Marissa chats with Maureen Johnson about her newest murder mystery - THE BOX IN THE WOODS - and her recently released Cruella De Vil origin novel - HELLO, CRUEL HEART - as well as the in-depth mechanics of plotting and planning a complex mystery story; some discussion of The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death by Frances Glessner Lee (so! fascinating!); thoughts on what makes for a good mystery, from "fair play" to "closed circuits"; and a few tips on how to maintain joy throughout your writing career, including embracing change and appreciating the simple things in life.
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 Maureen Johnson about her newest murder mystery - THE BOX IN THE WOODS - and her recently released Cruella De Vil origin novel - HELLO, CRUEL HEART - as well as the in-depth mechanics of plotting and planning a complex mystery story; some discussion of The Nutshell Studies of Unexplained Death by Frances Glessner Lee (so! fascinating!); thoughts on what makes for a good mystery, from "fair play" to "closed circuits"; and a few tips on how to maintain joy throughout your writing career, including embracing change and appreciating the simple things in life.
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: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 for joining me. I've actually got a bunch of things making me happy this week, but I've done my best to edit down the list. The first one is I got to see my local writing buddies a couple of days ago. It was the first time we've met up since COVID hit. And we got together for just like a nice outdoor writing date at a local winery, and we didn't get hardly anything done. We ended up just chatting the whole time because we'd missed each other so much, but it felt so good to be social. And I feel like that's, this whole pandemic thing has really put some of this into perspective, just how not to take things for granted. And I'm just so appreciating these things that seemed so commonplace before and now are such a huge deal. So yay. Writing friends and all the things and wineries do. The second thing that's making me happy is that I finally got to announce one of my super secret side projects that I have been telling you guys about for ages. If you missed the announcement, I am super thrilled to be compiling and editing my very first anthology. It is titled serendipity, 10 romantic tropes transformed and it, myself and nine other authors have written romantic short stories inspired by various beloved romance tropes. My story is based on the one bed trope and there's also the matchmaker and the fake relationship and the grand romantic gesture, and so much more. It's been super fun to work on. I've absolutely loved it. The contributors are all amazing authors that I just adore. Uh, and I love it. And so I really hope that you guys will check it out. You can find all the details on my blog or Instagram. That book is coming out in January, and I'm pretty sure it's going to be available for pre-order by the time that you are hearing this. So check it out. And the third thing making me happy today is of course getting to talk to today's guests. There is definitely a little bit of fan girling happening on my part today. She is the number one bestselling author of many WIA novels, including 13 little blue envelopes, sweet Scarlet, the name of the star, and truly devious. She's collaborated with Cassandra Clare on the shadow hunter universe and John Green and Lauren miracle on this super cute holiday romance. Let it snow, which has been adapted into film by Netflix. This past April, she released hello, cruel heart inspired by Disney's Cruella, Deville, and her new murder mystery. The box in the woods comes up on June 15th, please. Welcome Maureen Johnson. Hi there. Hello. Welcome. Thank you for having me. Thank you for being here. I feel like I need to catch my breath after reading your bio. Sorry about that. How do you narrow it all down and decide what to put in it anymore? Um,
Speaker 3:I don't really know. I just it's. It's not that it's hard to count the books that I've written, but I just don't. And so people ask me how many have you written? And I say, I don't know. And it's not like it's an incalculable number. It's just, I'm just like, I don't know. Just they're over there. Hello. That's how I count. I go on their own full shelf. It's a full shelf. It is. It's, it's one shelf's worth that's how many?
Speaker 2:Yes. And more on the way. It's all we ever do. I never
Speaker 3:Know whether to, like, I don't know how to count collections if that's the problem. Like, I dunno. Just look, but if you want one there over there, take one.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I know what you mean. I started to lose count maybe around like nine or 10. Um, but part of it is because I'm like, well, do I count the coloring book? Do I count the graphic novels? Like it does kind of start to muddle together.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And then no one wants you to break breakdown.
