Latest / Radio 831: A Romance Podcast / Origin Stories, the Rules of Romance with Jen Prokop, and Summer’s Anticipation Index

Transcript

Origin Stories, the Rules of Romance with Jen Prokop, and Summer’s Anticipation Index · Radio 831: A Romance Podcast

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Hi, and welcome to the radio eight three one podcast,
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: brought to you by the romance publisher eight three one Stories.
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: We're your hosts, Sinjonabasker and Tyler McCall, and we're so
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: excited to talk everything romance, from the novels and the
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: tropes to the book discreen adaptations, and of course the
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: drama of it all, you know, unpacking what the genre
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: says about who we are and how we love big stuff,
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: important stuff.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: We are so genuinely, like, honestly embarrassingly excited to be here.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: We really are. First episode. It's happening. It's finally happening.
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: We've been talking about doing this for so long, and.
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: Now we're here, actually here, well like virtually here, but here,
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: microphones and everything, a professional recording setup.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: For anyone who doesn't know us yet, which, Hi, welcome.
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: We are so glad you found us, thrilled that you're here.
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: This is a podcast about romance, the genre, the books,
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: the tropes, the adaptations.
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: The opinions. I mean, you and I have so many
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: opinions just between the two of us.
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: Mm hmm, quite a well of opinions, possibly too many,
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: no such thing, no such thing. But also truly, what
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: we want to do here is dig into what the
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: genre is actually saying about yearning, about how we love,
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: about what we want, and why we keep coming back
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: to these stories even when, and like honestly, maybe especially
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: when real life isn't giving us the happily ever after.
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, because the thing is, romance is one of the
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: most red genres in fiction, if not the most red
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: genre in fiction currently, and somehow it still goes so underestimated.
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: And I find that gap interesting. I know you find
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: that gap interesting, and I think.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: That gap is really the show, right, like bridging the
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: distance between what people think romance should be relegated to
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: and like what we know it to be. Yeah.
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: Absolutely, But okay, so before we get into all of that,
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: let's start at the beginning.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: The origin story.
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: Everyone has one us, you mean, Batman, spider Man, iron Man,
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: various other men.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: Many members of the Marvel and DC cinematic universe, any and.
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: Many many people in us. Yeah, but for us, it's
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: it's what the literary origin story.
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the book that got you the moment it clicked
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: Book one or I guess like book zero.
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: Son, tell me what was the book? What was the
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: thing that got you into romance.
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: So I grew up watching period pieces with my mom.
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: If someone's in a corset, she's watching it, like hell yeah,
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: if someone is getting laced up by a maid, she
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: is tuned in. So I think it's where like my
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: romance bones were installed. Also, like little known lore, she's
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: a matchmaker, and like I suspect that there are like
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: little inklings of that that like infiltrated my psyche at
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: a tender age?
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: Wait, how am I just learning this about you?
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: Wait?
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: You just dropped that lore? So casually she.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: Started doing that more college. But she's always been interested
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: in love, right, Like she's always interested in partnership, interested
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: in things like that. So I think it was like
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: a weirdly heritable property.
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: Like I am obsessed with this. Okay, so sorry, So
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: your matchmaker mom, who loves historical dramas.
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: Can't imagine where I got my interests in romance and
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: historical romance in particular from what a mystery? Yeah, someone
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: should get freud on the case. But like, I really
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: truly like started there, and then I actually started reading
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: genre fiction romance in college and picked up Alisa Kleapas
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: novel who I'm sure we'll talk about at some point
• 3:39
  Speaker 1: and was like, I'm a different person than who I
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: was before I read this, and I didn't realize that
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: people were doing this, that people were writing like this,
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: that people were telling stories like this, And I like
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: fell off of a cliff into the like deep well
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: of romance and I've I have yet to emerge, and
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: I don't the golm her scathed, So like that's good.
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: That kind of what got me started. How about you.
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: I feel like I'm one of those, I guess notorious
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: I started during the pandemic romance readers like I definitely
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: have memories of being in a books a million and
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: secreting my way into the romance area and like, yeah,
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: surreptitiously looking through books and things like that. But you know,
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: in a in a past life, I was a full
• 4:24
  Speaker 2: time fashion editor and that job kind of made it
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: so that I lost my free time until the pandemic.
