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- [00:00]
Cece
What's up, everyone? This is Cece. Do you know something I'm always looking for when I review the slush pile? Strong interiority. Well written interiority shows what your protagonist is thinking about in a way that is realistic and interesting. It propels the story forward instead of holding it back. But it doesn't stop there. A strong writer will leverage interiority into a superpower, into something I call psychological acuity. Think about it this way. Plot is what happens. Interiority is how your protagonist processes what happens. And psychological acuity is why it matters. It gives a book depth and meaning and staying power. All breakout books have psychological acuity. You have been asking me to teach a course about psychological acuity for years.
- [00:48]
Bianca Murray
Years.
- [00:49]
Cece
Well, it's finally here. Why did it take me so long? Because my courses take years to build. They're dense, they're thorough, and they're filled with examples and specific techniques. So this five day course begins on March 2nd. We'll have an optional interactive component. Students are invited to submit excerpts from their work for a chance to have them critiqued live during a class. If you're ready to take your writing to the next level, join me for writing interiority and psychological Acuity. Don't worry if you can't attend live. The sessions will be recorded. And for more information, check out my bio on Instagram or the podcast website. I'm looking forward to seeing you there.
- [01:35]
Bianca Murray
Hi there and welcome to our show, the Shit no one tells you about Writing. I'm best selling author Bianca Murray and I'm joined by Cece Lera of Wendy Sherman Associates and Carly Waters of P.S. literary. Hi everyone. Today's guest is the best selling author of the Haters, the Drowning Woman, the Perfect Family, the Swap, the Arrangement, Her Pretty Face and the Party. She has also written an executive produced an independent film. She lives in Vancouver, British Columbia with her husband and two cute but deadly Rescue Chihuahuas. It's my pleasure to welcome Robin Harding. Robin, welcome to the show.
- [02:17]
Robin Harding
Thank you for having me. It's so nice to be here and to catch up with you.
- [02:21]
Bianca Murray
Yeah, wonderful to have you here. For those of you who aren't watching on YouTube, I am holding up the book cover, Strangers in the Villa and I'm going to quickly read you the flap copy so that you all have some context. And then Robin and I are going to dive in. So, Sydney Low's life in New York is shattered when her husband Curtis admits to a meaningless affair with a client. Begging for forgiveness and vowing to prove his devotion, Curtis suggests the couple retreat to a remote hilltop house in Spain to repair their marriage. High above the Mediterranean, Sydney and Curtis are working on the isolated property and their when a pair of Australian travelers turns up at their door in dire need of help. Lonely for companionship and desperate for free labor, Sydney and Curtis invite the attractive young couple to stay. But as the days pass, dark secrets come to life. The Lowe's bond is tested, and not everyone will leave the villa alive. Love it. Love it.
- [03:27]
Robin Harding
The book is coming March 3, but you can pre order it now anywhere books are sold, and pre orders are the greatest thing for a book success. So if you're interested, please consider pre ordering.
- [03:41]
Bianca Murray
Pre orders are so important. People are always like, what do you give writers? You give them pre orders as gifts. And we're going to link to this as well in our substack and we'll put it on our bookshop.org affiliate page so you'll be able to pre order from there as well. Right. So, Robin, this begins with a, what we like to call a sneaky prologue. It isn't termed a prologue, but it says the Costa Brother house for sale. And it gives, like, the description of the house, etc. Was this always there? Was this a description you wrote for yourself in the beginning of the story? Tell us why you began with that listing, as it were.
- [04:21]
Robin Harding
Yeah, I wanted to start with the listing because it's what draws this couple to Spain. They see this listing that is this diamond in the rough, and they can work together and it's sort of a metaphor for their relationship. Their relationship isn't a bad place, but if they work hard enough, they can rebuild this into a beautiful home and a beautiful marriage again. And so I found a house online that was kind of the house in my head, and it was sort of a compilation of a few houses. But I, you know, drew from those real estate listings, and they're very flowery in. In Europe. It's funny, you know, real estate listings in Canada seem to be a little, you know, they're just pretty basic. And, you know, there's the buzzwords that mean this is a beautiful cozy means small and. But they go for it in Europe. So I had fun writing that in the voice of a Spanish realtor.
- [05:21]
Bianca Murray
It was very romanticized. And I think that's often what happens with people, right? We go on vacation to a place we like. This place is amazing, and it's away from our normal. We can imagine ourselves living there. This listing was like exactly the kind of thing that, you know, is just going to draw Someone in and be able to insert themselves between the lines to imagine what their life will be like in this home.
- [05:44]
Robin Harding
Exactly. And they come there, you know, so broken and so damaged and so there's so much riding on this house because it's, like I said, it kind of represents the relationship. It's broken down, but they can fix it.
- [05:58]
Bianca Murray
Loved it. Loved it. As a metaphor and as a. As an introduction. Also gave you something to imagine before we started diving into it. Something that I want to discuss is there seems to be a lot of pressure with psychological thrillers these days to put us straight into the action. You know, we've. We've got to have like a flash forward prologue that's at the middle or where something bad is happening and that sort of detracts from the openings that allow for setting the scene, giving some backstory about these characters, giving some context. Is this something that you find because you have been in the industry for a while, so you have seen how things evolve and what editors want and what they don't want?
- [06:43]
Robin Harding
Yeah, I think it's from my perspective, it's readers that want that. You know, readers. I see so many comments and posts about, you know, don't waste my time, get me into it. Right. You need to hook them really fast. But I think that in order to care, we need to know these characters. So it is a struggle. It is a struggle to make sure that we are kicking things off with a bang, but also, you know, developing these, these humans that we are going to spend this next 350 pages with. So I think what's working for me, I hope it's working for me, is planting the intrigue. So maybe the action doesn't happen that much, but the intrigue so that we know something's not right, but we don't know what that is. So that's kind of what I am using as I do. Setup of the characters and the scene and the scenarios is kind of plant seeds that readers pick up on and say, yeah, this is off.
- [07:47]
Bianca Murray
Yeah, we on the podcast, we call them curiosity seeds and we love them. So you plant them early on, you keep watering them, you keep watering them, and at some point they're gonna bloom. And the reader who's paying attention is waiting for the payoff of the bloom because they know something's coming. Right? Because I think what we want these days, especially in a time of there's so much distraction, is you don't want readers who sit there being spoon fed. You want readers who are actively engaged, who are theorizing who are figuring things out because that makes them turn the page.
- [08:22]
Emily Ohanjanian
Yes.
- [08:22]
Robin Harding
Totally agree, Totally agree. And as a reader, I feel the same way. Like, I love when I think, oh, oh, I know, I know. And then sometimes you don't. Sometimes you do, right?
- [08:31]
Bianca Murray
Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes you have guessed it, and other times, the best time is when. When you haven't.
- [08:36]
Robin Harding
Yeah.
- [08:36]
Bianca Murray
But, yeah, what I liked is that we had two chapters of sort of set up from you. We got the context of these characters. We understood things are pretty messy as we're coming in. There's a lot of layers of messiness. There's even, like this power imbalance. So cece, my agent, is often on the podcast, and she says she loves opening with power imbalances. And you would think, okay, this is a married couple. There is no power imbalance. But he has done something bad, and she is definitely lording that over it.
- [09:08]
Robin Harding
Yes. So she has the power even. She's the damaged, the injured party, but she has the power because he's done all this for her. He's like, I choose you over my career, over our wonderful life in New York. All I care about is this marriage. And so she holds. Holds the keys to everything. So, yeah, it was fun to write that, but she's broken also. She's damaged, and she's. She is trying to get her emotional trust back with him.
- [09:38]
Bianca Murray
But, yeah, I just found it so interesting because, you know, we speak so much about power imbalance, and then we often think of it in terms of socioeconomic power imbalance, or this one's the boss and this one works for them, etc. But for our listeners, what Robin has done here show brilliantly how power imbalance can exist in very different ways in ways that you wouldn't expect. So when you are playing around with power imbalances, you know, it doesn't have to be the kind of traditional. Traditional. This one's in charge of that one. This one's got more money than that one. It could be these subtle, you know, things that happen in relationships all the time.
- [10:15]
Robin Harding
Yeah. And I'm writing something right now, which I. I can't talk about yet, but there's a power imbalance between a mother and the daughter, and the daughter has the power. So it is interesting. It's like one character, you know, it's a college age daughter who's like, you know, comes home and she's superior and the mom's trying to get the relationship back. So, yeah, there's so many power imbalances that are emotional.
