Illicit Liaisons: MM Hockey Romance with Jason Wrench

This week, our guest host is author Jason Wrench, and we discuss:
* Face Off cover controversy
* Jason's appearance at BookCon
* Hockey romance
and more!

Jason Wrench writes. He writes a lot. With his publisher, Pride Publishing (now Totally Entwined) he’s the author of three different series: 12 Days of Murder & Till Death Do Us Wed, Up on the Farm (Finding a Farmer, Bewitched by the Barista, Sanctuary for the Surgeon, & Catching the Composer), and the Love and Liquidation Series (Boy Bands and Bullets, A Choreographed Coup, & Rhythmic Reclamation), and the standalone novella Wolf Island. As an Indy author, he’s published Life on the Naughty List, or What the Elf!, Jekyll/Hyde, and The Veil. His latest book, Shattering Securities, came out in Spring 2025. His day job is a college professor at SUNY New Paltz where he teaches in the Department of Communication. He’s a member of the Romance Writers of America, Rainbow Romance Writers, Text and Academic Authors Association, and The Authors Guild.

Jason appears in our first summer anthology, Moonlight and Margaritas, with his gay enemies-to-lovers romance, “Ship Happens,” a contemporary story set on a cruise ship.

LINKS TO JASON WRENCH

Jason's Website: https://jasonwrench.com/

Jason's Amazon Author Page: https://amzn.to/42T2ZQw

BOOKS MENTIONED ON THE SHOW

Goalie and the Geek by Jason Wrench https://amzn.to/4tgOnoW
Moonlight & Margaritas https://amzn.to/4tNokqt
Face Off by Chelsea Curto https://amzn.to/4eoTuzN
Heated Rivalry by Rachel Reid https://amzn.to/3QP9Jwo

READING OR RECOMMENDED

Playing Dirty by CE Ricci https://amzn.to/4d78f8c
The Other Bennet Sister by Janice Hadlow https://amzn.to/42ffc20
Shadow of Betrayal by Eva LeClerc https://evaleclercauthor.substack.com/
Urna Semper on Substack https://urnasemper.substack.com/

TENDER & TEMPTING TALES

Tender and Tempting Tales Substack: Subscribe and get a FREE story! https://tenderandtemptingtales.substack.com/

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Calls for Submissions: https://tenderandtemptingtales.substack.com/p/write-for-tender-and-tempting-tales

ILLICIT LIAISONS PRODUCED & HOSTED BY

Tara Leederman Substack: https://taleederman.substack.com/

Jenna Harte: https://jennaharte.com/

Outline and Show Notes: T.A. Leederman
Editing: Jenna Harte

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Hello, romance readers. Welcome to Illicit Liaisons with Tender and Tempting Tales, where each week we discuss the good, the bad, and the naughty of romance fiction. I am Jenna Hart, a romance author of the Southern Heat Contemporary Romance series and the Sexy Valentine Mystery Series, as well as the managing editor of Tender and Tempting Tales, a steamy romance anthology for readers who like quickies.

SPEAKER_03 0:23

Hi, I'm Tara Lederman, social media manager here at Tender and Tempting Tales, and Laura Maven, a main fiction writer for Starship Valkyrie, a science fiction game and story universe. I write science fiction stories, including romance, and you can often find me in our anthologies and on ZubSteck.

SPEAKER_00 0:36

And today we're very excited to have with us romance author Jason Rynch. Jason writes, he writes a lot with his publisher, Pride Publishing, now totally entwined. He is the author of three different series: 12 Days of Murder and Till Death to Us Wed, Up on the Farm, and the Loved and Liquidated series. And a standalone novella, Wolf Island. As an indie author, he's published Life on the Naughty List. I love that. I love that. I'm gonna have to read that. Or What the Elf, Jekyll Hyde, and the Veil. His latest book, Shattering Securities, came out in spring 2025. His day job is a college professor at SUNY, New Pulse, where he teaches in the Department of Communication. He's a member of the Romance Writers of America, Rainbow Romance Writers, Text and Academic Authors Association and the Authors Guild. And even much more exciting than all that, he was in our very first anthology, Moonlight and Margaritas, with his gay Enemies to Lovers Ship Happens, which was one of the favorite stories that we had received for the anthology. It's a contemporary story set on a cruise ship. Grab the book, you have to read it. You can find Jason at jasonRynch.com and his website and anything else we mentioned on the show will be listed in our show notes. So you can click it and go. Jason, thank you so much for being with us today.

SPEAKER_04 1:58

I'm glad to be here.

SPEAKER_00 1:59

Yes, we're very excited to have you. Now, Tara and I like to talk gossip and you know, hot takes, the tea, all things bookish in the bookish world. And we always like to have our guests join us in on the discussion. And recently I caught a video uh in which Heated Rivalry, which is, you know, of course the big, big drama going on now in terms of hockey romance, um, has their fans, the Reader fans, Rachel Reed's fans, have been going a little bit after Chelsea Kirto for having a hockey face-off image on the cover of Chelsea's book called Face Off, interestingly enough. Uh, and I've kind of accused her of plagiarizing the cover idea without, in fact, realizing that Chelsea's book cover had come out before Rachel Reed updated to her new cover that had the face off on it. And it really shows obviously how popular hated rivalry is. Um, but it also talks a little bit to fans how we really want them to stand up for us and are excited about us, but at the same time can complicate things because poor Chelsea's having to defend herself. We're just curious, like your thoughts around this whole issue.

SPEAKER_04 3:28

And well, this I'm glad you brought this one up because I have been tracking this one because this is very horrible to say, but I find it highly entertaining to watch when these things happen because I'm not involved.

SPEAKER_00 3:43

That's why we talk about it on this podcast. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 3:47

So first you're like, yeah, those look really similar. But then you also start looking at, okay, we know that the original one that came out face off, actually, that was started in January, almost almost a year before uh the Rachel Reed redesigns came out. Um, and it's also funny because there's another video that I was watching that and then was like, and here is a stock photo of two players facing off. Oh, look, this is probably what both of the artists were using when they were creating this, which you know, artists have often used reference images, and it just happened to be that when you think both of them wanted someone at you know the center line and looking at each other, there's not too many ways to do that image just by the nature of what both of them are wanting to portray in there. But watching the fans has been interesting because there are definitely some you know great fans, and there are definitely some rabid fans that have gone a little bit crazy, and especially going after people. And this has actually been interesting to also watch the the actors in heated rivalry having to go uh have problems with the fans as well. Um, and so there have been times when you know the actors on heated rivalry have actually had to post on social media being like, you know, the fans, your behavior is inappropriate. We love the fact that you like what we're doing, we love the fact that we have these fans, but how you are treating people is just wrong. And so again, it's always one of those things you want fans, but you know, you can't control fandom. And so sometimes fans just get a little bit out of control. Uh, that's usually a very, very, very small minority that tend to be very, very vocal, and it causes things to escalate way beyond anything that they actually should, which is kind of what we've been watching with the covers and with other issues involving heated rivalry.

SPEAKER_00 5:40

Yeah, yeah, it it is an interesting phenomenon. I think it gets maybe exacerbated because bookish content people will pick it up and talk about it, and so it spreads even more, right? I mean, here we are talking about it. Somebody like, oh, I didn't know, I'm gonna have to go, yeah. Um, but it it is at some point you love to have your fans be so protective of you, but at the same time, yeah, you don't want to hurt people. Poor Chelsea having to defend herself, her artist having to defend herself. But the other part of it is I have not found anywhere where Rachel Reid has said anything about it, and and maybe that is well advised. I mean, it's so easy to step in it on the internet, right?

SPEAKER_04 6:27

So also may be completely unaware that it's maybe happening. Yeah, because when you get to that level, she probably has a team of social media people. I'm seriously doubting that she's doing most of that stuff herself, right? So she may just, you know, between her illness and trying to get the next book out and everything else that's going on, because obviously she was we'll talk a little bit more about bookcon here in a minute, but she was at BookCon last weekend, so we know she's out doing things.

SPEAKER_03 6:54

She's kind of been a busy person this year, maybe dealing with a lot of fandom herself, right? You know, she has really rabid fans, and that can be scary in other ways.

SPEAKER_04 7:02

It's kind of like I don't know about either of you. I the first time I published a book, I went and looked at reviews. That was the last time I ever did that.

SPEAKER_02 7:11

I'll do that.

SPEAKER_04 7:12

Uh I was I just learned, yeah, if you start looking at all that stuff, you'll start second-guessing everything that you're doing, and it's just not worth it. So once you put something out into the world, you have put it out in the world, you now have your readers, and those spaces are for your readers. And I've already moved on to the next project. I may be two projects down the line from when uh I originally wrote something. So yeah, sometimes it's just best to be blissfully unaware of some of that stuff when it's actually happening.

SPEAKER_00 7:41

Yeah, but it it is an exciting story for her, right? To because who knows? I remember years and years and years ago, I was talking to an author who's in the he's a mystery author, and it was at the time Twilight came out and was kind of blowing up everything. And I asked him, like, why that book? I mean, there were other vampire romances, the same thing with Fifty Shades. There had been other highly erotic romance stories, so why those books? And he told me Stardust. We don't know what is going to grab the public's interest. And I feel like Heated Rivalry sort of did that coming out as the show. I mean, my 80-year-old mother has watched it, really, she seemed to enjoy it. Um, and it's really taken the world by story. In a lot of ways, it's good because of all the representation. But I also wonder if Rachel's like, I don't know what happened, Rachel Reed, you know, but how great, right? Stardust somehow hit that show.