Speaker 2:Well, I've got one collection of short stories. I've got this many novels. I've got nobody, nobody
Speaker 3:Cares. They just want it I'll answer. And I'm like, and they're like, that's fine. Like, cause nobody, nobody cares. But my mom, so it's
Speaker 2:Fine. Yeah. A lot of written a lot of book. Right. Um, so just for the record, I mentioned that I finally got to meet up with some writer, friends here a couple of days ago and it came up that I was reading your new book and they were all super jealous and the conversation devolved into a huge Marine Johnson love Fest. Well, yeah. So everyone's sends you their best and just like how awesome you are.
Speaker 3:That's it. Thank you.
Speaker 2:Okay. So why don't we kick this off with you telling listeners about your upcoming book, the box in the woods,
Speaker 3:The box in the woods is a mystery novel. It is a murder mystery novel. It's a standalone mystery, uh, that in which the detective Stevie bell, who I established in this truly devious trilogy, uh, has their first, uh, Harrison new case. And in truly devious, Stevie worked on a mystery that, uh, a, an old kidnapping murder case that happened at our school Elling him academy in 1936. And she got some press from that. And in this book, she she's had her 15 minutes of fame and it's all over. And she's just at home working at the grocery store and she has no focus when someone gets in touch with her and says, Hey, I, my name is Carson. I've just purchased this camp called camp Sandy Pines. It used to be called camp waterfalls. And it's where all the murders happened. And I want to make a true crime show about it. And I'd like you to come help me because you're the girl detective. And at in 1978, this was the scene of a series of murders called the box in the woods murder box in the woods murders in which four cap counselors, uh, went out in the woods one night and did not come back again. And it's pretty gruesome what happened to them and Stevie accepts and takes up the case in the town of Barlow corners, Massachusetts and at the camp with some of her friends. And in this case, the, the events of 1978 are not so far in the past. And some of the people that were there are still alive and around and, um, may present a clear and present danger to Stevie.
Speaker 2:Okay. So I obviously have a lot of questions about the actual book, um, and your, your process for writing this book and writing murder mysteries in general. But before we get to that, I am really excited to talk about the murder doll houses. Um, I am sort of familiar with the murder dollhouses. I read an article, just kind of stumbled across an article about them here, maybe like eight or 10 months ago. And I remember reading about them and being just amazed at what this woman had accomplished and that they were still in use today. And I remember thinking somebody needs to write a book inspired by these. And so I was so excited to find that you referenced them in this book. So for people who have no idea what I'm talking about, tell us about the murder dollhouses.
Speaker 3:So there was a woman named Francis Glassner Lee, who was a socialite. She was quite wealthy. And one of her, she, she kind of was, she kind of didn't have a focus, but she had a lot of money. And she tried to, it was just trying to get involved with her community and do do good works. And one of her friends was the co was the coroner of, I believe Boston. And he was explaining how, how much trouble they had recording and figuring out causes of death because, um, there was no police procedure. Like, you know, that you would see pictures of like what was happening in crime scenes. And that like everybody would come in and like smoke on the corpse, touch everything, bring a date, touch, take something home, like the, the processing to be like, sit on it, put your hands on it. And everything would get disturbed. And everyone's like, oh, it's clear what happened here. And he was explaining all these cases that he was seeing them all these like wild things that happen to people. And she got this idea that she could because it, cause he was explaining that everything mattered in the scene and she puts this all together in her head and decides that, and really invest in her, her study of this, she becomes one of America. She becomes probably the, the American expert in crime scene investigation when it wasn't a thing. Uh, and she would in fact go onto fun fund and found the first, I believe the first department of forensic crime investigation, uh, at Harvard potentially, there's a lot of question marks. I'm, I'm trying to remember off the top of my head, everything that she did, but she created these, not what they were called, the nutshell studies, uh, or the nutshells specifically the nutshell studies of unexplained death. And she based them on, uh, on its unreal cases. And she created, diorama's basically little dollhouse scenes of a death. They are two. When you first look at them, they're like, oh, that's like some dollhouse stuff. What you don't realize is the unbelievable level of detail because everything matters in the scene. So the little tiny postage stamp size calendar, the pages will flip and be accurate. The, every, every object is in the correct spot. Like, and she's just made it super, super small. She either commissioned it or she made it herself. Um, the positions of windows and doors and little bits of newspaper. And she, when she, um, had to make some clothing that was worn, she wore it herself for a year and then cut the cloth apart to make all of the little, all of the outfits. And by studying these scenes, if you study them long enough, you can start to pick up on the clues. And they were like blood splatter, placement of body positions, um, staining, uh, movement, uh, certain objects being the wrong way around. They are so good that they're still used. Uh, and they're also works of art and you can see them online. There's a 3d, uh, if you look, if you just Google it, you'll see that you can do a 3d walk, like spin through of the scenes. Um, but she basically originated this ideas. If you study the whole scene, all the details, the truth, the truth is there. You would just have to look at everything.
