ANNABEL MONAGHAN: Second chances at summer romances

Annabel Monaghan popped onto the literary scene with "Nora Goes Off Script" and she hasn't let off the gas since. This time, we're talking all about her latest book, Summer Romance, and some sweet hints at her upcoming fourth book.

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BUY THE BOOKS (Bookshop):
Nora Goes Off Script
Same Time Next Summer
Summer Romance

BUY THE BOOKS (Amazon):
Nora Goes Off Script
Same Time Next Summer
Summer Romance

Transcript

00;00;05;00 - 00;00;32;20
Speaker 1
Hi and welcome to Literary Hype. I am Stephanie, your literary hype woman and today's author conversation is a returning guest, which I love that authors are willing to come back, that they had a good enough time with me the first time around that they want to do this again. Annabel is the author of Noor goes off script same time next summer and now Summer Romance, which is the perfect book to pick up for your summer vacation, your beach trips, your pool trips, just enjoying summer romance.

00;00;33;13 - 00;00;38;28
Speaker 1
I mean, that's in the title. It is the title. Now, without any further ado, here's my conversation with Annabel Monahan.

00;00;41;28 - 00;00;49;12
Speaker 1
Well, welcome back to Literary Hype. It's so exciting to have you back. It's the coming year, and now you've got a whole new book for us.

00;00;49;16 - 00;00;51;18
Speaker 2
I know. I hope we do this again next year.

00;00;51;24 - 00;01;16;28
Speaker 1
I mean, we'll be talking about what's coming next year. Two coming up here in a minute. But first, we got to talk about summer romance. So when we talked last year, you were writing this it is quite a bit different from what you initially set out to do. So talk a little bit about what this book is about and how it actually started before it turned into this.

00;01;17;06 - 00;01;49;15
Speaker 2
You know, it's funny because I remember talking to you last year and I remember any time I talked to anybody about Summer, like what was coming out next, I had the hardest time explaining it. And I don't really think I knew what it was until it was over. But I set out to write a book basically about women and, you know, the way we're expected to, you know, work really hard and take care of a lot of people and look good while we're doing it and totally exhaust ourselves.

00;01;49;15 - 00;02;15;05
Speaker 2
And then we go to Instagram and Instagram wants us to spend a bunch of money on candles that'll make us feel better. I kind of wanted to write a book about that kind of best self care. And so I started writing a story about a totally exhausted woman who is like stuck and grieving and mother of three and how different her life is internally than it is externally.

00;02;15;05 - 00;02;40;29
Speaker 2
She's a professional organizer whose life is a total mess. But then the book took a totally different direction, and there's some stuff in the book about, but Instagram and the, you know, the magnesium foot bath that Instagram thinks is going to change her life. But what she realizes is that like just making her own small changes and finally taking care of herself is the thing that's going to change her life.

00;02;41;04 - 00;02;51;00
Speaker 1
What's it like for you as the writer to be in the middle of it and realize something isn't working and have to kind of figure out how to adapt it?

00;02;51;08 - 00;03;10;27
Speaker 2
Yeah, it's really weird. I mean, first of all, it's really weird to be me. It's really weird to write a book the way I do, which is a totally disorderly way. But it's fun I mean, it's not even like I'm writing a book and I'm like, Oh, this isn't working. I'm writing a book. And then I realized that it's not the book I want to write.

00;03;11;25 - 00;03;38;10
Speaker 2
And so you know, you kind of have to listen to yourself. I think this is probably true in all aspects of life. Like what? What's exciting and what's not exciting and when you're writing and you're like, Well, I can't wait to get back to that, that's when you know that you're on the right track and you're writing the book that you want to write when it's drudgery then you you just know that you've lost interest in the thing that you're writing is probably not going to be interesting.

00;03;38;12 - 00;03;45;03
Speaker 1
How do you keep yourself interested and find the things that need to be in the story to keep you interested in writing?

00;03;45;10 - 00;04;14;03
Speaker 2
Well, I start you know, first of all, I'm not writing like toaster manuals, so I like a love story. So I'm always going to be interested. And I the more wounded I can sort of make my main character and the more I can understand her, the more excited I am for her to fall in love. And then there's going to be a guy and I get to make up the guy so I don't know.

