Latest / Radio 831: A Romance Podcast / The Case for Bad Sex Scenes, Riss M. Neilson on Disability in Romance, and What We’ve Consumed This Month

Transcript

The Case for Bad Sex Scenes, Riss M. Neilson on Disability in Romance, and What We’ve Consumed This Month · Radio 831: A Romance Podcast

0:06
Speaker 1: Hi, and welcome to the Radio eight three one podcast.
0:09
Speaker 2: We're your hosts, Sinjon Obasker 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
0:19
Speaker 2: course the drama of it all, you know, unpacking what
0:22
Speaker 2: the genre says about who we are and how we love.
0:25
Speaker 1: Big stuff, important stuff. Tyler, I'm so delighted to be
0:30
Speaker 1: talking to you today because I want to talk about
0:33
Speaker 1: one of my favorite topics, sex scenes. It's also one
0:37
Speaker 1: of my favorite topics. I really want to bring it
0:39
Speaker 1: up this week because it's Disability Pride Month in the
0:43
Speaker 1: great month of July, and we've got Risa Nielsen coming
0:46
Speaker 1: on the pod later to talk to us a little
0:48
Speaker 1: bit about writing, disability and romance. And today we're going
0:52
Speaker 1: to talk about sex scenes that aren't strictly speaking between
0:54
Speaker 1: disabled characters. But I think it's important to talk about
0:58
Speaker 1: sex and disability to get because in disability, you're often
1:02
Speaker 1: talking about something that like profoundly impacts the way someone's
1:05
Speaker 1: body moves through the world. And I think that a
1:07
Speaker 1: really good sex scene is also going to be a
1:11
Speaker 1: scene where people write thoughtfully, purposefully and specifically about the body,
1:15
Speaker 1: so it feels like maybe a good place to start.
1:18
Speaker 1: We both brought today one of our favorite sex scenes
1:21
Speaker 1: from a romance novel to compare notes.
1:24
Speaker 2: What did you ring, Tyler? I'm really excited to talk
1:26
Speaker 2: about this. We had that conversation when we had Tia
1:28
Speaker 2: on the podcast Ta Williams about how sex work is
1:31
Speaker 2: character work. Emily Henry has talked about this in interviews,
1:35
Speaker 2: and for me, the best sex scenes are always examples
1:40
Speaker 2: of that, because you can write the hottest sex scene
1:43
Speaker 2: in the world. But if I don't believe that it's
1:45
Speaker 2: the kind of sex that these two characters would be having,
1:48
Speaker 2: I'm out, like.
1:49
Speaker 1: It just doesn't do anything for me.
1:51
Speaker 2: I had, as you might imagine, a hard time picking
1:54
Speaker 2: a scene for this.
1:55
Speaker 1: You don't say, I know, shocker.
1:58
Speaker 2: I decided to narrow it down by going to the
2:01
Speaker 2: well of Truly, I think this is my pick from.
2:03
Speaker 1: Maybe sexiest romance novel I've ever read.
2:06
Speaker 2: For me personally, I've reread it really recently and I
2:09
Speaker 2: stand by that it is Business or Pleasure by Rachel
2:13
Speaker 2: Linn Solomon.
2:14
Speaker 1: How did I know you were going to say that?
2:16
Speaker 1: Because I talk about it all the time in my
2:19
Speaker 1: heart of hearts, we're just did in sink.
2:21
Speaker 2: If you haven't read Business or Pleasure, the concept of
2:23
Speaker 2: Business or Pleasure is that this woman Chandler, has a
2:27
Speaker 2: one night stand with this really handsome guy who turns
2:31
Speaker 2: out to be terrible and bad, terrible, like it's fast,
2:34
Speaker 2: his dirty talk is miserably bad. She doesn't come like,
2:38
Speaker 2: it's just really bad sex, and so she leaves him.
2:42
Speaker 2: She like, I'm pretty sure she just ghosts him and
2:44
Speaker 2: she declines to hang out with him again.
2:46
Speaker 1: I think he falls asleep in his hotel.
2:47
Speaker 2: Room and she leaves early, or she just straight up
2:49
Speaker 2: as like I don't want to see you again and leaves.
2:51
Speaker 2: She's meant the next day to be meeting up with
2:55
Speaker 2: her next assignment, which is ghostwriting a memoir for a
2:59
Speaker 2: former teen star of a show that sounds like teen
3:03
Speaker 2: Wolf to me kind of, and she when she shows
3:06
Speaker 2: up to meet this person, would you believe it's the
3:09
Speaker 2: guy that she had the terrible.
3:10
Speaker 1: One night stand with.
3:12
Speaker 2: So he's really unhappy because he thought they had this
3:15
Speaker 2: really beautiful night together and he interpreted her behavior as
3:18
Speaker 2: like heinously rude and like rejecting him and Finally she
3:21
Speaker 2: has to tell him, actually, you're really bad at sex,
3:23
Speaker 2: Like I'm you're really bad at this.
3:25
Speaker 1: I love that she assumes.
3:27
Speaker 2: That she blows the assignment, but he's like, actually, I
3:30
Speaker 2: do still want you to write this book. And furthermore,
3:32
Speaker 2: I want you to give me sex lessons, like I
3:35
Speaker 2: want you to teach me how to be better at sex.
3:37
Speaker 2: So she puts together like a syllabus of things that
3:42
Speaker 2: they can tackle right that are about sex. It's not
3:46
Speaker 2: obviously they don't chow up straight into having sex, but
3:48
Speaker 2: it's like.