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: So like that's kind of what got me into reading
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: again generally. And I was like, oh right, I used
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: to love reading. I used to read books all the time. Yeah,
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: And there were two books in tandem that I remember
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: around that same time. One is going to be a
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: controversial pick. Because I don't think many would consider it
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: to be a true romance novel, but it is the
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: idea of you. Ah.
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: Yes, I'm still yet to read that. Oh.
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: My friend Selene texted me like early in the Pandemic
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: and she was like, you will love this. I am
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: a noted Harry Styles fan She was like, you will
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: love this. It's like Harry Styles fan fiction. And I
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: was like, amazing, Yes, And I read that and I
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: read Jezebel did an interview with Olivia Dade around the
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: release of Spoiler Alert, and I loved the interview. I
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: loved what Olivia had to say in the interview. I
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: was so riveted by the concept of both her generally
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: like her as an author, and also the book. And
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: I picked that up and those two together kind of
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: got me into like, wait, what's going on here, Like
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: it's been a minute since I've checked in. Yeah, and
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: I just started reading really voraciously. But I think what's
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: interesting is like you come from the very sort of
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: traditional background of the historical romance of it all. I
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: definitely think like foundationally, I come from a fan fiction background,
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: Like I was like deep in the fanfiction dot net.
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Oh, and I are not new to this.
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: I'm not new to this, and so I think it honestly,
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: like not that fan fiction and romance crossing over is
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: anything new, but I think it really prepped me for
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: the moment that I that we're in, which is so
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: many fanfic readers and writers who are becoming traditionally published authors.
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: Like obviously I picked up the love hypothesis, right, Obviously,
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: I don't think it's a coincidence that you again is
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: white like Holy Reil, all time favorite contemporary romance novel
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: by Kate Golback, because Kate comes from the fan fiction minds,
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: Like I think it's a different approach, but it definitely
• 6:37
  Speaker 2: laid a foundation for me.
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: Yeah, And I mean I think the overlap is a
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: circle in many ways, like yes, and I also like
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: I feel so profoundly shaped by my own experiences and
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: fandom when it comes to like relating to romance too.
• 6:51
  Speaker 1: I think that's kind of in terms of like framing
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: the pod too, like we're interested in romance culture, right,
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: like this thing that I think can feel a little
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: bit more all encompassing maybe like we're rooted in this
• 7:05
  Speaker 1: place of obviously loving to read and loving to read
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: romance novels and like feeling that they are this like
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: really important cultural artifact. But there's also this thing of
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: like romances everywhere you look, Like, yeah, romances in so
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: much of media that like may or may not self
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: describe as romance. And there's something about that that I
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: think is really freeing when it comes to like what
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: the pod might get up to. Yeah, yeah, do you
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: know what I mean? You can look at the romance
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: novel at the top of the charts and like decide
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: to be dismissive about it, But that, to me speaks
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: to a lack of knowledge about like where that novel
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: is positioned within the genre, what it's responding to, what
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: implications it might have for the novels that come after it.
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: The readership, which is this like massive population of people
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: who are profoundly influenced by the things that they consume
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: and treasure, right, Like, people have intimate personal relationships with
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: these texts that I think are worth reverewing. Even if,
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: like whatever the romance novel doesn't appeal to you, aren't
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: you curious about why people can't stop thinking about love?
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: Isn't that kind of the bedrock of a lot of
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: media that people are interested in. I don't know, I
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: just always see things like that that are like touted
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: as a kind of intellectual standpoint, and I'm just like,
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: aren't you bored, Like I mean, oh, you want to
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: read cool stuff.
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: I think it's just one of those things where in
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: the same way that I know horror, for example, like
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: good horror says something about where.
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: We are as a society.
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, good romance does the same thing. Yeah, you know,
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: I feel like the amount of times that I have
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: read a romance novel and felt either seen by something
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: or feel like it's gotten me thinking about something in
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: a different way.