Speaker 2:Do you know, were they based on unsolved murders at the time
Speaker 3:They were? I, I they're based on actual cases that I believe that they're not all murders. Okay. That's it, they're not all murders are, are, some of them are accidents and that the clues in the name she's like they're unexplained death. These were just scenes in which some people were found dead. And you have to try to figure out what happened here. Was it suicide? Was it an accident? Was it murder? Um, and they're all different.
Speaker 2:And I know that they're still used today in training detectives and forensics experts. Do we know like, was there a, uh, a case that was moved forward or even solved based on one of these,
Speaker 3:Not to my knowledge, but they were there their training tools that are still used. So things that people learned to do by studying them and by this approach went on to solve many cases.
Speaker 2:It's so fascinating. They're so cool. And they really are works of art. So people who are not familiar, I mean, they're creepy, like super creepy to look at, but definitely go check, check it out if you have an interest in creepy things. Cause they're really cool. Yeah. Not
Speaker 3:There they're graphic without they're not, they're not there to be. They're not there for the shock value. They're there 100% as, as tools, investigative tools, but they're also incredible. And it took her a long time to make these yeah. They cost a ton and they were really hard to make. They wasn't like, she just took a bunch of dollhouse furniture. It's the, it's the detail. Everything in it is. Right,
Speaker 2:Right. Yeah. She, wasn't just going down to Michaels and like shuttle, all house furniture sex. No, she
Speaker 3:She's just recreated actual homes and scenes in, in miniature. And it's, it's bananas how good they are. Yeah,
Speaker 2:I agree. I agree. And I was so excited to see them in this book because again, I, as soon as I read about them, I was like, there's so many stories here. Um, but of course your book is not actually about one of these dollhouses. You're just kind of using it as a tool, uh, at some points to, to further further the story. And Stevie is kind of inspired by, uh, what this woman has created. So now talk to me about writing murder mysteries, because you are particularly good at it. And this is one of the things that my friends been talking about that it is really quite mind boggling. I mean, I've read a lot of murder mysteries and I always find the mind-boggling to some degree because I can never solve it. But in yours, there is a level of detail and the, the plots, the murders themselves are so complicated and yet come together so well that it is really, uh, just an amazing craft. Um, and I'm super impressed. So question, I guess, are you a water? How much are you discovering? How much do you know in advance, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker 3:Uh, I am a lifelong mystery reader. They were the first, they were the first genre of book I ever read as a child. And I read every single one that I could get my hands on. I was utterly obsessed with detective fiction, just to a degree that was extreme. And it has always continued through my life and I it's just in my blood. And so I have a lot of opinions on what makes a good mystery. And in terms of writing them, I am 100% a planner, nothing can happen in these books, nothing gets done until I know everything because the mechanics of a murder mystery are small before. They're big. Um, you have to know, in my mind, you have to know exactly what happened and why I asked to know, know why before I know who and how or anything else. My dog has also just confirming this in the background. And you may be able to hear
Speaker 2:That's I heard the puppy in the background.
Speaker 3:Yeah, she's home. And she's, she's trying to tell me she's awake. She's like tell them about the murder mysteries. Um, so I build a little mechanism that is the crime, and I have to kind of look at it from all aspects and directions because the things you get in the things that solve the murder mystery in the, in the classic murder, mystery novel, the clues are a little bit of detritus that blows off the central event. So the central event is that the murder, the crime, whatever, and imagine that's like a fire. And then all you get are the little whisk, the little piece of burnt this or that. That's the thing is the overheard, the footstep, the fingerprint, the window left, open the, all the little tiny things that were left behind or went wrong. And that to see those, like, I have a kind of chart in my head or like a graph. It's more like a, it's more of like a spiral that always appears in my head that I can see all of these things in. So I have to know all of these things in advance, because it matters in the, you know, in terms of who appears in what room and where and what scenes, because you have to know exactly where to show the reader. What's what selection of scenes and information to present. So unlike a lot of other novels I write which I'll, which I'll plot out to a degree, these have to be rock solid from the beginning in terms of the crime and everywhere that detective is going to end up.
