Marissa chats with Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner about their newest YA sci-fi/fantasy novel - THE OTHER SIDE OF THE SKY - as well as balancing science and magic in one world; the challenge and brilliance of writing a romance in which the two protagonists aren't allowed to touch each other; preserving a sense of joy and escapism with our writing, even if that means letting yourself be distracted by side projects once in a while; and how many of us are writing a little slower in 2020... which is totally okay.
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/
Marissa chats with Amie Kaufman and Meagan Spooner about their newest YA sci-fi/fantasy novel - THE OTHER SIDE OF THE SKY - as well as balancing science and magic in one world; the challenge and brilliance of writing a romance in which the two protagonists aren't allowed to touch each other; preserving a sense of joy and escapism with our writing, even if that means letting yourself be distracted by side projects once in a while; and how many of us are writing a little slower in 2020... which is totally okay.
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. The thing that has been making me happy this week is the nightmare. Before Christmas. I love this movie so much. I have loved it since it first came out and I saw it in theaters. I don't even know how many years ago that was. Um, but now having little kids and introducing it to them, we've kind of started this family tradition where we always watch the movie around Halloween and it feels like the perfect way to kick off the holiday season. And I am so excited for the holiday season. So this year, instead of going trick or treating, we will be snuggling up and watching Jack the pumpkin King and the nightmare before Christmas. And I am so excited. Of course, by the time you guys are hearing this Halloween will be over, but nevertheless, I am really looking forward to it. And I am so happy to be talking to today's guests between the two of them. They have written more than 20 books for young adult and middle grade readers as a co-writing duo. They are the authors of the Starbound trilogy and the unearth duology their newest co-written adventure. The other side of the sky came out this September, kicking up a new duology that merges science fiction and fantasy. Please welcome Amy Kaufman and Megan Spooner. Thank you so much for having us. It's great to be here. I am so excited to have you. I loved these broken stars when it first came out so many years ago and I just really, really enjoyed the other side of the sky. So I'm so excited to have you guys, Oh, it's lovely to be here. This is, I mean, this podcast is, is, has been my, my lockdown pick me up where on day as we record this day, 111 of lockdown here in Melbourne, and this has been my happy place. So it's lovely to get to join in. Well, I'm so happy to hear that is locked down. Do you think it's different where you are than it is in the States? Like what, what precautions are people having to take in Australia? Oh, it's, there's a whole podcast in that it's, it's very, very different in Australia. Uh, the response on the whole has been very different. Uh, here locked down has meant, uh, all retail closed or food closed, except for takeout. Uh, no one going more than five kilometers or three miles from home only leaving home for two hours a day. We had a curfew for much of it. Essentially the whole of Melbourne just went home and stayed home unless we had to go to the supermarket. And that was it
Speaker 1:Legally mandated. It's actually something that everyone there is doing. It's not
Speaker 3:Like here where kind of half the population is isolating and being careful and you know, some people aren't and yeah. You know, there's actual steps being taken there and progress being made.
Speaker 4:Yeah, no, I mean, that's,
Speaker 3:You know, I mean, it's nice, but at the same time, I mean like the people there haven't seen their families and you know, what, how many months now, Amy?
Speaker 4:Well, wait, I mean, we haven't seen my husband's parents since the start of the year, which is rough because we've got a 17 months old and she knows who they are through FaceTime. So there's that, but a very wise friend said to me that this has been a great time for us to master the art of both end, which is to say, I am both grateful that we have a United response and I'm just going out and we can, we can be more than one thing, but I mean, the upside is that locked down is about to ease here. Uh, we, we've gone from a high of 725 cases a day back in July. We asked state has 6 million people. Um, when now when a second day in a row of zero cases, zero deaths. And that's where the really comprehensive testing raging. Wonderful. So pretty soon we all get to go outside again. Pretty soon we get to get to, you know, eat out and stuff. And I've actually been thinking about how am I going to do that in a responsible way on my social media, because I don't want people in other areas to see you know, me at a restaurant and think, Oh, well, it must be fine. And it's fine for me because I just spent nearly four months locked inside my house and there is no virus, not because it's fun. So that's something I'm definitely trying to think about how to be setting a good example while still doing the stuff. Right, right. No, that's interesting to think about, um, and of course it's, I dunno, that gives me some, some hope and some optimism to think that, okay, this a country that has done it correctly, you know, now here's the results of that, which is really great to hear. Absolutely. And I mean, we're, we're heading into, we've done our second wave and we're heading into summer. So we've just had our winter down here. Yeah. I mean, certainly the advice I'm giving to friends in the U S right now is as, as you head into your second wave, if there are things you can do that will make your winter easier, do them now, because, you know, we did little things, you know, whether it was, there was a safe way to get a haircut or when everyone else was panicked buying toilet paper at the side of the pandemic, uh, we bought an inflatable hot tub instead. And let me tell you best money I have ever spent in my life.
Speaker 3:The number of times I've gone to do some brainstorming with Amy for the CQL to the other side of the sky. And she's been like in the hot tub while we're doing our work, it's amazing.
