Where I Left Off

Second Chance Romance with Author Olivia Dade

• Kristen Bahls • Season 2 • Episode 53

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Thanks to Avon, Harper Collins, and Olivia Dade for joining me to talk about her newest upcoming release, Second Chance Romance. This is book two in the Harlot's Bay series. 

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Books Mentioned in This Episode:



For links to the books discussed in this episode, click the link here to take you to the Google Doc to view the list.

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For more, follow along on Instagram @whereileftoffpod.

Speaker 1:

Welcome back. I'm Kristen Balls and you're listening to when I Left Off a bookish podcast, and today I'm joined by USA Today bestselling author, olivia Dade, who you probably know from the Spoiler Alert series, love Unscripted series. There's Something About Marysburg series Zomromcom, and today we're talking about the second book in the Harlotsed series. There's Something About Marysburg series, zomromcom, and today we're talking about the second book in the Harlots Bay series, second Chance Romance. Thank you so much for coming on today, olivia.

Speaker 2:

Well, thank you so much for chatting with me, Kristen. I'm really excited to sort of talk through the book and just chat.

Speaker 1:

Yes, and this was a really really good book, so I cannot wait to talk to you about it.

Speaker 2:

I loved revisiting the character of Carl. He was definitely someone who sort of sprang to life in a way that I didn't necessarily anticipate in the first book in At First Spite in the Harlot Space series and I know for my readers he's definitely a reader favorite from the first book. So I was very happy to focus on him this go round.

Speaker 1:

So when you were writing At First Spite and you had Carl listening to the audiobooks, did you know at that point that he was going to be in the second book, or did that come later?

Speaker 2:

I thought that at some point I would be interested in telling his story. But I was not committed to telling his story as the second book. But you know, the same thing happened in the spoiler alert series is that Marcus's best friend in the first book spoiler alert Alex Woodrow. I knew he was gonna have a best friend and I kind of knew, plot wise what was going to happen. But his personality was so vibrant to me Some personalities you sort of have to build on the page and some of them sort of spring fully formed, like Athena from Zoot's Head. He kind of arrived on the page and sort of elbowed all the other secondary characters aside, and so I was like, well, I guess I would really love to tell his story as the second book and luckily my publisher agreed.

Speaker 2:

Something somewhat similar happened with this one, where I deliberately set it up so that the whole idea that he was listening I knew that he was listening to the narrator of the audiobooks, that he was less concerned about the actual books, although I think he's reluctantly into them at this point if only so he can, you know, argue with people about them and debate, debate about them with the nasty wenches book club. But I knew that he would be really listening to them for the narrator, but I just wasn't sure when that story would be told. But again, his sort of cantankerousness made him very fun to write and it made him, I think, I found I think readers found him very endearing and so, and so that's that's sort of what caused me to write his book.

Speaker 1:

Second, you may not be able to say yet, but do you know whose book is going to be third, and is that your current work in progress?

Speaker 2:

It is not my current work in progress. My guess is that the third book would be Molly's best friend, lise. You sort of see that there's something happening in the background where she has a bet and she wins that bet and you know that she is hooked up with someone and she's sort of very squirrely about it. I want to give a lot of details, squirrely about it. I want to give a lot of details and that's frankly so that I don't hem myself in. It's me a lot of room where I can serve to decide how I want her story to go. So I know that it's is happening in the background, but I have not served worked out exactly what that story will be and I want to give myself a lot of room to play. So that's what I did.

Speaker 2:

And that'll be really interesting with her alter ego and slash job, yes, with Sadie, with her being Sadie Raisin, the famous the famous erotic romance author. And also, at some point, it would be fun to write the stories of the dueling sex shop owners.

Speaker 1:

When I read that, I have a feeling that that's going to come back down.

Speaker 2:

I just love the thought of a town that is canonically so horny that they can support a small town.

Speaker 1:

They can support two sex shops, and of course Molly has to point that out.

Speaker 2:

Exactly exactly.

Speaker 1:

Oh my gosh, I love that. That. Okay, I I'm really excited. I'm also very excited for when the nasty wenches book club realizes that she's sadie. And then they're like wait a minute, are you kidding me?

Speaker 2:

we've been reading your books like half of this time the entire town of harlots bay has been listening to these books through athena's window. So she, uh, she is very much. Whether she knows it or not, it's sort of a town mascot local celebrity.

Speaker 1:

They never knew they had exactly exactly. So what are you actually currently reading? Authors always have the best recommendation, so I have to ask.

