June 24, 2025 • 43 mins
Welcome to the very first episode of Bookmarked by Reese’s Book Club! Host Danielle Robay is joined by two powerhouses (and Reese’s Book Club alums) Emily Henry and Yulin Kuang to talk about their real-life friendship and creative collaboration, as they set out to adapt two of Emily Henry’s recent novels. They dive into the romance renaissance, share behind-the-scenes details on screen adaptations, and even drop a few hints about the upcoming film The People We Meet on Vacation.
Like what you heard? Subscribe to the Bookmarked newsletter HERE for more buzzy book talk, and be sure to follow us @reesesbookclub for more.
People We Meet on Vacation by Emily Henry - find it HERE
How to End a Love Story by Yulin Kuang - find it HERE
The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins - find it HERE
North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell - find it HERE
Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn - find it HERE
Book Lovers by Emily Henry - find it HERE
Beach Read by Emily Henry - find it HERE
Luck of the Draw by Kate Clayborn - find it HERE
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen - find it HERE
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Danielle (00:00):
Bookmarked by Reese's book Club is presented by Apple Books. Hey, Hey,
I'm Danielle Robe. Welcome to the very first episode of
Bookmarked by Reese's book Club. We're going to get to
know each other well, but I want you to know
a little bit about me. I'm a shoe girl, and
(00:20):
I know it may seem odd to open a book
club podcast talking about shoes, but I have a point.
I promise great books and great shoes they both take
you places, sometimes across continents, sometimes into steamy love stories.
I've been in a few of those, sometimes into a
full blown identity crisis. I've also been in a few
(00:41):
of those, and sometimes straight into conversations that stick with
you forever. We're definitely getting into those. So if you're
already a part of Reese's book Club, then you know
it's not just a reading list. It's a lifestyle and
a movement. It's a place where brilliant women and brilliant
books get the attention they really deserve. And if you're
(01:03):
new here, welcome. You have found your people on behalf
of the Reese's book Club team. We are so happy
you're here. We accept you, we embrace you, and we'll
probably recommend fourteen books to you by the end of
this episode. So here's how it's going to work. Every Tuesday,
We're diving into the stories behind the stories. We're talking
(01:25):
to authors, actors, musicians, comedians, directors, anyone who's ever made
us feel something with their words. You know what I'm
talking about. Page to screen journeys, book talk of sessions,
plot twists not just on the page, but also in life.
Bookmarked is our once a week hangout, our meeting place.
(01:47):
So whether you're out on a walk, driving your work,
or hiding from your inbox, or just pretending to clean
while you're actually laying on the floor staring at the
ceiling like I usually do, I am so glad you're here.
This space is for you. Welcome to the club. Let's
go somewhere together. Today's guests are two of the biggest
(02:09):
names in the world of romance, Emily Henry and Yuleene Kwang.
Both of them hold so much weight separately, but they
are doing an interview for the first time together. That's
what's so fun about this. They're friends and creative collaborators,
and they're both Riese's Book Club alums. Emily Henry is
one of the most prolific romance novelists in the game.
(02:31):
She published six incredible books in five years. I don't
even know how that's possible. Her most recent book was Great, Big,
Beautiful Life, and it was the Reese's Book Club pick
in May. Now Yulin Kwang is a screenwriter, director, and
author whose novel How to End a Love Story was
last May's Reese's book Club pick. They're May's Sisters Now.
(02:51):
You've also seen her work on screen, including on Hulu's
Doll Face and now Elena's At the Helm of two
movie adaptations based on Emily's book The People We Meet
on Vacation and Betreat Emily.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
Leen.
Danielle (03:07):
Welcome to the first episode of Bookmarked. We're so excited
to have you here, Emily. All of your fans call
you m Hen, which is such a fun nickname. So
you Leen, I was thinking maybe we could give you
a moniker today. Are you cool with that?
Yulin Kuang (03:20):
Oh? Ooh, okay, you'll be the first tell me.
Danielle (03:23):
I'm thinking Youku.
Emily Henry (03:25):
I think it's cool.
Speaker 5 (03:27):
Youku.
Speaker 6 (03:27):
Oh God, I think it's very close to Yoko. I'm
a big fan of Yoko. Oh No, I'm like her
her artwork, and you know what you know. Yeah, sure,
let's lean in.
Danielle (03:37):
Okay, thank you. I'd love to give you guys a
chance to introduce yourselves to the book Club. And I
felt like, what better way than to share all of
our favorite nineties rom coms. We're all love story girlies.
I'll go first, just to set the stage. I'm pretty
woman anything Julia Roberts.
Yulin Kuang (03:56):
I think it would have.
Speaker 6 (03:57):
To be Nodding Hill. You know, I'm just a girl.
We're all standing in front of a boy asking him
to love her. That's it doesn't get better than that.
Plus there's that sequence where he walks through. I think
it's notting Hill and the Seasons change a cinema.
Emily Henry (04:12):
I agree, love that, I will say surprising, probably no
one You've got mail anything all that, I agree like
any of the Julia Roberts, any of the Meg Ryan
Sandra Bullock had some really good ones, truly.
Danielle (04:27):
A golden era. I also I'm split on the Jennifer
Aniston one. Some of them totally plagued my dating life
later on, Like Picture Perfect was such a great movie.
And also I'm like, I think that's why I went
for all the bad boys.
Emily Henry (04:40):
Yeah, we did not necessarily always get the right guidance
from these movies. Unless Tom Hanks was playing the lead.
Yulin Kuang (04:48):
He was always a good guy.
Emily Henry (04:50):
Yeah, he was a good guy, but he was like,
you know, running the little indies out of business.
Speaker 6 (04:55):
Is he a bad boy? I feel like he's got
like real cinnamon role.
Emily Henry (04:59):
Yeah, a bad boy at all.
Danielle (05:02):
What's a cinnamon roll quality?
Yulin Kuang (05:03):
Oh? What a question.
Speaker 6 (05:06):
He will be a stand up guy. He's the guy
that you kind of do want to marry. He's Tom Hanks, Yeah, exactly.
His foil would be the Hugh Grant.
Danielle (05:17):
I'm sort of obsessed with you Leen's dessert analogy. So
if the cinnamon roll is the good guy, what are
we naming this curmudgeon sort of charmingly sarcastic guy.
Yulin Kuang (05:29):
Crumb cake, now.
Emily Henry (05:31):
Cake, crumb cake, Crumberley, even Cumberly is kind of splitting
the difference. Yeah, there's that little thin crystallized layer on
top and then a soft, guey center. That's probably actually
my perfect kind of like the romantic lead.
Danielle (05:44):
Okay, you guys are so fun. So I talked to
a book agent one time and she said to me
that you can't write a book unless you can't write
any other book, meaning you have to get it out
of your body and into the world. And you both
written such great love stories. What pulls you both to love?
Emily Henry (06:05):
Like?
Danielle (06:05):
What is it about these love stories that you have
to put out into the world and get out of
your bodies? Youku? Can I start with you?
Speaker 6 (06:16):
I was always drawn to romance, like that was always
my genre of choice as a reader and as a
viewer because it was also you know, movies and TV
shows and all of those things. Even when I was
watching something that wasn't very romance forward, I would find
a way to become obsessed with the romance. Like I
(06:38):
think the example would be like in the Office, I
was very obsessed with Jim and Pam. And I think
that's because in a lot of comedies, the romance is
where they kind of hide the heart and it's where
the seriousness is. And I think any good romance it
gives me this feeling of like almost like butterflies. It's
like I'm so in love with their love that I
am feeling what I would feel falling in love for
(06:59):
the first time all over again.
Yulin Kuang (07:00):
It's kind of like microdosing life.
Emily Henry (07:02):
Yeah, you know that's I feel like my answer wouldn't
be too different. I think a lot about the weird
overlap between horror romance.
Speaker 6 (07:11):
Yes, I was just thinking that, yeah, because horror gives
you the chills, right, it's you also feel it in
your body, right.
Emily Henry (07:18):
And also like it's just there's so many weird similarities too,
where it's like both are frequently used to kind of
comment on the times falling in love and being terrified
both are very human, and there's also like tons of overlap.
And I feel similarly like I was not like a
romance reader growing up, but same as you lean, I
(07:38):
would always be most interested in the romantic subplot of anything.
I loved having crushes. I think I was ultimately very
boy crazy. Loved having crushes, loved daydreaming about falling in love.
And now I think the reason I stick with it
is because I don't think that there's anything more human
(08:01):
or more powerful than love. I think love is a
really strange evolutionary habit of ours. I also think that
there's just something really magical and strange about how frequently
we as humans put other people before us, not just
in a survival means, but just on like a day
(08:23):
to day basis, like putting someone someone else's desires and
needs before our own, because we have this kind of
indescribable feeling for them that just makes us want to
like elevate them and give them everything. I don't know,
I just think it's I think it's like the most
powerful feeling and the most powerful force in the world.
Danielle (08:42):
I have a question about what you just said, Emily,
because that idea of putting somebody else's needs ahead of
our own is so human. I think it's also so female.
I know I've felt it my whole life. And I
see this sort of renaissance in the romance genre, both
in books and in film, and the types of women
(09:04):
that you guys are writing that are on screen are
very different. What do you attribute the renaissance of romance to?
Emily Henry (09:14):
So many things? First, I feel like to your point
Danielle about like it being like kind of different. I
think there is in all the romance that I'm reading
and loving, including you Leen's book, there is this female
lead who isn't just trying to put a man before
her like that's not the situation. The situation is two
(09:35):
people who are broken, who are imperfect, choosing each other
and trying really hard to give the other what they
need and give them space to be who they are.
I'm sure there have always been love stories like that,
but I think that's becoming more normalized in media hopefully.
Danielle (09:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (09:52):
The romance thread that I feel like is always present
is that feeling of is what is it going to
take to get the happily ever after? What am I
willing to sacrifice? What's the thing I'm willing to give
up to get the thing that I want? And ultimately,
in a romance, it's worth it. It's always worth it, but
it has to. I think feel like they're choosing each
(10:15):
other now rather than just like one person sacrificing all.
And I think there is a lot more of an
appetite for heroines who are a little bit prickly, a
little bit complicated, who have the whole spectrum of human
emotion and complexity to them.
Yulin Kuang (10:32):
And I don't want to put down who she has
been in the past, Like I.
Speaker 6 (10:36):
Don't think it's as simple as saying, oh God, they
were all manic pixie dream girls and they were all trash.
Yulin Kuang (10:40):
Because I don't think that's true.