Speaker 4:It is in my back garden. So I have no idea what the neighbors think of the conversations they must be hearing, but I've chosen not to really engage with that question because I want to be there and, you know, I don't want to be self-conscious about it. So I think that is both material. I think to myself, plenty of people would kill to over hear this conversation. You're lucky. That's right. But when you can, you know, give them a copy of the book with a little note around it, just leave it on their doorstep. Here's what all of this has led to. Yeah. Yeah. You were a part of it. Um, on that note, why don't you guys tell listeners what is the other side of the sky about? Ooh, so, so the other side of the sky is, I mean, it's two things, it's a story. And it was also, it was an experiment for us. Uh, one that we were very relieved worked out, but the story part of it is it's a story about a Prince who falls from a high-tech city in the sky. And he lands in a world below that, that he didn't know existed. That's ruled by magic and prophecy, and he meets a living goddess there. And he discovers that he is a part of one of her prophecy, but I just make, do you want to talk about sort of the challenge that we set ourselves in writing it?
Speaker 3:I mean, one of the things that we like to do as co-authors is challenge ourselves and try to do books that are just a little bit outside of our comfort zone, so that we're sort of forced to improve our craft and uproot, improve our abilities while we've got a partner there to tear us on. Uh, so at the other side of the sky, we had, well, actually two challenges that we set for ourselves. And one was to see if we could write a book that so carefully straddles the line between science fiction and fantasy that at any given time, the reader doesn't really know what kind of book they're reading. You know, when we're in the Prince's point of view and North's point of view, it reads like a science fiction novel, but when we're in NIMS point of view, the goddess is point of view. It's absolutely a fantasy novel because you know, the magic that she is using is real to her. Whereas North looks at it and says, well, that's just science that you haven't explained yet. Um, and so that was sort of the initial challenge that we set ourselves with our, with this book. But the other one has to do with the fact that as a goddess, Nim is not allowed to touch another human or else risk losing her divinity. And so we wanted to see if we could write a romance between two characters who can't touch each other. We wanted to see if we could do something sort of steamy and longing and really tense with the romantic tension between these characters, but they never kiss, you
Speaker 2:Know, they
Speaker 3:Never hug each other. They never hold each other's hands.
Speaker 2:Okay. You perfectly summarized probably the top two things that I wanted to talk to you about. Um, let's start with the romance because I loved it for starters, both of these characters are so well-developed and to watch them begin in these two very different places and to watch them come together, I mean, it was just a great romantic tale. Um, and, and of course that's always my favorite part of just about any book that I read, I'm looking for those that spark and that romantic tension. And, you know, you say that this was kind of an experiment for you to have this, this character who cannot touch. They literally cannot touch without very dire consequences. And to me, it just felt like an absolute genius ploy on your part to build sexual tension, because there's no outlet for it. There's nowhere for it to go. And I thought that is brilliant
Speaker 3:Is the problem with talking about our books with another author is like, you know, all the tricks, you know exactly what we're doing, you see behind the curtain.
Speaker 2:Wow. Um, so you say that it was, but it was more of an experiment to see if you could do it. So tell me about writing the romance in keeping out this physical element of it. What were some of the challenges that, that brought plenty? There was so many times, I think when we looked at each other and said, look at challenges, one thing, why have we done this too? Because I mean, the thing is that, I mean, you'll know this as well, that if, if you're doing it right, as you're writing, you want them to kiss too. It's not just the Rita who should be hanging out for it. You know, if you're building a really believable romance and you're submerging yourself in it, as you write, you should also be screaming for it to happen. So I don't know if it's any comfort to people who spend the entire book screaming, just kiss already, but we still do the same thing.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Like the number of times we were like, well, we can, like, we can bend the rules. Right. Or like, have them touch through a piece of fabric or something. Right.
Speaker 2:And, you know, we had
Speaker 3:To just like, be like, no, come on, stay strong. We can do it.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I remember at one point, one of my references was the old TV series pushing daisies, um, which for Phyllis industry might not be familiar with. It is about a guy who has the power, that if someone is dead and he touches them, it will bring them back to life. But if he touches them again, they will return to death. And so he uses it to solve crime, you know, touches someone, they wake up who killed you, touches them, sends them back again. Uh, but he touches the Gill. He loves and can never touch her again because
Speaker 4:She'll return to death. And there are all these gorgeous things where they sort of wear hazmat suits and slow waltz and stuff. And I remember at one point making that argument to Meg being like, what if they just like, hold hands, but they've got like a blanket between their hands or something and make was like, once you open those dams And she was right, she was absolutely right. But I think one of the challenges in doing this stuff, and it's something that Meg does particularly well. And I feel I've learned from her because, you know, when you're the best thing about co-authoring is you learn from each other. Absolutely. But one of the things make, does really well that she started doing in these Birkenstocks and has done ever since is creating a sense of romance without going to the big stuff. Like, you know, like a kiss or even holding hands, because whether it's a literary romance or a real one, you know, you can't put the toothpaste back in the tube. Like, you know, if you think about someone that you've got a crush on and like the absolute tingle of the first time that you hold hands, but a little while into the relationship holding hands is normal. And you know, the thrill of the first kiss, but after a little while you just kiss each other, hello, and that's you, that's lovely in its own way and has a wonderful kind of depth and strength to it. But when you're trying to create the tingles of romance in a book, you know, you have to Dole it out really carefully. And Meg is really, really good at slowing down and noticing all of the little bits in between those big signposts noticing, noticing someone's hands or noticing the way that they move and sort of all this stuff that we do, but she pulls it up to consciousness really well and makes it frankly quite sexy at times. Thank you.
Speaker 3:That's so nice.
Speaker 2:So I will agree. It is quite sexy at times for a book that has no physical touching. There were times when I was tingling, I was like, Oh my gosh, it's so romantic.
Speaker 3:We had our editor, uh, uh, who is brilliant. And I think this is maybe the only thing that we like didn't take her advice on. She wanted us to like take out some of the stemminess. She was like, this is too
Speaker 2:[inaudible].