00;04;14;03 - 00;04;42;04
Speaker 2
It's pretty it's like it's easy to stay involved. What's hard, I think in writing romance in particular is to know how they're you know, they're going to have to fall in love and then there's going to have to be a problem. It's really hard to know what the problem is and to know what the problem is that, you know, my character's going to be able to forgive or bounce back from that's what's tricky.

00;04;42;10 - 00;04;59;13
Speaker 1
So your main character in this, Ali, since you're talking about the wounds, one of her big wounds is that her mom died and the grief that she's going through kind of talk about channeling that grief into this character and how it motivates her.

00;04;59;17 - 00;05;23;21
Speaker 2
Well, you know, my mom died 15 years ago. And so and people ask all the time, like, is this a really sad book? Like, should I be worried? It's not a sad book. 15 years ago, I would have written a sad book. It's it's light enough now that it's it's not so sad. But what I realized is that her life really, like, changed when her mother died.

00;05;24;04 - 00;05;51;08
Speaker 2
And it it kind of her mother was a person who stepped in a lot to help, which is wonderful. And it's what mothers do. But she did it sort of to access to the point where I think Ali forgot like how to use her voice and kind of never learned how to be married. So as Ali is like moving through this grief of grieving her mother, she's also realizing the way that her mother's handicapped her a little bit.

00;05;52;18 - 00;06;10;05
Speaker 2
And so she has to sort of move through forgiveness. And, you know, I think this happens to a lot of people. Like as we get older, we you know, we adore our parents, but then we sort of see them as they're just people. And, you know, that maybe they weren't perfect. People like God knows, you know, I'm not.

00;06;10;05 - 00;06;16;01
Speaker 2
And then we sort of come to terms with what it was and how much they loved us and we forgive them anyways.

00;06;16;07 - 00;06;35;23
Speaker 1
And you reference this thing about cardinals. I had not heard this until my grandparents died. And it's kind of weird, like how it feels very true that the Cardinals show up shortly after you've lost loved one of the theory the cardinals are your loved ones returning. You know.

00;06;35;23 - 00;07;03;00
Speaker 2
It's weird, too, because I actually started experiencing my mother as like a, you know, my lights kind of work as like red things coming into my line of sight a little bit like you. She always had a red like a pretty red lip on. And I started experiencing that before I had ever read that. So that is a universal thing that that people acknowledge that a cardinal is a thing.

00;07;03;09 - 00;07;08;00
Speaker 2
I also kind of wonder if cardinals are the only birds that are really around in the winter.

00;07;10;01 - 00;07;15;16
Speaker 2
So maybe that's a hopeful thought for people to have when things are kind of bleak outside. Those are the birds you see.

00;07;15;29 - 00;07;37;24
Speaker 1
It was very interesting. My uncle didn't believe in it until right after Grandma died and there had been a male cardinal that would harass him when he was mowing an area where Grandpa had told him not to mow. And then when Grandma died, a female joined him, joined the male and he was like, OK, now I believe it that I don't know, things like that can happen.

00;07;38;00 - 00;07;47;18
Speaker 1
And yeah, and Comfort Ali is kind of really going in. Making Ali's grief worse is that her husband left her on the anniversary of her mom dying.

00;07;48;13 - 00;07;48;21
Speaker 2
And then.

00;07;48;21 - 00;08;09;01
Speaker 1
Asked for the divorce a year later on that same day. So this one day is really tragic for Ali grief is kind of a really big theme in books that were coming out this year. How why do you think it's so important that we see grief on the page in various forms?

00;08;09;13 - 00;08;37;10
Speaker 2
I think the grief is it's the other side of the coin of love. You know? You know, if you lose somebody and you had a great love with that person, they were a wonderful parent. That's going to intensify the grief. So it's sort of the price that you pay. And I don't think that anybody would ever like decide not to love somebody who was really important in their life to avoid having that grief.

00;08;37;21 - 00;09;00;08
Speaker 2
So it's just it's like sort of looking at the the flip side or the dark side of love and admitting that it's worth it. I mean, you know, the other big thing in this book is about having a dog. Like, it's really like terrible to buy a dog. You know, that in ten to 15 years you're going to have a really bad day, but we get a dog anyways.

