Due to some technical difficulties, our previous interview with author Lauren H. Mae was not released in its entirety. We were super fortunate to be able to record AGAIN with Lauren! Check out this awesome interview that was so much fun! Huge thanks to Lauren for sitting down with us again!
Due to some technical difficulties, our previous interview with author Lauren H. Mae was not released in its entirety. We were super fortunate to be able to record AGAIN with Lauren! Check out this awesome interview that was so much fun! Huge thanks to Lauren for sitting down with us again!
Well, hello there, everybody. Hi, and welcome back. Hi, Lauren. Hi. Welcome back. So for those of you who do not know, we recorded a really amazing like hour long interview with Lauren and lost half of the audio. So you've probably listened to the second half, but we decided Screw it. We're going to just do another one. And it's going to be awesome. So we're back. strew how's it going?
Unknown:It's good. It was I was just thinking about how funny it is that last time we did this at the same time, and it was like pitch dark out. And now it's oh my
Rachel:god. Super right.
Margie:Yeah, time is an illusion. Yeah, it's true. We always say,
Rachel:time is indeed an illusion. I just went outside and felt the sun on me. And it was like, like, I might actually have to start putting on sunscreen soon.
Margie:To put on sunscreen when you look at yourself in the mirror.
Rachel:Shut up. If I think about the sun, I have to put on sunscreen. And also Rachel,
Margie:I thought that we were professionals. What are you doing drinking wine?
Rachel:I'm sorry. It's Wine Wednesday, and I had to take a picture for Instagram. Oh,
Margie:you're right. You're right. You're right. You're right.
Rachel:Should we have pretended that we don't we had never met before and like,
Unknown:Well, it's funny, because last time I we hadn't met before. So I like did my hair and put makeup on. But at the time, I was like
Margie:post workout. So
Rachel:yeah, I'm glad we're on the same page here as far as our own personal friends now. Yeah, we had a whole hour long interview before and it's fine. So hey, let's, let's talk some books, huh? All right. Hell yeah. Um, so I guess because it's gonna be hard for me not to like. So as I said last time. So we loved your book. Your book was magical. It was great. I'm a big fan. So we just kind of wanted to like rant about how wonderful your book is, and also ask you some questions about it. Many of which we've already asked you, but we're gonna make you answer again. I will be glad to answer them again. Except I don't have my notes from last time they have disappeared. So
Unknown:they're somewhere with the audio. So my
Rachel:God, oh, God. So Margie, do you want to kick off some of their questions?
Margie:Yeah, sure. My first question is, and this is more about like, not, is it okay, if we start not specifically about the book? Because I did have a question from last time that I didn't think to ask. Sure. In a romance novel, Lauren, what is your favorite trope? And what is your least favorite trope?
Unknown:Oh, okay. Well, I actually like a lot of tropes. There's not a lot that I don't like, I'll think of my favorite one in just a second. But my least favorite is the love triangle. Just Cannot. Cannot do that. Like that's on my my list of do not reads. And I will search good reads to make sure if there's even a question that it might be a love triangle, I will find out and I will spoil it for myself, and I don't care. I had a friend actually recommend a book to me. And I read one line of the description. I was like, Is this a love triangle? And she's like, I'm not going to tell you because it'll spoil it. And I'm like, No, you have to tell me cuz I'm distinctly not going to read it. And if you don't tell me and I read it, and it is I'm going to be very upset. And so she did tell me and it was so I didn't read it. Which I probably would have liked everything else about it. It had a ghost in it, which I thought was cool. I didn't read it. So I don't know how that turned out.
Margie:wasn't part of the love triangle was it Ghosts was
Unknown:because that's what she wouldn't tell me. She was like, well, kind of and I'm like, the only way
Margie:is all right, what's Casper up in there? Okay.
Unknown:And anyway, so yeah, that's the one that I do not do. My favorite so I, I don't know, like I've heard some people call this a trope, and I particularly find it to be more of a plot device and a trope, but I love the only one bed plot device slash troll. Go for that anytime. But more broadly, like a definite trope that I love is the sunshine grumpy pairing I just love the last book that I wrote actually that I'm querying right now is that trope and it was so fun. So that's why that's probably my favorite.
Rachel:When you say grumpy do you mean like broody or just grumpy
Unknown:Well, it's funny because I It feels like people have different different definitions of grumpy. The trope is usually titled that but I prefer like more broody than just cranky.
Margie:That's my type.
