Smart Podcast, Trashy Books, September 9, 2016

 

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Sarah Wendell:  Hello, and welcome to episode number 211 of Smart Podcast, Trashy Books.  I’m Sarah Wendell from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, and with me today is contemporary romance author Molly O’Keefe.  She also writes erotic contemporary romance as M. O’Keefe, and we talk about the differences between her contemporary romances, what it means to put the reader through the emotional wringer, and how she builds erotic intensity in her writing.  We also have a listener email from Katherine, who had a question about trends and groups of heroes, so we discuss that as well, plus, of course, what she’s reading and recommending.

We don’t have a sponsor for this week’s podcast or the transcript, but the transcript will, of course, happen anyway.  However, I would like to humbly say thank you for listening and for all of the reviews that you have left in various places for the podcast.  Every time I run into a new review of the show it’s like, ooh, this is so exciting!  So thank you!  If you would like to support the show or find out more about how you can contribute toward making sure every episode has a transcript, please have a look at our podcast Patreon at Patreon.com/SmartBitches.  You can make a monthly pledge of as little as a dollar, and you’ll be helping me keep the show more awesomer as often and as frequently as awesomer can be had.  So many of you listening have already backed the show, so thank you so much for doing that, and if you have shared the link or had a look, you’re most excellent.  Thank you as well!

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And now, on with the podcast!

[music]

Molly O’Keefe:  My name is Molly O’Keefe.

Sarah:  Yay!

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  That was it!  That’s all you have to do!

Molly:  I – okay, that’s it!  Do you want me to tell you what I write?

Sarah:  Yes, all of the things!

Molly:  Oh, okay.  All of the things.  So, my name is Molly O’Keefe.  I write romance novels of the contemporary variety and some historical Westerns.  I’ve written lots of ‘em, over thirty, I think.

Sarah:  Dude!  Seriously?

Molly:  Yeah.  Yeah, I started young with Harlequin, and so, you know, the numbers, like the years, they pile up.

[Laughter]

Molly:  So, yeah, so, I think I’ve written about a little over thirty books of various flavors, and –

Sarah:  That’s really great!  Way to go!

Molly:  Yeah, I started when I was twenty-five.  I sold my first book to Harlequin when I was twenty-five, so it’s, it’s, it’s been the career that sort of has grown up with me, for sure.

Sarah:  Now, are you the type of writer who always loved romance and was convinced, okay, someday, maybe, I can do this, or did you sort of look at the genre at one point and be like, dude, I can so totally do this!  Get out of my way!

Molly:  No, I, I’ve loved romance forever, and I, it was literally the first job I wanted, outside of, like, being a florist.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Molly:  I wanted to write romance novels.  And I, I made, like, I went to college, and I got a degree in Journalism and wrote –

Sarah:  Which is, which is a little bit like romance.

Molly:  Yeah!

Sarah:  Not exactly.

Molly:  Yeah.  Well, I thought that would be, like, my day gig, and I would write romance on the side, and that’s kind of what happened.  [Laughs]

Sarah:  So you made a plan, and then things went according to plan?

Molly:  Weirdly enough.  It’s true.  It’s so true.

Sarah:  Whoa.  That never happens!

Molly:  I know!  When I think about it, it’s the on-, maybe it’s the only plan I’ve had that’s gone according to plan, but I, I’m from the States, and I met and fell in love with a Canadian and moved up here illegally the first time –

Sarah:  [Gasps!]

Molly:  – and couldn’t work, and so I took classes at, it’s a now-defunct writing program called the Toronto Writer’s Workshop, and it was amazing, and it was run, all the teachers were, like, in the business.  Whatever they were teaching, they were in the business.  And mine was taught by Malle Vallik.

Sarah:  No way!

Molly:  Romance novels, taught by Malle Vallik, and so it just kind of grew from there.

Sarah:  What did you learn in the course?

Molly:  Write cowboys, and write series.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  I suppose those are good pieces of advice.  [Laughs]

Molly:  I mean, I’m sure there were other things, but that’s what really took hold.  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Write cowboys –

Molly:  Write series.

Sarah:  – write series.  You know, it’s not bad, it, it’s not bad advice.  It’s kind of timeless, actually.

Molly:  It, it has proven to be so.

Sarah:  So have you always written cowboys?  Are there secret hidden cowboys in all of your books?

Molly:  Wouldn’t that be some- – maybe.  Wait.  Hold on.  No. 

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Molly:  There have been, off and on, there have been cowboys, for sure.

Sarah:  Nice!

Molly:  Yeah.  For a girl that lives in Toronto, Canada.  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Well, I mean –

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  – there’re sort of hipster cowboys, right?

Molly:  Yeah.  They’re all, like, tending bar in my hipster bars surrounding the –

Sarah:  [Laughs] Surrounded by fake cows.

Molly:  Yeah, yeah, exactly!  They’re wearing, like, those denim aprons?

Sarah:  Yeah, totally.

Molly:  And their beards and their flannel shirts.  They’re making me cocktails.

Sarah:  So you write under several different names now.  Is it two names or three?

Molly:  Just two.

Sarah:  Just two.  It’s Molly O’Keefe and M. O’Keefe.

Molly:  [Laughs] Yes.  Very –

Sarah:  Very subtle difference there.

Molly:  Yes.

Sarah:  So, why, why two different names?

Molly:  Ah, so I was writing for, the last few years for Random House, Bantam and then Loveswept, and my books with the Everything I Left Unsaid series took a, a decidedly sexier turn.

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Molly:  So it was, it was decided that that would be the smart move.  [Musical noises in background] That’s my phone ringing.  Nobody ever calls me.

Sarah:  Oh, no, everyone’s going to call and come to the door while you’re recording.  That’s what happens.  My dogs are going to bark, someone’ll come to the door, they’ll need a signature –

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  – random dinosaurs will walk down my street, the dogs will lose their minds.  Yeah, it’s just what happens.  Don’t worry about it.

Molly:  Okay.  So there.  I, I turned it off.  So, the M. O’Keefe books, they, they, they’re just much, they’re much sexier.  They’re much sexier.

Sarah:  Do they still have happy endings?

Molly:  They do.

Sarah:  So they still qualify as romances:  they’ve got the, the Happy Ever After, and they’ve just got a lot more going to Bone Town.

Molly:  Going to Bone – [Laughs] – they do!

Sarah:  So M. O’Keefe is a signal for extra more Bone Town.

Molly:  Yeah.  You know something?  I honestly, I honestly can’t – you know, you read a contemporary romance these days, and there’re some that are, you know, they’re either, they’re either very sweet or they’re very sexy, right?

Sarah:  Yep.

Molly:  You know, I mean there’s, there’s little in between, so, I don’t know, I guess it’s just –

Sarah:  You know that’s, that’s true!  I hadn’t really thought of it that way, but that, that really is the case.  Either you get, like, wild, gravity-defying sexytimes, like, Bone Town on a fighter jet, or –

Molly:  Right.

