Cynthia Johnson & Suzette Stranding | Authors

Every film starts with a story. It takes an imaginative mind to create the characters, scenes, and structure that bring it to life. These creative people are called writers.

Cynthia Johnson, who is Tonia's mom, and Suzette Stranding talk about what makes storytelling powerful, how they create characters, and why they love what they do.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:05

You wanna just bring it over here? You won't be in there.

SPEAKER_04 0:08

Tony, I'm gonna have to borrow the book on Mike Nichols because you know he's one of my heroes.

SPEAKER_01 0:12

That is your book. Uh-uh. Is it? Yes. Sorry, I meant to return that to you. It was really good.

SPEAKER_04 0:21

I'm saying, oh here's something to myself. I didn't even know Mike Nichols had a book. I would have bought it. And here was my Well, well, well.

SPEAKER_01 0:31

Alright, you just let us know when you wanted us to start.

SPEAKER_02 0:34

I know that she is a book beating. And she brings inappropriate objects to do it.

SPEAKER_04 0:40

I know, which are very, very attractive to me right now.

SPEAKER_02 0:44

So good.

SPEAKER_04 0:45

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 0:46

Well then let's do it. Okay. Uh yeah. What wh why did you bring this to the podcast?

SPEAKER_01 0:52

I actually didn't bring it to the podcast. It was already here, but let me tell you where it came from.

SPEAKER_02 0:57

Ugh.

SPEAKER_01 1:00

What do you mean? Well, as you know, um, I've been diagnosed with alopecia.

SPEAKER_05 1:08

Yes. Oh, Peggy, do you have your inhaler? Yes, I do.

SPEAKER_02 1:12

Okay. Okay. Because you know I don't know CPR and she doesn't care. We gotta start over. Oh no, we don't need to start over, Peggy. I love your coughing. It's amazing.

SPEAKER_01 1:25

Yeah, it's good stuff, man. Good stuff. Okay, so, anyways, um, I now have to get 10 steroid shots in my head. And they thought this was gonna help me with the pain. So they gave this to me. And I looked at the woman and I said, Well, I can throw it at you. That would make me feel better. So that's what this is, but it's gonna go away now. You have a So you're gonna throw it at all over? That's gonna be. Anyways, uh, welcome to the short of it. I am Tony McGrass. And I'm her sidekick Rochelle. Oh, I government named myself again. You did? You always what is that shirt? I don't want anybody to dox me. You don't need my shirt? What is it? It's a taped banana.

SPEAKER_02 2:09

Well, yeah, it's a it's a representation of a piece of conceptual art where the conceptual artist made in an addition of three I'm already bored. A fresh banana. I want to hear about it. Thank you, thank you. Uh fresh banana taped to the gallery wall, and it recently came into the news because it sold for like six point something million dollars.

SPEAKER_01 2:34

And you contributed by buying a t-shirt.

SPEAKER_02 2:37

I'm just this is just you know saying that I I feel that I wish I had thought of that first.

SPEAKER_01 2:43

Exactly. Absolutely blown away. Um I'm excited about today's show. You are? I am for a couple reasons. Because your mommy's here? Because my mommy's here. Um and um and we're gonna be talking about so typically we talk about filming, filmmaking, the creative process, but the other part of the creative process of filmmaking, of course, is writing. Oh, I thought you were gonna let me end like, but uh oh, okay, let's do that again. So it's filmmaking. Um we know that part of the creative rice take two.

SPEAKER_04 3:16

Rice and beans is so mad at you right now.

SPEAKER_01 3:21

He feels always mad at us. We just we never pay attention to his direction, and but um it's okay. It is he's awesome. Um, anyways, filmmaking. We know that it is um a very creative process, and part of that process is writing. And we have two amazing uh guests on today. Yes, one's my mom, um, to talk about the writing process. Cynthia and Suzette, thank you so much for being on the short of it. Yeah, thank you.

SPEAKER_04 3:52

Well thrilling to be here. Something that we share, Suzette and I share with you two, is that we are partners. So we have been working together now for about couple of years. Couple of years. And we we send each other chapters and write notes on them and have a conversation about them. And it's really been so uh important to my writing process, and it's just been invaluable. Transformative. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:17

We meet on Zoom every two weeks or so, sometimes sooner, and it's been incredibly insightful to have a pair of eyes like Cynthia's, you know, with so much experience and wisdom. I mean, nothing beats it. It's great.

