713. Enemies to Lovers with Alisha Rai

[intro]

Sarah Wendell: Hello, and welcome to episode number 713 of Smart Podcast, Trashy Books. I’m Sarah Wendell, and my guest this week is podcast community favorite Alisha Rai! We start off catching up on our history of podcasting together, our life changes, and the challenges of making children wear coats? I assume if you are familiar with children and coats, you might relate to this.

And then it is Enemies to Lovers time. Her new book Enemies to Lovers is out now, and we both brought the good trowels, because we are going to dig into this trope, examine how it works, what are the essential elements, and what can easily go very wrong? Along the way we touch on how much we miss buddy road trip comedies, the weight of being an elder daughter, and at the end, her perspective on the threat of AI to authors, which is pretty inspiring.

Video will be available on our YouTube channel; there’s a link in the show notes. Please hit Subscribe. Amanda and I are about to try out some romance-themed drink mixes, possibly live, definitely silly.

I have a compliment this week. This compliment is for Dashen [DaSHEN] or Dashen [DASHen]. I’m not sure how to pronounce it, and I apologize.

Many people think that there is a face in the full moon, one that has wide eyes and an open mouth. This is because the Moon can’t stop itself from turning, but it is one thousand percent addicted to checking in on your incredibly uplifting and visually stunning life. So when the Moon is full and it looks sort of transfixed and in awe, that’s because it’s thrilled to be seeing you again.

If you would like a compliment of your very own or you would like to support this here show, patreon.com/SmartBitches. Our Patreon community is some of the most wonderful people. We have a truly welcoming Discord, you get full PDF scans of Romantic Times magazine, and you get bonus episodes! Plus, because of our Patreon community, there are no dynamic ads before or after new episodes. This is because they’re awesome. If you would like to join, patreon.com/SmartBitches. We would love to have you!

Support for this episode comes from a new sponsor, Sotto Voce Candles, and there is a coupon just for you. Sotto Voce Scents creates candles inspired by romance novels! Each fragrance is designed to feel like stepping into a rich, layered story, bringing the romance from the page into your everyday space. Why scents? Well, there are some lovely parallels between scents and love stories: they’re personal, they’re emotional time machines – a scent can bring you back to a moment, person, or feeling, just like rereading a book – and they’re unique in their chemistry. Sometimes attraction is instant and inexplicable, and you can’t articulate why this particular scent or character works for you; it just does.

Some of the bestsellers at Sotto Voce include Rosemary Me, which is a bestseller. Inspired by grand gestures, this blend of rosemary, citrus, salt, and neroli is warm, bright, and just a little sweet. And Scoundrelwood, which I adore, is one of the bestsellers and is my favorite: sandalwood, tobacco, vanilla, and leather conjure the dark and luxurious gaming hells and gentlemen’s clubs where you can find your favorite scoundrels. Scoundrelwood! [Laughs] There are new spring scents, too: Just One Bed, a warm and intimate blend of creamy notes and cardamom, it is soft and close and a little spicy; and the Grumpy/Sunshine duo. One is all brooding atmosphere, and the other is bright and effortless.

Each scent comes with pairing notes and recommendations for books, TV shows, and movies. And they’re gorgeous. They’re poured into this molded glass vessel with a rounded bottom so the candles kind of look like they’re suspended in midair. They are hand-poured in British Columbia, Canada – hi, neighbors! – and as I mentioned, there’s a coupon! Sotto Voce is offering listeners fifteen percent off their order with the code SMART15 at checkout. Visit sottovocescents.com and use code SMART15, or click the link in the show notes and your discount will be applied automatically.

Thank you to Sotto Voce for supporting this show, and thank you for supporting our advertisers.

All right, are you ready? Let’s take a road trip through Enemies to Lovers. On with the podcast with Alisha Rai.

[music]

Sarah: So, welcome to Lovestruck Daily.

Alisha Rai: [Laughs] Oh no!

Sarah: That’s a blast from the past, isn’t it? Oh, I’m –

Alisha: Such a, such a bla-, such a delightful blast from the past, though.

Sarah: I loved that show so much. I’m so –

Alisha: I loved it too.

Sarah: – bummed iHeart –

Alisha: You know what?

Sarah: – pulled the plug.

Alisha: The, the show, the show was good, but I loved just hanging out with you every week. That was, I mean, we could –

Sarah: Oh my God!

Alisha: – we could hang out regardless, but it was so nice to have it on the books. [Laughs]

Sarah: We would have that one, what was it, like three or four hours once a week where we’d be doing one, two, three, four, five episodes –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – and then we’d be done and then we’d have another marathon session.

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: Like, we were blo-, I was blocking off, I think it was Monday afternoons?

Alisha: It was Tuesday!

Sarah: I would talk to you for – was it Tuesday?

Alisha: It was Tuesday after- –

Sarah: I don’t remember time.

Alisha: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sarah: I swear, we would talk for hours every week, and then we’d get to talk to all these cool people and learn about all these cool things and –

Alisha: Ah!

Sarah: Ah!

Alisha: Such a treat.

Sarah: It was so nice.

Alisha: Such a treat.

Sarah: It was so nice!

Alisha: Well, you know what? Somebody just give us another podcast, and we’ll do it all over again.

Sarah: Yes, ‘cause you know, the money in podcasting is just everywhere.

Alisha: Oh yeah, it’s, it’s – I mean – [scoffs] – I mean, I think if any man can do it –

Sarah: Oh my God, do you know –

Alisha: If, if a man can do it, Sarah –

Sarah: You know, the plural for a group of white guys is called a podcast.

Alisha: A podcast, yes!

Sarah: It’s a podcast of white guys.

Alisha: Of course –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – of course! Yes!

Sarah: So welcome back to the show that isn’t Lovestruck Daily, but I am lovestruck to see you! How are you?

Alisha: I’m also love to – I’m, I’m so happy to see you. Like, this is, it’s always so nice to see you. It’s nice to be in the same time zone as you again. So it makes things a little bit easy –

Sarah: What’s that about?

Alisha: I know. So nice!

Sarah: Like, I text you and then you text me back, and I’m like –

Alisha: I know!

Sarah: – it’s three in the –

Alisha: It’s delightful?

Sarah: – oh no, she’s on the east coast now.

Alisha: It’s delightful, I love it, and I just – yeah, it’s just, I, I – before we start, I want to just congratulate you. ‘Cause I know it’s been 21 years for Smart Bitches.

Sarah: Aw! Thank you!

Alisha: Your, your baby can drink now –

Sarah: [Laughs] I know!

Alisha: – and that is wild, ‘cause I have been reading you from the start, and I remember when I was reading you, I was like, when I am a real time author, I’m going to be on that website. And now look at us! Like, that is so wild. So congratulations on that.

Sarah: Thank you!

Alisha: And I realized, I, I remember thinking about it this morning and I was like, When was the first time we did a podcast together? And I went back and it looks like it was around 2016. So this is our –

Sarah: Oh my God!

Alisha: – this is our ten-year anniversary!

Sarah: Podcasting!

Alisha: Of podcasting together!

Sarah: Oh my stars!

Alisha: I know!

Sarah: Is that true?

Alisha: I believe it is true, yes. Our very first I think was in 2016.

Sarah: Our topic was your new series, which I think was the not-really-Wegmans-but-Wegmans trilogy?

Alisha: Oh yeah! Not Wegmans! If you know, you know Wegmans. [Laughs] Yes.

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: It was, Forbidden Hearts was the series, yes.

Sarah: Yes, Forbidden Hearts, thank you.

Alisha: Okay, so 2017. Yes. Okay.

Sarah: Yep. And also being single. We talked about –

Alisha: Ohhh.

Sarah: – being single.

Alisha: Isn’t that wild? I feel like you have witnessed my entire dating adult, like, dating history and marriage.

Sarah: Literally, I witnessed all of your weddings.

Alisha: You witnessed –

Sarah: All six of them!

Alisha: – all my weddings. You…

Sarah: I ran, I ran one of them. It’s still one of my favorite days.

Alisha: You really did! You –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: – you were the – [laughs] – I called you ‘cause we were running late to the venue – which turned out to be Shaun White’s house, very randomly –

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: – which we rented. We did not know it was Shaun White’s house. In fact, I don’t know if Shaun White knows it was Shaun White’s house – [laughs] – that we rented.

Sarah: I don’t know if Shaun White ever lived there, but I will tell you that interior was white and marble!

Alisha: It was very white and marble with random dead animals scattered around, which was –

Sarah: So much taxidermy and a big ol’ Buddha!

Alisha: –  which was a delightful thing to try to hide for my Hindu ceremony, by the way. [Laughs]

Sarah: Wait, was it, was it Buddha or Ganesh in the foyer?

Alisha: No, it was Ganesh right in the front, which is why –

Sarah: It was Ganesh, right.

Alisha: – I walked in there and I was like, It’s perfect! Yeah, it was for my Hindu ceremony. We rented this house on Peerspace, and then it turned out – we were like, why are Shaun White’s photos all over the house? [Laughs] And it was – I don’t know what happened there. Anyway.

But yes, we were running late to the venue, and the priest had come, and the food had come, and I was like, Sarah, are you near there? And of course, you, being the efficient queen that you are were like –

Sarah: No. Nononono. I’m married to Adam.

Alisha: Who is –

Sarah: If you tell Adam to be somewhere at 11:30 –

Alisha: He was there at 11:00.

Sarah: – he will be there at 11:30.

Alisha: [Laughs] Yes. He was early!

Sarah: You called me and you were like, Are you on your way? I’m like, We’re four minutes away. What do you need?

Alisha: I know! And so you were –

Sarah: She’s like, Thank you! [Laughs]

Alisha: I was like, Get my priest in order! He doesn’t know what to do!

Sarah: I wrangled your priest; I wrangled –

Alisha: You wrangled my priest.

Sarah: – was it three? There were three caterers, right? ‘Cause we had –

Alisha: There were, ‘cause it was –

Sarah: – Indian food –

Alisha: Liberian food – yes.

Sarah: – Liberian food, and then there, and then in the middle of the ceremony – I don’t know if you ever saw this part – I was over to the side by the windows, ‘cause you were, you were on the patio, you know –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – getting married and stuff.

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: And I was over to the side, and a whole bunch of women I didn’t know came up to me and went, tap-tap-tap – [quietly] – Sarah, a caterer is here! And I was like, Oh, okay! So I just left the wedding and met the, the, it was, I think it was the caterer from Ghana. Yes, it was the caterer for the Ghanaian food.

Alisha: Oh!

Sarah: And then – Adam still tells, tells this story: he took out the trash fifteen times –

Alisha: At least.

Sarah: – at Shaun White’s house. [Laughs]

Alisha: At least. He took out –

Sarah: Every time I turned around, he had a trash bag.

Alisha: Shaun White’s garbage was filled with our trash.

Sarah: Oh, we filled Shaun White’s dumpster. Which is appropriate, ‘cause he is kind of a dumpster.

Alisha: Yes, but I, I must say, has a beautiful house that somebody –

Sarah: Oh, gorgeous.

