Latest / Arroe Collins Like It's Live / One Of Us Must Die From Author Zelly Ruskin We've All Been In This Position Of Decisions

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One Of Us Must Die From Author Zelly Ruskin We've All Been In This Position Of Decisions · Arroe Collins Like It's Live

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  Speaker 1: I don't know if you've checked it out yet. Arrow.net, A-R-R-O-E.net.
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  Speaker 2: Hey, how are you today?
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  Speaker 1: Absolutely fantastic. How are you doing today?
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  Speaker 2: Doing very well.
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  Speaker 1: I got to ask this question. You go into some
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  Speaker 1: really deep, dark subjects here. How has that author, as
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  Speaker 1: that story sharer, and a person who's relinquishing your stories
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  Speaker 1: to us, how did you shake this off? Or is
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  Speaker 1: it still living inside your mind, body, and soul, even
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  Speaker 1: as we speak?
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  Speaker 2: I think I've established with a lot of author friends
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  Speaker 2: that it's us very quiet, sweet people who have very
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  Speaker 2: dark minds. Um, I have seen a lot, you know,
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  Speaker 2: as a social worker, as a mother, daughter, um, and
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  Speaker 2: a wife and a divorcee, I, I have seen a lot.
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  Speaker 2: I have spoken with a lot of people and, um,
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  Speaker 2: I know people find it hard to believe, but people
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  Speaker 2: are not always who they seem to be.
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  Speaker 1: Oh, that's like, I always find that out. And only because,
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  Speaker 1: I mean, as a thing that I guess older people
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  Speaker 1: do when they get older, I want to do something
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  Speaker 1: I've never done. So I took up a job at
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  Speaker 1: a grocery store because I've never done anything like that before.
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  Speaker 1: What you just said about people, there's stories that we
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  Speaker 1: don't know. If you just listen, you will find stuff
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  Speaker 1: out that it's like, you've got to be kidding me.
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  Speaker 2: That's right. That's right. And it's, it is people like
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  Speaker 2: as a social worker, you know, we have to put on,
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  Speaker 2: you know, you put on a certain air and you
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  Speaker 2: close the door and you're with your client and you're
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  Speaker 2: very objective, but those same people at home, Or you
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  Speaker 2: can't believe what they're like on their personal time. And
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  Speaker 2: I think it's true of all professionals, not just social workers.
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  Speaker 2: Like who you are as a professional and who you
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  Speaker 2: are behind closed doors are very different characters. And I
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  Speaker 2: love exploring that dark side of it.
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  Speaker 1: Do you ever get the opportunity to explore the writer
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  Speaker 1: in you? And the reason why I bring that up
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  Speaker 1: is because I'm a defragger. In other words, I like
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  Speaker 1: to go in there and break stuff down. Why was
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  Speaker 1: I thinking like this? What led to this thought? If
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  Speaker 1: you claim you received it, what were you doing in
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  Speaker 1: order to even put up the sign that said, I'm
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  Speaker 1: open for availability?
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  Speaker 2: I think that it kind of went in reverse. Like
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  Speaker 2: I had these weird, weird moments that I had to
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  Speaker 2: explore and You know, so in this particular book, it
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  Speaker 2: was a moment of, you know, going through divorce and
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  Speaker 2: feeling those, you know, the bitterness and and and even,
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  Speaker 2: you know, I would go as far as hatred and
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  Speaker 2: absolutely recognizing for a second that revenge would be easy
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  Speaker 2: and revenge would be sweet and. And how easy it
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  Speaker 2: would be to slip down that slide. And I always, unfortunately, legally, fortunately,
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  Speaker 2: I always choose the high road. I prefer to go
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  Speaker 2: with the respectful route and the integrity, which is not,
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  Speaker 2: you know, it's not as satisfying, but it's the right
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  Speaker 2: way for me. But it was that, you know, even
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  Speaker 2: in that nanosecond, and we all have those nanoseconds, even
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  Speaker 2: if we have the best of spouses or partners where
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  Speaker 2: you say, you know, God, I could kill you. You know,
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  Speaker 2: in that moment, I could see how people could take
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  Speaker 2: that route and make that choice. And so that lingered
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  Speaker 2: with me. So when I became an author, I wanted
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  Speaker 2: to explore what would happen if somebody had to do that.
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  Speaker 1: Do you find yourself in a position of what I
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  Speaker 1: call hidden speak? In other words, you see all of this,
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  Speaker 1: this dark energy or something that just doesn't feel comfortable.
