Latest / Radio 831: A Romance Podcast / The State of Goodreads, Alexandra Romanoff on YA vs. Adult Romance, and Our Fall Romance Forecast

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The State of Goodreads, Alexandra Romanoff on YA vs. Adult Romance, and Our Fall Romance Forecast · Radio 831: A Romance Podcast

• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Hi, and welcome to the Radio 831 Podcast. We're your hosts,
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Sanjana Bhaskar and Tyler McCall.
• 0:12
  Speaker 2: And we're so excited to talk everything romance. From the
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: novels and the tropes to the book-to-screen adaptations and, of course,
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: the drama of it all. You know, unpacking what the
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: genre says about who we are and how we love.
• 0:25
  Speaker 3: Big stuff.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: Important stuff.
• 0:28
  Speaker 3: Tyler, can I ask you a question?
• 0:30
  Speaker 2: Always.
• 0:30
  Speaker 3: Reader to author.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm scared, but yes.
• 0:33
  Speaker 3: Do you use Goodreads?
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: I do. I do use Goodreads.
• 0:37
  Speaker 3: Okay. Are you a review writer? Are you logging what
• 0:40
  Speaker 3: you're reading regularly? A tracker?
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: I'm a tracker. So I'm on all the apps. I'm
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: a heavy letterboxd user. I use an app called Episoda
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: to track the TV shows that I'm watching.
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: Incredible. Niche pull.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: And yeah, I've been using Goodreads because I had not
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: been in the habit of reading. And I got back
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: into it in the pandemic. I was literally buying so
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: many books. At one point, I had a pile of
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: unread books that was like 30 deep. It was kind
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: of stupid. And I was like fearful that I would
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: buy a book that I had already bought. And so
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: I was like, actually, this is just a good way
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: to keep track of like what I already physically own
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: or have read. I used to do reviews more. And then.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: Once I knew that I was going to become an author,
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: that also stopped. I mean, unless I've been like I
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: will leave reviews of my like arcs that I've been
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: sent or like friends books and things like that or
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: like if I really, really loved a book. But I
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: would say by and large is not the primary use
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: case for me. What about you? I am a Goodreads user.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: I am a Gemini, so I resist all order, which
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: means that I log some stuff, review some stuff and
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: forget everything.
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  Speaker 3: Whole chunks of stuff.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: My Goodreads is also a strange place because about half
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: of my followers or friends on Goodreads, Goodreads has both
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: friends and followers, which is really stupid.
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  Speaker 3: I don't know the difference. Half of my friends on
• 2:02
  Speaker 3: Goodreads are.
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  Speaker 2: People from middle school. So I am seeing like my
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: class president logging. Reading Atomic Habits. Literally Atomic Habits. That's
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: what's happening over there. And then I'm logging Stalker Romance.
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: So it's really it's really an eclectic bunch. I am
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: a Goodreads user relatively recently. I was mostly a Goodreads
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: lurker for a lot of my life because I love
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: Goodreads review culture.
• 2:31
  Speaker 3: I'm saying Goodreads a lot. There are other book tracking platforms.
• 2:34
  Speaker 3: I feel like fine about all of them, Storygraph, etc.
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: But I say Goodreads because it's like the longest standing
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: book review platform. And I think specifically because I read
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: a lot of older school books, like I read a
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: lot of historicals and backlist. Many of those do not
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: have like a substantial review basis on other platforms that
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: were created relatively recently. However, you will find a review
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: from 2008 of a Christine Thean book published in 2001
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: that you might not see on other platforms, which is
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: why I say Goodreads specifically as a caveat.
• 3:07
  Speaker 3: This is not me saying like, cheers, Amazon.
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  Speaker 2: But yeah, I do use Goodreads and I find review
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: culture on there to be so interesting for romance, which
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: is obviously my bread and butter. But I was interested
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: because I know a lot of authors... feel quite particular
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: about other authors logging books and reviewing books and being
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: users of Goodreads.
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I will say as of recording, like my arcs
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: aren't out yet, like nobody has this book who's not
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: somehow involved in the production of the book. Very soon,
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  Speaker 1: I will have to pretend that Goodreads is a place
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: that simply does not exist and has never existed. And
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  Speaker 1: I'm sort of adjusting to that as a concept.
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  Speaker 2: I think that's interesting too, because it seems like the
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: appropriate standard, there are a handful of romance authors who
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  Speaker 2: regularly publish reviews and are excellent critics. They're interesting critics
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: of romance, even as authors.
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  Speaker 3: I'm thinking about K.J.
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  Speaker 2: Charles, who is an amazing follow on Goodreads and a
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  Speaker 2: historical romance writer.
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  Speaker 3: And Alexis Hall will also post reviews often. And it's interesting,
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  Speaker 3: I think K.J.
