401. Rewriting the Voice in Your Head: Creation and Inspiration with Dr. Nicole Peeler

[music]

Sarah Wendell: Hello, and welcome to episode number 401 of Smart Podcast, Trashy Books. I’m Sarah Wendell with Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, and with me today is Dr. Nicole Peeler. Dr. Peeler is the author of fantasy and a professor of Popular Writing at the Seton Hill MFA in Popular Fiction Writing. Now, we talk about so many things, this might be one of the episodes you listen to a few times because it’s really inspiring and affirming. We talk about writing, teaching, romance, writing your own catnip, and we take considerable detours into vampires, sewing, hobbies, creativity that isn’t monetized, fashion, goals, and how to learn to love writing again and again.

I do want to note that this was recorded prior to the dark winter of RWA. This was also recorded prior to the international quarantine, but I know that creativity in any form is definitely getting me through the quaran-times, so I’m curious about you: what is your creative outlet? What are the things that you do that you revel in? I would love to know.

You can email me at [email protected], or you can leave a message at 201-371-3272. I love hearing from you, especially when you tell me about what you do to make yourself feel better.

And if you are thinking, hold on, program in popular fiction writing? I didn’t know this was a thing. Fear not; I will have links to everything, including Nicole’s website; her Instagram; her newsletter; her writing on Medium; her free goal-setting journal, if that’s a thing you’re interested in; plus links to all of the things we talk about and the books we mention as well. Those’ll be in the show notes. Guess where that is: smartbitchestrashybooks.com/podcast.

This episode is brought to you by Ritual, a daily multivitamin obsessively researched for women. Ritual is vegan-friendly, sugar-free, non-GMO, gluten-free, and allergen-free, and all of the sources for the nine nutrients inside are provided for you to read and research on your own. Ritual is designed to be an easy way to build a daily – [loaded pause] – ritual. It’s a subscription box of vitamins that will arrive on your doorstep, and your next bottle arrives just as you finish the last one. It’s only a dollar per day to have your daily multivitamin delivered. The packaging is even thoughtful as well. There is a mint tab inside each bottle so that there’s no weird aftertaste that you can sometimes get with multivitamins? I really appreciated that part. Ritual is offering you ten percent off your first three months. You can fill in the gaps with Essential for Women by visiting ritual.com/sarah to start your Ritual today. That’s ten percent off your first three months at ritual.com/sarah. That’s S-A-R-A-H, by the way.

And speaking of SARAH as a code, this episode is also brought to you by Native Deodorant. Native Deodorant is formulated without aluminum, parabens, or talc. It’s vegan and never tested on animals, and it works! As I’ve mentioned, I have pretty sensitive skin which freaks out at the slightest provocation, and deodorants are no exception to that, but this has been a marvelous experience. I really like the coconut vanilla scent, which I understand is their most popular, and I get why. And I know that several people on the Smart Bitches team love Native as well. You can try it risk-free: there’s free shipping on every order, and Native offers thirty-day free returns and exchanges inside the USA. For twenty percent off your first purchase, visit nativedeodorant.com and use promo code SARAH during checkout. That’s twenty percent off nativedeodorant.com with promo code SARAH, S-A-R-A-H.

Now, I have to say, I find it kind of funny that my first name is the promo code because I grew up at a time when I think at one point there might have been four or five Sarahs in my class in elementary school, so – [laughs] – I love that I, I get the SARAH promo code. Like, no other Sarahs; just me! Mwa-ha-ha-ha-ha!

I do want to say a big, huge, honking thank-you – not actually honking; that would hurt your ears – to the Patreon community. And I have two compliments, which are so fun.

To Mirandia B.: The branches of your family tree, when viewed at the correct angle, spell “absolute triumph!” and the leaves all point at your name.

And to Sarah Y. – also a Sarah with an H, hello: When your friends think of you, each of them relaxes a little more than usual, because knowing you makes them feel safe, secure, and welcome.

If you would like a compliment of your very own, have a look at patreon.com/SmartBitches. Each pledge keeps the show going each week, helps me make sure that every episode has a transcript. Pledges start at one dollar a month. I have received so many new patrons in the past few weeks. Thank you so much! I am so honored to be keeping you company during what we call the quaran-times here.

As I mentioned, I will have links to everything we talk about, and I will end the episode with an absolutely horrible joke, but for now, let’s do this podcast. On with my interview with Nicole Peeler.

[music]

Dr. Nicole Peeler: My name is Nicole Peeler, and I’m an associate professor at Seton Hill University, where I direct the MFA in Writing Popular Fiction. So we are the first and one of the largest programs that does teach Popular Fiction. Most creative writing programs only teach Literary. And we’ve been doing –

Sarah: You don’t say!

Dr. Peeler: I know! And we’ve been doing it for twenty years, which is kind of amazing. I’m also a writer, and I’ve written a bunch of fantasy novels, and just to be totally ornery and paradoxical, most recently I’ve been writing creative nonfiction, which is the opposite of fantasy. And I’m loving both; like, they’ve kind of, in a really weird way, energized each other in a way that I wasn’t expecting, so. And I’ve also been freelancing with the creative nonfiction, which is really nice, as opposed to writing whole books, which is a painful process.

Sarah: So what is creative nonfiction?

Dr. Peeler: That is, like, essays about my life, so basically kind of memoir-y. But it’s not autobiography. Like, I, you know, it’s not like, here’s the time I met Liza Minnelli. It’s more like –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Dr. Peeler: Yeah. It’s more like – and I’ve not met Liza Minnelli, by the way – it’s more like taking aspects of my life that are particular to me, but then writing them in a way that they’re an essay, so it makes it universal. So, like –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: – for example, I have one coming out this week, probably with Medium, who I’ve been writing for, and it’s about, like, how I got into debt and how I’m getting out of debt. So it’s my individual story about what happened to me, which is very unique in some ways –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: – but I gear it so that anyone who reads it can take something away for themselves; they’re not just learning about me.

