409. Alpha Night and Alpha Women With Nalini Singh

[music]

Sarah Wendell: Well, hello there. Thank you for inviting me to hang out in your eardrums. I endeavor to make it a pleasant experience. This is Sarah Wendell from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. This is Smart Podcast, Trashy Books, episode number 409, with Nalini Singh. Yay! Keeping with recent tradition, this week we have a spoiler-free discussion of Alpha Night by Nalini Singh, which is out. We are going to talk all about the book – no spoilers – and we’re also going to talk about quarantine baking, gluten-free baking tricks, mating at first sight, alpha females, consent, and writing series, plus what she’s working on now. Yay!

I will have links to all of the books that we mention, especially all the books that Nalini mentions, ‘cause she brought a list, ‘cause she knows what’s up. I’ll have links to all of that in the show notes, and you can find those at smartbitchestrashybooks.com/podcast.

Speaking of podcasts-s-s – podcastses; podcasts? Yeah, I didn’t need to make that complicated – if you are looking for a new show to enjoy, I have an idea for you!

Erin Leafe: Hey, everybody, we are Learning the Tropes. I’m Erin –

Clayton Gumbert: I’m Clayton!

Erin: – and I’m the romance novel veteran.

Clayton: And I’m the – [significant pause] – virgin.

Erin: And every week we read a different romance novel, and then we talk about what we loved about it; we talk about all of our favorite tropes. We talk about Only One Bed, Secret Places –

Clayton: Secret Places, that’s mine! You stole it!

Erin: [Laughs]

Clayton: Every trope under the sun.

Erin: Mm-hmm.

Clayton: So to give you a little taste of our show, we’re going to play a clip from the episode where we reviewed Lisa Kleypas’s Dreaming of You:

So I started reading this book, and I immediately loved it.

Erin: [Gasps, laughs] Yay!

Clayton: I love this book!

Erin: [Still laughing] Oh, I’m so happy! This is one of my absolute favorite books in the world.

Clayton: Yes.

Erin: I love Lisa Kleypas so much, and if you were not into this book I was like, I don’t know what I’m going to do; this is going to be so upsetting to me. I am so happy that you loved it and that we can just fangirl out for the next hour –

Clayton: Yeah.

Erin: – because that’s all I want to do.

Clayton: [Laughs]

Erin: I didn’t want to have to defend it!

Learning the Tropes comes out every Wednesday, and you can listen to us anywhere you listen to podcasts!

Clayton: So come check us out!

Sarah: So if you are looking for a podcast to listen to while you quaran-bake or quaran-clean or quaran-cross-stitch like me, I hope you give them a try. I will have links in the show notes to where you can find Learning the Tropes, or you can search for them in your favorite podcatcher.

This episode is also brought to you by Ritual, which is a daily multivitamin that is 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 – [significant pause] – vitamin ritual! The subscription box of vitamins will arrive on your doorstep just as you finish your last one, and it’s only a dollar a day to have your multivitamin delivered! I really like the delivery so I don’t have to remember or mark my calendar or make a list and go to the store, ‘cause we only go to the store once a week, and I also like know what’s inside each capsule; that’s very cool. Ritual is offering you ten percent off your first three months! Fill in the gaps with Essential for Women by visiting ritual.com/SARAH – S-A-R-A-H – to start your ritual today. That’s ten percent off your first three months at ritual.com/SARAH.

I have a compliment. I love doing this. It’s one of my favorite things to do during the intro, so thank you to everyone who has pledged to the Patreon, and thank you to those who want me to do a compliment, ‘cause it’s so fun!

Lisa M., this compliment is for you: your loving personality and ability to make people laugh has inspired several people you know to name their pets and/or children and/or favorite things after you.

If you would like a compliment of your very own, handcrafted by me, yours truly, have a look at patreon.com/SmartBitches. Monthly pledges start at a dollar, and every pledge helps keep the show going and makes every episode accessible to everyone.

Hello again to our Patreon community. Thank you for being so truly excellent!

I will have links at the end of the episode, but let’s do the start of the episode! On with my conversation with Nalini Singh!

[music]

Sarah: Hi, Nalini!

Nalini Singh: Hi, Sarah!

Sarah: It has been so long since we’ve chatted! How are you?

Nalini: I am good! How are you?

Sarah: I’m okay! How’s it going in New Zealand?

Nalini: Yeah, pretty good! We’re, we’re just going into autumn, fall now. The weather is fantastic. In fact, it’s so fantastic that we haven’t had enough rainfall this season, so we might be going into water restrictions – [laughs] – which is not great.

Sarah: Oh, that’s just what you want!

Nalini: [Laughs] Yeah, no!

Sarah: That’s just great!

Nalini: But we’re hoping, since we’re going into fall, that, you know, it’s going to start raining soon, so it should be fine.

Sarah: Doesn’t it rain once a day in New Zealand? Isn’t that the rule?

Nalini: Unfortunately not! Unfortunately, the summer has just been, was just brilliant. So much sunshine and, you know, shorts and T-shirt weather. But yeah, yeah, we just didn’t get, you know, normally you’d get a bit of rain in the summer as well, but nothing! So –

Sarah: Ugh! Are you all still quarantining, or have you been let out of your houses?

Nalini: We are now, we’re currently level three, which means there’s a little bit more movement, and some people can go back to work, so if you work, like, outside or, you know, not in close proximity to people. But from Thursday we’re going into level two, which is much, you know, much more freedom. You can go and see people, and just gatherings aren’t allowed? Mass gatherings?

Sarah: Right.

Nalini: So, yeah, we’re slowly sliding out of, you know, quarantine, but – and fingers crossed!

Sarah: All right, so I follow you on Instagram, and –

Nalini: Mm-hmm?

Sarah: – I came very close to reporting you for pornography with some of the baking that you did. Holy quarantine baking! What did you make?

Nalini: Oh, way too much stuff, just like everybody else.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: Just like everybody else. But there’s this one recipe that I really recommend, which is, Sally’s Baking Addiction has a recipe for peanut butter chocolate cupcakes? So they’re like peanut butter cupcakes with chocolate fudge icing, and oh my God, just astonishing. And the other thing I baked a lot of was cheese scones? So scones, I don’t know, it’s not a big thing –

Sarah: Ooh.

Nalini: – in America, I think? They’re –

Sarah: Ah, so good.