Speaker 2:Is there ever anything that appears while you're writing, that was not a part of the plan, but then you're like, oh, what? That's really good. And now I have to figure out what to do with it
Speaker 3:Sometimes. Yeah. Or it'll occur to me that I could, I could loop something back. It's usually that like, I'm like, oh, actually that if that's there, then I can tie it back to this part. The truly devious series is three books. You should never, I violated rule. You should never write a mystery in three books, but everything ties up at the end. And so I had to make sure that everything that you get in the final book links back. I, I imagine it, like if you've ever looked in an in-flight magazine, it's like, here are all the places we fly. And it's just like all of these pictures of, of Lai, of arking lines from city to city that's, what's in my head, I'm like, this goes to here and this goes, this goes to here. And this goes to here. Um, yeah, it's, it appeals very much to the analytical side of my brain, which is big side of it.
Speaker 2:So it is, it is like a puzzle. And I feel like writing novels in general is like a puzzle, but with murder mysteries, it seems to be like particularly specific. Like with most books, you have all these pieces and they come together, but maybe you can kind of fudge this one here and maybe this one. And I thought it was going to go here, but it can actually go over here with a murder mystery. It does seem like it has to be so specific because you need to have those, those details that clue the detective character and maybe the reader into what actually happened. But then you also need to have the red herrings and the clues that don't lead anywhere and everything has to have a place. And it just seems really complicated. I like it though, but I was always a word problem.
Speaker 3:Like, I, I love these books. I loved every kind of brain teaser. Like we're probably, I just, I love them. So yeah. I mean, they've always run in my blood.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. You mentioned earlier that as a reader, like you have a really specific idea of what makes for a good murder mystery. What would you say? Some of the top things are to make a good mystery, novel, fair play,
Speaker 3:Fair play is that that's an old concept of what makes a good mystery. And that is, you're not, it's not hidden information. It's not like the, the tool required to solve. The mystery is completely non-existent in the book. Should there should be a, a, they may be obscure or they may be hard to spot, but the clue trail should be there. Like people should have the ability to solve this by using the materials provided so Fairplay. Um, there's a lot of things they have to feel right to me. Um, I like a closed circuit because when you do a classic murder mystery, you have to control the space of the worlds a lot, uh, because you have to constrain your cast of characters because otherwise your options are everyone, like who could have committed this crime, anybody. So, um, that's more police procedural. I mean, can you do a murder mystery that takes place in a big city? Of course you can like buy it. You just have to internally limit the characters or limit the world in some way, like who could have done it. You have to put them in a box. You have to take your characters. You got to put them in a contraction and go, yeah. Everybody into the contraption. And some of you will die. Let's do this. It's what you get for being in a murder, mystery novel, and a murder, mystery novel. I told you not to get in there.
Speaker 2:I do. So I'm curious. Cause I agree that like, by the end you have given us all of the information, but there is no way I could have figured it out. And I'm wondering, have you ever had readers come to you and be like, yeah, I had the answer by this page. Yes. No, I don't.
Speaker 3:They haven't done it yet because it's not out yet,
Speaker 2:But you've written others. How about some of your previous books
Speaker 3:For the truly devious? Yeah. Like they, the thing is you needed all three to get all the information, but they start like they, they put it together, you know, they were like, yeah, we they're, like, I thought I was getting it. And um, because they, those three books are, are set up in a way that they deliberately faint in different directions. So they're designed to throw you off a little bit, but the core information is there. Um, and that actually contains a lot of puzzles. So if you work out the there's a riddle that you get in the beginning that if you, um, if you kind of figure out the riddle, you might actually get the solution. So, um, yeah, people, people have worked it up. They said it took awhile.
Speaker 2:Well, readers are very, they're pointing things out in my book and it's like, yeah, yeah, you picked up on that way.