Alisha: – is renting out from under him – [laughs] – somehow for weddings on Peerspace.

Sarah: Gorgeous. His house manager is making bank.

Alisha: Making bank.

Sarah: And you picked a –

Alisha: I, I don’t know if he gets any of it, but there we go.

Sarah: – picked a beautiful place to get married for the –

Alisha: It was gorgeous.

Sarah: – for the first time. And then the second –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – and then the third.

Alisha: Yes. Yeah, yes, yes, all them! Yeah, they were all great, and you were there for all of them. But yeah, from the beginning, me just struggling –

Sarah: Oh yeah.

Alisha: – to find a guy who wasn’t going to kill me, and here I am –

Sarah: [Laughs] The bar –

Alisha: – married with – yes!

Sarah: The bar is in the earth.

Alisha: The bar is in the mantle, yes.

Sarah: And I remember you moving out to LA –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – and being like, I, I really think I need to get away from, like, this whole area. And I was like, Go for it!

Alisha: Yes, ‘cause I was in DC –

Sarah: Yes!

Alisha: – which is notoriously the worst city to be a single woman in, I feel, because – I think it’s actually been rated as, like, the highest, ‘cause the, the male to, like, female ratio is like, like straight, you know, women and, and men is off.

Sarah: And the, the, the douche-bro ratio to humanity is also off.

Alisha: And also the quality, you know? Like –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: It’s, it was the, what is it? How does it go? The, ah, the odds are good, but the goods are odd?

Sarah: Yeess! Yes.

Alisha: [Laughs] That is DC dating in a nutshell.

Sarah: And then you moved out to LA –

Alisha: I did.

Sarah: – and you met some dude.

Alisha: I did meet a dude.

Sarah: You totally married him –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – and then you kidnapped him, brought him back to the east coast –

Alisha: I did, I did.

Sarah: – and you, along the way in there some, you had a kid? Like –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – oh my gosh, this – a lot’s happened in nine years!

Alisha: A lot has happened in nine years. Yeah, so –

Sarah: And you’re so happy! And I’m so happy for you!

Alisha: I, I am so happy. I’m so much happier than I was when this podcasting relationship started. [Laughs]

Sarah: Listen, I’m happy to witness. I –

Alisha: Not our friendship, though. Our friendship is older, but –

Sarah: Yes, that is older. That is older.

Alisha: But our documented, our on-paper friendship is – [laughs]

Sarah: Did, I mean, I know we met on the internet. Like, I’m sure we met –

Alisha: Of course!

Sarah: – on Twitter.

Alisha: Yeah, I’m sure.

Sarah: But did we meet in person –

Alisha: Yeah, I think we did.

Sarah: – at, like, RT or RWA? Probably, right?

Alisha: Oh, you know what? We did, and I believe the first time I met you, you handed me your hotel room key, which I thought was very trusting of you! [Laughs]

Sarah: Oh my God! Yes, we went up to my room; we bought snacks and talked shit. I –

Alisha: Yes! [Laughs]

Sarah: – remember that.

Alisha: But before that, I think you caught me, we were going to go do that, and then I think you caught me somewhere in between sessions, and you said, You look overwhelmed. Here’s my hotel room card key –

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: – go sit in it! And I said, Okay! [Laughs] And I did. And it was delightful. And then you joined me, and then we did, yes, talk shit for a while, and it was fantastic.

Sarah: The thing about, when I would get hotel rooms, is that I would almost always ask for a suite. I’d have to –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – go through RT proper. I don’t think I did this at RWA as much because the hotels for RWA were always much more costly?

Alisha: Yes, very costly.

Sarah: But RT, I would reach out and be like, I need a suite because I need a quiet space to do interviews in, and I cannot have authors that I do not know come and sit on my bed.

Alisha: Yeah, that’s weird.

Sarah: That’s very weird. I need –

Alisha: It’s very weird.

Sarah: – a table and chairs. And if the only way I can guarantee a table and chairs is to get a suite, then I need to book a suite. And they’re like, We understand totally. Here you go; here are the rates, whatever. Sometimes it was really cheap?

Alisha: Yeah, I, I think I’ve had a –

Sarah: Like, sometimes they would book hotels that were so inexpensive. And I don’t mean like, you know, it wasn’t like it was a Howard Johnson’s! It was just –

Alisha: No, no, I –

Sarah: – it was the airport Hyatt! [Laughs]

Alisha: Yes! And I definitely, like, I remember they had an RT in New Orleans –

Sarah: Yep.

Alisha: – and it was –

Sarah: At the Marriott.

Alisha: Yes, at a Marriott, and we got a suite there, my, my friends and I –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: – and it was, like, very –

Sarah: It’s delightful, right?

Alisha: – very affordable. Like, extremely affordable. It was never like –

Sarah: I’ve –

Alisha: – RWA prices were, aw – [laughs]

Sarah: Oh, they were always so expensive. I mean, well, they, they –

Alisha: But RT was reasonable.

Sarah: That’s one of the things that sort of tanked the organization, right? They’d –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – locked themselves into a contract with Marriott –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – for like a decade or something like that?

Alisha: Some, some like, like lifetime plus sixty or something ridiculous like that.

[Laughter]

Sarah: You are now bound to Marriott for life.

Alisha: You’re bound for life! Yeah.

Sarah: Now that is a dark romance right there.

Alisha: [Laughs]

Sarah: I’m married to the Marriott.

Alisha: Bound to Marriott.

Sarah: [Laughs] Who’s the alpha in that relationship? Marriott, Marriott is –

Alisha: It’s, it’s always Marriott.

Sarah: It’s always Marriott.

Alisha: Come on, come on.

[Laughter]

Sarah: So what do you like about living back on the East Coast?

Alisha: You know, I, I do like the change of seasons. Like, I, I missed that a little bit in California. And I also think I just like living closer to my family? It was really difficult. I, I used to always say, Oh, California’s great because I never get that seasonal depression here. Like, I don’t really have to deal with that because it was always sunny even in the middle of winter. And then I had a child in September. And – [laughs] – the days started getting shorter and shorter, and I got to a point where I was dreading nightfall. Like, I could feel it in my body, be holding my newborn, and I’d be dreading the sunset. And I found out later that’s actually, like, a common thing postpartum? Like, it’s not –

Sarah: Oh yes.

Alisha: – unusual to, like, have that sundowning kind of effect where, where you start to get sadder as the sun goes down. But the days were getting shorter even for LA, and I, I think about that now in hindsight, like, living here close to my sister, close to my brother-in-law, close to my nephews, where, you know, my other sister visits regularly ‘cause she also lives in New York.

Sarah: ‘Cause y’all, y’all, all of you in your family, y’all spend some time on airplanes visiting each other. Like –

Alisha: Yes!

Sarah: – every time I talked to you, Oh, my sister’s here, my brother’s here –

Alisha: Yeah. Oh, they, they –

Sarah: – my brother and my sister and my mom.

Alisha: – they did so much – yes – they did so much work coming out to see us on the West Coast whenever they could, but still, it wasn’t, you know, like, it wasn’t –

Sarah: It’s only like six hours! It’s like the whole day!

Alisha: Yeah, it was a hike. It was a hike for them, and they have work and – [laughs] – real other jobs –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – in addition to me. So – but being here, and I think back now, and I, I just think, Gosh, if I’d had my sister full time during those months, no matter what the weather was outside, I don’t think it would have been as hard. Like, I don’t think that period after birth would have been quite so bad. We’re not really meant to do this without a village, like in close proximity to us?

Sarah: No, and –

Alisha: It’s really, really challenging. And so –

Sarah: Postpartum –

Alisha: – even though –

Sarah: – at night is –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – so isolating.

Alisha: It’s so isolating, I would dread it. Like, I could feel it in my bones. I would just – and at the time my husband was in school, and he’d be doing, like, night classes, and he’d be in his office. Well, it was a closet that we turned into an office; we called it the cloffice.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: But he’d be in there –

[Laughter]

Sarah: The cloffice!

Alisha: He’d be in there doing – this is LA real estate, please. We did not have a dedicated office. [Laughs] But he’d be in there, and I, he would actually put a chair outside of the door; like, he’d leave the door open and put a chair right next to it, ‘cause the cloffice was not big enough to sit two people.

Sarah: Aww!

Alisha: So I would sit like right there in the doorway holding the baby, ‘cause I would just be like, I can’t be alone. Like, I’m so sad when I’m alone.

So, yeah, I think the, the bright spot of this is that we’re just close to family and, and I could, we had a rough winter this wee-, year; it was –

Sarah: [Laughs, I would say hysterically, but that’s really a misogynous term, isn’t it? Anyway, she laughs, but not like it’s funny-gk] 

Alisha: – it was, to say rough is an understatement. It’s been real, like – it started snowing again today, and I was just like, Ah, geeze. [Laughs] You know, like, it’s –

Sarah: More snow?

Alisha: – never-ending, never-ending snow. And so, but even then I don’t think I’ve been nearly as, as sad as I was in those, like, months after having the baby and, and the nights were getting scary. So, so I think that’s it. I think once you have a family, it’s like really, really just vital to be close to people.

Sarah: If you can, and if you have people in your family –

Alisha: If it’s possible. If it’s possible.

Sarah: – that you, that you, that you want to be around.

Alisha: Yes, correct!

Sarah: That’s also important.

Alisha: And there’s not, not, you know, there’s, there’s not that many – [laughs] –

Sarah: No.

Alisha: – in either of our families that we’re like, Oh, we really need to be around you, but –

Sarah: ‘Cause I had the same experience with you: my in-laws were only about ninety minutes away when I had –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – when the kids were young? And so we would see them like twice a month! We would go up to them –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – and they would come to us, but, like, any opportunity to change the parent-child ratio –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – is important.

Alisha: Any, any opportunity. Yes.

Sarah: Any opportunity to make that ratio in your favor, even for an hour, is a, is a, is a gift? And –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – you know, my in-laws loved having us come and just hang out? So we would, like, go to synagogue on Saturday and then get in the car and go up there for lunch. Like, it was –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – easy.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: And that was not the case with my family. Like, my, I didn’t want them around – [laughs] –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – at, at all. And with –

Alisha: Yeah!

Sarah: – with my in-laws, you know, once my kids were older and then they moved, everything changed.

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: Like half our network was gone?

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: So I, I can only imagine not having it and then having it is just so wonderful to feel. Like, I have –

Alisha: Oh, it’s, it’s just, like –

Sarah: – I have backup.

Alisha: – such a relief. And I, I will say, I mean, we had friends, we had very close friends in LA, and we would hang out with them whenever we could, but part of living in LA is that it’s a real hustle culture, like, even if you’re not in the entertainment industry, and so everybody’s working; like, everybody’s grinding all the time. Like, there’s no off time. We had one friend who would just come over, like, on Friday afternoons when she wasn’t working, and she’d hang out with us and, like, hang out with the baby, and it was really sweet. My best friend lived like two miles up the road, and she would try to do that like once every other week or so, but it was hard! Like, here it’s like we’ll just go over to my sister’s on Saturdays or Sundays, and we’ll just spend the whole day doing puzzles. Like, there’s nothing else to do –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – but puzzles, ‘cause, you know –

Sarah: It’s like having extra living rooms.

