November 5, 2025 • 49 mins
We’re back—and now bi-weekly! Kayla and Rachel dive into the messy middle of revisions: what developmental editing actually looks like, why you should delay line edits, and how to plant undercurrents so readers guess the twist two beats before you reveal it. Rachel talks through changing her killer (and giving everyone a motive) in her one-night “Dinner for Eight” mystery—plus why a simple house map might save your pacing. Kayla shares hard-won lessons about cutting travel filler, building Lani’s agency, and getting a lifesaving line edit from friend-editor Angie. We also play with Enneagram-informed character work (Type One vs. Type Four rebellion), celebrate a 40th birthday murder-mystery party, and invite your pieces for our upcoming Storytime episode. Submit short fiction or poems (text or audio) to contact@writeyourheartoutpod.com
Please subscribe, rate and review!
New episodes every Wednesday.
E-mail us your short story at contact@writeyourheartoutpod.com
Follow us on instagram @writeyourheartoutpod
Leave us a message at 650-260-4885
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_01 (00:06):
Hi, I'm Kayla Ogden and I'm just there and this is
Write Your Heart Out.
Here we are together.
Woo-hoo.
And now we're bi-weekly, whichhopefully is good for you guys.
Yeah, you don't have to listento us as much.
SPEAKER_00 (00:22):
It wasn't about at all not wanting to meet up and
chat.
It's like I could meet when wefirst started podcasting.
I remember we were so gung-ho.
It's like we wanted to do itevery other day.
Yeah, just come on over andlet's just do this.
Yeah.
I mean, I still have thosevibes, but the only thing that
is, you know, the only hang upis just like the editing process
(00:44):
is kind of long because Kayladoes it herself to speak in
third person.
Third person.
Kay Kayla does it herself andKayla doesn't know what the fuck
she's doing.
So it takes longer than itprobably would for most.
Today we're gonna talk aboutediting, which it's gonna be
good, guys.
Yes.
Rachel, are you in your firstdraft or your second draft?
SPEAKER_01 (01:08):
So I don't even know.
What's the lingo there?
So I have my first draft.
It's a it was a full book.
SPEAKER_00 (01:12):
Yeah.
You wrote it in in justfeverishly at like 4 a.m.
and 5 a.m.
in the morning.
Yes.
Over the course of a month.
A month.
So that's your first draft.
Right.
And then now you're halfwaythrough your second draft.
SPEAKER_01 (01:27):
Yeah.
Okay.
So that's what yes.
SPEAKER_00 (01:28):
This is your first pass of the editing.
Exactly.
And then for me, my book, I knowwhat it needs now.
Like something got unlocked inme, and now I'm doing what we
call like a developmental edit.
Sure.
Yeah, so how is your editinggoing?
SPEAKER_01 (01:46):
So it's a slow plugging away.
It's so much more tedious thaneverything else that was fun.
It's not fun.
It's not as fun.
Um, and then I'm finding, youknow, as I go, little holes that
then I'm able to fix the moment,which is good.
It's a lot more of like, oh,this interaction doesn't
(02:09):
actually make sense with how thebook ends.
So I needed to fix thatinteraction and then add a
little bit more later so thatyou understand why that
interaction happened.
On I mean, to just dive rightin.
The killer changed.
Like pass-through.
It just it makes so much moresense, and I can have so much
(02:29):
more fun with the theundercutting and like I I can do
a lot more with the nuance ofhow they speak to each other if
it's this other character.
SPEAKER_00 (02:38):
Can I ask you, and I won't include it in the pod?
SPEAKER_01 (02:41):
Sure.
SPEAKER_00 (02:41):
Is it the husband?
SPEAKER_01 (02:43):
No.
Wait, who's gonna kill him?
SPEAKER_00 (02:45):
Yeah.
No.
Kill him?
Oh, the the the evil guy dies.
unknown (02:51):
I don't want to.
SPEAKER_02 (02:52):
Oh my god!
SPEAKER_00 (02:53):
Okay, okay, okay.
I'm done.
SPEAKER_01 (02:54):
I'm done.
Okay, you can keep any of thatsince it's you got nowhere.
Nowhere.
Okay, obviously.
Well, no, no, take that out.
Sam, you know, I don't want to.
Don't take the photo of Sam.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Um, okay.
This character was a lar a bigcharacter.
And then I have to kind of beefup w her motives.
(03:14):
So there's a lot of like umundercurrent in what she says
that needs to become morepresent.
Like it needs to become moreapparent in like her actions.
And actually, the the thought ofit came while during one of our
conversations of like how I canadd more undercurrent to what
she's saying.
And it has to be it has to comefrom missiness, you know, like
(03:35):
it that's where it has to comefrom.
There's no other way, becauselike she can't say it, and we're
not in her head.
It's not this is not a say it'snot Sam's, and she's first
person.
So it has to come from somethingelse, and it's been fun.
SPEAKER_02 (03:47):
Yes.
SPEAKER_01 (03:48):
And I feel like I'm good at it in the moments, but
like finding the scenes withthis character and adding those
moments is like a lot of notesto take.
SPEAKER_00 (03:57):
I I think um it yeah, it reminds me of the idea
that when the reader gets to themurder or the reveal of who the
murderer was, that they want tohave figured it out like two
beats before you tell them.
Right, yeah, yeah.
Which is I don't know if you canreally plan for that, but they
(04:18):
also want to be able to lookback and tell themselves that it
was all there, that it isn'tjust it wasn't like, oh, someone
snuck in through the window anddid it, and we never could have
figured that out.
There needs to be yeah, thatundercurrent that you're talking
about, and things that you cango, oh damn, that's why she had
sugar on her fingertips.