Speaker 3:Well, I think with murder mysteries, people also work on it like murder Mr. Readers, go in with an agenda and they're like, we're, we're going, looking, we're hung
Speaker 2:In, but go and look in. Yeah. Yeah. I was looking and I didn't even come close. Um, okay. Ideals. I want to talk to you cause you haven't of course just written mysteries. You have switched John Aras quite a bit throughout your career. Um, there has been paranormal, contemporary historical romance. Uh, first, just in general, have you received any sort of pushback from readers or editors when you've decided you wanted to switch? Um, or has that kind of all gone smoothly and you're just like, this is what I'm inspired to do today. So here we go.
Speaker 3:It's the second one. Really? Yeah. Nobody minds. Why I, yeah, there's nothing there because there's no, there's really nothing to mind. It's um, yeah. I, I have moved around. I've done different things. Um, I know that. Yeah. I don't know. I dunno. I just, the answer has been no it's been, it's been fine. I I've wanted to do, you know, what's weird is that I wanted to write mysteries all along and I was like, that's not for me to do. That's too good. And then I just felt like I was finally like, wait, why aren't you doing it?
Speaker 2:Why don't you do it? It take for you to feel like you had enough confidence to go and give it a shot. A shelf full of books
Speaker 4:Just occurring to me one day that I should that's that's fair. It's as
Speaker 3:Simple as that, I was like, what, why don't I do that? Why haven't I done the thing I want to do? I think we all, sometimes don't do the thing we want to do. And then Sunday we'll go. What but why, but why haven't I tried sushi? Like why?
Speaker 2:No, I think that that's true. I think a lot of us are intimidated by the projects that really excited us. Yeah. Yeah. Do you think that you could have written a murder mystery if it was your very first book or is there a part of you that feels like you kind of had to have those other books under your belt before tackling one of these?
Speaker 3:I did. And it was unpublished cause it was, it was, um, and it was really complicated and um, good. Uh, and I never, I wrote it with a friend of mine and it was like a, it was like a training project almost. Um, but yeah, I, I, that's where I started and then I just never did it again. Like I got, so I got so busy doing other stuff that I got signed up for a lot of stuff very quickly. And suddenly I was like, I don't know. I don't have time. Like I just was writing. I write for a living, which means like you're always writing and suddenly I was like, wait a minute, wait, what, why haven't I, why didn't I ever do that?
Speaker 2:Right. Are there any genres that you haven't dipped your toe into yet? That there's a part of you thinking maybe I'll give that a shot someday?
Speaker 5:Uh,
Speaker 3:I don't think there's any left that I haven't tried that I really want to do. Uh, no, no, that's not true. That's not true. Those things that I just, I just lied. Cause there's something else I'm working on because I'm working on it now. But until I, until I actually kind of get it done, I don't want to say because I'll jinx myself. Yeah, no, that's fair. I don't, I don't believe in jinxes, but I'm just, I'm like until I've done it, I don't want to say
Speaker 2:Yeah, no. I hate talking about products that are in the works before I'm ready to talk about them.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I keep things very close to my chest until I'm done. That's just my, that's just my move. A lot of my friends are very, they work. There's a lot of workshopping and helping each other where I'm just like, nah, nobody sees my stuff until it's until it's done.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I'm the same way. And I feel like as soon as you start telling people about it, then now there's like this added layer of pressure and expectation. That is not, that's always helpful. Yeah. And then I'll say,
Speaker 4:That's not what I meant and I'm not done. Don't even look at me. There's a lot of that. A lot
Speaker 2:Of internal inks happening. Why am I so wretched? Why did I think I can do this? Okay. I want to talk about developing characters. I love these characters so much. Um, they're all so fully realized. So fun. I want to be best friends with all of them. Of course feels super related to Nate. The writer will do anything but write his book. Um, but all of them are just really, really lovely. What is your strategy for creating characters that people are gonna fall in love with and want to spend hundreds of pages with?