Speaker 6 (10:42):
You know, I still love Summer from five Hundred Days
of Summer. I think she's still one of my favorite
characters that I've seen on screen, And so I think
what the heroine often does in these pieces is she
reflects something of who we are and who we crave
to see in the moment, and that tells us something
(11:02):
about ourselves. And so right now it seems like we're
craving women who need therapy.
Emily Henry (11:10):
And men who are willing to go yes, and men
who are willing to go and and yeah, I mean
we have a lot of conversations in this biz about like,
you know, is romance realistic? Is it aspirational? And it's
like to me, I'm like, no, it is. It is
absolutely realistic. It's just you're writing about the exception, not
the rule. Like, mostly dating is horrible, But if you're watching,
(11:33):
like your friends go through that dating experience when they
meet someone who's clearly so right for them and so
good to them and who they're so like wild about,
you're not like, oh, this is impossible. There's not just
a nice person out there that you could be with, Like,
it's not unrealistic to write two characters who are capable
of getting past these obstacles, who are willing to do
(11:55):
these hard things, willing to heal and grow. If it
means that they can be together and be the best
versions of themselves. Like, that's not it's it's only unrealistic
until it happens.
Danielle (12:06):
You know, Like, there's until it's not til it's not.
Emily Henry (12:08):
And yeah, most of the time, that's not how dating
is going to go. But when you're writing a romance novel,
you're not typically writing about like someone meeting their shitty
college boyfriend. You're writing about that person who's like worth
writing about.
Danielle (12:22):
I went on a date the other night with a
guy who used a French fry as a knife to
get salad onto his fork. Oh, and I'm like, I
don't want to read about that. I want to read
about the happily ever after.
Emily Henry (12:37):
But you know what, that's actually like a great romance novel.
Yulin Kuang (12:40):
Detail, fascinating behavior.
Emily Henry (12:42):
It only works when it's the right person. It doesn't
work when it's like and also he was wearing SpongeBob
pajama pants and crocs and like this was our first date.
You know, I mean, maybe it does, maybe it does work.
Danielle (12:58):
You both write different romance. I want to hear from
each of you what the secret sauce of your love
story is. If you can kind of take me behind
the scenes into your writing, something that maybe I wouldn't
know as a reader, even what is the secret sauce
for you?
Emily Henry (13:15):
Honestly, there's there are two components that are kind of
tied together for me. One of them is that they
do have to be flawed. I again, like, I think
there's this misconception that when people are reading romance, it
is because they're reaching for an aspirational story about two
perfect people. It's like something that would never happen. But
I really specifically feel like I write flawed female and
(13:38):
male characters, and you know, my books are pretty popular,
so clearly people like that. People want that. I think
people feel more drawn to characters when they have a
flaw that's recognizable and relatable, because it feels like someone
real that they could know. And like, I think that
we're all just craving connection. Even just you know, talking
more about what might have caused this romance renaissance, I
(14:02):
think part of it is that need for human connection
in a time where we're all so disconnected. We want
real characters. So them having a flaw that is a
central and significant part of the book, a flaw that's
something they actually do have to overcome. And work through
in order to be together, I think is something that
is always going to be what I reach for when
I'm pairing characters together. And then the second part of
(14:25):
that is, I specifically really love pairing two characters together
who have, you know, history, and flaws and issues that
kind of chafe against each other. Like I want their
specific issues to kind of exacerbate each other's, like, you know,
to trigger. I want them to trigger each other a
little bit.
Danielle (14:43):
Emily, you're a little toxic.
Emily Henry (14:44):
I love it, but no, But like the thing is,
that's like why else would they ever work through those things?
Like when you fall in love, you find out really
fast what your toxic traits are. You find out what
you're most afraid of when you're falling in love. I
love using a romance to take two characters with flaws,
put them together, have those flaws chafe against each other,
(15:07):
and then the only way those two people can be
together is if they kind of work through their own
individual issues.
Danielle (15:14):
M I love it so much. It's very real. Yeah,
that is what romance is in real life. Ewleen, what's
it for you?
Yulin Kuang (15:21):
I think a lot about the Susan Elizabeth Phillips quote.
Speaker 6 (15:23):
I think where she says something like if your hero
is a firefighter, then your heroin better be an arsenalistic Yes,
And I think that's such a great kind of distillation
of a dynamic where it's these two people they should
be something.
Yulin Kuang (15:36):
To each other.
Speaker 6 (15:37):
And what I'm most drawn to is people that like
they something's combustible there.
Yulin Kuang (15:43):
So that's kind of what I'm drawn to in a dynamic.
Speaker 6 (15:45):
And then similar to Emily's like flaw theory, I like
to look for a wound like I like to find
a character wound because I think we all kind of
you know, you go through life and things hurt you,
things bump against you, you develop some scars, and it
kind of it does become this moment of like do
you want to know how I.
Yulin Kuang (16:03):
Got these stars?
Speaker 6 (16:03):
I think when it's falling in love with somebody else
and you're finding those things.
Yulin Kuang (16:09):
So it makes sense that we're drawn to similar things.
Emily Henry (16:11):
I was thinking that just hearing you talk about it, like,
I really feel like there's just even though obviously our
writing styles are different, whatever, there is like a similar
baseline DNA there. And I think it makes sense that
our readership has such overlap too, because I think our
readers do.
Yulin Kuang (16:28):
Tend to be people who have great taste.
Emily Henry (16:30):
So great taste first of all, really pretty.
Yulin Kuang (16:32):
Not that it matters, so smart, really.
Emily Henry (16:34):
Smart, and then like just yeah, want real people who
they can see as mirrors. Like Daniel said, they can
see as a mirror and see their own stuff that
they need to like figure out, work through.
Danielle (16:48):
It's cool to hear that a lot of your readers overlap.
Is that part of the reason that you guys became collaborators, Emily,
do you remember the first time you read something of
you leans?
Emily Henry (16:59):
The first time I read something of you Leen's actually
was just a draft of The People We Meet on
Vacation script like weirdly, like so we got hooked up
before your book had published.
Speaker 6 (17:12):
So I was sent the People We Meet on Vacation
manuscript before it was published as this kind of like
a four year consideration to adapt. I knew it was
being sent to multiple people around town, and I read
it in one sitting, and I remember thinking one, yes, yes, yes,
a thousand times yes, like this has all the thousand
(17:35):
thread count pining that I need from a romance, but
also it had like a titanic number of locations. Yeah,
and go to there, yeah, and I was like, well,
I was like, this is such a fascinating kind of
Rubik's cube of adaptation. It was a really interesting puzzle
and that intrigued me rather than other things I'd been
sent before where you could kind of see it was
(17:56):
like almost like written to be adapted, and that was
compelling somehow. And so that was how Emily's writing was
first sent to me. Was I kind of describe it
as like a marriage of convenience. It was like an
arranged marriage through through like the publishing industry and Hollywood.
They were kind of like, you two seem like you
have a certain vibe maybe like.
Emily Henry (18:17):
Kind of sad girl romance, sad girl romance. Yeah, girls
making jokes.
Danielle (18:21):
In romance, hot girls.
Emily Henry (18:24):
Yeah, And so I think we were set up just
kind of on a zoom meeting. I remember you using
this phrase that I've heard you used since then about
being drawn to the blue shades in romance, and that
was really appealing to me because I knew that going
into adaptation, there was every chance in the world that
it was going to just go this route where it
(18:45):
could become really broad and just just tonally very different
from the book in a way. That I thought would
be disappointing to the readers because I think that they,
like we've already discussed, they want that depth. They want
to feel like emotionally engaged, like a deeper level. And Yeah,
it was just like, I feel like you the way
you talked about, first of all what you like in romance,
(19:08):
but also adapting, because I remember you talking about being
like such a huge reader and then being really disappointed.
Danielle (19:13):
Shady, I'm just kidding, but she was just.
Emily Henry (19:16):
Talking about being kind of like as a reader, being
disappointed with how adaptations went. And that was a huge
green flag to me because I knew that while she
has talent and vision and voice, she doesn't have ego
in the way that I think a lot of people do.
Like you're confident in your work, you know your value,
(19:36):
I think, but you don't have ego insomuch as you're like,
I'm going to make this mine and I don't care
if that makes it good or bad.
Speaker 6 (19:42):
Yeah, it's kind of a fascinating process adaptation. And I
will say we met, I want to say back in
twenty twenty one, and so it's been a four year journey.
I do think in the process of doing the work.
I would watch these other things get made, and I
would I would read the books, and then I would
watch the movies, and I would always wonder like, well, why.
Yulin Kuang (20:04):
Did they cut this, Why did they cut that? Why
didn't that? And things do change.
Speaker 6 (20:10):
And so seeing kind of people we meet on vacation
through the process, that has been very interesting and informed
more of my thoughts on adaptation now. Like, so I
was the first writer on people we meet on vacation,
I was not the last writer, but.
Emily Henry (20:26):
You were also like you were the writer multiple times.
I was the writer multiple times, press writer, second to
last writer, I think too.
Speaker 6 (20:34):
So when when there are this many writers, this is
going to get very inside baseball. But they take every
draft and they read through them all and they determine
who gets credit, who's done enough work that shows up
on the screen that they'll get credit. And so part
of that process meant that I got to read every
draft as well, and so I found that to be
very fascinating to change from my drafts to the next
(20:57):
writer's draft, to the next writer's draft to the next
writer's draft, and I could see things that I had
struggled with early on structurally that then became an issue
for somebody else later and then got removed completely by
another writer, and I was like, that's brilliant.
Yulin Kuang (21:11):
Why didn't I think to just.
Danielle (21:14):
That's interesting.
Yulin Kuang (21:15):
I came at it more as a reader.
Speaker 6 (21:17):
That was mostly my experience of watching these adaptations of
my favorite books and just being fucking disappointed because they
did not match the movie.
Yulin Kuang (21:24):
In my head.
Speaker 6 (21:25):
And I think now on this side of it, that
part of me still is very much alive and well,
but I think there is also another part of me that,
having gone through the process, I can kind of see
how we get there, Because I think in order for
a movie to stand on its own, it needs to
be a work of art that stands apart from the book.
And I truly do believe the purpose of adaptation is
(21:46):
not to provide one hundred percent faithful thing. Oh yeah,
it's to bring new readers to the source material, and
so for it to do that, it has to stand
as a work art on its own.
Danielle (21:56):
Well, there's that phrase, the book is better, And it
came from the idea that people like the adaptations didn't
live up to people's ideas of what these characters were.