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  Speaker 1: Charles is in a specific position because She was a
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: romance editor for many years and is like such an
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  Speaker 1: icon in the genre. I don't know that anyone ever
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  Speaker 1: begrudges her reviews. Like she writes such thoughtful, interesting, provoking reviews.
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  Speaker 2: One of the few sites for that in romance, like
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  Speaker 2: there's not a whole lot of romance criticism out there.
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  Speaker 3: But I think it is at times considered controversial to
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  Speaker 3: be an author who participates in the platform.
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  Speaker 1: There's been so much conversation across threads, book talk, book
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  Speaker 1: Instagram about the separation between reader spaces and author spaces.
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  Speaker 2: Right. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: I kind of believe in that separation, at least when
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: it comes to Goodreads. But like also I say that
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: as someone who I was never leaving like substantial in-depth
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: reviews of books to begin with, you know. I guess
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  Speaker 1: I'm going to have to start logging books the way
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: that my mother-in-law does. Like, I guess I'm just going
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: to have to get like a notebook where I write
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: books down. I don't know.
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: Hey, we're entering a real AI backlash analog swing.
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: So that could be you. It could be. That is
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: actually before I got on Goodreads, I kept a journal
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: where I wrote the title and the date of every
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: book I was reading. And that just became unwieldy. Like,
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: it just became unwieldy for me. Yeah, that's fair. Do
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  Speaker 1: you read reviews, though?
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: I read reviews.
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  Speaker 1: I don't ever read reviews before I read something. But
• 5:32
  Speaker 1: sometimes I'll read a review of a book that I
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: really loved or that I, like, really did not enjoy
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: and just kind of see what the vibe in the
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: comments are and what the vibe in the reviews are.
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  Speaker 1: Because it's a really helpful reminder that, first of all,
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: taste can be quite subjective. There are books that I
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: love that I will fight tooth and nail for. And
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: there are terrible Goodreads reviews. And I'm like, did we
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: read the same book? And then there are books that
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: I was like, oh, I didn't like that at all.
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: And then I'll read the Goodreads review and they'll be
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: like rapturous. And I'll be like, OK, well, yeah, yeah,
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  Speaker 1: it's their own. So it's like it's helpful in that sense.
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: You are very good about reading reviews. You're very good
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: at finding interesting reviews on Goodreads. Thank you.
• 6:11
  Speaker 2: It is. Honestly, I can't. That credit cannot go to me.
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  Speaker 2: I have a group of friends. We're like all historical
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: romance readers and stuff, which means that I've learned a
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: lot about historical romance from them and from reading reviews
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: that they like and they're Goodreads users as well. And
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: so we'll like pass around reviews that we find to
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: be like really thoughtful criticism. And I also, I love
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: reading criticism. And when I say criticism, I don't just
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: mean negative reviews of things. I love reading people's thoughtful
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: interactions with their work in part because that's like the
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: craft I'm attempting to hone myself as someone who writes
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: about the things that I love. I think that there
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: is such beauty to be found in the way that
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: people talk about things that they love and hate.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: I just think that there's something really artful about it.
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  Speaker 2: And I think romance.
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  Speaker 3: Provokes such intense interactions.
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  Speaker 2: Even in work that I find to be otherwise inoffensive
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  Speaker 2: and boring, I will like pull up a Goodreads review
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  Speaker 2: that is like crying, screaming, throwing up. This changed my life.
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  Speaker 2: And I think the process of getting to bear witness
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: to that even is so beautiful. special that I have
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: a soft spot for it. It's interesting too, I think,
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  Speaker 2: when you're on Goodreads, you start noticing repeat players, people
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  Speaker 2: who are prolific.
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  Speaker 3: Reviewers on there. There is like a true review.
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  Speaker 2: Culture, I think, on the platform that is worth inspecting
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  Speaker 2: in romance. There are reviewers who I'm like, oh, you've
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: been on NetGalley, which is like a platform that dispenses
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: early copies of novels for reviewers and readers, and you're
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: like an old hat on NetGalley.
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  Speaker 3: I know it.
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  Speaker 2: Like, this is your 40th arc this year. You're using
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  Speaker 2: GIFs in a way that feels very millennial and also
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  Speaker 2: very specific to a kind of Goodreads voice. There's a
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  Speaker 2: lot to love about, even if you're not writing reviews
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  Speaker 2: on there, or, I mean, in your case, I advocate
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: for you to protect your peace, Queen. But I will
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  Speaker 2: say for me, I'm having a grand old time reading
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: things And the best possible outcome is that I come
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: out of the experience of reading a review having thought
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: differently about the book.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. It's interesting that you say that about arcs and
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  Speaker 1: about NetGalley, though, because I do think we should talk
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  Speaker 1: about how the economy of arcs in romance. Yes. I
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: feel like it has gotten really out of control in
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  Speaker 1: a way that I haven't seen. I guess I see
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  Speaker 1: it some in like lit fic with really in demand authors.
