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"What Will People Think?" Sara Hamdan on Palestinian Identity & Breaking Stereotypes · Obnoxiously Pleasant

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome back, everyone, to another episode of Obnoxiously Pleasant.
• 0:03
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Henan.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Lina.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_01: You make Lena all the time.
• 0:08
  SPEAKER_01: Today we have a very special guest, uh, Palestinian American author, Sara Hamdan.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: Sara, welcome to the podcast.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_01: I'm so excited to have you with us today.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: Hello, Lena and Hanan.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: I'm the one who's excited to be here today.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: Oh no, thank you for coming on.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, today we're gonna be discussing Sarah's book, uh, What Will People Think.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_01: Very provocative uh title, and I absolutely love it.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_01: Can you tell us a little bit about the title and why, and a little bit about yourself and about the book?
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm just gonna give you the mic and tell us all about you.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: Amazing.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I'm just so excited to be here to talk to you about this because I'm guessing that part of the reason why this appealed to you is that Arab girl trauma that we all had of Shura'ulun Nas.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: What will people think about every single decision you make?
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_00: And I felt it a lot when I was in my um college years and early 20s, and it's just every big decision that you make from what you want to study to who you want to marry to you know later on how you're gonna raise your kids, it's all about what will people think and how will people say.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: It's like there's this jury of faceless people that are going to be, you know, judging and watching what you do.
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_00: So I wanted to just poke fun at that a little bit, and I thought, what better way to do that than through comedy?
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: Because comedians say things that kind of can be inappropriate or too candid or bold, but they say them and people laugh, but you hear it.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: So I just thought it was a really nice way to tackle cultural stereotypes, and um the novel is told in two different timelines.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: The first one is Mia, she's Palestinian American, she's in her early 20s, and she's just navigating her love life.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: She moonlights as a stand-up comedian, and then she discovers her grandmother's diary that dates back to Yafa, Palestine, in 1947, and she discovers her grandmother had an illicit love affair.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: So the book is really just a coming of age story for two different women in two different time periods, and it just shows you how the decisions we make do reflect on us individually, but also our families.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: And at the end of the day, love is love, and we should be able to love who we want to love.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I absolutely love that.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_01: Can I tell you?
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I love that you said coming of age.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: So growing up, like my favorite, favorite, favorite book when I was like in 10, maybe fifth grade, was Are You There, God, It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blue.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: Judy Blue.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_01: So I love that book, but I also feel like this for me, and I was just telling Lena, I'm like, like, I got by the time I got to like the last like three pages, I was just reading these pages like in tears.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_01: And I absolutely love that because I felt like, oh my God, look, somebody wrote a story about like for us, like by us, for us.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_01: And I always say that on podcasts.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_01: I love people who do it for us, who do it for our culture, who do it for our people, for our language.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_01: It's it was so beautiful.
• 2:59
  SPEAKER_01: And so for me, I was like, look, it's like our own little, are you there, God?
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's me, Margaret.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_01: Because I loved that growing up.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_01: It taught me a lot about, you know, it talked about a lot about things that were taboo that your mom may not have necessarily spoken to her about.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I kind of felt that in this book.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_01: Like, Mia feels like she is different.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_01: Like, she's not like her friend.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: She's not like, I mean, she talks about Katie, who is her best friend, and she loves her.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: She really does love Katie, but she knows that there's a lot of differences between her and Katie.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: The things that Katie does like, Mia may not necessarily be into.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_01: Um, she's just not gonna get certain things, I think.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_02: And I think we've all been through that.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_02: Like, as you know, Arab Americans, you know, growing up here, especially like you, you, you have friends in high school, everywhere you go, but like, and then you have your Arab friends who just automatically go.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_02: And you meet them later.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_01: And it's funny because also, like when I when I read stuff, I usually like bookmark, like I, I, I, you know, I basically fold pages.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_01: And there was one page here that I loved.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_01: And I put this here because like it stood out to me.
• 3:56
  SPEAKER_01: And it goes, me, it goes, I smiled, grateful for my two new friends, for my two new dysfunctional Arab friends.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: At least I had found them amid the storm.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: And I love that so much because I'm like, oh my God, I think every single one of us had that moment.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_01: We have that moment where you're like, oh my god, I found my people, my tribe.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but that kind of leads me to my next question.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: Um, the character is is I loved her in so many ways and her family and her grandparents and just everything.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, how much of that, if any at all, is like drawn from real life experiences for you?