Speaker 3:And, uh, that was when we were like, Oh, I think, I think we did. I think, I think we might've pulled this up. If, if our editors like, actually this is like too sexy.
Speaker 2:Oh, funny. Yeah. No, I think you absolutely pulled it off and I am dying to know what
Speaker 4:Book two has in store.
Speaker 2:Uh, so I'll just go ahead and jump to, how is book two coming? Do we have a release date for when can I get it?
Speaker 4:Well, I mean, well, those are all separate questions you can ask.
Speaker 2:Yeah. It's um, look, I mean, it's
Speaker 4:In the same way. Most books are in 2020, which is to say more slowly than anticipated. Uh, and I mean, we're, I think we're still having a discussion about what the release date will be, but I think one thing around this that I think, and I know that, you know, you've talked with other guests about this and I think it kind of can't be said enough is that if listeners feel like they're really kind of going slowly this year to know that they're not alone in that. And I think we all have this feeling of like, well, come on, you're home more than ever. Surely you should be getting some writing time in, but it's not that easy right now.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And like one of the things that we are very careful about when we write together is preserving the joy and the fun, because I really think that one of the reasons our books together, one of the reasons that they work is that any, and I genuinely are having huge amounts of fun when we're writing them. And that kind of, I think, spills over into the book. I think if you're not having fun, readers can tell and everything right now is harder than usual. You know, everybody's tempers are a little bit shorter. Everyone's stress is a little bit higher. Every task is just like a little bit harder, sometimes a lot harder. And so we're sort of taking it more slowly than we normally do because we're really working to preserve that joy. Anytime it stops feeling fun or stops feeling like we really want to write the next chapter, we kind of take a step back and we take a little bit of a break and we do some of the things that refill our creative well, and we talk about what's coming up next in the book and make sure that we're both anticipating the same things and kind of build up our excitement about the book again, before we get back to it. So, I mean, it is taking us longer. Uh, so it's unlikely. I think that it will come out at the same time, like a year from now, but it is good.
Speaker 4:Yep. We're working on it. I think I keep repeating to myself a piece of wisdom that the very clever and very experienced golf Nick's passed along to me recently, which I mean, you know, we all know it, but sometimes I think it helps to hear someone, you know, who's, who's one of the masters of, of what we do say it, which was better the right book light than the wrong book on time and well, and I mean, I always say to, to newer writers that I mentor that you don't get to put the book out with a little asterisk beside the title. And then when they turn it over and they looked down the bottom on the back under the barcode, it says this would have been even better, but I just didn't have enough time to write it. And my editor may be handed it, you know, once it's out, it's out, you don't, there's no postscript. There's no, you don't get to sort of give a caveat. You don't get to put the asterisks. So it needs to be right. It needs to be as good as you know how to make it. No, absolutely true.
Speaker 2:And I'll do my best, not to pressure you and complain and whine. Um, but think that's kind of fuel. Actually. There you go. I'll keep at it now. Um, but it does make me wonder because I, I agree. I mean, writing, it's funny this year, my next novel that I'm under contract for so slow, like the writing for it has been at a snail's pace. All of the other ideas I have that I'm not under contract for, I've been like so much fun. Like all I want to do is this other random thing. Um, and I, I'm not really sure where that's coming from and why there seems to be like this constant push and pull between the two. Um, but I definitely think it has something to do with COVID and quarantine and now the election and just all of the things kind of stirring up so much anxiety and so many emotions for however, that then translates to positivity.
Speaker 3:One of the reasons that a lot of us get into writing is for the escapism. It's the same reason that a lot of us get into reading it's for the sort of joy and fun of being carried away into a story. And of course your mind is going to want to go to the sort of delicious, maybe slightly forbidden ideas that you're not like contracted or quote unquote supposed to be writing at this time. I mean, you're going to shy away from responsibility when you're under stress and do the thing that's fun and shiny and new and novel.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And having the exact same problem. I mean, absolutely. I mean, yeah. Matt gave me an impassioned speech the other day about why a project she should be working on should in fact be something else entirely. I mean, the thing is that something else entirely sounds amazing. And I voted for it. I think I re I remember, um, Meg is the one who introduced me to, you know, a phrase from the golden compass where I think Leora talks about the idea of, um, ideas, having a soap bubble stage, where they're very beautiful to look at, but very delicate. And if you touch them, they're gone. And I think, I feel like all the pressure around us has kind of heightened that a little bit. So I know, you know, I'm, I'm working on a book at the moment that won't be out for another few years, but I'm very deliberately, even though I'm bursting to talk about it, I'm deliberately not talking even to my critique partners about it. They know it exists, but they don't know much of what's inside because I'm trying to keep that sense of wonder and excitement. And I know it was right now, as soon as the outside touches it, it will become more like work to me. Whereas right now it's like my own private adventure. Yeah, no, exactly. That's exactly the, the way that those projects can feel sometimes. And, uh, yeah, your own escape. And I think so important then have something that at least keeps you tied to your own creativity and keeps you in that mindset of, Hey, writing is fun. I really love doing this. Yeah. I think early on in all of this, I saw a Twitter thread from a radical Delilah Dawson who talked about how the fact that she has a lot of experience of writing through really hard life events. And one of the things she said that really stuck with me that I've used every day, since I feel like I will probably have to post her a copy of every book I successfully write during this time, uh, was that she said that it can really help to reframe your writing in your head away from, I have to do this today, too. I get to do this today. I in good conscience, I get to leave the whole world behind and slip away into my fantasy place and daydream and play. And I get to do that rather than got to get some words down.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I mean, I think one of the things we tend to do, especially when we're new to being published writers or writers under contract, like soon to be published writers, one of the things we've had to do is learn to write often and with consistency. And I think that that often translates into work. You know, we have to train ourselves to think of this thing that has been a hobby. We have to think of it as our jobs, but after a while, I do think that that can impact how you actually feel about the act of writing. You know, it starts to feel like work instead of play. Uh, and just because it's hard sometimes doesn't mean it can't be hard and fun.