Speaker 2:

I am a fan of Kelly Armstrong. She writes all sorts of different stories like she wrote. She did write a rom-com recently. She writes horror. She wrote a really fascinating series called the Rockton series, which was a kind of mystery suspense thriller with a romantic sub arc. And then she has a more recent series that is set in Victorian Scotland and it's a time slip where it's called actually Rip Through Time series where a woman goes back in time to victorian she's a actually police detective in canada, modern, goes back in time to victorian scotland and sort of ends up in the body of a maid for this uh sort of unconventional household at the time. And there are, you know, mysteries and murders and, like again, a very slow burn romance occurring with gray who is ostensibly her employer but really is she's helping him solve mysteries and it is aggro and and it's.

Speaker 2:

I love the books. I am going to shake the characters. I just want to make them kiss. They need to kiss and there was near miss kisses and I was like I swear to goodness, like, if you don't like, smash them together. I will be writing in a grieved email if the if the uh romantic arc doesn't at least somewhat resolve soon. But I do really enjoy those books.

Speaker 1:

I know I always have to remind myself whenever I'm reading something that's maybe a little bit more mystery or thriller or some other genre. They may not get together and it's fine, but hopefully they do.

Speaker 2:

As a sign of how much I really do enjoy her writing. I actually, I will be honest, really do enjoy her writing. I actually, I will be honest, there are mysteries that I kind of flip quickly past the mystery part to get to the romantic part, because I am a romance reader and author at heart. But I enjoy her writing so much, and the mysteries, the way she sets them up so much, that I actually even read the mystery part too, which is a true compliment for me. Because if the care, if the love interest is not on the page, if they're not on the page together often enough, I sometimes get a little antsy because I am born and bred like romance readers.

Speaker 1:

So yeah, how do you find your book recs?

Speaker 2:

You know a lot of it. You know used to be twitter, uh, but I'm not on twitter anymore and so blue sky, uh, some of it is. You know I read. I have a lot of writer friends now, since I've been doing this for, you know, 11 years, and so I read a lot of their books and I actually, when I chat with my writer friends, I ask well, what have you been reading? Have you liked it? So we, yeah, we give each other recommendations. I have recommended kelly armstrong to people before. She has a series that is like a female assassin, which I love. Now I think it's like nadia okay, like nadia something, anyway, but I love like. That series was great. Uncommunicative men are like her strong suit. She's really good that series in particular because the love, the slow burn, love interest, is also an assassin, but she does like she writes the gamut and I really admire that.

Speaker 1:

So, yeah, we recommend books to each other all the time so okay, I actually thought of a book rec that I think you would like. Okay, tell me tell me the most wonderful crime of the year by ellie carter. I don't know if you.

Speaker 2:

Oh, I've heard that those series like that her, you know the spy series and that were fantastic, so the one that's wonderful. Okay, yes, all right, it's going on. My list.

Speaker 1:

It's like a knives out holiday rom-com. But he constantly is driving her insane and he'll just say like want to make out all the time whenever she's so annoyed. It's amazing, it's so bad, it is the best. It's really funny.

Speaker 2:

That does sound hilarious. I will definitely have to read that. Thank you for the recommendation.

Speaker 1:

Oh, but just know that the first half seems like it's mainly mystery. But then there's a plot twist in the middle and you know why it's a romance novel. So hang in there.

Speaker 2:

Past the mystery part and then it'll get really it'll get way more into the romance. I will be patient, I promise, I feel like I have to preface that.

Speaker 1:

So I was going to ask like, what does a typical writing day look like? Um, especially since you have so many books coming out? You just released Zomromcom and now you also have Second Chance Romance, so it seems like your publishing schedule is really intense you know, there was a longer gap than normal between my my previous book that came out before Zomromcom.

Speaker 2:

At first spite there was, you know, usually my books were coming out once a year. That one was more like a year and almost a half. So I think you know, basically it's so. Then these got sort of like sort of near each other. Um, in part because some rom-com I think could have been published earlier, but because it, you know, had a, I think they wanted to do it somewhere in the basic vicinity of Halloween because of the sort of the zombie horror aspect and so putting it out something like March or something didn't really make a lot of sense. So they, they held on to it to August, which I, which I appreciate.

Speaker 2:

So a typical writing day for me, uh, I tend to some writers are very uh, healthy, like smart, very schedule driven people like who can write like I write every day from 10 to 4, and you know. And then take sundays. Yeah, I, I am very much feast or famine, so, like when I am writing I need to stay immersed in my character's headspace and in the story, and it's very hard for me to do that if I'm taking more than about a day off at a time. So I will sort of work relatively long days and I'll work most days of the week, maybe just take a day off, you know, during a week until it's done. You know, every time I pause for longer than about a day, I have to go back and basically reread what I've done before and try to reenter the headspace. It's just the way my brain seems to work. It works better to sort of do it sort of all in a big flood and then I take, you know, take time off, just entirely off. You know other than emails, and you know administrative stuff I need to do. I might not write something again for two or three months. So basically because I'm exhausted at the end and to sort of refill refill the well is what they call it.