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  Speaker 1: And you're able to put it into words, and you're
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  Speaker 1: using those words to kind of shift the way that
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  Speaker 1: you feel. And you use different languages. You know what
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  Speaker 1: you're saying. The readers are going to pick up something else.
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  Speaker 1: But you're using the fuel from that darker energy. Right.
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  Speaker 2: So you have to take that dark energy and put
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  Speaker 2: it into the character. And then you have to sort
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  Speaker 2: of separate it out from, okay, what would Zelie do
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  Speaker 2: with that? Right. turn it into, in this case, Sterling
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  Speaker 2: is the main character, you know, she, what would she
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  Speaker 2: do if she was faced up against that? And if it,
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  Speaker 2: you know, if she's a dark, if she's going down
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  Speaker 2: a dark path, then it's very different than what you
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  Speaker 2: or I would choose. And, and the more choices she makes,
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  Speaker 2: the more, you know, new challenges she's up against. And,
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  Speaker 2: and has to negotiate those. So you follow that trail. Um, but,
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  Speaker 2: but yeah, it's fun to go. It's fun to get
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  Speaker 2: dark like that and, and, and figure out how does
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  Speaker 2: that work and, and how does that look like? And,
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  Speaker 2: and you can sort of, you know, make anything happen
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  Speaker 2: in a book. So I can, you know, I don't
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  Speaker 2: use a lot of, um, real life stories because my
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  Speaker 2: readers tend not to believe them when I put those in.
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  Speaker 2: But I can start with something, a seed from something
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  Speaker 2: from real life, from my life, from something I hear
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  Speaker 2: on a street corner and put it in there and
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  Speaker 2: just explore what would happen if that particular person, you know,
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  Speaker 2: so in this case, Sterling has to get out of
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  Speaker 2: her marriage and the only way out is if one
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  Speaker 2: of them dies. And so how far will she go?
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  Speaker 2: And how far will she lose her ethics and her
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  Speaker 2: morals in order to get what she needs to get
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  Speaker 2: and to protect her family? And it's intriguing. And you
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  Speaker 2: really can go down a deep, dark rabbit hole with that.
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  Speaker 2: I find that what if fun.
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  Speaker 1: The name of the book, One of Us Must Die.
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  Speaker 1: We're coming right back with Zelie Ruskin. Hey, thanks for
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  Speaker 1: coming back to my conversation with Zellie Ruskin. The name
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  Speaker 1: of the book, One of Us Must Die. This is
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  Speaker 1: so front page newspaper. You know what I mean by that?
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  Speaker 1: In other words, you write in a way that we
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  Speaker 1: can all relate because it's like, oh my God, this
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  Speaker 1: reminds me of the story I just read yesterday or
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  Speaker 1: last week. Oh my God. And then the gossip starts there.
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  Speaker 1: And then people go, so what's going on? Did you
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  Speaker 1: read the latest one from Zellie? She's so in touch
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  Speaker 1: with where we are right now. I mean, you really
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  Speaker 1: are in touch with where people are.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you. It's a matter of having lived
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  Speaker 2: a very average life with a lot of very above-average experiences,
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  Speaker 2: like very strange things in my life. And like you said,
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  Speaker 2: it's listening. I hear stories from people, and the more
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  Speaker 2: I write these books, people come out of the woodwork
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  Speaker 2: and keep telling me they relate to these characters, and
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  Speaker 2: then they open up about their stories, and you find...
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  Speaker 2: you know, new intriguing premises for what the next book
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  Speaker 2: is going to be. But I really appreciate that compliment.
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  Speaker 2: You know, I want people to relate to the characters,
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  Speaker 2: even if they're flawed.
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  Speaker 1: There's something that I felt so deeply inside while reading
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  Speaker 1: One of Us Must Die. And it's probably just me,
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  Speaker 1: but I would love, God, I wish I was part
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  Speaker 1: of a book group right now where we could openly
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  Speaker 1: discuss this with everybody. But I just feel like that
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  Speaker 1: you reminded me that we have become the generation that's
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  Speaker 1: gone back into hiding. The days of the princess dies,
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  Speaker 1: expanding the woman's life. It's almost like they've been set aside.
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  Speaker 1: And a book like this says, by the way, I
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  Speaker 1: just want you to know. You have strength. You have
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  Speaker 1: people behind you. Get out of your darkness and let's
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  Speaker 1: grow forward here and really build upon it. And I
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  Speaker 1: love this because it does serve as a reminder of
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  Speaker 1: who we can be and not who we used to be. Right.