Sarah:  – you get some mild sexytimes, not a lot, not too much.  You know, just –

Molly:  And I used to think, like, it was a language thing.  Like, I honestly thought, like, the difference was cock.  [Laughs]

Sarah:  What, whether you said cock or not?

Molly:  Yeah!  Like, if it, like it was just that simple, but I don’t think that’s true anymore.  But anyway.  That’s, it’s, I think as things get, as my books got sexier, we, we, we just wanted to make it very clear what, what readers were getting.

Sarah:  I think that makes a lot of sense, although it’s funny, I wouldn’t consider your Molly O’Keefe books as sweet, because you are, forgive me, the type of writer who really likes to reach in, rip readers’ hearts out, squeeze them a couple of times, and then put them back.

Molly:  That is, that, I’ve heard that before, and I take it as a compliment.

Sarah:  Yes, this is not the first time.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  You write a lot of emotional impact in your stories!

Molly:  Yeah, well, it’s the, that’s the romance I really like to read.  Like, I, I really, I re-, if I, like, I want to cry a little bit – [laughs] – you know, like, I really like the wringer.  I love the wringer.

Sarah:  [Laughs] Have you always liked that?  Is that always what you wanted to write?

Molly:  Yeah.  Yeah, and, like, I, you know, I, I don’t know, you know, what your first romances were?

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Molly:  But mine were Elizabeth Lowell’s, and I just remember that feeling in every book, that feeling where, like, your stomach dips?  Like you’re going on a rollercoaster?

Sarah:  Yep.

Molly:  Like, the big emotion hits, and so I’m just constantly shooting for that.

Sarah:  Do you remember what the first Lowell that you read was?

Molly:  Oh, yeah, Love Song for a Raven?  Which –

Sarah:  Oh, that’ll do it.

Molly:  [Laughs] When you think about it, that’s such a crazy title.

Sarah:  Yeah, but that, all, I don’t know what it, whether it’s the song or the raven or both, but I’m like, oh, yeah!  That’ll squeeze all my insides.

Molly:  Yeah, both of them, both of them.  Tons of baggage, super emotional, loved it.  Loved it.  And I feel like it, I mean, it kind of holds up.  It pretty much holds up.

Sarah:  It’s weird how different books hold up for different readers.  Like, I can go back and read old Johanna Lindseys that are still laced with all of this crack that I, once I start one, I can’t put them down, and it’s almost like I’m reading with two brains.  Like, there’s the part of my brain that is here and now and in the present and is like, okay, you see all these problems, right?  ‘Cause I see a lot of problems here.

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Do you see these prob-?  I’m seeing some – okay, are you aware?  I mean, this is like a problematic Napoleon layer cake that’s, like, nineteen feet high.  And then there’s my other part of my brain who has always read romance and sort of has the whole idea of the history and changes of romance.  Like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, books are different now, it’s great.  Yes, problems, but you did see the crack?

Molly:  Just shut up!  Just shut up and let me enjoy this!

Sarah:  I’m going to deep dive into this crack, and you’re going to shut up, other part of my brain!  And then the other part of my brain just sort of throws up her hands like, okay, fine, fine, fine!  As long as – yeah, okay, go ahead.  And then we deep dive, and we have a great time!

Molly:  I had a, a friend who, a romance-reading friend, and we, she –

Sarah:  [Whispers] Those are the best friends!

Molly:  [Laughs] Yeah, right, and we just, we kind of stumbled upon each other, so that’s even more of a delight.  But she, I gave her my Elizabeth Lowells, ‘cause she had never read them, and then she gave me the Tom and Sharon Curtis books?

Sarah:  Ohhh!

Molly:  Because I had never read those, and so, like, I gave her these Elizabeth, I mean, like, and it was like we were handing our children over, like we were swapping children.  Like, we were, like, giddy and flush –

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Molly:  – and like, hahahaha, this is going to be amazing!  And, yeah, like, probably two weeks later, she emails me, and she’s like, I can’t read these.  I can’t read them.

Sarah:  Oh, no!

Molly:  And I was like, you know, I don’t, I can’t really read the Curtises either!  Like, if you missed the boat at the beginning, sometimes you can’t get back on the boat.

Sarah:  Yes!  And, and so when I, when I talk to people who are like, I want to read a lot of romance from the, you know, from, from way, way, way back.  I want to see what the original romances that everyone talks about are like.  And I’m like, okay, you’re, you may not like them, and it’s okay if you don’t like them.

Molly:  Yeah, they should come with a warning, for sure.

Sarah:  It’s like a whole other set of triggers.  Like, may cause you to gasp horrifyingly.

Molly:  [Laughs] Throw the book across the room.

Sarah:  Yes.  May cause you to wonder if you are on the wrong planet that everyone loves this book and you’re like, what is the rape-y asshole McAssholeness?

Molly:  Like, the, the real –

Sarah:  When you come across a book that has some consent issues, I know where my line is, but I can also immediately think of, like, oh, oh, I could think of, like, five people who are going to love this book!

Molly:  Right.

Sarah:  I better write down this title and send it to them right now!  It’s not for me, but it’s for you!

Molly:  Exactly.

Sarah:  So when you’re writing your romances, either as Molly or M. – does the M. stand for something other than Molly?

Molly:  No!

Sarah:  Have you made up a second name?  Matilda!

Molly:  [Laughs] Right!

Sarah:  Myrtle.

Molly:  Right.

Sarah:  Myrtle O’Keefe.

Molly:  Very sexy.  The, the sexier writer, Myrtle O’Keefe.

Sarah:  Magnolia.  Magnolia Myrtle O’Keefe.  Anyway.  So, you and Myrtle, when you are writing, you have different levels of erotic intensity that you’re exploring in, under different names, basically.

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  Is that a fair way of explaining it?

Molly:  Totally.

Sarah:  How do you build erotic in-, intensity?  What are the things that you do to differentiate the erotic intensity, ‘cause both names have the emotional intensity.  Like, I’m aware that when I pick up either, either, either O’Keefe – not the Georgias, but you and, and M. –

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  – my, my internal organs are in danger, especially the feely ones.  I’m aware, like, the emotional intensity is going to be there.  How do you amp, amp up the erotic intensity?  What are, what is the difference that you’re exploring, and how do you do that?

Molly:  Ah, well, that’s a really good question, and I think, I think a lot of it – so, I, I think what I, what M., the M. books do is they remove a part of the character’s life or plot that would be about family or job or, or, you know, some other part of their life, and it replaces it with this big sort of sexual question, like a sexual hook, so it’s, I guess it’s maybe a, a word count thing?  It’s also, you know, the sex, the sexual content, the hook, it sort of facilitates the change in a lot of ways.  Like, it becomes the, the tool that, that creates change.  You know, like, I, I take my two sort of writer heroes, which are Anne Calhoun and – oh, my God, I just blanked on her name.  [Gasps] Oh, my God!  Give me a second.  Why am I forgetting her name?  She’s British, Never Sweeter.  Who is that author, Sarah?

Sarah:  Charlotte Stein?