Unknown:Yeah, I like those brooding brooding guys.
Rachel:Yeah. Marty's a mother in the castle.
Margie:Yep. emotionally unavailable oh wait, I'm coming it's like I the what came to my mind was like in the book that like catch which I wanted to say the rules and that's not right although it is kind of right but it's still not right. Next one the catch there wasn't even one bed because they tried to go back to the one bed and his friends were like cars all we needed was what bet?
Rachel:Just one half of a couch Sorry. All right. So I have I want to hear a story in that I want to hear how you got started because I remember us this one thing I do remember us talking about and we referenced in half of the interview that came out and I love the story. So.
Unknown:So while I started writing fanfiction, yeah. So prior I did actually, I minored in creative writing in college. So I did right before that. But then I took about 20 years off, don't do the math. And then I found fanfiction as a grown adult. And I think most people find it as teenagers. But I found it as a grown adult. And I was like, What is this what? So I started, I started because I just was watching The Walking Dead and I just loved it. And I couldn't get enough of like, the little like YouTube compilation videos that people do in the fan art. And I was like, Oh, this is so fun. I can go down so many rabbit holes, and then I found fanfiction. And I was like, Oh, this is awesome. So I read all of the fanfiction that I could find. And then I was like, you know, I love writing. I used to do this. No one knows who I am on this little site. Like I can just make up a name and no one will ever have to know. And I distinctly remember, like posting my first chapter of this first story that I wrote. And someone commented because people do that. And I didn't know that. They commented on like, everything they read. And I got an email saying I had a review and I was like no way someone's reading this and it's like a lot of people read it and I ended up being like over 100,000 words. It was really long and wow yeah, I still love it and someday I want to take it that particular story and trim about 20,000 words off of it. Turn it into a story Yeah, turn it into a novel but yeah, so that's how I got started and actually some of my bestest bestest writing friends now are other shown Rick and Michelle and from The Walking Dead fanfiction writers and some of them have gone on to publish romance novels. One of them just got a book deal. That's awesome. Yeah, so it was a great re entry into the world of writing. Super
Rachel:cool. And for what it's worth I have never in my life read a piece of fanfiction which amazes me never never late sorry. I was gonna say just try like count but I guess Yeah, shades of gray. But I've never read that either.
Unknown:Well, not just that there were other romance authors that started with Twilight fanfiction Christina Lauren, who's a huge famous romance to their two women that write under the same name. They started out as Twilight fanfiction writers and their first series was originally a Twilight fanfiction. That got
Rachel:into novel Interesting. Yeah, no, I the
Unknown:catch was actually it did start as a fan fiction. It was a shorter the first act of the catch was originally a fan fiction and then I changed it.
Rachel:Yeah, in May. Okay, that counts that I've read. But I've never read like in the spirit of it real fan. However, I choose to believe that I have not made it until someone writes fanfiction about Margie and I and I will. We'll do an audiobook of when whoever does that.
Margie:All right. Rachel, you thought is so dangerous. You're opening In a can of worms,
Rachel:I am so willing to put myself out there.
Unknown:It could get really weird.
Margie:With our friendship, it's already gotten really weird.
Rachel:Of all the people I'm willing to get weird with. It's Margie.
Margie:I love it. What do you say stuff like that? Special?
Rachel:Alright, Margie, your turn for question.
Margie:Um, so how did you kind of make the leap from? Okay, this is a really awesome fanfic that I've written. And I love it. And I want to continue this to like, you know what, I'm actually gonna make this into, like, my own original characters, its own original story. And was it hard? Was it hard to like, bounce? Like, I guess to sort of translate
Unknown:it well. So I, I kind of did it in a weird roundabout way, I published that fanfiction. And then I wrote a whole bunch more. And in the time that I was writing a whole bunch more, I started to work on plotting and using specific beat sheets to plot out novels, specifically romance novels. And I started applying them to other fanfictions that I was writing. And so I wrote a few more after that, using this new beat sheet to kind of like, test it out in practice and figure out where I wanted to tweak it and which ones you know, worked for me because there's a whole bunch of different ones. And I ended up kind of combining two. So then I wrote this baseball themed fanfiction. And that was the one that I wrote with the full beachy and did it exactly how I wanted it to be. And then I was like, Okay, now I really want to write an original novel. So which one do I want to do that with? And I remembered that this one was kind of my favorite and where I hadn't written too much of it, it was really short. I thought, you know, I could take this because the fanfiction ended when they left the beach. So I was like, well, I could take this and just plop it into the first act, and continue the story. And I had to do a lot more than just that, like, obviously, create all the new characters. And I changed, there was new scenes and stuff that I had to write for the first act too. But it was so like I said, it was like kind of a backwards thing. I had written that one. And I went back to it when I wanted to make the leap. So was it difficult? I don't know. It was it was so much fun that I guess I would say that it wasn't difficult, because I was like, Alright, now I get to really dive into the characters. Whereas when you're writing fiction, fanfiction, you don't get to do that. So it was kind of like a whole nother layer.