Sarah: That’s very cool!

Dr. Peeler: Thank you!

Sarah: So how does one teach romance writing? Like, what, what are the courses like for that one? ‘Cause I, I, I am, I am a great fan of all genre fiction, as you know, but my greater passion is romance, and I know that you teach romance fiction, and I know that romance fiction writers are part of the program. How do, how do you, how do you teach that?

Dr. Peeler: Romance is absolutely a crucial part of our program, and we have the, one of my faculty colleagues who actually created the program is Dr. Lee McClain, who is a very prolific writer in the romance genre for Harlequin, as well as in self-publishing.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: And to be honest, I mean, I’ll focus on romance, but for the most part, all of our genres, like, teaching genre writing is kind of similar across. So everyone needs to know the genre – [laughs] – and –

Sarah: Wait, you mean you can’t just show up and be like, I heard there’s money to be made; I will write some of these sex books and make bank?

Dr. Peeler: Yes, exactly, and we do get that, where we get a student who wants to write romance because they see it on, you know, the supermarket shelves, and they’re like, well, that must make a lot of money. And they’re like, well, I’m going to write the romance, though, that’s going to be better than romance, because, like, everyone will die at the end. And then –

Sarah: [Groans]

Dr. Peeler: [Laughs]

Sarah: I’ve met so many, so many –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! And I think it happens in every genre. I mean, I remember when I was in graduate school – and I went to graduate school for lit-, like, for literature, like, not creative writing, and so I was going to be a literary critic up until, like, literally I wrote my book. Like, I was insisting I was never going to be a creative writer, I was just a critic, until I wrote a book, and then I was like, oh, well, shit, that happened. So – can I swear?

Sarah: I would be delighted if you did.

Dr. Peeler: Great. ‘Cause it, it just pops up. And my office mate was this guy who was, he was studying cultural studies, and he was just, he had lots of ideas, and one of his ideas was he was like, he just turns to me and he’s like, you know what I’m going to do? I’m going to finish my Ph.D., and I’m going to get, you know, a full-time teaching job, which, by the way, is, like –

Sarah: Oh yeah, good luck with that.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, we’re lucky when we do, so I was like –

Sarah: Yeah.

Dr. Peeler: – and I did get one, by the way, so I was, like, one of the lucky few, but, like, at the time I was like, I don’t know if that, I don’t know if we should be, like, confident about this, and he was like, well, and then to bolster my money, I’m just going to write some of those fantasy novels that –

Sarah: [Gasps]

Dr. Peeler: I’ll just whip out a couple of those every year, and at the time I was like, I don’t think it’s that easy.

Sarah: Dude.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah. And then, like, ironically, I went along and just, like, wrote one. But it was because I had, like, immersed myself in the genre my entire life.

Sarah: Right. There’s, there’s a lot, I think, of writers who come into the genre and think, I want to write the book, either I want to write this because I love it so much –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: – or I want to write this because I’m not getting what I want, and I know my catnip, so I’m going to write my catnip, which is what I did.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah. Yeah!

Sarah: And then there’s –

Dr. Peeler: It works really well.

Sarah: It, writing your own catnip, if your cat-, if, if your tricks work on you, it’s awesome. [Laughs]

Dr. Peeler: Especially if the catnip, like, coming from a, like, growing in a soil I love – I’m extending this metaphor too far – you know, because it can’t –

Sarah: No, I like this metaphor; I’m all about it.

Dr. Peeler: [Laughs] It can’t be the catnip that’s like, I’m going to write romance so that it’s not romance.

Sarah: Yes, everyone’s going to die at the end, and I’m going to kill the dog too.

Dr. Peeler: Yes, exactly. So that’s –

Sarah: It’s not a real book unless you’re absolutely emotionally devastated at the end.

Dr. Peeler: Exactly!

Sarah: [Laughs]

Dr. Peeler: ‘Cause no one, everyone loves that! So that’s kind of the first places for all of the genres, but especially with romance, we really root them in the genre, so they have to take RiGs, Readings in the Genre, which are online courses, and really think about what they’re doing too. And – and this is important for a lot of students – look at how the genre, how the genres change and the reader expectations, and this is a huge thing in romance, right?

Sarah: Yeah!

Dr. Peeler: So we have some older students who come in having read those, like, great ‘80s – [laughs] – romances who are like, I’m going to write about a barbarian woman, you know, who is raped by the very handsome man, but then she loves him, and we’re like, whoa. [Laughs] Things have changed, so –

Sarah: Uhhhhh, yeah.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: Yikes.

Dr. Peeler: So – and that’s a big thing! I mean, and obvi-, I mean, that’s a really obvious example of change, but, like, just issues of consent. We get this all the time; like, students will write things that for a newer, like, for the, for their critique partners who are younger, you know, the critique partners who are younger are pointing out, like, this is a, like, this is not consensual, basically. Like, you know, he, it’s the hero that kind of does the whole, like –

Sarah: Forced seduction thing?

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! Yeah, exactly, and the, like, basically stalking kind of Edward Cullen-y thing?

Sarah: Yeah.

Dr. Peeler: They point out, like, oh, this isn’t really what’s done anymore, and that’s like a really confusing conversation for some writers who are like, but this is romance! Like, for them, it’s very romantic. And they’re, I don’t think this has, I don’t think we can answer this question for ourselves or for the genre, but it’s a really interesting, I think the Readings in the Genre courses are a really interesting space where these conversations kind of come to fruition, and it’s really interesting to mediate those forum posts.

