584. Queer Pirate Decolonization Fantasy with Maggie Tokuda-Hall

[music]

Sarah Wendell: Hello and welcome to episode number 584 of Smart Podcast, Trashy Books. I’m Sarah Wendell, and my guest today is Maggie Tokuda-Hall. She has been a guest before, when her first book came out. It was called The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea, and it was released in May 2020, and she’s coming back to talk about the sequel, The Siren, the Song, and the Spy, and many of the things that have changed since the last book came out in May 2020. We also talk about her experience with Scholastic regarding her book Love in the Library, and we talk about Baldur’s Gate and queer pirate fantasy; you know, the usual. I really love when people come back to talk about the sequel, and I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did.

Hello and thank you to our Patreon community, who keep me going, who make sure that every episode is transcribed by garlicknitter – hi, garlicknitter! [Hi, Sarah and all my readers! – gk] – and making sure that every episode is accessible to everyone. If you subscribe to the Patreon, you get bonus episodes; you get a fantastically warm, welcoming, and fun Discord where we’re currently talking about things that aren’t soup and how to make good chili; and also you get full scans of the RT magazines that we will be recapping in coming-up episodes. So definitely have a look at patreon.com/SmartBitches.

And speaking of good things, I had a cool experience! This is a nice piece of news: rephonic.com ranked this show as one of the twelve best author-interview podcasts. Wow, thank you! Thank you to Lyn McNamee – I hope I said that right – who put Smart Podcast, Trashy Books on the list alongside things like Nerdette from WBEZ Chicago? That’s bonkers, ‘cause they are professional grade. But I’m also extremely flattered because I have tried very hard to improve my interviewing skills with each conversation, so being featured on a list like that means a lot; thank you. I will put a link in the show notes so you can take a look at the other author-interview podcasts, and thank you again to rephonic.com.

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All right, it’s time to do this podcast. You know, you, you come for the discussion of dismantling fascism, and then you stay for the videogame and book recommendations, because that’s how we roll. On with the podcast.

[music]

Maggie Tokuda-Hall: I’m Maggie Tokuda-Hall. I’m a children’s and Young Adult book author, and I also keep a podcast called Failure to Adapt that’s about book-to-film adaptations.

Sarah: You know, it’s really funny that you mention that, because I just now got an email from a reader of my site who is a professional stagecraft person that works specifically with wigs? And –

Maggie: Oh, cool!

Sarah: – she just needed to tell me how mad she was about the Pride and Prejudice adaptation in 2005 because Keira Knightley’s hair had been cut very short for a role, and so they put her in wigs –

Maggie: Oh!

Sarah: – but you can see the short parts of her hair sticking out, especially from the back, and she’s like, I just want, like, five minutes with some Dippity-Do gel, and I just want to fix her hair, every time!

Maggie: I have watched that movie eight hundred times, and I never noticed.

Sarah: You can really see it – so you know the scene where –

Maggie: I kind of don’t want to know! [Laughs]

Sarah: Okay! Well then I won’t tell you! ‘Cause I love that movie; that is my plane movie.

Maggie: Yeah!

Sarah: That movie lives on my phone –

Maggie: Yeah!

Sarah: – and if, like, there’s turbulence or I’m next to somebody on a plane that’s like really bumming me out, I put that on, and suddenly I’m just so relaxed!

Maggie: Yeah!

Sarah: It’s like –

Maggie: It’s a happy place!

Sarah: It’s visual Ambien for me, yeah.

Maggie: Yeah! I think I don’t want to know just ‘cause I love the movie so much and –

Sarah: That’s fine!

Maggie: – I don’t want, next time I watch it, to be like, Oh, there it is.

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: And then to not be able to unsee it.

Sarah: Okay, then, I’m going to protect you from this knowledge –

Maggie: [Laughs]

Sarah: – ‘cause the movie cannot lose its power; it’s very important.

Maggie: Yeah, yeah.

Sarah: So we last talked in May of 2020!

Maggie: Mm-hmm!

Sarah: It’s been a while. A few things have happened.

Maggie: …Yeah!

Sarah: Some things have gone on. I remember you telling me at that time that you had just had a child, and your parents were visiting through the living room window?

Maggie: Mm-hmm!

Sarah: And they would wave, and they couldn’t come in ‘cause it was pandemic time?

Maggie: My baby zoo. We used to call it baby zoo.

Sarah: Baby zoo!

[Laughter]

Sarah: So first, I’m going to presume that your parents have met the child in person now.

Maggie: Both of them! Yeah. Now there’s two!

Sarah: Oh, you’ve got two now! There have been developments!

Maggie: [Laughs] Yeah! Yeah, and they don’t have to visit them through a window anymore, which is nice.

Sarah: Which is very nice, I imagine –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – both for them and for you!

Maggie: Yeah, yeah.

Sarah: So in addition to a sequel baby – congratulations! –

Maggie: Yeah! [Laughs]

Sarah: – you also have a sequel book!

Maggie: Yes!

Sarah: Which labor was harder?

Maggie: Oh gosh!

Sarah: [Laughs]

Maggie: You know, drafting The Siren, the Song, and the Spy was such a delight, but then editing it was such a, like, monster? Like, I hated editing it, which is wild, ‘cause I had loved drafting it so much. And I hated being pregnant. My, like, second pregnancy was so rough, but then the actual labor was so easy? So I feel like it’s kind of a wash –

Sarah: Yep.

Maggie: – like they’re kind of even.

Sarah: Yeah!

Maggie: Yeah. [Laughs]

Sarah: That sounds very even.

So what will readers find inside this book? We know what we find inside a baby. Cute coos and vomit and poop; that kind of –

Maggie: Like, internal organs? Oh, okay. [Laughs]

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: Gosh, like, revenge, redemption, revolution, spotted hyenas, ‘cause they’re my favorite animal, and I have always wanted to have a fantasy novel with them in, and so there’s –

Sarah: If you’re writing fantasy, why not put hyenas in?

Maggie: Honestly, like, ‘cause they’re social animals, and so there’s these people that we meet where all the warriors keep them as their familiars? So they, like, go into battle with them, but they also just, like, hang out with them all the time, which is my ideal? [Laughs] And a dragon and a siren who wants to eat you. All the characters from book one come back for book two, but it is not really Flora or Florian and Evelyn’s story anymore. It’s Genevieve, who you might remember as Lady’s,  like, handmaid? And like two new characters who are of that group that, of the Wariuta, this group that have the spotted hyenas and live on the Shore and are currently resisting colonization from this sort of like major group.