Alisha: It’s like having extra living rooms, yeah.

Sarah: Everyone’s, everyone’s living room is also yours, and your living room is also theirs.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: Add to, add to that, it’s a lot easier to get around in upstate New York –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – than it is –

Alisha: Oh God!

Sarah: – to get around in LA? Like you say, Oh, my friend’s two miles up the road. Yes, in LA, that takes three hours.

Alisha: We went to LA for the holidays, and at first I was like, Oh, I miss this weather so much! And the minute we got in that car, got that rental…

[Laughter]

Alisha: – I was like –

Sarah: I do not miss this.

Alisha: – Fuuuck this!

[Laughter]

Alisha: Only I had to spell it, ‘cause my kid’s two now. But I was like, F-U-C-K this! I hate it!

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: This sucks! So yeah, there’s definite, there’s definite tradeoffs. I love California. My husband is a born and bred, you know, Californian. He grew up in Nor Cal, which is also its very own, you know, different beast. I, I would say actually Nor, like, where he grew up is actually more similar to this than So Cal ever was, so.

Sarah: That makes sense! I mean, it’s, it’s –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – rural; it’s –

Alisha: It’s woodsy!

Sarah: – more farming; it’s woodsy. There’s, like –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – universities and farms.

Alisha: Yes! Yeah.

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: And, and it’s, it’s, he loves it here. Like, he, the only – [laughs] – the snow has been an adjustment, but he has otherwise really, he really, really loves it. And he just, like, we were talking about our perfect day. The other, we went out bowling one night last week, and I was like, What would your perfect day look like? And he was like – ‘cause I, you know, he asked, you know, he’s like, Oh – I thought he’d say something like going to the beach or doing something.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: He’s like, You know, it’s really just when we go over to your sister’s on the weekends, and your nephews are there, and we just do puzzles and eat food and talk about our lives, and I think that’s really a perfect – like, I’m so content on those days. And I’m just like –

Sarah: Aww!

Alisha: – Awww! It’s really nice.

Sarah: Both of you have supportive family! That’s so lovely!

Alisha: Yes. Yeah. I mean, yes. It’s mostly my family – [laughs] – that does the heavy lifting, but – can I tell you, having a toddler makes me detest coats?

Sarah: [Laughs] I’m so sorry to tell you –

Alisha: I just want to be out of coat season.

Sarah: – you’re going to, you’re going to hate coats until – so here’s what’s going to happen –

Alisha: Ugh!

Sarah: – I’m going to give you a glimpse into the future. Adam and I –

Alisha: Please tell me.

Sarah: – were talking about this. When they are little, they will fight you on coats.

Alisha: Mm.

Sarah: They don’t want to wear them. They don’t want to –

Alisha: Mm.

Sarah: – put them on. It’s annoying. And then weirdly, in like July, he’s going to be like, I want to wear my winter coat. And you’re going to be like, What are you talking about? We used to –

Alisha: I believe it.

Sarah: – fight with our kids. They didn’t want to wear their coats in the winter, but then in the summer they’d be like, I want to wear my coat! And we’d be like, No! It’s like, it’s ninety degrees outside! But then they’re going to become teenagers. And I don’t remember who told this joke first – and if you’re listening and you remember whose joke this is, please tell me, because I quote it all the time – Teenagers are all desperately afraid that their friends will find out that they own a winter coat.

Alisha: [Laughs]

Sarah: Every teenager in my neighborhood, it is, like, below freezing; they’re just standing there in, in, like, short sleeves like this is no big deal.

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: All terrified –

Alisha: Yes, I do –

Sarah: – that someone’s going to find out that they own a winter coat.

Alisha: I, I do remember this from the twins when they were –

Sarah: Yep.

Alisha: – my brother and sister when they were in high school.

Sarah: Yeah!

Alisha: My brother would wear shorts and sandals –

Sarah: Yeah!

Alisha: – in the dead of winter, also in upstate New York –

Sarah: Yeah!

Alisha: – and would wear, wear that happily and not –

Sarah: It’s bonkers!

Alisha: It, I, I don’t understand what their skin is made out of, but I assume it’s something more insulated than what my skin is made out of. ‘Cause I, you, I, I bundle up like a snowman when I go outside. And I, I have almost given up on this toddler. Like, sometimes I just – ‘cause he’ll, like, put his hand in the coat and then bend it, like, on purpose that he can’t get the coat, you know –

Sarah: Oh yeah.

Alisha: – all the way fully through. The number of times I have walked him through a parking lot with his hands – [laughs] – bent in his sleeves just – and he’s –

Sarah: I refuse to put the coat all the way on. Yep.

Alisha: He’s so mad about it. And I, and I’m like, Bud, I gave you a chance. I don’t know what to tell you –

Sarah: Yeah!

Alisha: – you’re being ludicrous.

Sarah: Listen, you’ve got to wear a coat!

Alisha: You’ve got to wear a coat in some –

Sarah: The, the cold will kill you!

Alisha: – one way or another, and actually, you’re probably warmer this way, so let’s, let’s just go.

Sarah: I will also tell you that my younger child, who is now eighteen –

Alisha: Mmm!

Sarah: – went to college.

Alisha: Wow.

Sarah: Now, I’m, you know, I’m in DC. It’s kind of temperate. You know, cold for DC.

Alisha: Yeah!

Sarah: Like, sometimes we get in the single digits, but usually it’s pretty temperate. They are in college in Vermont, in Burlington. And two months ago – two months ago; it is currently March – two months ago in January, when it is, the high is a negative number of Fahrenheit in, in Burlington –

Alisha: Oh my gosh.

Sarah: – the high is like negative two.

Alisha: Oh.

Sarah: And I get this message: Mom, I think I o-, I, I think I need a winter coat.

Alisha: What?

Sarah: And I’m like, Well, I asked you if you wanted to bring your snowboarding jacket. No, no, no, snowboarding jacket is not going to work; that’s just for snowboarding. But I think, I, I think I need to have a winter coat. I’m like, in Burlington, Vermont, in January, you think? You, you think? Are you sure? Are you sure you’re sure? And I got the longest-suffering, oh-my-God-mom sigh, just – [sighs in long-suffering]. Yes, mom, I need a winter coat. And did I milk this? Yes. Did I keep going? Yes, I did. Did I find them –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – a gorgeous down, purple, long coat? Also, yes, I did.

Alisha: Ooh! Cute!

Sarah: Mountain Warehouse is great.

Alisha: I, I would milk it. I love that it took eighteen years.

Sarah: Oh! It took a long time, but they will come back to you and be like –

Alisha: [Laughs]

Sarah: – Mom, I, I, I’m really cold? And I don’t know why. I think I’m cold, and I need a coat? And you’re going to be like, Yeah, you think? Yeah!

Alisha: It’s, it is –

Sarah: What was your first clue? Your, your, your nose not being sens-, have any sensitization in your nose anymore? What was the, what was the first sign? [Laughs]

Alisha: Yeah. It is wild. I mean, I, I cannot keep anything on this kid: socks, mittens, nothing. Like, he –

Sarah: Oh! No, forget it.

Alisha: – he rips it right off, and the socks really –

Sarah: When you were –

Alisha: – kill me.

Sarah: When you were a kid, you had the mittens on a string through your jacket, right?

Alisha: Yes! I can’t find those anymore, ‘cause now I think they’re choking hazards!

Sarah: They’re choking hazards! No one has them! And then –

Alisha: No one has them!

Sarah: – when I was older it was like these middle, little metal clips that would clip to the cuff –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – and clip to the mitten, but then you couldn’t actually put them on without having the clips snap off, and then my fingers would –

Alisha: And also probably choking hazards now. Yeah, everything’s a choking hazard.

Sarah: Choking hazard, pinching hazard.

Alisha: Everything is a choking hazard. And so I –

Sarah: Just dip our children in, in some sort of insulation.

Alisha: – I, I, in the dead of winter this year, I was this close to just duct taping his mittens onto his hands ‘cause I was so tired.

[Laughter]

Alisha: And then same with the socks! Because you know what, it’s not, I don’t, you know, if you’re, if you’re fine wearing, walking around not wearing socks, I don’t really care. Like, what, what can I do? But what I hate is the minute I go into a store, there is some old lady who is like, Awww, Mama doesn’t care about you wearing socks! I’m like, Mama cares!

Sarah: [Laughs] Yes, I do care! I just –

Alisha: Mama cares very much!

Sarah: I just choose where to put my energy, and it’s not in socks!

Alisha: I am just older, and I am tired.

Sarah: Yes!

Alisha: I cannot fight this two-year-old who somehow –

Sarah: …Mama doesn’t –

Alisha: – who is thirty pounds but somehow has the strength of, like, a little Hercules. [Laughs] And I cannot –

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: – I can only fight him so much. So –

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: I’ve got to pick where my battles lie, and sometimes they are not with socks, lady.

Sarah: They are not with socks.

Alisha: Just cut me –

Sarah: The battle is not socks.

Alisha: – cut – so if you see a kid not wearing socks, please cut that mom some slack, because I guarantee you, nine times out of ten –

Sarah: The fight was had –

Alisha: – the fight was had –

Sarah: – and, and they took the L.

Alisha: – the fight was lost.

Sarah: They took the L, and it was an honorable L. It was a very honorable loss.

Alisha: You know what? I, if, if I can eat, get him to eat a broccoli, but he doesn’t wear socks, I will take that. [Laughs]

Sarah: Oooh! That’s a total win!

Alisha: Yes, I think that’s a total win.

Sarah: Oh! Totes!

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: So you, friend –

Alisha: Mmm.

Sarah: …new book.

Alisha; I do have a new book!

Sarah: Yay, new book!

Alisha: Yaaay!

Sarah: Congratulations!

Alisha: Thank you! It’s been a while. My last book was out in 2023; that was a YA. My last adult book was out in 2022, which, as you know, like, in romance terms, to have like three –

Sarah: That was like –

Alisha: – three years.

Sarah: That was decades ago.

Alisha: Yeah, it’s decades ago.

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: So I hope people remember who I am. [Laughs]

Sarah: People will remember who you are. Now, I don’t usually do this, and I’m only doing this because we are friends, but –

Alisha: Mmm.

Sarah: – I have something to share with you that I did not write. This was not written by me.

Alisha: Okay.

Sarah: First, quote:

>> This book is a delight.

Alisha: Oh!

Sarah: >> I know the cover is not nearly as cute as the cover of the first in the series, Partners in Crime, but do not be put off: Enemies to Lovers is suspenseful, twisty, swoony, and so, so good.

Alisha: Ahhh!

Sarah: And then the last paragraph:

>> To replace all the details that I want to share (but I won’t because they’re spoilers) about Enemies to Lovers, I will include a little background. The last fortnight has been incredibly difficult for my immediate family with stressor piled upon stressor, the latest of which was an emergency admission to hospital. But for the hours –

Alisha: Oh!