Sarah: So what texts do you use in your classes? You mentioned one of the online courses, which is reading, was it Reading in the Genre?

Dr. Peeler: Yeah. So they take three different ones, and in romance we have Contemporary, that’s one of the classes they can take, so Contemporary Romance. There’s a Classics Romance, so again, it gets, it gets into those issues of, you know, what was great about the classics, what did the classics establish, and what are we moving away from the classics? And then we have one on subgenres, which is obviously a really important class as well, ‘cause there’s so much.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: I mean, you know, there, there’ll be a sweet one in that class, or inspirational, and then there’ll be, like, an erotic one, and that’s challenging too, because romance readers often are very siloed in their subgenre.

Sarah: Yes. We like what we like, and we stay with what we like!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, and they haven’t necessarily read outside and can actually be quite offended by things that are outside of their genre. And yet we’re all on the same team as writers, so –

Sarah: Yep!

Dr. Peeler: – that’s always an interesting conversation too, to get people to kind of respect the subgenres that are in their genre and yet are actually kind of antithetical to their way of life.

Sarah: Yeah, and it’s important to understand what other parts of the genre are doing, because ultimately, don’t you find they all influence each other?

Dr. Peeler: Absolutely!

Sarah: Yeah. So what are some of the reactions the students have to the Reading in the Genre courses? Have you had any students be like, okay, so I’m going to read everything this writer has ever written; I’ll see you next year?

Dr. Peeler: Mm-hmm. Definitely, and oftentimes they do discover a subgenre – they think they’re writing one thing, but they’re really writing another? I think a lot of them also come up against what we were talking about earlier, that idea of, they’re not really writing romance? They’re really writing something else with a really strong romantic arc.

Sarah: Ah!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: So they also have to figure out precisely what genre they’re in, not only to strengthen the structure of what they’re writing, but also to meet reader expectations for the book that they’re eventually hoping to publish.

Dr. Peeler: Exactly. Exactly.

Sarah: Oh!

Dr. Peeler: And sometimes –

Sarah: Piece of cake. Not.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! Well, and sometimes it’s like, it’s actually like, well, you’ve obviously written an urban fantasy and not a paranormal romance, and then it becomes a question of, like, which, which, like, group of shelves do you want to be in? Which is selling at the time?

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: So that gets into a conversation about marketing, ‘cause that’s also one thing that our program is really, I think, good about, and obviously it has to be, because we are writing commercial fiction as a program, but just talking about the marketplace and talking about, you know, how to move things around in your mind, you know, how to move your plot around to make it fit various shelves, depending on where the marketplace is at when you actually finish it.

Sarah: Yeah. Also, how do you define to – if you, if you can; this is sort of on the fly – how would you define the difference between urban fantasy and paranormal romance to someone who is not fully fluent in either?

Dr. Peeler: Right. For me, it’s all about what can you, if you took out the romance, would the book still hold?

Sarah: Hmm! Yeah, that’s, I’ve heard that used as a, as a way of describing erotic romance: if you took out the erotic storyline, does the book fall apart?

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: If it does, then that’s an erotic romance. Otherwise, if, if you can take out all the sex and the story’s still there, you just have a really, really sexy romance.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, exactly.

Sarah: And that’s, that’s an important distinction for readers, for marketplace, for shelving, for what’s being bought, for what’s popular.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: These are all important things.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, and that’s, you know, we do do the Readings courses, and that’s really important to the program, but the big thing that we do is our students work one-on-one with first one mentor and then a second mentor, usually people who are well published in that genre, and they have to finish the actual book, and that’s the big thing. You don’t really know what you’ve written till you’ve written the last page. [Laughs] And that seems really obvious, but it’s amazing how people start out with an idea and a synopsis, or even a table of contents/outline kind of thing, but what they actually get to at the end is very different, and that’s where I think you can start to see those distinctions where someone, you know, thought they were writing kind of a normal romance, but actually did write an erotic romance that maybe doesn’t have enough sex, right? So that’s where you can have that conversation of, like, actually, this is an erotic romance. Like, if you strip out the sex, it doesn’t hold together, so you need to beef up those sex scenes if you want to hit that market, or you need to add something else –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: – to get a more mainstream romance.

Sarah: What have student reactions to the courses been like? Have the, have the people who’ve gone through the MFA gone on to publish, and, and have they – or have they gone on to teach? ‘Cause I know MFA is the highest degree you can get in writing fine arts, or in writing arts. Like, there’s no doctorate, is there? I don’t think there’s a DFA.

Dr. Peeler: There is; there are a few programs that have created a Ph.D. I don’t necessarily recommend those for complicated reasons. Not that I don’t think the individual programs are good; it’s just the way hiring works in academia. You can, if you are applying for a pure creative writing job, you can do it with an MFA. The only time we would ask for a Ph.D. is if you’re wanting to tea-, if, if we want you – it’s like, my job required a Ph.D. in Literature, because MFA’s only part of my duties. So you’re better off getting a Ph.D. in something like Rhetoric and Comp or Literature and being a writer if that’s the kind of job you want. So anyway, it gets very complicated, and there are Ph.D. programs, but they’re rare, and I don’t, that’s a lot of schooling for something that I don’t know if you need to get hired.