That you know, when you read something, you just think
your teeth in so deeply, and you have your own imagination.
You Lean, You're now you're writing People we Meet on Vacation,
(22:16):
but you're also writing and directing bet Read. Can you
take me into the writer's room? Like Emily, I heard
you talk about how your involvement and all of these
adaptations is really different. It sounds like you're maybe is
it fair to say you're closer with Uleen than some
of the other.
Speaker 6 (22:32):
Yeah, well yeah, I mean you Lean rank us, Yeah, yeah,
so your favorite screenwriter, yeah.
Emily Henry (22:38):
You Leen and Brett Haley, our director from People we
Meet on Vacation. Both of them we have now I've
been friends with them now for years because of this process,
and we've had a lot of back and forth. But
you Leen, it's nice because we've been through this already
once before, and I really trust her and I have
read a lot of her work at this point because
I've read her novel, I've read multiple drafts of her
(23:00):
People Meet on Vacation script. I read other writers scripts
in between those, which was really, like you said, it
was really illuminating, and I think while there were things
from all of them that I appreciate, like it also
deepened my appreciation for your work, because I think what
you do is really special. So I don't. Yeah, it's
like you lean she basically, it's just like when there's
a new draft, she sends it to me. If she
(23:21):
has a question, she'll send it to me. Like there
was a point where she was like, does Poppy have
a middle name? And I was like, oh, no, does
she I don't remember? And I was like, well, I
do think it would be this, So I like gave
Poppy a middle.
Speaker 6 (23:34):
Name, and it made it into a draft that I remember,
and it turned it into a joke, and then that
joke got rewritten and it's no longer.
Emily Henry (23:41):
But I know Poppy, yeah exactly, and like we're the
only two people in the world possibly who know it.
Danielle (23:48):
Well now you just shared it with us, thank you,
not the actual Yeah.
Emily Henry (23:52):
Do you want to care? Can we tell them?
Speaker 2 (23:53):
Sure?
Danielle (23:53):
Can you tell us sure?
Yulin Kuang (23:55):
Do you remember on three one two three?
Emily Henry (23:59):
Diana? I feel like you waited and we did. We
decide that it was after Princess die. I feel yeah,
her mom totally named her Poppy Diana. Yeah.
Danielle (24:09):
Okay, So you guys both talked about adaptations gone wrong.
Is there any adaptation in your mind? That has gone right,
Like when you think, what's like the North Star for
each of you for an adaptation.
Emily Henry (24:21):
Oh my gosh, okay, these are so different, but the
Hunger Games adaptations are phenomenal.
Danielle (24:26):
Ooh, that's a great are great?
Speaker 6 (24:28):
Oh man, this is such a hard question. Two thousand
and five North and South miniseries on the BBC. It's
probably one of my favorite at the two thousand starres.
Richard Armitage. It's based and Daniella Denby ash I believe,
and it is an adaptation of Elizabeth Gaskell's like eighteen
(24:50):
hundred's novel on the Industrial Revolution.
Emily Henry (24:54):
That also reminds me of another phenomenal adaptation, Gone Girl.
Speaker 6 (24:57):
Oh yeah, we talked about Gone Girl in our initial meetings.
Danielle (25:00):
I remember, right.
Emily Henry (25:01):
It's so good. It's really faithful. It's like, I think,
what we should call it is faithful. Plus, it's like
faithful in that the heart of the story is the same,
the heart of the characters is the same. You understand
that it's the same story. But plus is that they
took the fact that they have living, breathing actors and
are performing this and they use that to make it
(25:23):
feel in some ways bigger like and I think people
does that really well? But gone, girl, like the whole
thing with ben Affleck having the butt chin, and she's like,
I just you just like don't look trustworthy because of
your like butt the little like crease into your chin.
And so whenever he's like saying I'm telling the truth,
like he covers his chin with his thumb and he's like,
I'm not lying whatever, that little detail is not in
(25:43):
the book. That little detail was written because ben Affleck
was cast.
Danielle (25:48):
Okay, so this is actually my next question because Emily,
I can imagine when you're writing this character is fully
baked out and then you lean when you're writing the adaptation,
do you have a cast in mind? Like, do you
have an actor in mind for People?
Yulin Kuang (26:02):
I did?
Speaker 5 (26:03):
Not?
Yulin Kuang (26:03):
For beatreate I did?
Danielle (26:06):
Are you able to share who for bea tread?
Speaker 6 (26:09):
No?
Speaker 2 (26:10):
Do I know?
Emily Henry (26:11):
Text me later?
Danielle (26:13):
Yeah, okay, you're gonna have to come back on.
Yulin Kuang (26:15):
Yeah.
Danielle (26:17):
Well, here's the thing. Emily is known for her easter eggs.
Are there any that you can drop with us about
the adaptation?
Speaker 6 (26:26):
Oh, egal eyed viewers may already know. So I am
going to share maybe one easter egg, which is that
in the very first draft of People we meet on vacation.
I knew what I would want as a reader was
a recreation of the cover, and so I wrote something
that was like a recreation of the cover that I
(26:49):
think book lovers will identify. I think I even wrote
into the text it was like book lovers will recognize them.
That was like a nod also to book Lovers, which
was out at the time. But I was like, this
is a cover recreation, and that is one thing that
you know as much as things change from the first
draft to the last and what actually gets produced. I
am so proud to know that that book cover recreation
(27:13):
did make it into the final And this is.
Emily Henry (27:16):
Something that's okay to share because you literally will not
be able to tell. I don't think in this but
in that scene, we do have a little easter egg,
which is that Alex is reading an Augustus Everett book
in that scene, a book that does not exist. Funnily enough,
I mean none of them exists, but it doesn't exist
in print. Like I have not named this novel in
(27:36):
an existing book. Because Hollywood is weird, and because there
are different studios making the Beach Read movie than the
people we meet on vacation movie I could use the
Augustus Everett name because he gets name checked in people
we meet on vacation. This is so probably boring to
other people. I think this is fascinating. And so we
weren't allowed to use any of the book titles that
(27:57):
are included in Beach Read, so we had to come
up with a new book. So I came up with
a new book title, and I got to choose from
like a couple of different covers. And Alex is reading
this book, which you will not be able to see whatsoever,
I don't think, but in the cover recreation, so that's
an easter egg on an easter egg, a hat on
a hat.
Speaker 6 (28:16):
Okay, so for me to know as the director of
the next film, Like, where does that fit into Gus's bibliography?
Yulin Kuang (28:22):
I feel like this is some.
Emily Henry (28:23):
Later But did you know that there is another unnamed
happy place?
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Yes?
Speaker 6 (28:28):
Yes, Okay, good Emily, I am an Emily Henry scholar.
Speaker 5 (28:32):
Okay, oh my god, you mentioned book lovers.
Danielle (28:43):
I'm wondering how much influence book talk and fans actually
have over both your book, Emily, all of your writing,
and then you lean on the adaptation, like do you
try to put fans' wishes in there.
Yulin Kuang (28:59):
I can tell you, I can.
Emily Henry (29:01):
See the diplomacy wheels turning in your head.
Danielle (29:04):
Like give me a percentage if you can't answer.
Speaker 6 (29:06):
So I'll tell you this last summer, I had a
wonderful summer intern and I was like trawl the depths
of book Talk, book Twitter, all of the places that
I cannot look and just kind of come back to
me with like a PowerPoint of what these people want.
I had my list, and then I also had my
(29:27):
intern create this other list for me as well, and
there was some overlap which was fun to see, but
it was just a little piece I wanted to add
to my research process just to kind of honor my
former fangirl self.
Emily Henry (29:41):
Yeah, I mean, and I remember the very first conversation
that I had with Brett about people was him saying,
can you make me a list of the things that
the readers will riot if they don't make it into
the final cut. And so I did that. But I
will say for books, I'm not I'm not doing that
because I feel like for books, my attitude is like
(30:02):
everything we write will hopefully be someone's favorite book. But
for the adaptations, because there is already this readership to
like honor like. I was very grateful that I knew
you would be factoring that in on some level.
Speaker 6 (30:14):
Yeah, I remember in our very first meeting, I did
ask you if you could only save one scene from
this book, what scene would it be?
Yulin Kuang (30:21):
I do remember? Do you want me to think?
Emily Henry (30:22):
Tell me, because I have no memory.
Yulin Kuang (30:24):
It's the condom scene.
Emily Henry (30:26):
Oh you know what didn't make it?
Yulin Kuang (30:28):
Clearly?
Emily Henry (30:28):
Did it obviously? Would make it obviously? No? Oh wait, no, no, no,
you're right, you're right. Oh I thought you were talking
about Oh my god, I thought you were talking about
a different condom scene. There are two. There are two
different condom scenes in that book. One is funny and
one is sweet.
Danielle (30:44):
And also, you lean you love a sex scene. Yeah,
I've gotten to interview you before.
Yulin Kuang (30:48):
You love a sex scene?
Emily Henry (30:49):
Well, this condom scene is a comedic. Comedic, the sexy
condom scene did not make it in.
Danielle (30:54):
Sadly, do you guys feel like book talk has changed
romance because I remember growing up I would read my
favorite books. I didn't even think about what the author
looked like, and now not at all, like there are
I mean, you both are famous authors. People know what
you look like. They care, they're they're following you on
TikTok and Instagram. It's really changed. Do you think BookTalk
(31:17):
has changed romance as a genre.
Emily Henry (31:20):
Yeah, I think it's.
Yulin Kuang (31:21):
Certainly left like a mark on it.
Speaker 6 (31:23):
From what I've studied of book talk, A lot of
it also comes from kind of fandom, and specifically this
fan fiction archive archive of our own. I think the
distillation of tropes that we know and love in fan
fiction was not actually as prevalent in romance before a
(31:43):
certain point in time, Like they weren't as codified as
like there's only one bed once. That language of fandom
infiltrated romance like BookTalk, which I think makes so much
sense because fandom people are extremely online people. Extremely online
people are more likely to make content on BookTalk, and
then they're more likely to talk about it, and why
not use this vocabulary that we are all already kind
(32:05):
of conversant in to describe it. But then I think
that's when publishing starts to see it as a marketing tool. Yeah,
and then they're like, it becomes this shorthand for us all.
And so I do feel like I've seen the fanficification
a little bit of romance.
Yulin Kuang (32:21):
Would you say we completely.
Emily Henry (32:22):
I agree, And that's not like just a good or
bad thing. I think it's a kind of a neutral thing.