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  Speaker 1: Like if you have a Sally Rooney arc, you're basically God. Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: Or you're being hunted for sport.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: Or you're being hunted for sport. And you should brag
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: about that. But there's a whole system that has popped
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: up around romance arcs in particular, where it's when people
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: get declined an arc, they get really upset about it online.
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: And I kind of want to be like, Diva, this
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: book is going to be available for sale eventually. Like,
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: you will be able to read this book eventually.
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: They want you to read it, actually.
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: In fact, they would love for you to read it.
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: They just don't want you to read it right now.
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: But it is a whole system where it's like sometimes
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: getting approval for ARCs depends on how active you are
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: on these review systems. And I'm curious kind of what
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: your thoughts are on that process. I'm someone who withdrew
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: from a lot of influencer programs very quickly into being online.
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: But I do request ARCs, specific ARCs that I'm interested in, and.
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  Speaker 3: Will read those.
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  Speaker 2: Something that I think is worth remembering is that an
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: advanced copy, NetGalley, print, whatever it is, an eARC, whatever
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  Speaker 2: it is, is an invitation from a publisher for you
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: to do free labor for them. I think something that
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: I feel kind of sad about is that these advanced
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: copies are... The culture is changing where the economy of
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: ARCs has made it so that there are incentives to
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: offer even artificially inflated positive reviews in the interest of
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: preserving publisher relationships. instead of preserving that thing that I
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: find to be so interesting which is the good thoughtful
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  Speaker 2: considered review.
• 10:02
  Speaker 3: Which may or may not be positive, right?
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  Speaker 2: I think the reality is that Goodreads, because it's such
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: an ancient platform that has been sort of resisted in
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: shitification by being so bad.
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: It has not been updated in a very long time.
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: It really is such a potato website in so many ways.
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  Speaker 2: There is like a certain purity to its review culture
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  Speaker 2: that I think has become diluted by the commercial forces
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: that are more and more interested in a specific kind
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: of way of selling books that treats books as commodities
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: rather than artforms.
• 10:38
  Speaker 3: I think that.
• 10:39
  Speaker 2: Distinction has become ever more clear to me. And it
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: shows up in so many places in terms of influencing whatever.
• 10:44
  Speaker 2: But I think the battleground of reviews is definitely a
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: place where that happens. But I think the reality is
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: the best Goodreads users are in it for the love
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: of the game. These are reviewers that I see day
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: in and day out writing funny, thoughtful, incisive reviews. Of
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: romance novels and, you know, thinking beyond just the idea
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: of wish fulfillment or self-insert or a relationship with an
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: author that they're trying to preserve and are really truly
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: in it for the love of the game.
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I will no longer be a Goodreads user soon,
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: but you can certainly follow me and listen. And I
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: would love if you love a thoughtful critique of my book.
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: You should know when you do that that I'm not
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: going to see it. But speaking of authors that you
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: can follow on Goodreads, today I had the pleasure of
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: talking with Alexandra Romanoff or Zan Romanoff. She writes under both.
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: Probably know Alexandra Romanoff from her big fan trilogy at
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: 831 Stories. She has written three YA novels under the
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: name Zan Romanoff, hence the two names. And today we
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: got into a conversation about the difference between writing a
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: YA romance versus writing an adult romance. There are the
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: obvious things and then there are things that are less obvious.
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: And I had a lot of fun talking to her
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: about this. So I'm really excited for everyone to hear
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: our conversation. Well, Alexandra, hi. Hi. Thank you so much
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: for coming on. How are you today?
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: I'm good.
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: It's a pleasure to be here.
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: I'm so excited to chat with you today about all
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: things YA romance, moving into adult romance. What inspired you
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: to want to move from writing young adult romance to
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: writing an adult romance for 831?
• 12:37
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it was a pretty natural transition, I think. I
• 12:42
  Speaker 3: have written and published three young adult novels under the
• 12:44
  Speaker 3: name Zan Romanoff. So if you hear us going back
• 12:46
  Speaker 3: and forth on names, Yeah. That's why I have two
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: of them. I was a really passionate YA reader. But
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: also when I started writing those books, I was in
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: my like early mid 20s. And so I just I
• 12:56
  Speaker 3: basically still was a teenager. I wouldn't have told you
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: that then. But now I understand. Like I was just
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: really young. And so I felt like what I kind
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: of understood, you know, was young adult. Like that was
• 13:05
  Speaker 3: the part of my life that I had thoughts about
• 13:07
  Speaker 3: and like wanted to talk about. And then it got
• 13:10
  Speaker 3: to be that I was in my mid-30s and I
• 13:14
  Speaker 3: was starting to feel like, you know, I maybe have
• 13:16
  Speaker 3: said my piece on being a teenager. Actually, like that
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: may be kind of it for me in adolescence. And
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: so I was kind of already starting to think that
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: maybe that was a transition that I wanted to make.