Speaker 2:

You know, writing is generative work. It's creative, generative work and there has to be a wellspring within you from which that comes, the energy that you need but also the sort of creative impulse, and that just takes a little while for me to sort of read, for that to reemerge so that I can write the next book. And these days I try to for at least an hour or two per writing day, but it doesn't always happen, is I often either Zoom or have a Teams call with one of my writer friends and we do. They're not sprints because we're not trying to go fast, but just like do work blocks with them to keep each other company. It's really, you know, writing can be very isolating other company. It's really, you know, writing can be very isolating and it's really lovely to feel like you have company, even if most of the time you're just see the person's face off to the side and you're both muted. But then you check in every half hour or 45 minutes or hour and say how did it?

Speaker 2:

go like you know, I'm really struggling with this scene, or like I, I have this joke. I think it's really funny and it it really helps me and it's really joyful for me to check in with friends, and I started doing that this past couple of years and it really has transformed how big an amount of joy I have. In writing.

Speaker 1:

That makes sense. I'm remote and I do the same thing with my coworkers. We all sit on a Teams call and we just work and chat together and it really does help a lot and it keeps you focused. I feel like I can focus more when I know that someone's sitting right there too.

Speaker 2:

I mean there are times certainly it helps with motivation and that if I were just by myself I could manage to fritter away the entire morning on YouTube like some YouTube rabbit hole. But if I'm there with a friend and they're like diligently working away, I feel kind of bad about watching like a carpet get cleaned on YouTube. I have to. I was like I gotta do something. Fine, how did you find your writing group? My first writing friend I made, close writing friend I made was actually Mia Sosa.

Speaker 2:

Back in 20, I guess, 2014,. We were. We started out actually as critique partners before either one of us had agents, before either one of us had published a book. We met on the Romance Writers of America sort of message board. She was looking for a critique partner and someone else had actually snatched her up. But I wrote anyway and said if things fall through, then you know, please let me know. And it turns out they did. So I snatched her up and we became critique partners and then I even though it was a bit of a drive for me at the time at the time I lived in Hagerstown, maryland, so I went to like the Baltimore romance writers and the Washington romance writers things, but each of those was a pretty long haul for me.

Speaker 2:

So I met some people lovely people through that, but mostly online. Mostly Twitter was where I met most of my dear friends. Particularly sort of the period in the mid 20 teens mid to late 20 teens is where really I met. I met most of the people who, other than my direct family like that I love in my life, all came, came through there. So I'm very grateful to that time period because it brought me so many people that I love in my life.

Speaker 1:

It's amazing. I'm glad that you could find them through Twitter. I've heard a lot of similar stories from earlier Twitter. Of course, things change.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I mean, it was a very Twitter was at the time. You know, it was very much a book focused community, hilarious, like, just hilarious people, and just lots of conversation about books and about writing and um, yeah, it was really, it was really lovely, I don't know that. Briefly it felt like blue sky maybe could become that, and then the election happened and then after that it's and I'm still on blue sky and I enjoyed and there is bookish discussion and I need to make sure that I am more a part of that bookish discussion. But I think politics has sort of the urgency of the politics has sort of overwhelmed the timeline to a certain extent. So it's not not quite the same replacement and I, and from what I've heard from friends, it's not quite the same on threads either. It's because of the algorithm, some algorithm stuff with threads. So hopefully someday there will be, uh, one, one social media site to rule them all once again it'll be amazing.

Speaker 1:

I found my little corner of bookstagram, but it is definitely a a search, it's. It's not like you can just go on bookstagram and yeah it's. Yeah, it's a little bit more of a search. And then, of course, half the stuff happens in dms or like little group chats there, so it's not as if it's not like threads or blue sky where other people can see you know, right session too.

Speaker 1:

So, yeah, yeah, social media site will just come in, like you said, and just make it, make it fun again. It's, it's nice, whatever it's fun yeah talking a little bit more about second chance romance. Can you tell me about your process in creating the town of harlots bay? So I happen to know kind of a general like harlot-esque theme from the fighting bluesies, mascot and doxy, diner and some of the other really fun town establishments. So what kind of led you that direction?

Speaker 2:

I just thought it would be super fun to create a town that was sort of born out of like in this case, you know, 17th century, like runaway women, like proto-feminists, and that became sort of the town's identity. They became a place where especially women, but also men, non-binary people who had burned down their lives in some fashion come and sort of were able to sort of rebuild their lives in a supportive community. And I just was really amused by the thought that, you know, if it was called Harlots Bay was meant to be a pejorative but the people in the town embraced it, then they would sort of I really like the idea of reclaiming gendered insults. So you have, like the town motto is in bitches we trust and like and all of that I try to make, so like trumpet square, like basically have the town be a joyful reclamation of gendered insults, you know, in a way that is sex positive and you know positive toward like strong women. So so that was really a joy and I, because my background isn't my academic background, is in history I have this like lengthy explanation of like the history of the town, a lot of which was in at first spite, and then I realized no one cares, but you, olivia, I have to take it out.