SPEAKER_01 4:32

That's like us.

SPEAKER_00 4:33

Yeah, I'm well there's a practical thing happening.

SPEAKER_01 4:36

Wow, wow, that's amazing. Yeah, but you don't talk that nicely about me. I do. Not to my face. Well, no. Okay, I read it on her face. I read it on her face with respect. We can do that. Absolutely. So, um, so that's great that you two have found each other, but how did you find each other?

SPEAKER_00 4:56

Believe it or not, well, I've known her for many, many years in your family. However, one day out of the blue, she said I had been working on this book, uh, a romance uh called Rosario, and out of the blue, she sends me an email, she was involved with Grub Street, and said, There's a novel incubator going on, and I'm gonna nominate you to participate. At that point, I had not picked up Rosario for years. And I think it's my Catholic school can't disappoint anybody. And I remember saying, I better get back on the stick so I have something to offer. And it's because of her that I I resurrected the story and started writing because I thought I can't let Cynthia down.

SPEAKER_04 5:40

What she hasn't told you is years ago we were at some sort of reception, and we're the two of us are in a corner, and she's telling me about this story, and I just can't let it go. So every time I either saw her or was or someone was talking about her, I would say, How's the book? How's the book? And so I just maybe ten years had passed. And I had done Grub Street, and they were always looking for good writers, and I said, Ah, this Rosario, Rosario. So that's how it happened.

SPEAKER_01 6:09

So I I know a lot about your story, um, Cynthia slash mom. Um but what I learned about you very recently, yesterday, is how early you fell in love with writing at like four or five years old. Tell c tell that story.

SPEAKER_04 6:32

We lived in Cambridge and the house had an attic. And upstairs in the attic there were these uh boxes of these school tablets. And I opened it up and just saw this cursive writing. I said, Whoa, this is something. So I grabbed a pencil and I just I would spend hours just you know tracing the words, but I thought it was like some sort of a magical thing happening. And I think that's how I fell in love with it. That and the fact that Peter Rabbit was my favorite storybook story, that my mother would read me every night. I would make her read me the same story every night. And every night I'd get very nervous at the same part when when Peter Rabbit is, you know, hauling into the garden and here comes McGregor. And it would just be, and I just would loved it. I loved the thr the thrill and feeling of that being captured by those words.

SPEAKER_01 7:21

And so that for you, when did you know or when did you fall in love with the creative writing process?

SPEAKER_00 7:28

I had always wrote loved writing funny stories. And even when I was working as the executive director of a very large legal group and putting programs together and all that, I was always involved in typing long, funny letters to my friends. And eventually I landed through serendipity a job with a newspaper in New Jersey, and not only was I a reporter, but I had to write a funny column. I I uh from the outsider's point of view, who comes into this agricultural suburban New Jersey place and the things that I notice about it, it became really popular. And the bottom line is I fell in love with the writing and discovered that if you could put together 500 words that people responded to, it could expand into short stories or essays or blogs. And that's when I really discovered I loved it. Wow. That's that's incredible.

SPEAKER_01 8:22

Um so let's just jump right into it. Um the I I want to start with um, should we start with the story arc or a character domain?

SPEAKER_02 8:32

Oh, that seems really interesting. And yet I want to know about Rosario.

SPEAKER_05 8:41

I want to know about Rosario too. Oh my goodness, it is.

SPEAKER_00 8:48

She is in the room with us now. Hello. But she could tell you, Cynthia and I have been channeling on our books. So this is the storyline. It's a completely fictionalized romance based on one nugget of truth, and that is that my grandmother in the Philippines fell in love with a Catholic priest who never left the priesthood and who fathered nine children. My mother is number nine. Whoa. And I found out about it late in life in my 40s or something. And when I asked a cousin about it, she said, Well, you I said, Why didn't he just leave the priesthood and marry her? Well, you have to understand, he loved God more than he loved her. And I thought, what? Well, then I got into my writing mind. What if you could write a story where that seemed credible? Yeah. Where you could make the reader believe that there was this intense love between the two of them that went against all conventions. In my book, Nobody's a Predator. It's not that kind of thing at all. It's just about this compelling, abiding love. And that's what I wanted to write about. Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_04 9:55

I thought what intrigued me was what kind of a woman would stay with a man, have nine children, and it would be okay.

unknown 10:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 10:03

So I needed to know about her.