Speaker 3:I have no idea. I just kind of think about, okay, that's not true. Is it in the case of Stevie, Stevie is the detective and she is everything in, um, Stevie bell. I'm calling them the Stevie bell ministries. Uh, it was kind of purpose-built because I, I was like, I want, I don't want just, I want a detective mystery, which is this, which is a sub genre. I specifically want a, a detective mystery. So I had to figure out how to make a detective who was 16. And so I built everything around and for her, including M academy where she goes to school, everything was kind of built from the ground up brick by brick to serve her and the needs of the mystery. Um, so her character and all, and her background, um, are all in service of how someone who's 16 years old, ends up being a cold case. Detective she's obsessed. She's like, uh, a citizen detective who reads about watches, every true crime thing and has gotten obsessed and is like, I want to try to break this case. I want to, I want to crack it open. Um, someone like Nate, Nate is all of us. Nate is just me talking through the story. Like I like Nate, but yes, he is. His commentary is he's got, he, he's published a book and now he has to write more books and he has no end. He's just in a panic 100% of the time about it. And he is all of us.
Speaker 2:So obviously in this book, um, this is now the fourth Stevie book that you've written. Uh, so I imagined by this point, these characters feel like, you know, them and their voices are probably very solid to you. At what point in the truly devious series did you feel like, okay, now I know these characters.
Speaker 3:I mean, pretty early on, I've been thinking about it. I had spent so much time putting it together that I had to have a clear idea of who everybody was so pretty early on because like I, I had assembled, I had assembled all the pieces and the people and the setting and the, and the crime. And I had, I had, uh, I had files on everything. So I had, I kind of hashed them out. And then of course you learned by starting to write them in a kind of getting an ear for how they sound. Um, you always find something out, something out when you're, when your flesh, you know, when you're, when you're getting, you're getting the ear for them, I think. But it was pretty early on. I had a very clear idea of what this story was, which is a gift because I have gone into things where I'm like, I
Speaker 4:Have no idea what's happening.
Speaker 3:I am on space, mountain, everything is dark. And that is not how it was this.
Speaker 2:It's interesting how different books can be just completely different as far as how much we know going in. And at what point, the character's voice becomes really strong. And yeah, every one is different. Somehow I keep thinking at some point, I'm just going to be like, okay, this is how it works. Right. Well,
Speaker 3:I think you learn to write every book by writing that book. Yeah. So that it's, it's you think, you know how to write books? Well, you haven't written this book yet, so you, you learned to write that book by writing it and then you learn to write the next one by writing that one. Yeah. So the good news is you'll never know,
Speaker 2:It's always a new, fun adventure. It's always an adventure. Um, I do also want to touch briefly on your other book that came out this year, because you are super busy. Um, for those who haven't heard, you got to write the crew Wella Deville book, which is so cool. She's of course, one of the best villains. How did that come about for starters? And what was that like writing such a beloved yet despicable character?
Speaker 3:Well, I didn't go out much last year as a I'm sure. Many of us. Yeah. So I was like, well, I, yeah, I don't, it's weird. I partially that book was really a lot of it was written early in the pandemic and I sort of don't remember the early part of it. And then I remember very vividly sitting. It was, it was, it was the really early part. And just at first, my brain didn't work during the pandemic at all systems were off. And then it came back on really quickly. It was like, you're going to 1967 in London. You're going with Corolla by and, uh, way came about was, um, I was approached by Disney. Um, the smooth, the movie Cruella is about to come out and it is really fun and it takes place in the seventies and it's chlorella as a fashion designer. And this novel takes place in 1967. And the reason is that my agent Kate who's my, with my best friends was like, Maureen is obsessed to a very high degree with London between the years of 1967 and 1975. There is almost nothing she does not know about what was happening on a street by street level. This is information that no one has ever needed until now. And it's true. I'm obsessed and always have been, this is like, I have a couple obsessions and I'm really leaning into them right now. And I was like, yeah, I know a lot about what's happening in 1967 London. And I'd really like to bring that period to life. And it really went very smoothly again because it's like I had been, been preparing all my life, not really for Corella, but for the period in that something set then getting to, I, you know, she's, uh, she was created by Dodie Smith. And because I think a lot of people are like, oh, it's Disney. I'm like, well, no it's Dodie Smith. And Dodie Smith was an amazing writer who wrote things like I capture the castle, which is an amazing book. She also wrote the Starlight barking, which is sequel to the 101 Dalmatians sort of SQL. It's really weird and fun book. That's all about how a space dog comes down and is trying to gather up all the other dogs of earth and help them save the world and go into space with him. And it's through this thing called the Starlight barking, where they all communicate to each other. And it's really weird. And when people who've only read a hundred, one donations, I'm like read the Starlight barking and be surprised because it is not what you think and put the voice. I was really thinking of the voice of, I captured the castle of the narrator and that's how I got into that Headspace of it. I I'd seen, I'd seen 101 Dalmatians. Um, as a kid, I was very upset by anyone be mean to dogs. So I, I, I tended to shy away from it. Um, there is no part of that in this book or the movie. It very much stays away from the dogs.