Totally.
Yeah, the thisness, like thelittle details.
SPEAKER_01 (04:41):
The the murder itself within the book is a
little bit of a shock.
Right?
Like that, you don't really seethat coming, as far as I can
tell.
And I don't want it to beobvious there's gonna be a
murder coming.
SPEAKER_00 (04:54):
Does the the murderer is it premeditated?
SPEAKER_01 (04:57):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (04:58):
So like but you have to show that there was a reason
that there was a reason that shehas mo that he or she has
motive.
Right, exactly.
SPEAKER_01 (05:07):
But then also kind of give everyone a little bit of
a motive.
You know, like I don't knowYeah, everyone else has to have
a bit of a motive.
SPEAKER_00 (05:12):
I want it It seems like this whole like dinner for
eight thing where there's likeall these different characters
and somebody's gonna die.
It does seem like the thing todo for everybody to have a
little bit of a motive.
SPEAKER_01 (05:25):
Right.
And I and I as I you know as Istarted the book, it was very
much of a I wanted it to be amurder mystery and them to be
playing a murder mystery gamewithin the book, which they do.
And life becomes art, art whichcomes first, like you know, life
imitates art sort of a thing.
I don't know.
SPEAKER_00 (05:44):
Because of your birth Oh, because in the story,
because the art is happening andthen it happens Yeah.
Um I was gonna say becauseRachel had her 40th birthday
party.
I'm 40 now.
Woohoo! Oh my god, this was thebest party I've ever been to.
Yay! And that was what I wasgoing for.
I told you I had to focus a loton it.
(06:04):
I know.
She was like, I can't do thatnow.
I am working on my party.
I'm like, really?
And then it turned out she toldme she had had 80 people coming
to a dinner party, which wasalso a murder mystery party.
Dinner for 80.
Dinner for 80.
Dinner for 80.
SPEAKER_01 (06:20):
Dinner for 80.
Oh my god.
SPEAKER_00 (06:21):
Me, Sean didn't believe me when I said there
were 80 people coming.
He's like, no, they can't do amurder mystery with 80 people
because we had been to one withlike 20 people and we all were
characters, like all the people.
And we're we're like, how are 80people gonna be the characters?
But then the there were so manyactors involved.
There were like at least 10actors.
(06:43):
10 actors, yeah.
And they basically put on a showfor us and planted clues.
Yeah, it was amazing.
Was there anything that youlearn from that experience
that's going to like imbue yourbook, whether it be details or
or bigger things?
SPEAKER_01 (07:01):
Or so yes and no.
There's a crew that works withinmy book that is like the dinner
party crew.
And so two servers and a chefwho all work at this at this
house.
There that I felt like washelpful, watching the way the
actors work together and kind ofshifted roles throughout the
night because at the beginningof the night there were
(07:22):
paparazzi and they're the samepeople who then shifted into
different characters for theactual mystery part.
And I thought that that was fun,and I that that hadn't occurred
to me that that was a thing thatthey could do.
SPEAKER_00 (07:35):
Oh, right, that they could be different things.
Oh, I wanted to mention onedetail.
I don't know if you'll use it ornot, but I went outside at one
point and there were two actorsfrom the show and they were
standing outside of the door andthere was nobody else out there.
And I went down to have acigarette, let's be honest.
And I just saw the two actorslike talking to each other, and
(07:58):
it looked like they were ahaving a little bit of a
breather, doing a little bit ofshop talk, like you know what I
mean, just having a sack.
Then somebody else came out ofthe door, and I think that they
were coming down to talk to me,but then they saw the two actors
and they started like hamming itup with the actors.
Um, they were like, oh, it's themaid and it's the this and like
(08:20):
you know, the your friend,whatever.
And I just saw the actors likethey were so professional, they
just sort of like uh shouldersback, straightened up, turned
turned it right back on.
Oh wow, and started just youknow, doing the party with the
person again.
Like they didn't let the personsee behind the curtain.
SPEAKER_01 (08:39):
Oh, yeah.
Um just you who was sneakingaround.
SPEAKER_00 (08:42):
But just me who was going out and but and I was like
looking at them and I was like,oh, you poor people, you just
needed a second to breathe.
And here comes Johnny drunkyMcJo coming out here being like,
Oh, hello little maid, what doyou say to me?
Like, you know, but hey, yeah.
They were on they were supposedto be, but I I thought about
(09:04):
that in terms of like um like astory, like the story, right?
Like totally.
SPEAKER_01 (09:08):
I feel like that's very helpful actually.
SPEAKER_00 (09:10):
Like the humanity of the actors, like how it can like
slip through how they might justneed a fucking break and or
something.
Totally.
But they they did seem happy,they didn't seem like they were
like, I need a fucking break.
SPEAKER_01 (09:22):
But when are they in character?
When are they not?
Is like behind closed doors, atwhat point are they not in
character anymore?
It's a good little Yeah layer.
SPEAKER_00 (09:31):
Oh my gosh, and you know what would be funny?
Okay, I'm doing that thingagain.
You are like it.
Um, is like if say so say you'relike all in character and
everything, and then and you'rein the party and you're acting
like you're a newswoman, andyou're like, oh, what do you got
the scoop?
And then this other person'ssupposed to be um like a king,
(09:53):
and he's like, Oh, my liege, andthen you grab him and pull him
into the closet to have like areal conversation, but then he
like keeps on going with likefully not understanding.
SPEAKER_01 (10:02):
And you're like, no, shut up, we're just be you.
SPEAKER_00 (10:05):
That would be funny.
SPEAKER_01 (10:06):
That would be funny.
I don't have a moment like thatin the book, but maybe I should
add one.