SPEAKER_00 10:06

Yes. Yes. Now, in my fictionalized book, I'm not getting into the nine kids. Who would believe it? So it's really about their relationship that leads to the birth of their first child. What was all what were the barriers and the problems that they had to overcome to get to that point?

SPEAKER_01 10:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:25

I don't know if you're familiar with the the author, um Jorge Amado, but he he writes about South American culture and you know, it has all these elements of gossipy and community and religion and different kinds of things that I always felt were so warm and fascinating. And so much of that is also in the Filipino culture.

SPEAKER_02 10:46

Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Wow. That's incredible. It is really incredible. Wow. It's a great book. It really is.

SPEAKER_00 10:53

I can't wait to read it. When is it coming out? Well, I'm I'm probably two or three chapters away from landing the plane. So wow. Okay. Hopefully very soon. Hopefully, very soon. Thanks to Cynthia's health.

SPEAKER_04 11:05

But you know, she writes like it's a film. I mean, you can it's so filmically. You can really see, I can see it. You can almost smell the, you know, the the the um the the the vendors in the marketplace. Or when she's talking about when she's in the garden, you can almost feel like you are there. It's so evocative. It's just and it stays with me. I'll get a chapter from her, and like days later I'm thinking about, gee, I wonder what you know what's going on here. It's just so powerful. It's just powerfully rendered. Wow, that's amazing.

SPEAKER_02 11:36

I I can't wait to read it.

SPEAKER_01 11:40

Um so you also, mom, are writing about your family. Right. Um that's my next that was gonna be my next question. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_02 11:52

Okay, you're doing it.

SPEAKER_01 11:53

I mean, you know, I don't want to step on your own.

SPEAKER_02 11:55

Oh, you're no no no, you're the professional. No, but just you're not. No, I'm not. I don't know why. No, you are.

SPEAKER_01 12:00

That's not the truth. My goodness, woman. Um but anyways, what was I gonna ask? Oh, what's your book about? Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 12:10

Um my story, it's an intergenerational story about a family um whose whose origins come from Barbados, are in Barbados. And it's about a um a love, sort of unrequited love that goes on and impacts three generations of this family, and how that event just you know created havoc, created uh different uh directions. But basically what happens to, you know, the children of of of people, you know, who have um who essentially decided not to be together or they can't be together. Uh-huh. What happens to the offspring? And so it's it's just not this in situation where the damage is done between these two uh two people, but it's their children, it's their children's children, it's their children's children. And how it just has this ricochet effect. And is it's based on uh it's partially based on my my grandparents, um my great grandparents. Um But it it w the the the genesis of it is really Barbados. It was this this place where these people met where they came from and they carried that over to you know when they moved to the States, when they moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts. But the but this culture has been such a dominant uh force in our family. So it was just being able to write about it was fun.

unknown 13:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:37

And y you um in the last just recently, like in the last several years, you were able to go back to Barbados with your sisters.

SPEAKER_05 13:48

Right.

SPEAKER_01 13:49

And so what was like what was that like for you and how did that help your writing process just being in the area and the space and the culture?

SPEAKER_04 13:59

We grew well, we lived in St. Thomas for a number of years. And so you would think that one Caribbean island is like the others. Absolutely not. But being in Barbados and particularly in some of the parishes, it was like, oh my God, I'm not really making this up. This really is true. You know, to stand in Hilliby, which is Hilleby St. Andrews, which is the parish that my grandmother grew up in, and see these hilly fields to see these farms and say, oh my god. And it just was empowering to me. I knew that I couldn't stop. I I absolutely had to get the story down.

SPEAKER_01 14:36

What how do you fall in love with a character when you're writing? Do is it the story first? Is it the character first, and then you build the story around it? How d how does that process work for either one?

SPEAKER_00 14:49

Well, for me, I I often feel that every character has to evoke some kind of emotion in the reader, for good or bad. And I fall in love with characters that are that have extreme aspects to their personalities. You know, maybe Vicenta, she's the town gossip and she's particularly vicious, you know. But I I also feel that, and and and Cynthia I and I talked about this this morning, how she said everybody wants something. And and so therefore, all the dialogue and their personalities, their gestures have to push all that forward. And I particularly like the bad guys because they're more interested. They are, they're more interesting. Yeah. And it might seem very obvious the way they're trying to steer things, but at the same time, especially in this case of wit female characters, back in 1897 when there wasn't a lot of power, a lot had to be done through persuasion and you know, um that behind the scenes influence. And I always find that really intriguing.