Sarah: Right, ‘cause eventually you need to get a job with which to pay back those student loans.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, that’s the only reason you’d get a Ph.D. Like, a lot of our students do the MFA just because they struggle to finish a book.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: They’ve written lots of first chapters; they’ve maybe written, or they’ve maybe written a rough draft and didn’t know what to do with it, and they want to kind of evelate, elevate – evelate – [laughs] – elevate their –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Dr. Peeler: – writing. Anyway. So we do have, actually our, romance is one of our most pro-, is one of our most successful alumni – some of our most successful alumni come out of our romance program. So Pris-, Priscilla Oliveras, she’s one of our alums; Traci Douglass –

Sarah: No kidding!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! Traci Douglass. Way back in the day, Susan Mallery actually did our program, but she was well published before she did it, so we can’t take credit –

Sarah: Right.

Dr. Peeler: – for her success.

[Laughter]

Dr. Peeler: But yeah, we’ve had a ton of success stories in romance. Anna Zabo? They’re one of our alums.

Sarah: No kidding!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! So – I think that the nice, the nice thing about romance is a lot of our students come into the program from RWA, so they’ve, they’re already in a really professional mindset, which is half the battle.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. Right.

Dr. Peeler: And then, you know, we just take all of that professionalism and hard work that they’ve already had inculcated into them by RWA, and we just, like, you know, give them some more tools.

Sarah: Right!

Dr. Peeler: And then they are still in RWA the entire time they’re in the program, so, you know, we’re introducing them to agents and things like that and helping them with career ladders, but they’re also going to RWA events and meeting agents, and so that’s kind of a perfect combination.

Sarah: It is, ‘cause one is focused on the business side and some of the craft, and then you’re focused on the craft side and some of the business.

Dr. Peeler: Exactly.

Sarah: So I want to ask you about vampires.

Dr. Peeler: Yes!

Sarah: Okay. I, so I follow you on Instagram, which sounds like such a creepy thing to say, but I love following people who do neat shit and travel, and you do both –

Dr. Peeler: Thank you!

Sarah: – and I love your pictures from your vampire conference. You run a conference on vampires. Oh, please tell me everything about it –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: – this is so cool.

Dr. Peeler: [Laughs] Well, I can’t take conferen-, I can’t take credit for the entire conference. That is a brain child of these two absolutely lovely, wackadoo Welshmen who also do, like, the biggest Elvis convention in Wales. Like, they’re just insane and fun, and they’re great people. So they started this international vampire art and film festival, and we were brought in for a couple years of it to run the academic track. So my colleague and I created a call for papers, and Seton Hill was lovely and generous enough to sponsor us going to Transylvania of all places – which is highly ironic, ‘cause we’re also a Catholic school – [laughs] – so it was like, can we go invest, you know, to Transylvania for vampires?

Sarah: I can see no reason why those things –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: – wouldn’t match up.

Dr. Peeler: We had to, we had to ask an actual nun for the money, which was, and she’s lovely, but this was, it was like –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Dr. Peeler: – there’s times when I’m like, my life is very strange, and that was one of them. But yeah, so we just put up a call for papers for this fabulous conference, and we picked papers of people that were willing to go all the way out to Transylvania, which was a surprising number! I mean, it’s funny; it’s one of those things where you’re, we were like, oh, I really don’t know if anyone will do this, ‘cause it’s just a lot of money, and –

Sarah: Yeah, it’s one thing to submit a paper proposal; it’s another thing to be like, and I’m going to Transylvania!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! But we had a surpr-, like, a shockingly robust number of papers that were submitted, and pretty much everyone, especially the first year, pretty much everyone who got accepted went, which was also surprising. They came from –

Sarah: That is so cool.

Dr. Peeler: – all over the world, and they were, we were all, like, just people who really loved vampires. So it was amazing. I mean, Romania is one of the best places I’ve visited. Like, okay, I’m obsessed with vampires in, like, a number, and I’m obsessed with Transylvania on a number of crazy levels? So when I was real young I read – like twelve or thirteen – I read those historical Dracula books by Radu Florescu and Raymond McNally, which were all about that region and how politically insane it was and how Vlad Tepes came out of that just miasma of violence and just political fuckery and, like, you know, it was all over religion and, like, all these things that were supposed to be, you know, to my childlike mind, were supposed to be good things? I was like, wait –

Sarah: Yeah.

Dr. Peeler: – those can be used to wage war! And the person that, like, impales a hundred thousand people becomes, like, a hero! So I was just obsessed with these books and Vlad the Impaler, as one is, and obviously then I read Dracula and, like, I loved bats, so it was kind of my, it was definitely like a bucket list trip for me, and I got to do it twice, which was amazing, and Romania is just absolutely gorgeous. I mean, Bram Stoker writes about that, and he never actually went to Transylvania, but he read copious, you know, all the various kind of Victorian lavish travel guides of these places. So he used those as references, but they’re right! I mean, it’s just stunningly beautiful, and then, so you kind of look out the train window when you’re going from Bucharest to Sighisoara, which is in Transylvania, and it’s just fertile and lush and gorgeous, and then you look up, and there’s these terrifying mountains that are covered in fog, and they’re definitely where something evil lives.

Sarah: Ahhh!

Dr. Peeler: So it’s really a fascinating place, and then the ac-, like, the actual conference was in Sighisoara, where Vlad Tepes was born, and it is just, it’s a medieval citadel; it’s just the loveliest little place. The food is incredible; there’s not any processed food really, so you come back to America and everything tastes like plastic for a week. [Laughs]

Sarah: Oh man!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, it’s amazing! I can’t, I really can’t recommend going to Romania high enough. I know that that’s not on most people’s travel lists –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: – but I would highly, highly recommend it. And I think Dacre Stoker, Bram’s neph-, grand-nephew I believe is the relation, I think he does, like, vampire tours that I’m all about and really want to do – [laughs] – in the future.