SPEAKER_00 (10:10):
You never know.
SPEAKER_01 (10:12):
Well, so that's where I'm at.
I still am using the physicalcopy of my book to as like
keeping me as a placeholder.
And then as I'm adding notes,I'm finding it in the physical
copy of the book and tucking thenote in at that chapter so that
I don't forget where it is,instead of scrolling ahead in
the Google Doc.
Because if I scroll ahead in theGoogle Doc, then I'm fucked.
(10:33):
I will go down that rabbit holetoo quickly.
SPEAKER_00 (10:35):
Oh, yeah.
I was watching a video um of a awriter giving like 10 tips on
editing just to kind of get myhead in the space to record
this.
So she was saying, which I thinkis really good because I wasted
so much time on this editingline by line and taking out
typos and also just addingwords, fixating on sentences and
(10:57):
that kind of stuff on the secondpass or the third pass.
You can do that, but for me, itwasted so much time because
later on there was so much thatgot cut.
Sure, right.
And I'm cutting a lot of stuffright now.
Um, so what she was saying, andwhat I think is really, really
smart, and it sounds like whatyou're doing is to do like on
your second pass more of adevelopmental edit.
(11:18):
Yes.
So you're not doing a line editright away.
So you're thinking aboutcharacter arcs, you're thinking
about the story structure,you're thinking about all the
scenes, and like, do I need thisscene?
What is the scene giving?
Like, what's the conflict?
How does this move everythingforward?
Um, the reason I'm saying thisis because she was like saying
(11:39):
that she used a hard copy fordevelopmental edits for that
reason.
SPEAKER_01 (11:43):
I thought I was the only one.
SPEAKER_00 (11:44):
Because it slows her down and she so she doesn't get
like lost in the weeds.
Sure.
Yeah, you can totally I can sitthere and do a sentence for so
long.
Sure, yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (11:55):
The the nice thing about the hard copy is that
anything glaringly grammaticalsh pops out to me on a page,
like on a physical page.
So then as I'm the going therein the book in the on the Google
Doc, I can fix that as I go.
And I'm only fixing the glaringones.
And then honestly, I I lovegrammatical editing.
(12:17):
However, I don't think thatthat's gonna be my place in this
book.
I think that I have to havesomeone else do it when when it
comes to that.
Oh.
Um, because I think that once Iget to the place in what you
were just talking about, thedevelopmental editing, once I
get to a place that I feel likethat's good, I think I'm gonna
need to hand it off to somebodyelse to do the grammatical.
Like I think that that's whenit's smart.
(12:38):
Yeah, I don't think that um I'mthe girl for that job.
Yeah.
Do you what did you end up doingfor your grammatical stuff?
SPEAKER_00 (12:45):
Well, I thought that I was pretty good with it.
And my beta readers didn'treally flag too much, so I felt
really good about that side ofit.
Also, like, you know, you'reusing a word processor, so they
catch, you know, your spellingerrors and stuff.
But then I had lucky lucky me.
I had Angie Woo.
(13:06):
Yeah, Angie, you gotta loveAngie.
Yeah.
She looked through my book, andshe not only looked through my
book, she edited the book on aline level.
She didn't give me very muchdevelopmental notes, except for
she told me she told me that atthe end she wanted, you know, a
certain relationship to havelike a better conclusion.
(13:26):
Sure.
Um, that kind of thing.
But she told me stuff like I wasalways capitalizing the word
bishop and it didn't need to becapitalized.
So thing I was capitalizing alot of things that don't need to
be capitalized.
Okay.
And I think that's hard to know.
Sure.
I I don't know.
I I I don't have that knowledgeingrained about due seasons and
(13:48):
um directions and um titles andjobs and like those kind of
things.
Like I don't just have that inmy head whether they're totally.
SPEAKER_01 (13:57):
Sometimes I second guess myself as like when I
write something in like mommy,should mommy have a capital M?
No, it shouldn't.
Like I know that logically inthis moment, but like when I'm
actually writing it, I put itcapitalized because I think of
it as a proper noun.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (14:13):
It is if you're calling them their your that.
Like if I'm like yeah, if I'mlike, mommy, can I have a
biscuit?
Then it's capitalized.
If I'm like but if I'm like butif I'm like my mommy gave me a
biscuit, then it's not.
So it's like a nickname.
SPEAKER_01 (14:31):
Yeah.
unknown (14:31):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (14:32):
Did you say mummy?
SPEAKER_00 (14:33):
Mummy.
SPEAKER_01 (14:34):
You're so Canadian.
That's what you were saying.
No, I said mommy.
Oh.
But you know what?
I'm hosting a kindergartenbuy-in party today for my son's
kindergarten class, and it'slike a school fundraiser thing,
and everyone bought a ticket,right?
And it's a bluey theme.
So on the invitation I wrotehosted by the mums of M-U-M.
(14:56):
Yeah, and I was like, oh, are Iclever?
And you just said mummy.
It was so cute.
SPEAKER_00 (15:01):
Oh, I I never knew that that was a thing.
I I spell it M-O-M.
Yeah, but you know But I don'tsay it.
unknown (15:07):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:08):
Um, okay, so yeah, so that stuff she got, which was
amazing.
And then there was this otherthing that I was doing where I
would say, um, she shrugged hershoulders, comma, quotation.
Uh-huh.
I don't know, period, quotation.
Okay, okay.
So rather than saying she said,I would do I would just say her
(15:29):
body language.
Right.
Okay.
And that's not you, that's asentence.
The she shrugged, period.
And then the next sentencestarts with a quotation, a
capital letter, da-da-da-da.
Sure.
I didn't know that.