SPEAKER_04 15:55

Yeah, absolutely. I I think in both of our stories, what seems to be like the mainstay is the locations are just like another are other characters. So you get so much out of the the the placement, you know, these towns, these villages, the marketplace, um the church. Um it's just interesting to me that they really help sort of push that character uh along. But I always think about what does this character want? What are they willing to die for? What can they absolutely not live without? And I think that sort of propels where I'm going with the uh with the character. And we were talking about this morning. Sometimes I don't understand what they want or I don't like what they want. But I have to trust that voice, you know, to kind of propel it forward.

SPEAKER_00 16:44

When you talk about when Cynthia talks about a sense of place being a character, I saw that, I read it so clearly in your piece because the family's based in Cambridge, and um they there's that whole added layer of trying to fit in, conform. Then they go to Barbados, where everything seems so natural, and there's a strong spiritual intuitive component, and it brings out yet more aspects in their personalities. And I just thought you did such a masterful job with that. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 17:20

Yeah, I remember um you had me um working on one of your stories, and I just to your point to your point, Suzette, I fell in love with just the um just with the brokenness of and I can't remember his name. Bertrand. Bertrand. Just the brokenness of him because you know, so typically, particularly in cultures that, well, I'll just throw it out there, West Indian cultures, the men the men are just like just crazy. Right. But anyways, um, but you know, they they have to be strong, they have to be tough, um, they think everything belongs to them, including women and everything. But there was such a brokenness about him that in a way kind of reminded me of my dad, that it was, yeah, he was strong, he was this, he was that, but he he was broken. And he was broken because of of many things, but I I just I found myself just really understanding him far more than the women in your story.

SPEAKER_04 18:36

It's interesting, because we were talking about is it different today? We're talking about is it more difficult to write men or women? I mean, how you would like what is the difference?

SPEAKER_01 18:44

So basically, you all had the podcast before you came out. We had lunch. Nice.

SPEAKER_02 18:48

Yeah, you prepped. We prepped. We have to know. All right. I'm I'm just you know, are you gonna talk about that? I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 18:58

Well, I think for me, you know, writing of it from a man's point of view depends on how much experience I feel that I've observed. And I don't think that men are that much different emotionally. It's just that they're under maybe stronger constraints or uh stereotypes. Yes. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. You have a lot of male authors who are so great at writing women characters, female characters. Gabriel Garcia Marquez. You know. Brilliant. Right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:26

Or Hamlet. Not Spike Lee.

SPEAKER_04 19:30

But the thing about Bertrand that I like that I think that really appealed to me, it is he got broken through the beauty of this land. He was brought it's like it pushed through and it shattered him open. And that's what sort of sort of got him to sort of transform and see different aspects of it. Because he his his farm had been was very dry and very rugged, and it was tough to get anything out of the ground. And here he moves to this parish where everything is lush and easy and fluid, and everything is beautiful, and it's such such a contrast to what he's how he was raised.

SPEAKER_01 20:07

You know, a lot of our audience are gonna be filmmakers, aspiring filmmakers. We have one aspiring filmmaker in the audience listening to this. And I wonder for you both, what what to you makes a good story? Wow. Film-wise.

SPEAKER_04 20:26

We didn't talk about that.

SPEAKER_00 20:27

They they didn't prep for that. Oh, you didn't prep for that. Well, for me, again, I think a lot of it is evoking emotion, making me feel something. And when I feel something emotionally, I'm invested in the story and the characters. So I that's a a big thing. And when you talk about writing uh cinematically, the the gestures, the the believability of the characters, and also the the kind of where you look in from above and you can see the comedy of errors that is going on that the characters are not even aware of yet. That I I think that for me.

SPEAKER_04 21:09

I you know, I I was uh recently uh came upon the uh series CB Stryker. CB Striker, it's a series on uh British series on I think Showtime. She loves the British stuff. She does. I like British stuff.

SPEAKER_02 21:25

They g they do some good shows. Great stuff.

