Off The Vine with Kaitlyn Bristowe - Big Book Guys: The Housemaid with Freida McFadden

Episode Date: November 14, 2023

The Big Book Guys recently held their third discussion via Zoom last week, and not to toot our own horn, but this might just be the coolest book club out there. Delicious wine, Bailey’s harmonica playing, AND the author of the book – it doesn’t get better than that! The BBGs are thrilled to have Freida McFadden join them for a discussion about her book, 'The Housemaid.' If you haven’t read it yet, now is the time. It's a real page-turner! Freida dives into how she developed the characters, the inspiration behind the storyline, and even how she got her family’s input for mild torture ideas. Now, that’s some family bonding. She also explains how she balances her day job with writing and how being a practicing physician specializing in brain injury has inspired some of her novels. To wrap up, a few book club members ask their questions after reading the book and to top it all off, Freida announces some exciting news about the third book. Join the Book Club on Fable and follow Off The Vine Podcast on Instagram to keep up with all of our book club fun. We will be announcing the next book soon! Thank you to our sponsors! Check out these deals for the Vinos: L'OREAL PARIS – Discover the new Bright Reveal Dark Spot Serum and Broad-Spectrum SPF 50 Daily Lotion. Visit Target online and in-store to buy yours today. BOMBAS – Visit Bombas.com/vine and use code VINE for 20% off your first purchase. JENNI KAYNE – Get 15% off your first order at jennikayne.com/home See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Okay, let's talk about the original enemies to lovers story. Before all of our reality TV couples, before the rom-coms, we binge, there was Elizabeth Bennett and Mr. Darcy in pride and prejudice. And Audible has just dropped a brand new original that will have you completely hooked, I am. It's not just any audiobook. This is a full cast performance. So Marisa Abella, you might know her from industry, brings Elizabeth Bennett to life.

And Harris Dickinson from Baby Girl and Where the Crawdads sing is Mr. Darcy. And honestly, the chemistry, you guys, it's everything. Plus, you've got icons like Glenn Close, Bill Nye and Will Polter in the mix. Talk about a dream cast. Now, what I love is how Marissa pulls you right into Lizzie's world, her stubbornness, her wit, her messy family dynamics, and of course, her complicated feelings for Darcy. And with a vibrant new adaptation and original score by Grammy-nominated composer, it just feels so fresh and modern while still keeping that timeless Jane Austen charm.

So whether it's your first time experiencing Pride and Prejudice or you've read it a million times, you're going to fall absolutely in love all over again. So go listen to Pride and Prejudice now at audible.ca slash Jane Austen. Off the line. We're really crushing it at these book clubs because we keep getting really incredible guests, aka the authors of all these incredible books. always get kind of stuck in one author and then I go, oh, I can't read anything else. Nothing's ever going to be that good. And then I find a new author and I go, okay, there's other books that good where I cannot put it down. And that was what this one was. I'm going to bring in our guest, obviously. It's Frida herself, the author of this book. So Frida, let's bring

her in and ask her all of the juicy questions. Hi, thank you so much for coming. Oh my gosh. I have so many questions. Thank you so much for joining us today. I know everybody is so excited to hear from you. So thank you. Thank you for having me. I'm so excited. These are all the big book guys in our club and we're obsessed with your writing and you are just the cutest. So this was a page Turner. It was so good. And we have a lot of questions for you. When you published the housemaid, were you expecting this kind of fan love and reaction? No, definitely not. It's actually a funny story. I wrote it like many years before I even submitted it to my publisher, bookature, because I didn't think it was that good. I was like, oh, you know, I kept pushing it

back on my publishing schedule and pushing it back. And then when my publisher approached me, I thought it had something good to it, but it had issues with it. And I didn't know how to fix them. When they approached me, I was like, oh, this publisher will help me fix it. it. So I gave it to them and they were really excited about it. And I was like, wow, yay. So we fixed it together. But yeah, it was just, it was this book that was I had on my hard drive for like years and never published because I was like, this sucks. That's so crazy. People do this with music like musicians do this. Artists do it. Authors do it. I remember Carly Pierce telling me that she didn't think her song, every little thing was going to be a hit. And somebody

looked at her and said, no, that sounds going to change your life. And it did. And it blows my mind that you could have thought, like, in this book, it is what it is because everyone reading it and has read it and myself included, I'm like, it keeps me up at night how good it was. Well, part of it was like, the first person to read all of my books is always my mom. She's like, every time I write something, I give it to her. But I was afraid to give her this book. Because she has this huge phobia of being trapped in like a room or something. So I'm like, she's going to hate it. And then it's going to kill my confidence. I can't publish it. So that was part of it. I was just like, if my mom can't read it, then forget it. I can't do it. And did your mom read it and love it?

