In this bonus episode, Marissa chats with Bethanie Finger, founder and host of the Prince Kai Fan Pod - a Marissa Meyer book club podcast! Bethanie asks Marissa questions as submitted by her listeners and Patreon subscribers. Topics include the cliffhanger at the end of Supernova, Iko's original demise as per early drafts of Cinder, Captain Thorne's Soap Revolution, and the current scoop on a Lunar Chronicles TV series. (Warning! This episode contains spoilers, especially for Supernova, starting at 11:00.)
Books discussed in this episode can be purchased from your local independent bookstore or buy them online from the Happy Writer bookshop.org store (that benefits indie bookstores) at https://bookshop.org/shop/marissameyer
Find out more and follow The Happy Writer on social media: https://www.marissameyer.com/podcast/
In this bonus episode, Marissa chats with Bethanie Finger, founder and host of the Prince Kai Fan Pod - a Marissa Meyer book club podcast! Bethanie asks Marissa questions as submitted by her listeners and Patreon subscribers. Topics include the cliffhanger at the end of Supernova, Iko's original demise as per early drafts of Cinder, Captain Thorne's Soap Revolution, and the current scoop on a Lunar Chronicles TV series. (Warning! This episode contains spoilers, especially for Supernova, starting at 11:00.)
Books discussed in this episode can be purchased from your local independent bookstore or buy them online from the Happy Writer bookshop.org store (that benefits indie bookstores) at https://bookshop.org/shop/marissameyer
Find out more and follow The Happy Writer on social media: https://www.marissameyer.com/podcast/
[inaudible]
Speaker 2:Hello and welcome to the happy writer. This is a podcast that aims to bring readers, more books to enjoy and to help authors find more joy in their writing. I'm your host, Marissa Meyer. Thanks so much for joining me. This happens to be a bonus episode today inspired by our recent listener survey, in which a lot of you said that you wanted an episode in which I am the interviewee and answer some reader questions. Uh, and so I aim to please, that's what we're going to do today. This episode is going to be me answering a lot of reader questions with the help of our special guest. But before we get to that, the thing that is making me happy today is my tee shirt. I am wearing a very fancy special Prince Kai fan pod t-shirt today, uh, especially branded, um, and it is like the softest cotton. I think, of any t-shirt that I have ever owned. Um, and it was a gift from our special guest. She is a proud Raven claw, um, who just finished her bachelor's degree in library and information sciences. She is also the founder of the Prince Kai fan pod, which happens to be a Marissa Meyer book club podcast. I'm super excited to talk to her, please. Welcome Bethany finger. Hi, welcome. Welcome to the, does it feel weird to be a guest on somebody else's podcast? I'll let all, I've only been a guest a few times. Um, it's weird not doing the entrance. It was weird for me preparing for this cause obviously, usually I'm the interview were, and so I would take time to like come up with questions and topics and today I was like, I really just have to sign on and yeah, which feels weird for my podcast too. It's kind of a role reversal, I think easier when you're the guest. Yeah. True. True. So what is the Prince Ky fan pod? Let's start there for listeners who are not aware of it. So the pins K damn pod is a Marissa Meyer book club podcast. I do, uh, an episode every Monday morning about each book that you've written in chronological order. Well, no more publishing order, I guess. Um, and I used to have a couple of cohosts that COVID really switched things up. I have different guests for every episode now. And just chapter by chapter discussion of the books that you wrote. So obviously a lot of listeners to this podcast, the happy writer, um, came to this podcast because they are familiar with me and my books. Um, and I think, I assume a lot are going to be really excited to hear the Prince guy fan. But would you recommend that someone starts from the very beginning or are there like specific episodes that if someone wanted to dive in, they should check out this one or that one? Um, we go chapter by chapter in order, there's a couple of bonus episodes. Uh, we did a sender versus Cinderella episode after the first book finished my sister and I did a frozen two episode as a bonus, but I would start at the beginning cause it's kind of a read along. So the first episode is chapter one of cinder. And by the time this comes out, we'll be about to start chapter one of crest. Okay. So we're moving right along. How long have you been doing it now? It was a year. May 19th. So just over a year. Cool. Well, when you and I met, that was in Texas, right? Yes. The North Texas team book festival. Okay. And that was like right before the world shut down. So that must have been February, maybe early March, somewhere in there. And it was the first weekend of March I think. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah. So you, you came to the event and gave me this t-shirt, which I really do love it truly is for T shirts. Um, and told me about the fan pod. And it was definitely one of my more like bizarre author moments to think that there's a
Speaker 3:Fuck so crazy.