Sarah: Now, I also, as I mentioned, follow you on Instagram, and I have noticed that you have been taking sewing lessons –

Dr. Peeler: Yes!

Sarah: – and creating your own clothes.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: And this is, this is amazing to me for two reasons: one, you live in my hometown –

Dr. Peeler: Yes!

Sarah: – so I look around in the background and I’m like, I know that’s Pittsburgh, but where the fuck is that?

Dr. Peeler: [Laughs]

Sarah: What happened to that building?

Dr. Peeler: It’s in Morningside.

Sarah: Yeah, and I, nothing looks familiar anymore –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: – ‘cause Pittsburgh has changed so much –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: – ‘cause that’s what, that’s what happens when you move away from your hometown.

Dr. Peeler: Well, Pittsburgh’s changed so much.

Sarah: Oh –

Dr. Peeler: Since I moved here.

Sarah: – my gosh. Oh my gosh.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: Were, did you move there before Bakery Square had condos across from it? Back when Reizenstein Middle School was there?

Dr. Peeler: Yes.

Sarah: That was my middle school.

Dr. Peeler: Oh my gosh!

Sarah: And I, and we, we brought our kids to Pittsburgh ‘cause, you know, Kennywood –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: – is the best, and we got a, like a, a room with points – I think there’s a Marriott –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: – in Bakery Square, and we got there, and I’m like, where the hell is my middle school? [Laughs] Where did it go? Why are there multicolored condos where my middle school was? What happened here? Yeah, I was unprepared for how much has changed, so when I look in the background of your pictures I’m like, I know, I know that place. What – when was there a Whole Foods there?

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: What?

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: It’s amazing!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: So (a) I get to see, you know, how this place that I grew up in has changed, but also, you’re doing dope shit!

Dr. Peeler: Oh, thank you!

Sarah: Oh, it’s so cool! What have you made, and what have you learned?

Dr. Peeler: I, so I started sewing because I really wanted a hobby that wasn’t – like, I didn’t really have a hobby. I had writing, but that’s not a hobby.

Sarah: No, that’s slightly different.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! And –

Sarah: I’m in the same position as you. This is part of why I find this so fascinating.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, and so I really, so my friend Jaye Wells, who you probably know, she –

Sarah: Yes.

Dr. Peeler: – has been painting, and I just loved it. Like, every time she would post a painting I was like, oh my God, and, you know, even when she first started and they were like, you know, like, definitely like – and she’s gotten really, really good, actually – like, even when she first started and they were just kind of like these really bright, crazy things – and they’re still bright and crazy, which I love – but I would just be like, oh my gosh, I love that you’re doing this. I love that you’re doing something for yourself that’s not connected to writing and that’s not monetized. Like –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: – I hate how in our culture, like, everything has to be monetized, and we’re encouraging, like, our youth to, like, see that as the goal of anything that you pick up. Like, you know, you should be able to make money from that, and if you can’t, you should not do it, right?

Sarah: Yeah.

Dr. Peeler: And Jaye actually had that conversation, I guess, with her, she told me she had that conversation with her instructor, ‘cause he was like, maybe if you toned down the colors a little bit you could sell these, and she was like, shut your mouth.

Sarah: Good!

[Laughter]

Dr. Peeler: I do not need another thing ruined by, like, the insertion of capitalism, thanks. So that’s what I wanted from sewing, and my friend, I’m really lucky my friend Erin opened up this gorgeous shop, Firecracker Fabrics, and next to the shop and kind of a part of the shop, but it’s actually a separate business, is this place called Cut & Sew Studio, where they teach you to sew. And for years I was – like, literally years – I was going into Erin’s shop and just fondling everything in, like, a creepy way and being like –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Dr. Peeler: – I’m going to sew, and she was like, she kept telling me, she was like, don’t, ‘cause it’s, you know, like, it’s, you don’t need another thing kind of, you know, like, I know how busy you are, and it’s kind of addictive, so don’t even start. So when I was on sabbatical I did start, ‘cause I did have the time, and it’s just been so great. Like, it’s so great to make something, and most of my clothes are janky. Like, I made some dr-, I made a dress. I made –

Sarah: I love the dress you made!

Dr. Peeler: Thank you. I’m making another one –

Sarah: I think it looks so good on you.

Dr. Peeler: – that’s, like, crazy. And I’ve made a lot of short number ones, which if you’re part of the sewing community you know that’s, like, the thing everyone starts on. It’s like a kind of a really basic, easy to sew but super cute shirt. I made a dress number one. Anyway, I’ve just really loved it, and it’s taught me so much about my body and fashion, and it’s made me kind of renarrate the, like, shitty voice I had in my head that was always like, when I would try something on and it wouldn’t look good, I would be like, it just doesn’t fit because you’re too big. Like, that was like my constant reiteration.

Sarah: Yeah.

Dr. Peeler: Like, I’m just wrong; I’m too big; my boobs are too big; my blank blah-blah-blah – like, something’s just wrong. And one of my teachers – both of my teachers are great. There’s Catherine, who owns Cut & Sew, and then Brad, who’s one of her instructors, and Catherine’s just very, like, delic-, like, she know, everything’s very delicately put, she’s very diplomatic, and Brad is more just like, oh no, no. So, like – [laughs] – like, I pulled out a pattern, and I was like, Brad, I’m going to make this! And he’s like, no, you’re not. And he was like, that won’t, like, you can never wear a dolman sleeve, ‘cause you’ve got, like, beautiful big boobs, and I was like, ohhh! And then I looked at it, and I was like, every dolman sleeve I’ve ever tried on has looked, like, terrible. Like, there’s always a big – 

Sarah: It’s a sideways awning on your chest –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: – right?