She did. So when I finally gave it to her right around when I was giving it to my publisher, I was like, this is going to come out. Why don't you just read it? You can skip the locked in the room part. And she was like, I can't believe you. didn't give this to me. I love this book. I get that. I, too, am afraid of being, I mean, if there's any weirdos out there that like being trapped in a small room, I'm worried about you, but at first when I read it, I remember reading the beginning prologue, and I go, oh, well, I already know, like, this is going to happen, or I was already assuming so many things. So the twist really hit me where I was like, oh, what? I recorded my reaction.

But you're so passionate. I am already sold. Oh, I'm so passionate about it. I always want to know, like who do you enjoy reading books from? I don't really listen to many podcasts. Sue me, but do you read other books? Is there like an author that you enjoy reading? I love to read. Reading is like aside for writing, reading is my favorite thing to do. And that's like, you know, if I had a podcast, like I could go on for like a couple hours about my favorite authors. I think I'm going to say my favorite right now is not a thriller author. It's probably Taylor Jenkins read. I'm, like, obsessed with her right now. I love her.

Yes. I mean, we all know the seven husbands. Is there another favorite you have? I actually, my most recent favorite is, and I, my brain goes a little blank during these things. I carry a donut book. Carri Soto's back? That's it. Carrie Soda's back.

Yes. I loved it. And it was so funny because I, I'm not into sports at all. And I was like a tennis book. I'm not going to like that. But I was like, I think I got it up like it for two. on Bookbub. So I was like, oh, I'll give it a try. I like that other book she wrote. And I was like, I love this book. This is so good. And then I loved seven husbands. Amazing. Amazing.

You know, if I started naming the ones I like, I would just be naming every book. Okay. Maybe we'll have you make us a list or something one day of your top five favorite books that you've ever read because we need to pick one for one of our book club meetings. I always find author's brain so fascinating. What is it like to be in your brain when you're writing a book like this? I asked Colleen Hoover this too, where I was like, are you like, wow, I am dark? Like, what is your brain to get there? Well, I don't, I don't know any comparison because I've only just had the one brain, but I'm there. Sometimes when I'm writing something, I'm just like, I'm so excited just for like, oh, people are going to love that. Like, I just get so excited just to show someone.

and like I imagine people reading it. That's like, you know, like all this other stuff with publishing, whatever, but just the idea of people reading my book is just so exciting. I've been writing since I was like nine years old. And when you're nine, getting people to read your stuff, like a teenage or nobody wants to read your writing. You're like, please read this. I wrote this story.

Please read it. And nobody wants to probably because it's terrible. But so it's so cool. It's so cool. It's so cool that people actually are going to read it and like that they'll enjoy it. So that's my exciting thing. Just imagining people liking it. That must be a dream come true because obviously people like it and you've just gotten so much love from this book. And do you have any untold stories that are just saved in your notes where you go like is that where you put your inspiration? You just go into your notes if you see something and write something down.

Like I always think about I like to write music and anytime I get inspired by anything, I just have a note. section in my phone for music. And I'm wondering if you do the same thing. Absolutely. So I used to keep it in my head. And then I had this great idea and I realized I forgot it. And I was like, I can't believe I forgot that. So now I keep it in a draft file in my email. And anytime I get an idea, I just kind of like curble it in there, type it in there. Then I know it saved and I can come back to it. You're also a practicing physician specializing in brain injuries. which is, I'm like, how do you, to write a book and to continue to be a writer, I feel like your head has to be in it at all times. But then you're learning about brains. Like, how do you

balance being a writer and learning about brains? Seems crazy. First of all, I just want to emphasize, I am not a brain surgeon. People keep saying that. Like, how she be a brain surgeon and a right? And like, I could not do that. That is, that would be too much. I don't think anyone could do that. So not a surgeon. I have like a subspecialty and brain injury and I see a lot of stroke and, you know, rehabilitation patients. I only do it part time right now. So I'm like kind of half time. So I'm able to split it a little bit. I have most of my afternoons free to work. But it actually in the last few months, it just got to be too much. I was like started to almost have like panic attacks thinking about everything I had to do. So,