Speaker 2:Right? Yeah. Megan, I talk about this a lot, this idea that hard work and fun and not mutually exclusive. Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, definitely. It's just before, when we were chatting before we started the recording, um, we brought up jigsaw puzzles and I love jigsaw puzzles in part because they are a challenge and it is, you know, making your brain try to fit things together. And it can be very relaxing, very enjoyable for me, not for everyone. Um, but it's also a challenge and I kind of think of writing in that same way. Like it's part of the reason it is fun for me is because it's also a challenge.
Speaker 3:Well, and I think so I, a hundred percent agree with you and I'm a huge, uh, jigsaw fan. In fact, uh, Stephanie Perkins lives really close to me and we have monthly, uh, puzzle days where I just go to her house and we like sit there with her cat and do puzzles and listen to music all day. And we like, don't talk to each other. We like catch up for 20 minutes and then it's just like silence. But I think that a lot of writers like jigsaw puzzles. And I think it's because it's that same kind of focus where for the first, you know, 20 minutes, half an hour, couple of hours, however long it takes you to do chicks out puzzles. It doesn't look like much. You haven't made much progress. You know, you've maybe done the border and maybe like a couple of clumps of things, but doesn't really look like a picture yet. And that's the way putting together a novel is at the beginning. It's a little pieces here and there, but suddenly you get to a point where you can actually see the picture that it's going to be, and you can start filling in things faster and faster. And that sense of satisfaction builds. And then it's just super fun to be able to look at the finished picture. I mean, I think it's very much like writing a book.
Speaker 2:No, I agree. I think they have a ton of parallels and I think you described it perfectly. So I'm curious with you guys, co-writing, you've now co-written number of books together. Is this what you're sixth, seventh while we're on number seven right now, the sun number seven. Um, so going through now COVID and quarantine, and I think one of the biggest negatives for a lot of authors has been that we've lost some of these social outlets. You know, we're not going to book festivals, we're not going to conferences and, or writing retreats or these moments that we used to have kind of scattered throughout the year in which we'd be able to get together with other writers and talk shop and talk craft. And I think it's, it's, it's harmful to us when we don't have that because so many of us rely on that to kind of recharge our batteries and help us, um, you know, be motivated and inspired again. So I'm curious, do you think that the two of you co-writing together has that helped you to be able to kind of stay connected to another writer throughout this? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the thing is we, we do a mix of things. Like we, we write together, we also constantly kind of having craft conversations because that's one of the ways when we hit a snag, we don't just sort of try writing it 10 different ways. We sit down and pick apart the craft of it and work out, you know, why is this not working and what are we trying to achieve and how will it, how will we approach it? Um, but we also do the social bit as well, because I think that that social bit, even for writers who are introverts, you know, it's still important to get together with other writers and, you know, because it's such a weird job, if nothing else, you have to get together with other writers and go, this is weird, right. Nobody
Speaker 3:Else really understands, but you
Speaker 2:Know, it's, it's what affirms to you that, you know, you're, you're not losing your mind. It actually is a really strange job, but I think maybe I make sure that we do the social thing as well. And that, you know, we're also besties. We're also chatting all day about other things. We're also, you know, just before we jumped on with you where, um, we're both reading the same audio book at the moment and, and Meg has read it before and I have not. And I just hit a particular plot twist and I was just screaming at her in all caps about like that. She's just gleefully waiting
Speaker 4:For me to reach I'm sure. Sightly patients not saying a word, uh, but we do, we do the craft stuff together and the writing stuff together. And we also do the fun stuff together. We're often scribbling away at something together on the side. That's nothing to do with our published work. That's just,
Speaker 3:Just something fun for us, our own private adventure, so to speak. And we also like do stuff. I mean, we do stuff that other people are doing during quarantine. We will simultaneously watch an episode of TV and like chat to each other on Slack while we watch or, um, you know, go for walks and talk on the phone while we're walking. Although that's less so with, with the broken leg, but someday maybe. Yeah.
