First Cup of Coffee with Jeffe Kennedy
First Cup of Coffee with Jeffe Kennedy
First Cup of Coffee – June 1, 2026
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The (absolutely gorgeous) trade paperback edition of NEVER THE ROSES releases tomorrow!! Otherwise, I'm talking about friendships - working on them, forgiving what we can, drawing boundaries, and mulling the difficulty of having a relationship with someone who doesn't share your ethics about other people.
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Thank you for listening! You all take care.
00:01.46
Jeffe Kennedy
Good morning everyone. This is Jeffe Kennedy, author of Epic Fantasy Romance, also writing as Jennifer K. Lambert. I got it a little mixed up there, but I am here with my first cup of coffee.
00:16.92
Jeffe Kennedy
Delicious. Today is Monday, June 1st. Here we are. Welcome to June. I think this is funny. I posted a picture of this the other day, but I've got my Swiftie mug, which was a gift. I saw several people comment on my social media post because I did my found art with my little bit of lipstick mark on it, which I just think is great.
00:42.65
Jeffe Kennedy
Here I am with my Swiftie full of kisses.
00:48.79
Jeffe Kennedy
um But several people have the same thing. If you're not on video, it says Swift E. It's like a definition noun, a loyal super fan of the greatest American singer and songwriter of all time.
01:02.33
Jeffe Kennedy
Why do we specify American? I guess just to be nice, but Worldwide. but True Swifties unite. ah But yes, apparently someone said they had it on a makeup bag and the, I think not the kiss necessarily, but definitely the definition of Swiftie. Someone said they had two because apparently people think she's obsessed, ah which, you know, hey.
01:33.30
Jeffe Kennedy
But I love my Swiftie mug. Uh, I'm trying to think if I have all that much to say today. I don't know that I do because I have been kind of on hiatus. I did a lot of gardening this weekend and I have got all of my annuals out. And, uh, if you're on video, you could see that the Boston fern is in. It's a custom spot outside my window.
02:01.30
Jeffe Kennedy
It was beautiful, beautiful weather. Uh, on Saturday I went to, um, my yoga class, my favorite yoga class, and then met the delightful Megan Mulry for brunch afterwards, which ended up being lunch, uh,
02:23.06
Jeffe Kennedy
Megan I'm sorry but I have to tell them that that she was late and she felt terrible. I got there early because my class ostensibly ends at 10 15 but a lot of times we don't get out of there till 10 30 and sometimes it's later than that because you know what is time when you're doing yoga. Ah, although I noticed that my teacher is wearing a watch now so she might be trying to be better. Ah, but um.
02:50.58
Jeffe Kennedy
So I got to the the brunch place at 1040. We were supposed to meet at 11. And so, you know, that's fine. I had my Kindle and i sat there and I had my Dolce de Leche Latte, which is amazing and wonderful.
03:09.59
Jeffe Kennedy
And Megan is typically like slightly late. She's just one of those people that always run slightly late and we had already pushed off this meeting. We were going to get together on like Sunday and then we pushed it to Tuesday and then she had to push to Wednesday because someone came into town unexpectedly. And then on Wednesday, she called me with her assistant on speakerphone. Hi, Asya.
03:38.68
Jeffe Kennedy
And she was saying it turns out that she had to be somewhere at six, but it was somewhere near where I live. And could she meet me? And I'm like, you know what?
03:49.34
Jeffe Kennedy
Why don't we like make this be when you don't have to have a hard deadline? Um, how about later in the week? So we ended up Saturday brunch at 11 a.m. So 10 after 11 she's not there yet and that's unusual for her to be that much late.
04:08.09
Jeffe Kennedy
So I texted her and said, um, you didn't forget me, did you? And she texts back and she's like, oh my God, I'm the worst. Uh, she'd gotten caught up doing something, which is the kind of, that's what she does. She gets caught up doing things and she's like, oh, I'm on my way.
04:29.30
Jeffe Kennedy
Which of course she probably wasn't entirely on her way yet, but it was the theory. So she ended up getting there at like 11 35 and we sat there until easily 130 140 and it was delightful.
04:46.39
Jeffe Kennedy
And you know, and of course she apologized. She said she didn't want to brush that over, but also.
04:54.73
Jeffe Kennedy
It's something that I value about our friendship.
04:59.89
Jeffe Kennedy
That it is okay for us to keep pushing the date that we can um, be late and still forgive. and I've been i guess I'm always thinking about friendships does everybody think about them as much as I do I feel like I talk about them on here all the time and I'm often thinking about them. Um, maybe it's because in my Clifton strengths my number one strength is connectedness connectedness that's not easy to say.