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: And then actually during the pandemic, I ended up ghostwriting erotica.
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: Hell yeah.
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: So then coming to 831 and getting to do something
• 13:32
  Speaker 3: that felt like it kind of combined those two things
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: felt like this really kind of natural, wonderful thing and
• 13:35
  Speaker 3: felt like it fit more with where I was, you know,
• 13:37
  Speaker 3: at that point in my life and still am at
• 13:39
  Speaker 3: this point.
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: In my life.
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I love that you said, you know, you've been
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: writing YA and then you wrote erotica and then adult
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: romance kind of combined those two. And I'm wondering if
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: you could talk to me a little bit about the
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: difference in approaching an intimate or a sex scene in
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: between those three genres.
• 13:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, because they really are different and it is interesting.
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: People who haven't written it or don't read it a
• 13:59
  Speaker 3: lot don't think about the differences between adult romance and erotica. Yeah.
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: And those are actually, I think, can be quite, quite different.
• 14:06
  Speaker 3: But depending, there's some adult romance that skews more like erotica.
• 14:09
  Speaker 3: I mean, I was just started off when I was
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: writing YA, you know, it's the convention of the genre
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: that you don't write explicit sex scenes most of the time.
• 14:16
  Speaker 3: And so I was like, well, cool, I don't have
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: to do that.
• 14:18
  Speaker 1: If you ask me, like, what.
• 14:22
  Speaker 3: Sex acts my characters are doing in like the sex
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: scenes in YA, I can tell you I have a
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: very clear idea of that. In part because like these
• 14:30
  Speaker 3: characters are young, they're often doing stuff for the first time, right?
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: And so I needed to know like they're doing this,
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: they're going to feel this way after there's this level
• 14:39
  Speaker 3: of vulnerability, of intimacy, of change in their relationship. And
• 14:43
  Speaker 3: sometimes I would try and like lightly imply, you know,
• 14:45
  Speaker 3: what had happened. Right? The scene would fade to black
• 14:48
  Speaker 3: with like a zipper being pulled down if I was like,
• 14:51
  Speaker 3: parts are getting touched. It's so funny how I like revert, right?
• 14:53
  Speaker 3: I'm like, I've written all these sex scenes.
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: I was just thinking it's so funny that you revert
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: to like talking about it as if you were a
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: teenager also a little bit.
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: And I do think this is part of the challenge
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: of writing sex scenes for young adult because I will say,
• 15:04
  Speaker 3: so yeah, I chose to fade to black. I was
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: just sort of like, to me, this is about like
• 15:10
  Speaker 3: the romance, the yearning, you know, that comes before it.
• 15:14
  Speaker 3: And then how like those sex scenes change the intimacy
• 15:18
  Speaker 3: that these characters feel with one another, right? I was like,
• 15:20
  Speaker 3: I don't need to go into all the kind of
• 15:22
  Speaker 3: physical sensations that they're having necessarily. And I think that's
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: a fine choice. But I have since read YA sex
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: scenes that make me wish I had written them. Because
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: I think when you're writing a YA sex scene, almost
• 15:34
  Speaker 3: certainly you're an adult, right? And so you don't want
• 15:37
  Speaker 3: to be weird about teenager sexuality.
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: Right, right, right, right, right.
• 15:40
  Speaker 4: But I think there's something.
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: Really worthwhile also in kind of in not turning the
• 15:44
  Speaker 3: lights off and saying to that audience, like, here's things
• 15:46
  Speaker 3: people do in bed. Here's ways this is allowed to happen.
• 15:49
  Speaker 3: And especially like, here's ways people communicate. There's a book
• 15:52
  Speaker 3: called Our Shouts Echo by Jada Dia that I adore
• 15:55
  Speaker 3: for many reasons. But one of them is The love
• 15:59
  Speaker 3: interests in the main character are like hooking up for
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: the first time and he's trying to get her off
• 16:04
  Speaker 3: and he can't. And he's like, well, what do you like? Like,
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: what do you do? And she's like, what do you mean?
• 16:07
  Speaker 3: What do I do? I don't. And he essentially is like, well,
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: I would appreciate it if you would go masturbate and
• 16:14
  Speaker 3: then you can tell me next time what you like
• 16:16
  Speaker 3: because it's that's the way you're going to know what
• 16:18
  Speaker 3: I'm going to know.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: That's really helpful data to have.
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: Right. And the character does. She goes and touches herself.
• 16:24
  Speaker 3: And it's like these scenes that are erotic and awkward
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: and funny and like true to, you know, open the
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: door for teenagers to experience sex, especially something that's not porn, right?