Speaker 4:Well, I mean, you have flatmates for years, the two of us plus my husband. And so, you know, Megan, my husband have a board game date once a week where, you know, they, they jump on FaceTime and virtually play a board game together. And, you know, daughter just constantly tries to kiss my face on the screen, my hand into, but yeah, it's yeah, I think you, you have to very deliberately craft a lot of stuff to be together right now because I know I'm really missing saying PayPal and I know it's going to be a while longer before that happens. So it's not enough to just think, well, it will be great when we can, you know, I think we've had to be really proactive about finding that happiness because I've been thinking a lot about something that makes it to me the other day, um, that I'm sure you won't mind me repeating Meg. Um, no, we would. One of the things you said to me was that when we were just a couple of books in to our Korea, we were full of lots of advice for new writers. Um, you know, as, as everyone is, and you were saying that for you all these books later, uh, what it's just distilled down to is that writers should do whatever it takes to maintain the joy in their work. And my number one piece of advice, for sure. Right? Because if that's not happening, then none of the rest of it really matters. And so I think we've been doing a lot of stuff to come, you know, consciously to do that, to, to make sure that there's a lot of fun around work as well, because when we both get really exhausted, we sometimes fall back to just communicating about work, but it never takes as long to realize like, Oh, this always makes it worse. We gotta stop. We gotta pause for a day. We got to get on a video chat and Ben talk of work and just, you know, shoot the breeze for a couple of hours. Yeah, yeah, no, I think, I mean, obviously that's a lot of what this whole podcast is about. So I appreciate hearing you guys say that and I kind of just want to like talk for the next six hours with you. This is what I was saying was at the start that like, I mean, I've been listening because it's filling that hole for me. It's giving me that, you know, these are the conversations that, you know, if anyone's ever wonder what happens in green rooms, this is what happens in the green room at the,
Speaker 2:At the festival. It's just a whole bunch of artists going and how do you do it? And how do you do it? You know, none of us know what we're doing most of the time. I think, you know, the most distressing thing that you learned in your writing career is after a couple of books, you realize that you have not yet learned how to write a book because you cannot learn how to write a book because every book is different.
Speaker 3:Yeah. You can only learn how you wrote the last book and you only realize that after it's done
Speaker 2:Right. Which is, you know, but I think, yeah, I, one of the reasons I've been loving this podcast is it gives me that feeling of just listening to my PS chatter away. It's just, it, it fills up something that's very hard to feel at the moment. So it's really meant a lot. Well, I'm so glad to hear that. And it's obviously been really great for me personally, uh, being able to like, this is the way that I've tried to maintain these connections, um, outside of going to festivals and conferences. So, uh, and of course love getting to talk to so many amazing authors. It's just like this huge bonus on top of everything. Um, I do want to go back to the other side of the sky and we were talking earlier, when you were talking about how you approached this book with these two experiments in mind, one being let's write a romance in which they can't touch. And the other, you talked about how you wanted to write something that was like exactly 50% scifi and 50% fantasy. And it really blurs the line between those two genres. And I would say, you nailed it. I think it was brilliant the way that the two were blended together. And so just kinda talk to me, talk me through that. Like, how did you go about crafting this world? That is, it's both, it is a fantasy high fantasy world and it is very futuristic scifi at the same time. How did you kind of go about building this? What were we thinking hearing you say that, Oh man, no wonder, it felt hard.
Speaker 3:One of the things that made it, that made it work was that when we were doing the world building of this world, we weren't just building the present day world. We were also building the world as it existed a thousand years ago, because that's when these two people split when part of the population went to live in these cities in the sky. And the other part of the population lived below. And so we had to kind of know what was going on that caused this split, even though it wasn't something that was going to show up, at least not in book one, we had to know. And so it let us put this sort of sense of history into the world, which meant that we could have one group sort of accelerate its learning, it sort of scientific advancement while the other group was sort of more dependent upon magic and sort of, um, faith and, and I mean, North would say superstition then would say prophecy, but even he would say superstition, but so sure. Yeah.
Speaker 4:Yeah. And I think that that, that divide is actually, I think what also helped that we each take stewardship of a character, you know, I write North and make rights in them. And a part of that means you're sort of seeing the world from their point of view and you're sort of defending their point of view a little bit. So it means that, you know, every time I, as North tried to explain something, eScience Meg was there as Nim to be like, but what about this bit that doesn't, that doesn't fit with your scientific explanation? Does it okay.
Speaker 3:And one of the things we wanted to do was be able to have them have these conversations about things that are deeply personal and deeply important to them both and have opposing views, but not any sort of loss or lack of respect for each other. I mean, they actually fall in love while still having opposing views. And that was one of the other things that we wanted to do in this book really, which I think is pretty timely here in the us. Um, given that our country is more divided and more sort of black and white yes or no all or nothing sort of divided. And, you know, we wanted to show that you could have different views and still like each other, you could have different views and talk about it in such a way that you don't completely denigrate the other person's views. And I think when you have somebody in a fantasy world or in a science fiction world who can still respect the other world, it means that both of those worlds feel equally real, you know, you don't have one being sort of trampled underneath the other.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I think that's right. And I think that, I mean, obviously, you know, there are, there are subjects on which this can be done subjects on which this can't be done. You know, if the, if the other person's view takes away someone's rights or, you know, something of that nature, then, you know, that's not a conversation to which there are two sides, but you know, there are lots of conversations where actually there are lots of different views that could be valid and lots of reviews that could be held to different degrees. And I think, you know, one thing that we've heard from readers a lot on that was interesting to me because I, I, I don't know that I particularly spotted it as we were writing, though. You might have mag is that NIMS belief system says that she cannot be touched and that if she is touched, she will lose her divinity and North, you know, does not. I was trying to think of a non-scary way to say, but North does believe this and thinks this is a load of various sense of things. And, uh, but he, but he respects her request. Nonetheless, you know, like there's instant respect of her, of her belief system. He instantly goes with it, even though he's pretty sure she's not a goddess. And that in fact there is no divinity to be lost if,
Speaker 3:Oh, I was super aware of it. One of the things that I really loved about North was that he never disrespected that like he understood even before he really understood who she was and the world that she lived in, that it was important to her. And I mean, if we can talk about the sort of meta conversation behind the book, I mean, it's a, it's a question of consent. It's not a big deal to him, whether he touches her or not. It's a big deal to her though. And she's the one whose life and views and beliefs would be forever altered if he touched her. And, you know, even though he really badly wants to touch her more and more as the book goes on, you know, he's never like tempted, you know, he's never sort of carried away so much by his passion that he like almost touches her or something. Like he never scares her that way. And I think
Speaker 4:He's capable.