Speaker 2:

But I've got stuff in there like what happened during the french and indian war in the town. You will never know, but I know because, again, no one cares but me. But I, I did. I had a lot more nerdy explanations for things like the local shipyard economy, uh, anyway, back in the colonial period, but then I was like no one.

Speaker 1:

They just want the romance, olivia, just forget it well, so I know that you were a history teacher. How long did you teach um? And I noticed that Athena was a burnt out teacher. So I became a high school teacher and I taught for until I moved to be with my husband in Maryland.

Speaker 2:

I taught for three years and it was really one of the greatest joys of my life. I still think about, I say, those kids. I in my mind I'm like, I still think about those kids and they were only 10 years younger than me, so like they're in their late 30s now. They're not kids, but they were and I still think about them. I still think about a lot of them, a lot because I really adored them.

Speaker 2:

Some of them I had for two years in world history and then US history and but I was working like Athena, 70 to 80 hours a week and I didn't know how to much like Athena that came. A lot of that came from my personal experience. I didn't know how to half ass it Like I didn't know how to make the workload manageable in a way that I would still feel good about what I was giving to the kids in my class the attention they needed, the time they needed, like the grading, like attention to grading. I knew I was going to be getting a new prep and I was like I and I was going to be starting over in a new state. I would need to be licensed to that new state. I would be starting at the bottom of another school where I probably would not have the classes that I was best suited to teach.

Speaker 2:

I was like, do I have it in me, as much as I love these kids and I do and enjoy teaching, do I have it in me to start all over at a new school with preps that are probably not what I most want to do, and work 70, 80 hours a week when I have a new husband and we plan to have a child soon, like, and I just decided this doesn't make sense. It didn't so so I did leave. But my mom was a lifelong teacher, elementary school teacher. My aunt was a lifelong middle school teacher and my years teaching high school as much as I, they were brief, like they really. They meant a lot to me and continue to do so. So Athena's background and sort of her feelings about teaching were very much based on my own that makes sense um.

Speaker 1:

I'm a former audio video production teacher at high school, so I totally get what you mean adding another prep and just all, all the things that just get stacked on top of each other.

Speaker 2:

Right, it's, you know and I was teaching at the time of the beginning of no Child Left Behind, so there was a lot of new paperwork and a lot of new tests and a very much a focus on sort of teaching to tests rather than sort of whatever happened to be on the test. That was what you had to focus on, maybe not as without being as responsive to what the kids in your specific class actually found interesting, and it was. You know, I think things have only gotten more difficult for teachers since then. I don't think I would fare well in like modern schools, like the schools today.

Speaker 1:

So my hat's off to teachers who were making it work even now were you writing at the time of teaching like a little bit here and there, or had you not started yet?

Speaker 2:

it took every ounce of my energy to teach. I mean, there was no the mental load is just out of this world yeah, yeah, I mean I was teaching history and you know my last couple of years I was teaching AP history, so like a lot of writing too, and then the preps. You know my first year of teaching I probably got like four or five hours of sleep a night for most of the year because I was just constantly running behind.

Speaker 2:

I mean I remember this kid in one of my world history classes asking me like are we going to we're talking about, I think maybe the transatlantic slave trade? And he was like Are we going to talk about Eastern Africa at some point? And I was like that's an excellent question. It all depends on the timing. And the simple answer is I didn't know further than a week ahead. I mean, I was doing, working as hard as I could, like I just couldn't get any further ahead than that, so like I had no answer for it because I didn't know. So no, there was no. By the time I left, I think, I was like severely burned out because, as much as I love the kids, it was just so much. It was so much I did not start writing until 2014. So that was after I had done a lot of other sort of part-time usually jobs and then I was working at a public as a public librarian, for I'd been working there for about five years when I started writing.

Speaker 1:

That makes sense. Funny enough, I actually saw At First Bite in my library the other day.

Speaker 2:

I love librarians. I believe so strongly in their role, not just as like purveyors of literature, but also for the community they do. Libraries are so central, you know, as a meeting place in the community, as a resource of not just books and movies and audiobooks, but often like tools or creative things, and they're a place that often teaches community members like helps me members with, like job applications. It's internet access. It's a place to go when it's incredibly hot or incredibly cold and people need to stay alive. I mean fundamentally like unhoused people, but also people who may not be able to afford heat or air conditioning. Like it's there's so central to the community. I have great admiration for librarians and I honestly believe a good chunk of the reason I have a career is because of librarians. Librarians, and I honestly believe a good chunk of the reason I have a career is because of librarians.