Molly:  Charlotte Stein.  Right, there we go.  So I take my two, like, writer heroes, which are Anne Calhoun and Charlotte Stein, and I –

Sarah:  You don’t understand how big of a deal it was that I just remembered a name.  I’m sitting here amazed at myself, like, wow, Sarah!  It’s a good day!  Anyway, beg your pardon, go ahead.  Charlotte Stein and Anne Calhoun.

Molly:  Yeah, it’s already, like, the fifth name I’ve forgotten today, so.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Molly:  I think I’m heading towards my senior moment.  So I’d ask them, like, how they view sex scenes and the sexual plotline in their book, and Anne said, you know, something has to change.  With every sex scene, something has to change.  And that really, really clicked home for me and, and has continued to click home for me as I write.  And then Charlotte Stein, in her way, said, you’ve got to make the reader horny for something.

[Laughter]

Molly:  So that’s, those two things are sort of my, are, are M. O’Keefe’s guiding principles.  Did that answer the question?

Sarah:  [Laughs] Yes, it really does.

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  It, it’s almost as if sex is the solution and then a new problem.

Molly:  Exactly!

Sarah:  So it’s going to relieve some kind of tension and make a mess somewhere else.

Molly:  Exactly.

Sarah:  What are some about, the more difficult things about writing the different styles that you have?  Is there one where you’re, like, writ-, if you’re writing a Molly O’Keefe book and you think, oh, you know, man, I wish I could be writing for Myrtle right now, because then, like, I, they could just, like, rip their clothes off, and it would be, go this way.  Is it hard for you to make the difference, or have already plotted out the, the tonal shifts in each style?

Molly:  You know, it’s funny, that’s a, that’s a really funny question.  So the fourth book in this Everything I Left Unsaid series is called Wait for It, and it’s coming out in February, and it’s a character that we’ve met before, but it’s a standalone romance, but the, the heroine has kids, and I, I just have a hard time with romances where there’s, there are kids, where the kids aren’t around.  Right?  Like, are-, aren’t a part of the, the story in some way.

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Molly:  Like, I really, I, I really like kids in romance novels.  I’m, I’m one of those readers, so actually, so I, so I’ve got this story, and I’ve got my, the, the sexual hook.  I’ve figured out what the dynamic between them is going to be, but I still have these kids, and I found that, I found that to be, like, I was like, oh, Molly O’Keefe would have a much easier time with – [laughs] – with this story than M. O’Keefe, but in the end I think I’ve, I’ve managed the balance, but that was, that was one, that was one example of it being a different beast.

Sarah:  Oh, yes.  Well, once, once any children are involved, the opportunities for fighter jet Bone Town go significantly downward.

Molly:  Right, exactly, and it’s just the logistics of it, too.  Like, you’re just constantly finding a babysitter.  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Right.  [Laughs] Where are the kids?  Are they going to walk in?  ‘Cause you know, if they’re going to walk in, it’s the minute something really weird is going on.

Molly:  Right.  So my solution, which is kind of hilarious to me as I think about it now, is that they’re just always in a car.

[Laughter]

Molly:  Going to Bone Town happens, not all of it, but a lot of it, happens in a car.

Sarah:  In the car, on the car, in the trunk.

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  Not on top of the engine; that might burn someone’s crevice.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  You know, putting them in the car is a very good solution.  Mobile Bone Town.

Molly:  Mobile Bone Town.  It worked when we were teenagers.  It will work again.

Sarah:  Cars were a lot bigger then, though.

Molly:  I, it is a limo, if that helps in any –

Sarah:  Well, that totally helps!

Molly:  [Laughs] Yes.

Sarah:  You could, like, live in a limo comfortably.

Molly:  Right.  Right.  There’re different areas for the Bone Town.

Sarah:  Yes.  Yes.  Bone Town has many, many neighborhoods.  Do you have favorite books of Anne Calhoun’s and Char-, Charlotte Stein’s that you’re constantly recommending to people?

Molly:  Well, I thought Charlotte’s last one, Never Sweeter, the one where the heroine falls in love with her bully from high school?

Sarah:  Oh, there’s the tension.

Molly:  Like, it either works for you, or it doesn’t.  I, and I do firmly believe that, and I think I actually really like those kinds of books where it really works for you or it doesn’t, but by page seventeen I was bawling.  I mean, it was just so effective.  Like, she, she killed it on that one for sure.

Sarah:  So you like the books, and you want to write the books, that make you horny and weepy.

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Like, you’re aiming for two of a very strange set of seven dwarves.  You’re, you’re aiming for Horny and Weepy, but not Happy or Dopey.

Molly:  That’s my favorite emotion.  The horny –

Sarah:  Horny and Weepy?

Molly:  Horny-Weepy.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Molly:  And we’ve got to come up with a better name.  Weepy-Horny.

Sarah:  Now I’m mentally designing what these dwarves would look like in a new, like, sort of erotic Snow White.

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Like, okay, what are, there’s Horny and Weepy, there’s Emotionally, Emotionally Frustrated.

[Laughter]

Molly:  No.

Sarah:  So that, that is, that is definitely a thing that you write and a thing that you read.  ‘Cause it’s really interesting; I, I’ve spoken to a lot of authors in the context of doing podcast interviews, and one thing that I’ve heard many times is, I never read what I write.  Like, if I, if I’m writing this particular genre, I don’t read it.  But you read in the genre that you write.

Molly:  Yeah.  I’m, I’m, I’m looking for ‘em.  Like, I’m looking for those books, always.  Always.  So I’m ready to take recommendations.  Anybody’s got a weepy, horny book.

Sarah:  Horny, horny weepers?

Molly:  Send it my way.

Sarah:  Now I’m trying to think of all the horrible names you could make:  horny weepers, weepy horny books.

Molly:  Weepy, horny books.

Sarah:  Crying on the way to Bone Town.  It’s a bit long for a series name.  What about Anne Calhoun?  I have to say, I, I still think about Liberating Lacey, which is one of the earliest erotic romances that I have ever read.  Like, I, I don’t even remember when I read that, but I remember it was on a very old digital device.

Molly:  Oh, yeah, yeah.

Sarah:  It, it was possibly a Handspring, which ran the, which ran the Palm platform?  Like, that’s how long ago?

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  As I, as I carbon date myself, I’m pretty sure I read that on some kind of an archaically old, Palm platform device, because I had connected with someone who worked Ellora’s Cave and was like, okay, I, I’ve never read an erotic romance, and I don’t understand.  What do you recommend?  So she sent me, like, five or six books, and that was one of them, and it blew my damn mind.

Molly:  Yeah, and it’s funny, like, in, you know, it’s, it’s fairly tame –

Sarah:  Yeah!

Molly:  It’s very tame now, but, but still incredibly hot and weepy-making, and I love all of her books, but it, it was, yeah, like, I feel like it was kind of one of the first real big footsteps towards that direction.

Sarah:  And it, it started the relationship between the protagonists on the basis of, I would really like to have sex with someone; you will do.  Let’s go do the thing.

Molly:  Right.

Sarah:  And then it keeps happening, which makes it more complicated, but the foundation of their relationship was, well, well, let’s take a trip to Bone Town together.