But I will say tropes literally only matter if you
care about the characters, like it really only matters if
I get to see how these two very specific characters
operate in this situation and what happens when they are
in this situation.
Danielle (32:42):
Yeah, okay, Well, speaking of book talk, we have a
fan question for you. Hi.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
My name is Michel from Texas. I love how you
described Little Crescent Island in Great, big, beautiful Life, So
I want to ask Emily if you could live in
any place you've written about, where would it be and why?
Emily Henry (33:00):
Oh my gosh, I want to live in all of them.
I feel like i'm torn Wayneing Bay, Michigan fictional place
northern Michigan from Funny Story, but in the winter, I
would like to live in Palm Springs, where Alex and
Poppy go. I would take either of us happily.
Speaker 5 (33:21):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
My name is Nna. I live in New York and
I'm huge fans of both of you. I'd love to know,
as writers, how do you come up with those swoony
moments that make readers like me go wild For example,
you lean, I still think about that scene and how
to end a love story where he writes on her thigh,
and then I'd love to know how do you work
on translating those moments to the screen and showing the
(33:42):
chemistry between the two romantic leads Oh.
Yulin Kuang (33:46):
So good moment.
Speaker 6 (33:47):
As I was writing it, I was just like watching
the movie in my mind, and I was like, what
do I want to happen next? And I was like, well,
that would be compelling, And so I think that was
what happened there, and I think I'm always chasing that feeling,
and so when it comes to translating that to the screen,
I think it's it's kind of different if I'm directing
(34:08):
versus when I'm writing. When I'm writing, I'm creating a
blueprint that's for production. And so I knew that I
really wanted Emily's books are sexy. I wanted it to
be a sexy movie, and I didn't want that to
get lost somewhere along the game of telephone that is production.
And so I remember writing into the script for one
of the sex scenes, it was, this is a sex
(34:28):
scene that makes you wish you were having sex right now,
and that line. That line made it into the final.
Emily Henry (34:37):
Such a good line.
Danielle (34:39):
It's a great one, Emily. I heard you say, I'm
saying yes to things for my future self. I'm wondering
for each of you, what is something that you are
terrified of saying yes too, but you're going to do anyway?
Oh gosh, you're doing it for future? Yeah, Emily, can
I start with you? No?
Speaker 2 (34:59):
You lean?
Emily Henry (34:59):
Do you already have an answer that can buy me time?
Speaker 2 (35:02):
Sure?
Speaker 6 (35:03):
Yeah, right now? I would say. It's dance class. So
I figure skate and I was talking to my coach
about how do I get more graceful, and she said,
we'll take a dance class. And she's been saying this
for the last seven years that I've been skating, and
finally I decided, Okay, I'll take a dance class. I
think right now for future me. That's the thing is
I'm committing to doing I'm committing to the suck a
(35:24):
little bit, yeah, in the hopes that it will get better.
Yulin Kuang (35:27):
And it has gotten better.
Speaker 6 (35:28):
Actually, when I look at the videos, I'm like, oh wow,
there's like a marked difference, but it's it's hard.
Emily Henry (35:34):
Yeah. I love that answer, and like something I respect
and admire about you so much, Euleen, is that you,
I feel like, consistently push yourself to try new things,
like as we get older, especially when we find something
that we're good at, it's really really really hard and
scary to try something new, and I hate being bad
(35:55):
at things. And so I guess my answer if I'm
just going to piggyback off of yours, which I am,
is I have been playing tennis and the same thing,
I am so on athletic, and I don't know, like,
I think that is kind of a huge deal for me,
as like a perfectionist, to be like, yeah, I'm bad
at this thing and I keep doing it like I
(36:17):
can't ever be I'm not going to be a professional
tennis player.
Yulin Kuang (36:20):
You're never going to make your money doing.
Emily Henry (36:22):
Yes, I will never. No one wants to pay to see.
Speaker 5 (36:25):
That, but you'll eventually be good totally.
Danielle (36:31):
Okay, I'm giving you guys internet class. Oh those were
great answer, Thank you, great, great answers. Okay, we're coming
up on the end of our conversation, which means it's
time for speed read. Here's how it works. We put
sixty seconds on the clock and we're going to see
just how many rapid fire questions. I should say rapid
fire literary questions that you can get through. We're going
(36:54):
to go popcorn style, so you Lean, you'll get a question,
and then Emily you get a question after you Ready,
Let's do it. You're lacked in Okay, three?
Yulin Kuang (37:03):
Two?
Speaker 2 (37:04):
One?
Danielle (37:05):
Okay. One literary trope you would ban forever, Emily.
Yulin Kuang (37:09):
Billionaire, romance, secret pregnancy.
Emily Henry (37:13):
Oh.
Danielle (37:14):
One that you'll defend with your life.
Yulin Kuang (37:17):
Ooh, Friends to Lovers, Forced Proximity.
Speaker 6 (37:22):
Yes.
Danielle (37:23):
Favorite book to recommend to people.
Emily Henry (37:26):
Anything by Varry McFarlane or Kennedy Ryan.
Yulin Kuang (37:30):
Luck of the Draw by Kate Claiborne writing it down?
Danielle (37:33):
What book do you wish you could read again for
the first time?
Emily Henry (37:37):
Gone Girl?
Speaker 6 (37:39):
Probably Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Honestly, you know,
like take it back.
Yulin Kuang (37:44):
I just watched a Yeah, man, I just watched a
movie recently.
Danielle (37:48):
If you could live vicariously through one fictional character, who
would that be?
Emily Henry (37:52):
This is so messed up, but I want to say
Amy from.
Yulin Kuang (37:55):
Gone Okay, Yuleen, how about you Elouise at the Plaza?
Speaker 6 (38:00):
I just want to be rich with a drunk nanny
and a plug a turtle.
Danielle (38:06):
You have ten minutes in a bookstore. Which area are
you going to? First?
Yulin Kuang (38:10):
Romance?
Emily Henry (38:12):
It says on the day romance or sci fi? Weirdly?
Danielle (38:15):
Oh really? Yeah, Emily, that was a left turn, I know. Okay,
what's your red flag reading happened?
Emily Henry (38:23):
Oh this is a new one. People are skimming books.
Some people only read the dialogue.
Yulin Kuang (38:28):
People who leave restar Goodreads reviews give it a one
or a five.
Danielle (38:32):
Commit Yes, okay, a book that's shaped the way you
see the world.
Emily Henry (38:37):
I'm going to say the Giver, but mostly because it
taught me about like what writing could do.
Yulin Kuang (38:44):
I think it's Sanford Meisner's book on acting.
Danielle (38:47):
Do you ever read the last page first?
Yulin Kuang (38:50):
I used to, really, but not anymore.
Speaker 6 (38:53):
No.
Yulin Kuang (38:53):
I did it consistently through high school and then I stopped.
Emily Henry (38:56):
Danielle, do you do that?
Danielle (38:58):
No?
Speaker 2 (38:58):
Never?
Emily Henry (38:59):
Never?
Danielle (39:03):
Okay. My last question to you both is what have
you bookmarked this week? It doesn't have to be about reading.
It could be anything that you've you know, like kind
of like saved on your Instagram or anything.
Emily Henry (39:17):
I know, I'm going to buy screenshots because it's like
I do that thing of screen chatting an article I
want to read later.
Yulin Kuang (39:23):
Yeah, I feel like mine is going to be like
embarrassing because even.
Emily Henry (39:27):
Better, you Lean, I just screenshotted to Google and read
this later from BBC Science Focus magazine. Scientists say are
chances of finding alien life just skyrocketed. I don't know
why because I haven't googled it yet.
Danielle (39:40):
Very sci fi. This makes sense now, Okay, you Leen.
Speaker 6 (39:44):
So the last thing I saved was a New York
Times article dancing to the beating Heart of the New
York Public Library. The mission behind the Monica, Bill Barnes
and Company is to bring dance where it doesn't belong.
And it's an experiential art company that it does dance
in places where dance doesn't belong. And I was like, oh,
how interesting. Clearly dance is on my mind.
Emily Henry (40:03):
So yeah, and you know what, dance belongs everywhere. First
of all, that's true. Oh, I do have another one.
I don't know anything about where this is going. So
the Dad O'Brien posted a thing about I think I
knew podcast she has maybe called Murder on the Toepath. Okay,
so that's something I wanted to look into.
Speaker 6 (40:23):
Can I tell you My second thing I've bookmarked is
how to rewax your barber jacket, which is a YouTube
video on YouTube and I need to rewax my jacket
and I watch it. It's the most sexual thing I've
seen me. Yeah, it's this very handsome man and he
like and just like works it into.
Emily Henry (40:43):
The jacket book mark that you're like, I'm coming back
to this and we're gonna circle back.
Danielle (40:47):
This has gotten so weird. Thank you so much.
Emily Henry (40:49):
The perfect way to end any podcast.
Danielle (40:51):
Absolute perfect. No, Emily, you lean. It's so fun to
listen to you because you're so descriptive even in your speech.
Like I I if I had to like close my
eyes and I hadn't read any of your books, I
would know both of you were writers. So thank you
so much for taking the time. This was so fun.
Emily Henry (41:10):
Thank you so much. This was a joy.
Yulin Kuang (41:13):
This was great.
Danielle (41:17):
And that's a wrap for our very first episode of
Bookmarked by Reese's book Club. We are so excited you
tuned in. Thank you, and a huge shout out to
Emily and Yuline for setting the stage. This is just
the beginning and if you want a little bit more
from us, come hang with us on socials. We're at
Reese's book Club on Instagram serving up books Vibes and
(41:38):
Behind the Scenes Magic and I'm at Danielle Robe, Roba Y,
come say hi and df me and if you want
to go nineties on us, call us. Okay, our phone
line is open, so call now at one five zero
one two nine one three three seven nine. That's one
five oh one two nine one three seven nine. Share
(42:02):
your literary hot takes, book recommendations, questions about the monthly pick,
or let us know what you think about the episode
you just heard. And who knows, you might just hear
yourself in our next episode, so don't be shy, give
us a ring, and of course, make sure to follow
Bookmarked by Reese's book Club on the iHeartRadio app, Apple
Podcast or wherever you get your shows until then VI
(42:26):
in the next chapter. Bookmarked is a production of Hello,
Sunshine and iHeart Podcast. It's executive produced by Reese Witherspoon
and Me Danielle Robe. Production is by Acast Creative Studios.