Nalini: They are so good, and they’re so easy to make, and – so I’m celiac, and I have to always do substitutions for gluten-free stuff, and one of my top tips for anyone else who wants to do a substitution is, for a scone, for a perfect scone, just replace a third of the, whatever flour you’re using with almond meal, and just makes the perfect scone, and you just – honestly, I took them out of the oven, and I just ate like half the tray just standing there while it was still hot from the oven –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: – with butter. Just delicious.

[Laughter]

Sarah: So do you use, like, a gluten-free flour and then you substitute in a portion of almond meal –

Nalini: Yeah.

Sarah: – and that’s your hack.

Nalini: That’s my hack. I, I, I’ve tried, I have, I have taken, you know, taken the hit for you guys and tried it multiple times, and it’s been perfect every single time, so. They’re just light and flaky, and they come out beautiful.

Sarah: Ooh! That sounds – yeah. That’s, that’s porn.

Nalini: So now you have to do some more baking, right, Sarah?

Sarah: You know what? It’s fine. I’m okay with that. I think I need to make scones, and I think I need to make some of these cupcakes. What did you do to substitute for the chocolate cupcakes? Are they flourless?

Nalini: No, no, they’ve got flour. Ah, that’s like a normal person recipe, and then I just –

[Laughter]

Nalini: – for us special people, I, oh, I have ba-, I have lots of different flours at home, so sometimes I just do kind of a mad scientist mix and see what comes out? But just a normal gluten-free baking flour should do the trick. They’re quite soft –

Sarah: Nice.

Nalini: – and moist, so yeah.

Sarah: They don’t need to rise a lot. They don’t need a lot of structure.

Nalini: Yeah, yeah, no. They just, they just work. I mean, peanut butter and chocolate: where can you go wrong –

Sarah: Right?

Nalini: – with it? Yeah.

Sarah: And honestly, the peanut butter is its own structure. You don’t need gluten when you have peanut butter holding up your baked good, right?

Nalini: [Laughs] This is true! This is true. This is true.

[Laughter]

Sarah: So I’m going to need to find links to these recipes, because if I don’t share them when this episode goes up, people are going to be so mad at me.

Nalini: [Laughs]

Sarah: All right. So Alpha Night is almost here. Yay!

Nalini: Yay!

Sarah: Are you excited?

Nalini: I am, I am! It’s, it’s always so exciting when a book’s about to come out, because for me, you know, I finished writing it quite a few months ago, so I’ve been waiting longer than anyone to have it out!

Sarah: [Laughs] Now, do you ever have a problem when you’re promoting a book and you’re writing a book at the same time and you have to think, wait, which one am I talking about?

Nalini: Yeah, sometimes I have to be like, um, let me just take a second there to shift gears backward.

Sarah: Yeah, you know, to that book I wrote eighteen months ago.

Nalini: That’s right.

[Laughter]

Sarah: So what can you tell readers about this book? Because there’s some books where you’re like, I can tell you the title!

Nalini: [Laughs]

Sarah: Aaand that’s about it! [Laughs]

Nalini: No, I can tell you lots about this book. It’s –

Sarah: Right, tell me all about it!

Nalini: Tell me – okay. So it’s part of the Psy-Changeling Trinity series, but I think you can pick it up, you know, if you feel like just diving into this book I think you can, because these are two characters where we haven’t really been in that part of the world before, so. We’re in Moscow, specifically with the Wolf pack, and –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – and we haven’t had a story set in the Wolf pack in Moscow, the Changelings there, so. We’ve had a Bear book, but not a Wolf one. So I think it is, you know, doable to walk into this book, ‘cause you get introduced to the, the Wolves, the BlackEdge Wolves, and – so it features their Alpha, and the really fun thing about this book is that it’s the first time I’ve written a female Changeling Alpha as the protagonist, and so that’s, you know, really, was really fascinating to write and really interesting, and each character is unique, but Alphas have certain traits that go across different animal Changelings and whether, and gender and all of that. So that’s one thing that was really interesting, and the other thing was that it features a mating at first sight storyline, and that’s, you know, I’ve never done that in the series before, and that was also, you know, super interesting to write. The, especially because the hero is an Arrow, and Arrows are like, basically like super soldiers, you know, and trained to be emotionless, and Ethan has just a really interesting backstory, but that initial contact between the two of them, it’s just explosive and, yeah, I just had so much fun writing these two.

Sarah: So what were some of the things about writing an Alpha female that you liked? I love, love Alpha female stories.

Nalini: I’ve written quite a few very strong female characters in the series, and –

Sarah: I know; I love them!

[Laughter]

Nalini: – and what I like about writing the – well, particular, I’ll, I’ll stick with Selenka – what I really liked writing about Selenka was that even though she’s Alpha, she is very much herself. She, so she’s not trying to be an Alpha the way a male in the world might try to be an Alpha? You know, she’s, she lets the, the pups in the clan, you know, paint her nails if they want and put stickers on her, and she’s, she’s got that – how do I put this? – she, she doesn’t change herself in being Alpha; she is Alpha because of who she is?

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: And so all the elements that make her Selenka also make her a really good Alpha?

Sarah: What are the things that you think make a good Alpha?

Nalini: I think it’s not about brawn? Like, in the Changeling world, physicality does matter, because they have, you know, they have challenges of, against their rule, maybe from outsiders, and –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – they have to be able to protect the pack, but that’s not the heart of it? A good Alpha is very intelligent, and one thing that comes up, you know, in a lot of the books that feature Alphas is that they have to have this huge heart, because that heart has the capacity to love every single person in their pack. You know, they are the shoulder to lean on for every single member of their pack. And so Selenka, you know, she has that huge heart. She has the capacity to love, you know, an enormous amount, and I think that is at the core of what makes the best Alphas, that mix of intelligence and heart.

Sarah: Yes. And, and that, and that the intelligence and the heart also focuses on where the pack is now and what needs to happen to keep the pack whole and safe, so there’s almost like an immediate and a forward-thinking element to the way that they care for the group.

Nalini: Yes, absolutely. A good Alpha is thinking, yeah, not just about the now, but also about the future, and not just in terms of the, the people in the pack. So they’re thinking about the, the young, and where –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – where they will be in the future and how to help them become the best people they can be, but they’re also thinking about, you know, the financial health of the pack and how to position it politically so that – it’s all about protecting their people and –

Sarah: Right.

Nalini: – making the situation the best possible situation for their people. So they’re constantly juggling, like, multiple elements to make sure their pack goes from strength to strength.