That was the point where I ended up telling my boss a few months ago, I was going to cut back to just like doing like per diem. So like once a week, just like weekend coverage stuff. So it was a hard decision. I was thinking about it for like a year or two before I actually did it. They really, really didn't want to give it up. But I was also like making myself nuts. Yeah, that's, you got to at that point take a step back from something.

If you're starting to get panic attacks or anxiety over it, oh, I hate that for you. I'm glad you took a. step back from that. Also, do you think Andrew from the book had a brain injury at some point in his life? Because if you learn about brains, you realize that people that are that psychopath or sociopaths, there's got to be some sort of brain injury happening or one too many like concussions. I don't know. There's obviously something wrong with him.

Did he have a brain injury? I did not imagine that he had a brain injury. Although I do have a lot of books. I actually have a book called Brain Damage, which of all my books, it's kind of the most autobiographical within my own field. It's about a woman who has a severe traumatic brain injury when she was shot in the head. And it's like her having this horrible brain injury and trying to also figure out who shot her in the head. So that's the plot of that way. It's very much based on my real experiences.

except for the murder mystery part, of course. Yeah, of course. Well, who knows? How did you come up with the inspiration for this book? I really love the idea of like a terrible boss story. So it's another early book about how earlier in my medical training I got kind of tormented by one of my senior residents. And I was sort of, I just don't like the idea.

In a lot of my books, I have this, just like somebody in a terrible situation where they're tormented by somebody they either work with or live with. And I was just thinking like, imagine like you're a maid, a housemaid, and you're like working for this family and they treat you like crap. And I was like kind of looking online for true stories of like worst like cleaning person job ever and like awful things people did. And people were like, yeah, I cleaned for this woman. She used to leave her tampons.

everywhere and just like awful stuff. Happened to the book. Yeah. That's a great idea. So I was just like trying to like think of like, you know, true experiences of people who like have really awful experiences as a cleaning person. My God. Incorporate like the worst, worst staff that you could possibly do.

And you had two different perspectives through the book. Whose perspective did you start writing first? I always write books chronologically. So some people will tell me they skip ahead. But I feel like if you do that for me personally, if I do that, I'll never go back and write the hard part. So I like to just go chronologically. So the order you're reading it is the order it was written, except, you know, if a scene, you know, has to be going earlier. I'm not going to say, no, I already wrote that part.

I can't add anything else. But it's generally just chronological. And then so was Andrew inspired from like working for a terrible person or your colleague being terrible to you? Is that, was that the Andrew? Andrew was inspired by thankfully, Andrew is not inspired by a real person. Okay, good. Although some of the punishments in the room is actually an interesting story because I wanted, you know, I was obsessed with the idea of a room and these punishments he makes Purdue.

But I didn't want them to be too gruesome. Like, I'm very, I'm the kind of author. I'm not horror. I'm thriller. So I don't like anything to be too bloody, gory. So I was like trying to come up with things that were like torture, but not stab yourself in the eye with a fork or something like that. Yeah, just pulling out hands from head, a hundred of them.

Yeah. So that's like kind of awful, but it's not like gruesome. Yeah. So I had, I enlisted my whole. family. I remember, distinctly remembered having making both my husband at two different times, making both my husband and my teenager sit with me. Well, I said, help me think of a way that you can be tortured. And I can't even remember which ones I included, but they were all like horrible bright light, horrible, annoying noise. Like, it was just all these things that we thought of that

