3: novel and what makes a protagonist a protagonist. So what
Speaker 3: is the secret to writing a voicey coming of age story?
Speaker 4: I think it's about figuring out the voice of your
Speaker 4: character rather than just seeing it as your voice is
Speaker 4: an author, because you want to write distinct protagonists in
Speaker 4: each book, So it's about figuring out who is this
Speaker 4: person and kind of seeing them as a person. There's
Speaker 4: someone you're creating, but they are still a person, and
Speaker 4: figuring out what they want, you know. I mean I
Speaker 4: had when I was submitted time and time again to
Speaker 4: lit Up, I had phoebe the main character. Her core
Speaker 4: motivation was I want to get out of this time loop.
Speaker 4: You know, She's stuck in a timeloob the same days,
Speaker 4: repeating over and over again, and she's like, I want
Speaker 4: to get it out of this time loop, because who wouldn't.
Speaker 4: Then when lit up and Laura came in, you know,
Speaker 4: Laura kind of said to me, you know, I think
Speaker 4: Phoebe needs to have her own motivation on top of
Speaker 4: the time loop. Why is she so desperate to reach tomorrow?
Speaker 4: What is it about tomorrow that she can't have today?
Speaker 4: And that was such a lightful moment to me of like,
Speaker 4: oh yeah, I really need to figure out what is
Speaker 4: it that she wants. So I think the first step
Speaker 4: for writing a voice Waite novel is to just figure
Speaker 4: out whose voice it is.
Speaker 3: That's good, Laura, as the chef you know of the
Speaker 3: secret sauce here, would you share your perspective too, or
Speaker 3: if it's the same answer as Chatham, then that's okay.
Speaker 1: Chadam nailed it. I can just to add if you
Speaker 1: feel that as an author, there are a lot of
Speaker 1: young young adult novels out there. If you look at
Speaker 1: the shelves at Barnes and know you're gonna see tons,
Speaker 1: and how can you stand out? I would say, try
Speaker 1: to pick something that manners universally to teens and to
Speaker 1: those who have been teens and still remember their teenage years.
Speaker 1: What are those universal struggles, those milestones, those things that
Speaker 1: keep teens up all night talking to their friends or
Speaker 1: texting about them, because they matter at that time, so crucially,
Speaker 1: what are those things? And then I would challenge you
Speaker 1: to find what is not quite as universal about you
Speaker 1: as an author, expressing that what makes you special? What
Speaker 1: take can you find? What angle, what little plot zinger?
Speaker 1: What fresh thing can you bring to something that we
Speaker 1: already know to make it really exciting?
Speaker 2: Laura, this sounds like book therapy. You're asking such thoughtful questions. Well,
Speaker 2: that's what we do of our books.
Speaker 1: Like when I sit down to write a new book,
Speaker 1: it's like putting myself through therapy and putting the characters
Speaker 1: in there with me. We all get on the couch
Speaker 1: and we say, who have we been before today? And
Speaker 1: what have those days done to us? How have they
Speaker 1: made us? What's past his prolog? I did not say
Speaker 1: that Shakespeare did what's past his prolog? So what have
Speaker 1: we all seen, done, felt, hurt, loved and lived? That
Speaker 1: has then created the peer's the person we are on
Speaker 1: day one of that book, on page one of that book,
Speaker 1: and taking all that and infusing it through a story
Speaker 1: that's really exciting, can make a novel that's fun and
Speaker 1: resonant and relevant.
Speaker 3: So Chatham, earlier, you mentioned that you pitched this book
Speaker 3: as a queer, disabled spin on groundhog Day, and I
Speaker 3: know that you've brought your own personal health journey into
Speaker 3: this too. Why groundhog Day, I'm curious if that's nostalgic
Speaker 3: for you, and why this storytelling device?
Speaker 4: Yeah, absolutely, so I do love groundhog Day.
Speaker 1: Who doesn't.
Speaker 4: It's a crazy too, But it was more so inspired
Speaker 4: by just my sort of realization that when you have
Speaker 4: health issues, it can often feel like you're living the
Speaker 4: same day over and over again. You wake up in
Speaker 4: your pain, you go to a doctor's appointment, you're on
Speaker 4: more pain. People don't believe your pain, and it can
Speaker 4: often be very repetitive. And so I wanted to play
Speaker 4: on that, by that feeling of living the same day
Speaker 4: over and over again, by having a character who is
Speaker 4: chronicle ill and is living literally the same day over
Speaker 4: and over again, and having health issues can often feel
Speaker 4: like a very isolating experience. So that's why I decided
Speaker 4: to make Phoebe's love interest, Jess be disabled as well.
Speaker 4: So Phoebe is stuck with someone who really on an
Speaker 4: inherent level, understands her and what she's going through. Even
Speaker 4: though they have different disabilities, there's still this level of
Speaker 4: camaraderie there. So Yeah, the timeloop device was really less
Speaker 4: of an homage to Groundhog Day, as much as we
Speaker 4: all love it, and more sort of a way to
Speaker 4: represent what it's like to live your life with chronic pain.