Speaker 2:Oh, interesting. You will see
Speaker 3:That there are Dalmatians in it, but there's no.
Speaker 2:Are you able to give us any hints as to this book? I mean, I know it's kind of tied into the movie release, so I don't know how secretive things are.
Speaker 3:Oh, is I see. Cause it's out. Um,
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, it's don't mind me.
Speaker 3:Well, it is a, an orphan it's 1967. She lives in London with her friends, Jasper and harness. And she is 16. She's around 16 years old and she is a fashion designer. She knows she is except she lives in a bombed out hobble with her friends and they pick pocket to survive. So no one's going to take her seriously as a fashion designer, but she needs to make her way in the world. She's like, I need to show the world what I am, but it's also the most exciting time, pretty much ever to be in London. It is the summer of swinging London. Everything is colorful and the Beatles and art and music, everything is exploding everywhere in terms of society and art and music. And she is befriended one day by a very rich brother and sister, they Magda and Richard who kind of pick her up as a, as a kind of side project. And she gets introduced into the world of high society, London fashion, and starts making clothes for them and gets involved with a rock band. Um, so it's a fashion rock, 1967 story about friendship and love and betrayal and H and M shoplifting, big and big giant underpants. Um, which is a real thing. I read this book about the woman who was called the queen of the hoisters, who was the head of the east end of a major Eastern shoplifting gang. Her name was Shirley Pitts and she used to call it going shopping. They were very organized gangs of women shop. They had chauffeurs, they had, it was a huge operation and she could get anything out of a store partially because she had these giant bloomer things that she wore under her clothes. And they would kind of get anything into the underpants first rugs, multiple gowns, like Juul, you name it, everything went in. So it's a lot about shoplifting and I don't know, it was a lot of fun to write. It was a very welcome distraction from the lockdown. It
Speaker 2:Sounds super fun. And I'm happy to hear that no puppies were harmed in the making of this book.
Speaker 3:No, I couldn't. I couldn't even write that if I wanted.
Speaker 2:Um, okay. Last question. Before we move on to our bonus round, uh, as we kind of talked about before you have written many, many books, you were quite a ways into your career as an author. Uh, how do you go about maintaining joy as a writer and kind of staying connected to that initial passion that you had to get into this career in the first place
Speaker 3:You embrace the idea that everything changes. I've seen so many things cycle around. So I think when people enter, they're like, this is it, I'm in, this is how it's always going to be. And these are the ways things get done. And here are the important people and you know, and those things will all go away and change so ways that things are promoted will change, tastes, will change. Um, all kinds of things will change. But if you're, if you'd like to write, you have to just that's, that's what you do. You're the writer. You're not, we have to do all these other things, but you just have to be yourself. True. I know it sounds like was she, was she advice, but truly, if you're not yourself, then, then who are you? So you've got to do what you love as best you can and not get too hung up on the, uh, the trappings of it. And I just liked to go outside a lot and I have a dog and those things make me really happy. So I just try to be myself and go outside. And you know, I'm pretty, pretty happy with those things. Try to keep it pretty simple. I'm a simple creature of the forest. I'm like I live in a wooded Glade. I don't, I live in the middle of New York. Don't
Speaker 2:Ruin the vibe.
Speaker 4:No, but my husband knew
Speaker 2:It was a little Woodland creature. My
Speaker 3:Husband is English and he grew up in a forest. So when we go to his house, he literally like his family lives in a beautiful house in the forest, surrounded by wild ponies, a pony broke into their house once on Christmas, it's everything like they live in a magical English village, so I can go there and be a little creature.
Speaker 2:Well, I love that advice. Mushy advice is my favorite kind of advice. We're now going to wrap this up with our happy writer bonus round. Ooh, here's the question? What book makes you happy?