Speaker 2:Um, and I'm super, super flattered and glad that you're having fun with it. And I hope I know a lot of people in my listener survey mentioned it. So I know that you have a lot of fans listening. It's very special that they mentioned it in the survey that lots of people, um, yeah, truly it was a good showing, Oh, I did want to ask why Prince Kai of all the characters, it was a suggestion from a friend of ours. It's kind of a play on Prince kite fan club, which has started relevant in the first book, but not really after that, but I just loved it so much. I decided to go with it forgotten about the Prince Kai fan club. There was like an actual newsletter at one point that I wrote for like some bonus material or something. I need to track that down probably on my Pinterest board somewhere. Um, I could find I'll send you a link. I'm sure I could find it.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Cool. I'm super excited to have you here. Thank you for, for, for choosing to be my, my interviewer for this bonus episode. Okay. You take the reins. Okay. So there are quite a few questions. I get to ask my question first though. Very selfish of me. Um, so my question was also submitted by Patrion members when we had our zoom meeting. And it is, how do you feel about someone having a podcast all about your books?
Speaker 3:Is it an invasion of privacy? Is it super flattering?
Speaker 2:It's super flattering. Um, yeah. You know, it's funny because obviously over the years I've met so many readers and I've received so much email and fan mail. And so I know like practically speaking that there's a lot of people that have really connected with my books. Um, and I think that's incredible and it makes me really, really happy and feels very kind of validating in a number of ways at the same time. It's still really weird to me out there reading my book. Um, and I don't know, I kind of reached the point now where I feel like that's just par for the course and I'm never gonna totally get over that. Uh, but it is, it is strange. So like I don't, I don't like it when people like want to come up and talk about the book and uh, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's weird. I feel like I want to write the books and send them off into the world and then never think about them again. But I love it now. I love that the fan pod exists. I think that's so cool. And I think that's one of the great things about this time that we're living in and all of the technology and how people can find these communities, whether through blogs or social media or now podcasting, and you can kind of find your people, which I just think is really super cool. That's one of the best things about podcasting and STEM in general, whether you listen or you host is you would get to be a part of something, you get to be a part of a community from the comfort of your own home. Yeah. Right. For us as introverts. Oh, I wanted to ask. So are there going to be spoiler-y questions? Like, should I have a warning for people listening? Uh, yes. I suppose we should. Anyone listening there will be spoilers. There's time for me, there's a lot of spoilers and like blooper episodes for me. No, I bet. I bet I wouldn't be so hard to have a discussion podcast and not give spoilers. And by that you must mean like you, you talk about the F the, the chapters that you're on, but you don't talk about things that are still to come correct. But we do have what I call Easter eggs. There are a lot of foreshadowing ends in the books if you look for them. And so we started this, what I call Easter eggs. And in every chapter, I think the largest chapter had 19. One of the shortest chapter had one, but every chapter has had at least one Easter egg. So we get to talk about that on the Patrion. That's so cool. I mean, obviously I was aware that I was putting in little hints and doing things, but 19 and one chapter good on Mellon was a big, a big chapter. The biggest one, everyone overlooked was in one of the first chapters I go says, you'll need a new pair of gloves for the ball. Prince kike is her a new pair of gloves to wear to the ball. That was the biggest one. Everyone overlooked. Yeah. I'm going to be honest. That probably was not intentional on my
Speaker 3:Well, because the coincidence
Speaker 2:It's so works. It's fine. No, I like it. We'll just say that. Yeah, that was, that was me being really clever. So I would, I can start asking you questions now. Charming. Ready? I should preface this. There were 319 questions submitted. Oh my goodness. So go and look at your messages, your emails, or the comment that you left my Patrion team. And I tried the answer, everyone. Um, and there's also a link in my bio on Instagram for frequently asked questions that Maurice has already given answers to. And some of the questions are answered in there as well. Oh, wow. I love that. You put that much work into it. Yeah. I feel bad. If not, everybody's question gets asked. So I was trying really hard to make sure, even if we don't ask the question on air, maybe there's an answer out there I can find for you. Yeah, I should update. Cause I have a frequently asked questions on my website, but that's, it's been a while since it was updated. I believe that's the link I shared. Yeah. Yeah. I might just kind of steal all of the work that you do.