Speaker 2: Chatham, you come from a Jewish family, and there's this
Speaker 2: really special part in the book that talks about but
Speaker 2: share it.
Speaker 1: Will you share what.
Speaker 2: It personally means to you and why it plays such
Speaker 2: a special role in your story?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 4: I love this question because I actually haven't talked about
Speaker 4: this in interviews before, but this was something that was
Speaker 4: sort of inspired by my own life, something that I
Speaker 4: always say, you know, there's always this question with books
Speaker 4: of how much of it is your life?
Speaker 2: Is it?
Speaker 4: And people tend to assume, oh, it's all like a memoir
Speaker 4: and that's fictionalized, and it's like no, So I always
Speaker 4: say I sprinkle aspects of my life in my books,
Speaker 4: like Confetti, like I am not Phoebe and Phoebe is
Speaker 4: not me, but we do share experiences and there are
Speaker 4: details of my life that I add in that I
Speaker 4: feel sort of grounded in reality, and one of those
Speaker 4: is that concept of beshirt. So basically, my parents grew
Speaker 4: up together, they went to high school together, but they
Speaker 4: didn't like date in high school at all. My mom
Speaker 4: actually hated my dad. She would write in the front
Speaker 4: of her books that she hated him because their last
Speaker 4: names were close to each other alphabetically. So they were
Speaker 4: always paired together for projects. It's like a real life
Speaker 4: rom come. So they were always paired together for projects.
Speaker 4: And she was a very serious student and he would
Speaker 4: like to goof off, so she was always annoyed by him,
Speaker 4: but they were still kind of friends, and then they
Speaker 4: went their separate ways. They went to college, and years
Speaker 4: later they reconnected and now they've been married for over
Speaker 4: thirty years. So something my bubby would always say is, oh,
Speaker 4: it's it's fishirt. They're faded for each other, and it's
Speaker 4: love at second site. And I've just always loved that
Speaker 4: concept of love at second site rather than love at
Speaker 4: first sight.
Speaker 1: You know, love at.
Speaker 4: First sight is a classic, but I loved this idea
Speaker 4: of having these characters who come together and come apart
Speaker 4: at different times in their life. They meet first when
Speaker 4: they're seven years old, and then again at the beginning
Speaker 4: of high school, and then they kind of come into
Speaker 4: the time look with all this baggage around each other
Speaker 4: that they have to work through, and it's just sort
Speaker 4: of a beautiful idea of meeting at different points in
Speaker 4: your life until.
Speaker 1: The time is right. It's beautiful.
Speaker 3: All right, We are going to step into Phoebe and
Speaker 3: Jess's shoes for a moment because I have a silly
Speaker 3: question for us. If we had a day like Phoebe
Speaker 3: and Jess from time and time again, where we could
Speaker 3: live without consequences, how would we all spend.
Speaker 2: It without consequences?
Speaker 1: This is a tough question. I'm definitely doing something illegal.
Speaker 3: Really wait, no, concept not demure of you.
Speaker 1: It's not mindful, not very cute.
Speaker 2: I'm like riding a motorcycle through the desert. I'm running
Speaker 2: around naked somewhere.
Speaker 3: This is really funny because we just got done having
Speaker 3: a conversation about how her Jewish parents don't approve of
Speaker 3: her being on a motorcycle. So clearly there's some unearthed
Speaker 3: trauma here A thousand percent.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there is no consequences, you know. There you go,
Speaker 1: How about you, guys? This is not about me? I
Speaker 1: would just go to Paris every day. Oh my gosh. Yes,
Speaker 1: I would just get on and I fly like the
Speaker 1: business class, because I mean, it's not my money, it's
Speaker 1: going to come back to my account right to like
Speaker 1: the really nice business class and go to Paris sick
Speaker 1: every day and ecroissants and shopping and like hang out
Speaker 1: in the sun river and then just come home. And
Speaker 1: they keep doing that. Yeah.
Speaker 4: I was going to say the same thing because I
Speaker 4: think part of no consequences that people don't think about
Speaker 4: that I talk about in the book is that your
Speaker 4: bank account will replenish the next day. So it's like,
Speaker 4: you know, yeah, I would just kind of think, like,
Speaker 4: you know, what can I do for the most amount
Speaker 4: of money yet fly first class around the world. Hopefully
Speaker 4: I'm stuck. On the day that Taylor Swift is performing,
Speaker 4: I will be front row.
Speaker 2: I will we be together. We're definitely going to see
Speaker 2: some live music.
Speaker 1: I want to be in Chatham's Loop. I'm going to
Speaker 1: be a jazz hop into your move and do that.
Speaker 4: I was going to say, come bring the car and okay,
Speaker 4: you know, crash crash lightly into me.
Speaker 1: We'll go see.
Speaker 2: Joe's with Simone you're not off the hook. What's your answer?