Speaker 3:Like it's really beautiful and kind. Yeah.
Speaker 4:And he's, he comes from a, he comes from a community, the, that when we were doing the well building around his community, you know, we tried to think a lot about the various ways that they would have evolved and, you know, the, the, um, the place where they live, you know, the they're on a series of islands in the sky with limited space. And like, it will always be limited, you know, they will never, the islands will not grow, which means that you always have to work with the resources that you work with. And so we, we let that shape the community a lot in terms of, you know, the way they dress and the way they interact. But we also tried to think about, I guess, ways in which they might've evolved in which we hope our community will evolve. And, you know, one of them was that he, the reason that, that he and I weren't spending a lot of time, I guess, you know, in his point of view, thinking about, Oh, well this is an issue of consent and I mustn't touch it because she said no is to, because to him, you know, that's, that's efficient water. He can't even see it. Consent is just a part of how he thinks. And so it, you know, it doesn't occur to him that, that he would violate, you know, her requests. That's just, just not a part of, you know, how many ideas
Speaker 3:M is able to feel safe around him in a way that she doesn't ever really get to feel safe around anyone else. I mean, her people know that they're not allowed to touch her, but neither is she allowed to be a human with them. Whereas with Nora, she can be herself and she can be human and flawed and, you know, have her own sort of questions and moments of shaken faith. Uh, but knowing that he, he will be there for her and he will respect what, wherever she comes out in her own sort of struggles with these questions.
Speaker 2:No. And that was one of the things that I loved about North in particular is that he does show up in this world with a fair amount of skepticism. And, you know, he, like you, you've kind of touched on, he comes from a world of science. He believes in science, he believes in technology when Nim goes into, you know, it's magic, it's prophecy. He's very quick to be like, eh, okay, you think it's magic, but it's science that just, we haven't been able to explain yet. And there's a lot of skepticism there, but at the same time, he is always willing to listen. Uh, and he never, at any point just like shuts down the conversation and he's always willing to kind of go along with it. And I'm like, well, okay, let's explore. Let's ask the, what if question, uh, which I, I thought, um, it, like, it's very timely for today and a lot of the conversations that are happening in our modern world. Um, and so I just loved seeing that and loved how those two characters together really carried this, this idea of magic and science. Yeah. It's um, every time, because the thing is, Maggie is really good at writing quite compelling arguments. And so quite often Nim would say something and I'd be like, yes, I'm buying it. Wait a minute. I would have to literally stop and place myself and think, okay. And if you had literally gone to a world that you didn't know existed, and they were like, hi, this is magic. You wouldn't be convinced by this. You know, you would like, you would, even though in this moment, it's, it's very compelling and I'm having trouble breaking away from it. I had to keep putting myself back into what's my point of view. And, you know, I, Amy Kaufman, you know, human of earth who walks the dog and goes to the shops and watches, television, and lives, the life that we all live, which is what North does, although he doesn't walk the dog because he's unfamiliar with animals, limited space, but he, um, you know, he's, he's like us. And so I had to keep asking myself, you know, would this actually convince me in my real life, if this had happened, uh, and, and gathering the streets to not be convinced,
Speaker 3:It's so funny that you started out being like, what are the things make does really well, because I was literally opening my mouth to say, what are the things that Amy does really well,
Speaker 2:Let me stop you. Sorry, go on.
Speaker 3:Is that sort of sarcastic, you were talking about how he's, uh, you know, really skeptical at the beginning and Amy is so good at that humorous skepticism and the way it's expressed in North's voice while still not being cruel, because the way that North listens is also the way that Amy listens. I mean, we all have pieces of ourselves that show up in our characters. I mean, that's just being a writer. And I think with North it's that combination of humor and kindness where, I mean, some of the stuff that North thinks or says makes me laugh out loud, but I'm never like, dang North. That was me. And, you know, like I'm not her left being thinking that like he's terrible or that he thinks poorly of Nim or even really that he thinks poorly of her world.
Speaker 2:So I'm always having never cope, written a novel before. I always want to know about the nitty-gritty. How does it work? How do you balance the writing and the responsibilities, but probably one of the things that I'm always so curious about when it comes to co-writing is what do you guys do when you disagree on something?
Speaker 3:This I think is our most commonly asked question, because I think to a lot of people, it seems kind of particularly people who are creative and who do write and who do create, it seems kind of unthinkable to give up control of your vision or your ideas and let somebody else kind of take over, which is kind of, I think what most people imagine is what's happening is that like, for certain, in certain areas, one of us is in charge. And then in other areas, another, you know, the other one is in charge, but actually that, isn't how it ends up working with us. We, for the most part have the same general vision for the story. And whenever it happens that, you know, I might have idea a, you know, go down this, this path while Amy has idea be to go down this other path. What that actually means is that neither of us has found the correct path if we had both of us would instantly be like, Oh yeah, that's, that's the right idea. And sometimes that does happen. One of us finds the right path and the other one is like, Oh yeah, that's better. But when we both think we've found it and the other one is like, I don't know, it actually means that we need to take a step back. And sort of, this is what Amy was talking about when she said that we kind of do the craft work sometimes where you kind of like pick everything apart and we try to figure out, okay, what about path a is particularly appealing to you? And what about B is particularly appealing to me? And then we'll figure out a way to do a scene or a twist for a character that incorporates them both. So it's, you know, it's not that it was option a or option B, it's actually sort of secret option C.