SPEAKER_04 8:46

And just watching how that even happened, because I remember when it it first came out that Heater Rivalry was actually going to get made into a TV show. There was not that much buzz. I mean, those of us who are with in the MM Romance world were like, oh, you know, one of our kind of known books is actually going to be made into a TV show. We'll wait and see what happens. And then you didn't hear anything for a while, and you kind of knew that it was going on up in Canada. And the fact that HBO didn't even bother to pick it up until the month that it started airing, and just you know, obviously that was a pretty good decision on their part at the last minute, right? But it was just it hit at the right time. But I also go back and think about it. If you look in the queer space, the last time we had something that kind of had this kind of hit was when Queerist Fo came out.

SPEAKER_03 9:31

Yeah, a long time ago.

SPEAKER_04 9:32

It also was another one that was unapologetically queer, it was unapologetically sexual, and it had no problem showing that stuff. And it showed that then there was an audience, it's just there really hasn't been another one of these until heated rivalry.

SPEAKER_03 9:47

Yeah, yeah. 20 years of gay baiting.

SPEAKER_04 9:50

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 9:52

That's how I've been feeling very well. Um you did go to BookCon. Yeah, I heard a little bit about it. I I do know one person who went. I I saw somewhere where their indie author alley went really well. Uh, I did see another video where some people were complaining that some readers were a little bit aggressive. So uh, what was your experience of it?

SPEAKER_04 10:23

So I I went uh Saturday afternoon. I was actually asked to come in and do and do signings for the Romance Riders of America table. So I was actually there with them. So I was kind of nice because I got to go in and then I got to leave. So whereas the people that were like manning their own tables were there all weekend. I got there on on Saturday, about one o'clock. It was mayhem. I had, you know, I knew that they had sold something like they'd sold out of their 20,000 tickets that they were planning on having for the weekend. So I kind of knew that it was going to be big, but until you're in the midst of that, you don't grasp how big something like that actually is. And so obviously, we were in one of the big marketplace areas, and there was just people wall to wall everywhere, and it was it was a lot of fun to see that there was that many people that were obviously enthusiastic about books of all kinds, and you know, getting to actually talk to people at the booth and talking about romance writing in general and signing books, you know, it it's kind of fun because there's so much energy in a place like that. But yeah, the indie romance area that it was huge. Um, I've seen a lot of indie authors at various events. This is probably the largest group of indie authors I've ever seen in one place at a time. Wow, but yeah, it was because I went down and walked through and I actually knew a couple of the authors, like, oh hey, good to see you. Um, and and getting that opportunity to obviously for them to showcase things, but also for them to hopefully find new readers in a way that they wouldn't get to um normally. And I think these types of events are are good for us. I also think it was great that by the nature of it being in New York City and as large as this was, there was quite a bit of news that came out of uh book con. And and so I think it also was good for promoting, you know, just obviously the publishing industry in New York City in general, which in many ways is still the heart of the publishing world in our country. But it was also fun because here we are on one coast, and then on the other coast, you had the LA Times, you know.

SPEAKER_03 12:22

Yeah, that's what books was going. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 12:25

And so I know we we had RWA people out there representing us too, so lots of stuff going on all one weekend. That's just a lot of books, and Margaret Atwood as well.

SPEAKER_03 12:34

It was really cool.

SPEAKER_00 12:35

Yeah, I'm thinking of something as big as that. I'm wondering, did people have wagons to like pull their books? There were some people, but some people buy a crap ton of books, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 12:48

There were some people who definitely had their their things on wheels as they were going through the marketplace. Technically, they discouraged anything on wheels. That didn't mean it didn't happen, right?

SPEAKER_02 12:59

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 13:00

So I understood just because yeah, after a while, that's just a lot of books uh to try to carry around. And a lot of publishers were handing out arcs for things that are coming out, so you can imagine those arc lines were very long as people were trying to get those. Uh yeah, it was interesting to watch to say the least. And it was also nice. I I was I was glad I was behind a table. I got to watch as all of it was happening in front of me without always being right in the middle of everything. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 13:31

What were you signing while you were there?

unknown 13:32

Whoops.

SPEAKER_03 13:34

What were you signing while you were there?

SPEAKER_04 13:36

I took the first um books in most of my series, and just because that's easy to do. Um, so I had, you know, obviously I had the 12 Days of Murder. I had uh what is it? This is horrible when you start forgetting your own names. Uh Finding a Farmer, I had Boy Bands and Bullets. Um, I also had Scintillating Securities, and then I had uh obviously uh Life on the Naughty List or What the Elf, and of course, my new one uh that started coming out this spring, uh Tales from the Creed series. Uh the first book on that is Goalie and the Geek. So I had those are the six that I had with me that I was signing in. Big surprise, Goalie and the Geek was the one that did the best.

SPEAKER_03 14:11

Yeah, yes, yeah. I saw the cover for Goalie and the Geek. I really like it. I like that you went with something more photoreal.

SPEAKER_04 14:18

Yeah, it was so uh the funny thing was is I had purchased the cover about a year and a half ago and just had it sitting on my hard drive.

SPEAKER_03 14:28

Nice, good.

SPEAKER_04 14:29

So I was like, I know I'm gonna write one of these, and I was like, I'll get to it. And obviously, when everything blew up with heated rivalry, I was like, Oh, the time is now.

SPEAKER_03 14:38

Yeah, that's good. You scheduled your hockey era.

SPEAKER_04 14:41

Yeah, I was like, we are going to do this now. And so basically, starting from December through uh late March, I I uh did the trilogy that I had for that series, and was I have thankfully my editor, I was able to give them to her uh basically one book every month, and she was able to get them back, and we've been able to get them out every month, which is the first time I've ever done rapper release, and gosh, that makes you tired.

SPEAKER_03 15:04

Yeah, it sounds exhausting, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:07

Yeah, yeah. But uh nice that you were able to schedule your editor so that they could meet that as well. Because that's the other part, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:15

Yeah, it's incredible.

SPEAKER_00 15:16

I'm a big fan of the events too. I I love going to them and meeting other writers, meeting the readers, and you're right, there's an energy you leave there wanting to write if you know if you've been tired of it and now you want to go home and write. Uh, I always end up buying books, and um a lot of times they sit on my shelf for a while because I'm having a hard time getting to the I can at least say I left with fewer books than I arrived with. Well, that's good. That's nice and done. That means you sold some.

SPEAKER_04 15:48

That's not to say I didn't replace a couple, but yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:53

That's exciting. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 15:55

And Jason, I'm so excited you're here. Like we talked a lot on the show about AI recently and its impact on publishing and authors. And I've we've talked a bit about the the academic and teaching side of it. Um, and I know you're also a teacher and academic, and I know you co-wrote a book about AI literacy, the future is now. And so I was hoping hoping you could talk a bit about that book and your views on AI's impacts on publishing and on indie authors. And I'm sure it's also affecting teaching where you're at as well.

SPEAKER_04 16:20

No, not at all. AI not impacting higher education in the least.

SPEAKER_03 16:24

Nothing, nothing at all. Everyone's just writing in their blue books.

SPEAKER_04 16:29

There's actually been conversations about going back to the blue book uh in in some circles, because uh the reality is is AI kind of took a little us a little bit by storm. Uh, I remember many years ago now. I actually had the opportunity to play around with GPT 2.0 back when it wasn't much, but I was like, oh, look, there's this thing that can write, and from one sentence to the next, it made zero sense. And it's like, oh, that's fun. It can actually write a sentence. Good for it. So I wasn't concerned and you didn't really think about it. And then, of course, Chat GPT came out at you know, what was it, 3.5, and suddenly you're like, oh, everything just changed. And you had to rethink everything. I was actually had just signed a textbook contract to write a business and professional communication textbook. And I was literally, Chat GPT comes out. I'm sitting with my editor going, we have to reapproach everything now because this technology is going to just revamp what this field is and how things are done. And just to watch how everything has changed so rapidly and how it has improved. And I remember like the early days of like image generators where everything looked like Picasso.

SPEAKER_03 17:43

Oh god, yeah, for Sora One.

SPEAKER_04 17:45

And it was fun because you know, show those lips are three times the size of the rest of the head.

unknown 17:50

Who cares?