3:49
Speaker 1: All about that.
3:50
Speaker 2: And so even like in this book, I had a
3:51
Speaker 2: hard time picking, but what I've narrated down to is
3:54
Speaker 2: there is a scene where Chandler is teaching his name
3:58
Speaker 2: is Finn Agin Finn. Chandler is teaching Finn about the clitterists.
4:03
Speaker 2: Oh fabulous, where the clitteris is. And the thing about
4:07
Speaker 2: it is what's so adorable is that Finn is immediately
4:10
Speaker 2: like he so earnestly wants to be better at sex.
4:14
Speaker 2: He is so devastated to find out, Like every time
4:17
Speaker 2: they're having a lesson about something, he realizes how bad
4:20
Speaker 2: he was, and it's like devastating to him that he.
4:22
Speaker 1: Was that bad.
4:23
Speaker 2: He talks a lot about like a thing that he
4:25
Speaker 2: says in this scene that comes up again is like
4:27
Speaker 2: I can't believe I was trying to rush this, Like
4:29
Speaker 2: I can't believe I was trying to rush past all this,
4:31
Speaker 2: Like this is the best part.
4:33
Speaker 1: That's so good, it's so good.
4:35
Speaker 2: She is explaining where the clitterists is and that obviously
4:39
Speaker 2: leads to a demonstration, and he can't quite get it right,
4:44
Speaker 2: like he can't quite like you know, you're like with somebody,
4:47
Speaker 2: you're trying to figure out what they like. He's like
4:49
Speaker 2: almost getting her there and then losing it, and then
4:51
Speaker 2: almost getting there and losing it. And so she says,
4:54
Speaker 2: what if I just take over? And then it becomes
4:56
Speaker 2: a mutual masturbation scene. Cheers there should be, and I
5:00
Speaker 2: feel like you agree with me on this way more
5:02
Speaker 2: mutual masturbation scene.
5:03
Speaker 1: Way more, way more. It's sore.
5:06
Speaker 2: She takes over and she's just masturbating and he's watching her,
5:10
Speaker 2: and it says, ever since we started, I've been attuned
5:13
Speaker 2: to his slightest movement, his softest sounds. He could half inhale,
5:17
Speaker 2: and every cell in my body would feel it. Even
5:20
Speaker 2: if I move my eyes from him. He's so solidly
5:22
Speaker 2: there that I can't forget I'm being watched and not
5:25
Speaker 2: just watched studied, and Finn is an overachiever, cheered achiever.
5:32
Speaker 1: I like that.
5:32
Speaker 2: I love that it's so good because it's not just
5:36
Speaker 2: like what makes it like so hot is not just
5:39
Speaker 2: like it's not just mutual masturbation. It's not just him
5:41
Speaker 2: watching her. It's not those are all things that can
5:43
Speaker 2: be hot in a silo. But it's also this idea,
5:46
Speaker 2: that idea of being studied, that idea that he is
5:49
Speaker 2: like committing to memory, like.
5:51
Speaker 1: What makes her feel good?
5:54
Speaker 2: Like what what it is that she's doing that works
5:57
Speaker 2: for her.
5:58
Speaker 1: Every sex scene in the book is like that. It's
6:00
Speaker 1: it's truly the best. I always love a book that
6:05
Speaker 1: has a sex scene that doesn't go right, because I
6:07
Speaker 1: think the specificity of those kinds of sex scenes is
6:11
Speaker 1: so good for story in a way that like a
6:15
Speaker 1: perfectly effortless sex scene isn't always right. Yea, on some
6:19
Speaker 1: surface level, the perfect totally painless or like without awkwardness
6:25
Speaker 1: sex scene is something that's meant to convey how these
6:28
Speaker 1: two people are singularly perfect for each other and don't
6:31
Speaker 1: have any problems and blah blah blah. But I think
6:34
Speaker 1: what it ends up coming across as sometimes is generic.
6:37
Speaker 1: It comes across as like a generic fairy tale trope
6:40
Speaker 1: instead of something that like really serves this specific story
6:45
Speaker 1: and these specific people and their specific ways of being
6:48
Speaker 1: in the world, and that characterization at the end of
6:51
Speaker 1: Finn's personality and this like like I feel this sense
6:55
Speaker 1: of eagerness. Yeah, without having read any of the rest
6:57
Speaker 1: of the book. Yeah, it's so clear.
7:00
Speaker 2: Because also I feel like that's true to sexual encounters
7:03
Speaker 2: in real life, Like you very rarely have like a
7:05
Speaker 2: perfectly seamless like there's always something like kind of going on,
7:09
Speaker 2: And when I read one that is just totally seamless,
7:13
Speaker 2: no bumps, no like kind of awkward moments or needs
7:18
Speaker 2: to whatever, it always kind of reads to me like
7:20
Speaker 2: you watched a porn scene and transcribed it like and
7:23
Speaker 2: that's fine. Again, that's fine. I think that has its place,
7:26
Speaker 2: Like I'm not mad about it, but like I love
7:29
Speaker 2: those little like you're talking about, those little characterization moments
7:33
Speaker 2: you get of like first of all, what is the hiccup?
7:35
Speaker 1: And then also how do these two people deal with
7:37
Speaker 1: the hiccup? How do they communicate.