- [10:41]
Bianca Murray
Yeah, yeah. Family is messy, and we love messy. We love messiness in stories. Not in our own lives, but in story. We really like messiness. Okay, so when it comes again to the inciting incident, that happens pretty soon. I think it's like chapter three or whatever. We have this couple arriving, and on the podcast, we're always saying the inciting incident needs to answer the why now? Why today question. Why is the story starting now? Why didn't it start last week? Why is it not starting next week? And then it gets all the dominoes tipping over. So for you, was this always very clear in your mind, Robin? This is our inciting incident, and this is where we're going from there.
- [11:22]
Robin Harding
Absolutely. Yeah. And I. And I did want to get into the story that fast because I know that's what readers want. Right. I could have spent six chapters with Sidney and Curtis and their power dynamic and their damaged relationship, but I thought that knock at the door really kicks off the action. And, you know, I don't know if you would call this a cheat or not, but, you know, there's a knock at the door, and Curtis slides his chair back, and he's like, it's fine, it's fine. And then he says, why does he feel this sense of dread? So he has this inherent reaction to that knock at the door that it's not good news.
- [12:00]
Bianca Murray
And, yeah, yeah, I don't feel like that's a cheat at all. I mean, in life, all the time, we have premonitions, etc. I feel like if you use it too much in a story or there's too many coincidences or there's too many, you know, anticipations of dread or whatever can be a problem. But like. But you use it once, there it goes, and it immediately makes us pay attention. Like, this is not a normal knock at the door.
- [12:23]
Robin Harding
Yes. And so he's. So it's kind of. The first scene is through Sydney's eyes when. When they open the door, and she's like, why is he being so weird? Like, there's this night young couple who've broken down, and he's like, what do you want? And she's all, you know, hey, can I charge your phone? She's all, sweet. So again, the dynamic in the marriage comes through in this scene with these interlopers.
- [12:46]
Bianca Murray
I love that because, you know, so often we focus just on revealing character by, I don't know, telling the reader who the character is, etc. But so much can be read between the lines of how they interact with people. And, like, you Say, a knock at the door. Like, I was. I was mocking a friend of mine who, every time she goes on vacation, she makes really good friends. The kind of friends that she'll travel across the world to see in far flung places. Lisa, I'm saying hi to you because I know you listen to the podcast, and I'm the person. If I'm on vacation or at a resort or something and people want to talk to me, I'm like, no, I hold up my book. I'm just like. I'm not here to talk to people. I'm not here to make friends. I'm here to just, like, relax and whatever. And so, so funny how much you can ascertain about a person just by those kinds of things.
- [13:37]
Robin Harding
Yeah, those little interactions that reveal so much of character. And I think dialogue, too, you know, is. I'm such a fan of writing dialogue. It's my favorite thing to write. And I think just this third chapter exchange between these four people really does a lot for character for all of them.
- [13:58]
Bianca Murray
Right. So it. It sets all of them up. It gives us, as the readers, a lot to theorize about. It gets us to kind of be squirmy and being, oh, this one's being a bit rude, and this one's being about this. And, you know, as. As a South African, we have a friendly rivalry with Australia in the rugby. So I always say. So I always say, don't trust Australians at your front door.
- [14:20]
Robin Harding
Australian. So I knew all the Aussie isms because I've lived with one for 30 years.
- [14:28]
Bianca Murray
They were incredible. I love. Okay, so let's talk about structure. We've got Sydney and Curtis sections. We've got Bianca and Damian sections. And they're interspersed with transcripts of couples counseling sessions. So, Robyn, how much do you plot? How much do you pants? How much of this is set up before you dive in? How much of it is feeling your way and calibrating as you go along?
- [14:53]
Robin Harding
I'd say it's about 50. 50. So I do set up the major plot points. I use the, you know, save the CA screenwriting structure to make sure that I have enough plot turns and that they are coming at the right time. So I would say I plot out the key turning points, and then I always say they're like pegs on the wall. And then I write from peg to peg and try to get there in the most interesting way possible. So you've got, say, 60 pages to get to the next turning point. And you're like, what can happen in these 60 pages that is going to keep the reader really engaged and turning the pages to get to that huge next big twist.
- [15:44]
Bianca Murray
Yeah. In terms of those transcripts, did you write them all back to back so that you could understand this couple better and what they were going through, or were the transcripts also? You get to a point and you're like, I feel like this is a good spot to have some sort of transcript so they would get a bit more information.
- [16:00]
Robin Harding
God, I really struggled with those transcripts because, believe it or not, I've never been to couples therapy, even though I've been married for like a hundred years. But one of my very good friends is a psychologist and does couples counseling. So I knew what I wanted to reveal in those sessions. And then I worked with her to make sure it was realistic to what a therapist would ask and what a couple would reveal.
- [16:24]
Emily Sommer
And.
- [16:24]
Robin Harding
And I really wrote them all, like you said, kind of in a chunk. And then I had to figure out where they fit. And it was so interesting how they did fit into the plot from my perspective. Right. There were places where I'm like, oh, this is the perfect time to reveal Curtis's childhood or Sidney's childhood or their trust issues. And, you know, so there it just Sometimes, I'm sure you find the same. Like there's this kismet that happens in a. In a story where you're like, ah, these things are clicking and that you didn't think they were going to, and then they do. And it's. It's such a nice little moment of magic when you're writing, but it's also
- [17:02]
Bianca Murray
such a smart way of essentially providing backstory, because I think this is something that we struggle with the most as writers. Because often, I mean, in this story, the inciting incident is when he had the affair, which is before the, you know, like one of the inciting incidences is before the story even begins. And then we have an inciting incident that we see the page. And you could have begun with them in therapy while they showing this messiness before they decide to move. And that, for me is always interesting, is where you decide to begin, because the story can start anywhere, right. So for you, is it as a seasoned writer, you're like, no, I'm not starting with the backstory. I'm going to find an interesting way of interspersing that.
- [17:45]
Robin Harding
Yeah. So one thing I think in thrillers anyway is like you said, sometimes the inciting incident has already happened. Does that make sense? Like. Like, obviously there's going to be another one that's going to kick us into a new section of the plot. But usually I start with. I mean, the inciting incident could have been the move to Spain, but we're already in it. Right. So, you know, we could have said, oh, this couple. And they're, you know, deciding should they divorce, and then they decide to move to Spain. That in itself is inciting incidents. So I usually start, like, when I was doing screenwriting, they get in late, get out early is the same. Right. So it's like, let's. Where can I push them to so that, you know, the readers are as far into this scene as possible and then keep the action going from there. So I. Yeah, I use the transcripts as ways to give us more little kernels as we go of what was actually done in the marriage, what actually happened, without them having to have, like, a big, laborious conversation about it.
- [18:53]
Bianca Murray
Yeah. Because they'd have to sit and go, well, in the past, you did this and I did this and it. And I mean, you could have also had them seeing therapist in Spain if you wanted to. But again, I feel like the transcripts work best because that was in the past. So it was a really brilliant way, I think, of giving the reader backstory and context. But each time you revealed it. The problem with backstory is that you can drag the reader back and it can slow down the forward momentum. But because they were so short and each one revealed something that was that the reader didn't know, it actually ended up moving the story forward.
- [19:29]
Robin Harding
Oh, good, good. And I love reading that format. I just find it fun when I'm reading a thriller. I'm reading Not Quite Dead yet by Holly Jackson. Just started it. And there's, you know, I just love the breakup. When you're reading, you know, a dense book and then suddenly you've got a police transcript or a psy, you know, psychologist transcript. I just. I'm a fan of that break for the eyes and the brain. Just a different kind of style to take in information. Yeah.
- [19:56]
Bianca Murray
And it makes it more interesting because, as well, what you could have done is you could have done a dual. Sorry, I have to pronounce it that way, because when I pronounce it Jewel, everybody thinks I'm talking about diamonds. A dual time narrative. You could have gone backwards and forwards, you know, like them in the past, them now, them in the past. And again, this was a brilliant way of doing the backstory and avoiding that dual timeline narrative.
- [20:22]
Robin Harding
Yeah. Because I already have, like, shifting perspectives. I feel like you can bog things down if you're going. I mean, there is some past. I guess there is some. Some past scenes from Bianca and Damian. But, yeah, it would have been a lot. It would have been a lot if I had had both of them moving back and forward in time and shifting perspectives. So I just wanted to. I'm not sure what really was the impetus to add those, but I just, you know, it's just something you feel when you're writing. You're like, I think there could be a new. There could be a break here that gives some kind of insight in a fresh way.
