Latest / Radio 831: A Romance Podcast / Our Dream Adaptations Slate, Iman Hariri-Kia on Social Media in Romance, and Why the Genre Needs More Risk

Transcript

Our Dream Adaptations Slate, Iman Hariri-Kia on Social Media in Romance, and Why the Genre Needs More Risk · Radio 831: A Romance Podcast

• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Hi, and welcome to the Radio 831 Podcast.
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: We're your hosts, Sanjana Bhaskar and Tyler McCall, and we're
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: so excited to talk everything romance, from the novels and
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: the tropes to the book-to-screen adaptations and, of course, the
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: drama of it all. You know, unpacking what the genre
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: says about who we are and how we love.
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: Big stuff. Important stuff.
• 0:28
  Speaker 3: Tyler.
• 0:29
  Speaker 4: Sanch.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: We're in adaptation season.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Thank God.
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: As you know well.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: And thank God.
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: Sense and Sensibility.
• 0:34
  Speaker 4: Sensibility.
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: Pride and Prejudice, The Love Hypothesis, People You Meet on Vacation,
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: so on and so forth. Lots and lots of romance
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: and romance-adjacent properties in the mix.
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: It's a busy season. Yes, it is.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: Are there any that you are like, I really wish
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: this romance would be adapted? Why hasn't this one been adapted?
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: It's not in the adaptation pipeline, but really should be.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: So many. I don't even know where to start.
• 0:56
  Speaker 3: Actually, I'll start somewhere that I think will really delight you,
• 0:59
  Speaker 3: which is the Wallflowers series.
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely. I can see that as, like, an anthology,
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: you know?
• 1:06
  Speaker 3: I do not understand, given the success of Bridgerton, why
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: people aren't throwing themselves to find the next Bridgerton.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: And it's right there, and it's the Wallflowers series.
• 1:18
  Speaker 4: Correct.
• 1:19
  Speaker 2: And actually, Julia Quinn and Klaipas, I think, are friends.
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:22
  Speaker 3: I know for a fact that Hollywood right now is
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: looking for adaptations that can be serialized, whether it is
• 1:28
  Speaker 3: in movie form or in TV series form.
• 1:31
  Speaker 4: Mm-hmm.
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: You have four seasons right there, ready to go.
• 1:37
  Speaker 3: Lisa Kleypas is like an icon and a legend.
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: Massive readership.
• 1:42
  Speaker 3: Massive readership, massive fanship, really sexy stories. Also, you know,
• 1:47
  Speaker 3: we'd have to throw again the magic in there. So
• 1:49
  Speaker 3: that's five right there. That's five seasons, guaranteed.
• 1:51
  Speaker 4: Sorted.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: Hollywood, are you listening?
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: I actually do think that you could tell most of
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: those stories in like one or two long seasons. Like
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: I think you could do ensemble interconnected cast stories if
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: you wanted to.
• 2:05
  Speaker 5: I mean.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: You absolutely could.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: I would prefer as much time as humanly possible for
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: all of them. But you could adapt it in such
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: interesting ways.
• 2:12
  Speaker 3: Listen, love, light, and respect to the Jane Austen adaptations.
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: But like we've adapted them so many times. What if
• 2:18
  Speaker 3: we put our brains... to historical fiction.
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: It's interesting. When we were thinking about this, I was like,
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: all of the stuff in my mind is historical. Everything
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: I'm thinking about is historical and paranormal.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: Oh, say more. Give me the paranormal right now.
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: Oh my God. It is like my life's dream. One,
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: I would really love if Nalini Singh's Side Changing series
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: was adopted. I think it would be challenging, but so interesting.
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: She's such a fabulous writer. And I also think the
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: political themes of that work are... The first book, Slave
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: to Sensation, was written 20 years ago, and it still
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: holds up and is still enormously interesting and says all
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: sorts of really interesting things about colonialism and power and
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: identity and nature. And I think that it has such
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: rich potential to become a complex piece of paranormal work.
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: We are not in a world where we don't know
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: how capable paranormal is of being interesting and complex. Most
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: of modern TV is borrowing tricks from Buffy and pretending
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: it isn't. Like, quite frankly, it's possible for paranormal work
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: to be so generative and interesting. And I think Nalini
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: Singh is a really good example of that. I also
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: think Cressley Cole's Immortals After Dark series would be incredible.
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: It basically is a paranormal series that follows different creatures
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: in this world as they hurtle towards this thing that
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: they call, I think, an ascension. Basically, it's a period
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: where different monster factions are sort of fated to battle
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: because of a sort of population culling thing, where if
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: the population of monsters gets too large, there are these
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: like sort of natural tides and forces that result in
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: like population extinction. And so all of these romantic pairings
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: unfold over the course of like 20 books, basically, of
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: these people in this.