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: People dismiss it because it's there is a quote unquote
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: formula to it, Like you know that person A is
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: going to meet person B, or person a B and
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: C and D depending if you're writing a wide shoes, Yeah,
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: what your configuration of choices and they're going to end
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: up together and they're safety in that. But also because
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: you have those parameters and you have those boundaries, you
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: can use them to explore so many different ideas and
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: so many different concepts.
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, man, like any genre, any kind of
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: story has to operate from constraints, so you know where
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: you're going and what you're saying and what you're doing.
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: I'm so glad that we're talking about these constraints and
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: these boundaries. I think it really nicely tees up our
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: very first guest, Jen pro Cop from Faded Mates.
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: Jenn is so wonderful. She is someone who reads a
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: lot of romance, who writes about romance, who thinks really
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: hard about romance. As one of the co hosts for
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: Faded Mates, obviously been talking about romance novels at this
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: point for several years with her co host romance author
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: Sarah McLain. But she also is a Kircus correspondent for romance,
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: so she's a critic and she's been like a lifelong
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: reader of romance, and she's someone who I think is
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: a really reliable, wonderful authority on like what kinds of
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: parameters we're working with when we talk about romance here
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: on the pod. I think she'll be a really useful
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: ass in like helping us set up our frame of analysis,
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: if you.
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: Will, Yeah, we'll talk about what makes a romance romance.
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: I'm so excited to be doing this, truly, I cannot
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: express how delighted I am thank you for coming on, Jed.
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: We're so excited to have you.
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: I'm really excited to be here. I guess really the
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: point of the conversation today is that, like, this is
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: a romance culture podcast, and we're interested in like romance
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: as a way of seeing the world and moving through
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: the world and interacting with media, regardless of whether or
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: not it is strictly speaking romance genre fiction. But obviously
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: Tyler is a romance novelist and I am a romance reader,
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: and both of us come from this place of like
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: deeply loving and appreciating the genre and its bones, and so
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: I guess we're in a place of wanting to like
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: level set for a listener too, Like what are the
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: constraints of romance that are like particularly precious and like
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: the ones that shape what this genre really is to you? Right,
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: Because we understood like there's sort of the name thing
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: of like needs to be about love, needs to have
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: a happily ever after, But there's more, right, Like, there
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: are more expectations around this, And I'm curious about your
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: thoughts on that.
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: You know What's funny because I think romance readers are like, yeah,
• 11:53
  Speaker 3: there's some rules and it's outsiders who are really like,
• 11:55
  Speaker 3: but we don't like rules, how dare you? The scribbling
• 11:59
  Speaker 3: women of romance right like sort of put rules on
• 12:02
  Speaker 3: us that we don't like or we don't want to
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: deal with. And I think that's really like embedded in
• 12:07
  Speaker 3: sort of some of the pushback against it, because lots
• 12:11
  Speaker 3: of genres have rules, lots of kinds of stories like
• 12:14
  Speaker 3: come with some guardrails around them.
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: The one that.
• 12:17
  Speaker 3: I think is like the most famous and is of
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: course like the HGA right it has to end happily
• 12:23
  Speaker 3: or the HfN happily for now. You know, sometimes you
• 12:26
  Speaker 3: see something really smart go by and like threads or
• 12:29
  Speaker 3: social media, and you don't make note of who said it.
• 12:32
  Speaker 3: And one of the things that was really interesting me
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: is someone had this thread that they were sort of
• 12:36
  Speaker 3: like romance readers see that as very expansive. What a
• 12:41
  Speaker 3: happily ever after or happily for now looks like is
• 12:44
  Speaker 3: I can think of off the top of my head
• 12:46
  Speaker 3: fifty you know, one hundred a thousand different ways.
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: That might look.
• 12:51
  Speaker 3: And so to us that doesn't feel confining. And I
• 12:54
  Speaker 3: think it's like people outside the genre who think, well,
• 12:57
  Speaker 3: if they have to be happy what does that mean?
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: It mean a marriage, a baby, And I just don't
• 13:03
  Speaker 3: think that romance readers feel that way at all, Like
• 13:06
  Speaker 3: we're like, yeah, it's whatever the characters needed. And so
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: I think like it was really eye opening for me
• 13:14
  Speaker 3: to just like think about it that way, Like this
• 13:16
  Speaker 3: is not a problem for romance readers because we know
• 13:20
  Speaker 3: the ha is defined by the love interests, right, not
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: by a set of outside metrics.