Dr. Peeler: And there’s like a giant –

Sarah: Uh-huh!

Dr. Peeler: – folds that – like, I basically create my own dart –

Sarah: Yep!

Dr. Peeler: – just because the fabric, like, falls over, but it looks terrible, ‘cause it’s just, like, kind of hanging there like a flap.

Sarah: I am, I am with you in the large chest department, and I had, I was a bridesmaid earlier this year, and my sister-in-law was kind enough to be like, here’s the designer and here’s the color: pick whatever style you want. And I went to a dress shop that was filled with women who sound like your sewing instructor, who were like, yeah, no, that style would be terrible –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: – on you, and the, the fault is the style, not you.

Dr. Peeler: Yeess!

Sarah: You need to match your body –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: – to the right style. And they were like, let me show you an example, so they brought me this dress that looked fine, but it had a ruffle right under the collarbone, which basically created a giant, giant shopfront awning on my chest.

Dr. Peeler: Right. Right!

Sarah: Like, oh! So this whole ruffle trend, not for me! Nope, not for you, but this, this is going to work. I love the idea that you’re learning what styles –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: – are for you –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: – and it’s not your fault.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! ‘Cause that would happen to me every season when, like, a new fashion came out. Like, sometimes I would try it on and I’d be like, oh my God! Like, I am – ‘cause, you know, the opposite would work, too. Like, I would just be like, oh my God, I am, like, well sized suddenly, right? Like, this looks great! But then usually it would be something like a ruffle or whatever, and I would try it on and I’d be like, well, now I’m wrong. I’m just wrong; my body’s wrong. And no, it was just these different fashions, and most, and there’s only like a few different things you can actually do with a shirt, for example. So once you can identify, like, what works on you, it doesn’t matter what, like, new iteration it is? You know, not even going to try it.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: So, like, and, and the irony of all of, like, learning to sew is that – and this should not be the point – but I’ve actually become really good at online ordering finally, because, like, I’ll look at something and be like, oh my God, that’s adorable, and then I’ll look at the sleeve, and I’ll be like, nopes! Like, that will look like crap on me. And then I look at, like, another thing and I’m like, okay, there’s a raglan; I can do raglan; and I, it arrives, and it’s perfect.

Sarah: So what are you making now, sewing-wise? What are you working on?

Dr. Peeler: I am making this totally bonkers and very late – I was, it was supposed to be finished by now, but getting back to work means I have not as much time to sew – but I’m making a Dia de los Muertos dress.

Sarah: [Gasps] Nice!

Dr. Peeler: Yes, with this insane fabric. It just has giant, like, painted heads, so that’s the skirt, and then there’s a turquoise bodice and, like, a black kind of band. So it’s super fun, and I’m, it’s totally janky ‘cause I’m learning and, like, I’m doing all this, like, I’m making, like, a, like, inverted bodice thing that I’ve never made before with, like, a ton of darts, which I’ve never made, so they’re all over the place. And it wasn’t the best pattern for me; it was kind of a boxy pattern –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: – and again, this I didn’t know, most pattern makers kind of make what they would wear. It’s just like, you know, what we were talking about with books; like, we write the books we would want to read? So they, so this woman just makes really boxy patterns, so, like, we’ve had to kind of really, like, it’s like a Franken-pattern at this point; we’ve had to mutilate it to get it to fit like more of an hourglass. But I’ve learned so much, but it’s super janky. But that’s part of the fun of sewing is, like, everyone is so amazed that you made it, and then you’re just like, if you could see the inside of this thing. [Laughs]

Sarah: Which is also, which is also like writing –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: – because I look back at stuff I’ve written and been like, I would like to change this; I’d like to fix that.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: Yeah, I could do this better, and someone’s like, oh my God, you wrote a book?

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: And did it more than once?

Dr. Peeler: Yeah. And I think that that’s part of the fun of the hobby is, like, having something that really doesn’t matter, that just feels me with pride. Like –

Sarah: Yeah!

Dr. Peeler: – like, I wear – [laughs] – these, like, I’ll wear these, like, super simple, like, shirts that I’ve made, and half the time people aren’t even, like, really looking at the pattern, they’re looking at the fabric ‘cause they’re such great fabrics on, like, for sale now. That’s probably the reason I learned to sew is to use these crazy fabrics. But they’ll, like, they’ll be like, oh my God, that’s so cute, and I’ll just, like, crow, I made it! Like –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Dr. Peeler: – with such glee. And meanwhile, it, it’s like, for someone who, like, you know, for, like, one of the seamstresses working in, like, an actual factory, it would literally take them five minutes, and I’m like, I made this! And it took me like seven days, but that’s fine. [Laughs]

Sarah: Doesn’t matter!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! I can just be proud of it.

Sarah: It, it’s still a book; it doesn’t matter if you wrote in a week or six months or a year.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah. Yeah!

Sarah: You still wrote a book!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: And you still made a shirt. That’s so cool!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah. Well, and that’s why the short pieces I’ve been writing for Medium, the online platform –

Sarah: Mm-hmm?

Dr. Peeler: – and that’s why these short pieces have been really nice, because I love writing novels, but they just take really long, and in the meantime you kind of, it’s like you forget that you’re a writer, even though you’re writing every day. Like, there’s something about, like, seeing something published that kind of reminds you that, oh yeah, I’m a writer, and, like, getting – and you know, for me, like, as a commercial writer, like, getting a little check in the mail once a month is great too.