00;09;00;19 - 00;09;11;26
Speaker 2
And then when that dog's gone, we get another dog because it's like totally worth it. Like, grief and joy are like, you can't have one without the other. And they're important to each other.

00;09;12;00 - 00;09;19;18
Speaker 1
And that's something Allie experiences through her neighbor as well. Making friends with a woman in her eighties and nineties.

00;09;19;19 - 00;09;38;18
Speaker 2
Yeah, it's the same thing. And and we do it. We do it because it's going to, you know, for Allie I mean, you can see that that is like super happy part of her life, that relationship with her neighbor. But you don't have a 94 year old as a buddy without considering that this might end at some point.

00;09;38;26 - 00;09;46;15
Speaker 1
How do you approach balancing the grief that the characters are going through with the joy of a romance in your stories?

00;09;46;18 - 00;10;03;25
Speaker 2
I don't know that I sat down and thought like I got to balance this thing. Like some days when I was writing, I was like, God, this is just like feels really heavy. And some days when I was writing, I thought, this feels so romantic and fun and I think I'm going to leave my family and run off with a skateboarder immediately.

00;10;04;23 - 00;10;22;17
Speaker 2
And so I just had to you know, when you read the whole thing all together, you have to really tune in as the writer to your feelings. Like how am I feeling while I'm reading this book? Does this feel good or does this feel heavy? And to the extent that it feels heavy, you just got it for me.

00;10;22;17 - 00;10;25;17
Speaker 2
Well, if you're me, you just kind of start pulling some stuff out.

00;10;26;05 - 00;10;39;17
Speaker 1
Since you talked about our skateboarder. Yeah, let's talk about Scooter. And so your editor didn't initially want you to have Scooter be a skateboarder. What is up with that?

00;10;40;00 - 00;11;10;12
Speaker 2
I know. Can you believe that? Yeah. It's not like the most traditional, macho main character for a middle aged woman to fall in love with but I really got it in my head that he was a skateboarder. And as soon as I did, I started researching skateboarders, and I started going into skateboarding chat rooms and reading blogs and reading, like all the things that skateboarders talked about, about the experience.

00;11;10;26 - 00;11;29;14
Speaker 2
And the more I read the more I thought, this is exactly like falling in love. It's like bananas. It's a crazy thing to do. It's like you're just throwing your body out there with no seatbelt and hoping for the best and you're probably going to get hurt. So I kept persevering and she kept saying, This is not hot.

00;11;30;02 - 00;11;40;27
Speaker 2
No one wants to have sex with the skateboarder. Nope, nope. And I probably wrote six drafts of this book before she caved, and she said, OK, I get it.

00;11;41;12 - 00;11;46;16
Speaker 1
Which is even funnier because she's in a relationship with the skateboarder.

00;11;47;00 - 00;11;57;29
Speaker 2
Yes, her husband's a skateboarder. True story, but maybe not currently he's a skateboarder. Maybe he's skateboarder. Young. But you would think. You would think. But yeah, no, it was a tough sell.

00;11;58;03 - 00;12;15;14
Speaker 1
So how did you find that way? Of crafting Scooter, who's a lawyer by day and a skateboarder like with the teenagers on the weekends, finding that nuance in him that it made you hot for a skateboarder, despite what people would think?

00;12;15;22 - 00;12;48;27
Speaker 2
Yeah, it wasn't that easy because for a while when I was writing him, he was he was too goofy. He was just like, Come on, man, we need somebody with dental insurance here. Like, he's not like a guy that you want and then I just got to know him, and I just, like, he's such a good guy and he is quite responsible and grown up, but also has this sort of whimsical, I don't know, kind of free way about him, but it certainly didn't happen in the first draft.

00;12;49;06 - 00;13;02;08
Speaker 1
So Scooter's got the the lawyer side, but the the skateboarder side. And then Ali is a professional organizer who's a mess. So talk about how you crafted them to be what the other needs. Oh.

