First Cup of Coffee – July 1, 2026

 Why everyone should read CONSENT by Vanessa Springora about her affair with pedophile Gabriel Matzneff when he was 49 and she was 14. Also, how very much I loved The Devil Wears Prada 2, with observations on how the writing was done really well. And there may be a bit of a bookish opportunity embedded here! 

The Romancing the Vote Auction is live! You can bid on my items here: 

Writing Retreat in Santa Fe, NM
Signed hardback copy of Among the Thorns #1
Signed hardback copy of Among the Thorns #2
Signed hardback copy of Among the Thorns #3

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New Releases ~

Blades, Books, and the Bandit

Love, Lies, and Ley Lines

MAGIC REBORN

Never The Roses

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Among The Thorns

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Thank you for listening! You all take care. 

Transcript

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00:01.59
Jeffe Kennedy
Good morning everyone. This is Jeffe Kennedy. Also writing is Jennifer K Lambert, author of epic fantasy romance. I'm here with my first cup of coffee.

00:16.66
Jeffe Kennedy
Delicious. to- Today is Wednesday, July 1st. Uh, we're into the second half of 2026, which which Firehorse year and all but um, maybe it's a good thing that this year is going fast.

00:35.16
Jeffe Kennedy
It also means that we are officially into the month with the release of among the thorns. Um, that's super exciting isn't it and. I'm going to share with you all that I have a big stack of finished copies of among the thorns. It's not out for two weeks, but I have a big stack of them.

00:58.81
Jeffe Kennedy
So here it is. Look at this. Look at the beautiful foil cover, the gleam, the shine. It's got the beautiful. Oh, haven't even cracked the spine on this one yet.

01:13.34
Jeffe Kennedy
I forgot I hadn't even looked look there's a lily embossed case stamp. Um, it's a beautiful, beautiful addition.

01:25.69
Jeffe Kennedy
The map has grown from never the roses. Uh, So anyway, I did a giveaway in my newsletter, which some of you may or may not subscribe to and we got very low response on the newsletter amusingly enough.

01:46.42
Jeffe Kennedy
which actually I don't hold against anybody because i don't open any newsletters either I hate newsletters. Um, I'm happy to do it ah to keep people in the know apprised as it were but um.

02:01.56
Jeffe Kennedy
Yeah, ah, that many people answered on the newsletter so I thought well let's do that instead of Instagram this time. Well, um, No, no. So I'm doing an experiment with the podcast listeners.

02:17.56
Jeffe Kennedy
i don't know how many of you are out there wanting a copy, but Go ahead and I should have planned this out better. Um, ping me.

02:28.63
Jeffe Kennedy
ah ah Say that ping me with the word podcast. ah You or just I mean you could actual use an actual sentence but say I heard you're doing a giveaway on the podcast and I would love to win a copy. And assistant Karina is on vacation this week. So I am going to assimilate these and I'm going to choose winners by the end of the day on um, well, let's say the end of the weekend since it's um, Independence Day here in the us.

03:00.47
Jeffe Kennedy
Um, yeah, so. send me a message however via your medium of choice and say you would like to be entered into the podcast giveaway and win a signed copy of hardback among the thorns.

03:15.99
Jeffe Kennedy
I am curious to see ah what kind of response we get here. Um, just in case book tour information book launch will be at books on the busque on July 14th. Um, I plan to have some champagne and snacks there so that should be fun then tattered cover on July 16th and steamy lit in Miami on July seventeenth

03:46.04
Jeffe Kennedy
So if you're near any of those locations or want to be books on the Bosque and Albuquerque, of course, ah come on down. Other news, uh, the romancing the vote auction has gone live. It is of course to try to vote out our fascist government. So, um, that's what you'd be supporting, but I have several, auction items up. So if you would like to check that out, I will put the links in the show notes.

04:20.54
Jeffe Kennedy
Otherwise things are going just fine here. um oh I do get questions a lot on the deluxe edition of among the thorns.

04:31.13
Jeffe Kennedy
I should say that now because people are upset there are not sprayed edges on this one. Um, bramble says they're doing fewer sprayed edges. I know so going to like solid colors more apparently it's very expensive. It adds to the production time. There we are but um,

04:47.06
Jeffe Kennedy
I mean you're there for the story right? I know all you shelf collectors are out there. Ah, but there are going to be two special editions of among the thorns but neither I think has been officially announced yet. But yes, I mean I see some of you like commenting on social media and saying things like ah, you know blink twice if there's going to be an owl crate special edition.

05:13.11
Jeffe Kennedy
Ah, which is like I can't say on social media.