And I think the sewing does the same thing: it’s like I for-, I think we can forget that we, it’s okay, especially as women, we’re told, like, you shouldn’t have an ego? Like, I think it’s good to do things that burnish your ego, right? Even if it, you know, if it’s painting a colorful painting or making a, a shirt that people admire, I think that that’s a part of creation that we tend to ignore, but it’s actually really important.

Sarah: It’s also, I think, important to examine – ‘cause when you sew, you examine how your clothes are being made, which then –

Dr. Peeler: Yes.

Sarah: – might cause you to question, how are the other clothes that I’m wearing being made? Who is making them? Like, a six-year-old somewhere?

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: Is this, how is this produced? Is it produced in a way that’s, that’s damaging, or is it –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: – produced in a way that’s helpful? Like, that, it’s all part of a larger series of questions.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, absolutely.

Sarah: What are you working on writing-wise? I know you mentioned you’re writing for Medium.

Dr. Peeler: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: What else are you working on? Are you also writing more fiction?

Dr. Peeler: I am! I’ve been working on just kind of a total labor of love project; I don’t know if anyone will ever want to buy it. It’s like a sort of super ambitious Pullman-esque fantasy, which I guess is YA in the way that Pullman’s, like, His Dark Materials are YA?

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: The Bloody Chamber or, like, “Bluebeard” meets portal fantasy.

Sarah: Ohhh?

Dr. Peeler: Yeah. So I’m really excited about it, and I’m just, I’m just enjoying writing. I feel like the Medium pieces have kind of taken some pressure off myself in terms of, like, oh, I need to be publishing, ‘cause I’m publishing, and so I’m just really writing what I want to be writing right now and not really thinking about the market. So we’ll see what happens. [Laughs]

Sarah: That makes it fun again –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: – much like sewing.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, it does make it fun again, and I think, I know, I think my project is strong because I’m not thinking about whether or not it will sell? And I’m obviously not writing something that won’t, that can’t sell, right? I’m not being that extreme in it, but I’m definitely writing something that I’m, like, I’m really thinking like, what do I want to be writing? Not, like, what do I think will sell now? That can feel kind of radical at times – [laughs] – ‘cause I think –

Sarah: Yeah!

Dr. Peeler: – especially at a certain point in your career, you’re kind of put, you, I think I put too much pressure on myself to, like, write what will sell, write what will sell, write what will sell, and I think I kind of lost the purpose of writing.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. Sometimes the, the purpose of, of writing can be to enjoy that you made it, much like making a shirt.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, yeah! Exactly. Exactly. And making something that you –

Sarah: I mean –

Dr. Peeler: – would want to read or you want to wear, what you would want to hang on your wall.

Sarah: Yeah! It can be, like, it can be entirely for you!

Dr. Peeler: Yep. Yeah.

Sarah: And it doesn’t, it, writing is a business, and it is an industry, but it doesn’t always have to be for profit.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: It’s okay that it’s not, and I don’t know if that message gets shared enough.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! And that’s, I mean, we always tell our students, do not quit your day job. It’s great if that’s your goal, and it’s great if you’re able to achieve that goal, but –

Sarah: Mm-hmm!

Dr. Peeler: – I think that’s a really fickle mistress. I mean, publishing is a fickle mistress, and –

Sarah: Ohhh!

Dr. Peeler: – like, latching your livelihood onto something that you just took creative pleasure in is another layer of sort of danger.

Sarah: It is.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah. And some people love the hustle of the, like, freelance lifestyle? One of our, you know, we, the last time we did the vampire festival, Chris Golden and Tim Lebbon were some of our guests, and they, you know, they’re working freelance writers who are amazing novelists and also doing lots of things with tie-ins and doing lots of different things to make money writing, and, you know, it works for them, and they love it. So there’s all different models that you can aspire to, but I think each model has its pros and cons, for sure.

Sarah: Yeah. And it’s, it’s up to the individual to figure out what’s the model that works for them.

Dr. Peeler: Exactly. But I think that the assumption –

Sarah: That’s not all one size fits all!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: Much like sewing!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, yeah! Exactly! ‘Cause I think, I think there is an assumption that the goal has to be to write full time, and I think that that’s something to definitely examine whether or not that’s actually the case for your individual circumstances.

Sarah: Yeah, the, the default message of this must be profitable; this must be everything; you must, you must pursue the job that is your, is your passion –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah.

Sarah: – can be very damaging, and I say that as someone who made a job out of her hobby.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! Yeah!

Sarah: I don’t always recommend it. I adore what I do, and I, I love my life, and I love what I do, and I am extremely fortunate, but I also have a number of support mechanisms in place –

Dr. Peeler: Right.

Sarah: – not the least of which is being married –

Dr. Peeler: Right!

Sarah: – and it, it can be very, very hard. Like, I, I was doing an interview with a, with a self-published author this week, and I said, well, the good news is you’re in charge! And the bad news is you’re in charge!

Dr. Peeler: Right. Right. Well, and I feel a lot of responsibility as, you know, as – it’s like with teaching. Like, I –

Sarah: Yeah!

Dr. Peeler: – have a tenure track – I have tenure. I got, from the beginning I got the tenure-track full-time jobs that were really rare, and I cons-, you know, so I, I’m constantly counseling students, like, not to do what I’ve done, and I remember when my professor in college did that. I thought I wanted to be a professor, and she goes, ohhh, you should probably, like, you’re super, like – she’s like, I think you would be great at this, but it’s just really hard to get a job, so you might want to look into law, right? And I’ve been –

Sarah: Irony!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! [Laughs] I’m kind of doing the same thing constantly with my students, ‘cause, and it is that balance; like, like, I have a responsibility to articulate that you, that, like, students might not be able to get the things that I got, because times are constantly changing, right? The market constantly changes; the publishing market constantly changes. You know, we, we see that with self-publishing now, like –

Sarah: It changes hourly!