SPEAKER_04 21:27

And this is a guy who had been and he has a he has a uh something, a shattered leg or something. But he's so again a shattered, broken person. And he he is but he's so interesting. He's so interesting in this character. And there's something about him that I that pulls me and draws me in. And I think that's I think that's the I think it's the story, but it really is the character. It's the character. Yes. And I want him to be imperfect, and I want him to be just messy, and I want him to be soulful and deep and probing and probably unaware that he is an idiot. It just it's it's delicious.

SPEAKER_01 22:08

I remember um and I was young, I I I don't remember the year, but anyways, um we were watching The Jerk with Steve Martin. And mom, you laughed, I think, from the beginning to the end. And like cackling like I had never heard you laugh before. And I just kind of thought like this guy is such an idiot. Like I could not I couldn't appreciate any of it. And but then I watched it many years later and I laughed my ass off. I really did.

SPEAKER_02 22:51

So it's so funny. Because I I think for I I mean I don't know that we need to talk about the jerk a ton, but at first I was like ooh this is kind of offensive. Yeah. Exactly.

SPEAKER_04 23:03

But it's just so absurd and he's so dumb that it's sort of like it has that sort of Mel Brooks blazing status it's so offensive.

SPEAKER_01 23:13

You you just he's adopted by this black family that like saves him in the end and no one and he doesn't know that he's not black. And he doesn't know that he's not black. Oh my gosh. Anyway so that was just a like a side note but you know I think something that you and my grandmother did really well is you exposed Kia and I to a lot of different types of stories whether they were books or whether they were movies. And with my grandmother it was um she loved the birds too God love you guys. It was a lot of the period pieces it was a lot of you know a lot of black and whites which again you know I'm like why is it black and white we have color TVs and just couldn't figure it out and now it's like I never miss an opportunity. But the the stories and then what you did is you also gave us the space to write stories. And I remember like our activities were not necessarily go play with dolls but she'd give us like a she'd give us a prompt and then we would have to create something with that. And I I I can't even tell you how much that has impacted me as a creative because it it was just it was it was just so cool.

SPEAKER_04 24:35

I just I I know my mother was my first teacher. Yeah because w I would go to the movies with her since I was like four years old. And so we would always end up walking to the fiat theater because we lived in Cambridge so we either go into a theater in Harvard Square or Central Square. And on the way home I'd say well Mom why did that person do such and such and so and so and she said well Cynthia so and she would explain and that some people are that way because whatever. So she was really my the first person that helped talk to me about character and why people are the way they are the thing and do the kinds of things that they do. But she all my life she's been my she's been the best teacher.

SPEAKER_01 25:14

Yeah that's wonderful you know um there's a lot that can be said about story arcs and there's so much that people get wrong I think certainly certainly no names required but there's a lot that people get wrong right and um and just today I was meeting with um I'm in grad school and meeting with my advisor and she well she essentially tore my story apart um but that was a good thing. It was a good thing and she started talking to me she kind of gave me like this little list that I can't wait to like shoot my questions out at you but um she talked about the measurable goal what do you want this character to be able to achieve or fail at and what's at stake in that process the obstacles the internal the external the interpersonal the environmental It sounds um very much like my pre-production class. It was but I but I did well in that class you did I I did um but it was it was just like a eureka moment for me again because you know I I've I've done documentary my whole life and and now now I'm writing stories again but for the for the screen and um and I'm just wondering like in terms of the story arc do you have do either of you have anything to add to that or disagree with or I would just say trust.

SPEAKER_04 26:57

You've got to trust your characters because if you live with them long enough I mean that's not to write that down. Sorry if you live with them long enough they will tell you or it's it's not like I'm not someone who's like there's a nice outline and I really have whatever I really do. I much more organically I want to feel them I want to hear them and I do you and I were talking about that we hear them but if you trust that character I think it will he or she will show you where she has to go. I mean it's not like I know the end of my stories I have an idea but I think part of the fun of writing is that you discover so much things in the process I mean like I I mean one of my characters in the in the second manuscript of the series she literally walks into the ocean and doesn't return and it blew me away for two weeks I couldn't go back to the computer I said what the hell what the what is this and she literally walks into the ocean and never returns but she had to given what was at stake for the farm and the people that she was sac she sacrificed her life for this particular situation. But I didn't know that I had sort of came across that it wasn't mine.