Molly:  Right.  And that was all that was required.

Sarah:  Yeah.

Molly:  And you still, yeah, I mean, she’s just, she’s kind of a master at those, layering those things in so that you’re, you’re reading Bone Town, but you’re sort of like –

Sarah:  Oh!

Molly:  – oh, but what about, what about their childhoods?  [Laughs] Like, you can tell there’s damage there.  Oh, get to the part where they talk about their childhood trauma.

Sarah:  Someone needs to put a hot poker in the feels now.  Not other things.  [Laughs]

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  Do you have any other Calhouns that you recommend to readers who are curious?

Molly:  Well, you know, she wrote that series where it was, they were, it was a ménage series, and so it would be, you know, the hero and heroine would invite another guy in, and then the next book would be about that guy, and so I think there were three or four of ‘em?  I’ll, I’ll probably be wrong about that, but, like, you were introduced to the hero of the next book as he was invited into, you know, the couple’s drama.  Like, it was always a dramatic sort of – and, I mean, and I, I loved those books.  Big, big, happy smile about those books.  Lots of horny-weepy, weepy-horny happening –

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Molly:  – with those books.  Probably, like, the pinnacle.

Sarah:  Horny and weepy.

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  The SEAL’s Rebel Librarian?

Molly:  Those are her newest ones, and I haven’t, I haven’t had a chance to get those, to those yet.

Sarah:  What?!  I am – what?!  How did I miss – ?

Molly:  [Laughs] You’ve got to respect that title.

Sarah:  I have, I have deep respect for that title!  I can’t close my mouth!  Navy SEAL and librarian?  Like, it’s like the first, it’s like the person who put peanut butter and chocolate together –

Molly:  It’s true.

Sarah:  – and, and I had no idea it was possible!  I, okay, I’m sorry.  One-click buying, beg your pardon.  Shopping while recording the podcast is a very dangerous thing.  The SEAL’s Rebel Librarian.  I am legitimately in awe right now.

Molly:  I know.  I mean, it’s, it takes, like, a, it takes a page from Harlequin’s, like, just, just say what’s in the book in the title, and then, like –

Sarah:  Oh, hook titles.

Molly:  – puts it on steroids a little bit.

Sarah:  And you know what’s horrible is I used to hate the hook titles because I could never remember them.  They all sounded the same to me.  There was, there was a tycoon or a billionaire and a boardroom and a rebel and a virgin and a bride and, and pregnant shame baby mistress.  I, like, it was, it was like word salad, and I could never remember the names of the books.  Like, there was one Silhouette Desire by Maya Banks that I would constantly talk about, and I’d be like, I don’t remember the words, but, you know, it, they’re on a beach wearing a yellow dress with a red flower in her hair, and I actually remember very clearly, I talked about this at a book event in, inside a Barnes and Noble, like, shortly after that book came out, and I, and I loved it because the heroine is the, the typical innocent virgin character, but she is the sexual assertive, she’s the sexually assertive one in the story.  She wants the hero and she is going after him, even though she has no idea what she’s doing, and he’s like, uh, what?  I cannot have pants feelings for you; that’s unacceptable.  So there’s this great tension, but she’s the one who’s like, nope!  I know what I want!  She’s all of this autonomy and self actualization and complete ownership of all of her horny feelings.  Like, I dug that book so much.  Could I remember the title?  No.

Molly:  No.  [Laughs]

Sarah:  So I describe the cover, and I’m like, it’s so good, and I’m going to look it up and I’ll, I’ll tell you what it is.  Give me your email address; I’ll, I’ll, I’ll email you when I figure it out because it I know it was, there’s a tycoon or something.  Maybe boardroom something bride virgin mistress baby secret.  I couldn’t remember; they were all, they were all the same, like, fifty words, and I would never remember the titles.  Somebody actually went to the section of that store and came running up and was like, I found it!  Look, yellow dress, red flower!  Out of all of the Silhouettes on the shelf.  [Laughs]

Molly:  And the crowd cheered.

Sarah:  Yeah, I was so proud!  So proud!  But I remember now, I memor-, I made myself memorize the title.  It was The Tycoon’s Rebel Bride.

Molly:  Oh-ho!

Sarah:  Right?!

Molly:  Yeah, that’s good.

Sarah:  Is it Going Deep by Anne Calhoun?

Molly:  That was one of ‘em, I think.

Sarah:  All right.  I, I catch the subtlety there?

Molly:  [Laughs] Right!

Sarah:  The only thing that’s missing is if he was holding, like, a – [coughs] excuse me – holding, like, a really big gun or sword at his hip pointed at a slightly upward angle?  That might make it more clear.

Molly:  There’s one of ‘em.  [Laughs] Oh, yeah, and slightly upward angle!  It’s true.  Very true!  You know, the, really quickly, the Harlequin titles, in the Toronto subway system, at the, at the busiest intersection, there was a, like a, you know, a, a store that had, it was probably the best romance bookstore in the city.  Like, it, I mean, it was –

Sarah:  So obviously it doesn’t exist anymore then.

Molly:  Yeah, no, it’s gone, totally gone.

Sarah:  Of course.  They’re always gone.

Molly:  It, but, it was so top-notch, and so I remember, I would go in there, and you would see dozens, dozens of people commuting, and they would go over to the Harlequin Presents, you know, shelf, and you could just see ‘em going, CEO, sheikh, cop.  You know, like, they were just, like, I like, I like a sheikh, take the sheikh.

Sarah:  Yep!

Molly:  Like, it was just, it was the most effective sales tool for that time and reader.  It was just –

Sarah:  They, they worked!

Molly:  They, they did, and, like, that was, I just stood there with my jaw open going, oh, man, look at that!  Look at how effective it is!  Anyway.

Sarah:  I have a listener letter for you, actually.

Molly:  Oh, my God!

Sarah:  Yes.  Is that not the coolest thing?

Molly:  That is really cool!

Sarah:  I have a listener letter for you.  A lot of the people who listen, listen to the podcast listen while they’re walking the dog or cooking.

Molly:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  I know there’s one person who is, does custom-dyed yarn, so she’s always dyeing wool and listening to the podcast, which I think is the coolest thing!

Molly:  That is cool!

Sarah:  And there’re people on the, on the treadmill and, you know, wandering around or driving or whatever, so this is the email from, this is from Katherine.

Molly:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  I had some random thoughts about books today while out with the dog – which is, you know, totally something I do – Is the motorcycle gang the new Western?  I met Molly O’Keefe at RT, and I thought she was fabulous.

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  But I can’t get my head around the bikers and read one, let alone dip into the book budget.  I understand the group and the sequel – like Regency sisters.  Is it the dangerous man?  (No one in the gang is ever, like, a boy.)  Is it the, is it the dangerous guy?  What am I missing by not diving into this subgenre?  Even though it’s not my thing, I would really like to learn more about it.

What is your take on that?

Molly:  Well, that’s an interesting comparison, the, to the cowboy, ‘cause I do think, very much, it’s about a code.