Our producers are Matty Foley, Aliah Yates, Britney Martinez and
Darby Masters. Our production assistant is Avery Loftus. Jenny Kaplan
(42:49):
and Emily Rudder are the executive producers for a Cast
Creative Studios. Maureene Polo and Reese Witherspoon are the executive
producers for Hello, Sunshine, Oga, Caminwa. Chris Ston, Perla, Kelly Turner,
and Ashley Rappaport are associate producers for Reese's book Club.
Ali Perry and Christina Everett are the executive producers for
iHeart Podcasts, and Tim Palazola is our showrunner
Bookmarked by Reese's book Club is presented by Apple Books. Hey, Hey,
I'm Danielle Robe. Welcome to the very first episode of
Bookmarked by Reese's book Club. We're going to get to
know each other well, but I want you to know
a little bit about me. I'm a shoe girl, and
(00:20):
I know it may seem odd to open a book
club podcast talking about shoes, but I have a point.
I promise great books and great shoes they both take
you places, sometimes across continents, sometimes into steamy love stories.
I've been in a few of those, sometimes into a
full blown identity crisis. I've also been in a few
(00:41):
of those, and sometimes straight into conversations that stick with
you forever. We're definitely getting into those. So if you're
already a part of Reese's book Club, then you know
it's not just a reading list. It's a lifestyle and
a movement. It's a place where brilliant women and brilliant
books get the attention they really deserve. And if you're
(01:03):
new here, welcome. You have found your people on behalf
of the Reese's book Club team. We are so happy
you're here. We accept you, we embrace you, and we'll
probably recommend fourteen books to you by the end of
this episode. So here's how it's going to work. Every Tuesday,
We're diving into the stories behind the stories. We're talking
(01:25):
to authors, actors, musicians, comedians, directors, anyone who's ever made
us feel something with their words. You know what I'm
talking about. Page to screen journeys, book talk of sessions,
plot twists not just on the page, but also in life.
Bookmarked is our once a week hangout, our meeting place.
(01:47):
So whether you're out on a walk, driving your work,
or hiding from your inbox, or just pretending to clean
while you're actually laying on the floor staring at the
ceiling like I usually do, I am so glad you're here.
This space is for you. Welcome to the club. Let's
go somewhere together. Today's guests are two of the biggest
(02:09):
names in the world of romance, Emily Henry and Yuleene Kwang.
Both of them hold so much weight separately, but they
are doing an interview for the first time together. That's
what's so fun about this. They're friends and creative collaborators,
and they're both Riese's Book Club alums. Emily Henry is
one of the most prolific romance novelists in the game.
(02:31):
She published six incredible books in five years. I don't
even know how that's possible. Her most recent book was Great, Big,
Beautiful Life, and it was the Reese's Book Club pick
in May. Now Yulin Kwang is a screenwriter, director, and
author whose novel How to End a Love Story was
last May's Reese's book Club pick. They're May's Sisters Now.
(02:51):
You've also seen her work on screen, including on Hulu's
Doll Face and now Elena's At the Helm of two
movie adaptations based on Emily's book The People We Meet
on Vacation and Betreat Emily.
Speaker 2 (03:07):
Leen.
Danielle (03:07):
Welcome to the first episode of Bookmarked. We're so excited
to have you here, Emily. All of your fans call
you m Hen, which is such a fun nickname. So
you Leen, I was thinking maybe we could give you
a moniker today. Are you cool with that?
Yulin Kuang (03:20):
Oh? Ooh, okay, you'll be the first tell me.
Danielle (03:23):
I'm thinking Youku.
Emily Henry (03:25):
I think it's cool.
Speaker 5 (03:27):
Youku.
Speaker 6 (03:27):
Oh God, I think it's very close to Yoko. I'm
a big fan of Yoko. Oh No, I'm like her
her artwork, and you know what you know. Yeah, sure,
let's lean in.
Danielle (03:37):
Okay, thank you. I'd love to give you guys a
chance to introduce yourselves to the book Club. And I
felt like, what better way than to share all of
our favorite nineties rom coms. We're all love story girlies.
I'll go first, just to set the stage. I'm pretty
woman anything Julia Roberts.
Yulin Kuang (03:56):
I think it would have.
Speaker 6 (03:57):
To be Nodding Hill. You know, I'm just a girl.
We're all standing in front of a boy asking him
to love her. That's it doesn't get better than that.
Plus there's that sequence where he walks through. I think
it's notting Hill and the Seasons change a cinema.
Emily Henry (04:12):
I agree, love that, I will say surprising, probably no
one You've got mail anything all that, I agree like
any of the Julia Roberts, any of the Meg Ryan
Sandra Bullock had some really good ones, truly.
Danielle (04:27):
A golden era. I also I'm split on the Jennifer
Aniston one. Some of them totally plagued my dating life
later on, Like Picture Perfect was such a great movie.
And also I'm like, I think that's why I went
for all the bad boys.
Emily Henry (04:40):
Yeah, we did not necessarily always get the right guidance
from these movies. Unless Tom Hanks was playing the lead.
Yulin Kuang (04:48):
He was always a good guy.
Emily Henry (04:50):
Yeah, he was a good guy, but he was like,
you know, running the little indies out of business.
Speaker 6 (04:55):
Is he a bad boy? I feel like he's got
like real cinnamon role.
Emily Henry (04:59):
Yeah, a bad boy at all.
Danielle (05:02):
What's a cinnamon roll quality?
Yulin Kuang (05:03):
Oh? What a question.
Speaker 6 (05:06):
He will be a stand up guy. He's the guy
that you kind of do want to marry. He's Tom Hanks, Yeah, exactly.
His foil would be the Hugh Grant.
Danielle (05:17):
I'm sort of obsessed with you Leen's dessert analogy. So
if the cinnamon roll is the good guy, what are
we naming this curmudgeon sort of charmingly sarcastic guy.
Yulin Kuang (05:29):
Crumb cake, now.
Emily Henry (05:31):
Cake, crumb cake, Crumberley, even Cumberly is kind of splitting
the difference. Yeah, there's that little thin crystallized layer on
top and then a soft, guey center. That's probably actually
my perfect kind of like the romantic lead.
Danielle (05:44):
Okay, you guys are so fun. So I talked to
a book agent one time and she said to me
that you can't write a book unless you can't write
any other book, meaning you have to get it out
of your body and into the world. And you both
written such great love stories. What pulls you both to love?
Emily Henry (06:05):
Like?
Danielle (06:05):
What is it about these love stories that you have
to put out into the world and get out of
your bodies? Youku? Can I start with you?
Speaker 6 (06:16):
I was always drawn to romance, like that was always
my genre of choice as a reader and as a
viewer because it was also you know, movies and TV
shows and all of those things. Even when I was
watching something that wasn't very romance forward, I would find
a way to become obsessed with the romance. Like I
(06:38):
think the example would be like in the Office, I
was very obsessed with Jim and Pam. And I think
that's because in a lot of comedies, the romance is
where they kind of hide the heart and it's where
the seriousness is. And I think any good romance it
gives me this feeling of like almost like butterflies. It's
like I'm so in love with their love that I
am feeling what I would feel falling in love for
(06:59):
the first time all over again.
Yulin Kuang (07:00):
It's kind of like microdosing life.
Emily Henry (07:02):
Yeah, you know that's I feel like my answer wouldn't
be too different. I think a lot about the weird
overlap between horror romance.
Speaker 6 (07:11):
Yes, I was just thinking that, yeah, because horror gives
you the chills, right, it's you also feel it in
your body, right.
Emily Henry (07:18):
And also like it's just there's so many weird similarities too,
where it's like both are frequently used to kind of
comment on the times falling in love and being terrified
both are very human, and there's also like tons of overlap.
And I feel similarly like I was not like a
romance reader growing up, but same as you lean, I
(07:38):
would always be most interested in the romantic subplot of anything.
I loved having crushes. I think I was ultimately very
boy crazy. Loved having crushes, loved daydreaming about falling in love.
And now I think the reason I stick with it
is because I don't think that there's anything more human
(08:01):
or more powerful than love. I think love is a
really strange evolutionary habit of ours. I also think that
there's just something really magical and strange about how frequently
we as humans put other people before us, not just
in a survival means, but just on like a day
(08:23):
to day basis, like putting someone someone else's desires and
needs before our own, because we have this kind of
indescribable feeling for them that just makes us want to
like elevate them and give them everything. I don't know,
I just think it's I think it's like the most
powerful feeling and the most powerful force in the world.
Danielle (08:42):
I have a question about what you just said, Emily,
because that idea of putting somebody else's needs ahead of
our own is so human. I think it's also so female.
I know I've felt it my whole life. And I
see this sort of renaissance in the romance genre, both
in books and in film, and the types of women
(09:04):
that you guys are writing that are on screen are
very different. What do you attribute the renaissance of romance to?
Emily Henry (09:14):
So many things? First, I feel like to your point
Danielle about like it being like kind of different. I
think there is in all the romance that I'm reading
and loving, including you Leen's book, there is this female
lead who isn't just trying to put a man before
her like that's not the situation. The situation is two
(09:35):
people who are broken, who are imperfect, choosing each other
and trying really hard to give the other what they
need and give them space to be who they are.
I'm sure there have always been love stories like that,
but I think that's becoming more normalized in media hopefully.
Danielle (09:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 6 (09:52):
The romance thread that I feel like is always present
is that feeling of is what is it going to
take to get the happily ever after? What am I
willing to sacrifice? What's the thing I'm willing to give
up to get the thing that I want? And ultimately,
in a romance, it's worth it. It's always worth it, but
it has to. I think feel like they're choosing each
(10:15):
other now rather than just like one person sacrificing all.
And I think there is a lot more of an
appetite for heroines who are a little bit prickly, a
little bit complicated, who have the whole spectrum of human
emotion and complexity to them.
Yulin Kuang (10:32):
And I don't want to put down who she has
been in the past, Like I.
Speaker 6 (10:36):
Don't think it's as simple as saying, oh God, they
were all manic pixie dream girls and they were all trash.
Yulin Kuang (10:40):
Because I don't think that's true.
Speaker 6 (10:42):
You know, I still love Summer from five Hundred Days
of Summer. I think she's still one of my favorite
characters that I've seen on screen, And so I think
what the heroine often does in these pieces is she
reflects something of who we are and who we crave
to see in the moment, and that tells us something
(11:02):
about ourselves. And so right now it seems like we're
craving women who need therapy.