Sarah: Yes, it’s like a, it’s like a, a blend of, of caretaking and strategy.

Nalini: Yes. They’re like, you know, in a way, they’re CEOs of their pack.

Sarah: Yeah!

Nalini: Yeah, and, but in a much warmer sense, so they’re not just looking at the finances or the business. At the core of it is their people and making sure their people thrive.

Sarah: So the Alpha of your pack, Prime Minister Jacinda Arden, Ardern –

Nalini: [Laughs]

Sarah: – she would be a pretty good Alpha!

Nalini: She, you know, I think she’s proved herself! She would be a very good Alpha.

Sarah: Over here, not so much.

[Laughter]

Sarah: I’m sorry to say! [Laughs] But you have a person who is going to lead through caretaking and strategy at the same time, and that’s, that’s really hard, because there have to be, there has to be an emotional connection to everyone. I mean, all of the Changelings are so emotionally connected to each other on an entirely different level, but at the same time there has to be a strategic enforcement of boundaries and an understanding of, like you said, the young and the finances and the politics and where the pack is, always with an eye of keeping the pack safe. That –

Nalini: Yeah.

Sarah: – that’s a very resonant message, ma’am.

Nalini: Yeah, and I think, I, I won’t spoiler the book, but there is a point in the book, what you say about boundaries as well, and that does come up, you know, about the emotional connection. But at the same time, they can’t be driven only by emotion as well.

Sarah: Yes.

Nalini: There are boundaries that can’t be permitted. They can’t, you know, Selenka can’t permit certain boundaries to be crossed. And again, it comes back to the health of the pack and their future and, yeah, who they are going forward.

Sarah: Yeah, a few parallels to, to current situations. Like, a few. Like, maybe one or two.

Nalini: [Laughs] Possibly, you know. Maybe I’ve, maybe I’ve –

Sarah: Possibly, right.

Nalini: – told the future.

Sarah: So do you have lotto numbers?

[Laughter]

Nalini: Well, if I do, I’m not sharing them.

Sarah: See, this is why you’re no fun.

[Laughter]

Nalini: I’m keeping them, you know, to hoard flour and, you know, bake peanut butter cupcakes.

Sarah: You know, I suppose that’s a really good use of your lotto winnings. I mean, if you’re going to make things, that, that seems to, that seems to be like a good usage of it.

So one of the things that I love about your series is that there are different, there are definitely books where you can go in to the series at that book, but you will miss some things that have, that have, like, built to that moment. Like, Heart of Obsidian is an example: if you haven’t read prior books you might miss some of the nuances –

Nalini: Hmm.

Sarah: – but you can still go in and be like, yeah, okay, this guy crushes mountains. Got it; not a problem. With this book, there’s, this is still an entry point. People can come into the, to the Trinity series and walk into this part of the world and be like, okay, yeah, I got it. All right, yeah! Is that a difficult thing to do? ‘Cause you have one part of your brain that’s thinking – actually, it’s the same, it’s almost the same! You have one part of your brain that’s thinking about the community of your readers and the, and the pack of people who have followed you so far, and then you have the part of your brain that’s thinking strategically, like, how do I bring new people in so that they can also join the community?

Nalini: Yeah, it’s, it’s easier when I’m going into a new pack or a new, you know, segment of the society, because then I’m introducing them to everyone, regardless, because nobody really has met – for example, you know, we’ve met Selenka, but we don’t really know anything about her, so –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – so books like this, it is easier, just like it was with Silver Silence, where we went into the Bear, you know, the Bear clan, ‘cause again, we, we didn’t know anything about them, but I try not to repeat things? I think, I have faith that readers will pick up on where the storylines are continuing, especially, like –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – the background plot. I think readers are very clever at picking up threads and – now, I did have people who dropped into Heart of Obsidian, and absolutely loved it, so I think, yeah, it’s, it is, it can be a hard balance sometimes, and every so often I have to rely on my editors to sort of say, hey, you need to put in a little more explanation here, because it’s just going to be incomprehensible to someone who picks up this book in between, but at the same time, there do need to be entry points into a series, because I don’t want the series to get so big that it’s, it doesn’t feel welcoming to new readers? Yeah, I, I’m a series reader myself, so I know how important it is to have, be, have that ability to sort of jump into a series because you’re interested in it, and at some point you can pick it up without reading, you know, fifteen other books.

Sarah: Yeah. I’m sure you’ve, you’ve, you’ve gotten this question before, but it just occurred to me: is there a group that you like writing about most? Or is there a group that you’re like, oh, I cannot wait to write this, I cannot wait to write this? Or do you like moving between the different packs and moving between the different side groups? Is it, is it fair to even ask if you have a favorite? ‘Cause, I mean, it’s your world; it’s all your favorite!

Nalini: [Laughs] Yeah, they’re all my favorite.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: My problem is that I want to write about everybody? So it’s, it’s actually really difficult to keep myself really super focused and not bring in characters that really have nothing to do with the story, and I just want to see them again, so I just want to write about them, which is why I do the short stories, you know, for my newsletter, because it’s, it’s a way to sort of itch, I was going to say scratch that itch, you know, or –

Sarah: Yeah!

Nalini: – it’s a way to fulfill myself in bringing in other characters, but yeah, I, I just love the world. I’ve just absolutely loved the world, and I love going into any of the groups of people that live in that world, because even when it’s, say, a new group that I’m writing about – for example, the Wolves in this book – they’ve been living in my head for a really long time, so they’re not –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: – new to me? They’re like, oh, I finally get to pit, you know, like, really spend so much time with them, so yeah, yeah. No favorite –

Sarah: I love that!

Nalini: – everybody – [laughs]

Sarah: I love the idea of you just sort of sitting there going, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, I’ll, I’ll write about you in a moment. Hang on; it’s fine.

Nalini: [Laughs]

Sarah: How big is your series bible and your, and your world guide? Am I remembering right that your sister keeps that for you?

Nalini: Yes. So I used to keep it myself, and then it just became too ginormous, and so now she keeps it, and it’s, I don’t even know how big it is now; it’s pretty big. But there’s –

Sarah: Have you ever thought about publishing it?