Sarah:  Oh, I totally agree with you.

Molly:  Yeah, like, it’s, it’s a hero with a code, and it’s, and it’s also sort of the appeal of the hero with the code that is just on whatever spectrum outside of the norm.  Right?  Like, I mean, there’re some motorcycle romances where the, the, the code is, is way far out of the, you know, the norm of the world, but, yeah, I, I do think that that’s it.  And I, I also think that’s an interesting point about nobody’s a boy.  Like, even the boys are men.  I mean, it’s true!

Sarah:  Oh, it’s absolutely true.  There’s a, there is a – I don’t mean this in a, in a negative way – there’s a shorthand to character development when there is that code, because you, you have to be able to keep the code to even approach entering the community that does so.

Molly:  Right, right, and I mean, in, in a, and, like, kind of like the, the cowboy, you know, there is a certain element of danger that, and I, I think that readers really respond to?  And it’s also a great vehicle for, like, you know, a heroine in jeopardy story, which is, you know, a perennial favorite, so –

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Molly:  I, I do think that there’s, I, you know, like a lot of things right now in romance, it’s, it’s the standard tropes, like, kicked up a notch or twenty.

Sarah:  Yes.

Molly:  You know, like the Mafia thing.  The Mafia thing is so fascinating right now, but again, it’s the, it’s a code, and it’s a brotherhood, and, you know, that’s really effective for a lot of storytelling, I think.

Sarah:  I think you’re very right about that.  I hadn’t thought of it in terms of a code.  What I saw was sort of the pattern of guys in a group that not only have this code that you’re speaking of, which is really making my brain go all Jiffy Pop – like, it makes me think of Pirates of the Caribbean?

Molly:  Right!  Yeah!

Sarah:  Where, where they like, well, what do you, what do we do if you don’t get back to the boat?  And he says, well, keep to the code.  Like, there, there is an expected, there is an expected behavior of all of these people, and part of what makes that series so interesting is that there was a mutiny, and they’re, all of the men are still dealing with the consequences of having not kept the code.

Molly:  The code, right.

Sarah:  But with, with, with – you can hear my brain going pop-pop-pop-pop with –

Molly:  Right.

Sarah:  Okay, brain.

Molly:  We can also hear that Pirates of the Caribbean, you, you have boys.  You have boys.

Sarah:  I do.

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  I’ve got a lot of – I am the only one identifying as female in my house right now.  Even the, even the animals, all dudes.

Molly:  Oh, wow.

Sarah:  Lot of boys in my house.  It’s so much testosterone, although the animals are fixed, so I’m not sure if they have testosterone, but they’re all boys.  Anyway.  So with, not only do you have this code, but you also have a, a pack or a group of men that is closed.  Like, it’s not easy to enter that group?

Molly:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  And, and be part of the code, whether it’s the Mafia or, or a gang or a Western or a werewolf pack or, you know, Navy SEALs –

Molly:  or soldiers – yeah, exactly.

Sarah:  – soldiers.  You also have elevated status in one or more areas, so either they’re super wealthy or they have superhuman abilities.  They are, have status or access to things that most people don’t, so they are –

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  – a step and a half above in some specific coded area, so either they have a bunch of money and they exist in a secret world of extremely high society, or they exist in a hidden world, like the black market, and it’s funny because there are some of these worlds that I’m like, okay, yeah, I’m totally here.  I am very curious.  Let’s read more.  Like, I cannot tell you how fast I one-clicked on the idea of SEAL’s rebel librarian.

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Like, I’m here for both of these things!  But I can’t do gang, motorcycle gangs and I can’t do the Mafia because I know too much about the reality of those worlds to suspend my disbelief and say to myself as a reader – like we were talking about two brains?  The part of my brain that’s like, okay, yeah, sex trafficking is a thing.  I can’t, like, my, my eager-to-read brain can’t jump over that to get into the book.  Do you know what I mean?

Molly:  Yeah.  And I, I think –

Sarah:  And everyone has a different point for that.

Molly:  My, you know, like, my, my books, while sort of on the fringe of a motorcycle gang, and, and I, and I’ve had a couple of characters like this in other books, but I have, I have that same sort of problem, and the, the thing that is the most fascinating to me about writing them or thinking about them is, is the reality of, you know, in large part, in reality, motorcycle gangs are, you know, psychopaths to some extent, right?  Like, the violent criminal ones are dangerous.

Sarah:  Actual violent criminals, you mean?

Molly:  Yeah.  Right, right.

Sarah:  Yeah.  Yeah, exactly.

Molly:  With no impulse control and stuff like that, so my, the thing that I was really interested in was the men trying to leave it.  Like, the men getting there and, and, and looking for a brotherhood or looking for something that is romanticized about that and then realizing it’s not.

Sarah:  Yes.

Molly:  You know, realizing it’s, you know, they’re not brothers.  So, that was sort of the impetus for the first two books in the Everything I Left Unsaid is this family that has tried to leave this motorcycle gang in various ways.  And that was, I, I mean, I think it, it’s kind of a sad – [laughs] – weepy, horny thing.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  Oh, I’m going to have to title this episode Weepy and Horny:  An Interview with Molly O’Keefe.  [Laughs]

Molly:  Yeah.  It’s good.  But yeah, so if –

Sarah:  I’m sure whoever is in charge of marketing and publicity at your publishing house will be completely thrilled with that idea.

Molly:  They might be!  You never know.

[Laughter]

Sarah:  You know, and it’s funny because that whole idea of leaving the coded brotherhood, like, that was the whole point of the first Godfather.  Like, I don’t want to do this.

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  I don’t, I don’t want to be part of this, and against my better judgment, I am a part of this.  Shit.

Molly:  Right.

Sarah:  How do I get out?

Molly:  And the, you know, in Sons of Anarchy, the season when, you know, Jax, is about to leave and wants to leave, like, to me that series, when he decided to stay, while, you know, a crazy poignant moment, had he left, wow, that would have been really, like – [laughs] – I’m a little bit more interested in that series that I’ve written my head, you know what I mean?

Sarah:  Oh, totally!  That’s, I, I’m sure that there is an absolute ream of fanfiction about him getting the hell out.

Molly:  Oh, I’ll bet.

Sarah:  Because deciding to keep the code is as emotionally fraught and complicated as deciding to no longer keep the code.

Molly:  Right.  Right!

Sarah:  Because you’re breaking all the rules, even if you have really good reasons to break all those rules.

Molly:  Right.

Sarah:  And it’s funny how those, those, those themes keep appearing in different, you know, different subgenres that become popular.  One of the things that’s so interesting to me is how fast popularity cycles now?  Like –

Molly:  In, in just popular fiction or in romance?

Sarah:  In, in romance specifically.

Molly:  Oh –

Sarah:  In popular fiction as well, but in romance specifically, the cycle of what’s popular goes faster and faster and faster, and a lot of the times you see books that just sort of hit the popularity at the precise moment purely out of excellent timing –

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  – and being able to predict what the next rise of, is going to be, and I remember years ago, I was asked to give a talk at New Jersey Romance Writers about trends in romance, and I was like, I am the last person you should ask about trends, because I read the books when they’re done, not when they’re being bought by editors.  Like, I see what’s coming out which was someone’s good idea, like, a year ago or more.