SPEAKER_04 17:52

And then to watch, you know, now almost all that stuff is photorealistic. And you know, in this week alone, you know, um OpenAI released their new image generator, which for the first time I'm actually seeing text actually done well in an image and um done a lot of text and images. The fact that it can now do infographics that actually make sense. So we can't pretend that this isn't happening. So my friend Senea and I actually originally started off. We wrote a uh edited a book on commun generative AI in the communication classroom. And it was kind of when we were doing that that both of us were like, we are gonna have to start talking about this in larger respects as a society. I think a lot of people were aware that the AA world was coming, but they didn't necessarily know what that meant. And for it to hit as fast and as hard as it has, that you know, the idea that you know, people we've talked about computer literacy, we've talked about information literacy and media literacy. People now need to have artificial intelligence literacy to understand what this technology can do, what it can't do, what it should never do, it should never be your therapist. And yet we know people are constantly talking to them as if it is. That is a horrible, horrible idea. Um and yet we're seeing it. But a lot of that is because people don't understand what they don't know about this technology. Yeah, and so we just became really involved in that world. And you know, yeah, we so we wrote our second book and come came out this year uh on obviously looking at AI literacy as a broader thing, everything from generative AI to thinking about AI in the future, but also you know, some of the darker applications of artificial intelligence. And you know, some of those conversations have come up this spring with you know, people talking about, you know, should we have autonomous weaponry? What about the AI surveillance state? And for us, these are like, yeah, these are things we've been talking about and looking at for a few years, but you know, the public is you know starting to catch up in the publishing world. Well, I'm gonna shame one person. Feel free to edit this out. Their name is Barrett Williams, and if you Google that name on Amazon, you'll find over 5,000 books that this person has written.

SPEAKER_03 20:08

Dear God.

SPEAKER_04 20:09

Yeah, and all of them have also been turned into those fake little audiobooks for Audible as well. That there is the proliferation of what we call AI slop.

SPEAKER_03 20:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 20:20

Where it's these fast written books, half the time they're probably never been read by the person whose name has been thrown on the cover.

SPEAKER_03 20:27

Half the time, half the time.

SPEAKER_04 20:29

I'm being generous.

SPEAKER_03 20:33

I don't think any like any person if they actually read through some of the slop they send to these places, I think that they would be embarrassed. Oh, we were impressed, we receive AI slop, and there's just moments of sort of like you send this to us.

SPEAKER_04 20:46

And you know, the more you look at AI output, the more you realize uh what some of that stuff looks like. And it becomes more apparent when you're looking at it and going, yo, this person either uh just didn't know what the good writing looks like, which craft is still actually important, or they just didn't bother to look at it in the first place. Um, and so I do think that that proliferation of just so much stuff is a problem. Uh I wish that some of the larger, you know, sellers like Amazon did a better job of policing some of that slop that's getting out there. But of course, they're just interested in making money, not necessarily ensuring that there's the quality of a lot of that stuff. They always say that they're interested in that, but you know, when you watch some of these, you know, little, I don't know if you want to call them publishing houses, because that's not really what they are, but they're just putting out content, you can tell it's not about the quality of it. Um so I do think it is one of those things we have seen a lot of people across the spectrum are are using this technology for a wide range of different reasons. Um, I think some people, it's also been interesting, you know, you have a lot of people who are like they are verbally anti AI, yet when you actually talk to them and you know them, they're like, Yeah, you know that they're using it. Because it does simplify things. Like my favorite thing, I and I admit that I've done this where I've written the email that I wanted to write, and then I've gone to ChatGPT and been like, please rewrite this so that it sounds professional. You know, get rid of all those four-letter words that I that should not be.

SPEAKER_00 22:18

Could you help me tone this down?

SPEAKER_03 22:22

Jason, you're losing your voice. The purity of your rage. Yeah. Why would you tone it down?

SPEAKER_04 22:30

Oh, so your 18th grandparent has died this semester. I'm sorry to hear that. And so, you know, there are, you know, those things, but also it's just become more and more integrated. At first, people are like, oh, they're going to avoid it. And then I was like, Yeah, good luck on that, because it's going to be in every other piece of software that you own before long. And sure enough, you know, six months later, here comes Microsoft. And you know, the very first thing you get is like a clippy on steroids at the top, going, What do you want to write today?

SPEAKER_01 22:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 23:00

And I I think there are promises with the technology. There's obviously a lot of ethical issues, there's a lot of decisions that have to be made.

SPEAKER_03 23:10

But and the technology is going at a much faster rate than a lot of us can keep up with just having basic conversations about Amazon needs to get on top of it on the platform because people are struggling to find uh like author-written stuff and they want it. So I mean, I don't know how they're going to do that, if they need to badge authors or what, but I do think they need to create a way for people to sort. And I do think they know it's affecting the platform. But that's the one thing that where I have some hope there is that like I don't think Amazon wants to be flooded to this degree with material and make it difficult for people on KU to even find what they want to read.

SPEAKER_04 23:46

From a pure profit perspective, it'd go, this is your compute. Somewhere this you're getting you're paying for this, even if it's just the conversion of all of these fake books to Audible files, that's your compute that you're paying for. So that there's should be a price incentive for them to not have all of this. But apparently, as of right now, it looks like the profit margin for them is is good enough that it's not been something they've been overly worried about. But then you have something like Draft to Digital, which is a company I have been using for my indie stuff, just because I love to be able to upload it to one place and they push it out to everyone, and I don't have to worry about it.

SPEAKER_02 24:22

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 24:22

And you know, they've gone to this now. What is it? It's only two dollars a month for you know the entire year, basically, and you have the ability to use their platform, but and then it'll be like a one-time twenty dollar fee as a way of their hoping to try to you know decrease the amount of slot that's going through their system. Some barrier to entry, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:43

And I think I think if you make a hundred dollars, yeah, then you don't have that twelve dollar fee or whatever it is that they're yeah, yeah. I I Amazon does now have a limit to what you can upload, but I think it's like a hundred or two hundred, like a day or you know, something like that. Like it's something crazy, could be a month, week. I don't remember. Um but I also I also think because I I pay attention to a lot of this. I know there's a lot of uh courses out there that were teaching people who wanted to get into publishing, they would hire ghostwriters. Now they're teaching them to use AI. We know the AI is improving, and we know some people can massage it, either the prompt or they know craft enough to edit. And I think it will be very difficult uh for places like Amazon, draft digital, all of them to know if that's not self-reported, and readers may not know the I readers right now could love books they think are human written that aren't. And in my mind, I'm like you talked about the technology going, it's gonna continue to go, it's always ahead of where we are in terms of thinking about its impact, right? Like we're always sort of chasing it. And in my mind, like it's there. I'm gonna compete with it. And that's just what it is, it is what it is. I think it's just gonna continue to be used in the publishing world. It's a little pet peeve of mine that publishers are openly using AI for uh lots of things, including feeding manuscripts in to vet them, feeding manuscripts in to summarize them for marketing or whatever. Uh, but the author that uses it, no, no, no, you're the worst person in the whole world to ever have lived for using AI to write, right? You now have the attitude out there, right?

SPEAKER_04 26:42

It has been funny when you have these publishers like we will never accept AI. And yet it's like, oh yeah, but our marketing department is all about using it right now because it saves a lot of money for us.

SPEAKER_00 26:54

Exactly, because it's a tool. So, but that the my other pet peeve has been, especially last year when it was really starting to ramp up, and all these people like AI is the worst thing in the world, blah blah blah. And I'd say, Well, I dictate and I use an AI to transcribe. Well, that's not what I mean. And I'm like, You're a writer, say what you mean. You're talking about a very specific type of AI that you are against, which is generative, right? They they don't like AI. I always worry because so many people that come into the writing space, there's a lot they don't know. So if they come across somebody who's saying AI is bad and all of a sudden they notice in Grammarly or Pro Writing Aid, there's an AI tool that will switch a sentence from passive to active, right? Or whatever it is. Are they gonna think, oh now I can't be a writer? If they're dictating because they can't type, that's AI. Are they gonna think, oh now I can't be a writer because AI, air quotes, is bad. So I worry about that. So I'm like, be clear. What you think about AI is bad and recognize you're using it every time you talk to Siri or Google or whatever, right? It is everywhere in our lives beyond just asking chat a question.

SPEAKER_03 28:07

People need more knowledge and nuance in the conversation. A lot of them don't know how much AI tools are out there and are used for other things. I mean, I when I use Canva Pro, there's a there's a tool in there that removes background that does use AI, but I don't generate our marketing graphics just using AI because I think they're ugly and it's not a good opportunity for us to express what it is we're doing because you know, our visual style will not be there. You know, I I it's a nice opportunity for us to express ourselves as well. Um, but yeah, like a tool that removes background for me, something that I would do that would take I could do in Photoshop, but it would take me a long time is very useful. It's a it's a helpful tool for me.

SPEAKER_00 28:41

That new layer tool they have in Canva. Yeah, magic layer. Oh my god, that has been a game changer. Like, I do not want this in this photo. Yeah, identifying layers separates the layer and out it goes.

SPEAKER_03 28:53

Yeah, way better than the the previous editor where you would like paint things that you needed to remove.

SPEAKER_00 28:58

Yeah, yeah. Sometimes we had to do it a couple times because it wouldn't always disappear, right? There's like a like a hint of it, a ghost.

SPEAKER_03 29:06

A ghost I've had so many ghosts of things that I've had to remove. Yeah, magic layers is very, very helpful and it does to speed things up, but it doesn't mean that you know I'm not I'm not generating or marketing graphics. I like to express myself through that.

SPEAKER_04 29:18

I will say, as an author, I still prefer working with graphic designers for book covers. Um a lot of it is is I I you I think it's really easy for the most part at this point still to spot a lot of the AI generated book covers. They just oh my god, yeah, yeah. They have a look. And for me, it's like, you know, I kind of work with graphic designers in one of two ways. One, I have a book and I have I'm looking for the cover, or I see the cover and I'm like, I want to tell that stor story.

unknown 29:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:48

I love that.