Nalini: No, no, ‘cause it’s, it’s like, it’s the way my brain works in terms of how things are referenced –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: – so it’d be like, and here is the inside of Nalini’s brain, and it would make no sense to anybody else. But one thing Ashwini does for me with every book, and it’s particularly when – so I didn’t need this for Alpha Night, but I would need it for books where we’ve known characters for a long period. So for example, when I wrote Shards of Hope –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – she did what we call the manifestos. She did an Aden manifesto, and it had, like, reference to every single time Aden has appeared in the series, because what I do for long-term characters like that is I go back and I read every single piece about them in previous books? I think I’ve said this before when we’ve been talking: I have a tendency to delete material, you know, because of my process, the way I write. I write quite a lot, and then I delete and, and tighten things up, but sometimes I have information in my head that isn’t necessarily in the books, so I make sure I go through, you know, an, a character’s entire journey through the series to make sure that when I’m writing I’m not assuming the reader has information?

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: And I’ve also, I’ve also sort of, I refreshed myself on their journey so that their character’s really vivid in my mind –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – and I’ve picked up all the little bits and pieces about the history, and yeah. So we do that for the characters, and then there are some things that I still maintain myself, which is, the most important of which is the overall series timeline, which basically lives in my office all the time, and this just allows me to reference, you know, big world events and keep track of things like the ages of children.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: ‘Cause –

Sarah: I remember you telling me you had someone pregnant for like a year and a half. [Laughs]

Nalini: Yeah, yeah, it was like, yeah, that was, that was smart, but I picked it up, thanks to the timeline! So –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: – if you’re a writer listening to this, make sure you keep a timeline!

Sarah: Otherwise you have elephant lying preg-, elephantine pregnancies.

Nalini: That’s right, that’s right! Then you have to explain to people, oh, yes, well, in this world, people are pregnant for a really long time!

[Laughter]

Sarah: So I know when we spoke about Heart of Obsidian, you had a little Post-it note or a note on your computer that was sort of the overarching like three, I think it was like three words –

Nalini: Mmm.

Sarah: – like a three-word theme to the book that was sort of guiding the story. Did you have a similar note for this book?

Nalini: It was – yeah, I did. It was more like, like a little phrase, and it, it was knight, knight to his, to his queen? And that’s something that actually Ethan says in the book, you know: I am the knight to your queen. And it’s not necessarily – I don’t want to spoil it, but, like, it, Selenka’s kind of like, no, that’s not how I think of the relationship, but for him, that’s how he thinks of the relationship, and that was really critical in terms of, it just gave, put me into his head straight away, and he was the character that was new in this book, and –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – so having that, that, just that phrase, I always knew who Ethan was as I wrote the book, and, and I always knew what Selenka’s response to that would be, which also gave me her character and her story, but I just think that phrase is so perfect for this book and how the characters interact and how their relationship grows.

Sarah: That’s so cool. And I knew exactly, the minute you said it I was like, oh, okay, yeah, I get it, absolutely.

Nalini: Yeah.

Sarah: What are you the most excited about for this book when it reaches readers?

Nalini: The same as always: honestly, I just hope people love it. I’m excited for them to meet these characters and just be part of their love story, because it is, it’s a beautiful love story. It’s got so much heart, and there are just such great characters and, yeah, like I said, I just love this entire world, and I can’t wait for people to return to it.

Sarah: That’s so great! It’s, it is so lovely how much affection is in your voice when you talk about the world you created. Like, you’re just so happy!

Nalini: I am! I am so happy to return to this world, and, you know, I still reread books in the series, and they bring me so much joy, and so when readers write to me and say, oh, I’m rereading the series, that, to me, is such a compliment, because I know I reread my favorites, you know, books by other authors, and I know how much joy –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – they give me, so to know that readers find that in my books is just, it’s just a gift.

Sarah: Oh yes, and I actually wrote an article for the Washington Post newspaper about how rereading is something that people are doing a lot of, just because you’ve already done the construction work in your mind of, of, of building the world. Rereading allows you to just visit.

Nalini: Yeah, I read that article. It’s fantastic, and I agree with –

Sarah: Oh, thank you!

Nalini: – with what you said. Yeah, that was really, really good, and I absolutely understand. I know that when I’m really stressed and I just want a, I need time out, I’m more likely to reread, because –

Sarah: Yeah!

Nalini: – there’s comfort in that, in knowing – and, and you know these people already, so it’s like hanging out with friends.

Sarah: Yes! Oh yeah!

Nalini: Yep. Yeah.

Sarah: So do you reread your own books sometimes? Does your writing work on you?

Nalini: Yes, absolutely! Yeah, yeah, like I was saying, you know –

Sarah: That’s so cool!

Nalini: Yeah, I just, I love it. I, I write what I want to read, and so sometimes I’m like, what should I read? And I read something I’ve written, and I might not read it all the way through, because obviously I know, like, my brain’s filling in what’s coming, because by the time I write a book, I’ve read it probably twenty, thirty times, so it’s all there in the memory banks. But I read my favorite bits, and sometimes I read the bits that just make me cry like a faucet and –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: You know, Blaze of Memory is really good for that. That’s, there’s a scene in there, I remember, I was sitting at the keyboard, and I’m just literally sobbing, and I’m like, oh no, the tears are going to get on my keyboard, and my keyboard’s going to short out, and –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: But I still go back and reread that scene, ‘cause I just, it just works. And sometimes I read the happy scenes. Or I’ll even read the short stories that I write for my newsletter, just, you know, because, yeah, like, I wrote it because it’s something I wanted to see, and –

Sarah: Yeah.

Nalini: – so I enjoy going back.

Sarah: You’re, you’re, if you’re writing your own catnip and it works on you, then by all means! Like, why not?

Nalini: Exactly! Exactly! You know, when I was a kid – this was pre-internet, so, and I didn’t know about – [laughs] – I didn’t know about fanfiction or anything – I used to make up, in my head, I would make up the ends, like, epilogues for books that I really loved; I would just keep going with the characters.

Sarah: Oh my God, me too!

Nalini: Yeah. So like writing my own mental fanfiction? So now I just write fanfiction for my own books, so it’s great. [Laughs]

Sarah: Okay, I love that. You’re creating fanfiction for your own book in your own world.

Nalini: [Laughs]

Sarah: Just having a good old time.

Nalini: That’s right. It’s fun! It’s fun.

Sarah: That’s – [laughs]. So you’ve created a world that is so entertaining and so enjoyable and so filled with all of your different strains of catnip that you basically never need to leave.

Nalini: Yeah! I can’t imagine not writing in this world, but you know, I, I joke about that, but I think at some point, if I feel like these characters and this world are exactly where they need to be, then I think I would make myself stop, because I think it would be worse to keep going with a watered-down version, if you know what I mean? I would –

Sarah: Yeah!