Sarah: That’s very cool! Now, from my point of view, which, you know, may not be as fully informed across every single book community, ‘cause I know each –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – each genre has a community; it’s not like there’s just one group of book people.

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: It seems to me like it’s a little easier now in 2023 to communicate queer pirate fantasy with decolonization themes –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – to readers than it was in 2020.

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: Do you think that’s true?

Maggie: Yes.

Sarah: Yeah?

Maggie: And I know exactly why. Thanks, Our Flag Means Death! [Laughs]

Sarah: Yeah!

Maggie: Like…

Sarah: I mean, that has to be it!

Maggie: Yeah, it was it. Like, The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea was doing fine, and then that book happe-, or that show happened, and everyone was like, Well, where do I get more queer pirates with anti-colonization themes? And I was like, I’ve been here this whole time!

[Laughter]

Maggie: And so I am very grateful for Taika Waititi for doing that, ‘cause it, like, gave my book a whole second life, and it was very easy ‘cause it was like, Do you like Jim? Is Jim your favorite character? Well, have I got the character for you!

Sarah: Yeah. Their flag means death, but your flag means sales!

Maggie: Yeah! [Laughs] So specifically that. Like, it, it was wild how quickly queer pirates became, like, a thing people were looking for?

Sarah: Yep.

Maggie: Which is, when I wrote this book I was like, this is so weird, and I don’t know who’s going to care. And so, yeah, it, it is much easier, ‘cause now I can just say, Did you like Our Flag Means Death? And if you’re like, Yes! I’m like, Great, I’ve got a book for you; and if you’re like, No, I’m like, This conversation is over.

[Laughter]

Sarah: I have nothing to say to you, thanks very much. I’m going to –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – bag my own groceries and get out.

Maggie: Yeah, exactly. [Laughs]

Sarah: It must have been a little surreal watching that show and thinking, Wow, wait, I’m not the only one who is into, like, campy queer pirate with, with subversive themes? Like, I’m not the only one?

Maggie: I was so excited.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Maggie: One of – it was actually Annalee Newitz, who was one of the beta readers on The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea, was like, I just started this new show, and Maggie, you specifically are going to love it. And that, like, it took me like five minutes, and I mean, that show has such a sense of humor that is not central to The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea. Like, it’s more of a comedy than anything else, but it is aesthetically everything that I have ever wanted, and I am delighted.

Sarah: [Laughs] And others too, so when we have, when, when Our Flag Means Death’s next season comes out, you’ve, like, Well, speaking of sequel –

Maggie: It is wrong to be more excited about that than my own sequel? [Laughs]

Sarah: No, I don’t think so.

Maggie: I saw the still of Minnie Driver in it? Yeah!

Sarah: What?

Maggie: Yeah. Yeah.

Sarah: [Gasps]

Maggie: They really, they’re adding like three new women characters to the show, which my only complaint about season one was like I could have done with some more women, right? You know, like –

Sarah: Absolutely!

Maggie: And they heard us, and I am so excited!

Sarah: Oh my God, I just looked up the picture. Holy crap!

Maggie: Yeah, it’s very hot. It’s very, like –

Sarah: Oh my God!

Maggie: Yeah, she looks fantastic! And –

Sarah: They have done with her costume the thing that I love when you can tell someone has thought about what sexiness can be? Like, you saw this –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – I saw this with, with – red and blue hair, Batman villain girl –

Maggie: Harley Quinn.

Sarah: Thank you. God, my brain was just not getting there. I was going to be like, The one played by Barbie!

Maggie: Yeah, in Birds of Prey.

Sarah: You can, you can see the difference in Harley Quinn between a movie that had a very male gaze and then this, the movie that she was in charge of, which had a very female gaze. She was no less sexy.

Maggie: So sexy.

Sarah: So sexy! But wearing more clothes! Like, there was –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – no chance of chafing with her outfits that she would choose in the second movie, but you, you, you still knew what the character was.

Maggie: She could see down on the subway in that outfit –

Sarah: Right?

Maggie: – which I think is a real improvement, without, like, fear of labia poppage.

Sarah: [Laughs] Labia poppage is definitely a worry here.

Maggie: Yeah!

Sarah: And with the, with the Minnie Driver costume, first of all, it’s cleavage for days. She’s wearing a corset –

Maggie: It’s masterful cleave.

Sarah: She’s wearing a corset –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – she’s got green and pants, but her sleeves go all the way down past her elbows? She’s wearing trousers? Like, she is covered but holy-shit hot.

Maggie: My dream woman, yes, correct.

Sarah: Right?

Maggie: [Laughs] You know. Yeah, she looks incredible. I’m very excited. I mean, I think they, the costumes on that show are like their own character and are so much fun? And –

Sarah: Oh my gosh, yes.

Maggie: – I’m just excited to see it on more femme bodies.

Sarah: Oh, it’s, this is incredible. Thank you for bringing this into my day! I’m just going to be –

Maggie: You’re welcome!

Sarah: – floating around in delight about Minnie Driver in that outfit. Don’t worry; I will put a link –

Maggie: Yeah, thanks.

Sarah: – in the show notes. [Laughs]

Maggie: Yeah, it’s important. [Laughs]

Sarah: It is important; it’s very important!

What are you noticing about this release compared to the first book in addition to the familiarity with queer pirate fantasy and decolonization themes in Our Flag Means Death? Are there any other differences or similarities that you’re noticing as you start talking about this book?

Maggie: I mean, it’s, it’s kind of like an awkward position to promote a sequel, and so the general advice that I had been given by other writers is just to talk about your first book and make sure that everyone has read that?

Sarah: Ohhh!

Maggie: And then the sequel kind of goes from there, and be like, And then there’s more when you like it! So –

Sarah: Oh, that is very good advice!

Maggie: Yeah! And so, so no; in a lot of ways it’s very much the same task, ‘cause I’m still in the same world. I’m still, you know, kind of peddling the same content in a lot of ways. I’m more excited for after the book comes out. I feel like this book asks really different questions than book one did? And one of the most gratifying experiences of writing The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea was talking with readers afterward and hearing the different ways that they interpreted things and that they felt it applied to their own lived reality of whatever it was, and so, you know, book one is so much about your first romantic love and finding yourself.

And the second book is about, like, every other kind of love? Like, there’s like love between a mother and daughter, love between your mentor and you, you and your niche and a sibling; all these different ways that love can manifest –

Sarah: Your pet.

Maggie: – and have –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: And your pet –

Together: Yeah.

Maggie: That’s important. Your familiar, really.

Sarah: Familiar!

Maggie: They’re like, they’re like a team. It’s less like a –

Sarah: Familiar.