would be like torture, but not grues. Pulling out teeth is a little gruesome. Pulling out teeth is a little gruesome but that's yeah yeah it crescendo to that yeah and although this was family bonding time yeah family bonding time what is the worst torture you could come up with for a person and then you get to see how sick your family members are like what about this we bond we have horrible punishments to do in an attic does you're anyone else in your family right no I mean not really my certainly my husband does not, he's not a creative course. All right, could you have two kids, don't you? Yeah, they're little-ish. Well, they're not big. They're not fully grown yet. Okay, so you don't know what direction they're going to go with creativity. Yeah, they don't want to be

writers or doctors. They very vehemently do not want to be doctors. That's like when I grew up, I wanted to be a vet, and then I learned very quickly that you'd have to deal with dying animals and I was like and that ain't for me I'm out. Maggie did you say there's a question from? There wasn't a question but somebody said I wasn't, this is so gross. I was a nanny and the dad left his toenails under

the couch and he also had a 16 year old girlfriend. Miss Millie on that guy. Where's Millie? Oh my God, where's Millie when you need her? Oh my gosh, that's crazy. I always want to know too if you have visuals like do you have a visual of what Andrew, Millie, Nina?

like what they look like to you, or do you like the reader to figure that out for themselves? Yeah, I don't usually describe people in huge amounts of detail because they do want people to picture them the way you want. Like, I hate it actually when I'm reading a book and I have a visual of a character and like you see them a certain way and then the author will say, and her long blonde hair. And I'm like, no, she's a brunette. That's wrong. Yeah.

Yeah, that's fair. that's actually really fair what if it got cast as a movie like who would you want to play yeah who would you want to play the characters in if it turned into a movie people ask me that a lot and I don't I kind of would love like I have dream cast members like I keep I have this fantasy that like maybe somehow Reese Witherspoon will like get interested in it because I love her and she'd be an awesome Nina yes would be a great Nina be a great Nina and I kind of I kind of feel like, I mean, I don't know what, probably for Andrew, but like, I would love for, like, Chris Hemsworth to be just involved in some way. Yes.

Maybe without a certain. Yeah, he should just be involved in it. I also wanted to know if we missed clues in the beginning that this twist was coming because sometimes you read it back and I read a different book twice and the second time I read it, I was like, oh my gosh, how did I not pick up on that? Did you have any clues in the first part? You know, how you do two parts? In the first part, was there any clues that we missed? People ask me that a lot. And usually I could like rack off a bunch of clues, but I'm going blank right now.

One especially people will say, my book never lie. People will always ask me for the clues. And I've got a list of those in my head. But this one, I don't remember. I don't know if there were any specific clues. I think, you know, you have to balance it with the clues. You don't want it to be too much and you give it away. Yeah.

But you don't want to be too little. And then people are like, well, you could never have seen that coming. So it's a difficult balance. I was, yeah, ask. When you write, do you, because you write chronologically, do you know the whole story? Are you kind of improvising as you go? I definitely know the twist. Like, I won't start a book until I know the twist.

Like, sometimes they'll have an idea for like the beginning. Like, oh, this is a great premise. But I don't know what the twist should be. Like I'd love to write a book about, I don't know, like some cult or something, but I don't know what the twist is, so I can't write it. So I wait until I come up with the twist and then I start planning the rest of it in my head. But I don't do like, some people have like, you know, like every seed mapped out the whiteboard with all the lines and like everything. I don't do that. I kind of let the characters take me where they want to in a way.

But I think the twist is really important in a thriller because if you don't know, know what it's going to be. I feel like it's hard to set everything up for it. And I use this expression. Like when I didn't know it, I kind of write myself into a corner where like I've gone in a direction and I just don't know how to get to the twist from there and you end up having to backtrack. So I think it's better, you know, to know the twist going in. Oh, I want to know if any of the big book guys saw the twist coming because I was like shocked, did not see it coming at all. I want to know if anyone else saw, I see people shaking their head, no, but did anyone? To read this.

Yeah, you do. You really do. I want, did anyone see the twist coming? No. No. Something said a little, little tiny bit. Lee, I see you a little, little tiny bit, but everybody else, no. What I'm feeling weird is like, sometimes I think a twist is really obvious in a book I write and no one gets it.