7:39
Speaker 2: It talks so much about like how they communicate with
7:41
Speaker 2: each other, so much about how they are in their
7:42
Speaker 2: own bodies.
7:43
Speaker 1: Like it's just I eat it up every time. Yeah,
7:46
Speaker 1: me too. What did you bring I need to know?
7:49
Speaker 1: The book is Act Your Age Eve Brown by Tealia Hibbert. Yes,
7:52
Speaker 1: it's so good. It's so good. Okay. So the sex
7:56
Speaker 1: scene itself that I'm thinking about in Act Your Age
7:58
Speaker 1: Eve Brown is the where they're hanging out in her room.
8:03
Speaker 1: The premise of the book is that, like she has
8:05
Speaker 1: been hired as an cook at the inn that he runs.
8:08
Speaker 1: They're both autistic and so they have some interesting like
8:11
Speaker 1: quibbles around communication and personality, but they've like built a friendship.
8:16
Speaker 1: And he comes over to her room and is like
8:20
Speaker 1: sitting on her couch with her or like her sofa
8:22
Speaker 1: bed situation with her and feels something under his pillow,
8:26
Speaker 1: reaches underneath and pulls out a massive purple dildo I
8:30
Speaker 1: think or toy, and it like it's literally it's like
8:33
Speaker 1: a record scratch in the scene, like it freezes them both. Yeah, Eve,
8:38
Speaker 1: who has been masturbating to the thoughts of her boss
8:40
Speaker 1: for months at this point, has a total record scratch moment.
8:44
Speaker 1: He is like ensourcelled, like he is like under a spell.
8:48
Speaker 1: He goes into this trans and things escalate very quick. Yeah,
8:52
Speaker 1: and beautifully. He uses beautifully and he uses her toy
8:57
Speaker 1: on her. I think, among other things, lots of other
8:59
Speaker 1: stuff happens in that scene. But I loved that scene
9:03
Speaker 1: because the way she writes it is equal parts kind
9:06
Speaker 1: of funny and also so sincere, which is a typical
9:11
Speaker 1: of Talia Hibbert, the queen that she is of the genre.
9:14
Speaker 1: I think, And this was one of the points I
9:17
Speaker 1: was going to make about the like faulty sex scene piece,
9:20
Speaker 1: Like how instructive and informative that is for character work.
9:23
Speaker 1: The thing that a totally seamless, frictionless sex scene does
9:28
Speaker 1: is rob us of the experience of discovery, the idea
9:32
Speaker 1: that like two people are actively embarking on the discovery
9:35
Speaker 1: of one another, like there is stuff that is not
9:39
Speaker 1: known and must be found, and that can only happen
9:43
Speaker 1: if it isn't perfect PIV fairy tale whatever stuff. But
9:49
Speaker 1: I think similarly, Jacob, I believe, is the hero's name
9:53
Speaker 1: in Eve Brown. Jacob is embarking on a process of
9:57
Speaker 1: discovery with Eve by using something that she knows well
10:01
Speaker 1: that he doesn't, but like he's discovering her, and I
10:06
Speaker 1: think that that's so oh, it's so good. It's so good.
10:09
Speaker 1: It's such masterful storytelling.
10:11
Speaker 2: First of all, case made I knew immediately when you
10:13
Speaker 2: said it. Actor Age Brown also, which one was so
10:16
Speaker 2: many sex scenes can blur together, right like you read
10:18
Speaker 2: a lot of romance, you read allize sex whatever. I
10:21
Speaker 2: read that book six years ago, and I knew exactly what.
10:25
Speaker 1: You were talking.
10:25
Speaker 2: I could have told you without you telling me what
10:27
Speaker 2: color the toyless because I remember it.
10:30
Speaker 1: That well, because it was so good. Great pick, great pick.
10:34
Speaker 2: Okay, it's so fun talking about how important it is
10:37
Speaker 2: to embody a character, physically ground them in this way.
10:43
Speaker 2: I feel like we're definitely going to get into that
10:45
Speaker 2: with our guest, Ris, who also knows her way around
10:48
Speaker 2: a banging sex scene. Frankly, it must be said.
10:50
Speaker 1: It must be said. I'm so excited to have Ris
10:53
Speaker 1: m Nielsen on. She has previously written Ya and other fiction,
10:58
Speaker 1: but I came into her romance debut A Love Like
11:01
Speaker 1: the Sun, and she also just very recently wrote The
11:05
Speaker 1: Bridge Back to You, both of which feature disabled characters,
11:08
Speaker 1: both of which are like these really beautiful special romances
11:12
Speaker 1: that capture both like the visible and invisible elements of disability.
11:16
Speaker 1: I'm so excited to be talking about bodies and disability
11:19
Speaker 1: and love and romance and sex all the things with
11:24
Speaker 1: our lovely, wonderful guest, Ris. Ris, thank you so much
11:37
Speaker 1: for coming on. We are so so so delighted to
11:40
Speaker 1: have you, and today I think we really wanted to
11:43
Speaker 1: just open up a conversation about what it's like to
11:46
Speaker 1: write about disability in romance, and like, what is it
11:51
Speaker 1: about the way that you write disability that feels so
11:54
Speaker 1: singular and special in romance. I came to your work
11:58
Speaker 1: through a love Like the Sun, which obviously features chronic
12:02
Speaker 1: illness representation, and is I think really special because we
12:07
Speaker 1: don't really have a diagnosis for most of the book,
12:09
Speaker 1: Like it's not someone who's been living for years and
12:11
Speaker 1: years of the condition and knows what's going on and
12:13
Speaker 1: has a support team and all of that. We're working
12:15
Speaker 1: with a character who who doesn't really know. And then
12:20
Speaker 1: a bridge back to you, your most recent release featuring
12:23
Speaker 1: representation around ADHD and endometriosis. I think I think it
12:27
Speaker 1: seems to be such a consistent theme of your work
12:29
Speaker 1: to be exploring disability, And I'm curious if you want
12:33
Speaker 1: to just start by saying why, Like why are you
12:35
Speaker 1: interested in writing disabled characters?