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: I love this question.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: And I've gotten some reviews that say, you know, what a bold memoir.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, but it's not me, guys.
• 4:40
  unknown: Yeah.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: It's not me.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: You know, my grandmother didn't have an affair with a British soldier.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I I wanted to just say about what you were saying about female friendships before.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: My friendships have always been so important to me.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: I'm actually still in touch with my high school friends.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: We have a WhatsApp group, we talk all the time.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_00: I love the friendship that you two have.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I think as you're getting older, like I'm in my 40s now, and I invest so much.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the club, girl.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I'm all ouch, ouch, ouch.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_00: I invest so much of my myself and my energy into my friendships because they are sacred.
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: So, this I wanted to reflect that friendly love in my book, the the platonic love that you feel for a really good female friend.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: And that's where the friendship with Katie comes.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: That's where she discovers the dysfunctional era of friendship and how that hits different when she meets Phaedra because you finally feel like you found somebody who is a misfit like you in all the same ways.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: And it's girl, we have all had a Phaedra in our lives.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_01: Every single, I feel like every single Hanan is in the Phaedra.
• 5:47
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, when you guys read this book, I am not living my best life like Phaedra is.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_01: Okay.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, you are.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, you are.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: I am.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_01: I am living my best.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_01: We all have a Phaedra in our lives, and I love that because I really do feel like Katie is amazing and she brings all of these positive qualities, and it's wonderful to have that friend that, you know, that really like holds you down.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't think Phaedra would have ever done to Mia what Katie did to her.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: Like, she wouldn't have put her out like that.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_01: She wouldn't have just printed a story about her without like telling her.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_01: Even if she thought she was doing her a favor, I don't think she would have done that because we think, we being like uh like Arabs, right?
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: With your Arab friends, like, what are people going to think?
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: Like, are they gonna be okay with that?
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_01: Is somebody in her family gonna read this?
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_01: Is somebody, you know, going, we think about everything.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_02: We think of all the possibilities and all the ways it can go wrong.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_01: Now I have a like on that, I have a I have a very important question for you.
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_01: Because as I was reading this, I was like, oh my gosh, I can so relate because I am an Arab American, right?
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_01: Um, how do you with with yes, the story's written in English, right?
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_01: But there's so much reference in there to like, you know, the the village where where Mia's grandmother is from in Falasteen, where you know, there's specific words.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, how do you approach that for somebody who has like nothing to relate to when it comes to that stuff?
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so this was the tricky thing, and this is what I loved so much about what you said earlier, that this kind of felt to you like the Judy Bloom.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_00: Because we never see ourselves reflected in these stories.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: So this was something that I think is part of the reason why it took me so long to get the story published because I didn't have the confidence that this could actually be something that could go mainstream.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: Is this something writing just for me?
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: Is this the whole like, oh, writing is cheaper than therapy kind of thing?
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: I need to just get it out there.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: But then, you know, at the end of the day, I think there were a couple of things that happened.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: One is I won a Netflix award for a short scene from this novel where Phaedra and Mia are talking to each other about how strange and weird and wonderful and difficult it is to be a Palestinian American at that time and in New York specifically, and all of the feelings and the cultural stereotyping and all of that.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_00: So I thought, okay, I'm on to something here that could lead to something bigger.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_00: And that was the first nudge.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: And the other thing was just the timing.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: I think nowadays we're seeing a lot more stories from all around the world that do well.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: It's not so, I want to say, Eurocentric anymore in the same way as when you were growing up.
• 8:21
  SPEAKER_00: So all the best references for literature.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, as a writer, of course, I love to read.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: So growing up, I loved the Jane Austen's and the Margaret Atwoods, and I still love them.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: I adore them.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's the benchmark, but we never had variety.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't even like to say diversity because actually great stories come from all over the world.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: It's just this one happens to focus on a family that it's told through their Palestinian cultural lens.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: And that's fine because a great story is a great story.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, I totally agree with you.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_02: Uh I just wanted to, you know, there's two parts to the book.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_02: And I was telling Henan before we were, I'm like, Hanan, don't spoil it for the people who didn't know.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_02: I can't help it.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_01: I can't, it's spoiled.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_02: But there's the the book goes between uh, you know, the past and present, right?
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, as a Palestinian, like I'll be honest with you, I loved the stuff about Palestine before the as a non-Palestinian.
• 9:16
  SPEAKER_02: I know, but like it was like I was actually like I love both.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_02: I loved, I love the present, but I'll be honest with you, I loved when you took me back.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_02: Like, you know, even as as as sad as it was, it was so like before, especially before the neckma and how life was, yeah, and how ordinary and how beautiful it was just simple and and just people doing everyday things.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_01: But can I tell you that I loved this?