I thought that, you know, youcould just be like, he ran
towards her with his arms open.
Comma, quotation.
(15:50):
I missed you.
Exclamation part quotation.
I thought that that was the sameas saying he said.
Sure.
Sure, sure.
Okay.
I feel like I've seen that a lotthough in books.
She corrected that for me athousand times.
Every single it was allthroughout my text.
She didn't just message me andsay, Hey, when you do this, it
means this.
You should go back through.
(16:10):
She did it for me every singletime.
Oh, Angie, what a gem of ahuman.
I know.
And like, I there's nothing Ican do.
Like, I I could, I guess I couldpay her.
I took her out for dinner.
SPEAKER_01 (16:22):
I could pay her.
Well, I didn't pay her.
It would have been weird to belike, here's a thousand dollars,
Angie.
Yeah, like you take her todinner, she's your friend.
She did it without asking,right?
SPEAKER_00 (16:32):
Without me asking.
No, I I said, Can you read thisI'd love to hear your thoughts?
SPEAKER_01 (16:36):
I don't feel I think she did that out of love and
friendship, and that's likewonderful.
And you took her to dinner toshow you appreciate.
That's I think that's what youdo.
SPEAKER_00 (16:44):
Yeah.
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (16:45):
Like if I went to her and I was like, here, I hear
I hear you edit Kayla, youedited Kayla's book.
Here's mine.
Then I think that would be awhole different story.
SPEAKER_00 (16:53):
It took her a lot of time.
Of course.
I don't think she enjoyed it.
SPEAKER_01 (16:58):
Well, she probably did.
That was that's her professionthat she no longer does.
And she probably finds herselfdoing it anyway.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (17:06):
You know, and honestly, I'm just putting words
in her mouth.
I don't know how she felt aboutit, but you know, I guess I
think she wouldn't have done itif she didn't.
SPEAKER_01 (17:16):
I don't I don't think so.
I don't bake things for peopleif I don't want to.
SPEAKER_00 (17:19):
Oh, you don't?
No.
You just don't bother.
SPEAKER_01 (17:22):
Or I ask them to pay me.
Like if I if someone wants me tobake something for them and I'm
don't want to, I say, okay, it'sgonna be four dollars a cupcake.
Not gonna just make it for them.
But I will hand people loaves ofsourdough all the time.
Because like Right, because youwant to, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (17:38):
Um so I was wondering about your work as you
go through, has a theme emerged,or do you have a theme for your
book?
SPEAKER_01 (17:47):
You know, besides the like overarching murder
mystery thing.
SPEAKER_00 (17:51):
Yeah, like you know, when you learn at English
literature course, like they'llsay, and what is the theme of
this story?
And it's sort of like a deeper,sometimes it's like sort of like
a lesson or it's like aphilosophical or it's just like
the overall vibe or message whenyou put it all together, what is
it kind of about in essence?
SPEAKER_01 (18:10):
Yeah, I think that this is very much like um owning
who you are, not squashing downfeelings that you just don't
think serve you, because all ofthose things do serve you.
And like so this the maincharacter Sam totally squashed
down a part of herself that washuge, thinking that that was the
(18:31):
right thing to do, and then itends up exploding, you know,
over this night.
And um on the other side, as wetalked about with the Enneagram,
I do feel like she started, youknow, so in her type oneness,
and by the end she's likeemerged into like understanding
more of herself.
The overall theme would beaccepting yourself, uh, who you
(18:54):
are and like what you actuallywant and surrounding yourself
with people that help you beyou.
SPEAKER_00 (19:00):
That's awesome.
I vibe with that a lotpersonally, as somebody who's
probably in a similar life stageas your character, Sam.
I mean like as a mom with youngkids, it's like the person I was
before I got married, how muchdoes that person resemble the
person that I am now?
And what sides of myself have Isquashed down or suppressed
(19:24):
because I don't feel like theyfit in with the mother and wife
lifestyle that I have going onright now?
SPEAKER_01 (19:33):
If this book was to go, you know, go on and be
published and lots of peopleread it, the I think that it's a
stage of life and you know,obviously a much more dramatic
version, but like so it's atheme that so many people,
especially our age, will relateto, you know.
SPEAKER_00 (19:52):
Um, so just for those who didn't who don't know
what the Enneagram is, Racheland I talked about it really in
depth last episode.
Don't be scared to listen tothat one.
I know it says us it's an hourand 40 minutes, but you don't
have to listen to it all atonce.
And it's pretty fun and it'spretty interesting.
Um, but one thing that we weresaying, so the type one that uh
(20:16):
Rachel has characterized Sam,her protagonist, as is somebody
who needs everything to beright.
SPEAKER_01 (20:24):
Yes, everything is right or wrong, black or white.
It's hard.
Everything has to have likejustice involved.
There's gotta be like a reasonbehind every action.
SPEAKER_00 (20:35):
Yeah.
So I took something that wediscussed in the last episode
was that I said that I wanted totake the Enneagram test as my
protagonist, Lonnie, to learnmore about her.
Did you do it?
And I did.
Oh, but before I get to whattype my protagonist turned out
to be, which was like really,really helpful for editing, was
I learned something about myselfin the um taking this like 200
(21:00):
question test for the Enneagram.
And it's not because of what mytype is, which is type four, but
one of the questions said, um,when I am stressed out, I tend
to rebel or act rebellious.
And I said no.
And then as Lonnie, as yourself,no, as me.
Okay, yeah.
(21:20):
And then over the next week,I've realized that whenever I am
stressed, I am so rebellious.
Like, look at that.
For example, okay, so at mykids' school, it is so
frustrating because they have a10-minute window that you can
get your kid in the gate.