12:37
Speaker 3: Well, first of off, especially I think with Lanaya's situation
12:41
Speaker 3: in I Love Like the Sun, I actually experience something
12:44
Speaker 3: very similar. I know some people are like, oh, author's insert,
12:47
Speaker 3: Like I'm just going to say it right here. I
12:48
Speaker 3: insert all the time. Like I actually wrote that book
12:53
Speaker 3: as like a form of like almost like therapy for
12:55
Speaker 3: what I was going through with like medical malpractice and
12:58
Speaker 3: like a doctor that like you know a lot of women,
13:01
Speaker 3: so many women are not believed in the in the
13:04
Speaker 3: doctor's office. And that happened to me for years and
13:06
Speaker 3: years and years before I fought to get my diagnosis.
13:10
Speaker 1: Finally, that was like my main reason for writing that.
13:13
Speaker 3: And then when I first started writing it, like I
13:16
Speaker 3: really wanted to focus on the medical malpractice. But then
13:19
Speaker 3: as I was writing it, and during that time of
13:22
Speaker 3: my life, I started like questioning, I'm a single woman, right,
13:26
Speaker 3: and I started questioning like how do I tell people
13:30
Speaker 3: like when I'm dating, Like, how do how do I
13:32
Speaker 3: tell people that? Like when is the appropriate moment do
13:34
Speaker 3: I have to disclose this about myself that I have
13:37
Speaker 3: I have chronic kidney disease stage three for anyone that's listening,
13:41
Speaker 3: And I started facing those questions myself, honestly, now that
13:46
Speaker 3: I have gone through it and I'm over that hill,
13:49
Speaker 3: I was like, you know, am I still deserving of
13:51
Speaker 3: a full love? Like?
13:52
Speaker 1: Can I still have that?
13:53
Speaker 3: Like? Can I obtain that?
13:54
Speaker 2: Like?
13:54
Speaker 3: Well, you know, my bad days mean that someone's not
13:59
Speaker 3: gonna love me the way that I want, and I
14:01
Speaker 3: feel like I deserve, you know, I started having all
14:03
Speaker 3: of these questions, So I think I really just wanted
14:06
Speaker 3: to explore that in fiction, because I haven't read many
14:09
Speaker 3: books at that time that actually explored that.
14:11
Speaker 1: In romance, a lot.
14:14
Speaker 2: Of the disability rep I've read in Romance are characters
14:16
Speaker 2: who are already aware of are diagnosed with their disability,
14:20
Speaker 2: and very rarely do you see the process of being diagnosed.
14:23
Speaker 2: And it's interesting because one of the things I appreciated
14:26
Speaker 2: so much about your book is that not only do
14:29
Speaker 2: you see the ways in which women, especially are dismissed
14:33
Speaker 2: regularly through this process, but the ways in which I
14:35
Speaker 2: think we also tend to dismiss ourselves and dismiss our
14:38
Speaker 2: own symptoms, and how that compounds the situation, but also
14:43
Speaker 2: that question, am I still worthy of like a happy ending?
14:46
Speaker 2: Am I still worthy of the full story?
14:48
Speaker 1: Yeah? I think to that point, capturing that process of
14:50
Speaker 1: discovery was so beautiful because the doubt that the medical
14:54
Speaker 1: system imposes on the person can become a doubt that
14:58
Speaker 1: they inherit in themselves, and that like translates to the
15:02
Speaker 1: doubts that they have in all other areas of her life.
15:05
Speaker 1: And I think also romance as a genre is invested
15:09
Speaker 1: in some way in the project of showing us who
15:13
Speaker 1: the desirable subject is. That's why they keep buying this
15:17
Speaker 1: very particular class of like white, able bodied, wealthy romances.
15:21
Speaker 1: And I think it because it's trying to sort of
15:24
Speaker 1: like reiterate this theme of like, this is the desirable subject,
15:27
Speaker 1: This is who we should be seeing as beautiful and
15:29
Speaker 1: worthy of love, This is who we see as interesting
15:32
Speaker 1: and worth investigating. The like project of opening that up
15:36
Speaker 1: by saying, like, desirable subjects look like all kinds of things,
15:40
Speaker 1: Like Lenaiah is both a sick person and also, like
15:44
Speaker 1: the book is hot, there is like real sexual chemistry,
15:48
Speaker 1: Like her figuring stuff out about her body doesn't preclude
15:51
Speaker 1: her from being.
15:53
Speaker 3: Hot obviously, Like I mean, you've read it right, and
15:57
Speaker 3: just to let every readers know that, have I read it,
16:00
Speaker 3: you know, explicit scenes, it's like open door. Like I
16:03
Speaker 3: wanted it to be like sexy and shock sexual because
16:06
Speaker 3: that is also something, right. It's like, if you know,
16:09
Speaker 3: sick people get loved, then it can't also be sexy, right.