Sarah: >> – I was reading this book, all of those stressors disappeared. Even when I was waiting to hear from the hospital, I could escape into this book for a reprieve from the shit storm. Enemies to Lovers is fantastic and well worth the A grade.

Alisha: Awww!

Sarah: That’s from Lara. I had nothing to do with this!

Alisha: Thank you, Lara! I’m –

Sarah: I just edit. I do not write them; I just edit them.

Alisha: That is very sweet. That is – I, I think there is no greater compliment as a romance novelist. I don’t know if other genre novelists feel like this; I assume so. But I, I don’t think, especially as romance novelist, there’s any greater compliment than You made me forget all the shit that’s going on in my life for –

Sarah: Right?

Alisha: – a few hours. I mean, that is –

Sarah: Considering, considering how hard you have to work to forget the shit –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – to write the book in the first place?

Alisha: Yeah, for sure.

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: And this, this book, especially. I mean, it, I wrote it, I, I started writing it on my honeymoon, and then I got pregnant – [laughs] – and I wrote it during my pregnancy.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: And then I wrote it during my pregnancy –

Sarah: When you were not well.

Alisha: I was not well in my pregnancy. I wrote it in my postpartum, where I was extra not-well –

[Laughter]

Sarah: Yeah!

Alisha: – in my postpartum. And then I wrote it – unfortunately, my father-in-law passed away, and he was delightful, and I had to write it, you know, I had to kind of put it on hold for a while, while we dealt with all of that and worked through that grief, and then I had to go back to it.

Sarah: Life had a happening; that’s a lot of happening.

Alisha: Life had a happening. So what I’m trying to say is that this book, the end result is not what it started out as. It started out as something, a completely different beast, and it turned into something else along the way, and I’m just really proud of what it turned into along the way, because…

Sarah: You should be! It’s wonderful!

Alisha: – really fun. Yeah.

Sarah: It’s wonderful! Congratulations!

Alisha: Oh, good.

Sarah: You wrote a good book!

Alisha: Thank you.

Sarah: Do you know how hard that is?

Alisha: I wrote – it is really hard.

Sarah: It’s really hard to write a good book. Geeze Louise!

Alisha: It is really hard. I mean, I hold the book when it’s done, and I still can’t believe that I wrote it –

Sarah: You did it!

Alisha: – let alone that –

Sarah: You pulled it off!

Alisha: – I did it –

Sarah: You did it!

Alisha: – I did it in a competent manner.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: I’m like, Whoa! That’s cool!

Sarah: This review was very difficult to edit because all of the things that Lara wanted to talk about were spoilers –

Alisha: I know.

Sarah: – of all of the things that happened in the book.

Alisha: I understand that.

Sarah: So it’s like –

Alisha: That has been a –

Sarah: – on one hand we want examples, but on the other hand, we can’t give away too much. So she actually included a scene that I hid the whole thing behind spoiler tags. Like –

Alisha: Okay.

Sarah: – if you don’t want to read this, you don’t have to read this, but she gives an example of how these two characters really do move from being in a place of great distrust and animosity –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – toward, Holy shit, you are literally the only person I can depend on right now.

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: Well done.

Alisha: Thank you! I mean, I think that’s really – so the book is called Enemies to Lovers for a reason, and I –

Sarah: Good job on securing that title, by the way.

Alisha: Yeah, thank you. I couldn’t tell anybody the title – [laughs] – for years because I was like, Someone’s going to take it!

Sarah: I mean, the title already has, like, titles of books already have all the tropes listed out?

Alisha: Yes. Mm-hmm.

Sarah: Like, this is my book, A Friends-to-Lovers, Only One Bed, Forced Proximity, He’s Also –

Alisha: Correct.

Sarah: – a Dragon Story.

Alisha: Yes, yes.

Sarah: That’s the title of the book.

Alisha: Yes. Correct. [Laughs] So this is not new, right? This is, I didn’t, like, come up with this or anything, but when I, my former editor, Erica, who is no longer with Avon now, but, but she came up with the title, because I had no title and I couldn’t think of what to title it. And she’s like, You know, I think it’d be really cool if we just called it Enemies to Lovers, and I was like, No. And then I sat with it, and as I was writing the book I was like, Yeah, okay. [Laughs] ‘Cause I think part of – it’s not just about, like, tropification or anything like that. I, I did, I do think what it evolved into is a really good just wink at this particular trope. I mean, every, like, just assume that it’s all, it’s all one big wink with you. Like, we’re in –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – on an inside joke, and I hope, I hope people feel that. I mean, there, there is a lot in there that I think is, or that I tried to make, like, a lot of things in there to feel like this is what you love about enemies to lovers, or I hope this is what you love about enemies to lovers –

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: – as a trope, and I hope that you really feel that when you’re reading the book, ‘cause it is one of my favorite tropes. I love this…

Sarah: And when it’s done well, it’s delightful. And sometimes when it’s not – and we’re going to get into what makes an enemies-to-lovers work and not work as a trope – when it doesn’t work, it’s often because the story and the narrative have made one or the other of the characters just really un-, unlikable.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: Like, during the enemies phase, people do some dastardly shit, and it’s like, Yeah, I can’t get over that. Like –

Alisha: Right.

Sarah: – these characters might get over it, but I can’t get over it.

Alisha: Right. And I remember in early drafts, I mean, I, I would write it, and then I’d go, No.

Sarah: [Laughs] I’m sorry, that is –

Alisha: Now I hate him.

Sarah: – that is way –

Alisha: Too far.

Sarah: – too far.

Alisha: Too far!

Sarah: You have to balance the ass- –

Alisha: It’s a real –

Sarah: – asshole to empathy ratio.

Alisha: It’s a real fine line you’ve got to walk, and you’ve really –

Sarah: Yep.

Alisha: – got to get in both people’s heads so you know where their motivations are coming from, and they’re really –

Sarah: Yep.

Alisha: – not trying to do any harm, but this is just –

Sarah: Nope.

Alisha: – how things are playing out!

Sarah: So give me a quick summary of this book.

Alisha: So – ee – I mean, talk about spoilers. It is, it was so hard to write the blurb for this book without giving away –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: I would write it, and then they’d go Too spoiler-y. [Laughs] I’d write it again and they’d –

Sarah: Wait, did you write the blurb?

Alisha: Usually I give, like, the first draft, and then there’s blurb editors who, like, you know, finesse it a little bit. But I’ve, I’ve always, like, had a good hand in the blurbs of my books, so – so for this –

Sarah: So wait, did you write the part where the heroine has inherited her mama’s calculating brain, her daddy’s quick fingers, and a boatload of trauma?

Alisha: Of course I did.

Sarah: That’s fucking ama-! Okay, I have been looking at this – I’m like, Wow, that’s a really good blurb. 

Alisha: Yeah, it’s a good line.

Sarah: Of course you wrote it! Of course you did!

Alisha: Of course I wrote it. Come on!

Sarah: What the hell was I thinking? It’s a good blurb.

Alisha: Come on. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sarah: Blurbing is hard, man.

Alisha: Blurbing is really hard. I, I have to always approach it like I’m the movie phone guy. You know, like when I, when I write a –

Sarah: That’s such a good strategy!

Alisha: When I write a blurb, I think in my head, if the movie phone guy was here, he’d be like, In a world –

[Laughter]

Sarah: In a time, yes.

Alisha: In a time – and you, and you just have to, like, think about it like that, and that’s how I write my blurbs. But Sejal is the daughter of two criminals. She was a con woman herself, dabbled in it, ‘cause that’s sort of what she knew.

Sarah: It was the family business.

Alisha: It was the family business! It was how she was raised. And she’s gone mostly straight now. I mean, she’ll, like, do a couple things here and there if someone’s irritating her, but for the most part, she’s not out picking pockets. She’s pretty, pretty straight. She does close-up magic instead, which I think is very fun, which we’ll talk about, I’m sure. But that’s her, that’s her mode of, of making money now. She’s just quick with her fingers, and so she, she does that.

Krish is not an adventurous guy. His brother is an FBI agent, so his brother got all the adventurousness in the family. He comes from a law-, law-abiding family. His, his parents were in the legal field and…

Sarah: They’re very upholding people.

Alisha: Upholding! Very, like –

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: They’re very, his mom, his dad, everybody in his family is very, like, into the legal field. They’re on the right side of the law, always. And, but he just kind of keeps his nose clean and he keeps, he steps back from that. But his brother goes missing, and he is certain that Sejal’s family is behind it. And so he finds her, and he pretends to be his brother. [Laughs] And he shows her a badge that is not his –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: – and says, Look, I’m, I’m an FBI agent, and if you’re not going to help me, I’m going to turn you in and I’m going to turn in your whole family, and you really have to help me. And so that’s the leverage he uses to get her to agree to help him. She has her own reasons that are not quite aligned with his to help him.

And so they go on the run together. Like, they, I, I, when I wrote this book, I was really thinking of these great buddy movies of the past –

Sarah: Yes!

Alisha: – like Planes, Trains and Automobiles, or –

Sarah: Such a good reference.

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: We don’t have movies like that anymore. We don’t have –

Alisha: I think –

Sarah: – doofy bo-, buddy comedies…

Alisha: We don’t really. I think there was like an update with the Robert Downey Jr. movie Due Date –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: – with Zach Galifianakis? So I think that was kind of like the remake of Planes, Trains and Automobiles, which I think was a pretty good one.

But they started out as enemies and ended up as friends, and I thought that would be really fun to do with a couple! Like, put them, put, make them start out disliking each other, but for their own, for whatever purposes, their own reasons, they have to be together, and they have to take this wild cross-country trip. So they start in New York and they’ve got to get to California. Planes are quickly out of the question, so it becomes like a massive road trip, and they are, are crossing the country and slowly learning about each other and peeling back the layers and, and learning that they’re maybe not the worst – [laughs] – as they originally thought.

Sarah: And both of them are adults processing traumatic childhoods.

Alisha: Yes. This, this book is really my love letter to eldest siblings –

[Laughter]

Alisha: – especially. I am not an elder sibling, I’m a middle sibling, but I do love my older sister a lot, and I see how much work she does for the family, and I appreciate her very much. And I, I do think that elder siblings, especially in immigrant families are, especially eldest daughters, are, are required to do a lot of heavy lifting, both emotional, physical, everything.

And so these two are no different. Like, they feel like they’ve either let their siblings down; they feel as though they had to carry a burden that they were not prepared to carry at a young age. And so they are processing that and learning to let go of things that are not their faults or their, their damage that was kind of visited upon them by people who really should have been the adults in the relationship.

Sarah: And when it comes with this unspoken expectation that of course this is your job, you are the eldest daughter –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – this is the role that you fulfill –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – and you cannot break out of it because it is this unspoken yet sort of in the air around you –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – expectation, it’s very hard to be, to say, I don’t want to do this anymore. And I –

Alisha: Yeah!

Sarah: – shouldn’t have to do this anymore, because the other problem is that if you are doing all that labor and you stop, very few people are going to pick it up for you, and vulnerable people end up getting hurt.