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: World who are fated to battle.
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: Against one another. And you also watch these like political
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: machinations happen in the background of these different factions. starting
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: to develop conflict with each other. It would make for
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: such a good old school supernatural meets Buffy meets some
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: other paranormal world that could be so fun. Similarly with
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: Nalini Singh, who has like a bajillion side changeling stories.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: It could create this like whole massive interconnected world. And
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: it boggles the mind that these have not been adapted
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: for TV. It actually blows my mind.
• 4:38
  Speaker 3: I know, especially considering I feel like horror is not
• 4:41
  Speaker 3: that paranormal is horror, but it's so adjacent. Like, I
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: feel like horror is having such a moment right now
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: that I feel like that's kind of a no brainer. Also,
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: it's just like Hollywood.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: Are you listening?
• 4:49
  Speaker 4: I know.
• 4:49
  Speaker 2: And I think the thing that horror has been able
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: to do that romance is not necessarily is. I'm thinking
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: about Mike Flanagan, who does Midnight Mass and Haunting of
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: Hill House.
• 4:58
  Speaker 3: He's got the upcoming Carrie adaptation, I think, or like
• 5:01
  Speaker 3: it might be released.
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: I think so. I think so. It's such an interesting
• 5:05
  Speaker 2: format to me for these seasons to be loosely, loosely,
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: loosely connected, but sharing in a similar sort of tone
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: and vibe with the ability to tell contained story. That
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: is the format of romance.
• 5:18
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: In these interconnected series, you are working with stories that
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: really do hold up on their own, but can breathe
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: life into a broader world, no matter how explicitly connected
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: they are. And I think there's such a ripe avenue
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: for exploration that TV hasn't taken. I really don't get it.
• 5:35
  Speaker 3: So I really want to know, like, what catches your
• 5:37
  Speaker 3: attention when you're reading something that you're like, I would
• 5:39
  Speaker 3: like for this to be a Because I can tell you, like,
• 5:41
  Speaker 3: I have two different things that trigger that for me.
• 5:44
  Speaker 3: One is, like, I love this character so much that
• 5:46
  Speaker 3: I would love to see this embodied. The other thing
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: is sometimes when I'm reading something, I just think, God,
• 5:51
  Speaker 3: this would make such a beautiful adaptation. Like, Kennedy Ryan,
• 5:54
  Speaker 3: I know Skyland is getting a series adaptation.
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: Thank God. You know what?
• 5:58
  Speaker 3: And thank God for that. But score and reel I
• 6:01
  Speaker 3: was reading. And I was like, first of all, immediately, like,
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: the concept of these books makes for really great TV fodder.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: And I also, when I was like, I would love
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: for this to be adapted.
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: So score and reel are both set in a world
• 6:12
  Speaker 3: of this movie being made about a fictional like Harlem
• 6:15
  Speaker 3: Renaissance singer named Desi Blue. And I was like, it
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: would be so good. fun and so smart to like
• 6:21
  Speaker 3: have the miniseries of this movie being made and then
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: have the fictional Desi Blue movie like at the end
• 6:27
  Speaker 3: like have it like as a tie-in and like again
• 6:29
  Speaker 3: like I would really love to see that happen so
• 6:32
  Speaker 3: those are the two things where it's either like I
• 6:34
  Speaker 3: have connected with these characters so much that like I
• 6:36
  Speaker 3: would love to see a take on this and then
• 6:38
  Speaker 3: as I'm reading being like this feels so cinematically perfect
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: to me so like what what clicks for you yeah
• 6:44
  Speaker 3: So I think part of the reason why I chose
• 6:46
  Speaker 3: the two that I did, aside from the fact that
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: I just love these books and I've loved them for
• 6:49
  Speaker 3: a long time and they're such beloved romance properties, like people.
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: Love Malini Singh and Cressley Cole. I think really beautiful
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: last act resolution involves an internal capitulation to the circumstances,
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: like an internal capitulation to the idea of falling in love.
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: And I love that so dearly about novels and find
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: that to be enormously challenging in TV. Not enormously challenging
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: as in I wouldn't watch it.
• 7:14
  Speaker 4: I would.
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: I would watch it 100%. But I don't think it
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: gets made. And I think we have noticed that in
• 7:20
  Speaker 2: most of the adaptations that we've seen in the last
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: year that the very last act pushes for external over
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: internal conflict because it is easier to translate and make
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: legible on screen. Absolutely. I think Heated Rivalry was a
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: notable departure from that. But several other adaptations have favored
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: more of an external conflict than... the internal resolution. And
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: so I think I bring up paranormal in this context
• 7:46
  Speaker 2: because paranormal gives you lots of material for like a
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: big splashy external set of circumstances. And paranormal romance is
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: so skilled at being like, but let me bake in
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: some really interesting character work. Again, I'm talking about Buffy,
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: the idea that you can be telling a story about
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: a vampire slayer and also a story about a teenage girl.