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: And where everyone doesn't automatically know what they want. You know,
• 16:37
  Speaker 3: my sort of whole thing about sex scenes is like, yes,
• 16:41
  Speaker 3: I want them to be pleasurable. Yes, I want them
• 16:43
  Speaker 3: to be sexy and fun. But I also want them
• 16:46
  Speaker 3: to open doors a little bit. Like, I want them
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: to represent real sex that real people could really have.
• 16:50
  Speaker 3: Probably often the best version of the sex.
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: But still, yeah. I mean, we talk about this a
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: lot on the podcast, how sex is character work. Like,
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: good sex scenes is character work. And so what you're
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: describing is very much an extension of that. But for
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: a YA audience instead of for an adult audience.
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: And I think there is a way to sort of
• 17:08
  Speaker 3: dial down the eroticism a little bit. You know, turn
• 17:10
  Speaker 3: up some of the awkwardness and some of the uncertainty
• 17:13
  Speaker 3: a little bit. you know say to kids early like
• 17:15
  Speaker 3: sex doesn't have to be shameful and in fact it'll
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: be better if you have less shame about it and
• 17:19
  Speaker 3: about your.
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: Body i have to imagine this is why i'm curious
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: what the difference is in writing adult is an adult
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: like you can kind of turn that knob up where
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: you're like i actually do want this to be intentionally
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: to like i'm trying to make this sexier you know
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: what i mean versus like what you're saying which is
• 17:35
  Speaker 1: dialing up that knob with that's more of the like
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: the awkwardness and the exploratory factor, which is to me
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: as an adult still sexy because you still have encounters
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: like that as adults with people that you don't know,
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: you know?
• 17:48
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I know, right? Hopefully the sex you're having
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: as an adult is still exploratory and interesting and not
• 17:52
  Speaker 3: just kind of like, well, we both know what we're
• 17:53
  Speaker 3: doing here.
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 17:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, writing YA was such a funny head trip because
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: you do, to an extent, you need to be in
• 17:58
  Speaker 3: the heads of your characters, right? Where they're thinking this
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: like six or 17 year old boy they're crushing on
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: is so sexy, right? And then periodically, I would interact
• 18:06
  Speaker 3: with a real 17-year-old boy and be like, oh. God bless.
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: Sweet kids. I think with YA, I was always trying
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: to tap into desire writ large. What does it feel
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: like to discover desire for the first time and to
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: discover that your body can fulfill some of those and
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: other people's bodies can fulfill desires for you? Whereas writing
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: adult romance and erotica is more specific. It's much more
• 18:33
  Speaker 3: tuned into that person's body. I'm writing because I'm writing
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: about body parts that, frankly, on a teenage girl, I
• 18:37
  Speaker 3: just wouldn't necessarily name in the same way or with
• 18:40
  Speaker 3: the same confidence or with the same whatever. Yeah.
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: I asked about specifically the sex scenes, but I'm curious
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: from just a romance perspective. What do you get to
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: do in a YA romance that you don't get to
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: do in an adult romance and vice versa? Like, I'm
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: just curious, what about each is exciting to you?
• 18:56
  Speaker 4: The thing about.
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: YA is that everything is fresh, right? These are kids often,
• 19:01
  Speaker 3: certainly in my books, they're experiencing maybe lust for the
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: first time, like requited crush for the first time. And
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: so there's just this newness and everything is like completely thrilling.
• 19:12
  Speaker 3: On the other hand, it was really funny. Actually, I've
• 19:15
  Speaker 3: been working on like a novel that is for adults,
• 19:17
  Speaker 3: but it's not a romance. But there is a romance
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: in it. And I gave it to a friend of
• 19:21
  Speaker 3: mine to read. And one of her notes, she was like, Zan,
• 19:24
  Speaker 3: these characters don't hook up until like two thirds of
• 19:26
  Speaker 3: the way through the book. That's a YA impulse, right?
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: They're holding back like they've never kissed anyone before.
• 19:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 19:32
  Speaker 3: These people are in their 20s. They've kissed lots of people.
• 19:34
  Speaker 3: They can't start kissing right away. Yeah. Yeah.
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: I think that we've seen so many YA romance adaptations. Obviously,
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: The Summer I Turned pretty huge, like pretty much every
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: Jenny Han series. I know Off Campus isn't technically YA.
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: What do you think it is about YA romance that
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: we're seeing so many adaptations of that now? Adults are
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: watching it just as much as teenagers are.