Alisha: Yeah! I mean that –

Sarah: …you might be the only one who recognizes that.

Alisha: And, and part of it, I mean, Sejal left when she was young. Like, she left –

Sarah: Mm.

Alisha: – her family, and she left her little sister, and that causes a lot of, like, guilt and, and –

Sarah: Yep!

Alisha: – anger for her and worry for her sister. And so they are a bit estranged and –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: – and they both sort of had to deal with that and the ramifications of that choice and how it, you know, it’s, it’s not, it’s not your responsibility! You know, you didn’t –

Sarah: No.

Alisha: It’s, it’s, your responsibility to your siblings is as far as, as a sibling would go and not to take care of them forever, and, and so she has to sort of learn that.

Sarah: There’s even a word for that.

Alisha: Yes!

Sarah: There’s even a word for that: it’s parentification!

Alisha: Parentification, yeah. So she –

Sarah: Yeah, that was not a word when I was young, but yes!

Alisha: It was not. But I could have, I could have used it!

Sarah: Defined it. Yeah, I could have defined it very quickly.

Alisha: I could have told you what it was! [Laughs]

Sarah: Yes, but I didn’t know it was a word!

Alisha: Yeah, I did not know that was a word.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: When I found out that word, I said to my, I sent a text to my best friend. I was like, Did you know that there’s a word for what we, like, we had, we had to do? It’s called parentification. And she’s like, Girl, we are, like, the poster children for parentification.

[Laughter]

Alisha: Oh yes! Yes, we are! I had no idea! So yeah. I mean, she has to deal with the ramifications of, of being parentified, and so does he to an extent, and he maybe has a little bit of, like, he’s on a different part of that journey of learning how to –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – let go of his little brother and where to step in and where to help and how to help.

So yeah, the book has a lot to do with unpacking that trauma and, and where they are in timelines in terms of doing that individually, and then how they can do it together to help each other –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: – grow.

Sarah: Now, you mentioned that the heroine does close-up magic, and I think it’s so interesting because I just heard on, I think it was on Sirius Radio, that one of the most popular activities now for bachelorette parties is card tricks and magic acts!

Alisha: [Gasps] I love that!

Sarah: That people hire a magician or a, you know, an up-close magician or card tricks or somebody who does like, like a little mini Vegas show, but just for you. And it’s –

Alisha: Do you know it –

Sarah: – not prurient; it’s not super sexy; no one’s in a G string; it’s just, like, card tricks!

Alisha: I love that. I mean, I, I, we came so close to – who’s that magician who died? Harry Houdini, right? Yeah, Houdini.

Sarah: Mm.

Alisha: So Houdini has his estate in Los Angeles, and they rent it out –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: – for weddings and stuff? Do you – my dream: it was my dream to get married at Harry Houdini’s estate and have, like, roving magicians walking around doing close-up magic while, you know, we had our cocktail hour or whatever? And unfortunately it costs like forty grand or something ludicrous. Like, it was a ludicrous amount. I’m like, We can’t afford that. But if I had stupid money, like if I had so much money that I didn’t know what I was going to do with it anymore, I would have gotten married at Harry Houdini. I mean, I’d have, like, birthday parties at Houdini’s estate. I, I love magic so much. We, whenever we go to Vegas, we’ll go to at least one magic show. But always, we went to – in fact, one of the first times we went to Las Vegas, we went to see Shin Lim, who is, like, a close-up magician, and he won America’s Got Talent like a long time ago, so the audience was, like, us and senior citizens.

[Laughter]

Alisha: I don’t know why it seems like that was the audience for, for this particular act, but it was, it was fantastic. He was so good, and he’s so – I, I don’t know what it is about the charisma of magicians! I just think they’re so cool!

Sarah: Charisma’s at least a third of it, right?

Alisha: I, he, like, he would, like, smooth his hand through his beautiful hair, and I would just be like – [gasps, laughs]. And so we, like, afterwards, for a while, anytime anyone, like, my husband would be like, Oh, where’s the, where are the keys? And I’d pull them out from, like, something and he’d be like – [gasps] – Shin Lim?

Sarah: [Amused] Hmmm!

Alisha: [Laughs] I’d do the little, like, a hand, you know, through my hair thing. So yeah, I just, I, I don’t know what it is about magic tricks. I just think they’re so cool, and I think magicians are, like, really magicians. I know they’re not; I know it’s just sleight of hand; I know it’s just, like, quick fingers? But I think some, there’s some level of magic! [Laughs]

Sarah: I just googled the Houdini estate; I will link to it in the show notes.

Alisha: Oh good.

Sarah: First of all, this place is huge, and second of all –

Alisha: It’s huge.

Sarah: – Oh my God, it’s gorgeous!

Alisha: It is gorgeous. And they have, like, peacocks walking around. Like, it’s, it’s bananas.

Sarah: And I don’t, I don’t mean to be crass, but Harry Houdini’s kind of, kind of hot.

Alisha: Oh yeah, he’s real hot. I think magicians are, I think most of them are pretty hot. [Laughs] But, like, I, I, I don’t even think it’s the physical attractiveness? I just think it’s the, like, Ohhh! I’ve been to Magic Castle in LA like two times, ‘cause I would go –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: – I’d – if it wasn’t so wildly expensive, I would have gone like eight times. But I feel like there’s never a magician I’ve seen where I haven’t, I haven’t been like – [gasps] – You’re beautiful. [Laughs]

Sarah: Oh! Oh, and the charisma!

Alisha: Man or a woman, man or woman. Anybody. I’m like –

Sarah: Yeah! Like I said, charisma’s a third of it.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: This is the thing with Sejal, though, she is a, a trained con artist. She can rip people off, she can deceive people, but she wants to focus on card magic because it is still deception, but it’s not hurting anyone.

Alisha: Yeah! It’s, you know, it’s harming nobody, and it gives –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – people a thrill. Like, it’s, it’s –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – something good she can do and –

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: – she’s good at it, and she’s found something –

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: – that she’s really good at that she can make money at that –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – is not hurting anyone like her family may have done.

Sarah: No, and she’s got, she’s got, it takes physical skill; it takes mental agility; it takes, you know, real confidence to be like, Yes, I am going to fool you right in front of you.

So speaking of ways not to do things –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – [laughs] – let’s really dig in to the enemies-to-lovers trope, because it’s –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – very popular, and there are ways that it works, and there are ways that it does not. And –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – you in particular really interrogate this trope in this book.

Alisha: Oh, thanks! That’s what I was trying to do.

Sarah: Because – well, I mean, it, it, you could tell, because I, I love when someone who is deeply fluent in romance –

Alisha: Mm.

Sarah: – and the way that it’s changed – I mean, you’ve been writing for, what, fifteen years now?

Alisha: Over, yeah, a little bit over.

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: Yeah, wild.

Sarah: Right. So, like, you and I have been doing this for more than fifteen, maybe twenty-plus years, and we’ve seen the way this gets deployed, the way it’s changed –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – the way that enemies is defined. And I have to say, one of the greatest elements to the way that you use it in this book is that – and it relates also to what we were talking about, about, you know, parentification and trauma, dear God –

Alisha: Mm.

Sarah: In this book, you have these truly outlandish things –

Alisha: Mm-hmm!

Sarah: – happening to this couple.

Alisha: Oh yeah, it’s wild.

Sarah: Right? Like, this is – and this, and this is a compliment – this is some Harlequin Presents level –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – of, of, like, happenings.

Alisha: Yeah, ridiculous.

Sarah: Absolutely over-the-top ridiculous.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: One guy’s posing as his brother, who’s an FBI agent –

Alisha: Uh-huh.

Sarah: – kidnapping somebody else. I mean, it’s just like five federal crimes right off the bat.

Alisha: Yep. Mm-hmm.

Sarah: And, and she’s like, and my, you know, my parents are criminals, and I –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – am very good at criminal-ing. I’m really good at criming.

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: So you have these –

Alisha: And my, and my ex is a criminal. [Laughs]

Sarah: And my ex is good at criming too –

Alisha: Mm-hmm!

Sarah: – and that’s also a bit of a problem.

Alisha: Yeah!

Sarah: And then all of this wacky wild shit happens to them, and they have to keep going.

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: So you’ve taken these really wild situations and grounded them in things that a lot of people understand on a fundamental level, which is –

Alisha: Ah, thanks!

Sarah: – so difficult to do. You’re welcome! It’s really good!

Alisha: Yeah, thanks!

Sarah: But also, you can’t really do that unless you fully understand –

Alisha: Mm.

Sarah: – both the heights of ridiculous of romance and then the emotional depth of romance. So it’s this really wide span that’s all in this one book. And enemies-to-lovers is a really good way to capture that, because like we were saying earlier, you can’t be an enemy to your partner in such a way that you traumatize them?

Alisha: Yes, correct.

Sarah: Or harm them or do something that’s so irredeemable that it’s like –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – I don’t care if she likes you. I don’t like you, so I don’t want –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – you guys to be together. [Laughs]

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: It was an experience I’ve had. So what – let’s start with enemies-to-lovers. Why do you think people love this trope so much?

Alisha: It’s so funny to me, because I think – it feels like in a lot of ways people think this is a recent trope, like, that this has just sprung up because of BookTok or something like that. We –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: – we cut our teeth on enemies-to-lovers. I mean, if you were watching rom-coms in the ‘90s, ‘00s, You’ve Got Mail, 10 Things I Hate About You, any Katherine Heigl movie – [laughs] –

Sarah: Any Katherine Heigl movie.

Alisha: – literally and, any Sandra Bullock movie!

Sarah: The worst, the worst men.

Alisha: Yeah. And, and we had, I mean, we had it in romance, too. I mean, we, how many – especially in the historicals? Like Johanna Lindsey, Jude Deveraux, I mean, those, those were –

Sarah: Slap, slap, kiss!

Alisha: – Enemies –

Sarah: Oh yeah.

Alisha: – [laughs] – to lovers.

Sarah: Oh yeah!

Alisha: Like Enemies with a capital E! So –

Sarah: Oh yeah.

Alisha: – we, we have been to the extremes – and the extremes keep getting published too, but, but we’ve been to those extremes. And I think once you are in the extremes, it’s easier to pull it back a little and say, Okay, how do we make this so that these two still end up likable to the reader and to each other?

Sarah: Yes. Yes.

Alisha: Because I think a big, a big part of enemies-to-lovers – well, I think there’s about like three parts to an en-, good enemies-to-lovers. And the first one is tension. Like, you need the tension –

Sarah: Yes!

Alisha: – between them to – there has to be some kind of fight. It, it doesn’t have to be a fight that’s internal to them? It could be external. You know, it could be, Oh, you and I are on different sides of the law, which is kind of what happens here. So there has to be that tension.

And then I think there has to be some level of forced proximity, ‘cause remember that if, in this day and age, if you don’t like someone, you don’t have to spend time with them. [Laughs] You know, you don’t!

Sarah: I mean, I, I do admit –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – many problems exist in the current society, but that is not one of them.