Speaker 1:

They have been so good to me and my book, so that makes me very happy that it was in the library oh yeah, you, you are always stocked at our library thing and, like you said, it is kind of one of the last free third spaces for the community to be able to gather in one spot.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I mean, sometimes the things that happen there were even back, you know, when I was 10 years ago. I was sort of like there's one person who would like paint, I'm like just don't, just, please, don't get paint over everything. But like, yeah, it's a safe, you know, generally somewhat mostly quiet space that is, you know, a shelter that is a good temperature and and has resources for the community, like they do such crucial work agreed.

Speaker 1:

If carl and molly were having a movie night, what would be their go-to?

Speaker 2:

carl would probably have Molly choose, because whatever she chose, his great joy would be like bitching about it. Then his joy would come like basically bitching about whatever she chose. So that I mean otherwise, you know, because they're meant to be a little bit older, maybe they experienced a little bit of mystery, science, theater 3000, is um, I don't know if you know the premise, but it's these like b movies that were not great and then they had people sort of you see their silhouettes at the front of the theater there's a whole backstory but that are sort of making fun of the movie as it goes on like and it's, the jokes range from the most basic jokes to like super esoteric, like jokes about literature and movies, and I just I loved it and it would also suit their sensibilities. Like one of the the things was real pleasure for me writing the book was that in some ways it is a bit of a grumpy, grumpy book.

Speaker 2:

Carl is cantankerous, he is definitely grumpy. She Carl is cantankerous, he is definitely grumpy. She Molly is not cantankerous, but she is a little cynical. So like I could see them like sitting there and taking a lot of joy sitting in front of a terrible movie and like talking about how terrible that movie is and dissecting the ways in which it is terrible. So I think that would be a source of a source of joy for them.

Speaker 1:

I agree, and there are also these videos on Instagram where a wife will show her husband like for the first time, like she's the man or you know, a really kind of and uh, he'll make commentary on it the whole time and I could definitely see Carl doing that. He could fit right in. Yes.

Speaker 2:

Agreed.

Speaker 1:

Okay, so Carl and Molly are carrying a lot of past trauma, as we all do. What draws you to writing characters that they just feel like they have really high stakes to overcome, especially after that prologue where you see how many kind of like missed chances they had Right.

Speaker 2:

You know, I think to talk about more broadly for a second is that I think different sub-genres within romance have different primary challenges. Like, I think, historical romance, one of the primary challenges is actually researching the history, you know, like making sure. I mean, there are wallpaper historicals where it's sort of historical in a very modern way but sort of, you know, learning the essentials of the history of the time. And then you have things like paranormal romance or sci-fi romance where a lot of it is the world building. Right, that's the fundamental challenge, I think in contemporary romance. You know, the world building. If you're in the world as we understand it, that is less of a challenge. You don't have to learn the history.

Speaker 2:

But in today's sort of modern landscape, if two people are into each other, generally there's not a lot keeping them apart. You know, like if two people are into each other and they're both available, there's not a lot. There are a lot of reasons people don't end up together in reality, but most of those reasons would really frustrate readers, you know. And so I think you have to sort of figure well, why wouldn't these people be together? Sort of figure well, why wouldn't these people be together? And so in the case of Carl and Molly, then I mean you have issues of maybe just timing and I mean I had high school crushes that in retrospect I suspect that crush was returned, but neither one of us said anything. And it's not that we were. I mean, it's just your kids, right, and you're not thinking you don't recognize when someone else is into you. But in the case of you know Carl, I sort of envisioned him as someone who has like major communication issues, not because he doesn't feel things, but because he always felt things too intensely and didn't want to get made fun of for it and so just sort of keeps it to himself.

Speaker 2:

And then for Molly, she's someone who's moved around so much that it's hard for her to sort of make ties because she's always having to uproot them. So like what's the point If you're just going to move again in three months? Why get attached to people? And then, now that she's going to stay, she's just unpracticed in forming those ties and then by the time they re-meet 20 years in the future. She has also had like some very fundamental betrayals in her life. The two men in her life that she has trusted the most and loved the most of both, in different ways. She's been punished for trusting those men, so that you know her sort of natural instinct to distance and the way she's been trained to keep a distance has only been reinforced by that.

Speaker 2:

And then Carl again, you know, has, basically he's never really fully learned to sort of communicate like effectively, one thing that made him you know that I had to sort of grow into and I know that it's probably irritating for some readers his sort of way, distinctive way of speaking and thinking, like that he's not going to think in sort of long drawn out sentences, he's going to avoid using pronouns and that he he's gonna speak and think in a different sort of way than molly's going to, because he's just not a natural born communicator or someone who words is not how he shows. How shows caring. It is through actions that he shows caring. Often his words are directly opposed to his actions, where he's telling you he doesn't care about something or someone and he's going out of his way to assist that person because he does care.