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: So I think that to me is.
• 13:29
  Speaker 3: One that I'm only mildly interested in. I just feel
• 13:33
  Speaker 3: like if somebody is like I'm struggling, well, feel free
• 13:36
  Speaker 3: to get off the bus and read a thousand romances
• 13:40
  Speaker 3: and report back.
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Right.
• 13:42
  Speaker 3: The one that I feel is less stated is this
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: idea that the world the character's in And this is
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: language I for sure borrowed from Jennifer Porter, who is
• 13:54
  Speaker 3: like a longtime romance reader or someone on Threads is like,
• 13:57
  Speaker 3: She's like Jennifer r n N the world is not perfect.
• 14:01
  Speaker 3: But whatever unhappiness or like misery is like as a
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: result of their wound has to also be something that
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: they are addressing at the end of the book as
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: individual characters. And I think maybe this is where again
• 14:17
  Speaker 3: outsiders to romance struggle. It's like, oh, so you fall
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: in love and you're just happy. Well no, well.
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: No, yeah yeah right yeah.
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: Instead it's this person for people, These people's person makes
• 14:33
  Speaker 3: me better. So I think for me, when I'm editing,
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: I really sometimes am like mining this, like this is
• 14:41
  Speaker 3: going to destabilize the ha if this person is at
• 14:45
  Speaker 3: the beginning identifies XYZ as a problem and it's still
• 14:49
  Speaker 3: a problem where they're still in that kind of behavior pattern.
• 14:53
  Speaker 3: And so I think that to me is another like
• 14:56
  Speaker 3: unspoken maybe part of like what the h she means
• 15:01
  Speaker 3: is your world better?
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah, when we talk about the like traumatized man who
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: arrives on page one of let's say The Duke and
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: I by Julia Quinn, we understand that, like Simon must
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: be unmade and remade over the course of the novel
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: for the like anchor and hook of the end to
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: actually land, and also for the to be a story.
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: Like I think the idea that like plumbing, the interiority
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: is essential is a really interesting and like unspoken, like
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: you said, tenant of the genre.
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: I think like a core belief of romance is that
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: your human relationships, And I say that purposefully. I don't
• 15:41
  Speaker 3: just mean romantic love, but your human relationships should make
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: you better if you are going to continue them.
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Love isn't what makes that possible. It's that the
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: other person either sees the bad parts of you and
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: pushes you to improve them, or sees the parts of
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: you that you don't allow yourself and gives you the
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: room to express that stuff.
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: I saw Sherry Thomas speaking once, and we all know
• 16:05
  Speaker 3: Sherry right, brilliant, probably one of the most brilliant minds
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: in romance. And what she said is the love interest
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: is the person who sees through the lies you tell yourself.
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: Oh man, right, that's so yeah.
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: I mean I was like, let me sit down because
• 16:23
  Speaker 3: it's great. And I think that's like when we talk
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: about the ha If people think it's simple, I'm like, well,
• 16:29
  Speaker 3: you just aren't trying hard to understand what we're talking
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: about when big character changes require work, right.
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: I'm really curious with like the book Tokification of Discourse,
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: et cetera, and so forth, whether the concept of rules
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: around romance, like if readers have become more prescriptive about
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: that kind of thing or what you've noticed in that space.
• 16:55
  Speaker 3: I'm not going to just blame TikTok for that. I
• 16:58
  Speaker 3: think thick and aos three I think right, like the
• 17:01
  Speaker 3: tropification of Romance I think has also had a really
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: big part of that. Then we have like the large
• 17:09
  Speaker 3: scale trauma of the pandemic, right, and people really feeling
• 17:13
  Speaker 3: there's something very clear to me happening that like pre
• 17:17
  Speaker 3: and post pandemic about like just how little grace. I
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: think people are willing to extend a story property, whether
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: it be a movie or a TV show or a book,
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: to surprise them.
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: So I don't know.
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: I think that there is.