- [21:00]
Bianca Murray
Yeah, it was an elegant solution. And I think so much of writing is trying to find the elegant, simple solution because, you know, I've used the analogy before of a just drawing an outline of a figure, and that's writing, and then we feel like it's not working, and so we just start to color it in more and more and more because we feel like adding more words is going to help. And often that completely detracts from the original image you had. So when you come up with that elegant solution, it's incredible. It just feels like angels singing.
- [21:31]
Emily Ohanjanian
Yes.
- [21:32]
Robin Harding
Well, I'm so glad it worked for you because I really enjoyed it, having those in there as well and talking to my therapist friend. You know, she's so smart and so wise about relationships, and it was really insightful. She was, like, diagnosing them for me, the characters.
- [21:48]
Bianca Murray
That's incredible. I think.
- [21:50]
Emily Ohanjanian
Yeah.
- [21:51]
Bianca Murray
We've said before, put your characters through therapy. You know, have them have it. There's actually a podcast who puts characters through therapy, your main characters, et cetera, and so they can reveal a lot more than what you actually know in terms of what their diagnosis would be.
- [22:09]
Robin Harding
I do write character profiles beforehand, so I do know a lot about their history and who they are. Then it really informs how they move through the plot.
- [22:19]
Bianca Murray
Oh, wow. So Hannah, Mary McKinnon does the same, and she sort of shared her character outlines with everybody. So is that, like, quite a detailed form? Is it something you've put together yourself or something that you've gotten from somewhere?
- [22:33]
Robin Harding
I. I just put that. I. I just do it my own way, and I don't, you know, I find outlining and all the. The pre work. I. I'm always keen to get into the book, so it's usually point form, but I do like to know where they grew up, how they grew up, their socioeconomic background, their relationship with their parents, do they have siblings, things like that. I had a friend who used to like Myers Briggs all her Characters, like, you know, do the whole thing, but for me, it's just kind of notes that, you know, just like kind of a brief backstory that I put together so that I know who they are. And it just really makes it easy as you're going through the plot. Like. Yeah. How would she react if that's where she comes from and how her mother treated her and how her father treated her? Like, how. You know, it just is kind of a. That's what makes the character who they are.
- [23:22]
Bianca Murray
I like that. It's more of a psychological sort of approach than just, she has blue eyes and she has brown hair, which a lot of these character sheets have, which kind of irritates me.
- [23:32]
Robin Harding
Right. Yeah. I never. Sometimes I don't. Other than for consistency, their looks are less important to me than their psyche.
- [23:42]
Bianca Murray
Yeah. No. Unless that's a clue in the story. So in terms of upping tension and stakes, which is so important in psychological thrillers, you know, you want that slow burn, and then things need to get a little bit more sort of tense, and then they need to get a little bit more. And each time the stakes need to. To be up. So is that something that you do with the help of the. Save the ca. In terms of those action beats, do you ever find yourself recalibrating as you're going along, deciding something wasn't going to hit the spot the way you thought?
- [24:12]
Robin Harding
Yeah, that's so true. I mean, it's always fluid. I think what's interesting, though, is if you have. Yeah. If you have those plot points in place, and the challenge, instead of being 350 pages is 50 pages. So I'm writing to get to this huge thing that's going to happen, and what twists and turns can we take along the way? And sometimes you're like, oh, wait a minute, this twist is bigger than that, than the midpoint twist that I thought I was going to have. And sometimes you can be like, okay, well, now that's the midpoint twist. So everything's fluid. But I think that, you know, breaking the novel into these eight sections, you know, that sounds so. Minimizing it. But breaking it into these plot point to plot point, and then really focusing on getting between these big action beats in the most interesting way possible and keeping readers engaged, it really makes it more manageable. Because I don't know about you, but when I'm writing thrillers, like, my brain is twisting and, I mean, it's really. It's hard work. It's so hard. I used to write comedy. It felt so much. Like, it just felt so much.
- [25:22]
Emily Ohanjanian
I just bang out.
- [25:25]
Robin Harding
And now I'm like, oh, my God. Like, how do I keep them guessing and how do I keep them on their toes and not figuring it all out? And.
- [25:33]
Bianca Murray
Yeah, and. And readers are so much more sophisticated these days. Like, it takes a lot to, like, surprise them and keep them guessing because they're like, oh, I've seen this before. You know, it's really.
- [25:44]
Emily Ohanjanian
It is.
- [25:44]
Robin Harding
And even when, you know, when you've had several thrillers, like, I have, I'm like, how do I not repeat myself, let alone everybody else? Right. So, yeah, that is.
- [25:53]
Bianca Murray
That must be a challenge with that many books. Something that I just finished watching that actually surprised me and not much was his and hers on Netflix. And that's based on a book, I think, right?
- [26:05]
Robin Harding
It is, yeah. Alice Feeney.
- [26:08]
Bianca Murray
Yes. I now actually want to read that book. But that ending really took me by surprise. And it's not often that it happens, so it's great when that does happen. But what you've just said about being in the industry so long, you know, we don't see a lot of authors with longevity. And this is the part that, like, gives me a panic attack as a writer who's published four books and still hasn't had a New York Times bestseller or whatever, is that each time you only as good as your last book. I used to believe once you made it through the gates, there you were, angels singing. And you don't realize that a lot of those angels are, like, bouncers. They're going to chuck you out of that club, man, if you don't. So true. If you don't keep upping it. So, like, have you changed editors along the way? Publishers? Have you changed agents along the way? If you can just give us a bit of an idea of how that longevity manifests.
- [27:02]
Robin Harding
So the only thing I have not changed is agents. I have been with my agent. I said, he's the. My. Other than my marriage. He's my longest relationship with a male. We've been together for 22 years or something.
- [27:16]
Bianca Murray
That is incredible, Robin.
- [27:18]
Robin Harding
Yeah. Yeah. So he, you know, plucked my very first manuscript out of this slush pile in 2003. And he has been my ride or die. I dedicated a book to him and said, ride or die since 2003, and see me through all these crazy changes. So it's nice to have that stability because I have changed genres, I have changed publishers, I have changed editors. I mean, I have been doing this since then. Like, that's a long time, 23 years. And I guess I just say to myself, Bianca, and you as well, like, I did it once, I can do it again. So if I get dropped, which I have been, publishers are like, just last book didn't perform like we wanted. Bye. You know, and I, I remain professional. I take it on the chin. Yes, it hurts. But I have been in this business so long and I just have to believe in my, in my own ability as a writer to create something new and interesting. You know, like the Drowning Woman was a comeback book for me. I had been dropped by Simon and Schuster post pandemic a lot. They kind of got rid of a big, had a big cull of thriller authors. And I kind of saw it coming, but it was still, you know, it was painful, but I was like, I'm just gonna write a really good book that I hope will be, you know, engaging enough to get me back into this game. And it did. And that has been by far my most successful book.
- [28:50]
Bianca Murray
Book success is the best revenge. You're like, you don't want my book. I'm gonna show you. And I'm gonna write a book that sells so many copies.
- [28:59]
Robin Harding
It's, it's. And I just, you know, it's. Who knows what will happen? I'm under contract for another book, which I, it's nice to have a two book deal because, you know, my last publisher didn't want to commit to two books. We went book by book. We did like five books. But they, you know, every time I had to pitch, you know, a new idea. And so this time I have a little bit of stability, but I don't know what will happen after. I mean, the market changes and publishers change, editors move. You know, there's, there's so many unknowns, but I, I really try to just have belief in myself that I can, you know, keep it going.
- [29:37]
Bianca Murray
Yeah. And a love of the craft that keeps you.
- [29:39]
Robin Harding
Yeah.
- [29:40]
Bianca Murray
Back to the page.
- [29:41]
Robin Harding
What else am I going to do?
- [29:42]
Bianca Murray
It is incredible. And I always say publishing's like that scene in Friends where they carrying the couch up the stairs and Ross just keeps screaming, pivot, pivot, pivot. Everything in publishing is constantly pivoting. You've got to pivot from one genre to the next, from one editor to the next, and you've just really got to adapt and be versatile.
- [30:05]
Emily Ohanjanian
Yeah.
- [30:06]
Robin Harding
And you just have to make sure that it's something that you love to write. You know, like I. You love to read and love to write. I went from comedy to thrillers because, you know, I was writing kind of humorous women's fiction. Then I took a break to do screenwriting. And when I wanted to get back in the book business, I was like, well, what do I read now? I read thrillers, I read dark stuff. And I was like, could I write it? I don't know. And I wrote the Party was my first kind of foray into darkness. And it really launched me on a new career. And I find it so much fun. Hard work, but really fun.