Emily Henry (11:10):
And men who are willing to go yes, and men
who are willing to go and and yeah, I mean
we have a lot of conversations in this biz about like,
you know, is romance realistic? Is it aspirational? And it's
like to me, I'm like, no, it is. It is
absolutely realistic. It's just you're writing about the exception, not
the rule. Like, mostly dating is horrible, But if you're watching,
(11:33):
like your friends go through that dating experience when they
meet someone who's clearly so right for them and so
good to them and who they're so like wild about,
you're not like, oh, this is impossible. There's not just
a nice person out there that you could be with, Like,
it's not unrealistic to write two characters who are capable
of getting past these obstacles, who are willing to do
(11:55):
these hard things, willing to heal and grow. If it
means that they can be together and be the best
versions of themselves. Like, that's not it's it's only unrealistic
until it happens.
Danielle (12:06):
You know, Like, there's until it's not til it's not.
Emily Henry (12:08):
And yeah, most of the time, that's not how dating
is going to go. But when you're writing a romance novel,
you're not typically writing about like someone meeting their shitty
college boyfriend. You're writing about that person who's like worth
writing about.
Danielle (12:22):
I went on a date the other night with a
guy who used a French fry as a knife to
get salad onto his fork. Oh, and I'm like, I
don't want to read about that. I want to read
about the happily ever after.
Emily Henry (12:37):
But you know what, that's actually like a great romance novel.
Yulin Kuang (12:40):
Detail, fascinating behavior.
Emily Henry (12:42):
It only works when it's the right person. It doesn't
work when it's like and also he was wearing SpongeBob
pajama pants and crocs and like this was our first date.
You know, I mean, maybe it does, maybe it does work.
Danielle (12:58):
You both write different romance. I want to hear from
each of you what the secret sauce of your love
story is. If you can kind of take me behind
the scenes into your writing, something that maybe I wouldn't
know as a reader, even what is the secret sauce
for you?
Emily Henry (13:15):
Honestly, there's there are two components that are kind of
tied together for me. One of them is that they
do have to be flawed. I again, like, I think
there's this misconception that when people are reading romance, it
is because they're reaching for an aspirational story about two
perfect people. It's like something that would never happen. But
I really specifically feel like I write flawed female and
(13:38):
male characters, and you know, my books are pretty popular,
so clearly people like that. People want that. I think
people feel more drawn to characters when they have a
flaw that's recognizable and relatable, because it feels like someone
real that they could know. And like, I think that
we're all just craving connection. Even just you know, talking
more about what might have caused this romance renaissance, I
(14:02):
think part of it is that need for human connection
in a time where we're all so disconnected. We want
real characters. So them having a flaw that is a
central and significant part of the book, a flaw that's
something they actually do have to overcome. And work through
in order to be together, I think is something that
is always going to be what I reach for when
I'm pairing characters together. And then the second part of
(14:25):
that is, I specifically really love pairing two characters together
who have, you know, history, and flaws and issues that
kind of chafe against each other. Like I want their
specific issues to kind of exacerbate each other's, like, you know,
to trigger. I want them to trigger each other a
little bit.
Danielle (14:43):
Emily, you're a little toxic.
Emily Henry (14:44):
I love it, but no, But like the thing is,
that's like why else would they ever work through those things?
Like when you fall in love, you find out really
fast what your toxic traits are. You find out what
you're most afraid of when you're falling in love. I
love using a romance to take two characters with flaws,
put them together, have those flaws chafe against each other,
(15:07):
and then the only way those two people can be
together is if they kind of work through their own
individual issues.
Danielle (15:14):
M I love it so much. It's very real. Yeah,
that is what romance is in real life. Ewleen, what's
it for you?
Yulin Kuang (15:21):
I think a lot about the Susan Elizabeth Phillips quote.
Speaker 6 (15:23):
I think where she says something like if your hero
is a firefighter, then your heroin better be an arsenalistic Yes,
And I think that's such a great kind of distillation
of a dynamic where it's these two people they should
be something.
Yulin Kuang (15:36):
To each other.
Speaker 6 (15:37):
And what I'm most drawn to is people that like
they something's combustible there.
Yulin Kuang (15:43):
So that's kind of what I'm drawn to in a dynamic.
Speaker 6 (15:45):
And then similar to Emily's like flaw theory, I like
to look for a wound like I like to find
a character wound because I think we all kind of
you know, you go through life and things hurt you,
things bump against you, you develop some scars, and it
kind of it does become this moment of like do
you want to know how I.
Yulin Kuang (16:03):
Got these stars?
Speaker 6 (16:03):
I think when it's falling in love with somebody else
and you're finding those things.
Yulin Kuang (16:09):
So it makes sense that we're drawn to similar things.
Emily Henry (16:11):
I was thinking that just hearing you talk about it, like,
I really feel like there's just even though obviously our
writing styles are different, whatever, there is like a similar
baseline DNA there. And I think it makes sense that
our readership has such overlap too, because I think our
readers do.
Yulin Kuang (16:28):
Tend to be people who have great taste.
Emily Henry (16:30):
So great taste first of all, really pretty.
Yulin Kuang (16:32):
Not that it matters, so smart, really.
Emily Henry (16:34):
Smart, and then like just yeah, want real people who
they can see as mirrors. Like Daniel said, they can
see as a mirror and see their own stuff that
they need to like figure out, work through.
Danielle (16:48):
It's cool to hear that a lot of your readers overlap.
Is that part of the reason that you guys became collaborators, Emily,
do you remember the first time you read something of
you leans?
Emily Henry (16:59):
The first time I read something of you Leen's actually
was just a draft of The People We Meet on
Vacation script like weirdly, like so we got hooked up
before your book had published.
Speaker 6 (17:12):
So I was sent the People We Meet on Vacation
manuscript before it was published as this kind of like
a four year consideration to adapt. I knew it was
being sent to multiple people around town, and I read
it in one sitting, and I remember thinking one, yes, yes, yes,
a thousand times yes, like this has all the thousand
(17:35):
thread count pining that I need from a romance, but
also it had like a titanic number of locations. Yeah,
and go to there, yeah, and I was like, well,
I was like, this is such a fascinating kind of
Rubik's cube of adaptation. It was a really interesting puzzle
and that intrigued me rather than other things I'd been
sent before where you could kind of see it was
(17:56):
like almost like written to be adapted, and that was
compelling somehow. And so that was how Emily's writing was
first sent to me. Was I kind of describe it
as like a marriage of convenience. It was like an
arranged marriage through through like the publishing industry and Hollywood.
They were kind of like, you two seem like you
have a certain vibe maybe like.
Emily Henry (18:17):
Kind of sad girl romance, sad girl romance. Yeah, girls
making jokes.
Danielle (18:21):
In romance, hot girls.
Emily Henry (18:24):
Yeah, And so I think we were set up just
kind of on a zoom meeting. I remember you using
this phrase that I've heard you used since then about
being drawn to the blue shades in romance, and that
was really appealing to me because I knew that going
into adaptation, there was every chance in the world that
it was going to just go this route where it
(18:45):
could become really broad and just just tonally very different
from the book in a way. That I thought would
be disappointing to the readers because I think that they,
like we've already discussed, they want that depth. They want
to feel like emotionally engaged, like a deeper level. And Yeah,
it was just like, I feel like you the way
you talked about, first of all what you like in romance,
(19:08):
but also adapting, because I remember you talking about being
like such a huge reader and then being really disappointed.
Danielle (19:13):
Shady, I'm just kidding, but she was just.
Emily Henry (19:16):
Talking about being kind of like as a reader, being
disappointed with how adaptations went. And that was a huge
green flag to me because I knew that while she
has talent and vision and voice, she doesn't have ego
in the way that I think a lot of people do.
Like you're confident in your work, you know your value,
(19:36):
I think, but you don't have ego insomuch as you're like,
I'm going to make this mine and I don't care
if that makes it good or bad.
Speaker 6 (19:42):
Yeah, it's kind of a fascinating process adaptation. And I
will say we met, I want to say back in
twenty twenty one, and so it's been a four year journey.
I do think in the process of doing the work.
I would watch these other things get made, and I
would I would read the books, and then I would
watch the movies, and I would always wonder like, well, why.
Yulin Kuang (20:04):
Did they cut this, Why did they cut that? Why
didn't that? And things do change.
Speaker 6 (20:10):
And so seeing kind of people we meet on vacation
through the process, that has been very interesting and informed
more of my thoughts on adaptation now. Like, so I
was the first writer on people we meet on vacation,
I was not the last writer, but.
Emily Henry (20:26):
You were also like you were the writer multiple times.
I was the writer multiple times, press writer, second to
last writer, I think too.
Speaker 6 (20:34):
So when when there are this many writers, this is
going to get very inside baseball. But they take every
draft and they read through them all and they determine
who gets credit, who's done enough work that shows up
on the screen that they'll get credit. And so part
of that process meant that I got to read every
draft as well, and so I found that to be
very fascinating to change from my drafts to the next
(20:57):
writer's draft, to the next writer's draft to the next
writer's draft, and I could see things that I had
struggled with early on structurally that then became an issue
for somebody else later and then got removed completely by
another writer, and I was like, that's brilliant.
Yulin Kuang (21:11):
Why didn't I think to just.
Danielle (21:14):
That's interesting.
Yulin Kuang (21:15):
I came at it more as a reader.
Speaker 6 (21:17):
That was mostly my experience of watching these adaptations of
my favorite books and just being fucking disappointed because they
did not match the movie.
Yulin Kuang (21:24):
In my head.
Speaker 6 (21:25):
And I think now on this side of it, that
part of me still is very much alive and well,
but I think there is also another part of me that,
having gone through the process, I can kind of see
how we get there, Because I think in order for
a movie to stand on its own, it needs to
be a work of art that stands apart from the book.
And I truly do believe the purpose of adaptation is
(21:46):
not to provide one hundred percent faithful thing. Oh yeah,
it's to bring new readers to the source material, and
so for it to do that, it has to stand
as a work art on its own.
Danielle (21:56):
Well, there's that phrase, the book is better, And it
came from the idea that people like the adaptations didn't
live up to people's ideas of what these characters were.
That you know, when you read something, you just think
your teeth in so deeply, and you have your own imagination.
You Lean, You're now you're writing People we Meet on Vacation,
(22:16):
but you're also writing and directing bet Read. Can you
take me into the writer's room? Like Emily, I heard
you talk about how your involvement and all of these
adaptations is really different. It sounds like you're maybe is
it fair to say you're closer with Uleen than some
of the other.