Speaker 1:

but he, the more loudly he protests, the more he cares and I think molly at some point even says like carl never met. A sentence fragment I didn't like, like, yep, right, that's carl in a nutshell.

Speaker 2:

Yes, but I mean, I think we all have sort of trauma in our past one way or another. If you, if people who don't like, I'm very happy for them, but most of us at some point or another. And and again, you gotta, at some point in contemporary romance, you've got to explain why these people can't be together unless they're enemies or rivals or representatives of different mafia families. All of which could be true, all of which could be true. But if they are sort of more normal, like representative, standard representatives of people today, like why wouldn't these people be like I'm into you, are you into me? Yeah, yeah, I am. And then they, and then they hook up and live happily ever after. You'd have like well, that was a nice pamphlet. You gotta have a book.

Speaker 1:

That's very true. What aspects of Carl and Molly's personalities make them the most fun or challenging to write?

Speaker 2:

Carl. I was sort of figuring out his cadence of his speech for me, like. So that one thing that my editor told me when I wrote alex woodrow, the second book in the spoiler alert series. She said that often when there's a side character who's very vivid, like has a really large personality, when they get their own book in a series, that personality becomes like muted, that they are essentially like standardized to like standard hero or standard female main character, that like the things that made them so unique sort of get toned down and she's like.

Speaker 2:

But that's not the reason people love them is because of that. But it is challenging then to write a big personality. So one of my sort of big challenges to myself in writing All the Feels was not to tone down Alex, and one of my challenges with writing Second Chance Romance was not to tone down Carl, and so I tried to sort of you know his even in his thoughts and in his speech, make sure that he is the person that he is in book one, and so that was a little bit of a challenge. I think if you read one page and either their points of view, either carl or molly, I think you will know within a sentence or two who it is, even if it weren't labeled, because you can tell just from the way that they phrase things who it is, and that was part of my goal is not to have generic characters, for their personality to come through, even in descriptions or in their thoughts.

Speaker 1:

True and that was a really good point. Whenever you said that, I was like, oh my gosh, that is so true, that is so true.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I mean, I think the challenge is really having two uncommunicative in various ways two uncommunicative characters, making sure that the reader hopefully cares about them and can understand why they would be hesitant to just lay their heart on the table and be like. This is how I feel. Do you feel the same way that you would understand why that is not that easy for them?

Speaker 1:

So whenever you were crafting them and trying to make sure that they had different voices, did you do a lot of prep work before to make sure, or did you like while you were writing, you were just really cognizant of like OK, this is Carl. This is how he's going to think. This is how he's going to talk. This is Molly. This is how she's going to think. This is how she's going to talk.

Speaker 2:

this is Molly, this is how she's going to think, this is how she's going to talk. I would say it's the first scene from his POV. It's the one that I had to work hardest on just to establish where I you know, because if I wrote it the way I wrote Molly's, it wouldn't make sense for his character. It just it would be like who is this? It doesn't sound like Carl, and so, you know, usually it'll take me a little bit longer to write the first POV scene, unless it's very clear in my mind. This is what they they sound like, because Alex again, in all the fields, very clear what he sounded like, for whatever reason, from the beginning.

Speaker 2:

But you know, carl, because it was so different from how I usually write, because I love compound sentences, man, I love adverbs, I love adject write. Because I love compound sentences, man, I love adverbs, I love adjectives, I love compound sentences noticed in the best way. Yes, I love pronouns. Like you know, took me a day or two to sort of figure out okay, this is his cadence, this is sort of how he's gonna sound. So, yeah, I would say it was a little challenging the first day or two, but then you sort of you're like, well, this is how he sounds. It's sort of like if you're living with someone, you kind of can figure out like this is, this is how they speak, and so that became easier pretty quickly.

Speaker 1:

And, of course, carl. Definitely Carl had the help of matthew and athena kind of helping him along to get him to communicate, um, and they just kind of add a like fun, chaotic and cute element to it. Um, so are there any other characters that you really want to revisit or develop further in the series? I know you're talking about the two the rival sex shop owners.

Speaker 2:

I picture them across the street from each other and I pictured and I'm not again, I don't know if this will ever happen owners, I picture them across the street from each other and I pictured and I'm not again, I don't know if this will ever happen, but I picture that one of them has like more like the high-end classic toys and that the other one has sort of like the more fun, more like less high quality but like more features, like the sadie brazen, all these things like that. And the other one was sort of looked down anyway. So, yes, maybe at some point, and then definitely, um, these because I really, you know, I really enjoyed writing her. I think the Sadie Brazen part of things I tried. I have tried to this point not to write a writer, because I think it can get very self referential for authors to write writers that it can be a little navel gazey, like in meta and stuff and I and so I was actually not originally I did not intend for Sadie Brazen to be in the town, but my writer friends were like, oh no, she needs to be in the town. So I was like, fine, that's, that's what I did. So yeah, I think, I think Lise definitely, but I definitely.