SPEAKER_00 28:13

I know you have said a little Will in Rosario Father Teodoro the love interest okay he goes into the priesthood because his mother and his family in Spain expect him as the third son to go into the priesthood and it was never his choice but he was too he never objected. Now he comes to the Philipp and he actually goes to the Philippines volunteers because he wants to get away from his incredibly domineering mother. So what is it that he ultimately wants? Well he thinks he just wants to get away from her but what he finds is he would like to be honest about how he feels but once he becomes once he comes in contact with the honesty of how he has such a passion for Rosario it seems like the wrong thing to want the sinful thing to want and yet his whole journey is how does he express himself how do we get past these assumptions about him to see him for the man that he really is and honestly there were times when I had such paralysis about well how's he going to say that what is this what's the situation or the environment that causes that to happen. And I would wake up in the wee hours with almost like a misty little glimpse of a dream of maybe them in the garden talking to each other and some revelation being made. And I would just sit at my computer and go with that. And it was like channeling sometime somehow I would start to see it and I could imagine what they were saying what does what expression does she have on her face in what way does she kind of push him along toward his own honesty all of that kind of stuff.

SPEAKER_04 29:57

So wow yeah I think it always has to be obviously a bit beginning middle and end but I think it's it's the start that sort of really helps kind of propel you towards the end. What do you what does this character to have to discover? What is the what you'd what do you want for that person? What do you want for him? And I think if you allow yourself just to allow it just to trust it it'll come. Even if you you know you write 800 pages and it really comes down to three. But that journey of those 800 pages are going to be the best time you've ever had in your life really it's gonna be great.

SPEAKER_02 30:35

Or else you're not a writer.

SPEAKER_01 30:36

Exactly right I like editing 800 pages to five I like editing yeah I I I like editing as well and I just don't know how to do my own stuff sometimes but yeah that's okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:51

So Cynthia you have a background in media and um more Emmys than Tony. I don't think I do I think Tony has more Emmys than I do but who's no no I am she is she told me no um you have you have five I have three okay oh yeah wow and so um I sent them away so it's sort of hard to remember oh that's right you gave away your Emmys yeah to my mom oh that's right I think I gave three to seven but you still won them I mean that's really the bottom line right okay Michelle she gets it no I know that this is a sore you know subject it's not sore at all it's not competition honey it's not sore at all but uh I I still have time she's retired I have time yeah so right right right right well you're gonna get an Oscar right exactly you're gonna add that's right yeah that's right maybe you'll be an E Dog if I learn how to sing you can you can just write uh a song I can write a song I can write a song yeah totally you can how hard can it be? But anyway back in the atmosphere with drops of Jupiter in your head I'm sorry Michelle it's great I mean like this is you know it was it's an opportunity because you know she has had an award-winning podcast and I've never had a podcast and I don't know what I'm doing so I you know I can't just tag along for this ride you sparked the greatness in her ooh I love that and vice versa yes anyways but my it's not about it really was about sort of the what it's like to write for um TV versus go you know how to how what's that transition going from that kind of writing to writing like novels.

SPEAKER_04 32:51

I mean television is so collaborative and there's so many hoops you know you have your executive producer and the head of the department I mean all of the your material has to get sort of you know green lighted by these people and I'm not sure I always felt like I was confined, harnessed that I couldn't wait to get my own voice. And I didn't know what if I had a voice but I it was it was it was I think it was the frustration of having somebody say yes this is okay okay can you change that I just wanted to write yeah and so it was not it wasn't hard because I I always knew that's what I wanted to do. I thought I went into television thinking it was the most creative place I could possibly be. Yes and no right yeah yes and no it was it didn't give me what I thought it was going to give me but it allowed me to make a living and have a career and raise my children so thank you.