05:18.58
Jeffe Kennedy
Things are going generally fine here. I'm making good progress on never the roses 3. It is um the The new writing schedule is working pretty well. For those of you who are not familiar, I'm doing Mondays and Tuesdays, taking Wednesdays off to do business and yoga, and then Thursdays and Fridays working. And that worked really well last week. June was my highest word count month so far this year. So I've been building back up again. But also last week was my best word count week um all year.

05:58.01
Jeffe Kennedy
So that's great. Yesterday was kind of a difficult day for a couple of different reasons and I did not quite get my 2500 words. That's what I'm going for. I might pick them up this morning. I've got an online interview in 20 minutes but other than that. Um, yeah.

06:20.54
Jeffe Kennedy
Even though it's business day that's part of the reason why I have this extra day. So I'm hoping i can pick that up today. Ah, other things that I have been doing um what have I been doing? I did a lot of gardening which is nice. I caught up a lot of the gardening stuff.

06:46.10
Jeffe Kennedy
That's why I put the picture of the grape arbor on last week's podcast is I got um that fit for human habitation. ah And then on Sunday afternoon, I went to see devil wears Prada too, which okay folks.

07:03.96
Jeffe Kennedy
I adored it. I had such a great time watching this movie. Uh, it was um, went to the matinee on Saturday Sunday afternoon sorry and it was hot and windy and it seemed like a good time to go and the theater was packed. I think a lot of people were there to see Supergirl which I have not yet seen.

07:26.71
Jeffe Kennedy
But um, you know, devil wears Prada, the original has long been one of my comfort watches. It's one of my favorite movies. And so and I've watched it many, many, many times, but maybe more times than is healthy. I don't know.

07:43.37
Jeffe Kennedy
Uh, but I, I loved it. And the, uh, there was this brilliant combination of, um, Touchbacks to all of the bits. I loved all of the nods to the first one and being in on the joke because I think I caught like all of the Easter eggs.

08:07.42
Jeffe Kennedy
Because I am, of course, um, a true fan, but also it was so well written in that the characters were the same people. They didn't do this lazy writer thing where they make the writer be or make the writer, make the character be like somebody totally else doing a totally different thing.

08:27.70
Jeffe Kennedy
Um, but they, um had them be like the same people, but 20 years later. And believably so, like with, what did they say? A little more, little less tread on the tires, a little more road under the tires.

08:49.34
Jeffe Kennedy
um Excuse me.

08:53.75
Jeffe Kennedy
You could see how their character arcs had continued through, from the first movie to the second. And they could have, as many sequels do, simply recapitulated the first movie. And there were aspects of the arc that were very similar where you thought, oh, we're going to go down the same pattern of behavior again, right?

09:21.14
Jeffe Kennedy
Only. It wasn't because they've changed and things had changed and it was just really well done. It was a terrific study in how to do a sequel because it took the foundation of the first one celebrated it and built upon it and took the characters into new and interesting places.

09:46.71
Jeffe Kennedy
And it was very tightly plotted. it was all of the seeds were there in the beginning that came back around to um, the ending. so highly recommend I'm so glad I went to see it I kind of like was watching for it to come on streaming and then I was like just just go see it Jeffe.

10:06.78
Jeffe Kennedy
Ah I have been reading. I've actually been reading the Rex Stout Nero wolf books for reasons. Ah I've been reading the the novellas in four to go which is um sort of like classic Ah, noir detective stuff and it's interesting to read. It's a good departure.

10:28.63
Jeffe Kennedy
I also read consent by Vanessa Springora. And that was an excellent read.

10:39.13
Jeffe Kennedy
Um, she wrote about how when she was 14 years old, she had an affair with a 50 year old writer who was quite well known in Parisian literary circles. Um, her mother knew about the affair. Everybody knew about the affair because he wrote about it. He wrote books about Going to Thailand and hiring a bevy of 10 11 12 year old boys to celebrate desire with and he built this entire literary career on this idea of pure love with teenage girls.

11:19.45
Jeffe Kennedy
Of whom she was one. And it's. Especially in this era of looking at Epstein files and the complicity of all the people in the Epstein files. It makes it just really clear the excuses people wanted to make for her that, um,

11:39.38
Jeffe Kennedy
or for him really for the affair you know saying things like oh well that she just seemed unusually mature and it's like it's because these predatory types want young women and which is what it comes down to they just want to have young women um and she goes through all of the ways that he manipulated and molded her because when you're 14.

12:08.82
Jeffe Kennedy
you're so easily subject to that and that's why we have a real age of consent in France at the time the age of consent was 15 which is still.