Rachel:I have a question, what's a beat sheet.
Unknown:So a beachy is like, well, there's a whole bunch of different ones. But it's basically an outline, like a map of how your novel is going to go, you know, all the different plot points that are going to lead up to the rising action, and then the falling action and the conclusion. And so you can find a million different versions of them online, or there's books written about them. The one I use is saved the cat, it's called. It's not actually a beat sheet right
Margie:up our alley.
Unknown:But it's a plotting system. And it's actually for screenwriting, and someone I think her name was Jessica Brody, took that screenwriting B system and put it into a book called Save the cat writes a novel and applied it to novel writing. It's not that much different. Like instead of saying, you know, this happens at 30 minutes in it says, you know, three chapters or something like that, but Right, so I use that one. And then I also use one that specifically for romance writing, and I kind of combined them so you, there's a million different ones, and you can choose and play around with them and change them.
Rachel:Right. I've heard of one called campfire for like comics. I guess that's what it's called. I had no idea. That's what was called. I learned. You
Unknown:know, it was really cool because if you read save the cat and understand the plotting structure, you will never watch a movie again without being like, I know what this is. My I know. It's the dark woman I see. But all the plots are the beats are called different things. So yeah, my husband loves watching movies with me now when I show the inciting incident just happened.
Margie:So speaking of movies, and screenwriting, one thing I was wondering was with the end of this book, worrying you kind of thinking Was there you know, an old DVDs? There's the alternate ending, where it's like this is the other way that they were thinking about going and they didn't? Did you have a thought like that of like, was there like an old quote unquote, alternate ending?
Unknown:I'm not really but what there was was an epilogue that I purposely do begin to give it, give it give it to include, because I wanted to put it in, it's in the rule. So if you read the, the end of the rules, there's an extra chapter. That's the epilogue for the catch. And so there's gonna be a third book. And the epilogue for the rules is going to be in the end of that book. So keep buying my books.
Margie:How dare you.
Unknown:So in that sense, it's a slightly alternate ending, but you can get it other than mine.
Rachel:I so, so much more approve of that, as opposed to some of the other things where we saw were like, we did a book where it literally like, oh, no, and a book. It was like, this was a 150 page book was a novella. What the hell? No, that's a way better way to do it.
Unknown:Yeah, I can't really get away with cliffhangers like that in romance.
Margie:Because then it's not a really a romance anymore. romances are like, alright, we know we want the happy ending. If you don't give us the happy day, we will not be satisfied to be satisfied in more than one way.
Rachel:But Margie, that was the one where they knew they knew each other for 24 hours had sex and then loved each other. Yeah.
Margie:Like a normal Romance.
Rachel:Romance, romance normal. My one complaint about about the catcher is that it was just too long. They had normal human romance. I want it to be in
Margie:human relationship. So we've, I know that you enjoy it like science fiction, at least because because you wrote and enjoyed walking dead fan fiction. So are you going to go do you think you're going to venture into science fiction at any point in your writing?
Unknown:Well, I just like I have to be super clear. The reason I like The Walking Dead was because I was obsessed with Andrew Lincoln and I refused to watch it for a really long time. My husband wanted to watch it. And I was like, I'm now watching the show.
Margie:I need to look this person up because
Unknown:he was watching it. And I was in the room and he was like, hey, that's the guy from love, actually. And I was like, why guy from love, actually. Oh, Andrew Lincoln. I was like, so you want to watch the show? Okay. I'll watch it. And then I just got obsessed with it because it's really really good. Um,
Rachel:okay. Yeah, I see that Yeah.
Unknown:Yeah, so And him in that show. I mean, if you're gonna I don't google Andrew Lincoln and Google Rick Grimes because so but so I don't think I'll ever really write science fiction but I do have an idea brewing for like an apocalyptic romance. Which, when I wrote fanfiction, even though I was walking dead, I wrote almost exclusively a US which is alternate universe, there were zombies.