- [30:42]
Bianca Murray
And now you're like, hello darkness, my old friend.
- [30:47]
Robin Harding
This me in darkness.
- [30:49]
Bianca Murray
I love it. Robyn, Our time is up. So for our listeners, I'm holding up the COVID again. Strangers in the Villa again. Do the pre orders. Please support our authors. Pre orders are so, so important. We're going to link to it on our bookshop.org affiliate page and you can get it there as well. We w so much success with the drum.
- [31:08]
Robin Harding
Thank you so much. Thanks for having me. Bianca would lovely to chat to you.
- [31:12]
Emily Ohanjanian
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- [32:43]
Bianca Murray
family in Toronto, Canada, where she works as a professional book editor. After many years on the other side of the desk, she decided to parlay a lifelong love of joyous, escapist romantic stories into her own writing. The book tour is her first novel. It's my pleasure to welcome Emily Ohanjanian. Emily, welcome to the show.
- [33:04]
Emily Ohanjanian
Thanks, Bianca. Thanks for having me.
- [33:07]
Bianca Murray
It's so wonderful to get to chat to you because I met you so early in the process. I think the book deal had just been announced at that point. For those of you not watching on YouTube, I'm holding up the COVID of the book, which is absolutely beautiful. And I think, Emily, when I had you at my book launch, all we had to promote you at the time was a deal announcement. Is that right? Right?
- [33:29]
Emily Ohanjanian
That's right. Yeah. Everything started to happen after that. Yeah.
- [33:32]
Bianca Murray
Jeez, it's amazing how glacial and also how quickly publishing moves. There's times where it feels like a whole ice age has passed and then there's times where it's like you have to get them things yesterday or the week before. So it's like, yeah, I, I want to. Because you're a debut author, I really want to pick your brain on your journey to publication because there are so many ways of doing it and our listeners love hearing them. So I know you worked in publishing beforehand. Take us through what inspired you to write this particular book. If it was your first book, if there were books that are hiding somewhere in a closet or on a hard drive. Tell us everything.
- [34:17]
Emily Ohanjanian
It is my first book. It is the only book I have written, only novel length, length book that I've ever written or, sorry, since then I have written another book but it was the first one that I wrote. So yeah, I worked in publishing for many years. I worked at Harlequin and HarperCollins for many years and loved that job. I was a senior editor and, you know, it was a terrific career, very fulfilling. I got to work with books for a living, which is, I mean, the dream and it is really what I wanted to do with my life. So very happy there. A few years ago I resigned from that position. The scope of the job had changed. I wasn't doing as much editing. I really missed Working closely with the books. So I resigned to build a freelance career instead. And then I got to do more work with authors and sort of direct editing with a lot more of my time, which was the dream. And so a few months after I had started freelancing, you know, like my, my, my mental bandwidth was a lot higher after having left an in house corporate job which had been very, you know, it, it just took over a lot of my mental bandwidth. So it was nice to have a little bit more room to breathe, a little bit more room to think. And I just started thinking on this idea. It really started with Anna, the protagonist. She came to me as like a fully formed kind of character and I thought I'd long wanted to read a character like this in romance. I had long wanted to read the kind of second gen experience that she has in a romance novel that I just hadn't seen it done exactly this way before. And so I was thinking about it and it hadn't, it didn't even occur to me to write a novel honestly. But then it just sort of wouldn't leave me alone. I kept thinking about it and then I just decided, you know, why not? Like I have extra time now. I was used to working long hours, you know, like hustling all the time, so happy to spend my evening sort of noodling with this, with a manuscript. And I just thought, you know, why not just give it a shot if it sucks, nobody has to know, whatever happens and if it's good, then, you know, question mark, what happens? I guess. So I started writing it in earnest. Like, I don't know, somewhere between six months to a year after I left my in house job and then, and it was, you know, a process. I, I had no, I harbored no illusions that it would be easy to write a book. I know how challenging it is. I always really admired people who could write books. It was quite a challenge. When I was done with it, I was really, I was really happy with it. Like after, you know, I finished a draft, I did many revisions myself and then I sent it to an author friend just to see, you know, is this, should I be embarrassed and just lock this away and never, never let it see the light of day. And she was really instrumental because she was so effusive with her feedback and so encouraging and you know, she immediately was like, send it to everybody, you know, this has to be out there kind of thing. So that was a really, really nice push that I needed to sort of have the courage to start querying it.
- [37:27]
Bianca Murray
And then from there was it a case of, you know, just, just looking up agents who represented books you admired. How, how did that process look?
- [37:38]
Emily Ohanjanian
Yeah, so I, because I was in the industry prior, I had a good sense of sort of which agents were representing what. I wanted to work with an agent who I hadn't worked with in my editor life because I didn't, I didn't want to sort of muddy those waters too much. So I, I did sort of of query agents that I hadn't directly worked with before just to sort of go in clean like that. And I, I knew, you know, who had a good reputation, who represented what. I did a lot of research on Publisher's Marketplace to see who was selling what more recently. And then I started querying in very small batches to start and about. I think it took about six months, months until I heard back from an agent and she was like, in the last batch, I think that I had queried. So that's my plug for querying in batches. It's like it, you know, for a long time goes by and you don't hear anything and it can be discouraging. So if you can sort of, you know, start with your, start with your list and see like, who, you know, who is sort of prioritized and then start to work your way down the list in batches, I think that that worked really well for me. And then, yeah, so six months after that, I signed with that agent, the first person who got in touch with me, and then we did some edits together for, I think that took about six weeks. And then we went on sub and sub went really fast. That was really lucky. It just happened to catch a couple of people's interest. And then that got the snowball kind of rolling with other people in terms of getting them to read it more quickly, of having it languish in their inboxes for a long time.
- [39:19]
Bianca Murray
That's amazing. And I always wonder about editors being edited. You know, it's, it's always such a different thing because here you are, you edit other people's work and suddenly other people's editing your work. And you know, was it, did you find it difficult or was it like, oh, finally I can hand this across to somebody else who's. It becomes their problem.
- [39:40]
Emily Ohanjanian
Well, it doesn't become their problem. It's. It's still my problem, but it was actually really, it was wonderful. My editors are amazing. I work with really, really smart women. And I mean, I think it's hard to find not smart women in this business, honestly, people are, are just really sharp and, and yeah, it was, it was honestly wonderful to work with these editors, and they only helped to improve the book so much more. Obviously, there's still the emotional component of, of, you know, the, the roller coaster of emotions, of feeling like, oh, you want it to be perfect, and then you're a little bit, you know, saddened that it's not. And they give you notes and you just think at, you know, at first you have to process all the, all the feelings and all the logistics around what, how you're going to kind of reframe the work according to their notes. But in the end, I'm so, so happy with how it wound up as a result of their edits, for sure.
- [40:38]
Bianca Murray
I always allocate myself a few days after I get editorial notes to sit in the corner and mutter darkly about all kinds of things when I'm like, you know, it's a pity you couldn't recognize my brilliance because this is clearly excellent, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then I go through my period of muttering darkly and then I'm like, okay, how do we fix this? And how do I apply everything they've said? Because of course they're right. And so I've learned this about myself, and so I always give myself that cushioning period read. And I think each writer must learn about themselves, you know, how open they are to it, how much time it takes to stew or to really saturate before they can move on. And that's always something interesting. So before we move on to the book itself, I'm just going to read the flap copy here for our listeners. Sparks fly between the lively debut author and a grumpy publicist on book tour in the sizzling rom com from a fresh new voice in contemporary romance. Despite her popular podcast and sold out speaking events, Anna Mavillian still feels like she has to prove herself to her family, who can't believe she quit med school to build an influencer career, and to literary snobs who decry her buzzy self help book. Happily, her upcoming book tour is the perfect chance to show the world just how bright her star can shine. That is, until her beloved publicist resigns the night before their plane is set to take off. Announcing that a replacement is none other than Ryan Bleeping Grant. Ryan specializes in highbrow, important books, and his perma scale in every interaction with Anna makes one thing clear. He does not get her book or her. He's the last person who should be promoting a work. The last Person she should be stuck with for two weeks and the last person who should look that damn good in business casual. As they travel from city to city, however, Anna's assumptions about Ryan take new shape. A decidedly more appealing shape. Soon their growing attraction starts to feel like a ticking time bomb. But crossing that line could derail each of their careers faster than you can say conflict of interest. And they both have bigger dreams at stake than the best seller list. Okay, so something I want to ask because we get so many questions, especially about like romcoms and romances in terms of what are the musts. I've had questions like I've been told that there has to be a meet cute within the first five pages. We have to see the romantic lead within the first three pages. Can it take a chapter? Can it take this long? I mean, for you, what are the musts that you are seeing in romcoms these days in terms of people attention span? Do they have to have the meet cute sooner? What is your advice with all of this?