And other times, I'm like, this twist, nobody will figure it out. And everyone's like, oh, I knew it. I'm so frustrating that's hard i feel like it's so hard to write a book like writing music i always need about eight people in the room to help me because i don't know how to like i can i can come up with lyrics okay but i need someone to like give me the format put it into a specific style of a song play the instruments and i feel like as an author you just have to do it all yourself and it's just so impressive how your brain can work like that i want to know if you were milly or i guess anyone can answer this if you're milly at what point would you have quit that job because as soon as i like

got up into the attic and saw that there's no lock just on only on the outside and the family seemed a bit strange i'd have been like i don't know if this is for me again it was better than living in her car but at what point, if you were Millie, would you have quit? I think it's like, that's why I wanted to make her situation really desperate that she was like, had been in jail, she had no other opportunity. She was in her car, if she didn't, she needed an address. So like there was just no other option but to stay. That said, like one of the comments people say about my books a lot is like,

your protagonists are so dumb. and they don't make such terrible decisions. I'm like, yeah, that's probably true. But the good decisions don't need to interesting things happening. Like, I don't want the book to just be like, you wouldn't have a book. Yeah, you want to be like, oh, I quit the job. And then that was the end of it. Or I called the police and let them handle it, the end.

That's the same as like on Bachelor shows when people are like, I'm sick of the drama like get that girl out of here and then she leaves and everyone's like this show's boring I know I love the drama person so I always hate it when they get like voted off or kicked off or whatever yeah I know it's the it's the it's the meat and potatoes of the whole show you're like I need more that's why we're watching in the first place I did want to open it up to the big book guys to ask any unanswered questions that they may have that I didn't ask I don't know. I feel like I blank on things. Then after I go, why didn't I ask you that? So I'm leaning on the big book guys for some questions. I said, when is the third coming out? Can I answer that one?

Yeah. When is the third book coming out? Please tell me. So in the third, the third one has a white cover. I was making people guess that cover like forever. And I was like making a joke like, oh, well, the book was published by a British company. But at least they made the cover as like red, white and blue. And then someone pointed out to me that the British flag was also. Redway and Blue felt a little stupid then and other, many other flags, apparently. Anyway, it's coming out in June and it's also about Millie. And this one, she's married and has

children. So I really just wanted to go in a completely different direction. I didn't want it to just be like the same book again. Yeah. Like, oh, there's another family, Millie, you know. So this one's really just very different. But I really wanted to write it because I had a idea for it and I was just like I felt like it felt unfinished it felt like there needed to be this third part to it and now to me like to be a feels finished now what's the title can you tell us it's called the housemaid is watching which I'm also excited about because the first title of the three of them that I personally came up with and I didn't come up with the housemaid with housemaid because house made i'm saying about british stuff it sounds very british to me like i would never

that is not a word i would ever use like housemaid so when they said that i was like that i'm not british all right so i have a couple questions but i'll just ask one so other people have two but i just okay well i have two then i keep thinking about nina and cecilia like do you you my question is like did you have any idea when you wrapped up the book like what do you think they went and did like where did they go and what did they great question you know i don't think about things like that you know sequels are sort of like new to me in a way like i this is really the only thriller that i've written that has a sequel and it just like you know people loved it so much i just felt compelled to do it but i mean i just it

my head, I never think about what they're doing after. I mean, I imagine them like, you know, having like a happy life after that, just like kind of being on their own together. But I never like pictured anything specific. And I think I purposely like didn't want to bring them back for that reason. Like I just wanted to picture them having this like happy life together. Like they're done. They're like in another realm in like a heaven and happy space. where they're just like, we don't know where they are, but they're in another world where they're just happy at all times. Right.

They've been thrown off. They can not. My other question was, I probably know the answer to this, but who is your favorite character to write in the book? I have a very, very sad little TikTok with like four videos. I feel like I'm too old for TikTok somehow. But anyway, I have a TikTok about my favorite character in the Housemade, first House Made book.

and I won't go through the whole thing. It's a really funny video, but I would say my favorite character is Cecilia. She's just, she's very fun to write. But you can watch my little TikTok on it if you want. I'm definitely going to watch your TikTok on it. I want to know all of it. Please don't feel too old for TikTok. I want to know all your thoughts on all these books always.