Speaker 6 (22:32):
Yeah, well yeah, I mean you Lean rank us, Yeah, yeah,
so your favorite screenwriter, yeah.
Emily Henry (22:38):
You Leen and Brett Haley, our director from People we
Meet on Vacation. Both of them we have now I've
been friends with them now for years because of this process,
and we've had a lot of back and forth. But
you Leen, it's nice because we've been through this already
once before, and I really trust her and I have
read a lot of her work at this point because
I've read her novel, I've read multiple drafts of her
(23:00):
People Meet on Vacation script. I read other writers scripts
in between those, which was really, like you said, it
was really illuminating, and I think while there were things
from all of them that I appreciate, like it also
deepened my appreciation for your work, because I think what
you do is really special. So I don't. Yeah, it's
like you lean she basically, it's just like when there's
a new draft, she sends it to me. If she
(23:21):
has a question, she'll send it to me. Like there
was a point where she was like, does Poppy have
a middle name? And I was like, oh, no, does
she I don't remember? And I was like, well, I
do think it would be this, So I like gave
Poppy a middle.
Speaker 6 (23:34):
Name, and it made it into a draft that I remember,
and it turned it into a joke, and then that
joke got rewritten and it's no longer.
Emily Henry (23:41):
But I know Poppy, yeah exactly, and like we're the
only two people in the world possibly who know it.
Danielle (23:48):
Well now you just shared it with us, thank you,
not the actual Yeah.
Emily Henry (23:52):
Do you want to care? Can we tell them?
Speaker 2 (23:53):
Sure?
Danielle (23:53):
Can you tell us sure?
Yulin Kuang (23:55):
Do you remember on three one two three?
Emily Henry (23:59):
Diana? I feel like you waited and we did. We
decide that it was after Princess die. I feel yeah,
her mom totally named her Poppy Diana. Yeah.
Danielle (24:09):
Okay, So you guys both talked about adaptations gone wrong.
Is there any adaptation in your mind? That has gone right,
Like when you think, what's like the North Star for
each of you for an adaptation.
Emily Henry (24:21):
Oh my gosh, okay, these are so different, but the
Hunger Games adaptations are phenomenal.
Danielle (24:26):
Ooh, that's a great are great?
Speaker 6 (24:28):
Oh man, this is such a hard question. Two thousand
and five North and South miniseries on the BBC. It's
probably one of my favorite at the two thousand starres.
Richard Armitage. It's based and Daniella Denby ash I believe,
and it is an adaptation of Elizabeth Gaskell's like eighteen
(24:50):
hundred's novel on the Industrial Revolution.
Emily Henry (24:54):
That also reminds me of another phenomenal adaptation, Gone Girl.
Speaker 6 (24:57):
Oh yeah, we talked about Gone Girl in our initial meetings.
Danielle (25:00):
I remember, right.
Emily Henry (25:01):
It's so good. It's really faithful. It's like, I think,
what we should call it is faithful. Plus, it's like
faithful in that the heart of the story is the same,
the heart of the characters is the same. You understand
that it's the same story. But plus is that they
took the fact that they have living, breathing actors and
are performing this and they use that to make it
(25:23):
feel in some ways bigger like and I think people
does that really well? But gone, girl, like the whole
thing with ben Affleck having the butt chin, and she's like,
I just you just like don't look trustworthy because of
your like butt the little like crease into your chin.
And so whenever he's like saying I'm telling the truth,
like he covers his chin with his thumb and he's like,
I'm not lying whatever, that little detail is not in
(25:43):
the book. That little detail was written because ben Affleck
was cast.
Danielle (25:48):
Okay, so this is actually my next question because Emily,
I can imagine when you're writing this character is fully
baked out and then you lean when you're writing the adaptation,
do you have a cast in mind? Like, do you
have an actor in mind for People?
Yulin Kuang (26:02):
I did?
Speaker 5 (26:03):
Not?
Yulin Kuang (26:03):
For beatreate I did?
Danielle (26:06):
Are you able to share who for bea tread?
Speaker 6 (26:09):
No?
Speaker 2 (26:10):
Do I know?
Emily Henry (26:11):
Text me later?
Danielle (26:13):
Yeah, okay, you're gonna have to come back on.
Yulin Kuang (26:15):
Yeah.
Danielle (26:17):
Well, here's the thing. Emily is known for her easter eggs.
Are there any that you can drop with us about
the adaptation?
Speaker 6 (26:26):
Oh, egal eyed viewers may already know. So I am
going to share maybe one easter egg, which is that
in the very first draft of People we meet on vacation.
I knew what I would want as a reader was
a recreation of the cover, and so I wrote something
that was like a recreation of the cover that I
(26:49):
think book lovers will identify. I think I even wrote
into the text it was like book lovers will recognize them.
That was like a nod also to book Lovers, which
was out at the time. But I was like, this
is a cover recreation, and that is one thing that
you know as much as things change from the first
draft to the last and what actually gets produced. I
am so proud to know that that book cover recreation
(27:13):
did make it into the final And this is.
Emily Henry (27:16):
Something that's okay to share because you literally will not
be able to tell. I don't think in this but
in that scene, we do have a little easter egg,
which is that Alex is reading an Augustus Everett book
in that scene, a book that does not exist. Funnily enough,
I mean none of them exists, but it doesn't exist
in print. Like I have not named this novel in
(27:36):
an existing book. Because Hollywood is weird, and because there
are different studios making the Beach Read movie than the
people we meet on vacation movie I could use the
Augustus Everett name because he gets name checked in people
we meet on vacation. This is so probably boring to
other people. I think this is fascinating. And so we
weren't allowed to use any of the book titles that
(27:57):
are included in Beach Read, so we had to come
up with a new book. So I came up with
a new book title, and I got to choose from
like a couple of different covers. And Alex is reading
this book, which you will not be able to see whatsoever,
I don't think, but in the cover recreation, so that's
an easter egg on an easter egg, a hat on
a hat.
Speaker 6 (28:16):
Okay, so for me to know as the director of
the next film, Like, where does that fit into Gus's bibliography?
Yulin Kuang (28:22):
I feel like this is some.
Emily Henry (28:23):
Later But did you know that there is another unnamed
happy place?
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Yes?
Speaker 6 (28:28):
Yes, Okay, good Emily, I am an Emily Henry scholar.
Speaker 5 (28:32):
Okay, oh my god, you mentioned book lovers.
Danielle (28:43):
I'm wondering how much influence book talk and fans actually
have over both your book, Emily, all of your writing,
and then you lean on the adaptation, like do you
try to put fans' wishes in there.
Yulin Kuang (28:59):
I can tell you, I can.
Emily Henry (29:01):
See the diplomacy wheels turning in your head.
Danielle (29:04):
Like give me a percentage if you can't answer.
Speaker 6 (29:06):
So I'll tell you this last summer, I had a
wonderful summer intern and I was like trawl the depths
of book Talk, book Twitter, all of the places that
I cannot look and just kind of come back to
me with like a PowerPoint of what these people want.
I had my list, and then I also had my
(29:27):
intern create this other list for me as well, and
there was some overlap which was fun to see, but
it was just a little piece I wanted to add
to my research process just to kind of honor my
former fangirl self.
Emily Henry (29:41):
Yeah, I mean, and I remember the very first conversation
that I had with Brett about people was him saying,
can you make me a list of the things that
the readers will riot if they don't make it into
the final cut. And so I did that. But I
will say for books, I'm not I'm not doing that
because I feel like for books, my attitude is like
(30:02):
everything we write will hopefully be someone's favorite book. But
for the adaptations, because there is already this readership to
like honor like. I was very grateful that I knew
you would be factoring that in on some level.
Speaker 6 (30:14):
Yeah, I remember in our very first meeting, I did
ask you if you could only save one scene from
this book, what scene would it be?
Yulin Kuang (30:21):
I do remember? Do you want me to think?
Emily Henry (30:22):
Tell me, because I have no memory.
Yulin Kuang (30:24):
It's the condom scene.
Emily Henry (30:26):
Oh you know what didn't make it?
Yulin Kuang (30:28):
Clearly?
Emily Henry (30:28):
Did it obviously? Would make it obviously? No? Oh wait, no, no, no,
you're right, you're right. Oh I thought you were talking
about Oh my god, I thought you were talking about
a different condom scene. There are two. There are two
different condom scenes in that book. One is funny and
one is sweet.
Danielle (30:44):
And also, you lean you love a sex scene. Yeah,
I've gotten to interview you before.
Yulin Kuang (30:48):
You love a sex scene?
Emily Henry (30:49):
Well, this condom scene is a comedic. Comedic, the sexy
condom scene did not make it in.
Danielle (30:54):
Sadly, do you guys feel like book talk has changed
romance because I remember growing up I would read my
favorite books. I didn't even think about what the author
looked like, and now not at all, like there are
I mean, you both are famous authors. People know what
you look like. They care, they're they're following you on
TikTok and Instagram. It's really changed. Do you think BookTalk
(31:17):
has changed romance as a genre.
Emily Henry (31:20):
Yeah, I think it's.
Yulin Kuang (31:21):
Certainly left like a mark on it.
Speaker 6 (31:23):
From what I've studied of book talk, A lot of
it also comes from kind of fandom, and specifically this
fan fiction archive archive of our own. I think the
distillation of tropes that we know and love in fan
fiction was not actually as prevalent in romance before a
(31:43):
certain point in time, Like they weren't as codified as
like there's only one bed once. That language of fandom
infiltrated romance like BookTalk, which I think makes so much
sense because fandom people are extremely online people. Extremely online
people are more likely to make content on BookTalk, and
then they're more likely to talk about it, and why
not use this vocabulary that we are all already kind
(32:05):
of conversant in to describe it. But then I think
that's when publishing starts to see it as a marketing tool. Yeah,
and then they're like, it becomes this shorthand for us all.
And so I do feel like I've seen the fanficification
a little bit of romance.
Yulin Kuang (32:21):
Would you say we completely.
Emily Henry (32:22):
I agree, And that's not like just a good or
bad thing. I think it's a kind of a neutral thing.
But I will say tropes literally only matter if you
care about the characters, like it really only matters if
I get to see how these two very specific characters
operate in this situation and what happens when they are
in this situation.
Danielle (32:42):
Yeah, okay, Well, speaking of book talk, we have a
fan question for you. Hi.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
My name is Michel from Texas. I love how you
described Little Crescent Island in Great, big, beautiful Life, So
I want to ask Emily if you could live in
any place you've written about, where would it be and why?
Emily Henry (33:00):
Oh my gosh, I want to live in all of them.