- [43:26]
Emily Ohanjanian
Yeah, I mean I'm a big proponent of fast pacing. Just generally I think that, that you're never gonna lose on like making sure that your pacing is swift. And people are reading romance for the romance. So I personally feel like the sooner you can get them on the page together, the better. But I've read many, many excellent romances where it takes a chapter, two chapters for them to meet each other or to come onto the page together. I've even read romances where it's like many chapters before they are on the same page together. Certainly when it's a dual pov, you can sort of stretch that out more. Mine is a solo pov, so I did make sure to get them on the page together in the first chapter. That was just a personal thing. I wanted to make sure that they were on page as much as possible together. I feel like that's the best way to sort of build tension right from the get go. And you know, tension and conflict are key in a really compelling romance novel. So I wanted to, yeah, make sure that it was as quick as possible. I don't think there's a hard and fast rule. I think that, yeah, people's attention spans are, you know, decreasing I guess as we, as we move forward as. And. And people are reading in high volumes, which means that they have a lot of choice and, and they're happy to. I'm also a big proponent of dnfing books. If you're not into it, don't read it. You know, life is short. There's a lot of books to read. So, yeah, if you. If you want to really capture people's attention right up front, get them on the page together, show the tension, show people why they're reading this book in the first place.
- [45:04]
Bianca Murray
I can see you had a lot of fun with the grumpy sort of sunshine trope, the false proximity, et cetera. Speak a bit about tropes and how there are readers who become fans of a particular trope and who'll actually, as soon as they hear that that trope's been written, will be loyal not just to the author, but to that trope. And how you, as the author, decide, okay, how many tropes are enough? Which ones can you twist so that it doesn't feel like it's the regurgitation of the same thing?
- [45:38]
Emily Ohanjanian
Yeah, tropes are really. They seem to be more and more foregrounded in romance marketing, certainly in the last several years. They've always been a thing. It's not a new thing. But I feel like people now, when they pitch books or when they talk about their books or when they, you know, give the logline, often tropes are kind of included or. Or the whole thing, I guess, in terms of pitching the book, because I do feel like a lot of romance readers are coming to romance, romance for comfort, for escape, for that joyful experience that we get from this genre. And a trope is kind of like a promise you're making to a reader. You know, like, if you like this, then you are going to enjoy this book. If you like forced proximity, there's forced proximity in here for you. Come, let me take you on this journey of forced proximity. You know, it's a. It's kind of have a promise from the author to the reader. And I think that that's. There's a lot to be said about that for this genre in particular, because it is such a comfort genre for a lot of people. And. And I think that it's nice to sort of have that entry point for. For readers in terms of making it fresh. I mean, I have read any number of forced proximity and books, and I think that, you know, often it can be. I mean, authors can treat it so differently every single time, but certainly that promise is still there. The core of what forced proximity gives me as a reader, in terms of my experience. That tension that. That delicious feeling of, like, they're going to be on the page together a lot, and there's going to be a lot of really nice tension between them. That is Always being delivered, no matter how the execution is happening. And it's the same with a lot of different tropes. Like, you know, I really love the fake relationship trope, for example. And there's always a different setup. You know, it's never. It's never the same. If an author is really doing the work, and they almost always are, they're going to make it fresh and delicious every time.
- [47:44]
Bianca Murray
Okay, so besides those sort of rules about where they should be on opening pages and that you do need these certain tropes in ROM coms. Besides that, is there anything that, like the rom com author should be doing? I know that there's so much debate about whether rom coms can have a sort of non happy ending. And romance authors are like, no, it's happy ever after or happy for now. Those are the two things. And I've seen other people try and argue with that and go, no, it can still be romance, even if it doesn't have that. What's your take on that?
- [48:20]
Emily Ohanjanian
100% happy ending. Every romance novel has to have a happy ending. There's just no debate about that in my mind. It's not just ROM coms, but any romance. You know, the romance genre is. That's another promise that we're making to readers. You know, I feel like, just like with tropes, how a trope is a promise, a romance novel, if it's being marketed as a romance novel, is promising. Everything's going to be okay in the end. You know, maybe not. Not forever. Like you said, a happy for now certainly is acceptable, but there does have to be a happy ending. That is the promise.
- [48:52]
Bianca Murray
Because that is a comfort that brings people to the romance genre. Right. Like, if they want to read about all other terrible things happening in the world and whatever, go to another genre. But like, romance is. Is your warm and fuzzy blanket. It is the thing that you want to wrap around your shoulders to make you feel better about the world and just to. To really have that comfort. And yeah, the happy ever after gives you no matter what happens in the book, no matter how many obstacles are thrown at them, no matter how much they have to overcome, you know, you're going to get to this part where you have some certainty in a world that has very little certainty.
- [49:30]
Emily Ohanjanian
Yeah, exactly. And I was going to say that one of the reasons that we are, we as romance authors are able to explore certain themes and conflicts and difficulties and, you know, dark material sometimes is because we are going to make it okay in the end. You know, it's Kind of a safe space for readers to experience those maybe more challenging ideas because they aren't going to be left hanging at the end. In the end, everything is going to be okay. So, you know, no matter what trial the characters go through, no matter what conflicts arise or no matter what difficult themes are explored, don't worry, in the end they're going to be in love and, you know, they're going to be happy together and you're going to be happy and satisfied.
- [50:18]
Emily Sommer
Yeah.
- [50:19]
Bianca Murray
And. And what I love, counterbalanced with that warm fuzzy and that certainty is the social commentary that I'm seeing romance authors bring to their books these days, so that it's not just that warm and fuzzy. So in your book, we've got a second generation Armenian immigrant. She has so many expectations placed on her and then this very strained relationship with her mother, who she's constantly trying to please and who's not pleased with her for, you know, the life choices she's made. And again, that's something that an immigrant would really understand, children of immigrants would understand. And so you tackled that really well in the book as well.
- [51:00]
Emily Ohanjanian
Thank you. Yeah, I had wanted to explore that theme. The themes and experiences, I guess, that are. That relate to second generation children of immigrants in a way that I guess can universalize them for people who aren't necessarily second generation children of immigrants, just people who feel that they have expectations placed on them, you know, that are different, or people who sort of live a foot in two worlds kind of existence. You know, you're playing one role in this arena of your life, another role in another arena of your life. I think a lot of people can relate to that, whether or not they are children of immigrants. And so, yeah, I was hoping to sort of make that a more universal experience, but through the lens of a very personal second gen experience.
- [51:51]
Bianca Murray
Yeah. So the people who, you know, there's always people who are going to be like, this character has experienced that. People who are condescending of the genre, she writes, because, you know, it's not serious. And the same way a lot of romance authors get that, it's like, well, it's fluff, it's not serious. But again, like I say, having that joy and that comfort in the world is something I think we all desperately need right now. And that social commentary that is coming through is things that I've never thought about before, before. And I'll sit and go, hm, that's really interesting, you know, and it's good to show that that character who is falling in love is not doing so in a vacuum. You know, there is their career, there is. They've got family issues, they've got childhood wounds. They've got all of these things that factor into this moment when they are falling in love. And you display that so brilliantly.
- [52:43]
Emily Ohanjanian
Thank you. I'm glad that it appealed to you.
- [52:47]
Bianca Murray
Yeah. So let's talk a bit about cast of secondary characters in romcoms, because, oh, my goodness, I loved her cousin. I loved, like, just. Just all of the people. And they add like a B plot or a bit of levity on the side. It's nothing too much, but we always need those secondary characters, especially in rom coms. So for you, the challenge is always to make a secondary character really interesting, but not so interesting that they're elbowing the main character off the page. Did you ever find when you were writing them that you were like, okay, you need to take a step back. This isn't your story?
- [53:24]
Emily Ohanjanian
No, because my protagonist is such a dynamo that she cannot be outshone. But.
- [53:31]
Bianca Murray
But she also gives so much credit to other people as well, you know, that's.
- [53:36]
Emily Ohanjanian
That's right.
- [53:36]
Bianca Murray
She's. She's not like a narcissist who's like, it's all about me. Even when she gets compliments and stuff, she's like, it's thanks to this person or thanks to this person as well.