Speaker 3: Probably the day that my kids were born. That's the
Speaker 3: day that I want to be stuck in. Just that
Speaker 3: feeling when they place your baby on your chest for
Speaker 3: the first time. It's magical, euphoric. Even, Yeah, I'm surprised
Speaker 3: you're not having twelve children. How much you love giving birth?
Speaker 1: I love giving birth.
Speaker 3: I might have one more.
Speaker 1: We'll see. Well, I'm going to take a left turn.
Speaker 3: Laura.
Speaker 2: Your book is titled A Cuban Girl's Guide to Tea
Speaker 2: and Tomorrow and it is being adapted for film, which
Speaker 2: is really huge. Congratulations. How much control or input do
Speaker 2: you have as an author when your book is adapted
Speaker 2: to film, like, are you part of the casting?
Speaker 1: How much, say, do you get zero? Yeah? Pretty much? Yeah,
Speaker 1: we don't. When you option a book, if you're Stephen King,
Speaker 1: you might get more because you know, if you're this venerable,
Speaker 1: longtime author for thirty forty years, you are gonna earn more. Say,
Speaker 1: but that wasn't me as a new author. So the
Speaker 1: same company who made my movie also did the Jenny
Speaker 1: Hans to All the Boys I'd loved before, and I
Speaker 1: love that adaptation so much. Even though it's not so
Speaker 1: exactly like mirrors the book completely. I thought the adaptation alone,
Speaker 1: if you didn't know anything about that book and you
Speaker 1: just watch the movies, you go, oh, these are really beautiful,
Speaker 1: fun movies. So when I picked them, I went off
Speaker 1: that like, am I going to get a beautiful movie?
Speaker 1: And I absolutely did.
Speaker 3: That sounds like a real exercise and surrender.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: It's been a few years that we've been working on this,
Speaker 1: and I think i've it has taken me a while
Speaker 1: to do that, because when you write a book, you
Speaker 1: get to control everything until you know an editor might
Speaker 1: get in there and tune you a little bit bit. Really,
Speaker 1: it's your story. That's not always how it works in movies,
Speaker 1: because movies and books are separate entities and they are
Speaker 1: different brands. They are different I think for viewers, I
Speaker 1: will just caution you that if you do love a
Speaker 1: book and you do see an adaptation, to put the
Speaker 1: book away and just say, are the characters that I
Speaker 1: love represented well in this particular art form, which is
Speaker 1: a different art form that the author did not necessarily
Speaker 1: have control over.
Speaker 3: But no matter how many times you tell that to readers,
Speaker 3: they're still going to go on social media and complain
Speaker 3: about yes.
Speaker 1: They are and it's okay, and I understand. Like I said,
Speaker 1: my movie is not out yet. As soon as it
Speaker 1: sells and goes to its home, then I will let
Speaker 1: you know. But I'm will you celebrate? Oh gosh, I
Speaker 1: feel like I've been celebrating for years because they've got
Speaker 1: an option right after the book came out, so it's
Speaker 1: been alone, which was twenty twenty so like in twenty
Speaker 1: twenty one, like right away, So it's been a long time.
Speaker 1: You know, Hollywood is very slow. You think publishing is slow.
Speaker 1: Hollywood is very slow and something that I don't always
Speaker 1: understand and have to appeal to my team and and people.
Speaker 1: I don't have all the answers for that celebrating. I
Speaker 1: think I'll just I would love to be if there's
Speaker 1: a premiere, I want to do that, you know, and
Speaker 1: hang out with everyone, and I just want to be
Speaker 1: with my friends and family, the people I love who
Speaker 1: supporting me when I was writing this book.
Speaker 3: So cool, I mean, what a what a surreal moment
Speaker 3: to see so.
Speaker 1: Surreal. It was very emotional, yeah, very lots of different emotions.
Speaker 3: I'm so happy to see how happy you are with
Speaker 3: how it came in. Yeah, like that's that's really huge,
Speaker 3: and that just makes me really happy for you as
Speaker 3: a creative and an author. Well, thanks for coming on
Speaker 3: our show, guys. Thank you so much. Thanks for coming
Speaker 3: on the bright Side.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, Thank you, thanks for having us.
Speaker 2: Laura Taylor Namy is the author of A Cuban Girl's
Speaker 2: Guide to Tea and Tomorrow.
Speaker 1: You can find it wherever you get your books.
Speaker 2: Chatham Greenfield is a fellow of the lit Up program
Speaker 2: from Reese's Book Club and the author of Time and
Speaker 2: Time Again, available wherever you get your books.
Speaker 1: That's it for today's show.
Speaker 3: Tomorrow, It's well on this Wednesday, we're joined by Board
Speaker 3: certified psychiatrist doctor Sasha hamdani Our adhd Awareness Month. Join
Speaker 3: the conversation using hashtag the bright Side and connect with
Speaker 3: us on social media at Hello Sunshine on Instagram and
Speaker 3: at the bright Side Pod on TikTok Oh, and feel
Speaker 3: free to tag us at Simone Voice and at Danielle Robe.
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Speaker 3: See you tomorrow, folks. Keep looking on the bright side.