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_01: Uh it's it's funny that you say that because I loved it for the same reason, but it also made me realize something that in time in like in times of war, we focus on people, the people obviously who are dying, we focus on all the destruction.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_01: We don't realize that people have, for lack of a better term, whole as lives.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: They have all these things happening, feelings, emotions.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_01: And I love how human you just made everybody seem right humans.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_01: They're just humans, they're people like you, like me.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_01: They're just living their life, and then the shit storm takes place, and they're miss, you know, they have to run off and they're misplaced, and they lose their family, and they lose everything.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't think we we we look at it from that lens a lot, and so it really made me think a lot about like when I see when I see like videos when I'm looking on Instagram or when I reshare about what's happening in Gaza right now, because these people have lives, they're people, they're humans.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_01: We just see them as lives, dreams, hopes, everything.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, ambitions, everything.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yeah, like I am so I'm gonna cry right now.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_02: Don't cry.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_02: This is this is a this is a good moment.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_02: Don't cry.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: This is my favorite interview ever.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_00: I completely understand.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: Look, I have to do it.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: But it's true, it's so true.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: It's exactly, it's exactly what you're saying, and it's just you forget that we're talking about people with everyday normal loves and lives, and I think it's so hard, uh especially when you have Palestinian heritage, but when you come from anywhere in the world and you realize just how insane what we're watching every day is, and then having to um represent or talk about it or justify or whatever, it's just human beings, it's human beings who deserve to eat and to live and to hug their moms, and just all the normal things that even we take for granted.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: And it's um, you know, I I love what you said about the village scenes, and part of it is I wanted to kind of give a tribute to my own grandmother who told me about what it was like in her childhood growing up when everything was quite normal and exactly, yeah, exactly, exactly.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I wanted to preserve some of that beauty.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: Can we tell a story about Palestine that has joy and beauty for once?
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_00: Because we never get it.
• 11:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I I never got it.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I so love that.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_02: But see, that's I want to follow, I want to follow up on that because, like, for me, like I've seen all of any any Palestinian filmmaker or writer or author, I'm the first person to support, right?
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_02: But there's a part of me, and I always say this to like my close friends.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_02: I wish we can just have something, like a piece of art, whether it's a movie, a book, what a show, where it's not uh us getting killed, just us living.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_02: You know, joy joy is resistant.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_02: You know, like I know, like you know what I mean?
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_02: Like it's just I know it's not entirely exclusive.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't have to be, you know, like this is complimentary, it's just showing different sides, and I think we just don't get to see this one ever.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: That's so rare.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and it's go ahead.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, it's it's amazing to me.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: I love there's so many things that I loved about this book, and and one of them again, I will go back to what I said earlier, which is like I love people who do it.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: It took me a minute to collect myself.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_01: I love people who do it for our language, for our culture.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_00: So you have really beautiful feelings around this, and your heart is just so black.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: By the way, I it's not to interrupt, but I was telling Hanan, like yesterday I woke up, I was in the worst mood, and I was just so depressed.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_02: And I was telling her, I got all my crying out done yesterday.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_02: And like like just every day you get on the phone and you see these things, and I'm just like, why is this still happening?
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_02: Why is this being allowed to happen?
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_02: So you're crying today because you didn't have the crying, yeah, the crying session.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's like when I but when I look at like what you like when I when I read this book, I'm like, this book has just as a human being, I and I I love things that humanize us as a people because we are we're beautiful people.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_01: We love music, we have wonderful food, we have a beautiful culture, we have a beautiful language, we're so expressive.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_01: And your episode makes me think a lot about an interview we did with a publisher named uh and an author named Edemis Sergeni, uh, who is just half he's he's half Egyptian and and you know, half American.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_01: And he he said something really important, which is you know, there we are not represented like in this world, in the community of like authors and and and submissions and all of this, we're not represented as a people.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: So when Lena told me, hey, we're doing this interview with this, you know, Palestinian American author, and her name is Sarah Hamdan, and she's gonna send us the books, I was so excited because I'm like, okay, I will give this or I'll give this a shot, I'll give it a read.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I have to say, of the I'm usually like a historical nonfiction girly, right?