Molly:  Right.

Sarah:  And they’re like, nonononono, no, no, we, we really want you to do this, so I sat down and had a think about it, and I realized that there’re trends and then there’re evolutions of familiar tropes, and those two things merge a lot, but – [laughs] – the guiding principle for me, which you will appreciate, is Bruce Springsteen.

Molly:  Oh!  I, I appreciate it already!

Sarah:  Right, so –

Molly:  Continue on!

Sarah:  Pub- – [laughs] – publishing sage Bruce Springsteen –

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  – who knows all about publishing, whether he knows it or not, in, as he said, everything dies, that’s a fact, but maybe everything that dies someday –

Together:  – comes back.

Sarah:  So you have paranormal, which was kind of dead and buried for a long time and is still now starting to show up again in different areas, but the elements of the paranormal are still there.  You have the groups of people with a preternatural ability or access or status.  You have what you were talking about with the code.  You have a group of people who exist in secret, and a lot of the time the tension of the story is either in-, inducting someone into that secret world or someone getting out of the secret world.  Either way, someone has to be brought in or taken out.  And you have that motif replaying itself over and over and over again.

Molly:  Yeah, that’s true.  It’s like it’s, it, the, it – that’s a really interesting point about how, you know –

Sarah:  Bruce Springsteen knows everything?  Yes, he really, really does.

Molly:  [Laughs] I’m going to go see him in Pittsburgh in a few weeks.

Sarah:  [Gasps!]  That’s like a com-, I’m, that’s where I’m from!  Where are you going?  Are you seeing him at the Civic Arena?  Not the Civic Arena, Mellon Arena.

Molly:  Well, yeah, whatever they’ve renamed –

Sarah:  The thing.

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  Ooohh!

Molly:  Going back to the horny and weepy theme, Bruce Springsteen’s, like, the king of that.

Sarah:  He really is.

Molly:  Yeah, he’s, he, maybe that’s what I’m going for.  I just want to write a book –

Sarah:  Life is horrible.  Life is terrible.

Molly:  – as good as “Stolen Car.”

Sarah:  Let’s go have sex.

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Like, “Thunder Road” is all weepy, horny.

Molly:  I know!  The River?

Sarah:  “Atlantic City”?  Weepy and horny.

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  He is really the king of weepy and horny!

Molly:  There’s so much about my life that is making sense right now!

[Laughter]

Sarah:  We have deciphered much about your writing and your psyche today.  Oh, Bruce!

Molly:  I want to go, just real quickly, I want to go back to, like, the, the facets of different genres getting picked up and put in different places –

Sarah:  Oh, yes.

Molly:  – to, you know.  I feel like Kit Rocha –

Sarah:  The Bruce Springsteen, the, the Bruce Springsteen evolution of trends and tropes?  Yeah.

Molly:  [Laughs] I feel like Kit Rocha has, like, capitalized that, on that in such a huge way too.  Like, her books are such a mashup of so many powerful bits of different genres that – and it, and it –

Sarah:  Which parts do you see?  ‘Cause it’s –

Molly:  Pardon?

Sarah:  – interesting.  Which parts do you see, because I know that some readers will see some parts of that series and say, oh, this is why I love it, and then other people will, other people will look at the series and be like, oh, nonononono, I read it for this particular element.  What are the popular elements that you see that work for you?

Molly:  Well, I feel like, I feel like to some extent, so you have the, like, obviously that, like, brotherhood, secrecy, dangerous aspect of the paranormal romances.

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.  Yep.

Molly:  You know, like the, the wolf pack vibe.

Sarah:  Yes, the pack.  Which you sometimes see in sports teams, especially in dangerous sports –

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  – that can kill you.

Molly:  Yeah.  And then I think, particularly in some of the first books, you have the, like, innocent, to different extent victimized heroines of the historical romance genre, you know, that get, you know –

Sarah:  The damsels in distress who are way in distress.

Molly:  Right, exactly.  That, that is, you know, us-, you know, usually make up some of my favorite historical vibes – with this incredibly contemporary vibe, and then of course, you know, with the, all, every erotic element you could possibly think of.  And I feel like that, like, that’s a really successful mashup for me.

Sarah:  Oh, yes.  And it, it, it plays in a lot of ways with agency.

Molly:  Yeah!

Sarah:  Because the way each character has and doesn’t have agency creates additional conflict.

Molly:  Right.

Sarah:  Ah, agency.  It’s so good.

Molly:  I know.

Sarah:  [Laughs]

Molly:  I can’t, like, like, there’s so many, like, it’s really one of the give, the, the break-, breaking points for me.  Like, particularly like talking about the books that you reread and stuff like that?  I can’t – it, I will put down a book so fast if you get that whiff of, like, doormat or, you know – you know what I mean.

Sarah:  Yes, the, the, the type of character for whom things happen to them, rather than them doing things.

Molly:  Right.  Two dimensional sort of –

Sarah:  Yes.  The thing that I have been craving most recently is genuine groups of women, friendships?  Like, one of the things I love about the Call of Crows series by Shelly Laurenston –

Molly:  Mm.

Sarah:  – is that all of the heroines are, I mean, that is her, the, the heroines are, they’re already a sort of paranormal, superhuman, otherworldly creature set; like, they themselves are Crows who are the sort of deputies of a particular Norse goddess, but they are each others’ pack.  Like, they will defend each other, they take care of each other.  They may hate each other, but when, when shit’s going down, that person will totally guard your back, no question.

Molly:  Yeah, I like –

Sarah:  It’s, it’s that code.  I, I want to see more of the code between women.  Like, that’s what I’m craving.

Molly:  That’s super fascinating, and I would be really interested in hearing recommendations for some.

Sarah:  Well, I can tell you that Call of Crows is amazing, and writing good female friendships is something that I, I notice, like, when I look at my keeper shelf.  A lot of the books that I kept, even the historicals, are about groups of women.  Like – [laughs] – I have a whole keeper shelf that’s, like, squad goals.

Molly:  Yeah!  That’s really fascinating.  I love it, I love that idea.  I mean, you think of the Eloisa James series, right?

Sarah:  Yep, and Lisa Kleypas’s Wallflower, Wallflower series –

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  – is, is centered around a group of friends –

Molly:  All right.

Sarah:  – and so the idea of girls or women in a code – and then there was another one I just finished that I just could not stop thinking about.  It was called Roller Girl by Vanessa North?

Molly:  Oh, I know, I know.

Sarah:  Did you read that?

Molly:  I haven’t read it yet.  I’ve had it –

Sarah:  Oh, my God!  Oh –

Molly:  – I’ve got it to read, but I just heard so many great things.

Sarah:  There are two things that I love about that book.  One is that the heroine is trans, and she’s a former professional wakeboarder.  So she’s a former professional athlete, and so she has this fascinating, loving relationship with her physical body –

Molly:  Right.