• 17:32
  Speaker 3: A very much a prescriptive sort of element, like I
• 17:36
  Speaker 3: want to be able to like sort of you know,
• 17:38
  Speaker 3: three tropes in a trench code and now I know
• 17:41
  Speaker 3: what the story is. Yeah, but you don't know what
• 17:44
  Speaker 3: the story is. And I think that to me is
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: reductive in a way that I do think is sort
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: of bad for the genre, largely.
• 17:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, because I think that it has led to a
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: lot of criticisms that have made author I mean like
• 17:57
  Speaker 2: I feel afraid of anything that feels too complex or
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: too messy, or you know that that one person might
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: be like, well, your male main character is evil because
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: he did this thing. This one time or whatever. And
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: I think that it leads to a lot of sort
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: of like toothless romance where there's no stakes and you're like,
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: I say this all the time, but it's like this could.
• 18:19
  Speaker 1: Have been an email.
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: Yes, like you know, yeah, this romance could have been
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: an email. Yeah.
• 18:25
  Speaker 3: There's fearless writing and then there's fearful writing, and we're
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: really in a fearful writing kind of era.
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: I'm going to ask this and let me know if
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: this is like too big of a question, but like
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: if you had to hand someone three romance novels and say, like,
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: these are the bones, clearest examples of like romance when
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: it's at its best, what would they be? Why those? Okay?
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: I like it.
• 18:47
  Speaker 3: I like a challenge. I at recency bias is also
• 18:50
  Speaker 3: a thing. So right, And Kate Claiborne's newest book, The
• 18:54
  Speaker 3: Paris Match, came out, Yes, and my god, that's right.
• 18:56
  Speaker 3: I'm opening a tab. First of all, it's beautiful writing.
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: And I think I get a little like prickly around
• 19:04
  Speaker 3: people who are like, it's all bad writing. I'm gonna
• 19:06
  Speaker 3: give them something that I'm maybe like, if you think
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: this is poorly written, you're just a Jackass, okay, right,
• 19:11
  Speaker 3: But I think the other thing that The Paris Match
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: really delivers is a really strong woman as a main character,
• 19:18
  Speaker 3: which I think is really important to the bones of
• 19:21
  Speaker 3: the romance, right, like just in general, like these are
• 19:23
  Speaker 3: strong women who are dangerous in some way, and Layla
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: is someone who is like I have walked away from
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: a marriage. It takes a while to figure out why
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: she did. But I also think it delivers all like
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: the feelings, right, the angst, the yearning, the like, all
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: of that. Okay, So I would say that book for sure. Listen,
• 19:44
  Speaker 3: it's top of the twenty twenty six. I'm gonna say,
• 19:46
  Speaker 3: read Heated Rivalry.
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it is a first of all, it's a fucking banger,
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: like so good, right, And I think the other thing that.
• 19:55
  Speaker 3: It does so well is it shows how important sex
• 19:59
  Speaker 3: can be toward romance. Yes, and that like when we
• 20:03
  Speaker 3: write when we say the emotional intimacy and the sexual
• 20:07
  Speaker 3: relationship have to be like one is informing the other.
• 20:10
  Speaker 3: I think there's very few books that do it as
• 20:13
  Speaker 3: well as he would Rivalry US. Yes, yeah, yeah, so
• 20:16
  Speaker 3: I think that I would say Kate's going to deliver
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: the feelings Katid Bravery is going to deliver that part
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: of it. And then I'm going to say I'll talk
• 20:23
  Speaker 3: about a Beverly Jenkins book. I know that they're first
• 20:25
  Speaker 3: all I want to say historical because I love them
• 20:28
  Speaker 3: and I think they're so foundational to the like the
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: romance genre. And I know you said one, but I'm
• 20:33
  Speaker 3: going to say Indigo or Forbidden Dealer's Choice. These are
• 20:37
  Speaker 3: both perfect books, perfect yea perfect books. And I think
• 20:41
  Speaker 3: what these two books do, it's like really showing you
• 20:45
  Speaker 3: characters who are like these amazing individuals, both of them
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: in both books, who are on a path that gets
• 20:51
  Speaker 3: intercepted by then meeting the other person and their life changes.