16:13
Speaker 3: You can't also like have those kind of desires. You
16:15
Speaker 3: should just be happy that you're getting love in general.
16:18
Speaker 3: And it's like, no, you know, I want it all,
16:20
Speaker 3: and I'm sure so many people want Maybe a lot
16:23
Speaker 3: of people probably don't want it all, you know, but
16:25
Speaker 3: I'm sure a lot of us do.
16:26
Speaker 1: I'm kind of curious about how your second adult romance,
16:31
Speaker 1: you're still writing about disability, and it's different from Lenia's journey,
16:35
Speaker 1: and I'm curious about like what it was like translating
16:38
Speaker 1: this interest into a different context with a different couple,
16:41
Speaker 1: with a different relationship.
16:42
Speaker 3: So in the Bridge back to You, Olivia has endometriosis,
16:47
Speaker 3: and I didn't want to do the exploring story again.
16:50
Speaker 3: I think with Leanaya that was there, and I think
16:52
Speaker 3: for Olivia, I just like really wanted to showcase that
16:56
Speaker 3: like some people are already experienced in this right and
16:59
Speaker 3: know so that it might affect their partner, and it
17:03
Speaker 3: might affect their like say.
17:05
Speaker 1: Sex life.
17:06
Speaker 3: I have friends with it, but I also like did
17:08
Speaker 3: all my own I did so much research on it.
17:11
Speaker 3: Sometimes like women with endometriosis, it can hurt, they cannot
17:14
Speaker 3: want to have sex, Like there's so much there, and
17:16
Speaker 3: I think I really want to explore that for them,
17:18
Speaker 3: because it just came to me. It wasn't like a
17:21
Speaker 3: like a plan thing. But this is also a second
17:23
Speaker 3: chance romance. And I think coming back into the situation
17:27
Speaker 3: for Olivia and Carmelo, who Carmelo learns this thing about
17:32
Speaker 3: Olivia and that she's been struggling with this, and she
17:36
Speaker 3: is already feeling like I am still worthy of like love,
17:39
Speaker 3: and I am still worthy of like passion and like
17:43
Speaker 3: intimacy no matter what. But I think that there's a
17:45
Speaker 3: scenario in which, like someone else might come into the
17:48
Speaker 3: scenario and be worried that their partner that they had before,
17:52
Speaker 3: you know, like it's a second chance romance might not
17:54
Speaker 3: feel that way anymore because endometriosis can't affect things like.
17:59
Speaker 1: Sex life, right and so drive and I think it's
18:01
Speaker 1: clear also that like, the range of experiences that disabled
18:03
Speaker 1: people have is so vast. The relationships they have with
18:07
Speaker 1: their bodies are so vast, the relationships they have with sex,
18:10
Speaker 1: with community, with connection are so vast. And I mean
18:15
Speaker 1: the difference between a disabled person with the financial means,
18:18
Speaker 1: resources time, who has the right care team and is
18:24
Speaker 1: like working out how to manage their condition. Their love
18:28
Speaker 1: life might look differently from someone who's in the throes
18:30
Speaker 1: of diagnosis, which can be a multi years long process.
18:35
Speaker 1: And I think there's such a beautiful expansiveness to that,
18:39
Speaker 1: that like fullness of possibility, where like life happens alongside
18:43
Speaker 1: the medicine and it might look different, but it continues
18:46
Speaker 1: to happen. And also like, what does it mean to
18:49
Speaker 1: be appropriately cared for without having someone be like patronizing
18:55
Speaker 1: or condescending, Because that's I think the other experience that
18:59
Speaker 1: like of disabled people have of feeling like other people
19:03
Speaker 1: are babying them. What is it like to be noticed
19:05
Speaker 1: instead of baby exactly?
19:09
Speaker 3: And there's so much and not to like get on
19:11
Speaker 3: a real world subject, but when I was when I
19:14
Speaker 3: was writing this, Lily Reinhart, I think that's how you say, yeah,
19:17
Speaker 3: Lily Ryanhart, Oh, yeah, that was talking about being diagnosed.
19:22
Speaker 3: I already had this book was already coming out, and
19:24
Speaker 3: I was like, oh wow, like you know and everything
19:26
Speaker 3: she was saying, and even like as a celebrity was
19:28
Speaker 3: talking about like the condescension, the gas lighting for years
19:33
Speaker 3: like that, and you know, like this is a person
19:35
Speaker 3: that probably has so much more access than most people
19:38
Speaker 3: to medicine and you know, and still was experiencing it.
19:42
Speaker 3: So I found that very very telling also about like
19:46
Speaker 3: how women experienced this.
19:48
Speaker 1: I guess I'm most curious, like, are there other romances
19:52
Speaker 1: featuring disabled characters that you are like people have got
19:54
Speaker 1: to read these, either because of representation or to be honest,
19:58
Speaker 1: just because you love them. Real by Kennedy Ryan. I
20:01
Speaker 1: love Real.
20:02
Speaker 3: It's so powerful. It's such a powerful romance. It's and
20:05
Speaker 3: it's so like it's sexy and like fun and funny
20:09
Speaker 3: and crazy and like there's drama, but it's also like
20:13
Speaker 3: the chronic illness rep the disability rep in that book
20:15
Speaker 3: is very very very important.