12:21.56
Jeffe Kennedy
yeah very low but one of the things she talks about is how the very liberal French literary circles uh embraced him and embraced this idea as like part of the the free love movement you know and that people should be able to celebrate desire and you know long time listeners will know that I'm a very sex positive person and i absolutely um, a belief in in teenagers having sex lives because the hormones do turn on and we do want them and maybe this is going to be too much information for you all. But I mean I lost my virginity when I was 16 and I felt like I waited. i was very um,

13:09.26
Jeffe Kennedy
what good to go I I was very interested in having sex and my first experience was amazing and I lost my virginity to my 17 year old boyfriend which is why it's okay for people of the same ages to to have those experiences together if I had had that experience with a 50 year old man.

13:39.29
Jeffe Kennedy
It's just not the same you know and I I get that people complain that they don't. Ah, get like the whole power imbalance thing or that it doesn't matter or there's not really a power imbalance but there's just no way that an adult person can have a one on one relationship with a teenager.

14:01.56
Jeffe Kennedy
Ah, you are not partners. And they don't want to be i mean that's the thing is that these men unlike this guy. I should look up his name and call it out.

14:14.49
Jeffe Kennedy
So his name is ah Gabriel Matzneff. She is called him G in the book but apparently everybody knows that it's Gabriel Matzneff because he wrote about her. He wrote about her and called her V and everybody at the he like took her to parties and introduced her to people and everything because she was his little nubile teenage trophy right and that pumped up his ego.

14:39.23
Jeffe Kennedy
Uh, it's just, I, I really feel like this is something that, and I know that there have been plenty of women complicit in these things like her own mother was complicit. Um, you know, plenty of people, women who were complicit in, uh, all of the Epstein stuff, but also i do think that it's much more likely that,

15:01.59
Jeffe Kennedy
women are going to be the ones to step in and stop things. Um, there are men who will too, but I think that, uh, women have to be willing to step in and protect our younger selves, basically the younger versions of ourselves.

15:17.78
Jeffe Kennedy
And you know, it's, our minds are not finished yet. And I think I've, I've told the story, And maybe, maybe or not. When I was 22, I dated a guy who was 40. And I thought that I was very mature. And the thing is, it's like they do this. He always told me that I was very mature. Oh, so mature for 22 year old

15:42.55
Jeffe Kennedy
And looking back, I couldn't handle that relationship. um And he was manipulative. And I wouldn't go so far as to say emotionally abusive, but he there are things he said to me that stick with me to this day, um where he you know gave me grief about my weight. And he would come into my apartment and he would throw things away that he didn't approve of.

16:11.83
Jeffe Kennedy
Um, he didn't want to stay at my apartment. And this is an interesting thing because I've had this conversation with a lot of women and it was in this book by Vanessa springora. Um, they don't want to stay at your place. I mean, she was a different thing because she was technically lived with her mother. Right.

16:29.94
Jeffe Kennedy
it But, um, when you're in these kind of controlling relationships, they want to be in their environment. They want to be in their place. I don't want to come to yours. So anyway, it's an excellent book, highly recommend it. Um, I feel like everyone should read it. There's a movie that was made of it, a French movie. Um, and I haven't watched it yet, but so I don't know if it's good.

16:55.49
Jeffe Kennedy
Other than that, I don't know that I have all that much to say. I've been just head down writing this book. Uh, we have some old friends coming to visit tonight. That should be interesting.

17:06.68
Jeffe Kennedy
Um, Yeah, well, you all know how I get I think I said um, maybe I didn't say prog I started to and maybe stopped but progress on never the roses 3 is I talked about yesterday and what I did and didn't do but I did not mention that I am almost through the first act climax.

17:30.54
Jeffe Kennedy
woohoo I should hit that this week with any luck and I'm feeling good about it. Um, there are aspects that are kind of weird and strange but I'm enjoying that because that's how book one went and I I like that about it.

17:48.38
Jeffe Kennedy
Um, so and it's nice to know I've lots of time to write it and can reshape it later. So um, yeah, rather than babble about nothing I will sign off. I hope you all are doing well if you're in the US I hope that um you get to enjoy the independence day celebration. I know it's.

18:11.26
Jeffe Kennedy
very weird this year. It's weird and bittersweet. Um, and it's it's too bad because I do remember being 10 years old in 1976 and the um, the bicentennial celebration, the 200 years and how exciting it was, how much excitement and um, joy and celebration there was around that. And this year that's just really feels like it's missing.

18:40.98
Jeffe Kennedy
And it's really too bad. um But in the future, I hope. So I encourage you all to celebrate as you can.

18:52.79
Jeffe Kennedy
And I will talk to you all next week. You all take care. Bye bye.