Margie:That that is actually a really interesting thing in the world of fanfiction that I've read about is that why people like, like writing Twilight fanfiction so much is because they just use those characters that they know so well. And they've kind of put them in a use, they put them in alternate universes. So it's kind of like taking, you know, those classic, those. What, and this is on a much larger scale, what Disney does with classic fairytale characters, and they kind of quote unquote, bring them to life. So it's just just an interesting thing that I had never considered like it. Some people don't even like I don't even really like Twilight that much anymore. It's just that I know it so well, that it's easy to use these characters again.
Rachel:And again, like a lot of characters fall into specific tropes anyway, so it's almost like you're writing you're not so the writing like the character, you're writing the trope in this different way. I mean, it's so easy to morph it into an entirely different thing. I feel like has Twilight 50 Shades of Grey?
Unknown:Yeah, and especially for like The Walking Dead. I mean, Rick and Miss Schoen were such an awesome couple. But like, this was such an awesome love story, but it was also sad like the this horrible, horrible setting and so I think a lot of us fanfiction writers were like, well, what if they didn't have to watch all their friends die would not be so much fun. They deserve it. So we're gonna write that.
Rachel:So just throwing this out there. I know. It's probably a While out, but that never happens. We've never branched into that particular genre. So post apocalyptic romance.
Unknown:All right, well send it our way. someday, someday it's on my list of many plots that I have. Yes, ma'am.
Margie:It's a child.
Rachel:Hang on, we have a guest. Another guest. She wants to be a part of it. Oh, hello. Thank you. Oh, it's very windy over here. And that's terrifying. So she's been in my lap as much as possible because I am the protector. It's fine. Yeah. So I actually had a question. One thing that I really like about the catch was how diverse it was. Not just in like, God child, okay. Not just in like, you know, like different people, you know, in different like, like representation of different nationalities, that kind of thing, which I also super appreciated. But in like, the amount of like, friendships, you see, so you have the main relationship, but then there's, there's cat and all her friends. And then she starts to make, you know, become friends with Josh's friends. And it's like, you get to see kind of that, that burgeoning friendships happening. Specifically? Oh, God, I'm totally blanking. The one dude's wife, who was just like, okay, and like you. Don't you dare hurt him? Like, yeah, I love that. But is that like? So two questions, I guess that goes with that. Do you treat? Do you approach those friendship relationships writing wise, the same way that you would like the main relations like a romantic relationship? And also, do any of those relationships reflect friendships that you have in your life?
Unknown:Hmm. Well, I definitely to on a smaller scale, craft them the same way that I craft the the romantic relationship, meaning that I do put a little bit I try to put an actual arc into their story. Especially the side characters who are getting future stories. I tried to build up. So like the rules. The book, too, is Danny and Dylan. And so they each had their own little kind of arc in the catch where they changed throughout that narrative. So yes, like I approach it on a much smaller scale, because I would be plotting forever if I if I went that deep into all of them. But I do I know who's coming next. So I tee them up a little bit for the next for the next book. Friendship. Yeah. So it's when I, when I finished the catch, and I sent it to a couple of my friends, my best friend wrote back and she's like, okay, which 1am I like, you're not anyone specific. But those, you know, each of her girls, each of Kats girlfriends, they, you know, they were a little bit archetypes. They are their archetypes.
Rachel:There we go. There's the word Got it. Got it.
Unknown:There are there are archetypes so specific friendships, you know, there's, um, you see that a lot on on movies and such, you know, there's the, the really sensitive friend who's really sweet. And you know, then there's the snarky friend and then there's the tough love friend. So, in our real lives, I don't think that our friends ever really fall that specifically in the categories, they kind of span depending on what point in time you talk to them and what problem you're bringing with me. So they so all of those friendships and Josh's friendships as well, are kind of a blend of different friendships in my, in my real life. All right. And that was something that cat did that I heard that I had had to intentionally that I really thought was fun was she was excellent at knowing which friend to go to to get the answer she wanted. And I think that that's maybe something that I do, too.
Rachel:I didn't even notice that. Yeah, she totally did.
Unknown:When she wanted a certain answer, she went to a certain person that was going that was more likely to give it to her and yeah, I think that's something that's probably something I do.
Rachel:So I feel like every time we read a romance novel, I'm always like, alright, which ones me which ones? Oh, god. Yeah. The number of times I'm like one. Which one were you? I I like to think I'm a little bit of a blend between the tough love and the maybe I'm just the tough love one.