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  Speaker 2: And it is, you know, I don't like to be political.
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  Speaker 2: I'm very not articulate in politics, but we are slipping
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  Speaker 2: back to that. Both like my first book was about
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  Speaker 2: adoption and I see that happening in that world as well.
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  Speaker 2: But we do need to maintain that openness and not
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  Speaker 2: be afraid to be who we are. And I think
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  Speaker 2: that's true of whether it's a domestic violence situation, whether it's,
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  Speaker 2: you know, this kind of weird, I have to be
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  Speaker 2: a perfectionist in my marriage, you know, the idea that
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  Speaker 2: you can't be divorced. But it's also, you know, I
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  Speaker 2: know so many people who have some very serious medical
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  Speaker 2: issues who won't talk about them because they're afraid of
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  Speaker 2: how people will perceive them. Yeah. Yeah. I prefer openness.
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  Speaker 2: I think you find that there's community when you're open
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  Speaker 2: and you're not so alone and not so trapped.
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  Speaker 1: Now, did your own aneurysm play into this in a
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  Speaker 1: way of changing your outlook on life and becoming more creative?
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  Speaker 1: It's almost like somebody planted an energy source inside of
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  Speaker 1: you and said, okay, I realize this was bad, but
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  Speaker 1: you're about to do a bunch of good.
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  Speaker 2: So when I had my brain surgery, I basically told
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  Speaker 2: my My neurosurgeon, if you fix my brain, I'll use it.
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  Speaker 2: And I have always been creative. I had started writing
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  Speaker 2: before I had the surgery to correct the brain aneurysm,
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  Speaker 2: which I was very lucky that mine was found before
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  Speaker 2: any crisis. But I was writing my first book. And
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  Speaker 2: I don't know that I was really thinking about publishing
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  Speaker 2: as much as I was enjoying the writing process. I
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  Speaker 2: had gotten into a three-month start to finish your manuscript
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  Speaker 2: program when I found out I needed the surgery. And
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  Speaker 2: I basically said to my my surgeon, I'm not having
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  Speaker 2: the surgery till I finish the book. I didn't know
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  Speaker 2: if I was going to live or die. I didn't
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  Speaker 2: know if I lived, if I would be a completely
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  Speaker 2: different person or even able to write or be creative.
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  Speaker 2: And so I did it. I wrote that book in
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  Speaker 2: three months, and then it took me two years to
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  Speaker 2: make it readable. But yes, I do have an attitude
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  Speaker 2: of you must live and take a yes attitude, not
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  Speaker 2: a no attitude, and do things that scare you and
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  Speaker 2: put yourself out there. And for me, finding joy is
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  Speaker 2: in writing these books. And the bonus is if people
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  Speaker 2: read them and love them. But I'm just... Living and
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  Speaker 2: having fun.
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  Speaker 1: The average reader, I wish that they understood the paths
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  Speaker 1: of the creative ones just a little bit more. And
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  Speaker 1: maybe that's part of the thing that you're talking about
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  Speaker 1: when it when it comes to things that you said
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  Speaker 1: that we're kind of hiding. And that is is that
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  Speaker 1: I mean, I mean, my my not my last book,
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  Speaker 1: but the book before that. It was July 18th, 2009.
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  Speaker 1: And that's when I finished the book. The 21st had
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  Speaker 1: a heart attack. And it was like, I had to
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  Speaker 1: finish that book in order for my body to say,
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  Speaker 1: I can break down now. And so when I hear
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  Speaker 1: your story, I'm going, oh my God, Zellie. Zellie, you're
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  Speaker 1: so spot on on everything that you're talking about because
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  Speaker 1: you can't stop because you don't know. And then when
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  Speaker 1: you've got subjects like this, it's almost like you're saying,
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  Speaker 1: I'm answering the calling. Whoever is teaching me or whoever
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  Speaker 1: my muse is, you've got to answer that. And then, okay,
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  Speaker 1: then I'll deal with life after that. Right.
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  Speaker 2: That's pretty much how I live. I like the way
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  Speaker 2: you said it.
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  Speaker 1: Oh my God. And a scary place to be.
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  Speaker 2: You handle all the crises and then you fall apart.
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  Speaker 2: That's it.