20:17
Speaker 1: I really, I mean, I really love Real and I
20:20
Speaker 1: think it's such a beautiful example of all the things
20:22
Speaker 1: that we've been talking about with like the challenges of
20:25
Speaker 1: not being believed by a medical system not understanding if
20:28
Speaker 1: you should even take your own pain and suffering seriously,
20:31
Speaker 1: but then also potentially like in the process of falling
20:33
Speaker 1: in love with someone who notices you, finding the strength
20:37
Speaker 1: to confront the scary thing in you. Like I think
20:41
Speaker 1: that's so much of what happens with the main character
20:43
Speaker 1: in real And I think something that is so beautiful
20:47
Speaker 1: about like the possibilities within disability and romance, like exploring
20:52
Speaker 1: disability in romance, that the strength you find in being
20:57
Speaker 1: loved by other people is something that you can use
21:00
Speaker 1: to be like more loving towards yourself. As we're having
21:03
Speaker 1: this discussion.
21:04
Speaker 2: The other thing that I keep thinking about that adage,
21:06
Speaker 2: but it's like we're all going to be disabled one day,
21:09
Speaker 2: and whether it happens to you sooner or it happens
21:11
Speaker 2: to you later, it's just a question of like luck
21:13
Speaker 2: of the draw or whatever you want to call it,
21:15
Speaker 2: and you want to be with somebody who you know
21:18
Speaker 2: can take care of you like that because you don't know,
21:20
Speaker 2: Like bodies are crazy, weird little bags of bones, and
21:24
Speaker 2: like they'll kind, they'll do whatever they want whenever they want,
21:27
Speaker 2: and it doesn't matter how much you try to control
21:30
Speaker 2: your surroundings or do whatever, like things happen to you
21:33
Speaker 2: and you want to be with someone that you know
21:35
Speaker 2: you can count on for that stuff that's not exciting
21:38
Speaker 2: romance novel, riding off on a horse into the sunset stuff.
21:42
Speaker 3: Also, I'm so glad that you said that, because I think,
21:45
Speaker 3: like one of the biggest things when people ask me, like, oh,
21:47
Speaker 3: why you're right it, I'm like, well, seventy five percent
21:50
Speaker 3: of us will have a disability at some point.
21:52
Speaker 1: Seventy five percent of us, Like that is.
21:54
Speaker 3: Like a wildly huge number of us that will have
21:57
Speaker 3: a disability at some point in our lives. And even
22:00
Speaker 3: if you don't have like a quote unquote disability, right, like,
22:04
Speaker 3: you are still going to get older. So yeah, I agree,
22:07
Speaker 3: I agree with what you're saying.
22:09
Speaker 1: Res thank you so much for coming. This was so lovely,
22:13
Speaker 1: so lovely, Thank you.
22:14
Speaker 2: I loved it, Sanja. I loved that conversation with Ris
22:27
Speaker 2: me too. I just feel like it was a like,
22:30
Speaker 2: really wonderful, cathartic conversation.
22:33
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, romance is a bridge to a bigger world,
22:36
Speaker 1: and that's true. This is one of many ways that
22:38
Speaker 1: it is. You know, just what people are in the world,
22:41
Speaker 1: and so they fall in love, and so we get
22:43
Speaker 1: to think about what it's like to be sick and
22:45
Speaker 1: in love and in the world.
22:46
Speaker 2: Speaking of being in the world, we've been out in
22:48
Speaker 2: the world this month consuming things. Absolutely, we'll talk about
22:52
Speaker 2: what we've been consuming. And I want to start with
22:55
Speaker 2: something that I know you and I. We did not
22:57
Speaker 2: go together, but I know you and I are in
22:59
Speaker 2: the same page about, which is the Olivia Wilde movie
23:02
Speaker 2: The Invite. Yes, I am so obsessed. So the concept
23:08
Speaker 2: of the Invite is that this couple who is in
23:11
Speaker 2: peril invites their neighbors over for dinner. At this dinner,
23:15
Speaker 2: their neighbors reveal that they are in an open marriage
23:18
Speaker 2: and they're very hot because it's Penelope Cruise and Ed Norton,
23:22
Speaker 2: and that they invite people over to have a like
23:26
Speaker 2: orgies essentially, How did you feel about it?
23:29
Speaker 1: I really, really, really enjoyed it. I think some of
23:32
Speaker 1: the early reviews were kind of mixed, but I like,
23:35
Speaker 1: thoroughly enjoyed myself. Seth Rogen so funny, perfectly, Crew's genuinely
23:40
Speaker 1: the most magnetic person on the planet. Olivia Wilde underrated
23:43
Speaker 1: comedic timing and also her direction for this historic direction
23:47
Speaker 1: is that film is beautiful. So it's beautiful. The fact
23:51
Speaker 1: that it's on film is so stunning and really adds
23:53
Speaker 1: to Yeah, the way that it talks about intimacy. I
23:56
Speaker 1: found it to be such an interesting kind of hopeful,
24:00
Speaker 1: ultimately hopeful for me story about like love and loss
24:04
Speaker 1: and reconciliation.
24:06
Speaker 2: So Penelope Cruz's character is a sexologist, yeah, right is Yeah,
24:11
Speaker 2: And there's a moment look, I think we could discuss
24:14
Speaker 2: that she's kind of like the manic Pixie dream therapist
24:16
Speaker 2: in the end a little bit there, but she does
24:18
Speaker 2: have Yes, she has this line at the end talking
24:21
Speaker 2: about Olivia Wilde and Seth Rogen's relationship, and she's talking about, like,
24:27
Speaker 2: in this lifetime, you will have many relationships. Sometimes we
24:31
Speaker 2: are lucky enough to have a new relationship with the
24:33
Speaker 2: same person. I really liked that concept. I really liked
24:37
Speaker 2: that idea that like a relationship is not a static thing.