Alisha: Yes, you can leave! You have free will.

Sarah: I can hit the bricks!

Alisha: Hit the bricks! If you don’t like somebody, you don’t have to be near them!

Sarah: I’m out!

Alisha: You can quit your job; you can move away; you can do lots of things. I mean, some ways are more extreme than others, but you can leave. So I think forced –

Sarah: But if you have agency, you can –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – remove yourself from a situation that is –

Alisha: Right. And I, I mean –

Sarah: – unfortunate and harmful.

Alisha: – I, I think people have generally agency. I mean, there’s some reasons sometimes. And so the reasons you can’t leave, okay, fine; let’s play with those then. Let’s play with that forced proximity.

And then I think the third element of a great enemies-to-lovers is, like, the slow burn. ‘Cause it is really hard to go from I don’t like you; I don’t like what you’re doing here; I’m, I’m not, I’m not in your corner, or you are my direct opposition to, Okay, I love you. [Laughs] You know, like, it’s a really, really hard to get there from A to Z without all the letters in between.

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: So I think a good chunk of this book as they’re driving is just them kind of peeling those back and saying, like, Oh, here’s something nice I noticed about you; here’s something nice I noticed about you. Oh, this is kind of you. Okay, maybe you’re not the worst person in the world.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: And I, I do think –

Sarah: And their positions in the car –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – make that possible. Like, I have really good conversations with my kids or my spouse in the car –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – because it’s one of the few times when you’re sitting next to somebody, you are traveling together –

Alisha: Uh-huh.

Sarah: – but you’re not looking at each other.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: You’re not facing each other. You’re not facing off. You are –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – traveling together. And it’s easier to open up and talk about things that really matter when you’re not looking in someone’s face, but you’re sitting next to someone –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – in a, in that, in that closed space. Makes total sense!

Alisha: Yeah. Makes total sense, and I think it, it really is, you know, not only are they forced to be together, but they’re forced to interact with each other.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: And you learn a lot when you interact with someone, even if it’s something simple like, I remember when I was writing this book, in my notes, I had, like, certain parts where I was like, Turning point for him, turning point for her. And, and it wasn’t always something they said? It was sometimes something they did for each other, which, again, I can’t say what ‘cause – [laughs] – it would be a spoiler? But, so, yeah. I think, I think that’s a big point of it. Like, sure, there’s something, sometimes someone does something and it completely, like, switches something on in your brain where you stop thinking of everything they do in a negative light and you start thinking like, okay, what if I gave them the benefit of the doubt?

Sarah: [Laughs] I don’t actually hate the way you breathe. I’m glad –

Alisha: Yeah, it’s –

Sarah: – that you’re breathing!

Alisha: Yeah, like –

Sarah: That’s a new development!

Alisha: Okay, okay. All right, we’ll give this a try. [Laughs]

So yeah, I think, I think those are the elements. And I think the fact that we grew up with just seeing these, like, really bonkers versions of enemies-to-lovers play out – and sometimes they were great. Like, sometimes they work out well.

I think, I think Sandra Bullock has done some mov- – like, I love The Lost City, which is, like, her most recent one with Channing Tatum. I thought that movie was – she plays a romance author in it, which is why I watched it to begin with? I thought it was hilarious. I think it’s very underrated as a movie. It’s not going to win any awards, but it was – [laughs] –

Sarah: No!

Alisha: – very funny to me. But I think –

Sarah: I miss these movies, don’t you?

Alisha: I miss those movies, yes. I, I thought it was a great –

Sarah: I miss them –

Alisha: – great, like, Sandy Bullock movie, and it really –

Sarah: Yeah!

Alisha: – played on that thing of like, I don’t respect you and I don’t like you, and then, Oh, wait a minute – [laughs] – we are getting somewhere now, ‘cause they’re forced to be together and, and they realize, you know, like, Oh, wait a minute!

Sarah: I have long said that one of my favorite tropes in romance is, I don’t want to like you, I don’t want to like you, I don’t want to like you –

Alisha: Like I do.

Sarah: – and I cannot stop thinking about your hair.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: Damn it!

Alisha: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Sarah: Like, I don’t want to like you, but I do!

Alisha: Yeah!

Sarah: Damn it!

Alisha: Yeah, for sure! Yep.

Alisha: Yeah. And I think it’s –

Sarah: ‘Cause it’s inconvenient, and the stakes are high, and it’s annoying, and it’s more complicated, but also I can’t stop thinking about your hair!

Alisha: Yes! And I think that’s –

Sarah: Damn it!

Alisha: – it’s really important. Like, I’m, I don’t think anybody should ignore red flags or anything.

Sarah: No.

Alisha: Seeing red flags, that is not an enemies-to-lovers.

Sarah: That is, that’s different.

Alisha: That is different.

Sarah: That’s a different thing.

Alisha: That is different; don’t ignore those. But I –

Sarah: If he’s killing people and has bodies in the basement –

Alisha: Don’t do that.

Sarah: – that’s a red flag.

Alisha: Just stop that. Don’t do that. And so –

Sarah: If you, if, if this guy is on the moors and he’s damp and he’s yelling a lot about Cathy, that guy is nine red flags in a trench coat. No, no, no.

Alisha: Yeah, so many red flags. Yes, don’t ignore red flags!

Sarah: No.

Alisha: But I think there is something to say like, Okay, I prejudged you harshly based on things that were outside of your control.

Sarah: Yep.

Alisha: And I’m going to open my eyes a little bit and, and look at you as a full human being.

Sarah: Yep.

Alisha: ‘Cause I do think that it’s really easy, especially nowadays, to prejudge people and, and judge them one way based on, like, a very small snippet of possibly false information. And then you spend some time with them and you go, Oh, okay. Like, this is, you’re not, you’re not terrible. But I get it.

Sarah: And you have to be secure enough – (a) you have to be secure enough to rec-, to know that you were wrong –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – and secure in yourself and know that you can change your mind –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – and that’s okay. I mean –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – Angela Lansbury sang a whole song about this very thing. Finding you can change, learning you were wrong.

Alisha: Beauty and the Beast –

Sarah: Yes!

Alisha: – one of the greatest enemies-to-lovers! Though I will say if anybody imprisons your father, that is a red flag. [Laughs]

Sarah: That’s a bit of a red flag? But I also, I have a fundamental –

Alisha: Give him grace, but –

Sarah: – I have a fundamental problem with the, with this version from, from Disney in that this enchantress shows up, right?

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: And he’s, like, young?

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: Like, he’s young –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – and he’s rude.

Alisha: Uh-huh.

Sarah: Okay, and she gets mad.

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: So she enchants the whole castle? Like –

Alisha: Yeah!

Sarah: – all of his staff?

Alisha: What did the staff do?

Sarah: What did they do? What did Chip do? Mrs. Potts didn’t do anything! Mr. Clock did nothing –

Alisha: What did –

Sarah: – Lumière was just horny.

Alisha: What did the little boy do?

Sarah: Right, like, what did Chip do to you, lady? Piss off! Oh my God! Like, I would’ve been like –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – Fine, leave me as a beast! I own that –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – I was rude, but, like, why are you making Chip into a teacup for however many decades? That’s just –

Alisha: I mean –

Sarah: – way over the line here, lady.

Alisha: – by all means, eat the rich, right? But leave the staff!

Sarah: Yeah, leave the – they’re just trying to make a living!

Alisha: Leave the staff alone!

Sarah: Living in a house; now he’s a –

Alisha: They’re just –

Sarah: – now she’s a teapot –

Alisha: Awww!

Sarah: – and that guy’s an armoire, and come on, now!

Alisha: It’s not fair!

Sarah: But the whole point of that, of that, of that whole motif, the Beauty and the Beast –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – and the enemies-to-lovers is, is the part where you unbend –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – and you recognize –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: Oh, you were wrong about this person –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – and you see different things about them. Once – and then, of course, once you understand the other person’s motivation, it’s a lot easier to understand, Oh! This is why.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: I think part of the transition from enemies to regard to lovers is learning more and more of the why –

Alisha; Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – behind a character, which of course is, you know, what authors call motivation.

Alisha: Yes. And isn’t that like part of falling in love, too, is once you peel back the whys –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – you really start to get a deeper understanding of the person, and you –

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: – you fall more in love, like, with them. I think that’s true in real life.

Sarah: Especially ‘cause those whys can boil down to Why does he do this? Why does she act like this? Why is this happening? Because this is an honorable person trying to do their best. That’s why.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: That why, knowing that some-, someone is not fundamentally trying to hurt you, even if they kidnapped you using their brother’s FBI badge, which is a –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – bit of a questionable action, even then you –

Alisha: There were extenuating – [laughs]

Sarah: There were extenuating circumstances.

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: We understand why –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – this happened and, you know, it’s –

Alisha: But!

Sarah: But!

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: That also –

Alisha: Not the nicest thing to do. [Laughs]

Sarah: Not the greatest way –

Alisha: Yes.

Sarah: – to meet-cute somebody.

Alisha: To pick, to pick up a girl.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: I get it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, it is – when Kai and I first started dating, after our second or third date, I think, he said to me, like, Okay, well, I’ll see you in two weeks. [Laughs] No explanation. And I was like, That’s weird –

Sarah: Yeah! Okay!

Alisha: – after going on date after date with me in, like, you know, a week or so. And I texted him, and I, I sat on it for a while ‘cause I was trying to play it cool, and I’m like, Okay, yeah, see you in two weeks! No big deal. [Laughs] I was just, like, so bothered by it. I’m like, what happened that you don’t want to see me for two weeks? And so finally I mustered up the courage to text him and was like, Is something, like, is there reason you don’t want to see me for two weeks? And he went, Oh, my parents are in town. And I went, Oh!

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: Okay, well, that’s a good reason not to see me for two weeks. But yeah, it would be helpful – and, and what we discovered after that and sort of, you know, as we fell in love was that my family’s communication style is just to overshare everything.

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: We overshare. Like, if I am going to my sister’s, like, we usually go there on Saturday afternoons, right? She’ll call me at ten and be like, Where are you? What are you doing? What are you going to do on the way? And then, When are you going to get here? And I’m like, Well, first we’re going to go get coffee, and then we’re going to go to the play place, and then we’ll be there. [Laughs] Like, it’s, it’s minute by minute we overshare.

And my husband’s family or my husband’s, because of various things, was to information-diet his parents on a regular basis! And so he would just not share too much; just be like, Okay, well, this is all you need to know, okay? You don’t need to know –

Sarah: Yep!

Alisha: – any more than that. And that’s it, and that’s all we’re going to talk about. And I said to him –

Sarah: The information diet is so important.

Alisha: It, it is – well, now I know it’s important. I didn’t know –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – at the time it was important, but I was like, you don’t, don’t have to information-diet me. I need to know things – [laughs] – in order to understand what you’re doing.

But yeah, it was like a method of communication that he and I had to, like, learn and be fluent in. But I do think that is like, right? I had to peel back and say, Well, why are we doing this? Like, what, what is the reason that you can’t see me for two weeks and give it to me straight? Is it ‘cause you hate me? And he’s like, No! [Laughs]

Sarah: And you also had to look at Why do I think he hates me because he said –

Alisha: Yeah!