Nalini: Yeah. So, I mean, I don’t see that coming anytime soon. There’s so much in this world to explore, there’s so many stories and so many pathways to go down to see what lies at the end, but if I did ever get to that point, now, I hope I would have the strength to, to let go, you know.

Sarah: Yeah.

Nalini: I have attachment issues, but – [laughs] – but, yeah, yeah, I think, I, I do always keep that in the back of my mind: is it, are we reaching that point? And we haven’t yet, so I am free to go forth.

Sarah: Yeah, I don’t, I don’t, I don’t think you’ve reached that point –

Nalini: [Laughs]

Sarah: – not until you’re at least 195.

Nalini: Oh, there you go; I write it.

Sarah: Yeah, right? But also, you’ve created a world in which there are so many incredibly powerful entities trying to achieve some kind of coexistence and balance, and then equally powerful entities trying to not have harm-, harmony and balance, that there’s a lot of ways to explore all of the, all of the ways that shit can go terribly wrong!

Nalini: This is true! This is true, as we find out in Alpha Night. [Laughs]

Sarah: Yeah, exactly. Like, oh! Shit goes sideways in a hurry! Especially when you can kill somebody with your brain.

Nalini: That’s true, yeah. It’s, yeah, you’ve put it perfectly, basically. There’s, there’s so many powers –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: – pushing at this world. It’s like, how can you find equilibrium when there is no one power that is, you know, supreme? And in a way, that is the strength of the world, that there are –

Sarah: Oh, absolutely!

Nalini: But at the same time, how can they coexist? Which is the question of the series.

Sarah: Yeah!

Nalini: Yeah.

Sarah: Especially because half of the people – or not half, but a portion of the people who exist in the world, who achieve so much power, are doing so initially based on the idea that they shouldn’t have any emotions.

Nalini: Yes, exactly.

Sarah: So that part of the power balance is not having feelings, which is not a thing –

Nalini: Mm.

Sarah: – that you can really do!

Nalini: Well, they thought they could! And now the –

Sarah: Right!

Nalini: – you know, the chickens are coming home to roost, and –

Sarah: It didn’t work out so good!

Nalini: – we’re finding out – yeah! Yeah, so I’m just, I, I truly am as fascinated by this world as I was at the start when I started writing Slave to Sensation.

Sarah: Now, I – this is a bit unfair, because I didn’t send you this in advance, but has your understanding of psychology and emotions changed and evolved as you’ve been writing this world?

Nalini: Yeah, I think so. I think I have learned – I always did research, you know, from the start. I’ve done constant research, and I’m constantly learning, so yes. I think my understanding has gained more depth. I don’t think –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – what I understood then and what I understand now, there’s not been, like, a significant shift, but it’s more a case of depth and some subtlety and –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – having more knowledge and having spoken to more people who are experts, and yeah, yeah. For sure, it, as a writer, I am, I’m a big believer in growth, and part of growth is taking the time to become educated in various aspects of research that relate to the books I’m writing, so I am constantly, you know, reading. I read, I read a lot of nonfiction as well, and just constantly absorbing information about humanity and our psyches and the way our brains work. So yeah, for sure.

Sarah: Aarya, who is a rather, rather large fan of yours, which is a significant understatement, I asked her if she had anything that she wanted me to ask you about for this interview, and she wanted to know about the very deliberate explicit consent in Alpha Night – and no spoilers, obviously – because there’s –

Nalini: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – she’s, she pointed out, there’s always been consent in your books previously; it’s not as if you’re like, oh, consent! That’s a good idea! It’s always been there, but this scene was written with very specific consensual detail. What was your thought process while, while writing the consent in this book? Does it relate to the, to the idea of the knight to her queen?

Nalini: Exactly. Yeah, you’ve, it came from the character? So without spoiling it, the book, for anyone who hasn’t read it, Ethan’s history makes him a very sort of unique kind of character in some ways, and his belief that he is the knight to her queen, there’s a kind of, there’s a kind of almost obsessive devotion about it?

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: And as I’m writing that scene, you know, I was, I’m in his head, and, and I’m in her head, you know, at the same time – no matter which point of view I write in in the book, I’m always in both characters’ heads – and as I’m writing, I came to a sudden halt, because I thought, hold on. The way he thinks, the way he acts, would he understand consent in this kind of situation?

Sarah: Ohhh!

Nalini: Would his brain function that way to say that actually I can stop this no matter what she wants, even though she is my queen? Like, in that –

Sarah: Mm-hmm?

Nalini: – thinking process he was in?

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: And so I did have to consciously think about that, and at the same time, you know, I’m in Selenka’s head, and she’s also thinking the same thing. She’s having that sort of hitch, that moment, saying, hold on, hold on. Are we both on the same page here? Because she’s starting to understand how Ethan sees the world and how he sees their relationship. So it really, really came from the characters, particularly the character of Ethan, and, and that’s why it’s so explicit in this book, because for Ethan, he needs it to be that explicit?

Sarah: Yes.

Nalini: Yeah.

Sarah: Yes, it’s, it’s part of his growth and unders- – I’m trying to say this non-spoiler-y – it’s part of, it’s part of his understanding of, of, of growth and connection.

Nalini: Yes. It’s like there’s, there’s been certain massive gaps in Ethan’s life, even more so in –

Sarah: Oh, a few! Huh! [Laughs]

Nalini: Even more so than the other Arrows. I mean, the Arrows are not the most, had not the most stable sort of childhoods, but Ethan –

Sarah: No.

Nalini: – is even worse, you know?

Sarah: Yeah.

Nalini: And –

Sarah: And Arrows are not the most emotionally fluent creatures.

Nalini: No! [Laughs] No, I mean –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: And Ethan is just like, like, at one end of that, and he, he has had, you know, there are just certain things he just will not understand unless, you just have to be really, really open with them, and this was one of those situations where it was, they both had to be absolutely on the same page. And because of who Selenka is as well, if they weren’t on the same page, that would do so much damage to them both? And so it was really important to have that conversation on the page.

Sarah: Because how else is he going to understand it?

Nalini: Mm! Exactly.

Sarah: So Aarya also noticed that the definition and the, the limitations and boundaries of skin privileges has changed and evolved. Like you said, you learn nuance and depth of, of emotional connection, and it also seems to apply to, to the skin privileges, especially as connected to consent. Has that been, like, a, a conscious or deliberate adjustment in your worldbuilding? Is that something that you’ve consciously done, or is that something that’s grown with your understanding of physical and emotional connection?