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: And that is ultimately what you come back to that
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: show for. And I think it feels like paranormal is
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: a well-honed vehicle for being like, I'm going to give
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: you the car, the explosion, the vampire, the werewolf, and
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: also some deeply keen insight about human nature.
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: Yeah. The risk of really loving something and wanting it
• 8:27
  Speaker 3: to get adapted sometimes means the adaptation is a bummer.
• 8:31
  Speaker 4: It's hard.
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: You got to put your heart on the line as
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: a watcher.
• 8:33
  Speaker 3: I wonder if, You know, it does feel like especially
• 8:37
  Speaker 3: post heated rivalry that there's a real rush to find
• 8:40
  Speaker 3: more stories. And I'm also thinking about like Red, White
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: and Royal Blue, the Casey McQuiston novel getting adopted on
• 8:47
  Speaker 3: Amazon and that doing so well that like it was
• 8:49
  Speaker 3: sort of the cart leading the horse. And that was like, well,
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: now we need a sequel. So can we get that together?
• 8:53
  Speaker 3: Can we write a sequel? how much this boom will
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: carry on and how much it will affect the industry,
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: if that makes sense.
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: Well, I think the key is trying to find ways
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: to have people not just invest in singular properties, but
• 9:07
  Speaker 2: to understand that this is like a much broader market, right?
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: That we're both talking about series and books that have
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: not gotten their due in a broader mainstream way. Like
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: they're very beloved by romance readers and, But the reality
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: is that no one can know if they like a
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: story until they read or watch it. And so people
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: have to be willing to take the risk of putting
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: the Clepas on screen and being like, oh, actually, there
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: is something about this woman's writing and her capacity for
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: storytelling that transcends context and familiarity with genre, which is true. Like,
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: they were some of the first books I read as
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: a romance reader, and it didn't stop me from being like,
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: this woman is a genius, actually.
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: This one, kind of brilliant.
• 9:48
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 9:49
  Speaker 3: Oh, well, I do feel like Hollywood is in a
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: bit of a Groundhog Day scenario with this kind of stuff, though,
• 9:56
  Speaker 3: where stuff pops off and they're like, let's keep producing
• 9:59
  Speaker 3: the same white folks business over and over, so to speak.
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: Famously.
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: Famously.
• 10:03
  Speaker 3: But speaking of Groundhog Day, today's guest, we have our
• 10:07
  Speaker 3: friend Aman Harari-Kia on to discuss her new novel, Once
• 10:11
  Speaker 3: in a Timeline. which takes inspiration from movies like Groundhog
• 10:15
  Speaker 3: Day and Palm Springs, which is one of my favorite
• 10:18
  Speaker 3: and like a very underrated, I think, rom-com, which once
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: in a timeline, it follows an influencer who gets trapped
• 10:26
  Speaker 3: in her own timeline, reliving the same day in a
• 10:28
  Speaker 3: life over and over again, and her love interest who
• 10:32
  Speaker 3: has to help her escape the timeline. It was a
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: really beautiful novel and something that I think Iman has
• 10:37
  Speaker 3: done very well in her other books, which include female
• 10:41
  Speaker 3: fantasy the most famous girl in the world and a
• 10:43
  Speaker 3: hundred other girls is kind of seamlessly integrate social media
• 10:48
  Speaker 3: and internet life into her stories which i think is
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: a really tricky line to walk so we had her
• 10:55
  Speaker 3: on to discuss the use of social media as a
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: storytelling device and.
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: We're so excited to talk to her today Iman, hi.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: We're so excited to have you.
• 11:15
  Speaker 6: Hello to my favorite romance podcast. I'm so excited.
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: Today, we were hoping to chat with you a little
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: bit about social media because we have a lot of
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: thoughts about whether or not romance writers are willing to
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: really embrace social media in their contemporary romance. And I
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: think something that we've talked about recently is how there
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: is sometimes a desire to make contemporary romance feel timeless,
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: like to tell a love story that transcends a given
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: social media moment or era. But I think your work
• 11:46
  Speaker 2: is so of the moment, like you write such attuned
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: books to like a specific social media moment in all
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: of your work, like the more and less romantic work
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: that you write all attends to social media. And the
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: way that people play out identity and authenticity on social
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: media so much in a way that I find to
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: be really interesting. I just want to start there of like,
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: why write about social media in a landscape that to
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: me sometimes seems averse to putting social media on page
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: with romance?