Sarah: – he’d see me in two weeks? Like –

Alisha: Right?

Sarah: – what’s the deal?

Alisha: Yeah!

Sarah: To you, not having information was a sign of mistrust and –

Alisha: Yeah!

Sarah: – disregard, whereas –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – for him it was, like, a totally normal thing. He was like, Yeah, I’ll see you in two weeks! I’m going to be busy; I’ll be back. You know, whatever!

Alisha: And he had to learn that I vibrate with anxiety – [laughs] – when I don’t know what’s going on.

Sarah: [Laughs] So when you were writing this –

Alisha: Mm.

Sarah: – and obviously the title is Enemies to Lovers –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – what were some of the examples of things where you’re like, No, that’s too far? No, that’s too much. Because, like, we’ve been talking about the stakes and the tension. You need to have those stakes, and you need to have tension between the characters early on, (a) to counterbalance their fascination, because it’s very easy to be like, Oh! You’re hot and I have horny pants. Shall we?

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: Like, what’s going to stop you? Nothing to stop you! But you have to have characters who are then going to take risks, they might make mistakes, and they have to make, make mistakes that are big enough to have an impact, but aren’t so large that you can’t redeem the character in the, you know, in the pages that you have left.

Alisha: Yeah. I, and I think one of the major changes that I made later on was Sejal becoming a magician instead of a con woman, ‘cause in the beginning –

Sarah: Ohhh!

Alisha: – when I first started writing this book, I was in, like, a really angry state. Like, I’m still angry; I’m angry all the time. But, like, I, I – how can you live in world?

Sarah: That’s the secret. Yeah.

Alisha: It’s, it’s, yeah, it’s like Hulk. You’ve got to be angry all the time, right?

Sarah: We’re all angry all the time; that’s the secret.

[Laughter]

Alisha: And I think in the original draft, in the beginning, where she was, like, straight up conning men, like that was her thing –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: – which is cool! Like, I don’t actually mind writing a con woman, and she can con men; I don’t really care about that either. But, but it was too harsh for where I knew she had to be. Like, it was too, too far for where I needed her to be, from where I needed to be, her to be in her personal journey to, to make this trip –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: – with someone else.

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: And so I had to pull it back a little bit and say like, Okay, she is really good at it, and she can do it, and she is really angry at a lot of men in her life. But what can I do in a way where she’s kind of not doing as much harm –

Sarah: Right. She’s not exploiting –

Alisha: – to people?

Sarah: – people’s vulnerability –

Alisha: She’s not, yeah.

Sarah: – to take things from them –

Alisha: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sarah: – which is what a con artist does.

Alisha: Yeah, and –

Sarah: They’re preying on vulnerable people!

Alisha: Right. And so, like, now she’s kind of like a Robin Hood, right? Like, when she does do it –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – it’s for a good reason. And she –

Sarah: Yep.

Alisha: – she does it in a way where she’s trying to give at least entertainment to her mark.

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: Even if, you know, even if she is conning them in one way or another, if she’s hustling them, like, she’s at least trying to make sure they have a good time while she does it.

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: So that was a big thing.

Sarah: And there’s an element to consent to that. Like, if you –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – if you are allowing somebody to perform magic tricks at you, you have agreed –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – to this.

Alisha: Yeah, you’ve agreed! Like, you’re, you’re in it, right?

Sarah: I do not –

Alisha: If, if –

Sarah: – regularly traipse through the streets of DC and have random musicians – or, musicians – random magicians come up to me and start doing tricks in my face. Like, it’s, it –

Alisha: Yeah! So if you’re in a bar and you’re like, Yeah, I’ll bet some money on this, I mean, like, you’ve consented to – [laughs] –

Sarah: Mm-hmm!

Alisha: – getting your money taken away, most likely.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: And I think also in the original one, I had Krish actually being an FBI agent. Like, I think that was the other change. And I –

Sarah: Ohhh!

Alisha: – I realized if I was –

Sarah: That does change the stakes!

Alisha: It changes the stakes, and it changes the power dynamic incredibly. Like –

Sarah: That is such a good point! Yes, it –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: The power dynamic is always so important –

Alisha: Very important.

Sarah: – especially in an –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – enemies-to-lovers, yeah!

Alisha: Very important. Where I’m like, no, now he has way too much power over her.

Sarah: Mm-hmm!

Alisha: If he’s an actual FBI agent and she is an actual con woman, it changes everything.

Sarah: Especially in a book that is coming out right now in 2026.

Alisha: Right, yeah. And I, I kind of –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – had an eye on that, too. I was like, when is this going to come out? What’s the world’s going to look like? [Laughs] So I –

Sarah: Hell! Looks like hell!

Alisha: – I took that out.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Alisha: It’s going to look like hell, yeah. It’s going to be wild.

So I took, I took that part out too. And I, I do think taking those parts out and making those tweaks, even if it does make it really hard to write a blurb where it’s not as easy as, like, He’s on the right side of the law, and she’s on the wrong. Like, it’s, it’s not as easy as that; it’s a little more complicated. They’re both a little bit of everything.

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: I think it makes the story better, even if it makes it more difficult to talk about.

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: So.

Sarah: And it, and it gives them reasons why they’re both lying?

Alisha: Yeah!

Sarah: …they’re both lying for good reasons?

Alisha: Yeah, they’re both lying for good reasons.

Sarah: Whereas if he’s an FBI agent, he’s not lying.

Alisha: No. And he’s not, and he’s –

Sarah: He’s just, he’s just exerting power that he may not be allowed to use, but is going to anyway.

Alisha: And one of the things that makes it annoying, like, being an attorney, is that, like, I know when things are illegal, and I was like, He would get fired for…

[Laughter]

Sarah: That’s right! You –

Alisha: You can’t use your badge!

Sarah: – you are one of the many recovering attorneys in Romance Land!

Alisha: Yes, I am one of the many recovering attorneys. And so I was like, you know, it’s one thing to, like, pretend to be an FBI agent. Yeah, that’s –

Sarah: Yep.

Alisha: – really illegal, too. But your job is not on the line – [laughs] –

Sarah: Nooo!

Alisha: – you know, as, as a real FBI agent. So it’s okay!

And, and so, yeah. It, it’s a lot about motivations and why are they doing the things they’re doing? And, and I realized, like, if you don’t make them – and I think this is true for any book, right? If, if characters aren’t sympathetic to me from page one, I’m not going to –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: – keep reading. It’s just not, it’s not interesting to me.

Sarah: No.

Alisha: If, if I can’t find them likeable – and, and I mean likeable in a way where, you know, they don’t have to be perfect, but they have to be, like, somebody I, I kind of want to find love – [laughs] – in one way or another –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – otherwise, why am I reading this book? Then, then why am I reading this book? So.

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: That was, those were, I think, the two major changes I had to make to make…

Sarah: That’s really interesting.

Alisha: Yeah!

Sarah: Especially the part about making him not really an agent, just –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – having the badge.

Alisha: Yeah. Just, just having, having a badge.

Sarah: Which is a big, which is, which is a big uh-oh to have to fix –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – my guy. It’s a big boo-boo –

Alisha: Yeah, yeah.

Sarah: – that you have made.

Alisha: He shouldn’t be doing that either. [Laughs] But it is, it is –

Sarah: Real bad couple of felonies right from the get-go, my man.

Alisha: But he’s desperate, and again, extenuating circumstances. [Laughs]

Sarah: Extenuating circumstances.

Alisha: Just, whenever we watch K-dramas, which we love –

Sarah: Just go with it.

Alisha: – just, you have to, like, my, I’m always like, Oh no! And my husband will go, Let them cook. [Laughs] And I’m like, Fine! I will let them cook! So you just, just, when you read this book, just let me cook, okay? Like –

Sarah: Let them cook!

Alisha: – bear with me for –

Sarah: Oh my God, that’s funny.

Alisha: You’re going to read it, and you’re going to go, This is wild. Just bear with me, please, and let me take you for this ride. Let me cook a little.

Sarah: I think the thing I like best about this book – Amanda and I talk about this all the time when we recap older issues of Romantic Times magazine –

Alisha: Oh yeah.

Sarah: – like the early 2000s or the ‘90s. Like, and Amanda calls it when romance was really zany?

Alisha: Mm-hmm. It wasn’t, oh, was it a zany time?

Sarah: Wasn’t it?

Alisha: Oh, the zaniest. [Laughs]

Sarah: I mean, if you want peak zany, I would call that the Billionaire Playboy Sheik’s Virgin Stable-Girl. Like, that was peak zany. It, it just, that is, that is my standard against which all zany is judged. And it’s really nice to go read a book where it’s just like, Yep! Let – just go with it. This is going to be over-the-top fun –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – and I don’t have to do anything but just follow along and ride along.

Alisha: No, just come, please, just get in the car and get…

Sarah: Get in the car!

Alisha: Get in the car –

Sarah: It’s going to be a good time.

Alisha: – buckle your seatbelt –

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: – and just have a good time. That’s all I want people to do with this book. Just, just trust me, okay?

[Laughter]

Alisha: You may not know me, but just trust me!

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: We are going to get through this, and you’re going to enjoy it, I hope. [Laughs]

Sarah: And we’re going to have a really good time.

Alisha: We’re going to have a really good time.

Sarah: And it’s also going to be really hot.

Alisha: Yeah, I, I hope so! Yeah! I mean, I, I do, I do think this, like, the tension in this book, I think I, I did really well. I’m very proud of that part of it. So I hope people really feel that slow, slow tension.

Sarah: Oh yes. Because it’s, it’s, it’s tension that evolves. There’s –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – there’s always tension there, but it gets more complicated and deeper –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – the, the more that the story goes on. It’s like, I think it was Lisa, yeah, it was Lisa Kleypas when I was writing the first book who said that a really good sex scene causes as many problems as it solves.

Alisha: Ooh, I love that!

Sarah: It relieves as much tension –

Alisha: I’ve never heard that.

Sarah: – as it states. But it’s, like –

Alisha: Mmm!

Sarah: – totally true, right?

Alisha: Mm-hmm!

Sarah: Like, a good sex scene, if you just end all the sexual tension and that’s it, well, like, well then why are we reading?

Alisha: Yeah! What’s the point?

Sarah: It needs to, it needs to solve some problems and create whole new ones.

Alisha: Oh, I love that! That’s really cool.

Sarah: And really, a good conflict that’s sustained through a whole book does the same thing.

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: If you solve one part of it, there’s still other, more complicated pieces that are to be solved after.

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: Which I think is really, I think it’s really important, because I also think that there is a tendency right now – I haven’t fully articulated this to myself, so I’m sort of putting words together – I think that there is a tendency right now in a lot of newer authors to shy away from having their characters, unless they’re writing truly dastardly dark romance, like this guy’s a master criminal type of books –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – I think a lot of writers starting out right now, especially in contemporary romance, are afraid of having their characters make big mistakes?