• 19:57
  Speaker 3: I came into YA, I published my first book in 2016. Yeah,
• 20:02
  Speaker 3: it was the end of 2016, which at that point,
• 20:06
  Speaker 3: like the YA kind of boom was like already in
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: full swing. And, you know, I feel like a lot
• 20:11
  Speaker 3: of people were kind of discovering reading that could feel
• 20:15
  Speaker 3: really joyful. I love reading. I think reading like all
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: books can be joyful. But I think there were a
• 20:20
  Speaker 3: lot of people who maybe had been like turned off
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: by it, were able to kind of find their way
• 20:23
  Speaker 3: back in by finding YA novels. which tend to be
• 20:26
  Speaker 3: quite plotty, character driven, right? A lot of big feelings,
• 20:29
  Speaker 3: like it really meets you out front, you know? It's
• 20:32
  Speaker 3: just like, here's, I want to suck you in and
• 20:34
  Speaker 3: like sweep you off your feet. And then some of
• 20:37
  Speaker 3: those people were already adults. Some of the people who
• 20:40
  Speaker 3: were reading YA at that time got to be adults, right?
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: And we're sort of like, I love this and I'm
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: looking for this, but that grows with me, right? That
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: has more sex, more maturity in it. And then that
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: met the already voracious, like existing romance community, right? And
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: it's just been this kind of, massive explosion of desire
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: kind of one way or the other. But I do think,
• 21:00
  Speaker 3: I don't know, I don't know if the world's worse
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: than it's ever been, but it feels that way.
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: It sure does feel that way.
• 21:05
  Speaker 3: Yeah. And so like, you know, having that kind of dreamy,
• 21:09
  Speaker 3: immersive experience and really fantasy.
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that like dream version of your adolescence that was
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: just not real at all. It kind of related to that,
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: like a big component of romance, right, is the happily
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: ever after. Can there be a true happily ever after
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: in a YA romance when they– like, they have so
• 21:26
  Speaker 1: much life to live. Like, this is probably going to
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: be their first relationship of many kind of a thing,
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: you know? Yeah.
• 21:33
  Speaker 3: Other people have written them and I think have written
• 21:35
  Speaker 3: them successfully. I never even attempted it. I will spoil
• 21:39
  Speaker 3: my own books only. That's not true, actually. The last
• 21:42
  Speaker 3: book that I wrote, they're together at the end. But
• 21:45
  Speaker 3: it felt very much to me a happily for now.
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: I was like, these girls are going to go to
• 21:48
  Speaker 3: college and break up.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You're going to love– Being a
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: crazy college kid, single.
• 21:55
  Speaker 4: Exactly, right?
• 21:55
  Speaker 3: I was like, this is a perfect relationship for them
• 21:57
  Speaker 3: to be in in high school. And I think they're
• 22:00
  Speaker 3: going to grow apart in college because it happens. Yeah,
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: that was something I felt pretty strongly about for my own. Again, like,
• 22:08
  Speaker 3: I love to read a book with a happily ever after.
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: But for my books, like, yeah, I'm not dating anyone
• 22:14
  Speaker 3: I dated in high school. And it felt important to
• 22:15
  Speaker 3: me to have that on the page. Like, you can
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: be the heroine, the love interest, like, You can be
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: the girl in the story and you can end the
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: book by yourself. That is an ending for you, especially
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: at 17. Like that's a very appropriate ending for you.
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, 100%. And my last question is just, as you said,
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: your first book was 2016. How have you seen the
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: YA landscape change in the last decade?
• 22:40
  Speaker 3: Oh, my God.
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: I know, big question. And for the grand finale.
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: The YA landscape has evolved so much in the last
• 22:46
  Speaker 3: like 15 to 20 years. Went from being a really
• 22:50
  Speaker 3: small kind of niche book a genre into being this
• 22:54
  Speaker 3: huge blockbuster. Like there was this moment where it was,
• 22:56
  Speaker 3: it felt like, you know, the force in the literary world.
• 22:59
  Speaker 3: And I mean, the big thing I would say is
• 23:00
  Speaker 3: that it's kind of seeded that place to romance. It
• 23:03
  Speaker 3: feels like a lot of the hype that YA was
• 23:08
  Speaker 3: getting in the big book deals and the adaptations that
• 23:10
  Speaker 3: we're talking about YA romance, but it really has to
• 23:12
  Speaker 3: have that romance aspect to it, right? Like off campus
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: wouldn't be the phenomenon it is if it didn't have
• 23:16
  Speaker 3: the sex, I don't think. You know, contemporary young adult
• 23:20
  Speaker 3: has really kind of taken a backseat I tend to
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: think it's kind of a right sizing, you know, that
• 23:24
  Speaker 3: like it was very small, it was very big. Now
• 23:27
  Speaker 3: it's kind of finding that medium place for itself. It's
• 23:31
  Speaker 3: a young genre. Like it was one of the things
• 23:32
  Speaker 3: that was really interesting to me when I started writing
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: and it was to start researching. You know, we haven't
• 23:37
  Speaker 3: had like the conception of a teenager for that long
• 23:40
  Speaker 3: in human history, right? And the idea then that what
• 23:43
  Speaker 3: a teenager was and that they had the consumer power
• 23:45
  Speaker 3: to like have a whole section of books written for them.