SPEAKER_01 (21:39):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (21:39):
Literally between 8 15 a.m.
and 8 25 a.m., you can you gottabe there and your kid has to
walk through that gate.
And if you're not there at thattime, you have to go all the way
around to the principal's officelike a fucking loser.
And you have to sign the sheet,and the lady like is like, why?
(21:59):
and stuff.
And even if you're like oneminute late, like I've been
walking up there before, andwhatever the volunteer will
literally shut it as she watchesme and my kid walking up to it.
Ew.
Like she's there's such see nextTuesdays.
Like I and I like this school,and like I am, you know,
generally like as peppy as canbe when I get there.
(22:20):
I'm trying to talk to the otherparents, I'm addressing the
children, I'm being like a goodmember of like the culture and
everything.
But the other day, it happenedagain.
The lady shut the door in myface, and I have both my kids
with me, and I'm walking alongthe fence.
Just as another mom passed me, Isaid it so that she could hear
it.
I hate this place.
(22:41):
Oh, ooh.
Which, okay, I don't know howwhoever's listening, if you have
kids that are in like anelementary school or whatever,
but basically, when you haveyour kids in a school, you are
team that school.
Like you can support all theother schools and be nice about
all the other schools, butbasically you are on that
school's team.
Agreed.
You volunteer at that school.
(23:02):
When you talk about that school,you say nice things about it,
you promote that school.
Yes.
You know, and I was being alittle rebel bitch because I was
stressed.
Yeah.
I hate this place.
Like, who does that?
I'm like a it was like a child.
And I was like, oh my gosh, atype four.
Do type fours?
SPEAKER_01 (23:22):
It didn't say that that was a type four thing.
Maybe.
I would say type foursdefinitely knew that.
SPEAKER_00 (23:26):
I also noticed, like, yeah, with my husband,
like I rebel, not that he's um aleadership figure, but we are
partners and I'll rebel againstthe partnership when I'm
stressed.
Sure.
And it's so weird to like lookat that and be like, wow, you
know, you need to not go there.
(23:47):
Like, why are you going there?
SPEAKER_01 (23:48):
Well, yeah, I mean, sometimes you gotta go there.
SPEAKER_00 (23:51):
But it also makes me think whenever somebody's
driving in the car and they'regetting like the people who are
in traffic and stress out andflipping people the bird and
honking their horn, so that'sme.
Sure.
Like, I don't usually honk myhorn, but I do give people the
finger.
So it's like that's all thosepeople, yeah.
They're whatever Enneagram isrebellious when they're
(24:13):
stressed.
SPEAKER_01 (24:14):
Sure.
The or or type eights who arelike, it's my way or the
highway, you know?
There's I mean, there's there'stypes that just straight up
don't give a fuck.
SPEAKER_00 (24:23):
Okay, so you know, three four go to eight when
they're stressed, because I do.
SPEAKER_01 (24:28):
Um I think threes might go to eight.
I'm not sure.
We would have to look it up.
I feel like if you listen to theEnneagram episode, you're gonna
be like, oh my god, are theygonna do this again?
Um but I also do that.
So I feel like what you'redescribing is very four because
when ones go to four, which iswhen they're stressed, is when
(24:49):
I'm like, okay, I can find aworkaround of the rules now.
Like, and oh, and it's that'swhen that's when a one's willing
to get rebellious, is when likeI've been scorned, no one's
doing it right, so fuck you all.
I'm gonna do it wrong too.
And then that's when a one willget super rebellious, and like
it and that does ring true.
SPEAKER_00 (25:08):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (25:08):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:09):
Okay, I know maybe this is boring, but I just want
to say one more thing.
Oh sure, yes, do it.
Okay, so I wonder if that'spartly because so the four is
the individualist.
Yes, and as somebody who wantsto be like like different,
trying to shove me into a littlebox that is the rules really
pisses me off.
Yeah.
(25:29):
Saying that, like somebodysaying, I can't make an
exception for you and your kid,I can't open this gate for 20
more seconds.
Sure.
I'm like, but can't you just bedifferent for a second?
Totally.
Like, can't you be flexible andbe different from the rules for
a second?
Yeah, I think that that's whatthat is.
But I did take the Enneagramtest as Lonnie, and I that's my
(25:51):
protagonist.
I really recommend doing this umfor character development.
It was super helpful, especiallyduring the developmental phase
of editing, because I found outthat Lonnie is a two.
Okay.
Which is like the helper.
Yeah.
And it's a very loving, helpfulperson.
Yep.
And so I I realized that justbasically I'm reading these
(26:17):
questions and I'm thinking aboutmy protagonist, and I'm just
answering as she would.
I wasn't actually thinking, oh,what does she do throughout the
story?
Like, how does she act?
I was just kind of likeembodying her.
Sure, yeah I guess.
I think that I've I think thatI've just um absorbed her
because I've been writing herfor so long.
But then as I was going backthrough the book, I'm like, she
(26:37):
is helping people all the time.
Yeah.
In every single scene, like ifsomebody needs something, she's
hopping to it.
Yeah.
And so I'm like, all right, sothen what if what if she's
stressed?
Like, how does she act?
And does that line up?
Sure.
And like if there is anopportunity for her to help in a
scene, is she helping?
(26:58):
Uh-huh.
And so if she's not helping,then that's going against her
character, right?
Yeah, right.
So it's really nice to um tohave that.
And I think that makes her verylike lovable, right?
If she's always sort of steppingup and helping.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I wonder what do you know whatthe twos are?
Oh, twos go to eight.
SPEAKER_01 (27:16):
Twos, I I'm not sure.
We'd have to look it up.