Speaker 3:Fine.
Speaker 2:I volunteer. Um, well, that's awesome. Thank you Bethany for doing that slightly. So the first question is, is mad pie going to find out that she is Nova sister and we'll know that ever find out that she's magpie sister start with a really, really big one. That one was asked. A lot of these questions were chosen because more than one person asked them. Got it. Um, so I have not planned out what happens next in that story and in that world. Um, but yes, I definitely think that they do eventually figure it out, but I have no idea at this point in time, how they figure it out or what sort of turmoil that leads to. Um, I have some very, very, very vague ideas. Um, and yeah, it's one of those things I like right now, I'm not under contract to write another renegades or Gatlin city book or series. Um, and it's not what I'm currently working on, but I did like have that epilogue and this, these hints of magpie and, and her connection to Nova largely because I wanted an entry back into the, um, if, and when I did decide to come back to it. So there, there would be room for this story to grow and hopefully readers would be really excited to you to listen or to hear what would come next. So it was intentional that there's kind of this cliffhanger ending, but at this time, I don't know if or when I'll ever actually get to tell that story. So were there any challenges you faced when writing the wrong calm ish book instinct karma versus the previously written Saifai fantasy superheroes that you've written in the past? Yeah. I mean, every book has challenges. Um, but I would say the instant karma was probably the book that came with the exception of fairest. Ferris has its own kind of thing, as far as how quickly it came together in my head, but instant karma of all of my kind of standard novels, instant karma just came together really easily. Um, story-wise and plot wise and character wise, and it felt really refreshing to write it coming off of renegades. Um, obviously renegades and lunar Chronicles, both. They are big worlds and big dramas and there's huge stakes and Wars and tons of battle scenes. And, you know, just all of these like really complicated storylines, whereas instant karma is a much quieter story. There's a small, magical element, but for the most part, it's a love story. Uh, and so it just didn't require nearly as much world building. Um, there's not all of these subplots kind of competing for attention. So it was a much simpler story, which is not to say that it didn't have any challenges or parts of the book that, you know, I had to stop and figure out where to go with this storyline or that storyline. But compared to my previous books, it felt a lot, uh, easier and just kind of came together a lot quicker. Yeah. I imagine there's not nearly as much research involved for something that doesn't include like scifi technology or previous, um, stories that it was inspired by, like with heartless and like with the lunar Chronicles. Yeah, no, not nearly as much research for instant karma. I did have to research. There's a, so in the story, it's a, let me just quickly tell what readers really for people who don't know yet. Um, so yeah, it's a contemporary romance about a girl that one night goes and sings karaoke with her friends and she sings instant karma. We all shine on by John Lennon and something in that moment changes. And she develops this kind of mystical power of being able to exact instant karma on the people around her. However, whenever she tries to use this power to punish this guy named Quint, uh, who she cannot stand, it ends up backfiring. Uh, and so then over the course of a summer prudence and Quint ended up both volunteering at a sea animal rescue center and prudence is, is trying to figure out why her powers don't work on him. And then also starting to fall in love with him. And that's the premise of the book. And so as far as research goes like a lot of research about sea animals and sea animal rescues, which was really fun to research and kind of a lot of environmentalist themes and ecotourism I had to do a lot of research about. So there there's always some research involved, but yeah, like you say, not nearly to the extent as writing a scifi or, um, I guess renegades kind of as a superhero genre. So it's not really fantasy, but kind of in that same realm. Yeah. Fantasy is one of those, um, very large sub genres. Yeah. There's a lot that falls under that umbrella. If you could spend an evening with one or two of your lunar Chronicles characters, who would it be and what would you do? Oh, I'd love to just go hang out with eco. Um, and I don't know, go shopping and maybe just like go sit on a patio and have drinks and just, I mean, she can't drink, but she pretend she would pretend and do a marvelous job at it. Yeah. I would just, I just think