Maggie: – dog, more like a teammate who doesn’t speak the same language as you. [Laughs]

Yeah, so, like – [sighs] – I, I always knew I wanted to write the sequel, and I wasn’t sure when The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea was first out if I was going to get to. It was contingent on that book’s success –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – and so, so much of what I was doing in book one was leading to this place, and so I’m just really excited to, like, finally get to talk to readers about what I was, what was at the heart of all of it the whole time, which was, what does justice look like for a nation that has, like, colonized the world? And what does that look like personally?

Sarah: Yeah. I can’t imagine why that’s relevant.

Maggie: No, I can’t either! [Laughs]

Sarah: To anything that is happening in the place where we live.

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: What types of questions and responses did you get from readers to the first book that were most memorable for you?

Maggie: I got a fair few of people who came out as genderfluid after reading it –

Sarah: Oh, wow!

Maggie: – where they just didn’t know that was an option and that they were allowed to do that?

Sarah: Wow.

Maggie: And that made me really, like, tearful and, like, happy, ‘cause I feel like literature is doing its job at its best when it makes people feel less alone?

Sarah: Yes!

Maggie: That makes me, like, very emotional every time. But I also had people who, like, who came in with interpretations that I just didn’t see coming?

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Maggie: [Laughs] And that was also really gratifying, ‘cause it reminds you that once a book is published it’s not yours anymore; it’s everyone who reads it –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – gets to own it, and then whatever they took away from it is correct. It’s not my place to tell them that that wasn’t what my intention was or anything like that. And so there were a few of those that I thought were, like, really exciting and cool.

Gosh, like, I think in general, like, people not realizing that genderfluid was an option –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – was probably my happiest takeaway, and that came from people who weren’t necessarily genderfluid themselves as well. I got a few, you know, notes from, like, educators or older people who’d picked up the book ‘cause it has a nice cover –

Sarah: It has a great cover!

Maggie: – and they just like fantasy.

Sarah: Yeah!

Maggie: You know, like, whatever it was, and they’re like, Oh, I didn’t, I didn’t know that this could happen, and I was like, Yes.

Sarah: Yes.

Maggie: [Laughs] I was so happy for you that this was, you know –

Sarah: And that is also –

Maggie: – a learning moment.

Sarah: Unfortunately, that is also a very timely introduction, because so many people are trying to limit what readers are exposed to in terms of, yes, this is a thing, and it’s real –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – and, and it –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – and it can be you, and you can be this, and it is okay.

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: Yet again, your, your – so, do you play the lottery every day?

Maggie: Hmm?

Sarah: With your ability to, like, predict things just before they happen?

Maggie: [Laughs]

Sarah: So you release a book –

Maggie: Almost!

Sarah: – and it’s Our Flag Means Death, and then –

Maggie: [Laughs]

Sarah: – you release these books that really introduce people to a fantasy world with genderfluidity at a time –

Maggie: Well –

Sarah: – when that is endangered. Do, do, do, like –

Maggie: I feel like this is where I’m just, like, so deep in the fantasy world that, like, by the time I wrote it I was late to the game –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Maggie: – right? Like –

Sarah: That’s true! That is true!

Maggie: You know, like, I, I was hardly the first person to have, like, a genderqueer character; it just happens to be that not everybody is living and breathing in queer sci-fi and fantasy, and so –

Sarah: Yep.

Maggie: – it’s possible still that my book could be the first time that they confront that idea –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – but it’s hardly the first time in the market, right? Like –

Sarah: No, not in the least –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – especially not in fantasy.

Maggie: Exactly! Like –

Sarah: Especially not in fantasy for YA readers, too. [Laughs]

Maggie: Yeah, yeah! So, like, to me, when I wrote it, I kind of thought I was doing, I was maybe toward the front but not in the vanguard –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – of, like, anything to do with this stuff. Like – and I was playing so much with specific tropes that I have loved from fantasy but that hewed really closely to a, a binary understanding of gender, like boy, girl pretends to be a boy for survival! And it was like, it’s one of my most favorite tropes, but, like, what does that do in a world where we understand that gender isn’t actually binary? And so, you know, in some ways I liked to think I was thinking forward, but the fact of the matter is, like, I was medium to late to the game.

[Laughter]

Sarah: And yet your books have managed to hit right before a big trend shift, and –

Maggie: Yeah!

Sarah: – that’s pretty amazing.

Maggie: Yeah, I suppose so! Yeah, I hadn’t thought about it that way, but that’s kind of lovely to think about.

Sarah: Yeah! Especially the idea that someone’s going to read in your book about something they didn’t know there was a name for.

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: That’s, that’s the thing that always gets me, that a reader will discover a book and be like, Wait, that’s a thing and it has a name, and now I know what to look for, and now I know what to ask the internet to give me information for, and this, this is a thing? Like, this has a name?

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: There’s probably a Dewey decimal number that I could – wow!

Maggie: [Laughs]

Sarah: There’s a, this is a thing? That is always – I think that is one of the most powerful and gratifying things about reading, especially fiction.

Maggie: Yeah, yeah.

Sarah: Now, when we spoke in 2020, you had just had a baby; now you have two. And –

Maggie: Mm-hmm!

Sarah: – with this book, you are writing about young people, and the previous book, too, you’re writing about young people who are figuring out who they are, how they want to be in the world, and how they want to figure out their own lives, while also trying to build a better world for themselves in the future. Like –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – it’s, it’s one thing to figure out your identity and to figure out how you want to move in the world; it’s another thing to be like, And I’m going to change the world too! Big tasks –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – lot of to-do lists.

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: Do you have a lot of hope for younger generations behind us to do the same?

Maggie: Huh. I think I have to. Otherwise, there’s, like, nothing.

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: There’s, like – [laughs] – on a good day I’m like, Yeah, absolutely, easy-peasy. They’re going to change everything. But I think if that was true, this – if sudden and immediate change were possible, then we would have made it, right? Like –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Maggie: – it would have happened already. This is not for lack of previous generations trying or caring or being passionate enough –

Sarah: No.

Maggie: – or strong enough. Every generation of people, I think, is like equally strong, right? Like, and equally whatever. Like, it’s, we’re just all kind of making our slow, incremental changes as best we can. What I worry about for our future generation is that instead of making the necessary progress that would make their lives better, they’re going to be relegated to fighting against regressive policies, and that’s where all the energy will go, and, and then that’s necessary and awful work, but what a fucking waste of an incredible generation that is clearly ready for something so much better.

Sarah: Oh, it’s so true.