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  Speaker 1: That's so true. That's so true because writing is so important,
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  Speaker 1: but try to convince somebody to pick up a writing
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  Speaker 1: instrument and just put down a thought. Oh my God,
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  Speaker 1: I'm going to give you every excuse in the world.
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  Speaker 1: And yet, and yet, Zellie, you've now got a book.
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  Speaker 1: You've got something that people are going to be talking
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  Speaker 1: about because the title alone, when I walk into a
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  Speaker 1: Barnes and Noble and I see one of us must die. Oh, really?
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  Speaker 1: Let me see what this book is all about. And
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  Speaker 1: now you're going to talk about a bad marriage. Oh, really?
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  Speaker 1: Now you've got my attention there. You've got everything that
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  Speaker 1: we are in these pages. Yep.
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  Speaker 2: And I think that with every character, it is somebody,
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  Speaker 2: you know, You will recognize these people either in yourself
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  Speaker 2: or somebody you know. And I think that, you know,
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  Speaker 2: if there's going to be a teachable moment in there,
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  Speaker 2: it is don't judge a person by their, you know,
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  Speaker 2: don't judge a book by its cover. Don't judge people
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  Speaker 2: by the expression on their face or the, you know,
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  Speaker 2: like listen to them, get in there. And, you know,
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  Speaker 2: you really don't know, is their life a pretense? Are
• 12:52
  Speaker 2: they going through something difficult? You know, and even if
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  Speaker 2: they can't tell you because their situation is so difficult
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  Speaker 2: for them, at least they know somebody is there and
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  Speaker 2: somebody cares about them. And that goes so far.
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  Speaker 1: You know what they teach us at the grocery store?
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  Speaker 1: They teach us that when you see the grumpy old
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  Speaker 1: frumpy man or the woman that seems frail, go have
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  Speaker 1: a conversation with them right now. You're the only person
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  Speaker 1: they probably will see today. Go break that ice and
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  Speaker 1: have a conversation with them.
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  Speaker 2: I love that. That is, that is wonderful. That is
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  Speaker 2: exactly what I'd love people to do.
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  Speaker 1: And your book is that your book is that icebreaker.
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  Speaker 1: You've got to feel that inside your heart that you
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  Speaker 1: are going to create conversation here. Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: And I think, you know, that I didn't do it
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  Speaker 2: on purpose, but I find if you can teach something
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  Speaker 2: in an entertaining way. Yep. then, you know, that's incredible. And,
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  Speaker 2: you know, a lot of authors that I read growing
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  Speaker 2: up did that, and I didn't even realize that was
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  Speaker 2: happening until I looked back. And, you know, so like
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  Speaker 2: my first book, you know, teaches you about adoption, but meantime,
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  Speaker 2: it's a suspense story. You know, it's domestic suspense, and
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  Speaker 2: it's about this family drama, and you don't realize that
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  Speaker 2: you're learning about the world of adoption. And in this story,
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  Speaker 2: you're learning so much more about people and behavior and motivation.
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  Speaker 2: And and and and and yet, you know, and and
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  Speaker 2: it's also like one of the things that I think
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  Speaker 2: people don't see in the book, but get by the
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  Speaker 2: end of it is it's not even about the narcissist.
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  Speaker 2: It's about how the way we are parented changes who
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  Speaker 2: we become and who we choose in our lives. It's
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  Speaker 2: more of an intergenerational kind of study in that way.
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  Speaker 2: And it makes people think and talk. And if it
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  Speaker 2: opens up conversations about perfection and marriages and narcissists and gaslighting,
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  Speaker 2: if it makes people, I mean, there's people who are
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  Speaker 2: going to react like, okay, she's rich, who cares? But
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  Speaker 2: the bottom line is, it's not about her being rich.
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  Speaker 2: It's about what's happening to her. And her literal death
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  Speaker 2: by marriage, but also, like you said, the resilience and
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: the strength that it takes to be who she is.
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  Speaker 1: You have got to come back to this show anytime
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: in the future. I love where your heart is as
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  Speaker 1: a creative person. And I just see that there's going
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: to be somebody that's sitting in their car or sitting
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: at home with their own writing. They're so afraid to
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: set something free. And you can be that door that
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  Speaker 1: opens up for them. I just feel it inside of you, Zellie.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you so much. This has been amazing to have
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  Speaker 2: this conversation with you.
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  Speaker 1: Will you be brilliant today? Okay. Okay.
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  Speaker 2: I'm taking that and running.
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  Speaker 1: Thank you.
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  Speaker 2: I will do that.