she would be so much fun. She was one of my favorite characters to write and I just loved her personality, loved her humor and just her like ready to conquer the world attitude that she always had. Uh, and so, yeah, I would, I would love to spend a few hours just hanging out with eco. I have a feeling she would be a lot of fun to have a girls night with. Yes, totally. Then if it's just like a slumber party where you braid each other's hair and watch net dramas. Yeah. Really I'd love to have a slumber party with all of the lunar Chronicles heroines. I mean, I wrote them for so long that they kind of all just feel like they're really close friends. Um, and, and I know they're always going to be a really big part of my heart. Um, I think that when you read books, it feels that way too. Yeah. Definitely talking about them on the podcast. I feel like I know them so much better. I bet. I feel like you've probably spent more hours talking about them now that we do spend a lot of time talking about captain Carswell, thorn at the moment. Now that he's finally into the books, he is my favorite character. So lots of tension. No, I know my sister just read Crespo, so I've gotten lots of conversations about it recently. Okay. Does review the wealth and eco have Disney or if grandma's fairy tale counterparts? Oh, good question. Yeah. So really the Wolf, um, would have been, uh, in snow white, the, when the Huntsman takes snow white out into the forest, under the order of the queen to kill her, he supposed to kill her and bring back her heart. Um, and in the fairytale, he lets her go and ends up killing a deer instead, um, and bringing, bringing the heart back. And so where you would be the deer in that situation and then was eco, was the other one?
Speaker 4:Yes. Um, I, so she
Speaker 2:Kind of a couple of roles. There's the fairy godmother in Cinderella, um, which I kind of divided the fairy godmother up into partly eco and partly peony and partly dr. Orlandi, um, they all kind of help fill that role of kind of helping cinder get to the ball and also in Cinderella. So in the Grimms, and I think also the Perot version, um, Cinderella has like bird friends that help her. And in of course, Disney, she has the little mice friends that help her. Um, and so early, early on when I was conceptualizing the book and trying to figure out how do I bring Cinderella into this science fiction genre? My, I was thinking about that and we're like, who would her helpers be? Who would her friends be? Um, and my, one of my earliest thoughts was, Oh, she should have robot friends that kind of fill that role. Um, and that became eco who turned out to be nothing. Like I thought she was originally going to be like, I originally thought she was going to have a really small role. I didn't at all envision her being a big part of the story. And she was actually supposed to die. Um, or like at the end of cinder, like a dream dismantles her and sells her off. Um, and in the original conceptualizing of the series that was going to be it for her. And we were never going to hear from her again. Um, and then my editor actually was like, um, Maria says, you should maybe think about this. Cause I think you may have just gotten rid of one of your best characters that everyone's going to really, really love. Um, and so that made me kind of go back and think, well, what else could I do with here? And how else could I deal with this situation? And what, how could I use her going forward then into the story? Um, and that of course bloomed into the whole spaceship thing and the Android thing. And she just ended up becoming one of my favorite characters. And I know it's kind of a fan favorite too. So it was very serendipitous. It worked out really well. It did, she even got graphic, so we've got her own graphic novel. So I'm sure you get this question a lot, but movies or TV shows, are we going to get any want, I wish that I could be say like with definitive. Yes. Um, so currently lunar Chronicles are with a studio. Um, the rights of soul. This is now the third studio that has held the rights to the lunar Chronicles. And has, uh, when did I last here? Maybe like four or six weeks ago. Um, we heard from the studio and things are very shut down right now because of COVID of course. Um, but they were testing out a couple of different writers, um, I think, and maybe like one producer who was interested in being attached. I think so maybe if they do go forward, they want it to be a TV show. Well, that would be lovely. You get more time with TV shows. I know I want it to happen so bad. Um, I've learned with Hollywood it's, it's a very strange industry. And like every time the books have sold to a studio, there's this like rush of enthusiasm and you, you know, one of the studios flew me and my husband first class down to Hollywood and wined and dined