SPEAKER_00 33:42

Yeah have you have you uh written cinema I had not cinema but I had probably 22 years of being a columnist. Oh wow yeah and so basically you're taking 500 words and you're trying to convey a powerful message a story arc all of that it's so much easier to write 1200 words than 500 to make a jump into book authorship or something like what I'm doing which is a comp I've always written nonfiction the art of column writing the art of opinion writing and so this romance genre is very very new to me and what I found difficult was for years I was trained to get to the point. What's your point? Start off with your point right and go you know and and then end it all right and bolster it up and end it and suddenly it's like oh you got to get into the mental process you got to get into the the being of the character and you know maybe expound on the environment and that was really a challenge for me in the beginning. Wow did you find yourself trying to condense like I can tell about this person really quickly. Oh yeah like sometimes I would read back you know read my stuff back out loud and it would be okay I just kind of ran through that like a freight train and there was no poetic ebb and flow you know what I mean it was like this happened and then this happened yeah I had to kind of train myself from yeah from journalistic writing exactly yeah yeah and reading your stuff out loud is so important or if you're able to find a creative partner to read your stuff because I I think that we can get so far into our head that sometimes we think the words are there and they're not there.

SPEAKER_01 35:36

Right.

SPEAKER_04 35:36

There's an assumption that like I well I must have said this because I know it. Right. You know and so it's sometimes just getting another set of eyes that is so valuable. Yeah. It's very important. Very important. And I th that's why I think having a writing partner is just critical. I mean I of course it writing is lonely anyway. Not lonely but it's an alone time. I mean it it's a it's a very you know private situation. But when you have a partner there's just somebody else I know that she's as almost as invested in my work as I am I know she's only telling me giving me notes because they don't that to make you know to make the story to make the character make a point stronger and so she's on my side. And I love that you know I just it there's there's a sense of you know that that we have this that we are in this uh on this road together. That is wonderful.

SPEAKER_00 36:29

It is it is and also when it comes to reading out loud I mean I try to do that before I send my stuff back to Cynthia because you really catch duplicative words. The rhythm and the cadence is off. That's how I figured out oh this is just too basic here right and Cynthia's been a godsend because she'll say things like I think I just need a little more environment here. Yes or I want to know more about why Father Alob would do something like that. I mean it's so helpful because you get in the weeds right and it really uncovers a lot of hidden insights but yes reading out loud to completely makes the story better.

SPEAKER_04 37:12

It's true it's true we we try and tell our students that we do and they don't listen they don't I'm like that's not even a sentence bro favorite author and why or fate no favorite book not author favorite book and why I have to go with my Bible Song of Solomon Tony Morrison and I think she was the first writer that I had ever read that she wrote The Way I Dream and I thought wow this is incredible this is you know it was something it was a connection that I had with her words and I have to give my favorite Tony Morrison story. So she comes to GBH and wait you've met Tony Morris I met Alice Walker that's pretty good too that's too yeah so did you right there Tony Morrison's coming in to do something a McNeil Lear or whatever and so one of my engineering friends says she's coming in come in so I came in and I met her and she said to me don't I know you and it was like I was being sanctioned or ordained.

SPEAKER_02 38:25

She said I know I know you and I said no but I know you it was wonderful so cool yeah very cool well I have to reach back into um some really old books that really influenced me especially in the style that I'm covering Rosario in and that would be Jorge Amado the Brazilian writer and he has such a way of creating this community quirky eccentric mean sometimes very very human and how you really feel the the heat and and and the tropical atmosphere the uh you know Santaria the the the influences of that religion on that culture and I I just always have been so moved by his writing uh Isabella in House of the Spirits oh okay yeah um Laura Esquiville uh like water for chocolate that's her favorite yeah I love that one oh my goodness yeah that that have kind of informed my uh my style yeah or the way I would aspire to write yeah how about you uh wait what your favorite book my favorite book oh I could never pick a book I don't think okay I read I read at least two or three books a week wow I know I I do I just I love reading it's the most satisfying and in the summer I go out on my porch and read for hours that is that is I don't know you know they made television right I it's the same thing it's not it doesn't calm my spirit the way that reading does reading really good uh uh fiction is just the best experience yeah it's another world it is it is as and it's like I'll I find myself thinking about them and I wonder what's gonna happen next and yeah and you and not only that you get to produce them yeah you get to create the you know the scenarios the actors in the people that you know yeah it is it's very fun. You think I'm weird. Why do you think I'm weird?

SPEAKER_01 40:38

No I'm just saying I I calculate that I wrote I read 67 books in undergrad that's not very many okay sorry I think my favorite book is um The Shack and it's up on my read that and and I I I did not like the movie. I just didn't and because with the shock like I just I was there I was there and it was a very spiritual experience for me because I felt I felt what this man was feeling and I I correlated that to the times in my life where I didn't think God was there and was able to just kind of take that journey with him but I hated the movie. I really want people to stop making movies out of great books or bad movies out of great books.