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: But this from like page eight, I was just sucked in.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: I was in a zone.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_01: And like I told you, it's I loved it because the the child inside of me was like, oh my god, this is somebody who completely understands our um our like us, us, our experience.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_01: This is representative of our experience.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_01: Whether you live in New York City, whether you live in Middle America, whether you live in Los Angeles, wherever it is.
• 14:49
  SPEAKER_01: I don't care if you're Egyptian, I don't care if you're Palestinian, I don't care if you're Syrian.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: This represents the the story of like uh an immigrant, a child of immigrants, the things that you face, the dual identity, the the undocumented yeah, undocumented immigrants, the the language barriers, just so many things.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_01: And I, like I said, it took me back to being like that 10-year-old that picked up Are You There, God, it's me, Margaret.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I was like, God, I wish there was this was around when I was 10, 11, 12, coming of age, and have something to read and say, like, okay, you know what?
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: Here's something that represents me.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's okay to be me exactly the way that I am.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's thank you so much.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, everything that you're saying is what I wanted a reader to feel.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: So this means everything to me.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that makes me so happy.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, just honestly.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: And it has been so hard to talk about this book that's uh about a Palestinian-American comedian at a time when all of this stuff is going on in the news at the same time.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_00: So it means a lot that you're saying this because you're you understand it's about kind of showing the humanity of it, the joy, the love, but also the women at different stages of their life.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: Like you are seeing a young woman and a grandmother.
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_00: It just appeals to such a wide, you know, range of women and the Arab-American experience, but also the immigrant one.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: I've gotten so many incredible messages from people who say, Oh my god, you know, this could easily be about my aunts in next or India or whatever.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: There's a like a nice universality to it, but it's told through a very specific lens of that Arab experience.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what we know, we've lived it.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: And I love that.
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_01: Now I want to ask you like a little bit more of a technical question.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_01: I want to understand, like, what is your because I read your, I read your your your, you know, I read, I read that blog, but I also read the um sort of like, you know, the the message that you to your sister and to your husband, and I thought it was so cute.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, which led me to think about your writing process.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what did that look like?
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: Because you're like, he's he was the one who read your drafts, your sister read, you know, your drafts.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: So, like, how did you structure it?
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_01: Did you, did you know that, you know, okay, I wanted to do this juxtaposition?
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: Did you just want to tell your grandmother's story?
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: And then Mia came later.
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: How did this come about?
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: By the way, I got so many comments from people saying this was the longest acknowledgement section ever.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I was like, Well, 10 years of the world.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: Did you tell them, guys, I'm I'm I'm brown, I'm Arab.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: It could have been the whole book.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: You should have seen my wedding list.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_00: It was like, you know, we have a lot of people to thank and include.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: Um the I wish that I had a more, you know, studied answer to this, but the reality is I was a tired working mom who just really needed a creative outlet.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_00: And two young children, pandemic, full-time job, burned out.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: This was me trying to uplift myself and bring some joy into my house.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: So my writing process sometimes would include me hiding out in the pantry with the lights turned off and writing on my laptop, or it's like every mom lying to, you know, lying to everyone and saying, Oh, I have an important meeting, I have to go upstairs and do it on Zoom right now.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: And then just writing for half an hour.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: My husband is also really supportive, so he would see my eyes kind of glaze over, like, oh, you know, she needs she needs a minute.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_02: She needs a minute, she needs a yeah, she needs a minute.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: Just go upstairs and and write.
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: And it's just, I think one thing that I'm proud of through all of the ups and downs of yes, it took the 10 years, and there were agent rejections, and I'll tell you all about that as well.
• 18:23
  SPEAKER_00: There was real joy in writing this.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_00: I love to write, so I got a chance to do what I loved, and it's just stolen moments of time.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I think the most discipline that I was with it is before the pandemic, when I started to write, I would just go into the office early in the mornings and right before the workday began.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: And that's I think the most structured that I've been.
• 18:44
  SPEAKER_00: I left my job last June sort of focus on writing full time.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_00: So now I'm a lot more discipline.
• 18:49
  SPEAKER_00: Good for you.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, the corporate.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: That's amazing.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's exhausting.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_01: I can't wait to see like a part two of this.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: I cannot wait to see not even it doesn't have to be a part two, but I can't just I can't wait to see like more stories like this.
• 19:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: We need a a part two on how hard it is to leave a corporate lifestyle.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_00: And yeah, yeah.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_01: You know what it is?
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's it's not even the lifestyle, it's to leave that paycheck, that consistent paycheck.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, paycheck.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_00: There's you know the pros and the cons.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: There's the paycheck and the team and the work wife, and there's also really difficult managers and insane expectations, and you know, absolutely.