Nalini: I think it’s a case of subconscious growth mostly? You know, Slave to Sensation I wrote in 2005, it’s published in 2006, so that’s, you know, fifteen years, and who I was fifteen years ago is not the same person I am now. I think that would hold for anyone, and the world is not the same world it was fifteen years ago, and so –

Sarah: No.

Nalini: Yeah. I think I’ve changed and hopefully become better as a human being over the years, and I’ve learned more, and I’ve understood more, and I think it’s inevitable that that shows up in the writing, and we’ve gone through all these things in the world where, you know, with the #MeToo movement, and not just that, but all the conversations we’ve been having over all those years, you know, big and small, and it’s had an effect, you know, on the way I write, and it’s not conscious for the most part. Like I said, with Ethan it was very conscious because of his characterization, but in general –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – I am a very instinctive writer. I tend to just fall into the story and fall into the emotions of the story and go with it, but I think all these things that have happened in the world, all the years I’ve lived in the world, the changes are going to happen. It’s, I think it happens with every writer, and in my case, it’s probably a little bit more trackable because I writing, I’m writing this big series that’s gone on for so long. I think my voice has stayed the same throughout my writing career, but probably my understanding of the world has deepened, and again, yeah, like we talked about, the depth and the subtlety of understanding of how people relate to each other and, yeah.

Sarah: You’re not going to stay in the same place, especially if you’re exploring a world that big.

Nalini: Exactly. I think it’s, it would be very unusual to, to be exactly the same writer, you know, fifteen books along or – it’s more than that now; I’m losing track – but –

[Laughter]

Nalini: But unless you are writing those books in very close proximity, and, and I haven’t, you know, been – over a decade, a decade and a half these books have been written, so hopefully I’ve matured in terms of –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – my, just my understanding of people and of emotions and, and all of those things, and they all feed into the work. I’m not, like, I’m not an autobiographical writer in any sense. I don’t sort of take real world events or real world things that have happened to me and put them in books, but I think all the things that happen to me, all the journeys I take in life, they’ll show up in the books in terms of how I relate to the characters and how they relate to each other, so –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – so that the, the changes in the background, you know, that’s subconscious and, but that’s where the stories come from, so it’s going to show up.

Sarah: Of course!

Nalini: Yeah.

Sarah: I notice that in, in your next release this year in, right now it’s scheduled for November – I don’t know if, if it’ll move or if it has moved – but I know that Archangel’s Sun –

Nalini: Mm-hmm!

Sarah: – is, is next on your release docket, and you’re, you’re writing about the Archangel of, of, of Death and the Archangel of Disease?

Nalini: [Laughs] Yeah.

Sarah: You need to chill! You’re telling me, oh no, I don’t, I don’t write autobiographically! No, not at all!

Nalini: Nooo!

Sarah: Okay, I, I, I beg to differ. [Laughs]

Nalini: It’s, like, that book was written like, yeah, like, everything was planned; I, I wrote the book; and –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: – all this stuff happened, and I was like, nobody’s going to want to read this book now, but – [laughs]

Sarah: No, I don’t think that’s true.

Nalini: But I have to tell you, it’s, it’s actually, it’s the aftermath of Archangel’s War –

Sarah: Right.

Nalini: – where this book is set, so, and it’s, it’s a surprisingly, I, I want to use the word “fun” book, despite of all the, the dark things that are happening, because, you know, Titus, the Archangel of Africa, he is the best! I love him so much.

[Laughter]

Nalini: And he is just, he just lights up the page. He takes over the page when he’s on it, and – but then we’ve got the Hummingbird, who is, she is also the best! These two are just, you just put them together and things go boom, and it’s –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: – I just, I just was like sitting there going, hee-hee-hee-hee-hee! And, while writing their interactions, and my, my editor basically just sent me, like, a whole row of exclamation marks after she –

Sarah: Aw!

Nalini: – she read them, so it’s, I just, I really hope readers, you know, love the book, because I just absolutely adore it. I think these two are just amazing together, and yeah. So despite all the, the darkness that’s going on in, in the Guild Hunter world, there’s, there’s, their characters just, you know, come off the page and are just, their interactions, I don’t even know what to call it. It’s some kind of chemistry, you know, but you’ll have to read to find out.

Sarah: [Sighs] Fine! Fine! Okay, sure.

[Laughter]

Sarah: So what are, aside from book release and, you know, talking with me, what are you working on right now?

Nalini: I’m currently working on my next New-Zealand-set thriller? So –

Sarah: [Gasps] Oooh!

Nalini: Yeah. So it’s going to be a little bit different again, and so these thrillers are all standalones? And it’s interesting; it’s, from a writing perspective, it’s a completely different structure in terms of the book. So with the first book I had to be more conscious about it and just make sure I wasn’t slipping into making it a romance, but this one, it feels more natural to just, you know, to stay in that thriller sort of mindset, and yeah, it’s fun! You know, it’s – [laughs] – I just, I, I will look up all kinds of things, and I’m, like, wondering if anyone’s, you know, following my internet search history, they’re going to think I’m a serial killer or something, but I’m not, I promise –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: – and – but yeah, it’s been fascinating. Because it’s set in New Zealand, I know the areas really well, and I live in a beautiful country, but there’s so much, you know, there’s so much danger there, if you look at it from that perspective, and –

Sarah: Mm-hmm!

Nalini: – so yeah, it’s, it’s really fun. So I’ve got my head down doing that at the moment; I’m doing the first draft –

Sarah: Ooh.

Nalini: – so, which is basically just telling myself the story. No one else ever reads my first drafts. I would not give it to anyone. And, but it’s critical for me? I call it, like, the skeleton – you know, this is the skeleton of the story – and I always, I’m not one of those people who can write, like, a few chapters and make them perfect and then write the next chapters? I just blurt out the whole thing. Doesn’t matter if it’s messy, if there’s typos, or if there’s gaps; the point is to get from the beginning to the end somehow –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – not necessarily sequentially, and yeah, so that’s where I’m – it’s quite fun. Yeah, I’m, I’m at the end of the first draft now, so I’m sort of writing obsessively, because I need to get to the big climax and how to make that happen. Yeah.

Sarah: And you know what happens in your books when you sit down to write them. You know sort of the major points. Am I remembering correctly?