us. And they're like, we're going to make this movie and it's going to be huge. And we're all so excited and you just, you get that excitement and you get so hopeful about it and then nothing happens and that's happened like every time now. And so I'm trying not to, you know, I'm taking it all with a grain of salt. I'm still very optimistic. I still think that there's a huge chance that it could happen, but until it's actually on your TV, you just don't know. Yeah. I'm hopeful. I know a lot of us are hopeful, so, but you got a really nice little trip out of it. It sounds so. That's good. Oh no, it was so cool. And yeah, zero regrets. And like one of my, my coolest, I can't believe this is my life memories. So I have family in that part of the world. So I, I frequent that area and I love it. Yeah. Yeah. I live, I live Disneyland. I'm more a Noxbury farm girl. Gosh, I haven't been there since I was a kid. It's wonderful. It's magical in a different way. Yeah. I remember we went there. So I think I was in sixth grade when we did our family trip. Um, and it, we went like in the middle of September. So school had just started again and all of the parks were really empty and Noxbury farm had zero lines. And so we could just go and get on any ride that we wanted at any time. And it was like, we had the park to ourselves. It was so cool. Yeah. We always go in, um, late September, early October for that reason. So every time I go to a park, I'm trying to schedule it around when they won't be super busy. Yeah. I know. That's the way to do it if you can. So the next question is which relationship was the easiest to write about and why I'm in Linder Chronicle specifically? Any of them, any of them, what relationship was the easy it was it the easiest, right? Yes. Easiest to write and why? Um, huh, we stumped you. Yeah. I mean, they all, they all had challenges and, and parts of them that, you know, made it difficult, but they were also all really fun to write. And I love the romances and that's, that's like my favorite part of writing is writing the romance aspect. Um, yeah. I mean, it seems like not this isn't maybe fair because you guys haven't read it yet, but instant karma, the, the romance between prudence and quince was just like nothing but fun. It's my first, uh, hate to love romance. And so like, I got to do all the banter and like where they're at each other's throats all the time, but then show them slowly learning about each other and growing closer together. And I just loved that. Uh, and, and it didn't feel like a struggle, like, like so many of them. Um, but I said that in a good way. Uh, yeah, I don't, I've really, I don't know. I've, they've all, I've really loved writing all of the romances. I don't know that one of them felt particularly easy compared to the others though. They're all special in their own way. They are, they are. And I feel like I can't write a romance until I also can feel myself falling in love with these characters so that I can kind of understand what it is that each character is seeing in the other one. Um, and so by the time I'm writing their story and, you know, hopefully getting to the point where they're finally going to confess their feelings or have that Epic kiss, then I'm just like so invested. Um, and I, I ended up feeling that way about all of them. That's so great. So how do you organize your own books and who are your favorite authors? Uh, organized as in like the books on my bookshelf? Yes. Oh, okay. Um, so I have my TBR shelves, um, that obviously have not been read yet. I have a poetry shelf and a classic shelf, uh, graphic novels, um, a shelf for fairies Hills and Alison cause that just kind of ended up on that shelf. And then I have all of my white, which is not really organized at all. I just find a place and throw the books on there when I finished them. Um, and then a nonfiction section and my writing books and nonfiction craft books. Um, so yeah, so those are the shelves that I have on my bookshelf. Um, and what was the other question? Who are your favorite authors? My favorite authors. Oh my gosh. So many. Oh, LIBOR Dugo Laney Taylor, Robin, the fevers, um, growing up Louis soccer was one of my all time faves or set car. I'm not actually sure. How you pronounce his name? Um, RL Stein was really, really influential. Yeah. Who else? I mean, there's so, so many. I love Lish McBride. I love Kayla. Um, Julie Kagawa. Yeah. I'm so many. That's like the, just like read down the list. If you had to read one book for the rest of your life, which one would it be to be yours or it could be anyone else's well, it definitely wouldn't be mine.