• 23:48
  Speaker 3: That's a pretty new idea now. So, you know, I
• 23:51
  Speaker 3: think we're very much still in process and kind of
• 23:53
  Speaker 3: all that stuff. Like, what is YA? We're figuring it out.
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: We're figuring it out. Zan, thank you so much. This
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: was so lovely. Oh, my God.
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: Thank you. This was really, truly so fun.
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: I came away from that conversation with Zan knowing so
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: much more about writing YA romance, which is an area
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: that I'm not super familiar with.
• 24:19
  Speaker 3: I've read a few of them.
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: Do you read a lot of YA romance, Sanj? No,
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: not really.
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: I feel like I could afford to be reading more
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: of it, but I do not typically. As we've discussed
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: at length, I love a sex scene.
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's so true. They're a little bit different in
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: the YA for good reason. But speaking of looking into
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: reading more things. It is officially fall. I mean, you know,
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: not literally per the calendar. I know. No one yell
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: at me. But everybody knows that fall starts in September
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: after Labor Day. So it's fall. What are you looking
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: forward to reading this autumnal season?
• 24:53
  Speaker 3: Oh, my gosh. Okay.
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: One thing that I'm looking forward to coming out, which
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: I have already read, so cheating, just a little bit.
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: Bad Words by Rianach Robinson. I'm dying to read that oh.
• 25:02
  Speaker 4: My gosh tyler it was so good it was so
• 25:05
  Speaker 4: good it was so good i actually can't be saying
• 25:08
  Speaker 4: more than that but the premise is that it's a
• 25:11
  Speaker 4: literary critic and a debut author get into extended beef
• 25:17
  Speaker 4: like twitter beef over the fact that she keeps panning
• 25:20
  Speaker 4: his novels and it forms a romance obviously i thought
• 25:24
  Speaker 4: it was so solid it has such a grip on
• 25:27
  Speaker 4: me as a contemporary romance which is like not my
• 25:31
  Speaker 4: most memorable genre by far.
• 25:33
  Speaker 3: And yet this one definitely is that. So looking forward
• 25:35
  Speaker 3: to that.
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: And I'm also really looking forward to Damned If I
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: Do by Alexandria Belfler, which is, first of all, gorgeous cover.
• 25:45
  Speaker 3: I don't know if you've seen it. It's green stained glass. Stunning.
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: Premise is that the devil's right hand woman has to
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: convince her long lost husband to renounce their vows so
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: she can wed a prince from hell.
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: Say no more. What else could you need in a book,
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: you know?
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: Demon Ex-Husband is really, that's so big for me. That's
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: out on September 22nd. I think Rhinox is out on
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: October 6th. I'm wanting to read stuff that is like
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: sharp and funny and witty and hopefully a little scary
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: as we approach the winter months.
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: Wait, I read an arc of something also that is,
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: I feel like I'm taking baby steps into paranormal. Oh
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: my God, Tyler, I'm so excited. Which is like the
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: best things I could possibly say to you. It is
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: You're the One That I Haunt by Katie Young. It
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: comes out also in September. The pitch is sort of
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: like Gossip Girl meets my best friend's wedding with a
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: ghost twist. So it's this woman who's in love with
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: her best friend who is getting married and she is
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: trying to make his wedding perfect for him. And she
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: is also being haunted by his cousin about a family curse.
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: It's very, very sexy.
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: Fabulous promise.
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: It's paranormal light. Like it's not like crazy full on paranormal.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: But I feel like it's enough that I am now
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: open to receiving suggestions of more paranormal romance for spooky season.
• 27:08
  Speaker 3: Hey, all you need is an open heart and that
• 27:12
  Speaker 3: will carry you far, Tyler. Thank you. I feel very hopeful.
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: And also, speaking of very light paranormal, Lila Sage has
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: Free Falling coming out, which is the latest in her
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: duology about twin sisters who can see ghosts.
• 27:24
  Speaker 3: Spooky season.
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Anything else that you're really interested in this fall?
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Danica Nava has a book coming out called Sunflower Season. Yes.
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: Sunflower Farm. Is such a sweet setting for a romance novel.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: Kind of the ideal situation.
• 27:40
  Speaker 3: It's a cute cover.
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: It's a very cute cover. She always has really good covers.
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: Now, I also looked into movies that are coming out
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: in the fall.
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: Wise.
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: Because I like to know what's going on. And I
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: do feel like it's worth mentioning the adaptation of the
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: Colleen Hoover novel, Verity.
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: I'm actually really looking forward to that.