Nalini: Yeah. I usually know the major plot. I’m not a big plotter or anything; I don’t sort of write stuff down. That’s a little bit different for the mysteries; with the mysteries, I do sit down and have a, more of a sort of structured think about it, but still, it’s more about characters usually? The one thing I do know with the thrillers always is, you know, who did it. Basically, what, what the answer is, because that helps me put all the little threads in place at the start, and that’s, yeah, that sort of is, that’s true for my, you know, my paranormal romances as well, because there’s always an overarching storyline, and so I always know that, and that holds everything together. And then I just go!

Sarah: In this thriller, I take it that the, the fact that if you’re stupid the land will kill you is an element to the story.

Nalini: Little bit; not as much in this, this one as in the last one, but the landscape will always be a part of these books for me, I think, because it is such an integral part of life –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – here? You know, I live in a city, but I get in my car and half an hour, I’m, I’m on a black sand beach with these massive waves and hardly any people, because they’re just, the beaches are endless, you know? So it’s just, the awareness of nature is just part of existence? So that comes through in the books as well, I think.

Sarah: And it’s also just such a part of Kiwi culture generally.

Nalini: It definitely is, absolutely. [Laughs] So one of the hardest things in quarantine I think for everyone has been, we were allowed to go for walks, which was great, but not being able to go out into the bush or go fishing or go climbing or, you know, jump off bridges –

Sarah: Oh yeah.

Nalini: – if that’s your thing –

[Laughter]

Nalini: So –

Sarah: What’s it called, is it tramping?

Nalini: Tramping, yeah. Yeah, tramping is –

Sarah: Yeah.

Nalini: – I think you guy, you would say hiking –

Sarah: Yeah.

Nalini: – but it’s not really – it’s rougher than hiking I guess, ‘cause there, there’s just so much bush in New Zealand that it’s not, there’s no path. You kind of have to make your own path, and I read a, a really good book recently called Bewildered by Laura Winters [Waters], I want to say, and it’s the journey, she, it’s the, nonfiction, and it’s about her journey from, along the Te Araroa trail, from the tip of the North Island to the tip of the South Island? And –

Sarah: That’s a walk. Whoa!

Nalini: It’s massive; it’s like months and months, but when we say trail?

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: It’s not necessarily like, like, you know, she’s literally swimming across rivers, and you kind of have to find your own way through the mountains and, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s a really good book, but it kind of shows you the amount of wilderness that is still present here? And what it takes to sort of go into it.

Sarah: Yeah, and it’s, and it’s staggeringly beautiful.

Nalini: It is; it’s so beautiful. I’ve, you know, I’ve, I do a lot of traveling, but I keep coming back to here and thinking it is really one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever seen in the world, yeah.

Sarah: And, and that’s high praise, ‘cause you were born in Fiji, which is not ugly.

Nalini: No! I mean, Fiji is a different kind of beauty altogether, you know? It’s, it’s one of these things where you can’t really compare, ‘cause New Zealand has, has the Southern Alps, you know. It’s got the snow; it’s got the mountains and rivers and forest, whereas Fiji has got the tropical beaches, you know –

Sarah: Yep.

Nalini: – the tropical ocean where the, where the water color is, it’s so clear that you can see, like –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – little, colorful, tropical fish. You can just stand on the beach and the tropical fish will swim around your feet. Yeah, so it, it really is like a brochure.

[Laughter]

Nalini: So – sometimes, you know, you see those travel brochures, and then you turn up and it’s, it’s, like, disappointing? Yeah, no. Go to one of the –

Sarah: No.

Nalini: – Fijian beaches, and you’d be like, wow, what am I even doing here? It’s not even real. But, yeah, it’s just a, different kinds of beauty? I think New Zealand is more of that raw, sort of untamed, really almost harsh beauty?

Sarah: Yeah.

Nalini: Yeah.

Sarah: Yeah, I had to do a layover in Fiji, just in the airport, and I remember watching the sun come up at the airport, and I was like, oh my gosh, even the view from the airport is pretty.

Nalini: [Laughs]

Sarah: What is this country? What is this crap? [Laughs]

Nalini: Yeah, with, with the palm trees and –

Sarah: Yeah!

Nalini: Yeah. The one thing I always remember when I go to Fiji is when you walk off the, the airplane bridge and the wave of heat that just hits you –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: – soon as you get off the plane, because –

Sarah: It’s like a wall!

Nalini: It’s like a wall. You walk into this heat, and it’s this humid heat. I mean, after a while you get, you know, acclimatized to it, but I just –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – that’s one of my, okay, I’m – and because I grew up there, I have the same feeling when I go there and when I come back to New Zealand, which is that, oh, I’m home, you know? Feels like home, and it’s –

Sarah: Aw!

Nalini: – two completely different countries, and yet the feeling is so familiar in both places?

Sarah: Yeah.

Nalini: Yeah.

Sarah: Do you feel the same way when you go back to Japan? I know you lived there for a while.

Nalini: Yeah, it’s funny; I haven’t been back since I returned home to New Zealand, but when I used to travel, like when I was living in Japan and I’d come to New Zealand and then go back, I would have that same feeling as well? That feeling, feeling of familiarity and being home and just normal? Everything normal.

Sarah: Yeah.

Nalini: I don’t know if it would still happen, because it’s been so long since I’ve been back.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: But I do know that I have these moments where something will happen that’ll remind me of Japan, and I do have those very sort of nostalgic and warm feelings about it, so –

Sarah: Yeah.

Nalini: – it might. You know, I might step off a plane and be like, wow, this just feel so right? Yeah.

Sarah: Yeah. So I always ask this: what are you reading that you want to tell people about?

Nalini: Okay, so, like, I made a list, because I knew we would talk about this?

Sarah: This is why I like you!

Nalini: [Laughs] So recently I’ve been really into, like, the British police procedurals?

Sarah: Ooh!

Nalini: Where it’s – I don’t know, do you guys get, like, Vera and Shetland, those kind of shows in the US?

Sarah: We can get them through different streaming services. Definitely Shetland, yes.

Nalini: Yeah, so it’s, you know, I like that kind of, I don’t want to say, it’s almost a, the pace is different in the British –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – police procedurals. It’s a very sort of, solving the mystery and, you know, all the characters and –

Sarah: Yes!

Nalini: Yeah, it’s just –

Sarah: They’re almost cozy, but not quite!