• 19:23
  SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of it.
• 19:24
  SPEAKER_00: So leaving that and now full-time author, I write every single day and I'm really, really disciplined with it.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_01: So, with with the fact because this leads me, I'm so glad that you said leaving corporate and and because that leads me right to my next question.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of people out there, especially a lot of like young women, probably have similar stories to share with you, but haven't been brave enough to break the cycle of what will people think?
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: So, like, how do you like what can just offer some advice?
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: Like, if you could have, if you could be, you know, queen for day and you could be in charge of of telling all of these young women, here's how you're gonna do this and here's how this is gonna happen, here's the best, here's the worst.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like, just give them some advice because I someone out there is gonna be inspired by this.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: I'm just gonna let you know that right now.
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: You know what?
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_00: I think our time and our energy is so precious, and we forget that.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: And when you're a mom or when you have really important responsibilities at work, you kind of get sucked in and you are on that hamster wheel.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_00: And I think for me, it came during a hard time during the pandemic.
• 20:27
  SPEAKER_00: It was just pure burnout.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: Like I felt like I was doing everything for everyone else but myself.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it was the midlife crisis turning 40 point of oh my gosh, half my life is over.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: What am I?
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: How am I intentionally spending my time?
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_00: And why don't I do more of the things that I really like?
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: And when you're kind of a-type the way that I have been, because I'm a good Arab girl who did the whole Ivy League thing and did banking, even though she hated it before I finally got that confidence to turn to writing, which is my you know, one of my true loves.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_00: Um I think I just needed to believe in myself and actively building confidence is it's something you work on.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_00: I wasn't naturally born with it in the sense of like I'd write something and just know immediately that it was gonna be great.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_00: So write with joy, or if you're a creative person, proceed with joy, but also take that pressure off.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: There's no performance reviews there a way that there are with jobs, or there's no grades the way there are with college and exams and all of that.
• 21:32
  SPEAKER_00: Do the thing, do it repeatedly so that you get better and better and better.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: And if you do it enough, someone will eventually say yes, which is what happened with me.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_00: So I think it's just about that determination, but not in the workless kind of way.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: Persistence because you actually really enjoy this thing.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: All of this time, no one was breathing down my neck to get pages done.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_00: I did it because I love it, and I think that's why I succeeded at the end of the day.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: As opposed to work, where you have a devil.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: And you have to do the whatever it is you need to deliver in order to get the paycheck.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's reversing that process.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: But if you if you do it right, I think it can lead to really great results and bring that financial freedom, hopefully, that we're all looking for.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_00: Why else are you?
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: Aren't we all?
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_02: Aren't we all?
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_02: So you talk about just like be persistent and you know, keep trying, keep working, keep practicing.
• 22:22
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, but my question is you know how the beginning of the interview, you mentioned how people ask you, oh, is that your grandma?
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_02: And you're like, no, my grandma didn't have an affair with a British soldier.
• 22:33
  SPEAKER_02: So my question to you is this um for for I mean, people who are kind of worried, like you know, new writers who are worried, oh, do I share?
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_02: Because like every writer, let's be let's be honest, every writer takes stuff from their personal life and incorporates it into their writing.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_02: So for those people who are kind of, they want to tell their story.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_02: Like I have a I have a really good friend of mine, and I always tell her, write your book.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_02: Your book is your story is amazing.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_02: And and she's always worried about, well, what are people gonna think?
• 23:02
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, yeah, this title, it's over the book of the mail.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_02: And it's like, like, we're still worried, we're concerned about how we're gonna be perceived, or is this but like I want to talk about the Arab culture aspect of it.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_02: Like, oh, it's oh my god, can you believe her?
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_02: This this lady had an affair with a you know what?
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_01: Well, there's that, like I felt like I'm I'm glad that you said that because I felt like there's a couple of things that were taboo, right?
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_01: Like you have like a gay friend who's Arab, and you have the grandmother who had an affair.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_01: I don't even know if her and the grandfather were married before the marriage that happened.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_02: So you're just gonna tell everybody, like, Hannah, don't spoil it for the woman like all these taboo things.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_01: Like, did anybody ever stop and be like and look at you and be like, Sada, are you nuts?
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what are you writing?
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: Just because it's fiction doesn't mean you should actually put it out there.
• 23:46
  SPEAKER_01: You know what I mean?
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_02: Also, also, I I know we're like asking so many questions, but I also want to know your family's reaction to this book.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: Your grandma was your grandma like girl.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: Well, you know what?