24:41
Speaker 2: I think in our culture we treat like you get
24:43
Speaker 2: married and that relationship is the same thing forever.
24:45
Speaker 3: Yeah.
24:46
Speaker 2: In case dein Amber, Yeah, where it's like a relationship
24:49
Speaker 2: is a dynamic thing and your two people who can
24:51
Speaker 2: continue to negotiate and discuss and change the shape of
24:55
Speaker 2: what your relationship is, so I in that sense.
24:58
Speaker 1: I think I also found the ending very hopeful. Mm hmmm.
25:02
Speaker 1: So what else did you get up to? Because you
25:04
Speaker 1: are going to be so delighted. I know it.
25:08
Speaker 2: I cannot wait to tell you that I have been
25:11
Speaker 2: reading Lisa Clayviss's Wallflower series.
25:14
Speaker 1: I'm so delighted.
25:16
Speaker 2: I knew you would be, so, I said Santa text
25:19
Speaker 2: that was like, I need to know what the best
25:21
Speaker 2: reformed Rake books are, and you said A Devil in Winter,
25:27
Speaker 2: but you you have to read the first two books.
25:30
Speaker 2: And I was a little bit like, okay, but I'm
25:32
Speaker 2: on a quest here. I'm on a reformed Rake quest
25:35
Speaker 2: and those are side quests, but I'm going to do
25:38
Speaker 2: it because I trust you with my life.
25:40
Speaker 1: And I was like, I believe her. And I am
25:44
Speaker 1: in the middle. I haven't finished it. I'm in the
25:46
Speaker 1: middle of.
25:47
Speaker 2: Daisy's book Scandal and Spring, and I'm obsessed with all
25:52
Speaker 2: of them. Here's where I have a bit of a
25:53
Speaker 2: controversial take. When I posted to Instagram that I had
25:56
Speaker 2: finished it happened one autumn of our mutual friend dmned
25:59
Speaker 2: me mediately and was like, this is my favorite I
26:02
Speaker 2: know everyone loves Devil in Winter, and I was like,
26:04
Speaker 2: I'm getting their pause. So I read a Devil in
26:07
Speaker 2: Winter mm hmm. I think within two minutes of posting
26:10
Speaker 2: that I finished it. She DM me and was like
26:12
Speaker 2: Sebastian or Marcus like like gun to headshoos and so
26:18
Speaker 2: Sebastian two pretty.
26:19
Speaker 1: Best friends against each other. Here's the thing.
26:22
Speaker 2: So, so Sebastian is the reformed Rake in Devil in
26:25
Speaker 2: Winter and Marcus is Lord Westcliffe, who listeners of the
26:29
Speaker 2: pod may remember from my first homework assignment again the Magic.
26:34
Speaker 2: I had a tough time with Sebati. First of all,
26:38
Speaker 2: he's blonde, which I don't normally agree with the like
26:41
Speaker 2: blonde men can't be heroes thing, but like that was
26:45
Speaker 2: a notch against him. I did have a tough time
26:49
Speaker 2: with like what he does in it happened when autumn,
26:53
Speaker 2: and I appreciate that.
26:54
Speaker 1: Lisa Clayffs came.
26:55
Speaker 2: Up with like like, oh you did this because of
26:58
Speaker 2: X y Z. I don't want to spoil anything. If
27:00
Speaker 2: you haven't read the series, you should read the series.
27:03
Speaker 2: I appreciate how it's handled, and I was on board
27:06
Speaker 2: with like the specific love story, like I'm on board
27:08
Speaker 2: with Evi and Sebastian, but as far as heroes like
27:11
Speaker 2: I Am a Lord, Marcus Curley like youpis both.
27:16
Speaker 1: Actually, she says that Marcus is closest to like her husband,
27:19
Speaker 1: the man that she loves, like the person that she like.
27:22
Speaker 1: She feels very fond of Marcus on like a personal level.
27:25
Speaker 1: Saint Vincent is like her darling boy who shows up
27:28
Speaker 1: in all of the He's he's her Ilia Rosanov if
27:31
Speaker 1: you will, okay another that's.
27:33
Speaker 2: A great yes, heated rivalry mentioned sound the heated rivalry alarm.
27:39
Speaker 1: He's the like outwardly Greek arius uh fuck boy of
27:43
Speaker 1: swords who becomes deeply devoted and then shows up in
27:45
Speaker 1: all of the rest of her books in some way,
27:47
Speaker 1: shape or form. I love her reformed Rake. Yeah yeah,
27:50
Speaker 1: but like actually weirdly great complia and it is a
27:54
Speaker 1: really good great but yes, that's the bulk of my
27:58
Speaker 1: reading this month. What were you reading?
28:00
Speaker 2: I read Fossil Feud by Maggie North, which was a
28:05
Speaker 2: very sweet romance between a paleontologist named Ripley Adams woman
28:10
Speaker 2: and James Smithson, who's this like academic paleontologist. She's like
28:14
Speaker 2: in the field digging for bones so she can sell
28:17
Speaker 2: them but also hopefully show.