Nalini: Not quite, yeah. And there’s no sort of, they’re not gory, you know? They’re –

Sarah: No.

Nalini: – they’re more, it’s about the solving of the mystery, but one author I recently found is Paul Gitsham, and he writes the DCI Warren Jones series, and I’ve just glommed them. Like, I just – like, he has, you know, there’s the detective, and then he’s got his, his cast of, like his sergeant and the other inspectors around him, and, and it’s, I’m just loving the series, so I’ve just been going nom, nom, nom and working my way through them.

The other one I read recently is Ann Cleeves’ The Long Call, and Ann Cleeves is the writer behind Shetland, so they’re based off her books, and the books are fantastic as well. I love her as a writer.

So those are my two British ones. And currently I’m listening to the audiobook of Mia Sosa’s The Worst Best Man, and I just started that yesterday, and I’m already, I am already fully on the side of the heroine, Lina.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: I’m like, yeah. So that’s all I’ll say for the moment, but yeah, it’s, I’m having fun with that one.

And up, up next, shall I tell you about my TBR?

Sarah: Oh, please do.

Nalini: Okay, so I’m, I’ve got Martha Wells’ Network Effect –

Sarah: Ooh!

Nalini: – and that’s part of the Murderbot Diaries?

Sarah: I, I’m reading that next! I’m so excited!

Nalini: I am so, that is such a good series, right? [Laughs]

Sarah: It’s so good! I was thinking of it when you were talking about rereading. Like, I just went through the first four Murderbot novellas, ‘cause once you’ve one, read one, you kind of get it?

Nalini: Yeah.

Sarah: And it’s such a unique point of view, but I’m, like, so excited about the book, oh my God.

Nalini: Oh, I can’t wait. I’ve been, I – so, for some reason I read the first novella, like, in audiobook, and I just really loved the narrator, so I’ve got the audi-, I’ve ended up reading most of, you know, the previous novellas in audio, and –

Sarah: Ohhh!

Nalini: – so I’ve gotten Network Effect in audio as well, because I just, I think the narrator is just brilliant, and yeah, so I can’t wait to have Murderbot’s voice in my head again.

Sarah: Oh! I’m going to have to try the audio; that sounds really good.

Nalini: Yeah, you should try it. He does such a good job, you know, ‘cause the character has this sort of, you know, he has that sarcastic, sort of dry, I don’t know –

Sarah: Yes.

Nalini: – that voice, and it just comes through in the audio, and it’s, yeah, so good.

And then on my TBR I’ve also got Lucy Parker’s Headliners and Sonali Dev’s Recipe for Persuasion, and I just had an anthology pop into my Kindle, and I hadn’t real-, I, I forgot I ordered it? So this is great!

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: This is like a great surprise. I think I saw, like, a promo on Twitter, and I just thought, that sounds like my kind of thing, and it’s He’s Come Undone by Emma Barry, Olivia Dade, Cat Sebastian, Adriana Herrera, and Ruby Lang, and yeah, it just looks really fun, so I’m looking forward to that.

I’ve also got couple of things that I’ve said I’d read to see if I would, you know, blurb them, like, give the book a blurb, and that’s always fun, especially when it’s debuts, because I go in with no preconceptions, and, you know, and I always hope that I will love it, because it’s really nice to be able to, to do something for a debut author?

Oh, and I have two more that I want to mention, and these I read –

Sarah: Please do.

Nalini: – previously, but I, they’re coming out soonish, I think. One’s in May and one’s in June, so keep an eye out for them. The first is Farrah Rochon’s The Boyfriend Project, where these three women, they find out that this one guy is, like, three-timing them, and they end up gang-, you know, ganging up on him in a restaurant, and it goes viral? Like, someone tweets it –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Nalini: – and it goes viral. It’s good fun.

And then Kwana Jackson’s Real Men Knit, which is about a group of men who inherit the knitting store that their mother ran and loved, and, you know, it’s in trouble, and they have to save it, and it’s just, just got such a beautiful heart, that book, and it’s fun. I mean, it’s really romantic, and it’s fun as well, and I was just really into it, and I want to know about the other characters, especially there’s this one character, this one brother who is so worried about his sheets!

Sarah: [Laughs]

Nalini: His high-thread-count sheets that they dared to sleep on, and he’s just fabulous. He’s just totally stiff and, you know, just, you just want to see him unravel, so yeah!

So, and I’ve got so many more. Like, I’ve got Rebekah Weatherspoon. I loved Rafe. I read it last year, I think, and I’ve got a bunch of her books sort of lined up that I want to dive into as well? And I could just keep going, because the TBR is endless!

Sarah: Yeah, that’s the nice thing with digital books, though: they don’t take up much space.

Nalini: Yeah. I have to say, though, I just did – [laughs] – I just did a massive order with my local indie, just Chapter. I’m really lucky; Chapter in Auckland is, like, a romance-specific bookstore?

Sarah: Oooh!

Nalini: And, and, yeah, so, and I really, really like print as well, so I’ve just done a big order of books with Chapter, and, yeah, I can’t wait to get them!

[Laughter]

Nalini: Even though I have no room on my bookshelves; I’ll find space somewhere!

Sarah: Yeah! Yeah, you’ll find it.

Nalini: [Laughs]

[music]

Sarah: And that brings us to the end of this week’s episode. Thank you again for hanging out with me, thank you to Nalini for hanging out with me as well, and thank you to our Patreon community for making the show possible and making sure that every episode has a transcript.

The Patreon community is truly an excellent group of human beings, and if you’d like to join them, have a look at patreon.com/SmartBitches!

I will have links to every book that was mentioned, do not worry, and I will have links to some of the recipes, too, including that recipe for the chocolate cupcakes with the peanut butter? Yeah. I’m going to make those very soon. Very, very soon.

I have a joke. I always have a joke. This one’s really bad, because here in my world, it is the last week of online schooling, so my children are very excited. I figured a math joke would be a good idea, because a bad joke is great, but a bad math joke is exquisite. So are you ready? Here we go.

If puns make you numb, what do math puns make you?

They make you number.

[Laughs] It’s so dumb! I love it so much! Thank you to /ikennaezeee on Reddit for that one. That made me snort-laugh.

On behalf of everyone here, I wish you the very best of reading. I hope that you and yours are safe and sound. And I will see you back here next week for more podcast and more really bad jokes. Thank you again for joining me; it’s an honor to be in your eardrums.

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

[soothing music]