Dr. Peeler: Yes! Like, so people who are making really credible salaries, basically, from self-publishing have had to, like, re-examine as, you know, Amazon changes its algorithm, so I think no matter where you are, like, the goal should be to be as, like, flexible and willing to change your expectations –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Dr. Peeler: – as things change within the marketplace.

Sarah: Yeah, and, and that when you start a project, you can’t count on that still being something that’s popular when you’re done –

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: – which is really scary!

Dr. Peeler: Yeah! Absolutely! Absolutely.

Sarah: So what books are you reading right now that you want to tell everyone about?

Dr. Peeler: Well, the things that I’ve – so I’ve been reading, obviously, Philip Pullman’s new His Dark Materials books. I love, love, love, love, love the Greta Van Helsing series by Orbit? It’s, like, urban fantasy with a great romance arc between the –

Sarah: Is that the one where she’s a doctor?

Dr. Peeler: Yes. I love that –

Sarah: I loved it!

Dr. Peeler: Yes. Like, and the third one just came out, and I think that’s the end of the series. And they’re just super sweet. They’re, like, total nerd, like, Easter egg –

Sarah: They’re, yeah, they’re, they’re paranormal nerd Easter egg books.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah!

Sarah: Like, there’s so many references hidden in there.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, so, like, her romantic interest is Lord Ruthven – [laughs] – or, I’m sorry, Lord Varney from –

Sarah: Yeah.

Dr. Peeler: – Varney the Vampire? Like, so funny. So I love those.

I, I read this cra-, it’s literary, but it’s insane, and I loved it so much. It was called Hollow Kingdom by Kira Frank I think is her name? I think I got that wrong. [Kira Jane Buxton] But it’s Hollow Kingdom, and it’s, it’s a – [laughs] – it sounds so insane, but it’s the zombie apocalypse from the perspective of a pet crow.

Sarah: Oh yeah! One of my, one of my team, Carrie, reviewed it and said it was absolutely delightful.

Dr. Peeler: It –

Sarah: Utterly strange –

Dr. Peeler: It –

Sarah: – can be violent; totally delightful.

Dr. Peeler: It’s so delightful! So I adored that. So I would highly recommend those two.

And then I think the best book I read, I’ve read in the last year was Milkman, which is super literary, not – definitely kind of ambitious, an ambitious read, because it’s very Joycean in how it’s worded. It’s almost stream of consciousness, and there’s no, like, names? Like, everyone is what they are, so it’s like brother-in-law or – and the milkman is, like, that’s his kind of nickname. So it’s – and I can’t remember who wrote it; I’m terrible. I should have written it down. [Anna Burns] Anyway, Milkman: that is the, that is just one of the best books that I think I’ve ever read in my entire life, and it kind of, it’s the book that I’ve read in the last year and I can’t stop thinking about.

Sarah: I love books like that. They give you, like, a brain hangover?

Dr. Peeler: Yeess! Yeah.

Sarah: That is my favorite.

Dr. Peeler: Really amazing.

Sarah: Well, thank you so much for, for, for taking the time to talk to me. Is there anything else that you want to add? Or mention?

Dr. Peeler: No –

Sarah: You want to drop a plug for your program? Feel free.

Dr. Peeler: Yeah, absolutely. If you want information on Seton Hill and our program, which I highly recommend – it’s a great program – it’s, just Google Seton Hill writing popular fiction and you should find it. And you can find me at nicolepeeler.com, and you can find links, if you do want to read, you can find links to my books, and you can also find friend links to my essays on Medium, so that gets you past the metered paywall so that you can read any of the essays that I’ve written. And I’ve written, I’ve written a couple on writing, if you’re writers, and a couple on love, if you are, you know, a human being who cares about love. [Laughs] So.

Sarah: Well, I mean, why not?

Dr. Peeler: Exactly!

[music]

Sarah: And that brings us to the end of this week’s episode. Thank you to Nicole Peeler for hanging out with me. If you would like to find out more about her writing, about her program at the Seton Hill MFA in Popular Fiction Writing, you will find all the links in the show notes at smartbitchestrashybooks.com. You can find Nicole online at nicolepeeler and on Instagram @nicolepeeler as well.

Thank you again to our Patreon community for supporting the show. Every pledge means so very much, helps me keep the show going, helps me make sure that every episode receives a transcript. I am deeply appreciative to each of you for making sure that every episode is accessible to everyone. If you’d like to join our Patreon community, have a look at patreon.com/SmartBitches!

Every week I end the episode with a really bad joke, and this week is no exception. This, this joke is in honor of the fact that I – if you read the site, you know about this – I subscribe to BritBox and have been watching old reruns of The Vicar of Dibley with Dawn French, and it is among my favorite old sitcoms. It’s so funny, but there’s a particular episode that I love the most, and if you hear this joke and you know the show, bet you know which episode this is. So – [clears throat] – are you ready for a terrible joke, ‘cause this is really bad?

Did you hear the rumor about butter?

Yeah, the, the rumor about butter?

You shouldn’t spread it.

[Laughs] It’s so dumb! So – [laughs more] – it’s really terrible, right? It’s really quite bad.

On behalf of Nicole Peeler and everyone here, we wish you the very best of reading. Have a wonderful weekend, stay safe, and I will see you back here next week.

Smart Podcast, Trashy Books is part of the Frolic Podcast Network. You can find outstanding podcasts to listen to at frolic.media/podcasts.

[music]