00;13;02;19 - 00;13;27;19
Speaker 2
Maybe by accident. I'm not totally sure. But yes, I think that she needed somebody who was going to help her take a risk, who was a person who was just kind of fearless about his life. And I think that that maybe he needed somebody to make him feel settled. That's kind of how it plays out in the book.

00;13;28;00 - 00;13;53;02
Speaker 2
But I never think of that in advance. I never think of it like she needs someone taller and he needs someone shorter. And together they'll they'll balance each other out. I just have to create the relationship and kind of run it through a hundred times before I kind of come to a place where I'm like, Oh, that relationship would really work in real life.

00;13;53;04 - 00;14;08;00
Speaker 1
You have some pretty strong feelings about third act breakups and whether or not the male character has done enough groveling. And this one, I feel like it's more just doing the groveling because Ali's kind of kind of the one that messes up on the spot.

00;14;08;07 - 00;14;09;15
Speaker 2
Yeah. Oh.

00;14;10;09 - 00;14;21;28
Speaker 1
So trying to figure out what is that point of? They messed up too much versus they still have room to go there. They can make this work.

00;14;22;07 - 00;14;55;14
Speaker 2
I think this is really hard. I honestly think it's really hard because there are a lot of ways, a lot of reasons why you would break up with somebody, right? Either she does something terrible or he does something terrible. Usually it's because, you know, of some outside circumstance that makes them panic and walk away. But if you're going to have a happy ending and I like a happy ending, it needs to be something forgivable enough that you can come back together and your reader actually wants them to be back together.

00;14;55;15 - 00;15;17;07
Speaker 2
It cannot be unforgivable or there has to be a really good reason for it that we can get our head around and honestly, like, I just I think that's the hardest part. And P.S., I think all of us have different levels of things we think are unforgivable. You know, there are things that that some people might say, like, you can if someone said that to me, I would never go back to him.

00;15;18;09 - 00;15;25;29
Speaker 2
And then you think, oh, it's just words, that's fine. But then there are actions you couldn't recover from. I think it's just different things for different people.

00;15;26;10 - 00;15;52;29
Speaker 1
One aspect of the romance crafting conversation that I feel like you can speak really well to is there's been this whole debate over the value of spice in a book, and your books are steamy without the dramatic spice and that differentiation kind of talk about why people are trying to put romance against each other just over its steamer spice level.

00;15;53;01 - 00;16;19;25
Speaker 2
Yeah, you know, I think I think we just want stuff to talk about, you know, I think that's just like, well, why? Here's another thing we could debate I just I think it's all a matter of personal preference and a matter of what your style is like. What kind of a book are you trying to write? Like, there's there is a good reason why no one ever gets murdered in my books is because, like, I'm not a murder writer.

00;16;20;12 - 00;16;46;22
Speaker 2
So I write books. I like the part of a falling in love that's before the kiss. I like that kind of steamy tension and that moment of their so close. I find like a lot of energy in that. And so that's where I focus more of my attention. And there are other writers who are so great at laying out the exact, like, actions of the spicy scene.

00;16;47;06 - 00;16;57;22
Speaker 2
It's kind of not my not my jam. So, you know, the debate is just for something to debate, but there's no wrong and wrong or right. It's just like, what kind of a book are you trying to write?

00;16;57;26 - 00;17;05;11
Speaker 1
Do you have any tips or tricks that you use to help craft that tension leading up to that first kiss and build that steam level?

00;17;05;14 - 00;17;34;28
Speaker 2
I don't. I just tell you, like takes a lot of drafts and it's it really all starts with the emotional connection. You know, it never really starts with like, oh, I'm standing next to a stranger and his arm brushed my arm and now I'm having this tingly feeling. It's more about, you know, moments of vulnerability, moments of connection, and then all of a sudden it's like, you know, a vein is opened between a couple of people.

00;17;35;12 - 00;17;48;08
Speaker 2
This is sort of how it works in real life, too, as far as I remember. And then you know, and then the next thing and the next thing and you're thinking about each other. You know, there's sort of that yearning and love yearning.

00;17;48;23 - 00;17;52;06
Speaker 1
I know you're one of your sons still reads your books.

00;17;52;19 - 00;17;53;06
Speaker 2
God bless.