• 23:56
  SPEAKER_00: With fiction, you have license to play.
• 23:58
  SPEAKER_00: That's true.
• 23:59
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and people know that.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um, the second thing I'm gonna say is some of the raciest stuff that I've seen in the Arab world has been those Ramadan series.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_00: Like I remember watching one, and I I it was one of those famous actresses, I forget which one, and she's like licking a watermelon really sensually in the opening.
• 24:20
  SPEAKER_00: I'm like, what am I watching?
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: This is bordering on something really inappropriate.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 24:27
  SPEAKER_00: So then I thought, well, if they don't care, then why should I care?
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_00: And I also think that as a creative person, if you are an artist and something scares you and you are terrified of what people will think, you're probably onto something really good.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: Because that means that you are being honest and there is something raw.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: If it makes you nervous, I think it's actually a really good thing.
• 24:49
  SPEAKER_00: I'm terrified with most of the writing that I put out, and the earlier works that I did were not the same way, and I got many, many rejections on those works because there wasn't real truth there.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: I was always trying to mask it and make sure that things were proper and good the way we're that we're taught to.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_00: But I think um people appreciate when the masks come off a little.
• 25:13
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone has been there.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: You said yourself, you see yourself, and some of your thoughts and feelings in this.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: We all think this way, we just don't talk about it sometimes.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_00: Again, I will reiterate, it's fiction.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_00: So, of course, a lot of this is not true, and I I stand behind that, you know, as my disclaimer.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_01: This way, your teta's not like girl.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I did only give a copy to my parents after I had a bound, like it was already sent to the public store as the first initial.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: How excited were they when they copied?
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: I told my parents, I was like, if there's anything you have to say, you have to say it now because this is gonna like be printed in a month and we're done.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_00: So, what how did they how did they react?
• 25:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sure they were proud of you.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_00: They were really proud.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: I think they they've seen me wanting to be a writer for so long.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_00: So it's also I can see it myself with my own children.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like it's a dream come true, which is really nice.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: It's like if you have a child who loves to sing and suddenly they get a record deal, you know, it's part of it is that feeling.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: But then for a long time, I tried to convince my parents that being a writer is a worthy way to live your life.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I think they didn't really, really believe that I was good until this happened.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you know, so that actually leads me to my next question, and I love that.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: But like I feel like you said something really important in your last answer is that yes, like your parents have uh, you know, have seen you really wanting to do this, but also you kind of pushed yourself to a point where you hadn't before, right?
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_01: So, how do you feel like writing this book overall like has changed you?
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: And like how do you plan to move forward?
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what are next steps for you?
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: Because I feel like this is, and maybe for me, like I'm obviously super biased.
• 26:57
  SPEAKER_01: I loved it, right?
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_01: It was a great book.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_01: It was wonderful.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: But like, how do you feel like this has changed you?
• 27:02
  SPEAKER_01: And then what do you what do you see yourself like writing next?
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what are what are our plans?
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_01: Give me some uh give me give me some tea here.
• 27:08
  SPEAKER_01: I need to know what's happening, what's coming.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_00: I feel like this book helped me come home to myself because I had to think really actively about who I am.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: There are elements of me.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_00: There are elements of me that are in every single character.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_00: Like there are bits of me sprinkled in Mia and in Phaedra and in the grandmother and in the grandfather, every single one of those characters.
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's almost like method acting.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I got to write and then, you know, get into the mind of all of these different characters.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's just the most wonderful feeling.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I think one thing I learned about myself is I was always working really hard to have this amazing career and to prove that I was good enough.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: But the only way that I felt good enough was to do something for myself, and that was where this book came in.
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_00: And it's just been a wonderful thing of it getting published, like getting published alone is so hard.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_00: That's a big achievement.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_01: And a pretty big publisher, too.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_01: I know.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and it was this marvelous two-book deal, and it's like, oh, historic, and one of the biggest deals to come out of the Middle East for a contemporary author.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_00: So there's also the pressure that comes with that of oh my gosh, what are you gonna do next?
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_00: How am I gonna possibly measure up to this again?
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_00: Where this book made the New York Times recommended reading list and Forbes and you know got this spotlight on the Jimmy Fallon tonight show.
• 28:36
  SPEAKER_00: Like, I have to make sure that I keep hitting at this high level.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_00: And the only way that I can do that is to write stuff that scares the shit out of me.