SPEAKER_04 29:49

I may hoard covers.

SPEAKER_03 29:51

Hoard covers. You've got like a little trove of covers.

SPEAKER_00 29:55

You can do that with domain names.

unknown 29:59

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 30:00

I have some friends. I'm like, I will bequeath my covers to you.

SPEAKER_00 30:04

Oh my gosh. I'm gonna add that. How to find ideas, what to write. Go look at stockbook covers.

SPEAKER_04 30:15

Because there's you know, and there's so many talented artists that are out there that are trying to make a living. And I'm like, if I'm in a position I can help those people do that, and it gives me inspiration too. And that's why you know, you when I was working on Gold and the Geek, I had that cover sitting around. How it was just waiting. And then I had another one that I worked with who had two hockey covers that he had just came out like, oh, look, we have a trilogy, and put them all together. Um, so now I'm looking at the other sports books that uh I figure I'll just have a series of sport and then be done with it.

SPEAKER_03 30:45

I I now make our covers actually. And the fun thing about that is being inspired by the books, by the stories that are in the books and using that. Like in Pause and Peril, we actually we had a cover originally, and then when we read the stories, it was like, well, actually, and then we made the cover to sort of look like uh to be inspired inspired by the stories that we had done. We had the cute little spider and stuff, and and added like a dog that actually looked like the dog from Jenna's story. So I thought that was much more enjoyable than having some random person make us a cover, you know. I thought that was way better. And also just we know that there's no one using AI to make the cover because I did it, you know, it's there's like a it's kind of safer that way in in some ways.

SPEAKER_00 31:22

You are writing hockey romance too, and um obvious it's been a thing because heated rivalry's been so big. We've we've talked to other authors who have written hockey romance, and um you were rapid releasing, which is no easy feat. Um because you know, a lot of it's more than just writing, right? There's a lot of stuff that goes into it. Um, but we would just like to know more about you know, I guess it was this a cover that you saw and you got the idea, or I again I yeah, I owned the cover before and I even had the title Jolie and the Geek before I started writing it.

SPEAKER_04 32:02

It was I I kind of you know knew from the base of the cover that just it was probably in the new adult area, just because it was not a it clearly it was not designed as a steamy romance cover. Um, and so for me, half of it is okay, we have these two people. You have one guy who is obviously what I call the geek, and the other guy's clearly the hockey player. It's like, well, what is their story? And you know, that's always the thing that I love about writing is we're storytellers, and sometimes it's like, okay, I have a picture, but what's the story that goes with that picture? What's going on behind us? And figuring out what that narrative was. Um, and again, so I'd had the cover, had it sitting around, um, had the title, and I just decided obviously when heated rivalry hit, I was like, Oh, I should have already been working on this. Because I in the back of my head go, oh, I will get to that one later. So I knew I was going to go down that route, I just hadn't done it yet. And then when it came out, I was like, okay, if you're gonna get get while the getting is good, uh, and so I was like kind of in the position to be able to start working on this rapidly. Um, and and so then again, I had the first cover, another graphic designer that I work with had another one, and I was like, okay, I'm gonna get that one. Then he's like, Oh, yeah, I have this other one that I'm like, oh well, there we go. We got three now, we're good. And then so basically, from started working on that in early December, and I finished the last one up in March and got it to my editor so that we could have it out by the end of this month.

SPEAKER_00 33:32

So it's a book a month, right?

SPEAKER_04 33:34

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I can write if when I sit down and draft, I can the fastest I've ever drafted was about an 80,000-word novel on about 13 days. Good god!

SPEAKER_00 33:45

I thought I was fast. I'm not that fast.

SPEAKER_04 33:49

And here's I'm a plotter, so I know where the story's going, yeah, pretty much from the beginning. So that to me helps write fast because it's I'm not sitting making a lot of those editorial decisions while I'm writing. I'm like, nope. And if something tries to get in the way, I'm like, that is not what I told you you're going to do. When you're writing fast, you don't have a choice.

SPEAKER_03 34:09

Were you teaching at the time?

SPEAKER_04 34:10

Yeah. Well, but I had Christmas vacation in there, so that helped.

SPEAKER_03 34:15

Okay, okay. So it was over Christmas break. Gotcha.

SPEAKER_04 34:18

So it wasn't.

SPEAKER_00 34:18

I'm single and I only have two dogs.

SPEAKER_04 34:20

That also helps.

SPEAKER_00 34:22

I was thinking maybe you got snowed inner and there was nothing else to do.

SPEAKER_04 34:25

Well, there was a lot of snow in January and February. Yeah. That definitely helped.

SPEAKER_00 34:30

Do you dictate or anything like that, or are you just type?

SPEAKER_04 34:32

I'm ty I'm a typist. I will say though, I go back typing-wise to the good old days of internet relay chat rooms. And when you had to be very, very fast, because that was the only way you kept up with what the conversation was in the rooms.

SPEAKER_03 34:47

Oh, you mean like the the old posing RP? Yeah, oh my gosh, I used to do that in high school.

SPEAKER_04 34:53

And that taught me just to be a really fast typist and combine that with all of the academic work that I've done over the years. Writing fast and getting things done, especially on a deadline, is just ingrained in me. And so making the switch from academic writing to fiction writing is obviously a lot more enjoyable because I don't have to cite anything.

SPEAKER_03 35:10

Hell yes.

SPEAKER_04 35:12

But you know, it's the same skill set, it's a little bit different, but it's still, you know, a lot of the basic things.

SPEAKER_00 35:18

I I could only go that fast if I were dictating.

SPEAKER_04 35:22

Even then, 80,000 in 13 days would be and I don't know how you dictate because I've tried that and I would sit there. No, middle, I haven't tried recently. I tried back in the good old days of drag and dictate.

SPEAKER_00 35:33

So like all AI, it's improved, right?

SPEAKER_03 35:36

Like it's kind of a vision of hell. I tried it when I had eye surgery and just staring at the screen while it was trying to pick you to see me just being like, no, no, go back. I can't stand this anymore. I hate this. And then like I just turn. Like that's all in the text. I can't handle it.

SPEAKER_00 35:50

Well, let me tell you, I do not dictate sitting at my screen because you're watching it go by and there's a delay. You feel, oh, I'm talking too fast for you. So I actually go for a walk. I take my handy dandy little recorder and I dictate into that. And then I use dragon, and I I bought it before a lot of the otter and all these other AI tools were out there. I bought the expensive form of dragon that had the transcribe. And so it would transcribe, and then I revise from that. It messes up more because how I it's going from a recording and transcribing, and I'm not, I don't always enunciate right, or I speak too fast or something like that. Usually, if it's gone wonky, it's my fault. It's the problem's my end. But you know, with that, and I only did it, I thought it was weird too, but but I did it because I started developing a repetitive strain injury. Um, because I was ghostwriting for two people at the time. Oh wow. And they were rapid really, so it was a lot. And um I found when I finally figured out the rhythm of it and how to do it and made the adjustment, it's way fast.

SPEAKER_04 37:07

I will say I have had both of my carpal tunnels done.

SPEAKER_00 37:10

Yes. Yeah. My sister just had that, yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:16

So I had a radial tunnel after my sister's wedding, and that affected me for a few years. When I did nano rhymo in like 2019, I remember I had horrible wrist strain, and I was like typing in a brace and stuff like that. It's gotten better since then. I guess, I mean, I guess the most I've written in a day would be 13,000 words. So I guess I could probably do what you just described, but it hurts. It's hard, it hurts.

SPEAKER_00 37:38

You get over 10,000 in a day, just typing. Dictation is a little bit different. Typing, I mean, in my mind, my mind is mush. When you get about 10,000 words in a day, after that, it's just like nothing else can happen.

SPEAKER_04 37:53

There's a wonderful author. Um she's in the cozy mystery world. Her name is Amanda M. Lee. She has, I think, three different pen names that she publishes under, and she publishes two to three books a month. Oh, and she was a former journalist. Ums amounts of writing, mass amounts of editing, and this is her job. This she wakes up in the morning, she writes, you know, however many words she has to get written that day, she edits another six to nine thousand. She and it's just her job.

SPEAKER_01 38:22

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 38:23

And so, you know, I think especially when you develop certain writing skills and you just focus on that, you it is possible. It's not necessarily the most fun, but yeah, you get it done.

SPEAKER_03 38:35

Yeah, I think my issue is that my job is primarily a bunch of stuff at the press. So I I those end up taking up not just time but brain space, you know. Like I've gotta, you know, send an email to the authors. I've uh I've gotta make these graphics, you know, and that takes up creative energy as well.

SPEAKER_04 38:49

Uh I I have my hockey romance that I've been working on for over a month now. Um and it's going much, much slower. This is my straight. So I have my romance that I write uh for my fans, and then I have the stuff that I write for my mom. This would be more category.