00;17;53;26 - 00;18;00;23
Speaker 1
You. Which how you got them to read them. That is like the cutest thing ever that you would pay your kids to read your books. I love it.

00;18;00;29 - 00;18;03;03
Speaker 2
You couldn't get my kids to do anything for money. Yeah.

00;18;03;20 - 00;18;16;26
Speaker 1
Yeah. There you go. The notes for the future. Whenever I get around to having kids, that one but your middle son still reads them. What's the best feedback you've gotten from him about your books?

00;18;17;02 - 00;18;43;22
Speaker 2
Well, a lot of the feedback I get is is like, Mom, why? Why is she just like, oh, I can't wait to see him again? Oh, like he finds it so nauseating because, like, he's not a romance reader. But the best feedback that I get from him is logic. Like the the flow of like the flow of events or the flow of, you know, whether something's reasonable or makes sense.

00;18;44;14 - 00;18;58;28
Speaker 2
He's such a good set of eyes because he doesn't read these kind of books, so he's not going to just, like, get hooked in on the feeling and say, I loved it. He's he's kind of fact checking from a totally different perspective. So he's.

00;18;58;29 - 00;19;03;17
Speaker 1
Awesome. What's it mean to you as a parent to have your kid read your work like that?

00;19;03;22 - 00;19;26;12
Speaker 2
Oh, it just means everything. I really I can't even say it's just so it's so fun because like all three of I have three sons and they're all adults now to varying degrees. And it's like I can't talk to them about like basketball for 12 hours. So it's just a really fun thing for us to connect about. So it's just been it's been a really neat thing to share.

00;19;26;13 - 00;19;38;05
Speaker 1
And last time we talked you were talking about how much you love Carly Fortune and she's got a little blurb on your book. What's, how did that come about and what's that mean to you to have someone that you love blurring your book?

00;19;38;06 - 00;20;11;12
Speaker 2
She's such a lovely person. She blurbed Same Time next summer. Also, I think she's on the cover of that one too. I know she is. And it just means everything and it's you know, my my publisher, my editor reached out to her editor and asked her, but we have since, you know, developed a sort of online friendship. And I've done one of her events and we've gotten to know each other and it's just like really amazing to be part of a community where all the authors are supporting all the authors.

00;20;11;18 - 00;20;27;25
Speaker 2
Like, the more the better we do, the better we all do. And any time somebody has a book coming out, we're all talking about whoever's book is coming out. And I've just never really been a part of any community like that. So it's just been great.

00;20;28;06 - 00;20;42;16
Speaker 1
And so she talks about events. You have like the cutest line of dresses that you wear at these events. Where do you get them? And B, how do you select the, like, your tour wardrobe?

00;20;42;25 - 00;21;29;04
Speaker 2
Well, yeah, so I'm not actually the Queen of England so I don't go to like a lot of trouble selecting my tour wardrobe this year. I had I had Walker and Wade, which is a dress company. And Talbots actually gives me dresses for my book tour. So I had three dresses that I just took on book tour. But frankly, I choose my books come out in June and like I go to Texas, so I choose dresses that are not hot and that are thin enough material that I can have a carry on suitcase and put eight dresses in one pair of shoes and one pair of pajamas in that suitcase and nothing else.

00;21;30;05 - 00;21;37;00
Speaker 2
So that's kind of that's that's my fashion advice is don't have a check, any luggage to check.

00;21;37;08 - 00;21;44;02
Speaker 1
I've heard some horror stories from authors of Airport Nonsense on tour. So that that's very smart.

00;21;44;12 - 00;21;58;22
Speaker 2
When you're on book tour, you get up every day and go to the airport. So that's like that's your major thought is like, what's the easiest way for me to get through the airport? So, you know, paper thin material, easy to pack.

00;21;59;06 - 00;22;17;02
Speaker 1
But getting to be on tour is like a dream come true for a lot of authors. And being an author is a dream for a lot of people. You've kind of touched on this when you visited Saint Louis of late, chasing the dream later in life. What would your advice be to people who have this dream but haven't started chasing it yet?

00;22;17;02 - 00;22;19;17
Speaker 1
And they're thinking about like when they should start doing that?