- [53:46]
Emily Ohanjanian
That's one of my favorite qualities in a person, is when they give credit where credit is due. And even if they are like, you know, Anna is the star of her world. Right. She is the. She is the sparkle and the spotlight is on her. But even when people are in that kind of a position and they still give credit to their team, to the people who make it possible for them, to the people who, you know, know, bring them sunshine when they're struggling, I think that's a really. That's a really telling trait in people who are good in their core, you know, And Anna can come across a little bit intense and too much, and I felt like that would be like, her center of good is the fact that she is. She is very grateful for the people in her life. She is, you know, humbled by her cousin. She is. Yeah. She feels very, very much like she owes a lot to the people around her. And, yeah, I didn't think that she could be outshone for sure by. By Marel, her cousin, or the rest of her team who surrounds her because they are kind of more subdued characters. But I did love writing those secondary characters. I think Marle is one of My favorite, favorite characters of all, because she is just so. She does ground Anna when she needs it, and she gives her, you know, she gives her kind of tough love when she needs it. And she's just. She's just a more steady, even keeled kind of character. And I think that she hearkens a lot to Ryan, her love interest. And that's probably a large part of what appeals to Anna about Ryan in the first place is the fact that he is sort of that port in her wild storm.
- [55:20]
Bianca Murray
Storm, yeah. Yeah. I love it. And, you know, you've done a good job when the reader falls in love with your main character and wants to be best friends with your main character, but also wants to be best friends with the secondary character. So there you go. Okay, I think we've got a good time for one last question. So let's talk about the love scenes in rom coms, like the spiciness level. Open door, Closed. Closed door. What makes a good love scene a good sex scene? Take me through that.
- [55:47]
Emily Ohanjanian
Oh, so I love spicy scenes. That is like one of my very favorite things about romance novels. It's not that I won't read a closed door romance and very much enjoy it. It's just that I really gravitate to opening door, as you can probably tell from my book. And I think that the key to a really strong love scene is when, first of all, when there's tension, when it builds to it, rather than it's just like randomly kind of thrown in in the middle of the story. And second of all, that it moves the character journeys forward.
- [56:21]
Bianca Murray
It.
- [56:21]
Emily Ohanjanian
It shouldn't just be kind of gratuitous, extraneous sex, but it should be meaningful to their growth arcs and to their relationship arc. And they should end the spicy scene in a different place than they started it. So I tried to, you know, pull that off with the spicy scenes in my book and make sure that they were telling of where their relationship was going, you know, whether that's good or bad. You know, my main character has commitment issues and not. Not that they were necessarily committed, but, you know, she. She's going into them in a different mindset thinking this is just gonna be casual and fun and easy peasy. We're gonna, you know, go back to regularly scheduled programming after this and whoops, you know, there's. There's more feeling there than she expected. So that's sort of. I think that that fulfills the character growth that I want to see from a spicy scene. The relationship, the pushing forward of the relationship. Arc as well. So that would be my suggestions for people writing spicy scenes is to make sure that they're meaningful to the story.
- [57:28]
Bianca Murray
Yeah. And it also reveals so much about character because how you make love, you know what I'm saying? Like, the way you approach somebody sexually, the way you are in bed, how giving you are, how withholding you are, all of these things can tell you a lot about who that character is. And. And I think that's so important as well.
- [57:47]
Emily Ohanjanian
Yeah. I think it's a very good context in which to show characters at their most honest. Because it really vulnerable.
- [57:56]
Bianca Murray
Right.
- [57:57]
Emily Ohanjanian
And vulnerable. And like. Yeah, it's stripping away all of those pretenses, and you can't help but be very vulnerable in that situation. So a lot of the time, you know, what they say during a sex scene is the most honest they ever are together. And I feel like that's a really compelling thing about spicy scenes as well, is that we get to see and they get to see a side of each other that they otherwise don't. You know, they always have guards up, and that's part of what makes the tension in a romance really great, is, you know, that sort of. Of subtext in dialogue and. And that type of thing makes it so juicy and delicious to keep turning the pages. But then in that. In those spicy scenes when they're really letting their guards down, you. You see, you have a peek behind the curtain.
- [58:44]
Bianca Murray
Yeah. No, I love it. Okay, we're at the end of our time. I don't know how that happened. I'm holding up the book tour cover for our supporters. We will link to it on our bookshop.org affiliate page. Get the book there, support a lovely independent bookstore, and support the podcast. Podcast at the same time. Emily, we wish you much luck with this, and, yeah, hope to have you back for the second book.
- [59:08]
Emily Ohanjanian
Thank you so much, Bianca. It was so great to see you and to chat and I've long been a fan of the podcast, so also, thank you so much for this podcast, and it's such a great service to writers. I've been listening for a long time and just really appreciate you.
- [59:22]
Bianca Murray
Thank you for that. Thank you. Okay.
- [59:26]
Emily Sommer
Hello, everybody, and welcome to our comps segment. I'm Emily Sommer from East City Book bookshop in Washington, D.C. i am without Bianca today because right as we were scheduled to record earlier today, I got a call from my son's school, and I had to go pick him up at school because he was sick. So I am recording on my own now. So thanks to everybody for their flexibility and thanks for listening. Now, on to our comps with no further ado. Hi Emily, fellow DCEER here and I love E City Bookshop.
- [59:56]
Emily Ohanjanian
I'm hoping you can help with some
- [59:57]
Emily Sommer
comps from my women's fiction work When a hurricane exhumes a long buried body, Lou Bishop, a lonely middle aged woman returns to the Jersey Shore hometown she ran from 26 years ago. She must reunite with her estranged mother and former best friends to move on from her past and save someone she loves before losing them for good. My novel features a messy main character who struggles to atone and move on after loss, as in Blue Sisters by Coco Millers, and centers around the relationships that and seekers of a small beach community. Similar to Elan Hildebrand's Nantucket novels, it's dual timeline present day in the summer of 2000 with a mystery throughout. The best comparison I can think of for the timeline, nostalgia and female friendships is the movie now and Then, but darker, more modern and for an older audience. If you have any ideas I would be super grateful. Thanks so much for our first one. Hello, hello to my fellow Washingtonian and thank you so much much for the East City shout out. It always makes me very happy when people say to me when they're in the store that they listen to the podcast. So please say hello the next time you're in. I hear Jersey Shore and I immediately think about two really great books of the last few years. One is the Shore by Katie Rundy, which is a wonderful Jersey Shore family story. I think it could work. It definitely has the women's fiction vibe. I sort of bristle at that that label, although I do find it useful because people know what you mean. But it's a book for anybody. It's a great story. It is a main character sort of figuring out getting over grief and figuring out family and has a wonderful sense of setting and a nostalgic tone. There's a lot of great music in there, which I really appreciate as a music lover. The more recent one is welcome Home Caroline Klein by Courtney Price that's got a young woman returning back to the Jersey shop. Sure. Neither of these I think have the older woman estrangement. You know this. The plot isn't exactly the same, but I think that the the vibes and the audience might be the same. I also really like your Blue Sisters comp. I think that's just the right size and recency for an effective comp. And I love the mention of now and then. That speaks directly to me and I know what you're going for, even though I know you say, say it's darker and for an older audience, which is me now. So I love what you've mentioned and I would add the Shore by Katie Rundy. And welcome home. Caroline Klein hi there.
- [62:27]
Emily Ohanjanian
I am super excited to be asking this comp question. I am looking for recent comps that are in the genre bending literary speculative thriller area. Comps that balance literary interiority with speculative
- [62:43]
Robin Harding
or conspiracy adjacent thriller elements, particularly projects engaging with government experimentation, alter consciousness and family legacy.
- [62:53]
Emily Ohanjanian
The premise is that the novel explores motherhood set against the protagonist's childhood as the first trainee in what would later
- [63:01]
Robin Harding
become her father's CIA psychic spy program.
- [63:04]
Emily Ohanjanian
Inherited Family Legacy collides with real declassified CIA experience into consciousness, remote viewing and time space perception.
- [63:14]
Robin Harding
The story blends psychological suspense with speculative elements, examining how power, secrecy and inherited
- [63:21]
Emily Ohanjanian
trauma echo across generations.