Alisha: Mmm!

Sarah: And I’m not sure the reasons why that is, but I feel like the lack of tension is sometimes exacerbated by the lack of mistakes, even little ones.

Alisha: I, I think part of that reason is that conflict has become, it’s, it’s hard to write. Conflict is, I think, one of the hardest things to get right in romance in general because –

Sarah: Oh yes. You know, that’s so true. Conflict is really hard to write.

Alisha: Conflict is so hard, because think about it: you can’t just have conflict that doesn’t go unresolved to an extent. It has to be resolved at least enough. It doesn’t have to all be tied up with a pretty bow, of course, but it has to be resolved enough that you can get to a happy ending. Like, we all know what the ending is going to be, right?

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Alisha: We’ve got to get there! So the conflict is really doing the heavy lifting of how we get there. Like, that’s the roadmap of your book. But I think part of the problem with, with having characters who are too perfect or don’t make mistakes or are too good to be true is, first of all, they’re too good to be true. We’re all human, and we know that we all make mistakes. But I think part, a lot of it is that if people are really, really great, then there’s no conflict and we don’t have to worry about it. We can just get to the end, and it’s all great!

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: I think, I think conflict is a skill. I think characterization is a skill. It’s a muscle that needs to be, you know, worked and flexed. I don’t think all my early books had great conflict or great, you know, like, char-, characterization. I mean, fifteen years ago, God, what did I know? I didn’t know anything.

Sarah: Oh, I don’t know. I think, I think the femdom with the nipple clamps had really good tension with that guy who had like ninety-five thousand brothers and sisters.

Alisha: I mean, oh yeah! It was a, it was a wild time, right? Yeah, the 2010s were – [laughs] – it was, it was a wild time, but, but it was different.

And so, you know, that is a muscle that needs to be flexed. And so I do think newer authors, unless they have a really, like, unless they have a really solid grasp on that, or they have an editor who is, like, ready to invest in them as a professional, like, long-term –

Sarah: Yeaahh.

Alisha: – it is really hard to, to get that really pat.

Sarah: Yeah, it is hard!

Alisha: That’s an interesting, interesting idea. I didn’t, haven’t really thought of that.

Sarah: And conflict is, is difficult, I think, for people, because our whole world right now is constant conflict –

Alisha: Mmm.

Sarah: – and bullying.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: And I think the two get mixed up together, that if you’re in conflict with someone, well then someone must be right and someone must be wrong. And that’s –

Alisha: We –

Sarah: – not always true! You know what I mean?

Alisha: We struggle with nuance because videos –

Sarah: What?! On the internet? We struggle with nuance?

Alisha: I, I think so! And I –

Sarah: Oh my gosh!

Alisha: – I mean –

Sarah: Which is wild, because rom- –

Alisha: – what was Twitter?

Sarah: – romance Twitter and romance Threads, both? Like, Threads is where nuance goes to die. And yet romance as a genre is fundamentally about nuance?

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: Really good romance has a lot of nuance to it.

Alisha: Lot of nuance, and it’s a lot of gray areas, and I think –

Sarah: Yes!

Alisha: I mean, think about how quickly people get canceled for things, and then they have to go and they have to explain it, and nobody wants to listen to their ten-minute explanation ‘cause they already watched a one-minute cancellation video.

Sarah: Yep!

Alisha: So it’s really, really hard to get through life if you’re not picture perfect.

Sarah: And you don’t want to be the main character; it’s exhausting.

Alisha: Yeah! It’s exhausting.

Sarah: Everyone’s trying to avoid being main character.

Alisha: Yeah, yeah, everyone is. They don’t want to be perceived, Sarah! Nobody wants to be perceived.

Sarah: I mean, I can relate. Can confirm!

Alisha: I want to be perceived to a certain extent.

Sarah: Yeah.

Alisha: [Laughs] I want to be perceived enough to sell my books.

Sarah: It’s book promo time! You’ve got to be perceived, girl!

Alisha: Yeah, I’ve got to be perceived.

Sarah: It’s just frigging everywhere.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: So this is a dreadfully unfair question to ask somebody who’s about to release a book, so I fully own the fact that I’m a raging jerk right now. But –

Alisha: Mm.

Sarah: – are you working on anything that you want to tell people about?

Alisha: I would love to tell people about my next book, ‘cause it is a, it’s a cusp YA/New Adult book. So Young Adult, New Adult.

Sarah: Oooh!

Alisha: So it’s, it’s a little bit in the middle. But it is a Sliding Doors-esque Young Adult that’ll be out in 2027. But I’ve finished sort of my first draft; I’m working on the next draft right now, and so I, I really love it. I feel like there’s – I’ve always been fascinated with this idea of, like, one little change can change your whole life and, and how it would play out. So it’s, it’s sort of that idea, and, and I’m just, I’m really proud of this book. I, I feel like I’m always proud of, like, the last book I wrote. Like, I’m so proud of Enemies to Lovers, but I’m also really proud of this upcoming YA. And I hope people who are, who read my adult romance books actually will check this one out. I think they would really enjoy it, too. So that is what’s coming up next for me.

And then after that, I am a free agent!

Sarah: Ohhh!

Alisha: I am not under contract? For the first time in ten years, I am –

Sarah: Holy cow!

Alisha: – not under an active contract.

Sarah: And isn’t it wild how much has changed in ten years?

Alisha: It is very, very wild. I have not gone out to get a new contract either – [laughs] – but I am, I was really scared about it. I, I went through this whole thing where I was like, maybe this is it. Like, maybe I end here? And then I, I said, no? That’s wild. ‘Cause I’m a little tired, too. I’m just – but that’s partially my child’s fault, too.

Sarah: There is nothing wrong with taking a break, because –

Alisha: It is –

Sarah: – it’s not like the talent is going to leave you.

Alisha: It is scary to not –

Sarah: Yes.

Alisha: – have something, like, load- – and I do, I do actually have something loaded in the chamber, right? I got a YA coming out in 2027. But it is –

Sarah: But looking beyond that is intimidating. I totally get it!

Alisha: Looking beyond that is, is very, very intimidating. I have – and, and not having, not knowing what I’m going to do after that is wild to me right now. There’s no pressure? There’s no – there’s some ideas that I have down that my agent and I are fleshing out right now, but I don’t know where those books will end up. I don’t know what editor they’ll be with. I don’t know what publishing house they’ll be with. I mean, I don’t know anything about them, and that’s really both exciting and scary! I think I’m veering more towards excited now. I think my natural optimism is kicking out over my, my standard baseline anxiety about everything.

[Laughter]

Sarah: Well, one of the things that’s changed since you and I started writing in romance is that it’s so much easier to publish your own books now.

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: Like, there are –

Alisha: Oh, for sure.

Sarah: – more companies that want to help you self-publish than there are traditional companies that want to help you traditional publish.

Alisha: Yeah. And I –

Sarah: There are more options for self-publishing in terms of cover and formatting –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – and translation and all of this, all of the steps involved in publishing a book. There are more companies to do that than there are publishers now.

Alisha: Yeah, and I, I’ve done the self-publishing route.

Sarah: For sure!

Alisha: Like, I’m pretty comfortable with it. I’ve been traditionally published now, basically with the same –

Sarah: ‘Cause you started in self-publishing, right?

Alisha: Yeah, I started in, technically in digital publishing, but I –

Sarah: Digital! That’s right.

Alisha: – pretty quickly went over to self-pub. I went to digital-first publishing to start, and then I moved over to self-publishing.

Sarah: Who did you start with? I forget.

Alisha: Samhain?

Sarah: Samhain, that’s right.

Alisha: Back in the day, yeah, when –

Sarah: Back in the day.

Alisha: – when ménages were the, the illustrated cover of – [laughs] – of 2010, yeah, 2009. But yeah, different, different times. So yeah, I’ve, I’ve started, like, I’ve, I’ve been in everything at this point. So yeah, who knows? Who knows? The sky’s the limit, and I’m ready to kind of ride whatever is next. I know there’s a lot of fear and anxiety amongst authors right now, especially with the rise of AI and where it’s going to go and what it’s going to do. I know I sent out my Anthropic settlement paperwork. Yep, you did too.

Sarah: Me too!

Alisha: All my books were in there, so, you know, I guess I’ll get something for them, but nothing –

Sarah: That’s like my, my favorite thing to say when someone comes at me, like, all positive about AI, and I’m like –

Alisha: No.

Sarah: – Oh, you, you don’t like AI? Yes, it stole from me.

Alisha: It stole from me!

Sarah: It’s giving me money because it stole from me –

Alisha: Yeah.

Sarah: – and I also can’t file any kind of compensation for the fact that it has crawled my entire website and stolen –

Alisha: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – all of that to train the model –

Alisha: Mm-hmm. Yep!

Sarah: – and other parts of the internet. There is no compensation for that –

Alisha: Nothing.

Sarah: – but it, it stole from me so hard I’m getting money.

Alisha: Yeah. And it is, it’s so wild to me that anybody would even consider writing a book using stolen material. I mean, you’re not a writer; you’re a plagiarist at best. [Laughs] That’s not, it’s not writing.

Sarah: Plagiarist at worst, amateur programmer at best.

Alisha: Amateur, yes, very amateur.

Sarah: …good at asking question.

Alisha: Like, come on! The only comfort I have about that, about that whole settlement thing, and I think the only comfort authors have to kind of keep in their mind is that yes, they’ve stolen the books that you’ve written, but they haven’t stolen the books that you haven’t written yet. They can’t steal your brain. They can’t steal how you evolve as an author. They can’t steal –

Sarah: That is such a good point! They can’t steal –

Alisha: – anything –

Sarah: – what you haven’t written yet.

Alisha: – that you haven’t done yet. And so that is your trump card, right? Like, that is the card that you have to play, and so you have to just get better and better. And is it scary and is it challenging and is it frustrating? Yes, but you haven’t written your best book yet, and they have not devoured it yet, and so you need to just focus on writing your own best book, and it will work itself out. I’m convinced of it. I have to be. [Laughs]

[outro]

Sarah: And that brings us to the end of this week’s episode. Thank you, as always, to Alisha for hanging out with me? I will have links to the books and movies that we mentioned, and, of course, you can watch this episode on our YouTube channel @SmartPodcastTrashyBooks!

I also want to thank Sotto Voce Candles for sponsoring this week’s episode. Remember, there’s a link in the show notes to get fifteen percent off some truly gorgeous romance-themed candles.

As always, I end with a terrible joke. I will never leave you hanging, because this is really fun!

Did you know that if you turn a canoe over, you can wear it as a hat?

It’s true! If you turn a canoe over, you can wear it as a hat,

Because it’s capsized!

[Laughs] It’s so bad! That joke is from Upvoters_NeverDie, which I hope is true. Thank you, Upvoters_NeverDie. Cap-sized!

On behalf of everyone here, we wish you the very best of reading. Have a wonderful weekend; we’ll see you back here next week! And in the words of my favorite retired podcast Friendshipping, thank you for listening. You’re welcome for talking!

[end of music]