Sarah:  – because she’s a former athlete.  She’s transitioned.  Instead of being anxious or, or angry or in conflict, she’s genuinely friends with her body in a way that I just really admired.  She’s a personal trainer, so she, she professionally helps other people make friends with their bodies.  Like, that’s so amazing!  I love that part so much!  But then she joins roller derby!  Which is like a whole bunch of women who are completely fierce and awesome!  And so she joins a, like, like, a crew, a pack of women who are doing this incredibly tough sport.  You know, you need, like, quads of fricking steel to do roller derby!

Molly:  Right, right.

Sarah:  And so that, those two elements, like, I just loved that part so much!  You are going to love this book, oh, my gosh.

Molly:  You know, it’s, it’s funny how, how rarely you see that kind of, like, body positive –

Sarah:  Yes!

Molly:  – stuff layered –

Sarah:  And it’s hard to get there.  Like, I’m in my early forties, I’m forty-one, and I’m still figuring out how to be friends with my actual body.

Molly:  Oh, my – do not get me started!  [Laughs]

Sarah:  Right?  And it’s, and it’s like, I, I have two boys who are in elementary and middle school, and for young boys, in a lot of ways, it’s just sort of like, yep, that’s your body, that’s what it does, it’s fine.  And for girls, the criticism starts so early.

Molly:  So fast.

Sarah:  And the definition of what you’re supposed to look like is so much more narrow, and there is so much just revolutionary lightness of being that comes with saying to yourself, well, this is your body.  Let’s work together and figure this out.

Molly:  It’s one of the things that I, I most love about writing sex books – [laughs] – or books with sex in it, right?  I, I love the fact that it’s, it’s continuing an educa-, not an education, a conversation that has been silent for so long.

Sarah:  Yes!

Molly:  You know, we, so I have, I had my birthday; I am forty-one as well, and –

Sarah:  Hey!  Happy Birthday!  Welcome to forty-one!  It’s awesome in here.  The water is great, the bar is over there.

Molly:  Immediately my knees started to hurt, but –

Sarah:  What is that?

Molly:  [Laughs] I don’t know.

Sarah:  What the hell is that?

Molly:  But a friend of mine who’s had constant back problems went to this fascial stretch therapist, and, and the, and the woman was talking about this muscle, and I’m going to blow the name of this muscle, but it, in women, it is the muscle that surrounds your uterus, your womb.  Like, it weaves around all your parts.

Sarah:  Right.

Molly:  And it is often where our fear reaction lies, and all of us were looking at her blankly like, I have never heard of this muscle.  Like, how do we not know about this muscle?  And I feel like there is so much stuff that we never get to know!  Like, we never get to talk about, we never – like, I had one sex conversation with my family, with my parents growing up, and my, Adam and I, my husband and I have been talking about how, like, this realization that we are constantly talking about sex with our daughter and our son.  Like, it is an ongoing conversation.  As they understand more, you know, as things come up, like, we are, it’s – and that’s so different from what I had growing up.  I, you know, I can’t speak for everybody, but I know that there are people my age who are just like, yeah, one, one vaguely birds and bees conversation that was mostly scary, and –

Sarah:  Yeah.

Molly:  – and off-putting – [laughs] – you know?  And, and, and that’s, yeah, that, so I, I’m kind of delighted to be writing about sex in this way.

Sarah:  Especially because when you’re writing about super-hot sexytimes with people who are going out and actively seeking sexual fulfillment with people?

Molly:  Mm-hmm.

Sarah:  They are already own-, in ownership of, of their sexuality.

Molly:  Yeah!

Sarah:  Like, that’s so revolutionary!

Molly:  Yeah, I feel like in a lot of the books that we, we, I say, you know, that we started reading romance, you know, sex just happened to the heroines.

Sarah:  Yes, it was visited upon her.

Molly:  It was just a thing that happened, and, and I, I just, I love where all the conversations are going.  I really do.  I like the conversation of dubious consent, and I like, you know, I, I mean, there’s just, I like where all the conversations are going.

Sarah:  I like the part where, where, where readers can recognize – like, I see my job as, in one respect, helping people identify their, their reading catnip and then making sure they have plenty of it.

Molly:   Right, right.

Sarah:  And so it’s important to figure out what works for you as much as it is important to figure out what doesn’t work for you, and so I can tell you that, like, I said earlier, Mafia and motorcycle gangs, they are not my thing.  That is not going to do it for me.  I have super-strong negative emotions about both of those things that I can’t overcome to read, even in a fantasy world.  Even when I love the conflict and I love the writer and I just, I’m like, oh, yeah, okay, I’m tapping out now.  Sorry, that’s not for me.

Molly:  Yeah, totally get it.

Sarah:  I also know that my kink and my squick is not the same as anyone else’s, and so if that’s your thing, if that, like, totally rings your bell?  More power to you.  And I love that readers can have conversations of, oh, gosh, that doesn’t work for me, but not go to the point of, and there’s something wrong with you if you like it.

Molly:  Yeah.

Sarah:  And I feel like the more, the more we talk about what people like and dislike, the better it is, because there’s going to be a book for everybody.  Even if really dubious consent rape fantasy is your thing?  That’s okay!  We’ve got some of that!  I can help you find it.

Molly:  Right.

Sarah:  It’s not my thing, but it’s cool that it’s your thing.  That’s okay.

Molly:  It, it is funny how you can’t vault over your own stuff.

Sarah:  Mm-hmm.

Molly:  And, and, and the more I read – like, my rut is pretty – like, I, I, like I, you know, I feel like there, I’ve got more noes than yeses as, as a li-, you know, lifelong romance reading fan, so that’s why it’s so exciting to have something come along like Roller Girl or, you know, just something that busts a door open, that just goes, oh, look, you, this may not be your catnip right now, but just try it.  And you, yeah, and it’s a powerful, affirming, oh, that’s why I love to read kind of feeling.

Sarah:  And it’s funny that the more books you read, the more a reading slump?  Like, for me personally, reading scump, reading slumps scare the shit out of me.  Like, what if I’ve read all the books?  What if I’ve read all of them –

Molly:  [Laughs]

Sarah:  – and I’m never going to find another one that I really like, ‘cause I’ve read, like, nine, and they didn’t do it for me, and I’m just, oh, my gosh, what if this slump never ends?  What if I have to go do something else with my time?  What if I’ve read them all?  [Laughs] Which is really ridiculous, but –

Molly:  Yeah, and it’s, it’s –

Sarah:  – that’s how my brain works.

Molly:  – it’s very funny to have, I have a few, you know, I, you know, reader reviewer, you know, friend types who say –

Sarah:  Yeah.

Molly:  – that they save my books in case of emergency.

Sarah:  Yes!  And that’s a huge compliment.

Molly:  In case there’s, like – [laughs] – you know, like, break glass in case of reading slump.  Which is a, a beautiful compliment.  Like, it’s a, it’s a lovely thing, you know, that, that’s, that’s nice to hear, for sure.  But yeah, no, I can, I, I always, I always go to a reread.  Like, as soon as I hit the reading slump.  As soon as I’ve not finished, like, four books in a row –

Sarah:  Yep.