• 12:16
  Speaker 5: Well, I have just accepted that I am not an
• 12:21
  Speaker 5: evergreen writer. I have tried and failed to write evergreen fiction, nonfiction.
• 12:30
  Speaker 5: I am someone who very much I'm constantly in conversation
• 12:34
  Speaker 5: with the world around me and try as I might,
• 12:38
  Speaker 5: I write concept-driven stories.
• 12:41
  Speaker 6: I find it very challenging to start with characters.
• 12:45
  Speaker 5: I think that because I worked for so long as
• 12:49
  Speaker 5: a journalist, I was taught to pay close attention to
• 12:53
  Speaker 5: the news cycle and to the cultural zeitgeist. And constantly
• 12:57
  Speaker 5: ask myself what my way in was to whatever topic
• 13:01
  Speaker 5: du jour everyone was talking about.
• 13:04
  Speaker 6: You know, when I finally, I.
• 13:05
  Speaker 5: Should say, like worked up the courage to start working
• 13:09
  Speaker 5: on a draft, it was almost second nature for me.
• 13:13
  Speaker 6: To do the same thing.
• 13:14
  Speaker 5: And since then, I've sort of followed a very similar
• 13:17
  Speaker 5: protocol whenever I write.
• 13:20
  Speaker 6: And I find that.
• 13:20
  Speaker 5: It's really difficult for me to get invested in a
• 13:23
  Speaker 5: story if I don't have that initial pull. And this
• 13:28
  Speaker 5: is something that I think everyone will be able to
• 13:31
  Speaker 5: like pick apart and see a piece of themselves in.
• 13:33
  Speaker 6: And I've been warned my entire.
• 13:35
  Speaker 5: Very long six-year career that this is a way to
• 13:38
  Speaker 5: date yourself really quickly. The answer to that is I
• 13:41
  Speaker 5: think you're right. And some of my favorite fiction is
• 13:45
  Speaker 5: both dated and also eternal. Like, I don't think you
• 13:48
  Speaker 5: could say The Secret History is a novel that doesn't
• 13:51
  Speaker 5: date itself and doesn't feel grounded in exactly the time
• 13:54
  Speaker 5: it came out. And that only makes the text richer. Like,
• 13:58
  Speaker 5: that just makes People in 2026 want to dive into
• 14:02
  Speaker 5: what the hell was going on at Bennington College at
• 14:05
  Speaker 5: the time. So it's just not something I shy away from.
• 14:09
  Speaker 5: I try to make the themes feel really evergreen and
• 14:12
  Speaker 5: the themes feel universal. And, you know, the underlying message
• 14:16
  Speaker 5: to be as relatable as possible.
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: I think that there's something we talk about a lot
• 14:22
  Speaker 3: with writing in general, but also especially in romance, where like,
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: specificity is what allows universality of feeling like the more
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: specific that you can be. I really had that feeling
• 14:32
  Speaker 3: reading Once in a Timeline, which is your new.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: Book, about an influencer.
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: And I felt like you treated her with such care
• 14:41
  Speaker 3: and respect and like influence our culture with such care
• 14:44
  Speaker 3: and respect. that it made the character feel more real,
• 14:47
  Speaker 3: even though I'm not an influencer. And also the idea
• 14:49
  Speaker 3: of doing like a TikTok style, here's a day in
• 14:52
  Speaker 3: my life video is like in five years from now,
• 14:54
  Speaker 3: probably not going to be a thing that doesn't make
• 14:57
  Speaker 3: the character any less real or any less relatable. And
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: so I'm curious what it is about influencer culture and
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: about digging into influencers specifically, because I know you did
• 15:10
  Speaker 3: a lot of research on influencers.
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: That felt right for a romance?
• 15:15
  Speaker 5: I really love getting the feedback that I treated the
• 15:20
  Speaker 5: protagonist of Once in a Timeline, Laia Grace, with care
• 15:24
  Speaker 5: and respect because something that I was really careful about
• 15:28
  Speaker 5: when I was writing because The book itself is littered
• 15:32
  Speaker 5: with like satire.
• 15:33
  Speaker 6: It's super campy. It's really referential.
• 15:37
  Speaker 5: When you start reading it, you aren't meant to fall
• 15:41
  Speaker 5: in love with the main character. She's meant to grade
• 15:43
  Speaker 5: on you. And like that much is obvious. But I
• 15:47
  Speaker 5: really didn't want to turn her into a caricature. And
• 15:49
  Speaker 5: I wanted audience members to have empathy for her as
• 15:53
  Speaker 5: like a well-rounded person.