I feel like i'm torn Wayneing Bay, Michigan fictional place
northern Michigan from Funny Story, but in the winter, I
would like to live in Palm Springs, where Alex and
Poppy go. I would take either of us happily.
Speaker 5 (33:21):
Oh.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
My name is Nna. I live in New York and
I'm huge fans of both of you. I'd love to know,
as writers, how do you come up with those swoony
moments that make readers like me go wild For example,
you lean, I still think about that scene and how
to end a love story where he writes on her thigh,
and then I'd love to know how do you work
on translating those moments to the screen and showing the
(33:42):
chemistry between the two romantic leads Oh.
Yulin Kuang (33:46):
So good moment.
Speaker 6 (33:47):
As I was writing it, I was just like watching
the movie in my mind, and I was like, what
do I want to happen next? And I was like, well,
that would be compelling, And so I think that was
what happened there, and I think I'm always chasing that feeling,
and so when it comes to translating that to the screen,
I think it's it's kind of different if I'm directing
(34:08):
versus when I'm writing. When I'm writing, I'm creating a
blueprint that's for production. And so I knew that I
really wanted Emily's books are sexy. I wanted it to
be a sexy movie, and I didn't want that to
get lost somewhere along the game of telephone that is production.
And so I remember writing into the script for one
of the sex scenes, it was, this is a sex
(34:28):
scene that makes you wish you were having sex right now,
and that line. That line made it into the final.
Emily Henry (34:37):
Such a good line.
Danielle (34:39):
It's a great one, Emily. I heard you say, I'm
saying yes to things for my future self. I'm wondering
for each of you, what is something that you are
terrified of saying yes too, but you're going to do anyway?
Oh gosh, you're doing it for future? Yeah, Emily, can
I start with you? No?
Speaker 2 (34:59):
You lean?
Emily Henry (34:59):
Do you already have an answer that can buy me time?
Speaker 2 (35:02):
Sure?
Speaker 6 (35:03):
Yeah, right now? I would say. It's dance class. So
I figure skate and I was talking to my coach
about how do I get more graceful, and she said,
we'll take a dance class. And she's been saying this
for the last seven years that I've been skating, and
finally I decided, Okay, I'll take a dance class. I
think right now for future me. That's the thing is
I'm committing to doing I'm committing to the suck a
(35:24):
little bit, yeah, in the hopes that it will get better.
Yulin Kuang (35:27):
And it has gotten better.
Speaker 6 (35:28):
Actually, when I look at the videos, I'm like, oh wow,
there's like a marked difference, but it's it's hard.
Emily Henry (35:34):
Yeah. I love that answer, and like something I respect
and admire about you so much, Euleen, is that you,
I feel like, consistently push yourself to try new things,
like as we get older, especially when we find something
that we're good at, it's really really really hard and
scary to try something new, and I hate being bad
(35:55):
at things. And so I guess my answer if I'm
just going to piggyback off of yours, which I am,
is I have been playing tennis and the same thing,
I am so on athletic, and I don't know, like,
I think that is kind of a huge deal for me,
as like a perfectionist, to be like, yeah, I'm bad
at this thing and I keep doing it like I
(36:17):
can't ever be I'm not going to be a professional
tennis player.
Yulin Kuang (36:20):
You're never going to make your money doing.
Emily Henry (36:22):
Yes, I will never. No one wants to pay to see.
Speaker 5 (36:25):
That, but you'll eventually be good totally.
Danielle (36:31):
Okay, I'm giving you guys internet class. Oh those were
great answer, Thank you, great, great answers. Okay, we're coming
up on the end of our conversation, which means it's
time for speed read. Here's how it works. We put
sixty seconds on the clock and we're going to see
just how many rapid fire questions. I should say rapid
fire literary questions that you can get through. We're going
(36:54):
to go popcorn style, so you Lean, you'll get a question,
and then Emily you get a question after you Ready,
Let's do it. You're lacked in Okay, three?
Yulin Kuang (37:03):
Two?
Speaker 2 (37:04):
One?
Danielle (37:05):
Okay. One literary trope you would ban forever, Emily.
Yulin Kuang (37:09):
Billionaire, romance, secret pregnancy.
Emily Henry (37:13):
Oh.
Danielle (37:14):
One that you'll defend with your life.
Yulin Kuang (37:17):
Ooh, Friends to Lovers, Forced Proximity.
Speaker 6 (37:22):
Yes.
Danielle (37:23):
Favorite book to recommend to people.
Emily Henry (37:26):
Anything by Varry McFarlane or Kennedy Ryan.
Yulin Kuang (37:30):
Luck of the Draw by Kate Claiborne writing it down?
Danielle (37:33):
What book do you wish you could read again for
the first time?
Emily Henry (37:37):
Gone Girl?
Speaker 6 (37:39):
Probably Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Honestly, you know,
like take it back.
Yulin Kuang (37:44):
I just watched a Yeah, man, I just watched a
movie recently.
Danielle (37:48):
If you could live vicariously through one fictional character, who
would that be?
Emily Henry (37:52):
This is so messed up, but I want to say
Amy from.
Yulin Kuang (37:55):
Gone Okay, Yuleen, how about you Elouise at the Plaza?
Speaker 6 (38:00):
I just want to be rich with a drunk nanny
and a plug a turtle.
Danielle (38:06):
You have ten minutes in a bookstore. Which area are
you going to? First?
Yulin Kuang (38:10):
Romance?
Emily Henry (38:12):
It says on the day romance or sci fi? Weirdly?
Danielle (38:15):
Oh really? Yeah, Emily, that was a left turn, I know. Okay,
what's your red flag reading happened?
Emily Henry (38:23):
Oh this is a new one. People are skimming books.
Some people only read the dialogue.
Yulin Kuang (38:28):
People who leave restar Goodreads reviews give it a one
or a five.
Danielle (38:32):
Commit Yes, okay, a book that's shaped the way you
see the world.
Emily Henry (38:37):
I'm going to say the Giver, but mostly because it
taught me about like what writing could do.
Yulin Kuang (38:44):
I think it's Sanford Meisner's book on acting.
Danielle (38:47):
Do you ever read the last page first?
Yulin Kuang (38:50):
I used to, really, but not anymore.
Speaker 6 (38:53):
No.
Yulin Kuang (38:53):
I did it consistently through high school and then I stopped.
Emily Henry (38:56):
Danielle, do you do that?
Danielle (38:58):
No?
Speaker 2 (38:58):
Never?
Emily Henry (38:59):
Never?
Danielle (39:03):
Okay. My last question to you both is what have
you bookmarked this week? It doesn't have to be about reading.
It could be anything that you've you know, like kind
of like saved on your Instagram or anything.
Emily Henry (39:17):
I know, I'm going to buy screenshots because it's like
I do that thing of screen chatting an article I
want to read later.
Yulin Kuang (39:23):
Yeah, I feel like mine is going to be like
embarrassing because even.
Emily Henry (39:27):
Better, you Lean, I just screenshotted to Google and read
this later from BBC Science Focus magazine. Scientists say are
chances of finding alien life just skyrocketed. I don't know
why because I haven't googled it yet.
Danielle (39:40):
Very sci fi. This makes sense now, Okay, you Leen.
Speaker 6 (39:44):
So the last thing I saved was a New York
Times article dancing to the beating Heart of the New
York Public Library. The mission behind the Monica, Bill Barnes
and Company is to bring dance where it doesn't belong.
And it's an experiential art company that it does dance
in places where dance doesn't belong. And I was like, oh,
how interesting. Clearly dance is on my mind.
Emily Henry (40:03):
So yeah, and you know what, dance belongs everywhere. First
of all, that's true. Oh, I do have another one.
I don't know anything about where this is going. So
the Dad O'Brien posted a thing about I think I
knew podcast she has maybe called Murder on the Toepath. Okay,
so that's something I wanted to look into.
Speaker 6 (40:23):
Can I tell you My second thing I've bookmarked is
how to rewax your barber jacket, which is a YouTube
video on YouTube and I need to rewax my jacket
and I watch it. It's the most sexual thing I've
seen me. Yeah, it's this very handsome man and he
like and just like works it into.
Emily Henry (40:43):
The jacket book mark that you're like, I'm coming back
to this and we're gonna circle back.
Danielle (40:47):
This has gotten so weird. Thank you so much.
Emily Henry (40:49):
The perfect way to end any podcast.
Danielle (40:51):
Absolute perfect. No, Emily, you lean. It's so fun to
listen to you because you're so descriptive even in your speech.
Like I I if I had to like close my
eyes and I hadn't read any of your books, I
would know both of you were writers. So thank you
so much for taking the time. This was so fun.
Emily Henry (41:10):
Thank you so much. This was a joy.
Yulin Kuang (41:13):
This was great.
Danielle (41:17):
And that's a wrap for our very first episode of
Bookmarked by Reese's book Club. We are so excited you
tuned in. Thank you, and a huge shout out to
Emily and Yuline for setting the stage. This is just
the beginning and if you want a little bit more
from us, come hang with us on socials. We're at
Reese's book Club on Instagram serving up books Vibes and
(41:38):
Behind the Scenes Magic and I'm at Danielle Robe, Roba Y,
come say hi and df me and if you want
to go nineties on us, call us. Okay, our phone
line is open, so call now at one five zero
one two nine one three three seven nine. That's one
five oh one two nine one three seven nine. Share
(42:02):
your literary hot takes, book recommendations, questions about the monthly pick,
or let us know what you think about the episode
you just heard. And who knows, you might just hear
yourself in our next episode, so don't be shy, give
us a ring, and of course, make sure to follow
Bookmarked by Reese's book Club on the iHeartRadio app, Apple
Podcast or wherever you get your shows until then VI
(42:26):
in the next chapter. Bookmarked is a production of Hello,
Sunshine and iHeart Podcast. It's executive produced by Reese Witherspoon
and Me Danielle Robe. Production is by Acast Creative Studios.
Our producers are Matty Foley, Aliah Yates, Britney Martinez and
Darby Masters. Our production assistant is Avery Loftus. Jenny Kaplan
(42:49):
and Emily Rudder are the executive producers for a Cast
Creative Studios. Maureene Polo and Reese Witherspoon are the executive
producers for Hello, Sunshine, Oga, Caminwa. Chris Ston, Perla, Kelly Turner,
and Ashley Rappaport are associate producers for Reese's book Club.
Ali Perry and Christina Everett are the executive producers for
iHeart Podcasts, and Tim Palazola is our showrunner
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