05:32.89
Jeffe Kennedy
ah And so being connected to people is very important to me.
05:42.20
Jeffe Kennedy
So I think about friendships a lot and you know the waxing and waning of friendships.
05:52.38
Jeffe Kennedy
And it's been hard for a lot of us here in the U S in particular, uh, these, well, really since 2016, but then particularly since the 2024 election, uh, finding that we are the people that we otherwise love and are very connected and close to, um would actually vote for this regime or remain very connected to people who voted for this regime and it's you know there's a lot of political thought on this.
06:35.35
Jeffe Kennedy
So nobody needs mine, but it's been hard. It's been very difficult and I see people posting about having to go no contact with parents who just still believe everything that's on Fox News.
06:52.31
Jeffe Kennedy
you know And basically
06:56.28
Jeffe Kennedy
have through, well, yeah, like I said, I'm not going to go into this whole thing, but it's it's finding that you have a fundamental opposition in thinking and morality.
07:07.90
Jeffe Kennedy
to people that you otherwise cared about and were close to and it it sucks. It's really it's it's awful. Um, and when you know I complained about this but people in other parts of the world say you know like why aren't Americans doing more to you know fight trump and get him out of office.
07:35.51
Jeffe Kennedy
I was just seeing Jackson just came up on the portal. I was making sure he didn't have a ah freshly captured bit of prey. He got another pack rat and brought it in the house. It was like I walked out of the kitchen and there it is laying on the floor. And I i did. I screamed. I shrieked. It was like a baby shriek. But I was startled.
07:57.80
Jeffe Kennedy
It was an enormous dead pack rat. Totally on board with cats killing all the rodents they want to. the ah the gopher battle continues.
08:11.06
Jeffe Kennedy
Anyway, um, You know, I remember being in high school and learning about the Holocaust, learning about what the Germans did in World War II and um concentration camps and all of that stuff. And I remember with the passion of a teenager being...
08:38.46
Jeffe Kennedy
kind of you know I hope I didn't wish this on it's kind of wishing that I could have lived in those times because I would have stood up to fight. I would have been on the side side of people trying to stop the the horrible things that happened to queer people and to the Jews and to other people as well.
09:02.52
Jeffe Kennedy
Um, you know horrific horrific Um, treatment of people and yeah, and learning about what it meant to be a good German, what they called the good German in air quotes that they, uh, those were the people who looked away.
09:23.93
Jeffe Kennedy
who um, you know, lived near the concentration camps but said that they didn't know what the smoke from the ovens meant that they didn't know that people were being gassed and incinerated and buried in mass graves.
09:42.20
Jeffe Kennedy
And they were the people who looked the other way when their neighbors were dragged off.
09:49.27
Jeffe Kennedy
And it's a fascinating insight to human nature, right? you know, this is there are people who are always going to do that, who are always going to choose
10:02.42
Jeffe Kennedy
their own. It's not even just their lives. It's their own comfort and convenience over what over someone else over another person's life and livelihood.
10:19.19
Jeffe Kennedy
And we've been seeing that again, right? We've been seeing, you know, people, uh, saying, well, that they don't agree with. Rump. I've been seeing people call him that on social media or this regime, but you know, that they couldn't vote for a liberal or they couldn't vote for a woman or they couldn't vote for a black person.
10:44.34
Jeffe Kennedy
And i have. friends and family who are like well you know I'm a lifelong republican so I'm always going to vote republican.
10:56.50
Jeffe Kennedy
Even though I don't agree with everything and that's become so pointed and so difficult. Um. Anyway, I didn't mean to get into all of that, but it's like on what are our friendships based? Because knowing that someone is a good friend and someone that has been an important part of my life.
11:20.63
Jeffe Kennedy
will think things like that politics don't matter or that who's in office doesn't matter. um you know, does that make them the good German?
11:32.66
Jeffe Kennedy
i think it kind of does right because they are.
11:38.86
Jeffe Kennedy
Focusing on their own life and you know how who can can you be close to and care about people who um, don't have the same ethical foundation that you do.
11:52.95
Jeffe Kennedy
Um I don't know it's it's hard so you know being there for our friends and being connected with people but also um recognizing when people are there for you or not
12:13.50
Jeffe Kennedy
I have a friend that I had a um kind of a falling out with Um, and she is someone who is really important at a particular time in my life. Um, she hasn't been haven't been friends for a very long time just a few years couple of years but I appreciated her friendship. I enjoyed her friendship a whole lot and she repeatedly let me down.
12:41.27
Jeffe Kennedy
um she would cancel plans with me regularly. Uh, and she'd done it three times and I mean and this is not like late for lunch or can we push it off? This was you know like traveling plans um, meeting in other cities kinds of traveling plans and canceling on me at the last minute which you know.