• 15:55
  Speaker 6: Because I think that that's something that.
• 15:58
  Speaker 5: We often forget when we're interacting with any people online.
• 16:03
  Speaker 5: When you're in an infinite scroll, faces start to blur together,
• 16:08
  Speaker 5: messages start to become synonymous, and we detach the humanity
• 16:13
  Speaker 5: from the people that we're interacting with. And I think
• 16:16
  Speaker 5: it's really, really easy for us to start to treat
• 16:20
  Speaker 5: human beings as brands, as conceptual, rather than multifaceted and multidimensional.
• 16:27
  Speaker 5: The reason I wanted to pick an influencer in particular
• 16:30
  Speaker 5: to explore in this novel is because we've kind of
• 16:34
  Speaker 5: reached peak influencer. We're in a position where everyone feels
• 16:40
  Speaker 5: like they need to fine-tune their niche, rebrand themselves in
• 16:45
  Speaker 5: a way that they wouldn't necessarily do in their day-to-day life.
• 16:49
  Speaker 5: It's a protective shield, but something that came up frequently
• 16:53
  Speaker 5: in my research is is also how lonely they feel.
• 16:56
  Speaker 5: But I didn't realize how big of an issue it
• 16:59
  Speaker 5: actually was. So I thought how perfect to get inside
• 17:05
  Speaker 5: not only the projected day, but the psyche of a
• 17:09
  Speaker 5: young person who feels like they've had to don this
• 17:14
  Speaker 5: online persona, this mask, as a survival mechanism and is
• 17:19
  Speaker 5: embodying this dichotomy of having all of these friends, having
• 17:24
  Speaker 5: all this seemingly endless pit of money, being successful, living
• 17:29
  Speaker 5: in a beautiful city, having a great relationship with her parents,
• 17:33
  Speaker 5: but using the mechanism of the algorithm and of this
• 17:38
  Speaker 5: time loop to create literal cracks in her facade. Until
• 17:44
  Speaker 5: we start to see like the true sort of shards
• 17:48
  Speaker 5: of who she is and how she came to be
• 17:50
  Speaker 5: this person that lie and simmer beneath the surface. And
• 17:54
  Speaker 5: to also realize that like in the end of the day,
• 17:58
  Speaker 5: nothing artificial can ever replace.
• 17:59
  Speaker 6: Like true human connection.
• 18:01
  Speaker 5: So yeah, I think an influencer was the perfect way
• 18:05
  Speaker 5: in for that kind of conversation.
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: I'm thinking a lot about becoming a brand has become
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: an increasingly inevitable part of being in contemporary life. There's
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: a tension between that and a desire to be like
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: authentic and genuine and connected, which is the project of
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: a romance novel. Like we've had the conversation on the
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: pod about how there's such a like historical element to
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: yearning because social media and the like shopping effect of
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: modern dating apps can really interfere with our ability to
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: be close to people. And so- you have this dual
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: sense of compassion for her as an influencer. And the
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: question of like, what is the path out of that? Like,
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: what is the path forward? What do we do in
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: a world where we can't throw our phones into the
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: ocean because we are part of a society? I think
• 18:52
  Speaker 2: that's a challenge that I sometimes wonder if romance writers
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: are not always interested in exploring. I don't mean that
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: as a criticism. I understand why that is such a
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: difficult tension to grapple with. But there's like a To
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: that point about the attempt at timelessness and contemporary, I
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: think social media and the messy, fraught, alienating aspects of
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: it are something that can sometimes feel antithetical to the
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: project of romance. So how do you write a love
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: story knowing all of that to be kind of true
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: at the same time?
• 19:27
  Speaker 6: I think this is a really interesting question. And I
• 19:29
  Speaker 6: actually think that yearning.
• 19:31
  Speaker 5: Functions in a very similar way that it always has
• 19:33
  Speaker 5: in that from the dawn of time, we've been putting
• 19:38
  Speaker 5: on personas in order to like pass in our everyday lives.
• 19:43
  Speaker 5: The true work of romance has always been like pushing
• 19:46
  Speaker 5: past that external perception to understand understand who the true
• 19:53
  Speaker 5: person is underneath and being able to deeply understand someone
• 19:59
  Speaker 5: and not just perceive them I think that's always been
• 20:03
  Speaker 5: the work of romance and the work of yearning is
• 20:05
  Speaker 5: that there's a side of someone that is readily available
• 20:10
  Speaker 5: for everyone. And then there's the side that is only
• 20:14
  Speaker 5: touched by the love interest and who they could be
• 20:18
  Speaker 5: just for you that leads to yearning, that leads to
• 20:20
  Speaker 5: the building of longing, that leads to the desire for more.