Maggie: I don’t know. I think today I happen to feel a little – [laughs] – pessimistic about it? Like, the, the increments are coming too slowly, and I feel sad for the young adults and the children right now who maybe are queer and don’t have that language yet and are having the books that help them be the healthiest, happiest, wisest versions of themselves taken away from them?

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: And I don’t know what the long tail of that looks like, but I do suspect that book-banning is really myopic and that these kids will find that language, and they will fucking hate the people who did this to them.

Sarah: Oh yes, the pendulum is –

Maggie: And so, like –

Sarah: – going to go Whoosh! Back the other way.

Maggie: Yeah, exactly! And so, like, I just wish it wasn’t going to take that long. Like, I wish to not put them through that, and, like, I don’t know. I think part of it’s that I’m a parent now and I’m very aware of how it is solely the adult responsibility to fix these fucking problems –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Maggie: – and I see how insurmountable it is. And it is not for lack of my passion, strength, or interest in these things –

Sarah: No.

Maggie: – and commitment to it, but – and even within my own community it’s difficult to really advocate for a lot of these things and be heard and, like, win every time, right?

Sarah: Oh yeah. Yeah.

Maggie: And so – [laughs] – I hope, I hope, I hope things will get better, and it seems like we’re trending that way in some ways, but I think if we ignored the global rise of sort of regressive totalitarianism –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – we’re kidding ourselves. Like, it’s not just the United States. I, every time someone’s like, I’m going to move to Canada! I’m like, Do you think this shit’s not contagious?

Sarah: It’s so contagious!

Maggie: You know what’s going on in Edmonton there right now? Like – [laughs] – they got their own Nazis! We have a lot of reckoning to do.

Sarah: Oh, just a little! But also –

Maggie: [Laughs]

Sarah: – at the same time, I know, as a parent of teenagers, I am so hopeful because, like you mentioned, vocabulary and being able to –

Maggie: Mm-hmm!

Sarah: – name things, they are not only confident naming things, but they are very confident talking about things. Like, all of my –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – my sixteen-year-old’s friends, they all talk about therapy and they talk about their therapists, and, and so I have a lot of hope for the generations who can name and activate things and, and actually make specific plans and progress because they know what it –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – what, what it’s called, and they have a common language? But –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – like you said, the, the generation that is poised to do so much is also the generation that’s contending with these horribly regressive policies.

Maggie: Yeah. It’s a gross moment right now.

Sarah: It, it really is. I do want to ask – speaking of regressive policies –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – and experiences, I want to ask you about –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – Love in the Library! How is it, how’s it doing?

Maggie: It’s doing okay.

Sarah: Yaaay!

Maggie: It’s still like a quiet little picture book kind of chugging along.

Sarah: And how are you doing?

Maggie: It’s – I’m fine. I feel like I should give context, which is that Love in the Library is the true story my maternal grandparents, who met in a Japanese incarceration camp during World War II in Idaho called Minidoka, where my grandmother was the camp librarian, and every day my grandfather would go in and check out books he had no intention of reading so that he could go flirt with her. They fell in love under this kind of like awful backdrop of virulent racism. So that’s that story. [Laughs] And it’s a picture book; it’s intended for like first grade through fifth grade, really.

Sarah: Yeah. Did you expect, when you posted your story about your Faustian bargain with Scholastic, as you called it, did you expect it to go as wildly viral as it did?

Maggie: No. I – so Scholastic’s education division made me an offer to license the book, which would have been great for me and the book and getting it into classrooms, which is where I intended it to go, but they wanted to take the words “virulent racism” out of my Author’s Note and delete an entire paragraph situating what had happened to them in the context of American history and being clear that, like, this still happens, this kind of racist policy. And I said No, and I was really grossed out and offended, and I decided to say No publicly, because I suspected, and was correct, that I was not the only author being asked to do these kinds of things in the wave of this new, like, kind of rising culture of book bans that’s happening right now.

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: And I thought at best it would create an intra-community discussion where authors could talk to their agents about things that they were being asked that they didn’t feel comfortable with, and even agents and editors to get together and talk about, like, well, what’s even appropriate to ask here? And, like, you know, just to be frank about what was going on. And instead it turned into, like, a much larger thing, and for about two months my entire life was just sort of talking about Love in the Library and book censorship and, like, why this would be an inappropriate thing to do. Why did I decide to go public? Why? Why, why, why, why, why? Like, all the time.

And I was pretty shocked, because there are much more damning examples of book banning happening right now, but I think part of the reason that my story caught on the way that it did is that I am, like, a nice cisgender lady, and I am not Black. My voice mattered more in that moment because of so many structures of racism and prejudice, and I was kind of shocked because of that, and so I really took the responsibility of being asked to advocate for a really wide community really seriously?

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: And so when Scholastic came back to me and they were like, Okay, here’s the deal: we will license your book without any edits. Good? And I was like, Well, no, because I wanted to know what they were going to do to make sure that they never did this to another marginalized author ever again? I wanted to know, you know, what they were doing to kind of combat book bans, ‘cause that was ultimately what this was about, and because I’m petty, I wanted to know it had happened. Right?

Sarah: I mean, that’s not petty!

Maggie: I mean, okay, yes. I was trying to come at it at the time, at the, from like the perspective of reformative justice instead of, like, punitive justice?

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: I’m not interested in punishing them; I just want to make things better –

Sarah: Right.

Maggie: – for the community. Right?

Sarah: And if you know how it happened, then you can say –

Maggie: Exactly.

Sarah: – Okay, if these are the things that caused this to happen, that’s, then –

Maggie: Yes.

Sarah: – there’s going to be points of intervention that we can –

Maggie: Sure.

Sarah: – do differently! For sure.

Maggie: Yes! Yes! That is also true. Also ‘cause I was just like, What the fuck?

[Laughter]

Sarah: Like, this seemed like – this was such a whiff on their part! Like, it is such a massive miss. Like, what?!

Maggie: Their first apology was, This isn’t our policy to do this, but good news! Going forward, this will, it will be our policy not to do this! And I was like, What does that mean? Like, what – and so when I met with them – ‘cause I met with, like, the CEO and the head of the education division and, like, some other people within their company – they weren’t able to give satisfactory answers to any of those things. They weren’t able to tell me how this had happened. They weren’t able to tell me anything satisfying about what they were doing to combat book bans? They’re, they were basically like, We provide annotations, which I was like, Well, what does that mean? I thought it might be like education guides and stuff? And it’s not; it’s just the good press a book has gotten. And for perspective, that is available on the Amazon page for any given book; that is not the resource of a billion-dollar company.