We'd have we'd I don't want tolook it up.
I feel like that's a rabbithole.
SPEAKER_00 (27:21):
If you take the one of the free tests as a
character, even if you don't usewhatever the type is, and you
don't say, Oh, my character's atype two, so I'm gonna write
her, you know, buy the Enneagrambook because this is truly what
human nature is.
I completely buy into thesepersonality types, whatever.
(27:43):
Even if you don't care aboutthat or don't do that, just
taking the questions andthinking through it, like
thinking through, um, you know,I'm my character.
Am I rebellious when I get mad?
And then thinking, no, I wouldnever do that when I'm stressed.
Oh, okay.
I would never do that when I'mstressed, you know.
Um, then you could go, well,what does she do when she's
(28:04):
stressed?
Well, she has this chapter whereshe's stressed and she acts this
way.
She should do something similarwhen she's stressed later on in
these other chapters just tokeep things consistent and make
them like a real person.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, so totally, totallyrecommend that.
It really, really worked.
SPEAKER_01 (28:19):
Okay, well, I love that.
I'm so glad it worked.
Yeah.
I am so curious as to where youare in your editing process.
And like you printed out thebook, you hated it, you put it
in a drawer.
Is it still in the drawer?
No.
SPEAKER_00 (28:32):
Well oh no, no, yeah.
The that um that copy, so I Iwanted to do what Rachel was
doing because it was super cool.
So I had one made.
I printed out my book and had itin a it was like it's bound, it
has like a cover and everything,and I was gonna go through like
she did, but I just couldn'tdeal with it.
So it went in the drawer, it'sstill in the drawer.
(28:54):
But in terms of editing, whatI'm doing now is so I have a
three different point of viewcharacters.
Okay.
Do you have different point ofviews?
Or no.
SPEAKER_01 (29:02):
Uh oh well, now I do.
I didn't.
Um, but there's a chapterinterspersed every once in a
while that's from a differentpoint of view.
That's cool.
Yeah.
And it and they're two differentpeople points of view.
First half of the book issomebody's point of view
interspersed in there, and thenthe second half of the book is
somebody's points of viewinterspersed in there.
SPEAKER_00 (29:22):
And they're different when the interspersal
are different people, but themain point of view is always
Sam.
Yes.
Cool.
Okay, so I love how creativethat is.
For some reason, I thought thatI had to do so, these are the
character names John, Jelene,and Lonnie.
Okay.
I thought it had to be likeJohn, Lonnie, Jelene.
John, Lonnie, Jelene.
(29:42):
Well, it is a pattern that I'veseen in books before.
Yeah, and then yeah.
I think I just thought that thatwas the way that it had to
happen, even though I wrote mostof John first.
Um so now what I'm doing is I'mpulling out all of the Lonnie
chapters because what I heardfrom my beta readers was that
it's her story.
(30:02):
Okay.
Like even though the othercharacters get pretty much as
much time on the page, they'rejust like, it's really Lonnie's
story.
Yeah.
I'm I'm going through all of herchapters and feeling like, do
they read like a book?
Sure.
Like if this were a standalonenovella or whatever, to how's
her arc and how's everything?
And so that's been really,really great.
Totally.
(30:22):
And then I'm gonna put that backin and then I'm gonna make sure
I'm gonna do that for eachcharacter and then I'm gonna
make sure that they're in theright place.
Yeah.
So something that was happeningbefore was I have these really
high octane chapters for allthree characters in um in a row.
(30:43):
Okay.
So literally one gets abused,one dies, one's friend dies.
Like all in the same part of thebook.
It's like they all like there'sa crescendo like they all climax
at once.
And if it were a book with onecharacter, these really big
moments of conflict wouldusually be followed by a chapter
(31:05):
or a scene or something of kindof like reflection.
Sure.
So that the um reader has abreather so it's not like just
listening to like a heavy metalsong like bring them down a
little.
Yes and put some white spacearound the intense moments so
that they stand out.
(31:25):
Sure.
Right.
Um so when I'm looking at theLonnie chapters together, they
do that I have, you know, thisreally crazy thing happens and
then she's traveling somewhereor she's in conversation with
someone or there's like just alittle bit of a dip before we go
get back into things.
And I have that with eachcharacter but when you put them
(31:47):
together all the intense partsseem to line up and all the dips
seem to line up when it almostshould be opposite.
Okay.
Are all of their points of viewthey their story all interlocks?
It no they're all in differenttimes.
Oh okay but they're you don'trealize that they're related to
each other.
Sure sure sure sure yeah okay soanyway so that's pretty complex
(32:13):
um but right now where I'm at isI'm about halfway through doing
Lonnie and one thing that I'mlearning is that um so I'm
cutting a lot of stuff out I'mreading it through and I'm like
what do I need this chapter todo?
I need her to so there's thisone chapter where she arrives at
(32:34):
Waterfront Station in Vancouver.
She realizes that she doesn'thave her purse or any of her
money or her ID or anything onher and she has nowhere to go
and she gets her tarot cardsread and then she meets a
friend.
So I need her to lose her moneytarot cards read and meet a
friend.
(32:54):
But at the beginning of thechapter I have like four
paragraphs where she gets on thebus to go to Waterfront station
and she has these funnyinteractions and you know it's
all like mood and it's likeshowing like how downtrodden she
is and how lost and naive she isand everything.
And then I was like you knowwhat I don't need to show the
reader how she got there justlike just because she was
(33:18):
somewhere else in the last scenejust because the last time you
saw her she was at thisapartment building doesn't mean
I need to show her getting toWaterfront station.
I can just have her getting offa bus.