Margie:Yeah, you're just the tough love. And I love it for that. I love you for that because no bullshit. I'm not. I'm the sensitive one. I'm like I'm I'm a cry now.
Rachel:I got we both got some stark though.
Margie:Oh, yeah. Oh yeah,
Rachel:there's the Snark otherwise if you didn't we wouldn't have this podcast. Yeah, that's
Margie:that's why when your publisher or your publicist reached out to us, we were like, Do you know what we do? Are you sure about this? We do have an advantage though. Because now Lauren, you have listened to the episode where we review this. So yes. So do you have any thoughts on the episode? Or was there anything you wanted to defend?
Rachel:I want you to do what we did to the book to us.
Margie:Yeah.
Unknown:First of all, their girls trip was not in Florida. Great. It was Virginia Beach. It like you mentioned at once and I was like, Oh, that's funny. It was in Florida. And then you're like, I'm gonna divide this entire thing up. Florida and not Florida, and I was like
Margie:damn it. Yeah, Bella. 70. Right. Shut up.
Rachel:Oh, I take full responsibility.
Unknown:That was very funny. And also she was an AMA not Emily. Dammit.
Rachel:I legitimately one. Read that entire book thinking they were in Florida for the first half. I'm not gonna lie. She was so self conscious the whole time what we're doing that episode and like, I know I'm gonna get it wrong so sorry.
Unknown:I mean, to be fair, there's probably not much difference between Virginia Beach and some beach town in Florida.
Margie:Virginia Beach does sound classier. Like anywhere in Florida. You're kind of like how far away from Miami? Is it? Oh, that's that's cool. So I
Rachel:grew up going down to like Panama and destin and stuff. And so when I was thinking like, oh, the Gulf Coast is really warm. Like, that's where you'd want to go on jet skis and stuff. Maybe? I don't know. I can't justify anything. I'm
Margie:Lord, please say, Rachel. There was so jet ski see?
Rachel:His name was John. Rachel, not Josh.
Unknown:Oh, and you? You asked me last time we recorded this. And I wanted to make sure it gets in there is this name is Josh rideout not out? No, it was right out. And, um, the whole idea for that book came from a trip that I took to Virginia Beach. So it was extra funny. Like, no, that all happened in Virginia. But other than that, I loved listening to that. It was so fun. I have written two and a half books since I wrote that book. So it was fun to go back and like listen to some of the moments that I kind of forgot about.
Rachel:So do you coming? So I this is a totally personal question. I am super curious about this. So do you ever go back and look at something else that you've written in the way before times are in the past in general, and be like oh my God, what did I do? Because like, I feel like I know artists that do that. I know writers that do that. And I'm just like, I do that. I'm curious if that's a thing that you Oh,
Unknown:definitely I'll read some of my fanfiction and think like, well, cuz I've just practiced so much more since then and remembered some of the stuff that I learned in school and so I'll go back and I'll read them and I'll be like, what a that is the most passive voice ever. Yeah, oh, look at that info DOM What a terrible but when you're writing fanfiction, you're writing a chapter and posting it and so I don't I don't usually go back to my novels and think that because I it's not off the cuff like fanfiction is it's like I have it all. I know what I'm doing before I do it and I'm super, super annoying about it. So yeah, I will definitely go back to my fanfiction and think wow, I really didn't know what the heck I was doing. Kids like no one cares about that.
Margie:That's what they're there for. Right? It's a beautiful place like it's there. It's there when you need it. It's there to give you a hug and to love you and it will never judge you.
Unknown:Yeah, it doesn't. Yeah, that's like that's where it completely
Margie:That's what I keep telling myself about my fanfiction.
Rachel:For what it's worth, we didn't have to read any of your sentences and be like, Alright, I'm gonna tell you what the commas are in a buck wild since I didn't have to do that.
Unknown:I tend to overuse them. So if you found some extra ones
Rachel:if anyone's curious, but these now hiding under the blanket that I'm using out there, it's so scary, honestly. Yeah, it is. To real. I hear you're up next.
Margie:I'm sorry. I'm looking at my cat and trying to figure out it's like she's looking at a ghost or something. I have no idea what's going on with her probably. So what was your I mean, like, I'm sorry, this is kind of just a blase question, but Well, tell me what. So you really loved Virginia Beach, because you wrote a story about beat like about two characters down there? Was it just because like, you just wanted to kind of place it somewhere? Or was Virginia Beach just like this beautiful, beautiful spot and you wanted to bring it to life in the story?