Speaker 2:

I have so much love for Matthew and Athena, and now Carl and Molly too, that I mean they'll, they'll show up at some point around the edges of the other stories.

Speaker 2:

Uh, in this case, you know, the people Carl is closest to in his life other than Charlotte, you know, and her kids and his own family are Matthew and Athena and well, and the Nasty Wenches. He actually has quite a large community which he only really realizes after he was supposed to be dead. So this is sort of the second chance. Romance is also sort of his second chance to sort of reframe, sort of his relationships with the people in his life, you know, and sort of reframe in a way that he allows himself, allows them into his heart fully and then is fully in their lives too. So that's part of what the second chance is about too is for him as well as for for the two of them.

Speaker 2:

But uh, but yeah, but they, he's close. Matthew's, his best friend, athena, has sort of grew up together right and is one of the people, the person that he is the most willing to admit vulnerability to, because Matthew is, it's such a sweetheart like he knows Matthew would never take advantage of that vulnerability to hurt him. So he is more willing to be more, more vulnerable with Matthew because Matthew is like a solemn.

Speaker 1:

It just would never occur to Matthew to like try to hurt carl in any way and, like I think, athena even says, um, something about matthew being her guide to carl and loves her under like the carl cheat sheet is, is matthew, so she can sort of figure out.

Speaker 2:

and you know, and she sort of has a shortcut into being in carl's life because carl felt so guilty about firing her, like in the my original draft of the book, the first draft there's a longer conversation about the fact that he feels terrible about having had to fire her in the first book through no fault of her own, but that his guilt over that meant that he kind of felt like he owed her, that he wasn't just like you're bothering me leave, like that. He kind of felt like he owed her, that he wasn't just like you're bothering me leave, that he felt like he kind of owed her to be a little more patient than he normally is and sort of allow her into his life, even apart from the fact that he loves her for herself but also loves her for how she is with Matthew, because he really wants good things for his best friend and and sees that in her.

Speaker 1:

And I love how well her and Molly get along.

Speaker 2:

Yes, and I think Athena's ebullience and like sort of openness is something that I think would be really lovely for Molly long term. You know that Athena would just sort of drag Molly along with her into adventures and into relationships and in a way that Molly probably needs.

Speaker 1:

I agree on the aspect of Lee's being um a writer. At least her genre is so kind of out there that I I feel like it. It probably helps, because you're like, well, I'm not necessarily writing that exact same thing, so I am not, it is I.

Speaker 2:

You know, I read the entire gamut of romance. I read kisses only. I read erotic romance. I read, you know, paranormal. I read historical. I read everything, mystery, obviously, you know, uh, mystery romance and so forth, but I don't write the entire gamut, and it was, but I do, again, I do read it.

Speaker 2:

So I was like, well, maybe Brazen's like works are not fully divorced from things that have been on my Kindle in the past. Now, admittedly, I don't think I have a like a cryptid loch ness monster dom on there a lot I was. So when I came up with the title loch ness master, I was so pleased with myself I can't even tell you how, like all my friends who talk with me, that next week I'm like guess what title I came up with like, yes, yes, very nice, olivia, I was very happy. And then, of course, this one.

Speaker 2:

I had a lot of fun with the idea that sadie brazen was potentially flirting with dark romance. But you find out that maybe not entirely, but with my kangaroo, my kidnapper, and one of my great joys in writing is coming up with fake, ridiculous intellectual property. So in this spoiler alert series, coming up with not just the, uh, the books that that the tv series is based on, but also all of like marcus's terrible, terrible films that he's made, like all the horrible scripts and things. It was just such joy for me and so that basically serves. Sadie Brazen's books serve the same and the books that the Nasty Wenches read as a whole serve sort of that.

Speaker 1:

They scratch that itch for me, which I appreciate I love that that makes it fun, yeah, so what is one deleted scene or moment that you kind of thought about including but didn't make it, um, into the final book? And we've talked about a few, but if there's another one that you can think of, I mean, I, originally there was one.

Speaker 2:

I had thought that I might write one more sort of trust building exercise scene, like the blindfolded putt-putt maybe. But then because they now put the corporate magazine he got out of corporations monthly, um, I thought, uh, I I was thinking it would be hilarious like how, in eps, like the blindfolded putt-putt would be. But then after the escape room I was like, no, we're good. I mean, in the escape room I will tell you was largely based on my own escape room. My husband and I did an escape room when we were a few years ago, we were in hawaii. We did an escape room there and my husband I mean he's a very he's doc. I mean he's a, he has a doctorate, he in physics, phds in thermodynamics, right, smart man, like, and I don't feel like I'm that slow.