00;22;19;29 - 00;22;45;16
Speaker 2
Well, I think, you know, today's the day actually I think don't wait until tomorrow. And it doesn't have to be a big thing. Like you don't have to quit your job and start writing a book. You can start writing for 10 minutes a day, 20 minutes a day, an hour a day, wake up a little bit earlier and just start writing the book that you want to read.

00;22;45;27 - 00;23;10;29
Speaker 2
And that's the best advice that I have for any writers, is don't try to write your version of the great book that just came out. That's a big success. Write the book that you want to read and that you're uniquely qualified to tell, and that's basically the book that you want to read. Because if you're chasing whatever the big book is right now, by the time you get your book out there, people are going to be over that anyways.

00;23;10;29 - 00;23;16;12
Speaker 2
So you just just like keep it personal and just keep at it a little bit every day.

00;23;16;19 - 00;23;22;26
Speaker 1
We touched a little earlier that you have a book coming out next year. What can you tell us about that? Book and where you are in the process?

00;23;23;01 - 00;23;52;08
Speaker 2
So I've just turned in what will hopefully be the draft before we start nit picking, you know, just like so hopefully the whole story is there. I turned it in and I did not feel entirely terrible about it, which is like for me, you know, that's like a five star situation. So it is about a child star who is all grown up now and she's trying to make it in Hollywood she really wants to.

00;23;52;08 - 00;23;58;11
Speaker 2
She was kind of a joke child star when she was growing up and now she wants to be taken seriously and she falls in love.

00;23;59;17 - 00;23;59;27
Speaker 1
Kids.

00;24;00;08 - 00;24;06;11
Speaker 2
I know. Sorry. Spoiler alert. Spoiler alert. She falls in love and then there's a problem.

00;24;06;19 - 00;24;09;05
Speaker 1
I'm sure you saw a problem coming.

00;24;09;12 - 00;24;11;03
Speaker 2
I know, Stephanie. I've said too much.

00;24;11;03 - 00;24;32;10
Speaker 1
I it's ruined. And for same time next summer, I bought a yellow dress to take a picture with your book and for summer romance about ice cream sandwiches to take a picture with your book. Awesome. A non spoiler or a spoiler out of context. What will I be buying next? Year to take a picture with your next book.

00;24;32;26 - 00;24;33;14
Speaker 2
Candy?

00;24;34;16 - 00;24;36;24
Speaker 1
Ooh. Any particular kind of candy?

00;24;36;27 - 00;24;59;13
Speaker 2
She eats candy in her closet when she's stressed out. She has like a whole shoebox full of Halloween candy, and she eats Skittles and almond joy and Snickers and all of the like. The mini size of little candy. So I, you know, catch up with your dentist before my next book comes out because there's a lot of candy in that book.

00;24;59;21 - 00;25;04;00
Speaker 1
I'm glad I asked now so I can buy a ton of Halloween candy to save for next June.

00;25;04;15 - 00;25;04;28
Speaker 2
That's right.

00;25;05;12 - 00;25;09;16
Speaker 1
So the last question we always ask, because this is literary hype. What books are you hyped about?

00;25;09;29 - 00;25;36;19
Speaker 2
I'm really excited. Last week, Maggie North's rules for Second Chances just came out, and it's probably the best book I've read all year. It's a love story about a married couple. And it's she decides that she's going to come out of her shell by starting to do improv. And it's funny and it's smart and it's just awesome. So that's one you should read for sure.

00;25;37;05 - 00;25;40;08
Speaker 1
Well, thank you so much for taking time to talk about your book with literary.

00;25;40;08 - 00;25;44;19
Speaker 2
I know. I always love talking to you, Stephanie. Thanks for having me. Awesome.

00;25;48;17 - 00;26;07;25
Speaker 1
Thanks to Annabel for hanging out with me and talking about her newest book, Summer Romance. If you'd like to get your hands on Annabel's newest book, Summer Romance, or any of her previous books, the links to do so are in the show notes for you, as well as where to find her on social media. If you enjoyed this conversation, don't forget to subscribe to the Literary Hype podcast.

00;26;08;06 - 00;26;13;07
Speaker 1
Give us stars and share it with a friend. Thanks for listening to the Literary Hype podcast.