- [63:24]
Emily Sommer
Okay, for this second one I'm showing my age because I thought right away about the old classic book and movie the Manchurian Candidate. I know that's not right. It's too big. It's too old all the time things. I mean, anything with Frank Sinatra in it, it's too old and too big. But I did think of Manchurian Candidate, which I think is a compliment to your pitch because that's the classic. It's still a really good movie. I have. I don't know that I ever read the book, but I watched the movie probably 25 years ago and I remember thinking at the time wow, this holds up. So maybe it still will today. Four things that are more timely, more appropriate for your inquiry. I think last month I mentioned Noah Hawley and Rob Hart and I will throw those out there again because I think they are two fantastic writers. When you're talking about a blend of literary fiction, speculative fiction and thriller elements, especially with like government conspiracy and government experiments. A really excellent psychological suspense with that speculative bend from both of them. So I would look at the their books and see which ones feel the most appropriate. I also always like to mention Helen Phillips in inquiries like this because I think that she is such a wonderful and unique writer of very literary speculative novels. So she is not on the sort of conspiracy theory, experimentation, classified experiments that's not her work but the literary speculative thriller. Absolutely. So I would suggest those authors One Lucky Girl is an upmarket caper that takes place during the 24 hours of Mardi Gras in New Orleans when the storm soaked burglary of a multi million dollar art collection collides with an identity theft heist gone wrong.
- [65:11]
Cece
Tracy, a young stripper and new mother,
- [65:14]
Emily Sommer
is pulled into a citywide chase involving her violent ex, a human trafficker and a former teacher forced into crime to survive. After Tracy escapes with Tom, a rich chef carrying the wrong bag, choices harden into consequences and collisions turn fatal, forcing Tracy to decide what, in a city built on stolen history deserves to be saved. One lucky girl shares the New Orleans setting of Quarter to Midnight by Karen Rose and Full Exposure by Tien Kim Lam, but it's neither a romance nor a thrill. Thriller Swamp Story by Dave Barry is also a caper, but more of a comedy. The stories that seem most similar are movies like last year's Oscar winner Honora. Thanks in advance for your help. Okay, our third this upmarket caper sounds very fun. I love this idea. It makes me remember my first very fun trip to Mardi gras in the mid-90s. If you're doing the math, I was a teenager then, so that is a story for another time, one best told over cocktails. But I will say my best friend Nora and I still don discuss it fondly on a very regular basis. My first thought for a comp for your query letter is Murder Bimbo by Rebecca Novak. I think it's an obvious comp because that book just came out, it's getting a lot of buzz and it's about a sex worker turned assassin. Tonally, I think it's probably more satire than anything else and probably more satire and more politically driven than yours. It is not a caper, but it was really interesting. The blurb on the COVID is by I think it's from Catherine Lacey and she calls it a gone girl for the Luigi Mangioni age. So that's a very interesting blurb right there and I will I will suggest that to everybody who likes the this idea of a sex worker getting revenge or getting what she's due and what other people are doing. I also thought about a favorite of mine, Real Easy by Marie Ratkowski, which is a serial killer mystery set in a short strip club. It is excellent and it treats the strippers and the strip club with a lot of respect and dignity. Just a really good book. It's a more straightforward thriller, I think, than yours is, but again, it's excellent. Nic Stone has written more YA than adult, but her recent mystery, Boomtown is also a mystery with a stripper as a main character. But again, I think it's more a thriller than what you're looking for. So for something that would capture the upmarket caper, the really fun part of what your book sounds like maybe the most Wonderful Crime of the Year by Ally Carter that is an East City bookshop favorite. A lot of my colleagues loved it, including my boss Laurie, and that's it's really outside of her wheelhouse. So I knew and Laurie said she enjoyed it too, that it was definitely a winner. It might be just the right upmarket caper for you to mention. It's both a romance and a really fun heisty book, so it might get both of the aspects of your book that you're that you're looking for. I also really like the mention of Anora because I can't think of anything else like Anora that's out there. I think that brings a really vivid picture to what you're doing. So good luck.
- [68:26]
Emily Ohanjanian
Hi Bianca and Emily, I am looking
- [68:29]
Emily Sommer
for comps for my cozy why I
- [68:31]
Cece
mystery entitled Hidden June. The story follows June Wylie, a lonely homeschooled 16 year old in an isolated New York town, as she uncovers a dark family secret. While navigating her first relationship, which she must keep hidden from her controlling mother and the sudden death of her one
- [68:50]
Emily Ohanjanian
and only friend, she becomes convinced that
- [68:52]
Emily Sommer
her parents aren't who they claim to be.
- [68:54]
Cece
With only a quiet, contained family and
- [68:56]
Emily Ohanjanian
all almost non existent social circle, June must ask herself who can she actually trust? The novel covers topics like friendship, teenage angst, disabilities, grief, and complicated family dynamics.
- [69:09]
Cece
I haven't yet found a good comp.
- [69:11]
Emily Ohanjanian
I think it's similar to A Good Girl's Guide to Murder, but that's obviously pretty big and my story is definitely more light hearted. I'd love to hear any recommendations you might have. Thank you.
- [69:24]
Emily Sommer
Hi, I always recommend A Good Girl's Guide to Murder so I totally see where you're coming from when people mention something like A Good Girl's Guide to Murder or they want something along the vein of Holly Jackson but cozier, more light hearted. My recommendation is always the Agatha's by Liz Lawson and Kathleen Glasgow, so I think that one could really work here. It's definitely lighter and cozier year when I sell it to people in the store. I recommend it as a real Veronica Mars feel to it. It's got that kind of snappiness and it's just a real pleasure to read. They also wrote a very good sequel to the Agatha's called the Night in Question, so in my opinion either of those might be good. They're not as dark as Holly Jackson or like a Maureen Johnson or Karen McManus, but they are for similar readers and I think they might work here for your cozy wife.
- [70:18]
Emily Ohanjanian
A mystery I am seeking comps for
- [70:20]
Bianca Murray
my upmarket commercial novel in 1880s Southeast
- [70:24]
Emily Ohanjanian
Asia, three childhood friends reunite after a
- [70:27]
Bianca Murray
decade in which their lives have gone in very different directions. Lady Violet is a botanist adventurer, Charlie a successful London trader, and Jack a dissolute rogue. When Violet gets infected with a mind
- [70:39]
Emily Ohanjanian
destroying leech and Charlie's company comes under attack, the friends work together to save
- [70:43]
Bianca Murray
Violet, Santa, sanity, and Charlie's life's work. But every intervention makes the situation worse.
- [70:49]
Emily Ohanjanian
In the end is a problem shared, really a problem trebled.
- [70:52]
Bianca Murray
It addresses themes of the nature of personal freedom and friendship with deeply imperfect people, and has mild speculative fiction notes in the Botany for tone and use of historical Setting Jonathan Strange and Mr.
- [71:05]
Emily Ohanjanian
Norrell would be perfect, but it's old and very big.
- [71:08]
Bianca Murray
I'm drawing a blank on other books
- [71:10]
Emily Ohanjanian
that balance social comedy and upmarket writing. Writing in a historical setting.
- [71:14]
Bianca Murray
Thank you for this invaluable service.
- [71:17]
Emily Sommer
Okay, for number five here, my first thoughts are probably again, like the Manchurian Candidate, too literary, too old and too big. But those are Euphoria by Lily King and the Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert. So two authors who are probably not useful comps because they're they're just big marquee names and both of those are older books of theirs. But even if they don't work for comps, they are both excellent and I highly, highly recommend them. Elizabeth Gilbert's nonfiction, I think can be quite polarizing and controversial, but she is a marvelous fiction writer. I mean, I've read her the memoirs also, but her novel the Signature of All Things, I never thought I could care about someone studying Moss. Like it's just fantastic. And I read Euphoria by Lily King after reading Heart the lover Best of 2025. I had read Writers and Lovers. I think I've read it three times now and I thought, okay, now it's time for me to read her historical fiction, which is just as good as her contemporary fiction. No surprise there. And maybe these are not too literary, since Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell has the right tone, but again, probably too old and too big. But I stand by them as excellent recommendations for anybody who wants great historical fiction for social comedy and more upmarket historical maybe check out India Holton. Her first book, or at least her first book that made me aware of her, is called the Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels, and I think it is a little zanier and more fantastical than what you're describing, but since there are light speculative elements to yours and you mention the social comedy, I would take a look. And she has others too. The Ornithologist Field Guide to Love is another that might work. So maybe one of hers could be a good match. I don't know. Sometimes I'm just going on vibe here and I just get an intuition and it's a. It's just a guess. Just a gut guess.
- [73:17]
Robin Harding
So that's my.
- [73:17]
Emily Sommer
That's my intuition gut guess here. We'll see if it if it works, but India Holton's books are very well loved and often recommend in our shop.
- [73:27]
Robin Harding
Good evening. I'm looking for comp help from my novel titled Virgin Emo Chi's Masquerade Ball. It's a blended genre story, a rom com shell with a mystery center.