Speaker 4:Hmm. Yeah. And we literally talk about that. Like we literally say, okay, let's figure out secret option C. We go digging for it. Because I think, I mean, what people want to the, the, the white people usually phrase the question is, do you find the answer is no, we never fight every so often, you know, as makes sense, we have different ideas, but we more experience it as sort of standing side by side, staring at a whiteboard saying with a real curiosity and like, ah, interesting. Okay. Tell me more about why that feels right to you. Like, let me get in your shoes and understand it, and then I'll get you in my shoes. And I think, you know, I mean, we, we were flatmates for years. I mean, we don't really fight. We were flatmates views and occasionally everyone would get very hangry and squabble. And then one of us would say, do you want a cup of tea? And the other one would say yes. And then that would be the end. But I think, you know, we, we always say like, if you can, if you can share a house and figure out who does the dishes, you can probably figure out most things. And that sense of sort of standing side by side. And I think of having great faith in the other person's writing ability and having great faith, but they don't come up with bad ideas. You know, if, if they say there's something, there there's something there. And I mean, being willing to just have a look, I think
Speaker 3:To co-write with somebody, you have to really truly love their writing. You have to love their writing and you have to respect the, the mind that produces that writing and the process that they use, even if it's different from yours and you have to have faith and you have to believe that the other person is doing what they think is best for the book, the same way that you are, that you're, you're on the same team. You know, you're both doing the same thing. You're both trying to get the same end result, which is that book that you can look back at and say, yeah, I, I have no regrets. I like the way that we did that.
Speaker 4:So I know you both have done solo works as well as, as co-writing. Do you feel that co-writing has influenced the books that you then write on your own in any way?
Speaker 3:Uh, yeah.
Speaker 4:I mean, beyond the, we learn a lot from each other. And so therefore, you know, of course all the, all the things you learned from the other person show up in your books, but I mean, neither of us have a completely write anything on our own.
Speaker 3:Yeah. We're in a stackable now from each other. In fact, uh, I, uh, my book, well, I probably shouldn't say which one it is, cause this is slightly spoiler-y. Um, I had a book that I was writing that where I had written, I think the first, I don't know, two chapters, three chapters, and I had set up the love interest and the villain and sort of like all the key players. And I sent it through to Amy because, you know, she's my sort of first reader and I didn't give her much context. I was just like, here, here it is, you know, have a read and she read it and she sent it back and it was, you know, being a cheerleader and all, you know, this is great. I can't wait to read more. And I just, I love this love interest that you set up between these two characters. And she had pointed at the villain and the love interest. And I was like, what book are you reading? And I kinda, and I kind of just like shook it off and went back to writing. And then I realized as I was writing, Oh my God, this is the love in chest. And the thing is I would have gotten there myself, but it would have taken at least a third of a book. I think for me to figure out that the more compelling story would be a developing sort of sympathy of spirit between these antagonists. Then the one that I had initially set up and the thing is, Amy now knows my writing better than I know it myself. Like she can read what I'm writing and actually tell the sort of choices that I'm going to make later on and like save me a huge amount of work, rewriting the book. That's pretty amazing.
Speaker 2:I mean, look in fairness though, I think I do, I have a, an unpublished book that I wrote right back when we were, um, before either of us were published. I remember showing it to Meg and Meg saying, this is super great, except the problem is your in love with this other guy, not the love interest, which means kind of, so is she, and so I've probably been quite aware of that in the sense of who's like the most interesting person.
Speaker 3:True. I was way more interested in that villain character than I was in the initial love interests that I had set up. That's so true.
Speaker 2:I mean, he's cool. I'm very happy with how it turned out. Well, I love that. I think it kind of parallels for me sometimes how readers or fans will, you know, they'll read, say the first book in a series and then the fandom starts talking and they start asking you questions at, you know, book events. And sometimes the readers will project on things that you haven't fully become aware of yet. And it's like, Oh yeah, guys, that's totally where my brain is taking. Yeah. Yeah. And the thing is, they're not, you're not bending to follow what they've suggested. They've just seen it before you have. Yeah. It's almost like it's something in your subconscious that you were putting into the text that you didn't realize yet. That's exactly it that's exactly it.
Speaker 4:Yeah. Okay. We
Speaker 2:Are going to start wrapping this up, but before we do Amy, I saw that you also have a podcast. Do you want to quickly tell listeners about it?
Speaker 4:Oh yeah, sure. So, I mean, you know, before we were talking about how much we're kind of missing out on connecting with people and that's one of the reasons I ended up doing it because I had been planning it for a long time. And then when lockdown hit and I mean, I heard from someone apparently Amazon literally sold out a podcast mix at one point, like every man and his dog was lodging a podcast. And so I thought, Oh, maybe I'll wait. Actually it was, I don't really want to sort of join in on this giant wave of things. And then I thought, no, you've been planning this for ages. Just go ahead and do it and enjoy yourself. And it's been such a wonderful experience. I'm never going to stop. So it's a, it's what Amy Kaufman on writing. And it's a short podcast. Every episode is under 10 minutes. And I just answer one quite specific craft question, every episode. So I listen to his email questions in and uh, we read out that question. I give an answer, I give some examples and then I give an exercise at the end and I've, I've set it off. I think, you know, one of the same goals in mind that this podcast has, which is it's for writers, but it's also for readers who are interested in how it gets done. And so I've tried to create exercises at the end that, you know, only take a couple of minutes that you can do, whether you're a reader or whether you're a writer. So I've got episodes in there on sort of how you do your well building and then how you wave it in. I've got lots of, so season one is out and season two starts at the end of the year. It's just been such an enormously fun experience. I, I think one of the things, and I don't know if you find this said, but when you write novels, you only get to have that feeling of like, yes, done, like once, maybe twice a year. And even then, you're not completely sure that you are done every time you put out an episode, you're like, yes, complete. I did a thing, check something off my list. This feels wonderful. So I think that that part of it has been enormous fun as well.