Molly:  – I go directly to a reread.

Sarah:  Yeah, my husband sent me the Pew internet research about book reading that came out today.

Molly:  Oh!

Sarah:  So this is a very small sample.  It was 1,520 American adults surveyed between March 7 and April 4, 2016.  So this is a very small representative sample, but one of the things that, that grabbed my attention was that Americans, so 73% of Americans reported they’ve read at least one book in the past year, and then Americans read an average or mean of twelve books a year.  The typical median American has read four books in the last ten months – twelve months – and I’m like, okay, I read twelve books, like, in the last month and a half.

Molly:  Right, right.

Sarah:  So I’m already way outside this data, and that, part of that is like, what if, what if I’m so far out of the mean average that I read too much, and I’ve run out?  And then I look at all of the books that I have on my eReader and, like, sitting in my, my cloud and then sitting on my shelf, and then I think, you, you, you’re weird.  Just go, go have –

Molly:  But it is a, it is a very real panic.

Sarah:  It is a totally real panic!

Molly:  It’s, only readers get it.

Sarah:  It’s completely irrational, but yes, I have it.

Molly:  Yeah.  I think that’s a fair fear.

Sarah:  Yep.  And being the, being the author for whom you can reliably bust a slump with, that is a huge compliment.

Molly:  Yeah!  I thought so too!

Sarah:  Way to go!

Molly:  [Laughs] Thank you.

Sarah:  All right, so last question for you.

Molly:  Okay.

Sarah:  What have you read recently or are reading that you really want to tell people about and make sure people know about?

Molly:  Well, the, the, my book of the summer was not a typical romance.  Do you read Joshilyn Jackson?

Sarah:  I have read a couple of hers, but I haven’t read the new one.  What’s the new one?

Molly:  Oh, this wasn’t a new one.  This was called A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty.

Sarah:  Oh, I heard about it!  What did you think?

Molly:  I, I loved it.  I, I wholeheartedly loved it.  Like, on my, like, down on my knees loved it.  Like, just really – I mean, she’s a, she’s, you know, usually a very hit author for me.  Like, I, you know, I, it’s usually a great reading experience, but this just really married a lot of amazing elements to me.  So that was definitely my read of the summer.  I loved Sonali, I got an advance copy of Sonali Dev’s next one, Change of Heart, and that was great.  I had a, I had a pretty good reading summer.  That was a definitely good one.  So I would say those two are my, top of my recommend – yeah.

Sarah:  So what is on your read next list?

Molly:  Well, I have a really, I have a, I have a very fun anthology that, a holiday anthology that’s coming out in October, and I’m reading all the stories that’re in that anthology, and it’s with Laura Florand and Stephanie Doyle and Karina Bliss and Jennifer Lohmann, and, so that’s, that’s, that’s coming out in October, and that’s going to be, that’s really great.  Those, every, every story is a really solidly different, fun contemporary romance.  Like, just good, good, fun contemporary romance.  I’m loving that book right now.

Sarah:  I love a lot of those authors.  What’s the name of the anthology?  It’s not out yet, is it?

Molly:  No, it’s coming out in October.  It’s called You Had Me at Christmas.

Sarah:  Ohhh!

Molly:  And Karina’s book, which I finished last night, is, is in her rock star series.

Sarah:  Oh, hello!

Molly:  Yeah, yeah, really good.  Married couple, kind of on the rocks.  It’s the bass player.

Sarah:  Really?

Molly:  Yeah, yeah.

Sarah:  Oh, my gosh.

Molly:  And there’s, it’s really good.  Again, and it, like, it put me right in my happy place, ‘cause there were kids involved, but they weren’t, like, moppets.  They weren’t, like –

Sarah:  Plot moppets?

Molly:  Yeah, they were, they were a thing that to be dealt with, and, you know, she just writes with great heart and humor and, yeah.  That’s a, that’s a beautiful one.

Sarah:  Writing kids who are characters but whose characters don’t derail the story is a skill.  You know what I mean?

Molly:  Yeah.  Yeah.  I think so too.  I feel like you can always sort of tell.  Well, you know, I mean, I think it comes back to the thing, like, every character has to be a character.

Sarah:  Yes.

Molly:  Like, every character has to have a, you know, a, a plot line to some extent, right?

Sarah:  Yes.

Molly:  Like, they have to be somewhere and get somewhere, and there has to be some conflict associated with that, and you know, I think Karina does that flawlessly.

Sarah:  I, I have, like, a list in my brain of people who are – [laughs] – who are going to like this anthology.

Molly:  Yeah, I know.  Well, you know, we, we’re all – yeah, I thought it was a good group.  It was, like, a really good group of, like, my favorite authors, and except for, I think Laura Florand, everybody kind of – yeah, everybody came out of Superromance, which, you know, was a line that I loved for so long, so it’s a, it’s a, it’s a great, it’s a great anthology.

[music]

Sarah:  And that is all for this week’s episode.  I hope you enjoyed that interview.  I want to thank Molly O’Keefe for hanging out with me and talking about all the things.

If you have ideas or suggestions or questions or you would like to tell me about a book that you’ve really liked or not liked, you can do one of two things.  Well, you could also just, you know, open the window and yell, but I may not hear you.  You can email me at [email protected], or you can call and leave a voicemail at 1-201-371-3272 and tell us about the book that made you a romance reader or about a book that you’re really excited about, or just ask questions.  We like questions.  Maybe we have answers.  Maybe they’ll be the right answers.  Next week I have an episode of reader mail, reader voicemail, reader interaction, listener stuff.  It’s going to be awesome, so I hope you will tune in for that as well.

The music you’re listening to is provided by Sassy Outwater.  You can find her on Twitter @SassyOutwater or on Facebook at pawsitivelysassy, and that’s P-A-W-sitively, PAWsitively.  The music this week is Peatbog Faeries.  This track is called “Nyup,” and it is from their album What Men Deserve to Lose.  You can find the album and the song on Amazon or iTunes, and you can also find them on their website at peatbogfaeries.com.

I have some compliments!  This is so fun. 

Lisa:  Whenever you walk into a room, inside their heads everyone in the room, including the cats, is thinking, yes!  You’re here!

And I have a surprise extra compliment for garlicknitter, who does all of our transcripts:  You do a tremendous job!  Thank you so much for creating our transcripts every week.  [gk:  Aw, you’re welcome!  I love this gig so much!]

If you are wondering what I’m talking about and why there are compliments and what’s happening, have a look at our Patreon campaign at Patreon.com/SmartBitches.  There are various levels of rewards for different monthly pledges, starting with a dollar a month, and if you are supporting the show or thinking about it, thank you.  I really, really appreciate it.  I cannot tell you how much fun it is to do this podcast every week, but it’s time for me to stop doing it – not the whole podcast, just this particular episode.

So, on behalf of Molly O’Keefe and M. O’Keefe, conveniently the same person, and everyone here, we wish you the very best of reading.  Have a great weekend.

[awesome music]