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: I'm really looking forward to it. That movie was made
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: for me in a lab. Are you kidding me? It's
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: Anne Hathaway, Dakota Johnson, and Josh Hartnett. Lock me in
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: the cabin with.
• 28:07
  Speaker 3: Them, please. Correct.
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: Correct. And it's not a romance, really, but it's like...
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: psychosexual drama in a way that I think is interesting
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: and like Cullen Hoover has written romance. So it feels
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: applicable to me.
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: And the one that I know is applicable to you
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: that I'm actually surprised that you have not mentioned yet
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: is Wicker.
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: Holy shit. I can't believe I forgot to mention that.
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: I cannot believe. I was sure. Oh my God.
• 28:28
  Speaker 3: I was asleep at the wheel.
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: What's going on over there? Wake up. Hello.
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: I cannot express to you the degree to which I
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: am excited about Wicker. I'm not a person who asks
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: for PR screeners or advanced copies of things, generally speaking,
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: like I sort of have to be forced into asking
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: for the things that I want.
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: I'm begging, I'm begging on the mic.
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: People at Wicker, if you hear me, my personal phone
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: number is redacted, but I can be, I am available
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: and can be reached to discuss Alexander Skarsgård at length,
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: to discuss Olivia Colman, who was one of my favorite
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: actresses of all time.
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: Can you please give a slight synopsis of Wicker?
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: It's an adaptation of a short story about a fisherwoman
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: who is largely considered to be undesirable, unattractive, uninteresting, whatever
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: it is. And she goes to a local wicker man
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: in her medieval village and asks him to make her
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: a husband.
• 29:23
  Speaker 3: And he says, show up at the chapel in a
• 29:25
  Speaker 3: month's time. And she does. And Alexander Skarsgård, made out
• 29:29
  Speaker 3: of wicker, likes the baskets. I love that freak man.
• 29:31
  Speaker 3: he's such a freak, I.
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: Love him so much, arrives and the rest of the
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: trailer suggests that a huge portion of the room of
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: the movie is Olivia Colman getting spectacularly dicked down by
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: wicker man Alexander Skarsgård. I couldn't dream of anything better.
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: I can't express to you how made for Sanj this
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: is as a film.
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: Those two movies are like Separately made for us in labs.
• 29:58
  Speaker 3: Correct.
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: It's also like the premise, fabulous. Second of all, the
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: like kind of reference to Pygmalion is so charming to me.
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: I think it's just any kind of I've made someone
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: to love you. what will happen when you have to
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: confront the person that emerges is, oh, it will always
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: work for me.
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: It will always work for me.
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: My sincerest hope and prayer, knocking on wood, is that
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: because this isn't, you know, strictly releasing as like capital R,
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: capital C rom-com, even though it seems quite funny and romantic.
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: Is that I hope there isn't like a secret death
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: at the end.
• 30:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah. There's been an unfortunate.
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: Trend of these like more drama movies with romance elements.
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: advertising as rom-coms and then trying to yank the rug
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: out from under you as if by giving someone cancer
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: at the end or killing them in some other fashion.
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: But can a wicker man have cancer?
• 30:53
  Speaker 4: No.
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: And my hope is that the ending is beautiful.
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: I hope this for you too.
• 31:00
  Speaker 3: I'll be seated either way.
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: And of course, I'm sure that we don't have to
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: tell anybody listening to this podcast this, but the love
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: hypothesis does come out in just a few short weeks. Yeah.
• 31:08
  Speaker 3: Total anticipation. Tyler and I have totally not seen it
• 31:11
  Speaker 3: at all. Nope. We wouldn't know a thing about it.
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: We haven't heard anything about it. Don't worry about it.
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: And that's the show. That's the show. Call us and
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: leave us a voicemail with your thoughts at 833-831-LOVE. That's 833-831-5683.
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: If you fell hard for what you heard here, get
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: episode notes delivered straight to your inbox by signing up
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: at 831stories. substack. com.
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: And share your recommendations and topic ideas in the post comments.
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: Head to 831stories. com to keep up with.
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: 831's monthly read-in-one-sitting romance novellas and sign up for a
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: membership to The Ones to get your hands on them
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: before anyone else. The Ones also get a 20% discount
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: on everything on the site, including 831's beloved trope hats
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: and pleasure reading merch.
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: The Radio 831 Podcast is a production of iHeart Podcasts,
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: hosted by Sanjana Bhaskar and Tyler McCall. The show is
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: produced by Liz Smith. And for iHeart, our supervising producer
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: is Emily Marinoff. Special thanks to the whole iHeart team
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: and especially Allie Perry and Allison Cantor Graber. Our executive
• 32:22
  Speaker 1: producers are Claire Mazur and Erica Cerullo. Our music is
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: Domino by James Ryan Carr and Love Is What You
• 32:29
  Speaker 1: Do by Alibi. We'll be sharing the love here again
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: next week.