SPEAKER_02 41:37

Oh bad yeah bad movies out of great books that's what it is yeah does books deserve a limited series in my humble opinion like that works so much better yeah um like Leanne Moriarty I love her writing and uh they did uh Reese Witherspoon and uh of course I'm not gonna be able to think of the name of the show but it was so amazing and the the author was an executive producer so uh is it um Gillis she wrote Gone Girl um no it's not her what is it Big Little Lies yes Big Little Lies Ding ding ding ding ding pretty little lies big little lies big little lies oh my gosh the first of all the book phenomenal she's such a great writer and then the way that they and it's it's also like Reese Weatherswin's big into reading so if you care about the text to begin with and then you turn it into a a show you're gonna be true to that and a and a limited series gives you the space to act and I think you need that yeah like Dark Winds by Tony Hillerman. Yeah that was a great series the whole Navajo to develop it because trying to condense like a good novel into you know an hour and a half is like doesn't it just doesn't work.

SPEAKER_01 43:00

Yeah. Although I I I do think the color purple worked I think they did a good job with that but it was the casting of a good film is the casting agrees agrees acting is so important.

SPEAKER_00 43:15

But like House of the Spirits the movie was such a disappointment audience I loved the book.

SPEAKER_04 43:20

Right yeah I think I had to go back and re read the book after I saw that film too and the Joy Luck Club.

SPEAKER_01 43:27

I love that I love that absolutely anyone she went home why because she was coughing and having a did you kick her out I I asked her to go in the hallway to to cough I'm so sorry. Peggy's my favorite I know she is she'll be back I know she was just having a little episode she'll The Joy Lock Club? Not me. I'm worried about Peggy. You are worried about Peggy. And mine. Yeah. I just anything I'm writing, it goes to her. Now it goes to Rochelle as well. But you know, it is it is just great to be someone who just appreciates how brilliant you are. And you know. Thank you. Yeah. And and I I love you. I I think you're brilliant. And I do want to direct your first film out of this trilogy. So boy.

SPEAKER_00 44:49

Oh my gosh. That would be fun, huh? That's amazing. I'm here on the ground floor hearing this.

SPEAKER_01 44:59

Oh, and Suzette, thank you as well. This has just been really fun. And you know, it's you come back when the books are done. Come back and talk about it. Oh my gosh. We want to autograph copies. We want to, you know, get out, you know. Yeah. Yeah. We'll have them on the on the desk. A good idea.

SPEAKER_00 45:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 45:20

We'll get you some buyers. All right. Buy the box.

SPEAKER_00 45:24

Thank you so much. Incredible experience.

SPEAKER_01 45:29

Thank you. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 45:30

Thank you both.

SPEAKER_01 45:31

Doing our close of the show.

SPEAKER_02 45:34

What the hell? Like, did someone give you a low energy pill?

SPEAKER_01 45:37

No, you know, it was this, I started thinking about these stories that were just so powerful in my life. And I just I I think I'm just still in the moment. That's all. Okay, alright. No pills. No, I'm sorry. No, no, don't don't do pills. Pills. Don't do drugs. I was just throwing shade at you. This this is your brain on drugs. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The egg, the egg.

SPEAKER_02 46:00

This is a dare podcast. Yes.

SPEAKER_01 46:02

It is a dare podcast.

SPEAKER_02 46:04

Dara sponsors us.

SPEAKER_01 46:06

No, but it it's it's great, you know, and like not for nothing, like just sitting around a table with like incredibly creative women, including yourself, is just it just brings me a lot of joy.

SPEAKER_02 46:16

Yeah, yeah, I agree. Yeah.

unknown 46:19

For sure.

SPEAKER_02 46:20

For sure. Yeah. But now you've just ruined the meme by teasing me, so I don't really know what we're supposed to do now.

SPEAKER_01 46:29

And that's the short of it. Hey, we hope you enjoyed the short of it. You can listen to the short of it each Saturday right here on BroncoIRadio.com. Wanna stay in touch with the shorties? Follow us on Instagram at underscore the short of it, on Facebook at the Short of It, or on our YouTube channel, Hobe Productions Media Channel.