Sarah: A billion-dollar company with unfettered, un-, unfathomable access to school libraries.

Maggie: To schools. Yes.

Sarah: To schools, that –

Maggie: And so –

Sarah: The Scholastic Book Fair, for us, I mean, for people our age – I’m a little older than you – that’s a foundational memory, the Scholastic Book Fair.

Maggie: Oh yeah! Yeah! It still is. Like, people don’t realize that independent bookstores can do that and do it better, first of all. It’s, it’s so much a part of so many people.

In terms of how they were going to make sure that this didn’t happen to other authors going forward, they hired outside auditors to kind of evaluate their process, which I’m like, Okay, I understand that institutional change takes a really long time, but when we had that conversation, they hadn’t even hired them yet. They were just sort of like, Okay, like, that’s something we’re thinking about. And I was like, Okay, well, that’s…

Sarah: That sounds like PR more than effective policy engagement.

Maggie: Exactly. And so the fact is –

Sarah: That sounds like a public relations decision.

Maggie: Exactly. And since then, I have spoken to the outside auditors. I have no idea what their results are. I don’t know what, if any, of my time talking to them will do.

Sarah: Oof.

Maggie: I was willing to give it, but it was sort of like – I don’t know. I, I just have very little hope, because about fourteen years ago they wanted to license a Lauren Myracle middle-grade book, and they asked her to take out the gay uncles in order for it to go into their book club program, and they did the exact same thing: backtrack, apology, This will never happen again, We’re hiring outside auditors to make sure this never happens again. So if you didn’t learn what needed to be learned fourteen fucking years ago, what is happening this summer that you think is so different?

And so I didn’t accept the deal, still, and that does suck, because I would rather take the deal and the money and the access and have my book be available in all these classrooms, but, like – [laughs] – it would have been such a disservice to all the people whose voices are regularly ignored in this conversation –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Maggie: – to take a soft line on this.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Maggie: And there are – let’s not mince fucking words – typically, when these bans happen, they happen around trans and Black authors, and particularly where those identities intersect, and it is, the book bans are not about the content of the book: it’s a proxy for the identities that they represent. It is a framework for doing damage to physical bodies, and I am not interested in compromising with that.

Sarah: No, or participating –

Maggie: And I –

Sarah: – in that system.

Maggie: No! And I think Scholastic is still trying to figure out how to exist within capitalism at the same time as supporting values that they say they support, but, you know, where the rubber meets the road in terms of sales? We’ve seen what they will do! And so I am glad that that is public. I am glad that within Scholastic this created, like, a really big problem – [laughs] – and then –

Sarah: Oh yeah, it seemed like internally there was probably a lot of email. And they’re probably very grateful they’re not subject to Freedom of In- –

Maggie: Lot of meetings, lot of emails!

Sarah: Yeah. Lot –

Maggie: I mean, it’s –

Sarah: [Laughs] Lot of texting.

Maggie: I think what a lot of people don’t understand about Scholastic is that it’s basically two companies. There are, there’s the publishing side that publishes books like Melissa by Alex Gino, which is one of the first and most wonderful novels about a trans kid to kind of be mainstream and marketed. It was edited by David Levithan. It’s like a beautiful, wonderful book, right?

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Maggie: And then there’s the education division and the books, book clubs. Like, their whole sort of like, that wing of the company that goes directly and has relationships with so many schools. And that’s a sales-oriented company; that’s a different deal. That’s where capitalism, like, really happens, and –

Sarah: And they sell a lot of books.

Maggie: They sell so many books. And so that’s where my interaction with them happened.

Sarah: Right.

Maggie: And so all the people who are on the publishing side were furious! [Laughs]

Sarah: Yeah!

Maggie: And I received emails and messages from many of them who were just like, I’m horrified that this happened in the company that I work for, and, like, I know – you know. And I, I know that feeling. Like, I used to work for Apple; I worked for iBooks.

Sarah: Oh boy!

Maggie: And I loved that job. I had a great time. That job was so meaningful to me, and I, like, loved, my boss in that job was a really important mentor in my life, and at the time when I was working there, they did like a WWDC conference where they were like, Now you can, like, use Adobe to, like, edit photographs, and they literally edited a smile onto a woman’s face, ‘cause, like, If she’s not smiling enough you can just, like, put it in there! And every – yeah, exactly; the face you’re making is exactly correct. We were all just like, Oh my God, what are you –

Sarah: What?!

Maggie: – the tone – what are you thinking?! And I remember being like, I don’t have the power to, like, make you not do this. Like, this company is enormous, and, you know, Scholastic isn’t as big as Apple. It’s not exactly apples to Apples, but, like –

Sarah: [Snorts]

Maggie: – you know, I do, I just want to be clear that I don’t blame people in the publishing half of this company –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – for what happened, and nor do I think they deserve to have their good work and good names dragged through the mud because somebody in the education division – somebodies, more likely – made it clear that these kinds of books were problematic for their sales and should be avoided. And so the fact that it had been selected by these Asian mentors that they brought on to do this project was, like, ex-, you know, that’s great –

Sarah: Oh my –

Maggie: – that’s one step, but they had to advocate really hard to include Love in the Library. There was a lot of resistance from Scholastic to include it at all. And so then when they finally won them over and were like, Yeah, no, Scholas-, this book is going in, they, Scholastic’s education division went behind those mentors’ backs and made the offer that they made to me. And so those mentors also got blindsided; these Asian, you know –

Sarah: Oh, for heaven’s sake!

Maggie: – authors and educators who had been brought in to, you know, say, These are the voices we think are important and represent us, and, like, we’re doing this all together, and so those poor people also got kind of fucked in this whole situation, and it was just, to me, like, very corporate. Like, it was just like exactly the kind of stuff that happens in a corporation that has diversity values but no guidance about how to actually implement them, and so they’re just meaningless words that make people in higher positions feel good, that have no relevance to what the rank and file are going to do on a day-to-day basis.

And so it was a stone-cold bummer, and it still makes me sad, and I still wish that they could have just pulled their shit together and given me a good offer – [laughs] – that I could have taken, because I am selfish and I want my book to go places, but, like, you’re like, How’s the book doing? Fine. Like, about the same as it was before, because the clamor has died down –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – and so, like, there was like a huge kick in sales, and then it goes away, and that’s totally normal, and that’s no one person’s responsibility to fix for me, but I really did have to say no to an incredible opportunity because –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – they fucked it so hard. [Laughs]

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: And so I –

Sarah: And what Scholastic does is it creates a long, a long tail of sales, because your book –

Maggie: Exactly!

Sarah: – is still in the book fair for five, ten years sometimes, and it will keep showing up.