28:18
Speaker 1: Them in museums. She like deeply cares about paleontology, but
28:21
Speaker 1: she was kicked out of her program for like very
28:23
Speaker 1: controversial authorship dispute reasons. So it's like a little bit
28:27
Speaker 1: of like a stem romance situation. And James Smithson is
28:31
Speaker 1: like a total icon in the field who she ends
28:34
Speaker 1: up falling in love with while they're on a dig
28:36
Speaker 1: site together and sort of begrudgingly thrown together, and it
28:39
Speaker 1: was very sweet, Like I think dinosaurs actually make for
28:43
Speaker 1: good romance fodder in some way. Like, Look, here's the
28:47
Speaker 1: thing as a graduate student who will, by the time
28:49
Speaker 1: I finished school, have been in school for seven consecutive years,
28:53
Speaker 1: and prior to that have been I was like in
28:55
Speaker 1: undergrad before, I've been in so much school I've been been.
28:58
Speaker 1: I will be in so much school. I will probably
29:00
Speaker 1: be in school for the rest of my life in
29:02
Speaker 1: some way, shape or form. I find it so romantic
29:05
Speaker 1: when people have such deep devotion to something, like when
29:10
Speaker 1: they have deep devotion to the subject of the pray.
29:13
Speaker 1: But I think it's why every time I read like
29:15
Speaker 1: a kind of stem romance, I am Forever Compelled, Like
29:19
Speaker 1: I always think of it as such a beautiful anchor
29:23
Speaker 1: for the romance plot that's on top of this bedrock
29:26
Speaker 1: of like these two people with the shared love of
29:30
Speaker 1: a given subject. I think Maggie North does a really
29:33
Speaker 1: beautiful job of it in Fossil Food. I also kind
29:37
Speaker 1: of a I'm on a real kind of stem romancy
29:40
Speaker 1: kind of kick at the moment. But I was given
29:43
Speaker 1: a copy of Chase Me if you Can, by Heather Francis.
29:46
Speaker 1: This was lovingly described to me as Twisters fan fiction.
29:50
Speaker 1: To be clear, I don't really think it's that. Like
29:52
Speaker 1: a damn, I got excited. It's the cover, the premise.
29:56
Speaker 1: I understand why people are selling it that way. But
29:59
Speaker 1: it's been between a woman named Sloan and this man
30:02
Speaker 1: named Wes, who are both like storm chasers, but they
30:06
Speaker 1: are more specifically photographers, Like they're interested in getting photos
30:10
Speaker 1: of these storms so that they can publish them, so
30:12
Speaker 1: that they can win prizes and stuff. So there are
30:14
Speaker 1: times when I felt like this was less about stormchasing
30:16
Speaker 1: and more about photography, which you know, I also like that,
30:20
Speaker 1: But it's set in the backdrop of like these two
30:22
Speaker 1: storm chasers who end up again thrown together under unlikely circumstances,
30:26
Speaker 1: having to push past their petty feud with each other
30:29
Speaker 1: and fall in love. And I liked that one. I
30:31
Speaker 1: think it was you know what I could have done
30:33
Speaker 1: with more storm Chasing, more Storm in the Storm Chasing novel. Yeah,
30:37
Speaker 1: that was my other romance read this month. I also
30:40
Speaker 1: rewatched The Wedding Planner iconic j Loo romcom. I did
30:44
Speaker 1: see your note about the bad Italian accent.
30:46
Speaker 2: I have not rewatched that movie in a long time,
30:48
Speaker 2: but I do read an Italian accent being tough.
30:50
Speaker 1: So the guy who plays Alex Karev in Grey's Anatomy,
30:53
Speaker 1: I don't know the actor's name. I only know him
30:55
Speaker 1: as Karev. Karev is Jlo's Sicilian love interest who her
31:00
Speaker 1: dad is trying to set her up with. And one
31:03
Speaker 1: he looks prepe Bessett. Two he is doing the worst
31:07
Speaker 1: Italian accent you have ever heard in your earthly life.
31:11
Speaker 1: I've seen The Wedding Planner before, but I think I
31:13
Speaker 1: was like a child and so I couldn't take him seriously.
31:17
Speaker 1: I don't know what he was saying because I was
31:19
Speaker 1: genuinely laughing. He was doing a bit of a Mario situation.
31:22
Speaker 1: I fear also Beathean McConaughey is a cheater, cheater, pumpkin
31:27
Speaker 1: eater in that movie. A lot of people who wax
31:30
Speaker 1: poetic about how they can't handle infidelity and romance love
31:33
Speaker 1: the wedding planner. Let me just say, I think that's
31:37
Speaker 1: an extremely productive July. Thank you. I think yours was
31:40
Speaker 1: as well. Thank you. I feel good about it. And
31:42
Speaker 1: we've had quite a swap. You're in your historicals. I
31:45
Speaker 1: know where freaky Friday situation happened to us this month. Actually,
31:50
Speaker 1: I know. Hey, that's the power of friendship. That is
31:52
Speaker 1: the power of friendship, and that's the show, and that's
31:55
Speaker 1: the show.
32:02
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32:04
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Speaker 2: whole iHeart team and especially Ali Perry and Alison Kanter Graber.
33:00
Speaker 2: Our executive producers are Claire Maser and Erica Cerulo. Our
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Speaker 2: music is Domino by James Ryan Carr and Love Is
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33:09
Speaker 1: We'll be sharing love here again next week