SPEAKER_00 39:06

For my mom category. What does that mean? No spice or something. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 39:13

Fade completely to black.

unknown 39:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 39:17

I think it would be fun to be able to publish two versions of your book. Like here, here's the spice and here's the not spice. Amazon would probably terminate your thing because you're plagiarizing yourself, right? But it would be fun to have two versions of the same book, but one is spicy and one isn't.

SPEAKER_03 39:34

Would it be good to be able to toggle it on and off, right? Like you just like hit the spice button and then it just the the spice unfurls, or you can hide it, right? Spice, no spice.

SPEAKER_04 39:42

Let's face it, there are some books that when you're reading them, it's like the plot is only there to get you from one spice to the next. One spice, yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 39:52

Yeah, no, I like neon gods would not work with a no spice. Yeah, just for like two pages.

SPEAKER_00 39:58

You can just put a little chili pepper next to, you know, here's where it's not, here's where you can skip for, yeah. Oh, that's funny.

SPEAKER_04 40:06

Which is always one of those interesting things when you start writing, you know, obviously romance, whether you venture into the world of erotica is a whole other thing, but figure out how where especially sex fits in and how that works. And yeah, I'm a big believer that it needs to fit into the narrative and it should help propel the story forward. Advance the characters in their relationship. I hate it when you're like reading plot plot plot plot. Let's have a 20-page sex scene. Plot, plot, plot, plot. Yeah. Like when you can take the sex scene out and it doesn't change the story. Yeah, what are we doing?

SPEAKER_03 40:40

Yeah, it's very like knock knock sexogram. Like, oh, I guess it's sex time. All right, I guess I'm reading that.

SPEAKER_00 40:46

When I was ghostwriting, my client is one of the spicy ones. She wants six to eight spicy bits in an 80,000 word. It's quite a bit. And a lot of the times she sends me the plots. And and I go through some of them I rip out because I'm just like, this is weird. But I'll add something in later to kind of make up for what I'm taking up. But when I'm doing plotting for myself, plotting for her, when there's so many, or even myself, I don't have that many. I do try to have reason this is happening here and now, right? Even if they're not in love yet, per se, you know, there's something shifting, there's something going on when I'm plotting, it is sort of plotting those bits, you know, that they have their own little arc stories, right?

SPEAKER_03 41:36

Well, it does when she sends you the plot, does it say, and here's a sexy bit? Yes. It does.

SPEAKER_00 41:43

You know, some yeah, they don't tell me they sometimes it'll tell me, oh, it's in the shower, or it's this or that. Sometimes there is a direction there, sometimes there isn't. Sometimes they will say the mood of it, or if it's ultra kinky or something like that. My point is that I agree that those bits are like any other action scene. If you had a violent fight scene, or you know, anything that's going on, those the spicy bits should have a reason for being there. At the same time, there's readers who just love that stuff, right? Like they don't care. So it depends who your reader is and and how many some people would think of eight spicy bits, that's too much. And and other people are like, I want more.

SPEAKER_04 42:27

My favorite writing stories. Um, I was working with my editor, and it was the first time. So the first two books I wrote, 12 Days of Murder, um, until Death to a Swead, that was really more romantic suspense. Good body count, because you know that it's romantic suspense, and not a body count in a sexy way. It was right, right. With a thing like 12 days of murder, you know what you're getting.

SPEAKER_02 42:49

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 42:49

But then I was like, I'm gonna write more, I'm gonna see if I can do a traditional romance, which is where I got the Up on the Farm series. And so it was my first time really writing sex scenes. And I remember her coming back going, I think you have too many arms.

SPEAKER_02 43:03

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 43:04

Oh no, and she goes, You need to work on your choreography, yeah. And so that's what all of my friends know. We refer to it as the choreography, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:15

I'm convinced that some of the best spicy bits have very little choreography or very little what I call tab B and slot A type things. Like, you know, it's a lot of sensation, a lot of emotion, a lot, maybe some thought, and less the mechanics, I think, are some of the best spicy bits I've ever read. Is that? I mean, you have to have a little bit, obviously, to make a living writing spices.

SPEAKER_03 43:41

Jenna does it. Jenna can do it, too. Can you?

SPEAKER_00 43:45

So, you know, I do want to ask you something if I can cut in because I remember uh I follow you on Facebook, and I and this was Heated Rivalry. It was taking off. So it was a couple months ago, and you had a post there. Uh, and I can't remember exactly. It said, but I walked away thinking because we know that a lot of women now are writing gay men romance and and of course the hockey, and the in the comment I walked away with thinking they're doing something wrong. I mean, it wasn't like a bad comment or anything, but I walked away thinking he's saying that they are doing something, there's something that they're missing. And I was just curious what that was.

SPEAKER_04 44:27

Okay, well, MM Romance is interesting just because if when you look at the history of MM Romance, it was predominantly written from the beginning by cisgendered straight women. It is all it which again, there's actually a wonderful documentary that came out uh several years ago that focused on MM Romance, and it kind of talked a little bit about the history and the reality that it's always been an interesting female space. Um, that you have had more and more actual gay men that are entering into this space over the years. And some of the things that I see wrong with a lot of the MM romance is especially with some of the stuff that we were talking about earlier, where it literally is like no plot and it's just all about the sex. And you go, Yeah, gay men's lives are a way more convoluted than just that. Um, but at the same time, I'm like, there are some times I'm like, oh, they they have all this romance stuff that I'm like, yeah, it doesn't always work that way either. And realizing that, you know, like today, I I don't see nearly as much, like in the romance that I read, of how many of them are going onto their cell phone, looking on Grindr or Scroff or any of the other dating sites and going, Oh, this person's three miles away from me. Okay, might as well. And that happens, that is a reality that happens. Um, and it doesn't even, you know, you have a lot of open relationships, which I'm not seeing as many of those types of relationships depicted. And so I think sometimes, you know, it's like with any actual relationships, they're messier than sometimes they really look on the page. And so I do think sometimes some of the the MM romance I look at, I'm like, it does not resemble what I actually know exists um in the gay community. But you know, I had one time where I had again a different editor who was like, Oh, that doesn't work, and I'm like, Oh, I can guarantee you that works. I I know this happened. Right, I realize you may not be reading or seeing the same things, but yes, this very much does work. Um, and that is sometimes the difference between you know writing from a lived experience versus writing from a fantasy experience. At the same time, though, I do write, you know, both most of my stuff is in the M Romance world, but I do write straight romance. I've never been a straight woman, and yet both of my books are written from a cisgender straight woman's perspective. And for me, I'm always like, I write them as people, they're just happen to be females, and I think the strong, powerful female leads are just way more interesting to me in that respect. So to me, it's you know, you approach anything, you you want to approach it from an authenticity place and you want to do the right by the characters.

SPEAKER_03 47:01

Yeah, but I've been wondering about this for a long time, since I was like 15, actually, because I've been in fandom spaces where MM relationships between couples were a big deal. And I, you know, I knew a lot of female writers who wrote this, you know, and yeah, a lot of us in in my group are bisexual women, and I we would talk to each other, it's like, why is it so compelling to us to want to see this male character with this other male character? And some of it I think is that like in those stories, the protagonist is male. So like that's the character who's like your vessel character. And you then, like, as a as like uh if you're a straight woman, the male characters are maybe more interesting, and so you want to see them. So in fandom spaces, I like that was always I was always curious about that. But I I find it so strange how many straight cis women are writing MM like original romance and how many of them are in that space, you know, and and how many of them are like writing about MM sex without having that experience. That is feel that's that's very, very odd to me. Like I understand wanting to explore the energy of a in a fandom, you know, like, oh my god, Sirius and Remus, like in Harry Potter. I get why women were really interested in that 20 years ago. It's a little stranger to me to then take that to the original universe when you don't have that lived experience. I've I've always tried to figure it out, especially if you're not in that community, you don't know a lot of gay men, you don't know a lot about it. That's that's okay.

SPEAKER_00 48:24

I was about to say you would have to have someone you knew or at least a reader for you. Be I mean, because I've you know, I wrote hockey for my client, I never played hockey. True. And then the one hockey game, you know, well, maybe more than one, but I've written about a lot of things I don't know. You do you do your research, but whenever we're talking about people living lives that I would never have, whether it's in the LBGTQ community, whether it's a different race from me, whatever it is, you you have to do your due diligence so you don't offend even by accident um or slip into stereotypes.

SPEAKER_03 49:01

My point is not that they can't. I think that it's great to write for perspectives that are not your own. I think that's wonderful. I think that writers have to do that, right? You can't just write from your own experience. Right. What I'm asking really is more like, why is it so compelling? I think there are reasons why it's so compelling. I just want to get at them, I think, as my academic brain is like, why is this so interesting to women? I think it might be because an MM relationship feels to us that those of us who have been in relationships with men like a different kind of relationship with men than a like a kind of a compet relationship of a woman with a man, right?

SPEAKER_04 49:33

Like they don't come into it with expectations, right? Because there aren't these societal expectations that have been built into us from birth about how those relationships are supposed to function. So there's inherently just a lot more negotiation about the relationship itself. They are inherently more egalitarian just by again the nature of the relationship.

SPEAKER_01 49:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 49:54

And I think it there is that aspect to it, and that is a factor of escapism.