[inaudible] feel that way about their own books. One book, pride and prejudice. Oh, I love pride and prejudice. I do too. I do too. And it's, it's my comfort book and I'm not making you happy book. It is my, make me happy book now 100%. And I'm not much of a re reader generally. I almost never read a book more than once. Um, but I think I've read pride and prejudice four times, um, which is a record for me. So, and, and I'm actually gearing up. I'd love to reread it again this year. Cause it's been awhile now. I, my heart Wells up every time he says I was in the middle before it had begun. I know. Um, when will instant karma be available in the UK? Oh, um, well, so usually my books have a delay between coming out in the U S and coming out in the UK, but with instant karma, um, it's going to be different because it's actually, my U S publisher is going to be distributing to the UK this time, as opposed to having like a separate UK publisher for the book. So I think that they're going to be releasing them simultaneously and it will be out, uh, on November 3rd, like it is in the U S I think, I don't know that for sure, but, but I that's my guest, we all hope so. Yeah, me too. I hate that there's a delay. If one of your books could be adapted into a musical, which book would you most want it to be? Oh, heartless. Yeah, a hundred percent. I that's like one of my big dreams is for heartless to become a musical, um, large, a good one. It's uh, well, thank you. Um, I was really, really inspired by wicked by Gregory Maguire, um, was one of the big influences for writing heartless. And of course it became a musical and it is in fact, my favorite musical. I love it. And there's really early on in the show. There's this moment where Glinda comes like out of the rafters on this big hoop, that's supposed to be like her, her bubble that she floats around in. Um, and it's a great like stage moment. And when I was writing heartless, um, the first time you see just in the ballroom and he's hanging, um, or swinging on this hoop, like an Acrobat, and that was, I think very much inspired by that moment in the wicked musical. And so ever since I've just really wanted to see that. And I just think it'd be really beautiful and special. I think so too. I didn't realize that that moment was connected to wicked. And now I feel like how did I overlook that? Yeah. I mean, it's not obvious, I don't think. Um, but, but just kind of one of those, those visual moments that really stuck with me does Torin have a family he does not. Um, which is one of the things that I might change if I were to ever go back and rewrite it. Yeah. And largely the reason being that I, or my, my reason for making that decision was that he was at the castle all the time. Um, and I didn't want to have to try to balance like this, what would be a realistic storyline, where he actually has a life what's happening in the story. Um, and, and so I ended up just deciding that no, he's devoted his life to the Royal family and doesn't have time, um, for, you know, for a family. And so that's what we went with, but now, but I almost kind of feel like I did an injustice to him in hindsight. Uh, yeah. So I might change it if I ever went back to change it, which I won't. But yeah. Now you guys know, I have said, I know we talked about it on an episode of the podcast and we kind of fabricated this whole world where Torin was young and engaged and he lost his fiance to the plague. And so now he's just married to the job. Oh, what a sad story. Yeah. So dedicated to work. Yeah, no, he is definitely a workaholic. How do you feel about writing a short story about the infamous? So revolution, are you familiar with the soak revolution, uh, as in when thorn was in prison? Yes.
Speaker 3:[inaudible]
Speaker 2:When Corona virus hit, there was a huge swing on Instagram for thorn to start another soap revolution. People even made actual bars of soap and distributed them to random people. So there's a question of, if you, you know, COVID one 28, would you write another one where captain Carswell, Thorne did another soap revolution in support of the COVID-19 28? That's hysterical. I wish that I had known about that because I so would have worked that into the plot of COVID-19 told me. Awesome. Um, yeah. So I'm sorry, what's the question. How would you feel about writing a short story about that? Oh, well, I wish that I had back when I was writing that story. Um, yeah, probably not going to have a lot on my plate right now. Um, but that's hysterical. So is the, is the idea that thorn is producing? So like, is he a manufacturer? The idea is that he becomes like an entrepreneur, so, and then he does really weird names for all of his soaps. Yeah, no, I can so see that carry on character. I think there was one that was like, captain's Musk. Awesome. You guys are the best. I love them. We had a lot of fun with that one. Um, when does COVID one 28 take place? Is it after the graphic novels and is it after Scarlet and Wolf's wedding? Okay, good question. I knew that when I was writing it.