Speaker 2:

We were so bad. We were so bad. They started putting stuff up on the screen like look under the rug. Because it was clear that we were not getting anywhere. And when they did it, it very much was similar to what happened when they came at the end. They're like, and if you did this, like it took 10 minutes for them to go through the steps and then they opened up like there were two rooms we hadn't even gotten to. I'm like, oh, we did so bad, we were so bad at and I think we're better communicating than Carl and Molly, we're just really bad at escape rooms.

Speaker 1:

So it was fun to sort of um, to reimagine that as as Carl and Molly's like failure rather than mine but I will say, with escape rooms, sometimes it's hard because I feel like you can go the super in-depth route when it's really not that in-depth. So then you're going on this whole, like I think it's going to be this thing, this thing and this thing, but it was really just the simplest thing that you could have thought of the whole time part of it was just simple incompetence on my part, but also I think I over intellectualized some stuff where I'm like I wonder what this implies.

Speaker 2:

About the mystery, where really you're just like oh, let's see if those numbers that they found underneath the rug work. On something like where there's no real meaning, it's just like you're just looking for something that might work.

Speaker 1:

But I think it was mostly just that we were slow well, I love how, um in the book at least Molly's kind of making those connections um whenever she's comparing Carl to her ex-husband and realizing that he didn't get mad and he didn't do those things kind of instantly. So I thought that was very astute of her to kind of realize that they're doing it.

Speaker 2:

You know, we are used to a certain like. I remember when I met my husband and there was something like some connection at the back of the TV that we had that need to be I need to undo it and it wasn't coming undone. So I got out pliers and I undid it. But when I undid it I like basically ripped out the wiring. I ruined the TV just through best of intentions, but really just.

Speaker 2:

And I remember being like I was in tears.

Speaker 2:

I was so I mean we were just dating, like we weren't, we weren't married yet, and I was just in tears, like terrified that he was going to be just so angry at me.

Speaker 2:

And I just remember he was just like, oh, it's a thing you didn't mean to, it's a thing it can be replaced, it's it's fine, and it just was not.

Speaker 2:

He was like you know it's it's fine and it just was not. He was like you know, he was more unhappy that I was upset that then that this had happened and it was so different from my experience sort of, um, you know, either from where you grow up or you know, with your own family, birth family or previous relationships and I just remember being like, oh, thank, thank goodness, Like that's it, that in it's that sort of moment from Molly where, like she's, like this is the way what would have happened in my previous life with my ex husband, that's not, that's not how this is going to play out and like that can be a very powerful moment. So, even though they communicate terribly and fail miserably at the escape room, you're right, Like it is still a very telling moment for Molly as she begins to sort of understand that some of the things that she's most afraid of experiencing again won't happen again with Carl.

Speaker 1:

She can definitely be safe with him.

Speaker 2:

Right, exactly.

Speaker 1:

Is there anything else that you would like readers to know about Second Chance Romance?

Speaker 2:

I would say that the scene at the end at the prom well, it's not prom, it is their 20-year reunion dance was one of my most fun experiences writing from beginning to end Because I went full. You know I love all those like teen romances, like movies of like the early 2000s and so forth and I was like what would be kind of fun to sort of harken back to this that makes sense for like late 30s people like. But I just had so much fun with that scene, so like I hope that when people get to that part of the book toward the end of the book that it's just really fun for them. I hope the whole book is fun for them, but I I hope they look forward to it and I hope that they appreciate the, the theme, the under the sea, that was so fun. I was really looking forward to that. The whole writing the whole book. I was like I cannot wait till this. I cannot wait like to make it.

Speaker 2:

I just love the idea that you know the both hackneyed theme for like a dance under the sea that someone took it like way too like nerds took it way too literally. Just make it, because you know we had just when I wrote it. I mean that horrible tragedy with the the sub, it just happened. But there was all this stuff about like what is it like under the sea? And I'm like under the sea not romantic, so like you know, all these creatures that are down like how like unfriendly to human life, it is down there and I was just like it would be hilarious if you had people like be like this is what it's really like under the sea and then have that like kelp streamers anyway instead of yeah, like glitter and exactly exactly.

Speaker 1:

I love that. Well, thank you, uh for joining me today, olivia, and that's it. Thanks for listening to where I left off a bookish podcast. You can visit Olivia's site through the link in the show notes and you can purchase her novels anywhere. Books are sold and second chance romance releases November 25th 2025 thank you so much for chatting with me, kristen.

Speaker 2:

I had the most lovely time. It was the best.