SPEAKER_03 49:59

But yeah, I agreed. Yeah. I I think that yeah, the idea of negotiating things out and not entering a relationship and being the woman from the beginning, I think is compelling to a lot of like cis women, not only to read it, but to write it. Which knowing the sexism in society, I can understand that. Yeah, I think that's where it'd come from. Yeah. But then, but also to like to guard those spaces against gay men is a thing I've also seen. And I think that that's also a problem.

SPEAKER_00 50:26

I I did see here's something. Was this in that video where these ladies, women, were having a watch party for heated rivalry? And uh I guess some of their gay men friends showed up and they kicked them out. It's ridiculous. Because it was supposed to be a safe place for women or something. And it just, I you know, I mean, whatever you need to feel safe. I don't want to, but it just felt sort of you were watching a show about you know, two gay men and your gay men friends were want to come watch it with you.

SPEAKER_04 50:57

And never felt unsafe with my because they're men. One thing I do want to go back to as a comment that you made was the issue of research, because I I am not I grew up in West Texas for some reason. We don't have ice, and that was not something that we had with hockey, but you research, and I think sometimes that is one of the most important things authors can do is go in and do the research that they need to do to make the world livable. Like there was um in goalie and the geek, there's a situation where I needed to have my goalie dress. I've not dressed in a hockey, you know, locker room putting all that stuff in. But you know what? There are now videos on YouTube with actual NHL players who walk you through how they dress. Yeah, that's awesome. This is awesome.

SPEAKER_03 51:47

I think a lot of a problem is if there's a lot of MM romance in a space, like in fandom, they will copy each other as their their research, right? If you read a lot of MM romance, that's your research, and it's not necessarily talking to gay men, having gay friends, asking them about sex, asking them about prep, asking them what they use, like none of that. You know, like if you don't know that and you don't know anybody to talk to and you don't do research that way, you're just reading other MM romance written by other straight women, you you might miss things.

SPEAKER_04 52:17

Well, I'm glad you mentioned the issue of prep because that is not necessarily one of those things that a lot of um I've seen a lot of the authors think about. Yeah. That is now I can guarantee you that's one of those first questions that people have. They want to know, you know, not only are are you on prep, but also are you on any any of the other drugs that are out there? Um now there's all kinds of different classifications that are helping. And you know, talking about the world of you know, people that actually have HIV and what that actually looks like in a modern context.

SPEAKER_03 52:48

Um, yeah, like not writing like it's 1992.

SPEAKER_04 52:51

Yes, right, yeah. Ryan White, this is not this is not that time period, unless you're doing a historic piece, which is kind of scary when you think that 1980s may be considered historic.

SPEAKER_00 53:04

Yeah, yeah, it was 40 years ago, so that's no, it wasn't, it was 29 years ago, Jenna. I had to tell you how old I am.

SPEAKER_04 53:18

And I had to admit last night, one of my students I was like, I've never seen SpongeBob. I'm like, and they're like, Did you not have a childhood? And I'm like, like, not when you did. I'm like, it came out in 1999. I was already in graduate school, so yeah, no, this is not something that you were in grad school in 99.

SPEAKER_03 53:38

Oh my god, I don't want to say how old I was in there.

SPEAKER_04 53:40

I graduated in 1994 from high school and then got my doctorate in 2002.

SPEAKER_03 53:46

So Jason, as some of you might know, wrote one of our my favorite stories from the first anthology, uh, Moonlight and Margaritas. Uh, and your story, Ship Happens, which is a gay enemies to lovers romance featuring a former bully exploring the theme of adolescent and internalized homophobia. It was one I really, really loved because I don't normally like enemies to lovers. And it was the first time I read an enemies to lovers and was like, I think I might actually like this. Um, because you know, it it explored the idea of them being enemies for reasons that were like really, I don't know, really personal to me. I given when I grew up and when I went to high school and and what we dealt with behind the orange curtain in Orange County, I I thought that that was really wonderful and revelatory. I want to know what was coming next in the world of Jason Wrench. Uh, and I'm always hoping to see a short story from you with us and another anthology since I love ship happens so much, no pressure.

SPEAKER_04 54:30

I'm definitely gonna do another one. I just I I know the last one you were doing was Faye, and I'm like, I yeah, I'm not a Faye person. I read some romantic, but it's not, you know. Again, I've done a couple shifters, but that's about the extent of what I've done there.

SPEAKER_00 54:45

But as for ship sports one coming next year, though.

SPEAKER_04 54:48

So perfect because I I have plenty of covers. Uh we have to come raid your cover supply.

SPEAKER_01 54:57

I know.

SPEAKER_04 54:59

But it was funny because you know, I I liked the idea of when the moonlight and margaritas. And I start going, okay, well, what is this gonna look like? And you start in your head, and I always it was fun for me because I start with a theme of the anthology and go, how does that fit? And for me, it was like, oh, where are people drinking lots of margaritas?

SPEAKER_03 55:19

Like I loved that the margarita was gross in yours. I loved working with that, like everyone else was like, all these wonderful margaritas, and yours was like, and it was like radioactive decay. It was so good, and it made him ill, and it was the thing that brought him to Leo. I loved that, like it propelled the plot.

SPEAKER_04 55:37

Thinking about things and turning them in new and unique ways. Um, but again, even for that, I watched a lot of cruise ship videos. I've been on cruises when I was younger, but it's been a long time, and they've they've changed just a little bit just since the last time I was on a cruise ship. Yeah, and so just watching people's stories, seeing, and again, there's YouTube videos, there's a whole YouTube video series. All it is is this guy who is a ship doctor, and he talks about what it's like to actually be a cruise ship doctor and what his day is like and the stuff that he sees. And so, again, that research component, you know, did help ground the characters and different things, and and then, of course, you know, so for so for the creating that one that was fun. And uh, I know I told Darry this at one point. So when I was avoiding writing, I did map out the entire ship.

SPEAKER_03 56:26

It's you, it's very obvious that you did, yeah. And I and I sympathize with this because I did a novella on a space cruise because this on the ring runner, and I had to map it out as well because I also did a murder mystery on it, and it's all the all the sh all the decks are named, and I noticed in yours that you had named all the decks, and I was like, Oh no, he he mapped it out.

SPEAKER_04 56:44

I always say I never run into writer's block, but writer's procrastination, I am very good at that. Yeah, I have one. It was a I was working on a cozy mystery, and I had the whole small town. I even have all the logos for each of the shops.

SPEAKER_00 56:58

Oh my god. Whoa, I think that would be fun. You could create a fandom thing, right? A little you could have a special thing that has the logos of the shops and a little, you know. I think JR Ward puts out a book that has information like about all the characters, and and you know, fans love that stuff out of the mind.

SPEAKER_04 57:21

Wait to put it in the back. Like this that series also has a resort, and so I I have the complete resort mapped out and where everything is.

SPEAKER_00 57:28

And because you're putting maps in your book, you really could write a romantic because there's nothing that sets fantasy apart, like having a map in the I do want to encourage you, Jason.

SPEAKER_03 57:42

Ship happens, it would make a very good novella to extend out the like the emotional journey, especially that like Leo is going on, and like you know, like the way he he needs to kind of say sorry and make up for what he's done. Like, I it would make a very good novella if you ever wanted to expand it out.

SPEAKER_04 57:58

I thought about actually expanding that out into a series, I just haven't because I mean there's so many, there's other characters that even I was seeing when I was writing it that I'm like, oh, that I could go with that one, I can go with that one, and because it's it's a cruise ship, there's lots of characters um inherently, and and and each week they get kind of like the love boat, you get a brand new set of things.

SPEAKER_03 58:20

Yes, yeah, do a whole cruise series. Yeah, I love the two of them. I thought that was really great. It was the first time I liked an enemies to love since pride and prejudice, so congratulations.

SPEAKER_04 58:30

But again, I also look at them, I don't you know what the tropes are, but I also am a big believer of if you have the tropes, figure out how you're gonna make them yours so that you're not just doing the same thing and realizing if you're using a trope, you want to fuel them with as much humanity as possible. And having that backstory and going, why are that? It's not like they just met the first time and I absolutely hate you. Let's fall in love.

SPEAKER_03 58:56

Just hated his stupid, handsome face and his amazing glistening chest and his beautiful eyes. I hated them so much.

SPEAKER_04 59:03

Oh, I jumped him.

SPEAKER_03 59:11

Yeah, that's a lot of romanticity right now, unfortunately. Not that not the entries we are getting. All the submissions for foes are wonderful. Not you, you're all wonderful. We love you.

SPEAKER_04 59:23

Just add some tentacles and you're good.

SPEAKER_03 59:26

It's all the yes, for me, yes, please add just space tentacles.

SPEAKER_00 59:31

That makes me think of what is the show, the boys?

SPEAKER_04 59:34

Yes, the on on Amazon.

SPEAKER_00 59:37

Yeah, yeah. I'm not gonna talk about that episode.

SPEAKER_01 59:40

I'll have to put an explicit note on the yes, but tentacles, you know.

SPEAKER_00 59:47

Yes, I was watching it with my mother. I she was watching it and I was with her, so she was, you know, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 59:56

There are those moments when you something comes on TV and you're with one of your parents, and you're like, I want to crawl into a hole right now. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:03

Oh, yes, yeah. You're like, please give me death.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:05

Right now, yeah, I gotta go to the restroom now. See you in a minute. Um, well, Jason, you're a communications professor, which makes this a perfect topic because we like to do hot takes around here, just our thoughts and attitudes or whatever about bookish things. Do you have a favorite and least favorite hot take?