Unknown:No, it's not really that beautiful. Sorry, to anybody that lives there. You know? It's not, um, no, it was just such a fun trip. I took this trip. It was my four girlfriends, and I drove there from Maine. And we kind of plan this like, like any 22 year old girls do like with no thought whatsoever. We were like, oh, we should do this. That would be fun. We went to actually see a concert we wanted. So 311 was playing. And we couldn't get tickets in Maine. So we're like, oh, they're playing in Virginia Beach. Let's just go there. So we did. And, and we were like, oh, none of us has a really good car for that. So my friend literally went and bought a car for this. She's like, well, I need a new car. Anyway, I'll get this one. And so it was just such a fun, fun trip that I was like, you know, I'm just gonna, you know, throw a little nod to that and place it there. And we had a blast when we were down there being absolutely ridiculous and stupid. And we were more Danny than cat was no cat. And so yeah, it wasn't like it was the place was super special. It was just like that memory. And the, the way that cat and Josh meet, where Danny pretends that Josh is her boyfriend to get out of talk. We used to do that all the time. And I thought, I mean, we would do that, like, once a weekend, not in Virginia Beach. But like whenever we went out, like if we were ever like in a position or talking to someone we didn't want to talk to, we would always be like, Hey, that's my boyfriend and nine times out of 10. Whoever the guy was, was cool and was like, hey, yeah,
Margie:that in mind because my friend and I are going to Florida in May. Yeah, I'm gonna keep that in mind while we're in the home. You
Unknown:gotta pick right though. We were doing Portland, Maine in 2004. It was safe.
Margie:It was a chiller place.
Rachel:A world was different than Florida. Virginia Beach.
Margie:Actually, Florida, okay. First pointed out on a map for you.
Rachel:First sentence of the fourth paragraph, it was a long overdue vacation a road trip down the coast to Virginia Beach.
Margie:What did you know, I didn't like now I'm just gonna I'm just gonna make Rachel look like an idiot on earth.
Rachel:No, I just wanted to know how much of an idiot I was. If I was in the first paragraph, if it was in the first paragraph, I would have been like, Oh my God, but it's a fourth. So I'm giving myself not a pass at all. I
Unknown:started meeting that I was like, We wasn't Florida, right. I do. I do remember that. About writing that book.
Margie:So another interesting thing was cats history and like her past, I don't want to call it I don't It's not trauma, I would say more disappointment with her act with her ex. Was that inspired from anywhere?
Unknown:I'm not really. I kind of made that.
Margie:I early because I was really interesting. It was something that we had never seen before, but was really, really sad. And I think it was something that you could definitely see happening today. You know, I think that in romance novels, there's a tendency to like over dramatize breakups and like that, it's like, oh my god, you just got broken up with Come on, we're going to the bars, and we're gonna find you a new man. Very much more like no, this is what an actual human being would do.
Unknown:Well, I feel like I've read a lot of romance novels that start with walking in and, like, physically seeing your boyfriend sleeping with someone else. And then, and then they go to the bar and oh, man, if
Margie:that happened to be one time, it's happened to be a walk in the kitchen I walk
Unknown:I'm glad that you found that to be, you know, a valid issue. Because it one thing that I really didn't expect when I published this book is how many people hate cat like they hate her. And, and that, like breaks my heart a little bit, but I find have a have a hunch about that. And it's backed up by just the slightest bit of good reads sleuthing. And it's the youngest readers that hate her. And I just not to be like, ageist or anything, but I feel like he got to live a little bit to understand how much that can mess you up? And how many? How many things like I've seen people say that, like, she didn't deserve Josh, she was a terrible person. And she, like, what happened to her wasn't bad enough to make her hate all guys, and maybe but, but that was their response to it. That was her response. And she know, right. And it wasn't just that that had that her ex did that it was a whole thing where like, now she's at a certain place in her life. That's not where she wants to be. And it was just like, you know, a piling on of all these things are her friends are much further ahead in their careers. And I don't I never saw it as she hates all men. I saw it as you know, fool me once. Shame on you fool me twice. I'm not gonna look like an idiot again. And so I
Margie:I also felt like it was her trying to protect her future too, because she pulled away so much and dependent on somewhat on someone else. So much. She's like, my future and my career is what I have right now. And I'm not willing to give that up, which is so fair, after you know what, what happened to her. Right. And I think to going back to like the ages thing, I also think that young readers, like you know, we were talking about the love triangle before there is this, like all that, why a trope out there right now. And it's a lot of like love triangles. It's a lot of like, one true love and brain when that's what you're expecting from a romance novel. And then cat doesn't fulfill that for you.