Speaker 3:Yeah,
Speaker 2:Well, it takes place in the year, one 28. Um, so gosh, I don't, I could, I could go back and find out and email you off the top of my head. I don't remember what I ended up deciding. Okay. If you do email me, I'll, I'll announce it. Okay. Write it down. I know that I did one 28 because that's the year, which is two years after cinder. Um, so that would have been after the graphic novels, which are like a year after winter. Um, but yeah, I don't remember where it was going to fall. As far as the wedding, we will we'll wait in anticipation. All right. Last question. What was Kai's childhood like? Good question. I mean, there would have been a lot of tutors, um, and a lot of schooling and education, uh, raising him to be a world leader. Um, so lots of diplomacy, lots of history, but I think that he, you know, he would've wouldn't have had a ton of freedoms necessarily. Cause there would've been a lot of expectations on his shoulder from, um, from the beginning, but at the same time, like I don't, I think that he had a really loving father. I think that a lot of the people in the palace would have been very, um, friendly toward him. I don't see him as being particularly lonely growing up. Um, but I think that he would have known from the time that he was really little, that, um, there were expectations on him and his behavior and he was the type of person that would have wanted to live up to those expectations. I think he does a good job of that. I do too. I do too. We talked a lot in those chapters and cinder about how his personality went kind of one 80, as soon as he had to actually do a press conference. He's really calm. And then when he's, when he speaks, it's it's torrent inspiration coming out. So that was my last question for you. Oh my goodness. Cool. Unless you want more, I have more, this is your show. Um, so the other question was, did Kai have any girlfriends or love interests before he met cinder? Um, I know in, in my, if I were to go back and look at my character notes, he would have had, I don't know if a girlfriend he would have had a girl that he liked and that I think he kissed at one point. Um, but I don't know that it ever became like a big thing. Um, and I don't really remember what I decided as far as why that didn't work out. Um, I think a lot of it is that he had so many responsibilities that he wouldn't have been focused so much on girls and romance. Um, until of course he met cinder. Um, but at the same time, I mean, he, he is a teenage guy. So clearly he, I think that it's likely to think that he would have been looking around the castle and seeing, you know, just the people there and maybe making eyes at some girls at some different points, but I don't believe that he ever had anything serious to senders the first love, which is always great. Yeah. And that's a trope I, that I do so often and I love, I love the first love trope. Um, and I, as a grownup, there's a part of me that always feels like, is this really realistic that all of them happily ever after, and they're the ones, um, which in real life, of course, I think that it's natural and healthy to, you know, date a few different people and figure out what it really is that you need and wants in a person. But fiction, I just really love that idea of, of meeting the one and, and it being right. I like that idea too. My husband and I are kind of high school sweethearts. So I love the idea of just picking one and saying that one, I'm gonna have that one from Danielle. And I do think that there's something too, when you find the one, they're the one, like sometimes it happens in high school and sometimes it doesn't happen until much, much later. But I know when I met my husband, there was no question that he was the one for me. Oh, that's wonderful. How do you feel about don't get glamour? Do you know what that is? No, but it sounds like that murder podcast, like the it's actually inspired by a Twilight podcast where at the end they say, don't get bitten. So I started at the end of our podcasts. We say, don't get glamored until next time don't get glamored right now. Everybody's trying to think of fun ones for heartless and, Oh, we already thought of one for instant karma, but we don't have one yet for heartless or for the Renegade series. Okay. What's the instant karma one don't mess with prudence. Cute. Um, are you going to do Ferris and stars above also as part of your podcasts, everything you've ever written, where are you thinking? I do COVID