SPEAKER_04 1:00:27

Yes, for me, hot take is always start with the characters. And one of the four things that drives me the most crazy, I should not be able to see your writing. If I see your writing, there's a problem because your writing is getting in the way of the actual story.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:41

Oh interesting. Oh boy.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:44

Because I'm a genre fiction person, and if if I'm seeing the writing, that's taking me out of the story, and that is a problem. I know that's that is a controversial hot take for a lot of people.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:57

Yeah, and and of course, the thing would be how would a writer recogn and how do you teach that? It's such it's one of those weird things. I can't teach it to you. I can't you spent but I when I see when I see it, I see it, right?

SPEAKER_04 1:01:10

Well, if you spent 30 minutes crafting that metaphor, probably probably too, yeah. 30 minutes crafting a metaphor, good god, time yeah. As for good hot takes, things to do, always start with your characters. You want to have the more realistic the characters are in your own head, the easier it's gonna be to write them and to make sure that you are able to distinguish them voice-wise. Yeah, it's when they're not distinct that you start fight again, going back to the dialogue. Sometimes people write and you're like, I should be able to see the character just in the dialogue and know which character is talking. There's sometimes you can't, that happens, just especially in a conversation, but they should be distinct enough that they again start to feel real.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:52

And if they're not, that that's something you have to think about is okay, what is preventing that character from being their own independent person?

SPEAKER_03 1:01:59

What about you, Jenna? What are your least favorite favorite hot takes?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:03

I was gonna mention that uh we were talking to somebody who said they wrote a slow burn. I don't like those.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:11

Slow burns are your your your hot take is that you don't like slow burns. Yeah, I like slow burns.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:19

I don't, I mean, at some point I'm like, come on, let's get to it. Jump his bones.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:25

What's really funny is having characters in there being sort of like, are you are you two fucking yet?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:31

What is going on here?

SPEAKER_03 1:02:33

Yeah, that was my friend Mark always says, they're fucking that blank.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:41

I have speaking of writing and particularly writing and adaptation, because I'm reading uh something now, is being able to recognize the the characters from the original. Um I'm reading The Other Bennett sister. I'm listening and reading The Other Bennett. So this is Jane Austen, Mary Bennett from Pride and Prejudice. Um, but I've read other adaptation, you know, stories of Pride and Prejudice, you know, from Darcy's view or after or the P. D. James murder at Pimberley or whatever, Death at Pimberly. That one in particular, I read it and I was like, I did not see Lizzie or Darcy in that book. And I I just sometimes I'm like, you know, maybe some of these things don't do if if or why are you doing it if they're not who we know? Uh now in the other Bennett sister, what is what I'm trying to keep my focus on is this is Mary and her experience. And I mean, Mrs. Bennett is mean. Like she's you know, not in in the book, she's sort of this silly, but but here she's sort of mean, and I'm sort of like, well, this is Mary's experience of her. She has a she has a situation with uh Lizzie um that is sort of mean. Uh and and I still feel like I still feel like I'm in that world, but sometimes I I'm having to say, okay, this is Mary's experience of it, not Lizzie. Lizzie, who could look at things with humor, right? Whereas Mary is very much, I mean, it's it's sort of sad. It's really, it's it's a more serious take on what is it like to be the middle child that everybody ignores or is embarrassed by. At one point, Mrs. Bennett is afraid that Mary will make it difficult for the other girls to get married. So that type of thing, you know. So I guess my hot take there is just when you do an adaptation, being able to recognize the people we've all come to know and love.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:51

Yeah, be true to those characters.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:52

Same if you know, if you read Heated Rivalry and you're you were watching it, do you recognize them on the screen? I I loved Red, White, and Royal Blue. I thought they captured the essence of that book really well when they made the movie. But I've seen some movies where I've persuasion is one of them with with Dakota Johnson. No, that was not Anne Elliott. So anyway, that's my take.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:19

No, my my least favorite hot take listen recently has been uh like pe what people think sci-fi romance is. Like I you know, sorry, it's not that it's not that, right? It's not that that's not a thing, and I'm I'm not gonna shove those people the corner. I'm not gonna say, no, I'm not like the furries, I'm not gonna say that, right? Like they are my brethren. We love the tentacle people. I'm just gonna say that that's not all sci-fi romance is, and it's not the essence of what sci-fi romance is. So, like seeing people be sort of like, ew, like it's like you the moment you say that you're right, sci-fi romance, like it's immediately tentacle erotica. That really bothers me, you know. It's like it'd be like saying all of romantic is just, you know, like is just for. Fairy fucking, and I think that that would be really rude to say that that's all that it is. It's obviously not now. It's not that it's not that. And like we've we appreciate the fairy fucking, but it's not all that it is.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:11

And it's not all it has.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:12

It could be dragon shifter.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:14

It could be so many things, right? It doesn't it doesn't even have to be like a monster or an alien, right? You know, like I have, as you know, Jenna, I've written sci-fi romance in Hawaii with two humans, right? That was like people immediately act like, oh, it's it's oh, it's in outer space. Like, that's not what sci-fi means, you know. Like sci-fi can take place on a planet, you know, it doesn't have to have any monsters or aliens in it whatsoever. It's it's science fiction. We're talking about technology's effects on society, we're talking about technology's effects on relationships. You know, we could be talking about, you know, like a like a gestator or something like that, or or or changes to DNA. You know, there are a lot of ways that a science fiction universe could affect a relationship and could affect the way people fall in love. That is science fiction romance. It it could be so many things, it doesn't have to be tentacles. So that's been my big, my, my big like hot take thing that's been annoying me.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:04

And my favorite science fiction having some of the same struggles that romantic fantasy, fantasy, romance, romantic. You know, we have all these different terms, and it's sort of like you know, some of it is high on romance, a little less on fantasy. So some fantasy readers feel like, What this isn't enough, or it's the opposite too much fantasy, not enough romance. And I could see sci-fi robot having the same thing. I was really expecting more, you know, science fiction type stuff, where others are like, I want more of the romance. And yeah, like there's an offer I really like a lot of words to write another world, right? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:42

It's an offer I really like on Instagram. She calls her stuff fantasy romance, Elizabeth Wheatley. And I don't blame her for saying that. I don't blame her for distancing herself from romanticy because I think there's an expectation in romanticy of a certain kind of story, and she's saying that I'm not that, I have more fantasy in mine, so mine's fantasy romance. And I don't blame her for carving out her niche like that. And I'm gonna and there, but there does seem to be a fight in romanticy and fantasy romance of how much fantasy should be in this. And I think that probably sci-fi will go through the same thing, right? It'll go through the same struggles.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:12

But you know, other things could go for you could write a hockey romance and hardly have a game. I've read mafia romance that hardly has any violence in it, right? Like, I mean, um, so you know, all genres sometimes can be light on the thing somebody is expecting and subgenre.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:29

Yeah, it just depends on how readers feel about it and how authors feel about it. I feel like if something sci-fi romance, it should deal with some sci-fi topics and not just use space as a setting, right? Like I think that it should deal with those topics. Um, I'm not gonna like be like that's not sci-fi romance at all, like if it uses the setting, but I might say, you know, like, well, it's not using sci-fi very well, you know, which is unfortunate. Uh my favorite hot take is I like seeing people just encourage writers to write instead of constantly imposing rules on them, you know. Like, even though I was a writing teacher, I I have gotten a little bit tired of writing rules, especially instituted by readers, but also by other writers. It feels like gatekeeping, you know. Don't write prologues, don't write epilogues, don't write description, write more description, right? You know, and like putting it out there on Instagram, like if you're not doing this, you need to buy my course, you know? And it's like, oh my God, just let people write. Like people have so many reasons for why they write what they write. Like, don't tell everybody they have to write in media res in the middle of the action, you know, like maybe they have a reason for having a slow opening, you know, just let them try, let them write it the way that they want to write it. Um, you know, and like if they ask you to beta read, of course, and you can give them some advice, go for it. But like putting it out on Instagram, just making people feel like they they suck the moment they try is terrible. And I I feel bad for a newer writer running into stuff like that who like already feel like they're terrible before they even get started. Because they're running into all these rules, like, oh, maybe I should get rid of my epilogue. Maybe I should not have maybe I should not have so much description, maybe I should just have dial. It's just I don't know, like leave people alone, let them write, you know, like enjoy a a panoplay of different kinds of writing styles and different kinds of stories and enjoy it so that everything isn't the same.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:03

When it's all said and done, write the story that you want to write. Sometimes that story will be commercially viable, sometimes it's not, and that's okay too.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:10

But yeah, it's still good for you to write, and it's you might still find some readers, it might not be a hundred thousand of them, but it might still find its readers, it might still be somebody's favorite story, even if it's just your sister. But you know, it's okay. Don't quit your day job necessarily, but but but right, you know, it's still really good for people.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:28