• 20:25
  Speaker 5: And so in many ways, I think that writing yearning
• 20:30
  Speaker 5: in the social media and the dating app age is
• 20:32
  Speaker 5: kind of an evolution of that exact same phenomenon, except
• 20:36
  Speaker 5: instead of like performing for people at parties or performing
• 20:40
  Speaker 5: for people in class or performing for people in the office,
• 20:45
  Speaker 5: we now spend so much of our time online. So
• 20:48
  Speaker 5: we're performing for people online. And it's that same desire
• 20:52
  Speaker 5: to like understand who this person is beneath their mask
• 20:56
  Speaker 5: that like drives romance forward.
• 20:58
  Speaker 6: The meet cute still exist.
• 21:00
  Speaker 5: The picking someone apart to like truly understand what their
• 21:06
  Speaker 5: like gooey center looks like still exists.
• 21:10
  Speaker 6: It just looks a little bit different.
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: It's interesting as you were talking about that, I'm thinking
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: of it very much and from the opposite perspective of how,
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: you know, that expression to be seen as to be
• 21:21
  Speaker 3: loved and to want somebody to want to know you
• 21:24
  Speaker 3: beyond what you're projecting for everybody else. And I think
• 21:27
  Speaker 3: like that's also something that you very much capture in
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: this book is that Laia is somebody who feels that
• 21:35
  Speaker 3: if she, she will be lovable if she projects a
• 21:38
  Speaker 3: very specific, very certain type of image of herself and
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: it's like actually who you really are is lovable yeah.
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: It's like the old adage of don't buy your own
• 21:49
  Speaker 2: press like don't buy your own pr like the stories
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: we tell ourselves or project are so compelling and persuasive
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: because we've done them a million times but intimacy in
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: this context is about finding a person who will be
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: endlessly curious there's like an indomitable horny human spirit that
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: i think is like under that you know.
• 22:10
  Speaker 6: I completely agree with both of you. Like to be
• 22:12
  Speaker 6: seen is to be loved.
• 22:14
  Speaker 5: And Laia is a character who is being watched by
• 22:18
  Speaker 5: thousands of people, but only seen by one. And I
• 22:22
  Speaker 5: think that that will resonate deeply with readers who often
• 22:26
  Speaker 5: feel like they get on live and like clown for
• 22:30
  Speaker 5: the public, but then can exhale when they're in private.
• 22:34
  Speaker 5: I really love Noah, the love interest in Once in
• 22:37
  Speaker 5: a Timeline. precisely because he genuinely really likes Laia as
• 22:44
  Speaker 5: a person, but also he understands that she is constantly
• 22:49
  Speaker 5: self-censoring because she wants to sound best when she finally
• 22:53
  Speaker 5: says what's on her mind, which means that very often
• 22:57
  Speaker 5: she's burying the truth about what.
• 22:59
  Speaker 6: She actually wants to say.
• 23:01
  Speaker 5: And I think that for a lot of people, it's
• 23:04
  Speaker 5: easier to accept the first answer because digging deeper is
• 23:08
  Speaker 5: going to take time and effort and it's going to
• 23:10
  Speaker 5: be uncomfortable.
• 23:11
  Speaker 6: But sometimes the discomfort's worth it.
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 23:13
  Speaker 3: It's also something that I think about a lot is
• 23:16
  Speaker 3: how internet is really how so many of us find
• 23:20
  Speaker 3: community these days.
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: I mean, like, that's how I know Sanj is through
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: the internet.
• 23:25
  Speaker 3: What kind of challenges are there in capturing that energy, though,
• 23:29
  Speaker 3: on the page in a romance novel of, like, finding
• 23:32
  Speaker 3: a community online versus finding that community in person when
• 23:35
  Speaker 3: you don't have those sort of visceral touch points?
• 23:39
  Speaker 5: When it comes to capturing online relationships and communities in romance,
• 23:45
  Speaker 5: I just do my best to make sure that the
• 23:47
  Speaker 5: conversations feel real and earnest and colloquial and not overly polished.
• 23:53
  Speaker 5: I know that people have big opinions on this. I
• 23:55
  Speaker 5: know some people really hate text conversations in books. I
• 24:01
  Speaker 5: know that others won't pick up anything with technology. I'm
• 24:05
  Speaker 5: the complete opposite, and I think that's because I was
• 24:08
  Speaker 5: raised a huge.
• 24:10
  Speaker 6: Meg Cabot fan.