My question is kind of for Caitlin, but you posted that you recorded your reaction to reading one of the chapters. And so I think I know what it was, but I just wanted to see what chapter it was. It was when she went, oh, did they make food that good in prison or whatever? She said, like, when I was like, oh, she knows. She knows. She knows. It was when I read that. And then I kept flipping and it, like, turned into the different perspective.

And it was like how to sabotage whatever the, I forget what exactly it was. Your sadistic evil husband. Yes. And I was like, oh, this changes. everything and it was crazy because i love a twist in a book and i i knew something was going to happen but i just thought it was going to be okay now she's locked in the room like what next but that whole twist was pretty great pretty genius but that's the part i recorded okay that's different than what i thought it was i thought it was going to be when they i thought it was going to be when

they switched from i mean or milly's perspective to nina's but i definitely get where you were seeing that because that was like oh she knows something but i thought it was because she you thought they spent the night in New York together. And so that's what she was thinking. But it was... But it kind of was both because I saw that and then I continued to like flip the pages and saw like, okay, now it's a different perspective and all that. So you're kind of right.

It was, it was a little bit about... I just wanted to comment. I was just reminded of something from the last question. Actually, when I originally wrote, was planning the book out in my head, my thought was that Nina and Enzo was. would like end up living happily ever after together like that was my original idea and then somehow it just didn't feel right so I just it just didn't happen and I think that was the right decision but yes I think so too so first off to I wanted to say I am not good with suspense at all

like I have to get through books really fast like this but I want to thank you Frida for at least giving us a more like finally tied like ending like you could still kind of make your own predictions about where everybody went after that but i i was satisfied so i appreciate thank you thank you so much i also wanted to ask i mean not necessarily about this book specifically but you said you you write from like in chronological order so how does your whole like how long typically does your whole process take you i'm someone who's always been a really bad writer and so I'm just curious if you're not really besides in like obviously the editing process how long it takes you to go from planning to like submitting I guess so what I generally do

is like you know I don't write multiple books at once like I usually will like if I have an idea I'll start thinking about it and like I'll just have it kind of percolating in my head while I'm working showering showering is a big time of like writing planning for me you know taking walks stuff like that and as the time goes on i'll start planning more specific things and like plot details and then like well now i work so i'll like wait for a time when i know my work schedule is late or i know i have a week off coming up or some a time when i know i'm going to have a lot of time to write and at that point i'll just like start writing like crazy and i've got most of it planned out in my head by then. And this is not something I used to be able to do, but I've been

writing novels for so long as I can remember really. So I've just like really, like when I have an idea in my head, I can almost kind of like transcribe it like directly onto the page without like too much effort at this point. So I can usually write it, you know, do a draft in like a few weeks but of course then it be editing you know the editing can take months after that and if i don't like it then it'll just sit on my hard drive for years and like somebody will you know there'll be an opportunity to you know have it worked on like somebody say oh do you have something new and then i'll start working on it again like just today i picked up a manuscript that i can't even remember when i wrote it wrote a long time ago and it looked completely new to me and it was fun to work

on it. I was editing it. So it can be a multiple year process, but it can also be very quick if it all comes out exactly like I want. That's so impressive. Gosh. I was wondering, I have a question about CC or Cecilia. I work in the child abuse and neglect field. So, you know, a lot of what went on with her was so probably traumatic in the book. But the way that she reacted to Millie a lot without knowing much about her was interesting to me because she seemed I don't I don't really like saying this but maybe kind of brady towards Millie. And I'm wondering in your mind whenever you're writing the book, why was that? Is it because her mom was there telling her, you know, Nina was there telling her, you know, we don't like her for whatever reason,

or was it the grandmother and how she acted or was it the way that she was kept from her mom? And so that's just how she was whenever her mom would get punished. Like how how was, who was Cecilia to you with that. Like part of it was just like sort of having fun with her just being a bratty child and you know, another way to torment Millie. I think she was like just so traumatized by what was happening with her mother that she was just constantly acting out. It's like when a kid is, you know, has a bad home life and then they start acting badly at school and you don't really know why, but they're just like acting out like all the time. So like she could be good with her mom. because she's worried about her mom.