• 20:56
  Speaker 3: And I think that's what romance does really well too,
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: that we were talking about, right of those books, what
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: the characters at the beginning would have said, this is
• 21:04
  Speaker 3: what I want my life to be like versus what
• 21:07
  Speaker 3: they have at the end shows you the transformational nature
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: of falling in love.
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so that's I answer that that's a good lineup.
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: That's like a good lineup. It's a sexy lineup, it's
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: a an honest lineup.
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: We put you on the spot and you're like, I'm ready,
• 21:26
  Speaker 2: you know what I read.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: I'm ready, I'm ready the letterbox.
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: Top for you without any morning, basically nail that.
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: Well. Thank you also for all of the time that
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: you've given us, and also like your expertise and wisdom
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: is so so so appreciated. Thanks for coming on. No,
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: I loved it.
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: It was my pleasure.
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: I wrote down all those book recommendations from John. They
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: are now on my summer reading list.
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: Yay.
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: But speaking of summer reading list, it is right around
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: the corner, believe it or not. Yeah, it's actually going
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: to happen. We're going to be warm and in the
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: sunshine again. And I want to talk about what we
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: are anticipating this summer. Yeah, what are the three things
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: that we're most excited about that we're really looking forward
• 22:20
  Speaker 2: to that we're circling dates on our calendar for uh
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: huh ready songe.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: I'm ready, I'm ready. Okay, So I'll go in chronological order,
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: because I think that's just most respectful to the media.
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: First Rivals season two, Yeah, well season one consumed me, mind, body,
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: and soul. It's so important to me. I have seen
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: so many edits of Declan O'Hara online. It's like, actually, ridiculous,
• 22:47
  Speaker 1: and it premieres on May fifteenth, actually, but I think
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: they're doing it in two chunks, so there's one in
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: May and then the next six episode chunk is in June. Probably.
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: I'm really really excited to see David Tennant being just
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: an absolute diva for like several hours. And also there's
• 23:04
  Speaker 1: a romance in Rival. I mean, the whole thing is
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: based off of like the Bonkbuster series by Dame Jillie Cooper,
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: the iconic kind of romance Bonkbusters, the author from the
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: eighties and nineties. But there's a romance within the Rivals
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: novels that really closely mimics a romance within one of
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: my favorite romances of all time. But more on that
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: at a later date. We have too much to get through.
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: I know, I'm mystery. I'm saving it for the clear
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: banger Clipberger. And then my second thing is Score by
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: Kennedy Ryan, which is the sequel to the book Real
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: by Kennedy Ryan, which was so beautiful and so really
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: I mean, like the thing of Kennedy Ryan is that
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: like she's just so guided that like, really, how much
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: is there to say? Besides like this book is going
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: to rock and I'm really excited about it. And these
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: are characters from the first novel that I was really
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: interested in and curious about, and it's a second chance romance,
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: and like music is at the heart of the novel,
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: and I'm like so interested in everything that Kennedy Ryan
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: has to say. And I think also, like in the
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: Wake of Sinners, it feels like a particularly well timed novel,
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: So I'm really excited to read that, and I like
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: I am continuing to like build my theory about how
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: she writes, so having a new data point to supplement
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: that is going to be really exciting for me. And
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: the last thing is just a Highland Fling by Nana Kamar,
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: which I'm cheating a little bit because I'm reading it
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: right now, but it's not out until the end of July,
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: which is a very sweet romance set between a woman
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: who attends her dad's wedding in Scotland and a guy
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: who she hooks up with and then doesn't realize is
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: actually at the wedding the next day and the like
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: road trip that they need to go on shenanigans are ensuing.
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: I will say this is like the most concise summer
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: I can give it. So I'm very excited to see
• 24:57
  Speaker 1: that book come out. And like, also, she's just like
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: a really fun writer who has really sexy heroes, So
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: what's not to love what those are?
• 25:06
  Speaker 2: My free Oh my god, Kennedy Ryan is an overlap
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: for me, So I mean, I pick it different, but
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: I love but like, Kennedy Ryan is an auto by
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: for me. Like I see a Kennedy Ryan book, Yeah,
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: it goes in the cart you know.