• 24:12
  Speaker 5: And for anyone who like read Meg Cabot in the aughts,
• 24:16
  Speaker 5: whether it's like her Princess Diaries series or Mediator series
• 24:20
  Speaker 5: or like the All-American series, Girl duology, she's someone who's
• 24:24
  Speaker 5: not only always like littered her books with pop culture references,
• 24:28
  Speaker 5: but has also used like multi-formatting in order to tell
• 24:31
  Speaker 5: a story. And I've always found that to be like
• 24:34
  Speaker 5: a really fun, exciting, creative, like stimulating way to read fiction.
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I really am going to be thinking a lot
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: about romance's obligation to think about modern communication more. I
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: think that's something that I don't give enough thought to.
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: Maybe because I'm such a historical reader.
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: It's true.
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: People are always saying stuff in ye olde letters that
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: are interesting to me. But, I mean, there's a different chemistry,
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: a different beat, a different tone to our contemporary romance.
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: Yvonne, this was so fun. Yeah, thank you. This was
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: so interesting.
• 25:06
  Speaker 6: I love you guys. Thanks for having me.
• 25:18
  Speaker 2: Tyler, I adore Iman.
• 25:20
  Speaker 4: Same.
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: She's the best.
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: Just a little ray of sunshine.
• 25:22
  Speaker 2: A very dear friend of the pod, I would say. Yeah.
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: But speaking of friends of the pod, we got an
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: anonymous voicemail from a listener, which is so good that
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: I think Tyler and I are going to have some
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: thoughts about.
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: Oh, for sure.
• 25:36
  Speaker 4: Hey, guys. I love the pod. I'm calling in relation
• 25:39
  Speaker 4: to the Kate Koldeck episode and the case for Messier Romance.
• 25:43
  Speaker 4: And I wanted to say I totally agree with you.
• 25:46
  Speaker 4: I really want to see romance tread like this somewhat
• 25:49
  Speaker 4: less familiar, more fun ground that's not just like good
• 25:52
  Speaker 4: moral representation in quotes. But I'm a freelance developmental editor
• 25:57
  Speaker 4: and something that I learned in, you know, all the
• 25:59
  Speaker 4: courses that I've taken, et cetera, is that reader expectations
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: are paramount. That's just something that was like drilled into
• 26:05
  Speaker 4: our heads over and over again. And it's really hard
• 26:07
  Speaker 4: to like not take that seriously when readers are paying,
• 26:11
  Speaker 4: you know, some of the bills of the writers that
• 26:13
  Speaker 4: I'm trying to advise. So I feel like my hands
• 26:15
  Speaker 4: are kind of tied in this situation and it's really frustrating.
• 26:18
  Speaker 4: So where is there room for the genre to shift?
• 26:21
  Speaker 4: Does it need to be from the top down with
• 26:23
  Speaker 4: publishing houses? Because that feels kind of depressing to me,
• 26:26
  Speaker 4: but I'm also not sure what I can do as
• 26:28
  Speaker 4: a freelance editor. Thanks for the food for thought. Really,
• 26:32
  Speaker 4: really interesting conversation. And thanks to both of you and
• 26:35
  Speaker 4: to Kate Goldbeck for such a great episode. Okay. Bye-bye.
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: Okay. Reader expectations. How do we change this? How do
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: we make changes in this genre? What do you think, Tyler?
• 26:46
  Speaker 3: This is such a cop-out answer, but I think it's
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: a little bit of everybody. Like, I think everybody kind
• 26:50
  Speaker 3: of has to get involved with this, where... I think
• 26:53
  Speaker 3: it becomes very easy in a system like this to
• 26:55
  Speaker 3: sort of capitulate to what is currently working. Whether you're
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: an agent, a publisher, a writer, and you're like, well,
• 27:02
  Speaker 3: I see that XYZ type novel is what people are reading.
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: So we need to do more of that.
• 27:10
  Speaker 3: Versus like, I'll approach it from like my perspective as
• 27:13
  Speaker 3: a writer, which is like, I only really enjoy writing
• 27:17
  Speaker 3: things if it's my interest. idea, which seems really obvious
• 27:22
  Speaker 3: and self-explanatory, but in my previous work as a freelancer,
• 27:27
  Speaker 3: it really is a huge difference between like, this is
• 27:30
  Speaker 3: a story that I either pitched out myself or that
• 27:33
  Speaker 3: I agreed to take because I personally was very excited
• 27:36
  Speaker 3: by the idea and something that I took to make money.
• 27:40
  Speaker 3: And I can do this, something that I took to
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: make money jobs, obviously, but it feels like pulling teeth.
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 27:47
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 27:47
  Speaker 3: And it's like, I know why this is being assigned.
• 27:49
  Speaker 3: I know why this works. I know what they're looking for,
• 27:51
  Speaker 3: but it sucks. Versus like, this is something that I'm
• 27:54
  Speaker 3: really passionate about.