Maggie: It’s not, it wasn’t for book fairs; it was for, like, a thing specifically to sell directly to educators.

Sarah: Oh yeah.

Maggie: And so it’s like a, it’s a smaller thing but a cooler thing –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – for someone like me where it’s like – book fairs depend on the book-buying audience, who’re just like, Yeah, I want this in my home.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Maggie: And I’m like, I would love it if you want this in your home; that’s great. I really intended this book for classroom use –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – where, like, where you can use it to start this conversation. Right?

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: And that’s, that’s missing now. Like, that, I don’t get to do that as much as, you know, my peers felt I deserved? Which was meaningful to me, that it was selected by, like, other authors and educators who’re like, Yeah, no, this is an important and essential story about the Asian-American experience in the United States. Fucking cool, right? Like, I would like that!

Sarah: Extremely cool!

Maggie: Yeah! That makes my heart feel good, and it, like, makes me feel like I told the story right; I did right by my grandparents. I, I guess, my point is, the reason I’m, like, hammering home that this fucking sucks is that – I mean –

Sarah: ‘Cause it fucking sucks! Yeah!

Maggie: – first of all – is I think we are all often faced with little choices like this, and in the grand scheme of things, this was actually a little choice. The amount of money that they were offering was not that much, and, like, it was an email. Like, this was not like they called; like, you know, no one ascended from heaven and was like, Maggie! Like – [laughs] – here it comes! Like it –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – ended up becoming big because I went public with my No. But we’re all faced with these little decisions over and over and over again, and I think often it is hard not to see past the things that suck. I don’t regret a fucking thing. Like, I am really proud that if we lose the – [laughs] – the war against fascism, at least I made a stand, like, early on. Like, I –

Sarah: Oh yeah.

Maggie: – you know, like, and I fully intend to keep doing it, and I think all of us think that these little stands matter most when it’s like life or death, and I don’t think people understand –

Sarah: No.

Maggie: – the power of our cumulative rejection in all these tiny places.

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: Because this one licensing deal was a tiny place.

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: It’s a tiny fucking place. I’m one person for, like, a spot in a display that was going to be, you know, like –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – sold to educators.

Sarah: And yet they whiffed so hard!

Maggie: They whiffed it real hard, and it gave me the opportunity to say No and to say No publicly, and I hope more people do that, because –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – we all have more power in the light. I think, like, these strikes that we see happening, going on right now, are so instructive to everybody who’s in creative fields of just rejecting the premise that we can’t exist without them. They can’t exist without us.

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: And so, like, I looked at this also as like a labor issue – [laughs] – because, like –

Sarah: Oh, it’s absolutely a labor issue, and –

Maggie: Yeah! Where it’s like, No, I –

Sarah: – yet again –

Maggie: – refuse to be treated –

Sarah: – on trend you are! Yeah!

Maggie: – this way – [laughs] – by people who would give me money, like, for my services for –

Sarah: Mm-hmm!

Maggie: – the thing that I have made, and so –

Sarah: And I’m sure from their point of view they were like, Wait, you’re saying no? But nobody says no to us! People don’t –

Maggie: The way it was so casual, and I followed up and was like, Is my offer contingent on this? ‘Cause I just wanted to be clear. And I got an immediate, like, Yeah! Of course it is! from my Candlewick person, ‘cause they know, ‘cause they know when Scholastic demands stuff for the first book, you just say yes!

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: No one says no! So it’s like they don’t even negotiate usually – [laughs] –

Sarah: No! Who says –

Maggie: – for these kinds of things, and so, like, it was just casual. It was clear that the edit was done lazily because the red line that they offered me didn’t actually, it made a sentence that didn’t make any fucking sense? And it was like, yeah, so they just shot from the hip this casual, stupid, fucking thing, and –

Sarah: Because the word racism made somebody’s tummy hurt, so we’re just going to decimate a sentence to get rid of it.

Maggie: And I’m sorry; how do you talk about Japanese-American incarceration without talking about racism?

Sarah: I don’t –

Maggie: That’s like trying to talk about the assassination of Harvey Milk without mentioning homophobia or the fact that he was gay!

Sarah: Or Twinkies.

Maggie: [Laughs] Or Twinkies.

Sarah: Or Twinkies, yeah.

Moving on to happier topics, I want to ask you about books that you’re reading right now –

Maggie: Mm-hmm!

Sarah: – but I also want to ask you about Baldur’s Gate.

Maggie: Hell yeah!

Sarah: [Laughs]

Maggie: I’m playing Baldur’s Gate! [Laughs]

Sarah: Speaking of hope for the future, tell me all about Baldur’s Gate.

Maggie: I made a Tiefling paladin. Her name is Xenobia. Yeah, I named her after a character in my own book; I’m a fucking dork. But to start, to be fair, my husband started it, ‘cause he named his character Rake, and I was like –

Sarah: Okay, see, I think that’s –

Maggie: – Well, if he’s in canon –

Sarah: – fabulous!

Maggie: – then I get to be as well. Like, why does he get to name a character after my character if I don’t get – and what was cute about that is Rake’s character is, like, very much based on my husband –

[Laughter]

Maggie: – so okay – or like some of his personality traits are, anyway, and so, like, I was like, Of course you like Rake the best. [Laughs] You two share a language.

And we’re only a little bit in, and I, this is the first videogame that I am better at than my husband.

Sarah: [Gasps]

Maggie: Like, in the history of us. He’s like one of those people who always puts the videogame on its absolute hardest settings and, like –

Sarah: Oh yeah.

Maggie: – you know, just, like, grinds it out and finishes every side quest and, like – whereas I play like one videogame every five years. [Laughs]

Sarah: Oh yeah, I’m still on a playthrough of Dragon Age: Inquisition. I don’t want it to end!

Maggie: Oh yeah, it’s, it’s, I, I’m not really – like, I like a good story, and I can get into it if. I’m going to play, it’s probably going to be like a Dungeons-&-Dragons-y kind of game. Like –

Sarah: Story Mode, yeah.

Maggie: Yeah. But this is the first one where, like, he keeps fucking up the, the controller. It’s now like, What are you doing? I’m like, Oh, this is how it feels to be you most of the time! [Laughs] So it’s a delight, and I like it! But we’re only like probably three hours into, like, actual game play, ‘cause we have two children and can only play once they go to bed, and then –

Sarah: Of course.

Maggie: It is not what I would call winding-down time, yeah.

Sarah: Nooo.

Maggie: And so, like –

Sarah: It is very active.