Yeah and and I can lose all ofthese darlings like I have these
darling little moments darlingdarlings where she comes across
like this teenage girl and theteenage girl's like kind of mean
(33:40):
to her and then this is how shefeels and then she's isolated
and whatever and it's like wellwe already know she's lost we
already know she's isolated wealready know she's socially
awkward so sorry bitch that weall gotta go and then it
tightened things up so much it'slike I just gave the like you
would say like the chewable partsure to the person.
So um I'm cutting a lot andthat's good because I have way
(34:02):
too huge of a word count.
SPEAKER_01 (34:04):
So how um how much time passes within your book
like just we don't even have totalk about the whole book but
like with all the characters butlike the from Lonnie's point of
view is this like a year, a weeka day?
A year.
Okay.
Yeah.
I'm gonna be so curious inDinner for eight when it when
somebody else has eyes on it asto like there's a lot of because
(34:25):
everything happens in one nightin my book.
So I'm so cu you know because sothere's a lot of like going up
the stairs coming down thestairs walking from room to room
and like really having to showlike this this house layout.
You can't hear what's happeningfrom one room to the other
because it's like an old housewith lots of walls and all this
stuff.
And um I don't know if all ofthis click clacking in heels
(34:49):
around the house is reallynecessary.
You know can she just jump fromroom to room?
Because I feel like thetraveling there is an important
part or is that a darling youknow like how will that all
flesh out and hearing you saythat you know the the you know
her traveling to the stationisn't actually necessary.
SPEAKER_00 (35:09):
Yeah isn't actually necessary that really makes me
wonder like yeah it'sinteresting when you talk about
the the layout of the house andhow you do need to know really
where they are because of whatpeople can hear and how long it
takes people to get to a placefrom another place.
So yeah that is interestingsometimes in books they'll have
a little map at the beginning.
SPEAKER_01 (35:30):
I've thought about a map I actually my friend is an
architect and I actually wasthinking about having her draw
up something for me because Ilike there's a place around the
side of the stairs that I canclearly see in my mind's eye but
I don't know if I'm properlydescribing it.
And I I feel like if I see alayout in real time or like if
(35:54):
in front of me maybe I'll beable to describe it better.
Cause like there's this mainstaircase and majority of the
house is like two thirds on oneside of the staircase and then
on the other side there's a likea third with just like a couple
rooms on this other side and itwas more like servants quarters
because it's an old house.
And like yeah people don'treally go over there but then
(36:16):
like some people do go overthere.
SPEAKER_00 (36:18):
You know like I think you should I think having
a map would be I feel like a mapwould be cool.
Especially if you could have itas part of your first five pages
that you send to agents.
How cool is that so I read abook recently that oh I wish I
could just say what it was justto but it wasn't that good.
Oh yeah I think oh fuck I thinkit was called the neighbors or
(36:39):
something like that.
Okay.
But basically there's thesepeople when they live in this
neighborhood and each person ineach house on the block is part
of the murder mystery story.
Okay.
So you really need to like it'sit's good to know like who's at
the end of the block, who's inthe middle who's beside each
other.
And at the beginning of the bookthere's just like a little map
(37:00):
and I found myself referencingthat a lot.
I was like oh who is she marriedto and you just go back and
you're like oh they live therethey live there is awesome.
Yeah.
Um so say everybody's at thetable in the dining room and um
you're you show that Sam wantsto go to the kitchen or you have
her say excuse me I need tocheck on the hors d'oeuvres and
(37:20):
then some things happen and thenit's the end of the chapter and
then the next chapter you couldjust start with her in the
kitchen.
Right.
You know what I'm saying?
But it seems like because of howyour story is written in one
night and all the movementsreally matter it seems like you
(37:41):
might have to find a way to putthat in without um boring the
reader.
Like if so like say she isclimbing the stairs she should
be thinking about stuff.
Totally um but if you don'treally need that then it should
be a line.
Right.
Like up the stairs she wentagain to the on the left hand
side of the house period.
SPEAKER_01 (38:01):
Like that's enough right totally I I mean I guess I
do do that.
So like there's this backstaircase that was like the
servant stairs um that it waslike kind of behind the kitchen
and like she goes up like that'sher favorite staircase because
that's like the easy one and shedoesn't like the tea like the
the first time she climbs upthat staircase she's like
thinking about how like it'sit's ugly and so much better and
(38:24):
so much more homey in the backof the house because that's the
servant's area.
SPEAKER_00 (38:28):
Is that character development what you were doing
there or is it foreshadowingthat something crazy happens on
one or the other of thestaircases?
SPEAKER_01 (38:35):
Oh definitely both.
SPEAKER_00 (38:37):
Okay well that's great.
Yeah yeah then that's great.
From what I'm gathering fromyour what you're saying about
your book I feel like it wouldbe almost impossible for it to
be slow.
It's impossible it's impossiblelike and boring it's one night
it's not like you have a crazyword count you have like eight
(38:57):
characters to describe at leastand you have a whole game like a
whole like presumably kind ofexciting little game playing out
underneath it.
And so it's like how the fuckcould that possibly be?
SPEAKER_01 (39:11):
And somebody is murdered I can't imagine but
okay sorry we need to get backto yours I'm sorry I didn't mean
to derail it into dinner foreight again.
SPEAKER_00 (39:18):
No I don't know what I was even saying I'm just
saying that I I'm taking out alot of stuff I'm making sure
that Lani when she needs to behelping is helping um and I also
want her to really gain agencyby the end of the book because
she's so controlled andmanipulated by her mother at the
(39:39):
beginning that she really andyou really need to show her
flourishing at the end.
Yeah.