Rachel:Well, and honestly, that's a big thing that I really liked about this is that I feel like it really turned the normal trope on its head like that, that usual thing where it's like, oh, he's just been through so much. And he's so broken and I can fix him kind of thing. And in this case, it's like not she's been through a lot. But she has to learn how to fix it herself. I went
Margie:I will say the one thing that bothered me about cat that I really hated that she did is she asked someone else to flirt with Josh, I hated that. I was a girl.
Rachel:There's a reason this episode was called
Margie:girl. I was like that is that yes me
Unknown:that immediately.
Margie:Yeah, she Yeah, she did. She did that
Unknown:as soon as it came out of her mouth.
Margie:Weren't you know, we're human. So I think that in books too. You have to write people as human beings who make mistakes. Yeah, yeah. And coming and coming from my therapist who's like, you need to learn to trust more people. I get where cat is coming from.
Rachel:And I think that's something that we definitely don't see in a lot of books is where someone does something like that. And then immediately it's like, oh, shit, I shouldn't have done like there's that self awareness that is usually like
Margie:it well usually also comes from the guy the guy's like, oh, I should have done that because I got in trouble for it as opposed to I shouldn't have done that because I heard my significant other
Rachel:exactly. I still kind of a little bit fell in love with Josh. Oh my god, but also appreciate his own struggles but also Oh my god. Enroll he was a great a sinner Boy. Boy, Cinnabon boy. I loved him.
Unknown:Yeah, he didn't have a lot of faulty had a few he had he was kind of cranky at times and he goes
Margie:out when he has pneumonia. Yeah.
Unknown:Well, he didn't know he had pneumonia
Rachel:could have predicted a pandemic. And everyone reading this book going, where's your mask? Oh my God, why are you going? Why are you going to dinner?
Unknown:Two months after the book comes out? Yeah, that's not okay. You know. I mean, maybe it wasn't anyway, and that's why we're here but but I do think you're right. Like, I think and I don't just think like I know that in invoke to Dylan, not like the actual things that cat does, but he has a lot. He makes decisions coming from the same place. And no one has a problem with Dylan. Everyone's like you like you said, Oh, poor broken man.
Rachel:Like the double standard is so interesting to me. Like, I want a romance novel where the girl is broody. Real broody. Yeah, maybe it's because I'm a bisexual train wreck. And I would absolutely love to see that. But like,
Unknown:I think of some I think if you hit me up with those
Margie:people who I think especially I'm only trying to think in TV where I'm like, oh, that character is definitely by and they're broody. But it's like, do you really mean like, they're not like our? Yeah, yeah, just like you can get the vibe.
Rachel:I just want take the Castle in Scotland. Take the mists, midnight, full moon, all that. Just pluck the vampire boy out. That's what I want. I want the girl to kidnap someone on a train to Scotland. That's what I want.
Margie:Yeah, what you wish for?
Rachel:Oh,
Unknown:well, maybe you need to start writing fanfiction.
Rachel:Writer, I would absolutely do that comic though. I would illustrate that comic. There you go. 100%.
Margie:She has to dramatically walk through the towers, though. Like with like, oh, bellowing behind her? Absolutely, yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Rachel:Yeah. I'm trying to think, if I have any other questions that I want to hit you with. I mean, I have a lot. But you know, within the time frame, I'm thinking this one's gonna go out on our actual podcast feed. So the last one went on our website, I would love to put this one out as sort of just a supplemental to our episode and throw it out on the actual podcast feed so that like more people can see it. So that's what I want. Definitely want to do. I'm trying to think Margie
Margie:is there. Is there a question we should ask you?
Rachel:Okay. Is there a question that like, It's okay about that. Or you?
Margie:What are some things about the book that you? Yeah, that like, you feel like isn't touched on or you haven't been asked? It's weird now, though, because it's light here. And it's dark where you are? That is?
Unknown:Well, I'm actually trying to think if there's anything that you asked last time that we didn't remember to say again, but um,
Rachel:I feel like all these questions have come up a lot more organically than last time has. Because we knew each other a little bit before.