I don't know if this is a good example, but I know when Diana Galvadon started, decided she wanted to write, she determined she had to just write something she knew she would throw away. It was like her practice, her study, her how she was going to learn to write. Now, fortunately for her, it turned out to be outlander. But, you know, I mean that idea, the idea of I'm gonna write by I'm gonna learn how to write by writing. I'm gonna figure it out because there's so many things about writing that are what works for me and may not work for you. You may not be able to dictate, or you may only be able to dictate. You may write from the middle out, you may write at the end first, you might write out a order. You know, there's just but you have to find what works for you, and you only can figure that out by doing it.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:16

Yeah. I wrote a million words of what remains while I was home with a toddler, and it helped me work out a lot of pro a lot of things, you know. Like I was just at home with a toddler, like needing to have some kind of like psychological stimulation, something to get me out of just being here with a toddler all the time, you know. Uh, and I it helped me work through a lot of things grief over my father, loss, uh mental health things, you know, and I'm glad that I wrote it. I love it, you know, and I hope that it finds its readers. It might not be a hundred thousand people, it might only be 12 people. That's okay. I'm glad that I wrote it.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:46

It's another not good example, but that's how Nora Roberts started, right? She was snowed in, was about to throttle her children, and thought, maybe I'll write something.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:56

And so she wrote, yes, it was Irish.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:00

Definitely better than throttling your children.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:02

Better than throttling your children, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:04

Yeah, but losing your mind, you know. All right. Last thing we do around here is what we're reading and our recommendations. What are you reading, Jason?

SPEAKER_04 1:12:11

I am currently reading Plain Dirty, which is the Latin U book four by CE Ricci. That is what I've been currently. I've been going through. Big surprise, I've been going through a lot of hockey romance series. This is an entire hockey romance book that's not has nothing to do with hockey. Uh it's all baseball in this book. I have a cover for that. That will probably be if plan stays on track, that'll be coming out this summer. I'm getting my sports out of my system.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:46

There you go. I want your cover collection when you pass. Put me in your will.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:51

You need to do like an Olympic series because how many sports are there in Olympics?

SPEAKER_03 1:12:56

There is a lot of fucking at the Olympics, Jenna. There's a lot. They ran out of condoms. It's happening. This is a thing.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:02

I will write before I am done a curling romance. Yeah. On my list.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:08

That is the most Canadian thing I've ever heard of.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:11

Even talk to a graphic designer already.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:13

Oh my gosh. Will you do what you explain it to me? Because when we were watching this year, I was like, I do not understand how this game. I mean, I under, you know, we get the, but how the points are earned and and I was just I become a curling fan once every four years.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:30

Fair enough. Talking about ice skating.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:33

I think it has that feeling like all of us go, I think I could throw a rock.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:38

I know how to sweep.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:41

That looks a lot more complicated. It looks like out falling.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:46

Yeah. Like the momentum that they have, they have to maintain while they're like they're scrubbing really and like it's keeping them going, but also keeping them going back. And I like there's an obviously a very complex physics equation happening here.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:57

It's really how flexible the people when they're throwing the rot down the thing. They have to be a lot of things.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:02

Yeah, they have to get way down low. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:04

Yeah, there's a lot more to it.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:05

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:06

When are you reading, Jenna?

SPEAKER_00 1:14:08

Well, I'm still reading and listening at the same time to the other Bennett woman. I got slowed down a little bit because I'm I'm ready for it to come out. I'm eager to watch it. Uh, and I also read a novella that someone gave me for free when I was at Suffolk. It was a prequel to her series, and it was a woman's fiction. And I kind of enjoyed it, except for because it was a prequel to a woman whose husband left her and her uncle dies and leaves or something. So this whole thing is just watching her husband convince her they should move into a smaller home because the kids are gonna get ready to go to college, and she's just been an at-home mom, right? Doing her thing, and he he like gets her into this dump, and the care and the kids are there, and then he just leaves with the woman, and then like and then her uncle dies and leaves her, and then it's like over. And I was like, I I don't know if I like this as a book on its own. A bummer. It is badly.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:05

I like desperately want you to read Freedom by by Jonathan Franson just so we can complain about it together. Yeah, have you read it, Jason? Do you know what I'm talking about?

SPEAKER_04 1:15:14

But I love the idea. I want you to hate Ben.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:17

I do this all the time. I gave my friend white noise, and I was like, I need you to read this to suffer with me, please. Yeah. That's how I feel about freedom.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:26

What should be on the cover of that book forever?

SPEAKER_03 1:15:28

Read this with your friends to suffer together. Yeah. It'll trauma bond you.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:36

What are you reading, Tara?

SPEAKER_03 1:15:38

Well, you know, the things I've been looking forward to every week. I'm looking forward to, you know, I read Eva Leclerc's Shadow Shadow Betrayal. That's some fun. And I've been reading Parish's uh Ernest Semper, excuse me. Um, uh Case of the Engagement Party, Dardophane Mystery in Iphigenia World, which I really love. Um and I've also been reading his new novel, which is Lion of the Garden, which is like a I mean, you can call it sci-fi romance. It's very like Ice Planet Barbarians. It's got the clone Rattos in it, who's like gigantic, like seven feet tall and blue, and I'm loving it. If it if it doesn't become the next Ice Planet Barbarians there is, there is no justice in the world, and I will stick by that. I will defend that to the death. I'm really loving it. I highly recommend it. Do you follow Erna on uh Substack, Jason? No. Erna is one of your fellow authors in Moonlight and Margaritas. It's actually Parish Baker, but um just like this like really cool kind of like fantasy sci-fi world, like a planet that humans have gone to sort of on a decade ship and and have like established a life on and like of terraformed to some degree, and like their their their society has sort of like been almost kind of bombed itself back to the Stone Age, not like they haven't really bombed themselves, but they are very like they're a very sexist society, very controlled, very hierarchical society. Um, and he sort of writes about like love stories within that, you know, how people can find happiness within a lot of like all of these strict. And there are like clone servants and clone minors, uh called Lambdas. And in uh the Thessaly affair, his last novel, one of the Lambdas got free with the main party. I was so into this Lambda, I was so excited. I was like, Rattos, I love him. And then he like generated a picture of like what Rattos looked like just for fun and said it to me. And I and he was like, say it, say it. And I'm like, Well, that that is a romantic lead, sir. I I don't know what to tell you. I think you have to write a novel about him, and that's where we're at.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:31

Yeah, he he could be a hockey player. I mean, he's built buff pizza, but he's also blue.

SPEAKER_03 1:17:38

He would kill everyone, he's so huge. He he like bats lions out of the way with one hand. Like hook, only blue, right? Like I adore Rattos, he's the best.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:48

Kind of reminds me of the movie AI with Gigolo, was it Gigolo Joe or Gigolo Jam that Jude Law played? Yeah, like that. I'm I I'm not waiting for a clone. I am waiting for my happy butler robot, though.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:06

Yeah, yeah, that's a lot of the clones in in Erna's world. I mean, I follow Erna Semper on Substack if you if you have a Substack or something like that. Like it with Parish is publishing stuff every week that you can read for free, and it's all really good.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:18

Yeah, you know, in the JD Robb books, they have droid servants. Some people have droid servants and and those and they also have the auto chef, which is really what I want one of those. In my mind, it looks like a microwave, but it acts like a vending machine. Like you can just say, I want a burger, and a burger shows up.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:36

Oh, it's like the replicators from Star Trek.

SPEAKER_00 1:18:39

Yeah, yeah. Real gray hot. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:43

My favorite thing is actually in in fifth element when they have these like little sprinkles they put in this bowl, and it's like the the roast chicken sprinkles. They put them in the big bowl, they put the bowl in the microwave, and it just rehydrates them into a giant roast chicken. And and that Lilu goes and she goes, like, chicken, good, and like pulls the chicken out. I love that. It's he no one explains anything, it's just there, and it is hilarious. Thank you so much for being here with us, Jason. We really appreciate it. You're wonderful. We hope you'll join us again, not only on the podcast, but also in anthologies and you know, just tell us what you're you're working on and keep it updated. And as always, we are Tender and Tempting Tales. You're Tender and Tempting Tales on Substack. You can find us there. We've got great articles and of course podcast episodes every week. You can also find us on Instagram, that's Tender Tempting Tales on Instagram. You can find us on Facebook. We have the Tender and Tempting Tales reader group and author group. Become one of our authors. We are there. We have a call open right now that is Fantastical Foes. By the time this open, this by the time you hear this podcast, that will probably be closed and will probably be open for Starlit and Spellbound. That's our next anthology coming out in the fall. We want otherworldly stories of 10,000 words or less with three chili peppers. And of course, it's got to have a little bit of like a fall vibe, and it's got to have uh just a little bit of like an otherworldly era to it. You know, something like uh like time travel or nanites or magic, something supernatural, whatever really whatever sparks your imagination, do that. Uh, Jenna?

SPEAKER_00 1:20:04

Jason, I do want to thank you very much. I really enjoyed chatting with you today. It's been quite enjoyable. I second Tara that I hope that you will come back and write with us again too, because we love ship happens, and everybody needs to go get moonlight and margaritas. It's the perfect time. Summer's coming. You need to get a good margarita and enjoy ship happens. And until next time, uh just wishing you peace, love, and happily ever after.