• 28:46
  SPEAKER_00: So I have to do that.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_02: And I I absolutely I'm excited.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_02: If it's scaring the shit out of you, then it'll probably scare me too.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_01: No, I honestly I I love more of this.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_01: And like I said to you before we even started recording, I one of my nieces just moved away to college.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: And she has look, she's probably one of the sweetest, most beautiful, not because she's my niece, but truly sweetest, most beautiful, most kind, most smartest girls I know.
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_01: Shout out, Hannah.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think you're amazing.
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and you know, it's I mean, honestly, like she's she's the first kid in her family.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_01: There's only it's only her and her sister, but she went away to college.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_01: Like she moved away from home, and you know, she's 18.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_01: It's her fresh start.
• 29:27
  SPEAKER_01: So, like, I think something like this is gonna like hit home with her.
• 29:31
  SPEAKER_01: I'm I I fully plan on having her read this book because I think she is so focused on being the best version, most excellent version of her, like version of herself and of anybody that's her age are doing what she wants to do.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so I feel like this book is gonna tell her, like, no girl, like enjoy your life.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_01: Like, you're good.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_01: People out there are are not as like they're not as perfect as they as as you think they are.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_01: And that's one of the things that I think I loved so much about this book is that she found her like misfit friends, right?
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_01: She you you she learns that, like, hey, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not perfect, and it's okay because they're not either.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody is perfect.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_01: Even the people that she thought were the most perfect, that she was afraid to to discuss who her, you know, her true self with, they're not perfect either.
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I love that so much because it, like I said, it humanizes us.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_01: You realize that you you realize that even the closest people to you, you may not know everything about them, right?
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_01: And just in conversation, and I love that because like that's a huge thing for us in our culture.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_01: Like you don't really, you're kind of like afraid to talk to your mom and dad openly.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_01: You're afraid to talk to your grandparents openly.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_01: There's a lot of taboo subjects, and I love that that book breaks that.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_01: Like, hey, if you just had a conversation, you would find out that the person sitting next to you is a human, is a human being.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_01: And so I love that.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_01: What a surprise.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_00: But again, it's just spot on what you're saying because I wanted to break that model minority myth as well.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_00: Like you're always expected to either in TV shows or in any stories, um, Arabs are shown as the bad guys, or they're shown as the per perfect person who's like trying really hard to be the banker and you know, show up in the right way.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I really, really wanted to have flawed women who make mistakes and are still lovable and you're rooting for them.
• 31:21
  SPEAKER_00: So they make inappropriate choices, they make obviously wrong choices, but you understand the context of what led to that and then how they overcome it and come into their own.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_00: I just need it to show people who weren't perfect, and then that is also great.
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_01: I love that so much.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_01: I love that they weren't perfect.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_01: I love that they were just like regular humans with the city.
• 31:43
  SPEAKER_01: I was yelling at her.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_02: I was like, girl, it's not gonna work out.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_02: I'm like, no, it's not gonna work out.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: That was me.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_01: You know what's funny?
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_01: I told Lena, I was like on page, and I again I I I you know I see I take notes when I don't.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_02: This one just remembers.
• 31:58
  SPEAKER_01: On page 91, I read that and I was like, I I'm not even kidding, Sarah.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_01: I like shed a tear because I I was like, this is not gonna go the way that you want it to.
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_01: This is he's not here for that.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_01: He's here to take you and everything.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_01: He's not, it's not this bubble that you but then, but you know, again, I I love that I loved it so much.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_01: But now, most importantly, um, I want to know where can I get your book?
• 32:26
  SPEAKER_01: Where can I get the audio book?
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_01: How do I support you for all the listeners out there?
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_01: Because I'm hoping that someone out there is gonna like drive with this the way that that's so tell me, where do we where do we buy this?
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_01: Where is it available?
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_01: And where can we listen to it to?
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_00: And everything that you're saying, I I can't tell you how much it means to me because I've written it for you.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_00: I've written it for the younger Sarah and the older future Sarah.
• 32:51
  SPEAKER_00: Girl, I felt like it was for me.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_00: I loved it.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so it means a lot because you're exactly who I wanted to receive this, and you've received it so beautifully.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_00: You can find it in any bookshop.
• 33:04
  SPEAKER_00: You can find it in on Amazon, uh, Barnes and Noble at all the indie bookstores.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: The Audible version is available on Audible.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_00: Um Apple.
• 33:15
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's just it's everywhere, everywhere that you can any major bookseller.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_00: And you can find reviews on Goodreads.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um it's gotten really great reception so far.
• 33:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I just I can't wait to hear what more people think of what more people think.