But, like, everyone else, she's sort of a brat around. Thank you. Okay. And then, Ashley? My question was, like, your characters and their reactions and, like, their personalities and everything, they're, like, so vividly drawn out. Like, how do you approach developing the characters? Like, how much do you have them outlined versus, like, creating them as you go?

Like, how they react in different situations. The characters, to me, are, like, very important, like, in my head. Like, I have to have, when I'm really. writing about a character, it has to be somebody who intrigues me that I care about. Otherwise, it won't, they won't be a good character. So, I mean, I really try to, like, get in their head and also, like, have something about them that's, like, sympathetic in a way. Like, even though Andrew, like, always, like, horrible he's a sociopath, like, he also was tormented by his own mother. So, like, there's this sort of sympathetic. I mean, I wouldn't call him sympathetic exactly, but, like,

even the villains, like I'd like to give them something vulnerable about them that I can sort of not like them exactly, but just like have some sort of empathy for them. But like I just every character I'm thinking like what makes them tick? Like what do they care about? Like what are their goals? And I also like in my book, I always have to have like some guy in the book that I have a little crash on because I think I'm a romantic at heart. So I'm like, Like, I always need to have that in my books. Hi. Well, first of all, I absolutely love both of the books.

I cannot wait for the third. So good. I am so curious to know what the meaning of the white clothing was throughout the book. You know, it's funny. Like, people ask me a lot, like, what's the meaning of this? What's the meaning of that? And sometimes it's just like, it doesn't have a meaning. It's like, I just thought, like, okay, you know, like he's obsessed with white.

And he wants all his, you know, women to wear white and I think it's just it's there's no meaning exactly beyond that like yeah it's creepy like white's a creepy color in a way like I don't know like creepy I find I guess I find wedding dress is creepy I don't know but there's something I don't know it's it doesn't have a meaning like there's some literary meaning or like some you know like some like message behind it It's more just like, oh, this is something I find creepy. So I'm going to put it in there. Wait, that's a really funny point.

I too find wedding dress is creepy. Yes, because it's like you're, think about this concept. You're dressing in all white because you're supposed to be like a virgin while your dad, this man hands you away to another man and you're an all white. It's creepy. I get it. I get it. I love it.

I'll wear white on my wedding day. I'm just, I get where you're coming from. I did not wear white on my wedding dress day. I wore black and white. No, I did not. And I bought my dress at Target. Jugs? I did wear a wedding queen.

I bought my wedding dress. I would totally do that actually. I would wear like a black pants suit. Thank you all the big book guys for your questions. And Frida for taking the time tonight to answer all them and let us get in your brain for a little second. It was so fun. And everyone needs to read the second one. And then I cannot wait.

for the third one. Thank you so much for having me. This is so much fun. You guys look like you're so comfy there. I'm like really jealous. We're so comfortable. We are really cozy and we've got cheese and dogs and we're happy. And thank you again. So let's take a vote on if we should read part two, which I'm biased because it's so good. Or if you guys want to start a new book, which I will not be upset at. We can do that too. But let's take a vote. Oh, new book. Oh, new book is yeah new book is winning new books winning okay that's fair we can i get that i get that but maybe just read the second one whenever you have a chance because it's so great but i totally get doing a new one because we want a new author that we can slide into their dms and force them into coming

on the pod hey bailey sing us out with a harmonica outro yep here we go here we go yeah oh the lord is good to me and so i thank the lord for giving me the thing I need the sun and the rain and the apple seed. The Lord is good to me. Johnny Appleseed. Amen. Whoa. We are Fergie and Jesus.

We are a combination of Fergie and Jesus. Look at everyone clapping for you. Got my new talent guys. I'm quitting every song. Four hugs a day? Four hugs a day? Wait, what? Four hugs a day.

Oh, we need to talk about this. No, we really do. I don't know about this. I'm being four hugs a day. Yeah. That's the minimum. A bare minimum. Four hugs today.

You can get one, okay? This is not good. Well, you need to go search for hugs from strangers. Probably. Because. Because. Dada, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. It sounds like Chicago.

Nobody gets enough hugs a day. Can I hear it? Number is four. Now, if you have got for hugs today, then you better get some more. That's the minimum. I'm not a mom's for a house. I'm Katlyn Bristow. I'll see you next Tuesday. Thank you.