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, so I'm.
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: Excited about that. I'm also excited for Rachel Lynn Solomon
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: has a new one coming out on July fourteenth, Extracurricular.
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: Oh okay, I'm curious about that one. Yeah.
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: It's a former pop star who enrolls in college and
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: she gets on with her sexy professor who has a
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: slutty little earring on the cover. It's all I could
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: ever ask for in this world, Like, say no more.
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: I need to know what goes on with these two immediately.
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: So so excited for that. And then I'm excited for
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: what I'm calling the Olivia Wilde double feature this summer.
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: So there's two movies coming out with her in them.
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: One she directed called The Invite and it is about
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: a couple who get invited by their neighbors to be
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: in weekly orgies. So I'm excited Seth Rogan's in it.
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: I wait, Jeff saw straight.
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: I saw. I like walked in as this trailer was
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: playing when I went to the movies recently. Yeah, this
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: is I didn't know the premise, but this is wild
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: I'm tickled. Okay, sorry, go ahead, I'm delighted.
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: So it's her Seth Rogan, Penelope Cruz, and Edward Norton.
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: And that's when she directed. And then she's in a
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: movie with Cooper Hoffman called I Want Your Sex that
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: comes out later in July. Oh, and it's Greg Arakis.
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: I'm not familiar with his work, but the reviews out
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: of Sun Dance were really intriguing to me. She plays
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: like a professional dominatrix, like I've heard. Like it's like her,
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: like she was made for this role. I really like
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: when you let Olivia Wilde be a little kookie. Yeah,
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: so I'm really I'm really invested in this. Like Olivia
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: Wilde kind of sexy, intriguing double feature.
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: I like her when she's being a little kookie. I
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: was introduced to her first when she was on House,
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: so her as like, yes, bisexual chaos even in House
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: like was really a formative So I seeing her as
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: a dominatrix, I think, really lands that feels correct.
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it feels it feels really good. I'm I'm excited,
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: like I get excited for summer block Like obviously, like
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: The Odyssey is coming this summer.
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: I will be sad for that.
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: Like, you know, there's the summer blockbuster situations, but I
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: like the weird little movies that people put out as
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: counter programming. Yeah, so okay, Lightning Round though, if you
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: had to pick one of the things that you just said,
• 27:35
  Speaker 2: my gosh, I know, no.
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: Prash, Okay, I'm gonna say Score because it's the one
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: that we both had, Like I just think that it's
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: gonna be so good, Like it's such a guaranteed banger.
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna go with that. I'm gonna go with that.
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: But that was actually like picking between favorite children, so excruciating.
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: Ask because I'm really brave.
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: You're so brave, you're super for doing it.
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: Okay, So that's what we're looking forward to this summer,
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: and we've got a lot on the docket, so honestly,
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: we'll probably come back here and keep you always posted
• 28:10
  Speaker 1: on what we are continuing to read and listen to
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: and watch and love the sticky summer. I hope you
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: have your thigh chafing bomb in the cart at Target.
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: It is the season. This is the season. But thanks
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: for hanging out and we'll see you next time. Let
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: us know what you are looking forward to this summer.
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, let us know what's not on our list that
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: we should be yes reading. I'm compiling my summer reading list.
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: Yeah, what are we missing? I gotta know? And that
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: has been the very first episode of the radio eight
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: three to one podcast. We did it, We did it.
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: Oh believe it. It's real, emerging unscathed.
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: And that's the show. Call us and leave us a
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: voicemail with your thoughts at eight three three eight three
• 28:57
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• 29:02
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• 29:04
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• 29:09
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• 29:12
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• 29:16
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• 29:34
  Speaker 2: The Radio eight three one podcast is a production of
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  Speaker 2: iHeart Podcasts, posted by Sandanabascar and Tyler McCall. The show
• 29:42
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• 29:45
  Speaker 2: producer is Emily meronoff special thanks to the whole iHeart
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: team and especially Ali Perry and Alison Kanter Graver. Our
• 29:52
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• 29:56
  Speaker 2: is Domino by James Ryan Carr and Love Is What
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: You Do by Alibi. We'll be sharing love here again
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: next week