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's awesome.
• 33:31
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you so much.
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, did you have any other questions?
• 33:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so you know what?
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_01: I do have one last question because we had all these questions, but what is one question you wish yes, you know, more people would ask you specifically about the book or about your writing journey that we haven't asked?
• 33:47
  SPEAKER_00: I love that.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um maybe a bit about the cover inspiration because that one took quite a bit of back and forth, and it's uh it's subtle, but there's an olive tree on there, you know, piece out of Palestine.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_00: There's also, do you see the little embroidery?
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's I do, I do over the top and the bottom.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 34:08
  SPEAKER_00: I have it up on the screen too.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so that's the original Tatriz that comes from a village near Yeffa.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: And then you have the New York City skyline, and it's all about sunrise colors and hope.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_00: And again, I just wanted a feeling of love and joy and cheesy harmony for a change because I think being Palestinian is so beautiful, and we don't get to see that beauty often.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_00: And I wanted it there front and center.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 34:37
  SPEAKER_01: I love that.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_01: I love that, and you know what's funny?
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_01: I'm one of those weirdos that like just to wrap this up, you know how like people um people never never read like the back of the book, like people always go in and they like read the inside cover to see what it's about.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_01: No, I read everything.
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: I read the I start by reading this first, and then I always read the insert in here, right?
• 34:55
  SPEAKER_01: Which is like the about the author, and then I go to read what the story is about.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um but no, I I I'm so glad that you shared that.
• 35:03
  SPEAKER_01: I'm really, yeah.
• 35:04
  SPEAKER_02: And also just to say that we actually read the books because when when when uh Clarissa we talked about, I'm like, yeah, but send us the books.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_02: We can read it.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_01: And we'll read the book.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_01: No, honestly, I um like I cannot, I cannot thank you enough for for sharing the story with us.
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_01: I really I have this feeling, this strange feeling that that somebody is gonna have the same exact feeling out there that I'm and I'm like, I always say I'm I'm 45.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_01: And so if I have all these feelings and emotions, I'm sure somebody who is much younger than me, right?
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_01: And I would love to to to I would honestly, honestly, I've they're they're gonna have the same, they're gonna have the same feeling because I feel like it really is a wonderful representation of us living here.
• 35:44
  SPEAKER_01: I loved all of the the the kind of the small breaks where where you look, you see her relationship with her grandmother, with her friends, all of these little words in Arabic, you know, the just everything, everything.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_01: I loved everything about it.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_01: It was my Arabic version of Are You There, God It's Me, Margaret.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_01: I loved it.
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_01: I loved it.
• 36:03
  SPEAKER_01: I can I really, really loved it.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a it's it's a great read.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_02: Didn't you you you don't want to you won't put it down.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_02: You want to finish your I mean it took me three days.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_02: It took you three hours.
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_01: It took me it literally, it took me exactly it took me three and a half hours to get to it cover to cover.
• 36:16
  SPEAKER_00: That's incredible.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: I can't believe that.
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_00: I love to hear it.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_01: So it's uh even my husband, my husband looked at me.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_01: He came upstairs, it was like one o'clock in the morning, and I was like this.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_01: Oh no.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_01: Literally, I was like this, and he's like, he's like, You're a monster.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, I'm almost done.
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_01: There's like five pages left and I'll be finished.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but Sarah, thank you so much for your time.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for this incredible book.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_01: Everyone, um, what will people think?
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, you know that I'm at a point where I don't give a crap what people think, but you're gonna love this.
• 36:45
  SPEAKER_02: And we'll put links, we'll link it, you know, where you can get it and where you can also get the audiobook.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_02: Perfect.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 36:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and the um hardcover is out now.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_00: The paperback comes out next May.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, okay.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_00: And then a year later will be book two.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_00: I can't wait.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_02: Hopefully, we'll get a book to talk about that.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, we definitely, but book two is it, is it it's totally different story than this, right?
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: Completely different story, but it will have touches of I mean, what you liked in this one, in the sense that there is some American experience, there's a lot of creativity, there's female friendships, but it's it's very it's a completely different story.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, I love that.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_02: I'm excited.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_02: I love that.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_01: I know, I'm telling you, I I absolutely I'm so excited.
• 37:27
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, so we'll be the cool ones that get the first dibs on the on the on the review cop, right?
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_00: I love Paris and all.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
• 37:35
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much, Sarah this was amazing.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: This was amazing.
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_00: Have a great day.
• 37:40
  SPEAKER_00: You too.