Maggie: – we play for a little bit, and then we’re like, Okay, we’ve got to wind down. [Laughs]

Sarah: And at least an hour of that –

Maggie: So that’s fine.

Sarah: – is, is, is customizing your character, right? The, the, the character customization –

Maggie: Oh, I spent fully an hour and a half, and my paladin looks fucking cool. She is green; she has horns –

Sarah: Oh, hell yeah!

Maggie: – she has a snatched Ariana Grande ponytail? Like, she’s very hot. I’m very proud of her. Every time she’s onscreen I’m like, Look how hot she is!

[Laughter]

Sarah: I saw pictures! She is indeed hot!

Maggie: She’s cool! She’s fucking cool! Listen, if you can’t just make people who look fucking cool, what’s the point? [Laughs]

Sarah: And then, and then have them, like, win battles.

Maggie: Right?

Sarah: Yeah!

Maggie: She has a flaming two-handed sword right now? Very cool.

Sarah: Oh, hell yeah!

Maggie: It’s very cool!

Sarah: Hell yeah!

Maggie: It’s just cool! So that’s her deal.

Sarah: Yeah, I’ve been, I’ve been playing Witcher 3 on Story Mode for a while, and I don’t –

Maggie: Hmm!

Sarah: – I don’t, I’m, it’s fine; I can go battle things. Oh, I’ve got to kill things. The thing I love is that when bandits attack me and I kill them –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – sometimes they’re just wearing a helmet and like a pair of tighty-whiteys, ‘cause the game renders them like, like, I don’t know what they were doing before they decided to attack me, but this guy’s in a helmet and some tighty-whiteys, and then I can loot him –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – after he’s dead, and if I, sometimes I will loot –

Maggie: That’s a loot.

Sarah: – an entire chicken? A, a panini sandwich? And I’m like, Where were you keeping this? Was this in your pants? I don’t want it if it’s in your drawers, Bro!

Maggie: I love it when you’re holding a fish?

Sarah: Yes!

Maggie: And you’re like, You – that’s gross.

Sarah: Like, why?

Maggie: That’s, you can’t just be walking through the wilderness with a fish in your pocket, but all right.

Sarah: Like, that’s just nasty! [Laughs]

Maggie: They apparently never go bad, which I love for them.

I just read Bombshell by Sarah MacLean?

Sarah: Oh! Tell me how you liked it!

Maggie: It is the platonic ideal of a romance novel. I want to reread it a thousand times. This is exactly everything I ever want. If I’m going to read heterosexual romance, they are the couple I am most interested in.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Maggie: I love, like, a very put-upon, rule-following man being paired up with, like, a gleefully, like, just law-breaking woman. [Laughs]

Sarah: Yep.

Maggie: There to ruin his day and also his life, and have him be like, Yay, it’s what I wanted! [Laughs]

Sarah: Lawful Good and Chaotic Anything pairings are so fun.

Maggie: A delight, and you could, I feel like you can tell that MacLean was just, like, tickling herself pink the whole time?

Sarah: [Laughs]

Maggie: ‘Cause their bant-, she’s always so good at banter, but their banter is like next level good.

Sarah: Oooh!

Maggie: It’s very fun, and I, like, one of my favorite kinds of interactions is when someone really serious says something like, that they mean to be damning, where it’s like, You create so many problems, and the character who is the chaos monkey just goes, Thank you!

Sarah: Oh, hey! That’s a big compliment.

[Laughter]

Maggie: And there’s a few of those in this book, which I think is great. The whole series is a fucking delight, but also this one ends, the last sentence of the epilogue is such a, like, banger, gets you so fucking excited for the fourth book in this series that, like, I, I couldn’t wait for this one, because I knew the minute both these characters were introduced in book one –

Sarah: Yeah.

Maggie: – that I was going to be heavily invested in their romance, and that it was going to be my favorite, and I was correct.

Sarah: Yep!

Maggie: And I, the duchess’s character, I’ve always been like, Oh, she’s really cool! But I, like, didn’t even think of her as a romantic lead? I was just like, Oh yeah, she’s like a boss.

Sarah: Yeah!

Maggie: Okay!

Sarah: She’s Charlie.

Maggie: But it sets up her, fourth, the fourth book is her romance, and it sets it up in the last sentence of this book, and I was like, Ohhh! Now I’m going to burn someone’s house down if I don’t get this book, like, as soon as possible.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Maggie: Like, I will be driven to violence.

[Laughter]

Sarah: And that’s something MacLean is really good at? Creating a pairing that, even if this is your pairing and it’s book two or book three –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – she creates an overarching narrative that by the time you hit book four you’re like, I have to read this.

Maggie: Yeah! I just started Wicked and the Wallflower by her, too, ‘cause I was like, Okay, I know Devil gets mentioned in book three, and it all exists in the MacLean-iverse, so all these people are running around London at the same time. And I was like, Okay, well then I want to meet him; so I’m reading that book right now. And that’s not my favorite type of pairing, ‘cause it’s like dark man and like good girl! Which is less, I like, okay, like I, but I’m still into it, ‘cause I just really like her writing. But – [laughs] –

Sarah: That is awesome!

Maggie: Yeah. So those are great. How ‘bout you? What are you reading?

Sarah: So I just started The Blonde Identity by Ally Carter? And –

Maggie: Okay.

Sarah: – Ally Carter used to write YA. This is, this is –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – a contemporary thriller. It has some really classic tropes? We have a –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – secret, surprise twin; we have secret agents –

Maggie: Oh!

Sarah: – we have amnesia –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – and we have alternating, very short chapters between the hero and heroine’s point of view; and the heroine at this point where I am does not, still does not know who she is; she just knows who she’s not. And –

Maggie: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – the guy who is chasing her through the snow – she’s not wearing boots or anything good like that – is convinced that she is someone else, and then he figures out –

Maggie: Mm!

Sarah: – that this is her twin who, and this woman, she – well, she doesn’t have, she has amnesia; she doesn’t even know she had a twin; she doesn’t know who she is at this point.

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: But because the chapters are so short, and because there’s so much action –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – like, like, like playing Baldur’s Gate, this is not a before-bed book for me, because I’m just like, Oh my God –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – oh my God, oh my God! Keep going, keep going, keep going!

Maggie: I’m sorry, I have two more books.

Sarah: Please tell me –

Maggie: Can I tell you? Okay!

Sarah: – every book! All of the books?

Maggie: Okay.

Sarah: Just give me them all!

Maggie: My favorite books of the summer: The Fourth Wing? [Laughs]

Sarah: Oooh!