Speaker 3:Oh, a lot of books that make me happy. Um, it depends on the day. It depends on the moment. There are so many good books in the world. How can you not be happy with them? Um, I'm just going to go with a go-to one that I say a lot, which is the Western game, which is one of those books that really hooked me early on to mysteries. It was a central, it was a central text of my, of my childhood. I was obsessed with it. I wanted it to be turtle, essentially. I just, I, more or less wanted to be turtle.
Speaker 2:What is your personal mantra? It's probably fine. Do you have a writing ritual?
Speaker 3:I, I bright. That's mostly the ritual. I'm always amazed when people are like, and then I do this. I would do that. I'm like really? That's amazing. That seems so great. How did you do and tell me all about it and I just do it. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I don't have one either. I'm always a little envious of writers who have like really great ones. Like I have this specific teapot and a specific kind of tea in this specific candle. And like, that sounds so romantic, but yeah, I don't have anything like that.
Speaker 3:Like what do you ha what happens if you don't have those things?
Speaker 2:No, I think that's the problem is it's exactly what if you have to write it in airplane or something. Yeah. Honestly,
Speaker 3:I find that the best places are usually the, like the least I do well outside and I do well on places like airport. I do great, great getting somewhere. That's kind of benign. There's nothing else going on. And I can't get up. I did some of my best work in a blank, Carol, in the bottom of a library facing a concrete wall, like as little stimulus as possible is often the best for me. Um, but no particular ritual. Yeah.
Speaker 2:What is the best writing advice you have ever received? Um,
Speaker 3:I just, just, don't be afraid to mess up cause you write writing badly as part of writing, everything you write is, is bad until it's good. So if you're writing badly, then you're doing the right thing. So write badly and be happy with it.
Speaker 2:That was very quotable. That's totally going to be infographic on her Instagram. What are you working on next?
Speaker 3:The new Steven Bell ministry? Um, yeah. Well, I have, I have another book coming out this year, which is an illustrated guide called your guide to not getting murdered in acquaint English village, which is based on an article I wrote last year for crime rates that was called, you're not getting murdered in acquainted English village, which I basically made a list of how to avoid being murdered by the vicar and all the other people in town. And it was really popular. And an editor was like, we want to turn this into a book. And I said, yes, I want to make an illustrated book. And I want my friend, Jay, who is this I've who I've known for years and years. He was actually one of my boyfriend's post-college and we moved to New York together. He is an amazing illustrator and he is a, his, his day job is that he's one of the main artistic directors of a Broadway, um, ad and design firm. So when you look at all the logos and the designs for the big Broadway shows, he's one of the guys that makes those. So he's, he does really cool stuff, but he did these amazing Edward Gorey like drawings for the book. So, um, that's coming out in September and then the next Stevie bell mystery is that is what's around me on all the notes and the that's the little bit machine I'm building now. That's what I'm doing. I'm very excited.
Speaker 2:I am very excited as well. I'm still happy to hear. There'll be another one. Lastly, where can people find you
Speaker 3:On Twitter at Maureen Johnson and on Instagram at Maureen Johnson books. And I'm really trying to build up Instagram more because it's so peaceful there.
Speaker 2:I love Instagram.
Speaker 3:I'm Mo I did so much on Twitter, but I'm like, Instagram is so, so serene, like Bookstagram is so people, nice pictures of books, um, and online at Maureen Johnson, books.com. Awesome. Maureen,
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for joining me today. Thank you for having me readers. Be sure to check out the box in the woods, uh, which comes out next June or this June, and is available for pre-order as well as hello, cruel heart, which is out now. Of course, we always encourage you to support your local indie bookstore. If you can, if you don't have a local indie, you can check out our affiliate at bookshop.org/shop/marissa Meyer coming up next week, I'll be talking to Lizelle Sam Berry about her debut. Why a fantasy blood like magic. It is also coming out this June and is currently available for pre-order. So check it out and I hope you'll tune in next week. If you're enjoying these conversations, please subscribe and follow us on Instagram at Marissa Meyer author and at happy writer podcast until next time stay healthy, stay cozy and whatever life throws at you today. I do hope that now you're feeling a little[inaudible].