one 28. Oh my gosh. Um, what would you do? I mean, don't get your head cut off. Don't lose your head would be a good total. Is your head. Yeah. Um, for renegades, huh? I know we had someone say don't get neutralized, but we can't use that until one of the later books. So we need something in the beginning. I don't know. We have a few years. You're good. Don't be a villain. I do like, don't get neutralized though. I do too. We just won't be able to use it for the first few. Uh, it'll be awhile before we get to use it. So we need something like a placeholder. Yeah. Yeah. What's the, I'm trying to remember. One cannot be brave. He has. Yeah. Um, it doesn't really work for anything. Does it until next time be brave, I guess. Yeah. There's also the, the, do you have what it takes that? Okay. Done. Yes. That was really excited. So clearly that works. Don't get, glamored kind of came in the middle of an episode we were talking and I just was like, yeah, we would just say like, cause one of my friends love step one of my former Becca loves that murder podcast. Um, so we, uh, that kind of just came when we were having a conversation. I was like, we could say, don't get glamored. That would be fun. Yeah. No, that's cute. I like it. I'm trying to think. Is it stay sexy and don't get murdered? I think, I think I haven't listened to that podcast. Um, that is what they say at the end. Yeah. Probably the famous podcast ever. I know. I know. I it's funny. I actually, Oh gosh, I hope this doesn't turn anybody off, but I did. I listened to the, started listening to the very first episode cause I loved true crime and I'd heard so many people say how much they love this. And in the very first episode, they're talking about a really famous murder that was like a, had a documentary about it. And they started poking fun of a theory as to what happened that I am convinced that this is actually what happened. And this is ridiculous that people believe this. I was like, okay, I'm done.
Speaker 3:Not fair.
Speaker 2:My, my favorite, uh, true crime podcast is called unsolved murders. And they, uh, do scenes where they acted out kind of like an old radio show with like sound effects and music and voice actors. And it's a really good one to listen to. Oh, cool. That sounds great. But all nonfiction, all nonfiction. It's all true crimes solved crimes. Yeah. No, that sounds fascinating. It's really good. I like it. I think that was all the questions I had for you. Cool. Out of 317,
Speaker 3:Are you able to boil it down?
Speaker 2:We did my, I, I really have to thank my Patrion team. They helped me a lot. Trying to figure out all the answers to some of the questions, some of the questions we were like, I know that answer is in the universe. We just have to find it. Yeah, I've done this so many interviews and I'm sure I probably contradict myself at times.
Speaker 3:[inaudible]
Speaker 2:So tell. So let's tell people where they can find you and the fan pod, if, for people who want to go listen. So Prince County fan pod is everywhere. You can. We have a website we're on Instagram, that Prince KPM pod, uh, Apple podcast, Spotify, Stitcher, I heart radio, Google. I have a Facebook page that no one pays attention to, uh, on Twitter, which I'm still trying to figure out. Awesome. Well, I, I hope that people will go listen and relive the lunar Chronicles with you. How fun? Yes. We're about to start crest, which is very exciting. Cause it's my favorite book, but I'm told it's most people's favorite books. So it is, I would say it's yeah. The winner as far as favorites go, mostly I think just because of captain thorn, he is definitely my favorite character. Uh, and then Creswell is, is, has my whole heart, so well, thank you. I'm so happy. Yeah. Well thank you very much for doing this Bethany. Thank you so much for having me. This is a very surreal dream come true. Good luck with the podcast. Um, and yeah, well, I'll be whenever if ever you want me to come on and answer more questions or anything? You just let me know. That would be wonderful. Awesome readers. Check out the Prince Kai fan pod from, um, anywhere you listen to podcasts, as, as Bethany said, and you can subscribe to this podcast so that you can always be in the know about new episodes and you can find me on Instagram at Marissa Meyer author and happy podcast until next time stay healthy and cozy out there and your bunkers and whatever life throws at you today. I do hope that now you're feeling a little bit
Speaker 1:[inaudible].