13:03.48
Jeffe Kennedy
I put down kind of to flakiness, um, kind of to busyness, but also she left me in the lurch. And so, you know, we talk about this, like the boundaries, right? You know, the boundaries is the line that you draw.
13:17.78
Jeffe Kennedy
um and I said, you know, I think what we need to do is not make plans together anymore. And she said she could accept that, you know, that she didn't want to make it be that way, but she could accept it.
13:30.04
Jeffe Kennedy
And then, um you know After we decided that, I don't know, like five months, six months after that, when things were really going down for me, she made an offer of help.
13:46.14
Jeffe Kennedy
and And it's not easy for me to ask for help. I'm not good at that. um I think other people are better at it, but I think it's hard for all of us. But she made an offer of help, and I said,
14:00.06
Jeffe Kennedy
Yes. And she thought I didn't mean it. And we you know, it was this, and it was kind of the same miscommunication as before.
14:12.66
Jeffe Kennedy
And we kind of went back and forth over text, which is not great, but we went back and forth and later, you know, and I said, I was really hurt that I said, yes, please come help me. And,
14:26.39
Jeffe Kennedy
And you decided i didn't mean it. And she said oh well you know let's let's process this let's talk about it. And I said you know what I can't I because I was in this very bad place and I said I'm exhausted i can't do this. And she didn't really understand and was not listening.
14:44.95
Jeffe Kennedy
Um, which is the same thing. I don't know if she just like didn't really read the texts or what, but I said, um, I said, I can't do this right now. I simply cannot. I'm you emotionally exhausted. I am cannot. I'm empty. Cannot, uh, work out an emotional thing with you right now.
15:06.97
Jeffe Kennedy
And haven't talked to her since then. And I know that the onus is on me to reach out because i had said basically,
15:19.99
Jeffe Kennedy
I don't have bandwidth for this. Leave me alone. And to her credit, she has, she listened to that, but she has not reached out and I have not reached out. And talked to my therapist about this. Have I mentioned I'm in therapy now?
15:34.26
Jeffe Kennedy
ah Uh, and she's so her whole thing with me is whose feelings are you taking care of by doing this? Because I am someone who apparently like I want to fix things for everybody.
15:49.18
Jeffe Kennedy
And I'm always taking care of other people's feelings. Uh, probably this comes back to like the whole Holocaust and Nazi Germany and me not really understanding how someone else can not care about what's going on in other people's lives. Uh, it's hard for me too I'm I'm always going to care. I'm gradually accepting that it's not up to me to fix other people's feelings.
16:14.55
Jeffe Kennedy
Um, so my therapist asked, she said, well, whose feelings would you be taking care of by doing that? And it's like, well, hers, I guess. And even though I miss that connection and friendship, um,
16:31.32
Jeffe Kennedy
Yeah, so I still keep thinking about that though so I might I might reach out to her at some point because I I do miss that connection.
16:42.68
Jeffe Kennedy
um and I'm in a better place so much better
16:49.58
Jeffe Kennedy
Let's see. So um, yeah, it's interesting because Megan is kind of on the hiatus now too with the lit festival being done with. I've been on hiatus from writing, handling a lot of business. I've gotten a lot of things off my list. I'm cannot tell you all how happy I am about that.
17:09.26
Jeffe Kennedy
Uh, weights, you know, like the things that slide down your to do list and a crew gravitational weight. Um, I have managed to deal with so many of those things and there's a few things left, but I'm hoping to get those done this week. I'm going on writing retreat this week and um,
17:31.45
Jeffe Kennedy
Yeah, guess I just don't have a whole lot else to say. It's been a good break. I had a very low word count months in May. Uh, and then and also a big money. So, you know, it's like I'm coming to understand too that there is not a direct connection between how many words I write and how much money comes in, which is how I felt for a very long time.
17:56.15
Jeffe Kennedy
ah and that feels good too you know but I also have this huge backlist now so that really helps and a very successful front list. I'm very grateful for that um tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow paperback version trade paperback of never the roses is out in the world. yeah, go go buy it up. i couldn't afford that hardback price go get the trade paperback. It's it's a beautiful edition and slightly different I should show you.
18:30.30
Jeffe Kennedy
I think I showed you before but look how gorgeous it is with the foil. Oops hitting the wind chimes and also they put the case stamp on the inside covers.
18:43.50
Jeffe Kennedy
The it's a black background with a gold foil rose and it's got the maps and all kinds of beautiful things. So go ahead and get that for me get that for you.
18:59.86
Jeffe Kennedy
and I will talk to all on Friday you all take care bye bye.