• 27:55
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: I think you can tell when a work comes from
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: the heart, not to sound PBS special about it, but
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: I think there are often experiences I've had of reading
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: like a debut novel and being like, oh my God,
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: this person put everything they had into this.
• 28:09
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: They were like, this is the romance novel that comes
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: from my heart. Like this is the one I always
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: wanted to write.
• 28:14
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: And it's interesting because then if they go on to
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: write other work, it will always be measured up to
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: that debut, not just because of success, but because I
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: think there can sometimes be the feeling of like, this
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: is the thing you were meant to write and you
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: wrote that story. What would it be like for you
• 28:27
  Speaker 2: to pivot into other things? And I think a lot
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: of people, Kate included, talked about second book pressures to conform,
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: to produce for the market. It does seem like a
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: lot of writers end up in a place of having
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: these truly novel, genuine, interactions with the stories they want
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: to tell, and then they arrive in the publishing market
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: and something of commercial pressure does dilute their ability to
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: tell something new and original and personal. Which isn't to
• 28:55
  Speaker 2: say that's always the case, but like authors of all
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: kinds on the pod have talked about commercial pressures. So
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: I'm inclined to believe that it is a publishing problem.
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: One thing is that publishing is, I think, also aware
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: of the fact that it's a problem that people feel
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: these commercial pressures And that's partially why there seems to
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: be such a massive pipeline from self and indie pub
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: into trad pub spaces that self and indie pub work
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: is where people take major story risks and character risks.
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: And then publishing is like, hmm, it looks like something
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: we can capitalize off of, so let's yank it into publishing.
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: I say that with some cynicism, as you can probably tell.
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: But we need people who are willing to take risks
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: to make good art.
• 29:37
  Speaker 3: I've thought about this with regards to other types of writing,
• 29:40
  Speaker 3: where it's like at a certain point, if you're trying
• 29:42
  Speaker 3: to make it for everybody, it becomes for nobody.
• 29:44
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: Like if you're trying to make it to please everybody,
• 29:47
  Speaker 3: it becomes so nonspecific as to be unmemorable, unrelatable. Like
• 29:52
  Speaker 3: some of my favorite romance novels, like I've read reviews
• 29:55
  Speaker 3: of them and like people were like, I hated this
• 29:57
  Speaker 3: so much.
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: I'm like, well, you read it wrong.
• 30:00
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 30:01
  Speaker 3: Yeah. But it's exciting because it's like they're my favorite
• 30:04
  Speaker 3: because they made a mark because something about it was
• 30:06
  Speaker 3: different than like it didn't feel like.
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: A copy of a copy of a copy.
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: The persuasive argument I think I can make is when
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: I'm speaking to authors who have these anxieties about this
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: kind of thing or who are like really preoccupied with
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: the idea of not making something that will be commercially
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: viable or are driving towards these things. Because I think
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: those anxieties are totally legitimate, by the way. I don't
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: think they're unreasonable. Financially, it is just a better move
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: to be thoughtful about writing a book that will provoke
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: like true passion in a reader over one that is
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: the lowest common denominator of whatever market force is. So
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: I think the unsatisfying answer is that every single piece
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: of this puzzle needs to change. Please leave us voicemails.
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: We love hearing from you.
• 30:49
  Speaker 3: We love being challenged to think through these kinds of
• 30:52
  Speaker 3: things with you. So please call us and leave us
• 30:54
  Speaker 3: a voicemail. The number is always at the end of
• 30:56
  Speaker 3: every episode, but I'll say it again.
• 30:57
  Speaker 4: It's 833-831- Love.
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: That's the show. That's it.
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: I think that's the show.
• 31:08
  Speaker 3: Call us and leave us a voicemail with your thoughts
• 31:10
  Speaker 3: at 833-831-LOVE. That's 833-831-5683.
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: If you fell hard for what you heard here, get
• 31:20
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• 31:23
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• 31:29
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• 31:33
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• 31:37
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• 31:48
  Speaker 3: The Radio 831 Podcast is a production of iHeart Podcasts,
• 31:53
  Speaker 3: hosted by Sanjana Bhaskar and Tyler McCall. The show is
• 31:56
  Speaker 3: produced by Liz Smith. And for iHeart, our supervising producer
• 31:59
  Speaker 3: is Emily Marinoff. Special thanks to the whole iHeart team
• 32:03
  Speaker 3: and especially Allie Perry and Allison Cantor Graber. Our executive
• 32:07
  Speaker 3: producers are Claire Mazur and Erica Cerullo. Our music is
• 32:11
  Speaker 3: Domino by James Ryan Carr and Love Is What You
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: Do by Alibi.
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: We'll be sharing the love here again next week.