Maggie: Which I’m sure someone has talked about on your show already, ‘cause it’s romantasy, so it’s very, like, it is exact-, it’s a Smart Bitch Trashy Book, you know? Like, it’s –

Sarah: Ohhh goody!

Maggie: – it is, does the worldbuilding make sense? Not always!

Sarah: [Laughs] Nah!

Maggie: Did I have the best time? Yeah, I did!

Sarah: Yep!

Maggie: I read it when I was on vacation: when I say a beach read, it better be this good? Or I am mad at you.

Sarah: Oh yeah.

Maggie: Like – [laughs] – we went to Hawaii as a family, and I was just reading it all the time ‘cause it was like the perfect book to pick up and put down, just have a good time every time I was reading it. There’s an orgasm so good it causes a lightning storm? Love that for her. Thought it was hilarious.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Maggie: Had a great –

Sarah: Love that for her!

Maggie: [Laughs] I do! Like, I was literally just like, Oh, good for you!

Sarah: Yeah! Get it, girl.

Maggie: I literally cackled when that happened. My husband was like, What happened? I was like, I’m not going to tell you ‘cause you will not respect me. [Laughs]

Sarah: Out of context –

Maggie: I told him.

Sarah: – you will not understand.

Maggie: I told him anyway. I said that, and then I told him immediately, because that’s what kind of person I am.

Sarah: Yeah, but I’m sure he, he was like, Oh, yeah! Checks out!

Maggie: Yeah! I, I feel like the way I’ve been pushing this book to my friends is like, Do you like dicks and dragons? [Laughs]

Sarah: And, and if these people are your friends, I’m certain there’s a very high percentage where –

Maggie: Nine out of ten –

Sarah: – the answer’s Why, yes!

Maggie: – of them are like, Yes.

Sarah: Yes! Why, yes, I do!

Maggie: [Laughs] And then Yellowface by R. F. Kuang is the hardest I have laughed in a thousand years. I thought that book was a fucking banger. I read that one while I was traveling as well, and I was on work travel for that one, and boy, did I enjoy that book. As an Asian person whose entire career has been in publishing, I felt like it was just everything! It was so correct! It was so funny, and I had had it recommended to me by several white women who were like, It’s the most stressful book I’ve ever read.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Maggie: I read it and I was like, No, it’s not. It’s the funniest book I’ve ever read.

[Laughter]

Maggie: It is the first, like, thriller/comedy I think I’ve ever read? Where, like, it’s got the kind of like propulsive thriller-y thing happening where you –

Sarah: Mm-hmm!

Maggie: – what’s going on? What’s happening? Oh no! What’s she doing?!

Sarah: Yep.

Maggie: But it’s increasingly absurd and so funny. Like, the, those two feelings are so, like, woven in together so well?

Sarah: Yes!

Maggie: And I thought it had the exact correct ending. Like, just nailed that finish.

So highly, highly recommend those three books for very different reasons.

Sarah: It is wild to read a book where you’re like, Wait a minute; have I been in a meeting with this person who wrote this?

Maggie: [Laughs]

Sarah: There’s a book called The Dead Romantics about a ghostwriter who is struggling to ghostwrite a romance, and they get an –

Maggie: Hmmm!

Sarah: – editor, and they go into the publishing house to meet with the new editor, and just all of the little asides and the amount of detail, I’m like, Oh, okay, this person has not only worked in publishing –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – they have worked in publishing.

Maggie: Yeah, yeah.

Sarah: And I, and I kept reading it, thinking, I wonder if I know this person? Like –

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: – the, these two, this is a lot of detail that you know.

Maggie: Yeah, man! I love that. Yeah. I, I didn’t ever have the feeling of like, Oh, we were in the same place, but I did have that feeling of like, Oh, did we have to deal with the same person?

Sarah: Oh yeah!

Maggie: Like, a few times.

Sarah: Oh yeah. Oh, I, I know that person. Oh yes.

Maggie: Yeah.

Sarah: So where can people find you if you wish to be found?

Maggie: I am decreasingly online. Although I am still on Bluesky at @maggietokudahall, my Instagram has gone private. My Twitter is just there for updates because that website has been co-opted by the worst people on the internet?

Sarah: Oh God, it’s so true.

Maggie: Bluseky’s where you would go if you wanted to chat with me. TikTok’s where you would go if you want to see the random things that I reblog; it’s mostly animal facts.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Maggie: And I’m @maggietokudahall in both of those places. You can also go to my website, prettyokmaggie.com.

[music]

Sarah: And that brings us to the end of this week’s episode. Thank you very, very much to Maggie Tokuda-Hall for being a guest again, and for being so candid and sharing so much of her experience since we last spoke.

I will have links to all of the books that we talked about and to Maggie’s website and her podcast, Failure to Adapt, in the show notes, and you know where that is. It is smartbitchestrashybooks.com/podcast. And yes, I will have the link to the image from Our Flag Means Death that is so very, very, very, very interesting. Like literally a thousand cosplays will be born from this image, and I am so excited about that!

I always end with a terrible joke, and this joke is from Bransler, and this is a true story. So this is what Bransler put it in the, in the Discord. I love this so much.

>> Yesterday I was in the grocery store and a random elderly man stopped me and told me a bad joke, and it made me think of this Discord.

Which is the highest of compliments!

>> For context, I was looking at frozen fish when he walked up, and for a second I thought he was asking for weird culinary advice. [Laughs] No! This is what he said:

Miss, do you know what kind of fish goes best with peanut butter?

Give up? What kind of fish goes best with a peanut butter?

Jellyfish!

[Laughs] If I get accosted at the grocery store, which is not a place I visit often, ‘cause I don’t like grocery shopping, but if I get a-, if I get approached by people with bad jokes anywhere, I will feel like my life has reached a new pinnacle of meaning. That is so awesome! Thank you, Bransler!

Also, I do have a correction to issue – I probably should have done this at the top of the episode, but I’m going to do it now. This is episode 584. The previous episode was 583, but I said it was 584 because I’m bad at numbers, and I made a mistake, so I apologize. This is actually 584, and I know you’re writing this down in a notebook somewhere. You know, all the mistakes that I’ve made with numbers, ‘cause there are so many. Anyway, sorry about that. My bad.

On behalf of everyone here, we wish you the very best of reading. Have a wonderful weekend, and we will see you back here next week for – [gasps] – Romantic Times Rewind, Part Two, where Amanda and I are going to go through the ads and features of the May 2014 issue, so do not miss that. And don’t forget you can find images and scans and lots and lots and lots of visuals at smartbitchestrashybooks.com and smartbitches.tumblr.com, because I do, I do love Tumblr. 

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

[end of cool music]