- [73:37]
Bianca Murray
The intended audience are for those who
- [73:38]
Robin Harding
like found family and friendship stories and
- [73:41]
Bianca Murray
the rom com with a happy ending.
- [73:42]
Robin Harding
Of the nine major characters with dialogue, seven are women and beta Readers tell me it feels like a potential book club book. People say their heart is full after reading it. Also, the protagonist barely gets to kiss anyone, but there is talk of sex and smut and profanity, so I'm afraid
- [73:57]
Bianca Murray
cozy may not be an appropriate comp to it. I'm thinking the story is like Scooby
- [74:02]
Robin Harding
Doo trying to stop Ocean's eight. I think Jesse Sutanto may be a comp, but I'm not sure. Please help and thank you very much.
- [74:10]
Emily Sommer
Okay, I love a rom com shell with a mystery center and I love found family and friendship stories stories.
- [74:17]
Robin Harding
So.
- [74:17]
Emily Sommer
And I love a book that makes my heart feel full after reading it. I do think I need more plot to be able to give you much useful advice though I do like the mention of Jesse Sutanto for a book that has a Scooby Doo meets Ocean's 8 feel. And Elizabeth Little wrote a book a few years ago called Dear Daughter that I think is probably at this point too old to be useful. But at the time that I read it I thought of Scooby Doo and I compared it to Scooby Doo and in the best possible way. I meant it as a huge compliment because it was just so much fun. It was just goofy but great, great fun depending on your plot and the age of your characters. Another that could work is Meddling Kids by Edgar Cantero that's got a real Scooby Doo Stranger Things vibe that is very fun and is a friendship story, but I don't know without more about the plot, the actual plot or the characters. I am mostly guessing. So maybe describe this on the podcast Instagram somewhere and see if people can crowdsource some good suggestions for you. You know, there's a really smart audience of listeners out there and they've got a lot of great ideas. As you can tell, when people come to the podcast with their own great comp ideas in this segment, which I so appreciate. Hello Emily and Bianca, this is Coach Nora and Coach Doug and I would love your input on our business how to Book Cocktail Coaching. It's a step by step guide to overcoming professional isolation by building a mutual coaching relationship with a trusted colleague over drinks. It's Mad Men meets Can't Even and that refers to Anne Helen Peterson's book Can't How Millennials Became the Burnout Generation. One comp that brings in the coaching aspect with a twist is Coaching Outdoors by Leslie Roberts. There are plenty of business how to books for the entrepreneur, but they rarely address the need for human connection and none of them combines business with the catalyst of cocktails. There are cocktail books that focus on business entertaining, like Professional Drinking by Jim Schlixer, but that's not quite what we're doing here. We'd sure appreciate if you have any other comps for us. Hello Coach Nora and Coach Doug. I love this idea and it's so interesting because I've I don't think we've had any. I don't think I've had a voicemail with a business how to book like this. Certainly not one that blends cocktails and coaching. I really like the Mad Men meets Can't Even vibe. I think that is a smart pitch because that gives me sort of a feel for it. And I love Anne Helen Peterson. I'm a big fan of hers. I pay for her substack because I think she's so smart. So I like that. That kind of gives me an idea. And maybe the that would work for an agent too. Business books are tough. They're tough for me particularly. DC Is not a business town. We are obviously a government town, so we don't have a huge business section. It's outside of my area of expertise. But like I said, I love Anne Helen Peterson. So I like what you've already said. And I don't know about a lot of coaching books specifically, but the mix of cocktails with it makes me think that your book is more fun than your usual business book. Certainly sounds more fun to me. So I would consider something, even if it's not subject wise, exactly the same. I consider Something like the Financial Feminist by Tori Dunlop that is a book about personal finance and money, but it appeals to millennial and younger readers and it's not dry. It has sold very well for us because she has such a wonderful conversational tone and is just really down to earth. If that's the audience and the tone that you're looking for, I think that could be a really useful comp. I would also look at a book that is a big seller for us and I think it is industry wide. It's called Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara. So again, it's not a book about coaching, it's not about cocktails, but it is a book that is probably in the same same section that has had a very wide readership. So in that book it takes the restaurant industry as a lens through which you can achieve success in any field and it's about how to make really great customer service decisions and how to make that impact your business and really take everything up a notch. My husband's firm, everybody there read it recently even though they have nothing to do with restaurants. But I think think just looking at very approachable, accessible business how tos and self help books with that lens that have a really wide audience, I think that's a good idea because I think that might be that's the kind of audience you want just as wide as possible. So I would look at at things that are a little further afield than just the coaching that might have that kind of fun accessible readership like Financial feminist and unreasonable hospitality. Hi Emily, I'd love some ideas for my dual POV Second Chance romance with a historical twist.
- [79:18]
Emily Ohanjanian
Reluctant literary travel host Augusta Devasti is
- [79:21]
Emily Sommer
on a tour of England where she discovers handwritten pages of a French novel by Jean Jacques Laguerre. But many of the original words are increel and crossed out. Drawn by the chance to reconnect with her past historian career and explore Laguerre's possible ties to her own Haitian heritage, she retraces Laguerre's literary career only to encounter her former love, Hughes, whom she swore to forget after he left her years earlier without saying goodbye. Despite the long standing order from Hughes family to keep his distance from the devastes, Hughes apologizes for how he left. He's soon shattered by the lies that powerful art patrons in his family spread to keep him and Augusta apart.
- [79:52]
Emily Ohanjanian
But once Augusta learns of his family's
- [79:53]
Emily Sommer
connection to the Legares, Jun hues fight their growing dangerous attraction to each other. They decide if allowing themselves to secretly work together to Track down the rest of the manuscript will help them uncover Jean Jacques's true legacy and with it a possible, possible future for them. My story contains the literary mystery of the story she left behind, but is set in present day Boston, London and France. Any help would be so greatly appreciated. Okay, my first instinct for your book here is Good Dirt by Charmaine Wilkerson. She burst onto the scene with Black Cake, which was beloved by lots of people and was made into, I think a Netflix movie or show Question mark was definitely adapted. I think Good Dirt is even better than Black Cake. It also has a Caribbean angle. It is about family history. It is multi generational and just in very. A very literary, well written story of what happened to this family and piecing it together. I think that that might be for the same audience, which is great because that one had a very big audience and is still selling for us. I also think you could look at Village Weavers by Miriam J A Chauncey. She is a Haitian, I think a Haitian American writer of literary fiction. And she's wonderful, absolutely wonderful. Now, neither of these books are romances, and I know that you said yours is a second chance romance, but the rest of it, the rest of what you describe sounds pretty literary. So I think maybe one of these would work. And for romance specific comps, I also think that's something. Something that the. The listening crowd here could help us with. So I. That's. That's me shoving it off onto other people for assistance and advice. Once again, thank you all for listening, especially when it's just me talking to myself. Although I guess I'm also talking to all of you. It feels like I'm talking to myself in the computer. Thank you for sending in your pitches. Thank you for asking for this comp help. And it's always a pleasure to be here. So I'll see you next time.
- [81:53]
Emily Ohanjanian
Time.
- [81:54]
Emily Sommer
Thanks, everybody.
- [81:55]
Bianca Murray
And that's it for today's episode. I hope you'll join us for next week's show. In the meantime, keep at it. Remember, it just takes one. Yes.
- [82:09]
Cece
What's up, everyone? This is Cece. Do you know something I'm always looking for when I review the slush pile? Strong interiority. Well written. Interiority shows what your protagonist is thinking about in a way that is realistic and interesting. It propels the story forward instead of holding it back. But it doesn't stop there. A strong writer will leverage interiority into a superpower, into something I call psychological acuity. Think about it this way. Plot is what happens. Interiority is how your protagonist processes what happens and psychological acuity is why it matters. It gives a book depth and meaning and staying power. All breakout books have psychological acuity. You have been asking me to teach a course about psychological acuity for years.
- [82:56]
Bianca Murray
Years.
- [82:57]
Cece
Well, it's finally here. Why did it take me so long? Because my courses take years to build. They're dense, they're thorough and they're filled with examples and specific techniques. So this five day course begins on March 2nd. We'll have an optional interactive component. Students are invited to submit excerpts from their work for a chance to have them critique peaked live during a class. If you're ready to take your writing to the next level, join me for Writing Interiority and Psychological Acuity. Don't worry if you can't attend live. The sessions will be recorded and for more information check out my bio on Instagram or the podcast website. I'm looking forward to seeing you there.