Margie:Have you watched? Have you watched? What is it Bridget Richardson?
Unknown:Oh, so you asked me that in the second half, because that was I have not watched it. But I probably will. At some point.
Margie:You will do the musical when it comes out. Lauren.
Unknown:I watched the TIC tock musical I have. No. Well, no, I do. I do want to shout out to my amazing cover artists because I think that probably 95% of my sales success has come from beautiful cover. But also they're so gorgeous. That was Lenny Kaufman. And she is amazing. And she I actually had pictures of the celebrity fan cast that I do well, they're not fans because it'd be a fan of my own book. Author cast when I cast them in my head and I know what they look like I pick out celebrities that they look like. And so I sent her pictures and she absolutely nailed it. And yeah, so that that was amazing. So if you like the covers of books, you should check it out because you might actually like the book too. And the third book is coming out and the same cover So the third book is Sagna. So the tough love friend. Yeah.
Rachel:Oh, that one
Unknown:that one's fun so far it's gonna be a little bit we fell behind with pandemic times. Um, but so it'll be a little bit but that one's really fun so far to say
Rachel:cats back the CO hosts busy has returned.
Margie:The cattails just been kind of like they've been might have been fighting each other while we've been recording, which is great. It's great isn't
Rachel:tight. I did my first ever art stream last night for the people on our Discord. Hey, listeners, check out our Discord. And this was a lot of it.
Unknown:My cats locked out of here.
Rachel:Mine would be screaming.
Margie:That was smart, but my apartment has no doors.
Rachel:Yeah, that Yeah. Also that. Oh, so I do want to just make one quick last like comment is that I would like to mention how appreciative I am. She's laying on my arm right now. That Josh is not a six foot seven wall of man meet. And as a normal human body proportion and goes for runs and like
Unknown:yes, yes. Personal also
Rachel:no she thing. No, she thing personal. Personal. I mean, any book that like doesn't have those two things is like this book is actually legitimately fantastic. So y'all go listen to it. Read it. Yeah, read it.
Unknown:Read it. Listen to it.
Rachel:audiobook they telling you.
Unknown:I've got to figure that out. That's that's on the list.
Rachel:I've already offered my services to any fan fiction. So yeah.
Margie:The fan fiction. I'll do that. I'll do the regular book. Yeah, the tones of my voice.
Rachel:Well, y'all, thank you so much for listening to this second interview, which I maintain was way more organic and fun than the first. I mean, the first one was a lot of fun. But the audio is last forever. So
Margie:yeah, but now we're friends. So yeah.
Rachel:So Lauren, do you want to go ahead and plug any of your plug doubles? I know we can find you on Kindle Unlimited specifically. That's how I got the book.
Unknown:Yes, both of my books are on Kindle Unlimited. And the third one will be when it comes out. And you should definitely follow me on Instagram. I was listening to the second half that you guys published and I said that my one of my goals was to get 1000 followers and I did it. So now I just want more and more and more Hell yeah. But follow me on Instagram because that's where all of my book news happens. And it's at Lauren at Lauren H may author is my Instagram. I was
Rachel:gonna say when this goes out, we'll put a post on our Instagram too with that you added and also your website is in the link on our Instagram right now. So
Unknown:check that out. Yeah, yeah. Yes, follow me on Instagram for fun things and cover reveals there's gonna be a cover reveal of Book Three soon. Oh, I'm so excited. Cats gone. Well, I have and I'm doing well. I don't know when this is gonna come out. But I'm doing a giveaway a week of giveaways right now on the rules. So Oh, cool.
Rachel:Hello, Kiana child, cats. And we have four additional CO hosts and they're all that happens. It's fine. Well, I think Margie, do you have anything else? You know? I'm
Margie:good. I'm good. This was so fun. Thank you so much for coming on again. Lauren.
Unknown:Thank you. Thank you guys for doing this again.
Rachel:Absolutely. Wow, thank you guys so much for listening and go check out the catch and the rules and follow Lauren on Instagram so that you can look at the cover radio for the next one which I'm very excited. Do we get to know the title? Do we know the title? Is that really true?
Unknown:It's the exception these
Margie:ooh that's sexy. I like
Unknown:I'm blurb is on my Instagram to Kellyanne the blurb Yeah,
Rachel:look out for this. Cool. Well, thank you guys so much. And hey, stay tuned for our next episode and other stuff. So yeah, it's fine. We're professional. Yeah, we are good. Outro bye