Speaker 2:Definitely more immediate gratification happening.
Speaker 4:Like you couldn't wheel you as a little right now, but to be honest, I sort of thought that I would put it out and that, you know, kind of like my mum would listen and I was like, that's fine because I'm not doing it to build an audience for anything in particular. I'm doing it one because it's fun for me. And two, because I do a lot of mentoring and I've, you know, I'm always aware that a lot of people who might need that mentoring or need that craft stuff and not people who have access to a public office. So it's sort of an attempt to make that, that craft mentoring, you know, as widely available as, and I think that now is a time when that's, you know, more useful than it's ever been because we can't get out to workshops and we can't get out stuff like that. No, definitely. So Amy Kaufman on writing, I assume it's available wherever podcasts are sold. Yes. Wherever you, wherever fresh podcasts can be found. Awesome. Well, I will check it out. That sounds like perfect listening for NaNoWriMo coming up. So excellent. Um, you know, make a cup of tea and have a listen and, and 10 minutes later you're done. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Honestly like the max of my attention span right now,
Speaker 4:I'm going to listen. I'm going to binge listen the whole season while working on my jigsaw puzzle. Amazing, amazing. The other thing I keep hearing from people, which I did not anticipate, uh, is that they find it very calming. I keep getting people saying, have you considered doing an ASM, our podcast as well, but delightful voice. Thank you. I, um, I worked as a mediator for a decade and a lot of that mediation had to be done over the phone. And your voice is your only weapon over the phone. You know, you, you can't use body language. You can't, you know, literally see what people are doing. So everything has to happen with your voice. So I think my mediation team and I used to be like opera sing. As soon as we got a tickle, we'd be like, sorry, can't speak. You have to drink hot tea and honey. But yeah, you, I think you learn to express more of what you're feeling through your voice when you have to do it for so long. I'm sure it's the same for people who are writing and that kind of thing. No, that's so interesting. Have you ever thought about doing audio books? Oh, I mean, I would love to. I think the Australian accent is a bit of a barrier. We love Australian acts. Let me tell you how weird I find it to hear my audio books read in American accent. My characters sound to me.
Speaker 3:I actually have that problem too. When I hear Amy's characters read with an American accent. I'm like, Hey, Whoa, because I hear them. If not in Amy's voice, I hear them with her accent, you know, it's, it's so strange. It's really
Speaker 4:You thinking well, and for North in the other side of the sky's audio book we requested and got Jonathan McClain who has narrated for us before. Who's absolutely bloody wonderful. And if, if anything, Jonathan was a little bit as well. What I was hearing in my head. So I think, you know, I got over the American accent pretty quickly, but, um, yeah, I don't know. As, as Mike would tell you, I could talk underwater. So I love her funny things. Okay. Well, we are going to wrap this up with our happy writer, lightning round. First up, what book you happy?
Speaker 3:It's about called crocodile on the sandbank by Elizabeth Peters
Speaker 2:Book that makes me happy is, uh, the doc is rising by Susan Cooper. Would you rather live in North city with all this technology or NIMS with all its magic and definitely North, I would not do well without wifi and medicine.
Speaker 3:Unfortunately I have to say North too simply because I am an indoor pet and living in the forest, see, would, would kill me.
Speaker 2:What do you do to celebrate an accomplishment?
Speaker 3:Uh, we usually, uh, jump on Slack or else, uh, video hangout and order fancy food and either watch something together or just like chat and catch up. It always involves food. Always involves food. For sure.
Speaker 2:We kind of touched on this a little bit earlier. Um, but nevertheless, what advice would you give to help someone become a happier writer? I would say that we all talk a lot about finding critique partners, but I think it's also incredibly helpful to find cheerleaders as well. And to know when you need them.
Speaker 3:Um, I would say to cultivate and learn to listen to your instincts as regards your inner creativity, you know, learn to recognize when it's tired and when it needs some support and some self care.
Speaker 2:Lastly, where can people find you?
Speaker 3:My website is www.meghanspooner.com. And I'm also Megan Spooner, no spaces, no punctuation on Twitter and Instagram.
Speaker 2:Uh I'm at any kaufman.com and Amy Kaufman on Twitter. I'm Amy Kaufman author on Instagram because the lady from Louisiana took my name. He uses it and make, and I also have a newsletter that you can sign up for on either of our websites, where we give writing advice. And we talk about upcoming projects and tell you about new releases and we give away stuff. We give away stuff, always a bonus. Amy, Megan, thank you so much for joining me today. Thank you so much for having us.
Speaker 3:This was so much fun
Speaker 2:Readers. Be sure to check out their newest book. The other side of the sky, which is out now, of course, we always encourage you to support your local indie bookstore if you can, but if you don't have a local indie, you can also check out our affiliate store at bookshop.org/shop/marissa Meyer. If you're enjoying these conversations, we would love it. If you subscribed and help us spread the word to others, readers and writers, you can find us on Instagram at Marissa Meyer author and at happy writer podcast until next time stay healthy and cozy in your bunkers and whatever life throws at you today. I do hope that now you're here.
Speaker 1:[inaudible].