And I think that I like I was soready to be done writing it that
the last scenes are very likeand then happily ever after but
like what Angie said to me was Iwanna she's like really would
they really be okay already likeI really want to see like this
(40:02):
how this shook out and thingslike that.
So and that's really important.
I don't like the end note ofyour book like if people don't
like the ending they're gonna bepissed.
SPEAKER_01 (40:10):
Oh yeah nobody wants it to be wrapped up too quickly.
Yeah you know like yes I meanyou don't want it to slog on but
you also don't want it to bewrapped up too quickly.
Yes.
That's why like Breaking Bad wassuch a great show is like it it
tied did you watch Breaking Bad?
Yeah.
You know how like the last fewepisodes it was like I'm ready
for this to be over but all ofthis still needs to happen and
then they tied it up soperfectly but they didn't drag
(40:32):
it out.
Right.
And it was like okay I feelsatisfied and it's horrible it's
a shitty ending but it's likewhat needed to happen.
SPEAKER_00 (40:39):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (40:40):
You know that's what people want is they they want it
to be able to be tied up withoutloose ends.
SPEAKER_00 (40:45):
Yes.
SPEAKER_01 (40:45):
And also without like nobody wants a rushed
wrapped up job.
SPEAKER_00 (40:50):
Yeah yeah so I can't rush it.
You were asking me before do mycharacters surprise me and
actually yes they do totallysurprise me because when I was
writing the first draft Lonnieends up falling in love with
someone that surprised me andher and each other.
Like there so it surprises them.
Yeah.
And I don't know if I showenough of their like it's almost
(41:14):
like with a murder where if themurder happens and there you
don't you didn't sense anythingbuilding it's sort of not earned
right sure.
I kind of feel like her lovestory with this person isn't
really earned.
Like it's like they have allthese scenes together where
they're kind of confused abouteach other but there isn't this
like a chemistry or connectionbuilding.
Yeah it just sort of like theyjust end up in bed together kind
(41:37):
of out of circumstance andthey're all of a sudden like
whoa yeah and I don't know ifthat's a good thing or a bad
thing.
Okay.
Has that ever happened to you?
Ended up in bed with someone andthen all of a sudden been like
whoa um I don't know has thatever happened to you?
SPEAKER_01 (41:52):
I'm trying to think I mean I've definitely slept
with people where I'm like oopsthat was a stupid choice.
SPEAKER_00 (42:00):
Like was it like that you made that choice
because you were in the moment?
Yeah it was like all right wellwe're here but it's it's not
like that with them.
It's like they're friends.
Right.
Um but I don't think anyone'sexpecting them to get to get
together because oh it's likeI'm gonna give everything away.
Yeah like I'm thinking thatthere was this one time when I
(42:23):
was traveling and we were with agroup of people and there was
like this other group of peopleand the people that we were
hanging out with were locals andthen we were gonna leave and go
and I was like oh hey to thisguy I was like can I get your
number like so because you guyslive over there we can all hang
out and stuff.
And I thought nothing of itbecause he was like five years
younger than me or something orlike three years younger than
(42:44):
me.
I just didn't think anything ofit and then I guess he took it
like I wanted to be with him.
Yeah men get a little excited Ihad no idea I really had no idea
like I was asking sort of themfor their numbers and I got him
and then they come over to watcha movie like it's just like a
whole group of us and all of asudden he's trying to hold my
(43:04):
hand and I was like oh I wasvery like shocked.
SPEAKER_01 (43:09):
Try to hold your hand but a little buttercup.
SPEAKER_00 (43:12):
It was like when he touched my hand it was like fire
like it was like tingles.
It was like oh like I wonderwhat that is you know it's like
you someone's not even on yourradar and then they touch your
hand and it's like boom.
Well it sounds like you do havethat in common with Lonnie then
yeah so oh so I should showmaybe like her surprise.
SPEAKER_01 (43:36):
Yeah I think that I think so.
SPEAKER_00 (43:38):
She's not surprised at all when it happens for some
reason.
SPEAKER_01 (43:40):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (43:41):
She's just sort of like floating into it.
She's sort of like oh look atyeah but she should be like whoa
this is but she's kind of usedto being told what to do right?
SPEAKER_01 (43:50):
Yeah.
So is it like a she's being toldwhat to do?
SPEAKER_00 (43:53):
Nobody's nobody would ever tell her to be with
this person.
SPEAKER_01 (43:57):
Okay but in the moment is he kind of like
telling her what to do?
Yeah like kind of ushering thesituation.
SPEAKER_00 (44:03):
No sort of falling into each other because they've
just been through a trauma.
SPEAKER_01 (44:09):
So then maybe the electric moment of like she's
surprised is being surprised isfun.
Being surprised is fun and I dothink that that little firework
chemistry moment whether it'sreal or just perceived in the s
you know in the in that onetouch that does happen.
SPEAKER_00 (44:25):
It does happen and it's magical like it's there's
something strange about itbecause it's like somebody
attractive could touch your handand you would feel nothing.
Totally and then somebody thatyou're not expecting could touch
your hand and you just feelsomething.
Totally why it could be becausewhere you're at in your cycle oh
it could be literally the dayyour egg is just hovering there
(44:48):
waiting for a spur.
Population changes everythingmaybe that's all it is or maybe
it's pheromones or maybe it'sfate.
I think it's all of it.
I think it's all of the abovemaybe you knew that person in
another lifetime.
Maybe I believe in all of thosethings so oh that's so sweet.
I if I believe I feel like if Ibelieve in anything it's other
other lives.
(45:09):
Yeah that would be a really coolbook or story like that whole
other lives vibe.
SPEAKER_01 (45:14):
A past lives situation.
SPEAKER_00 (45:15):
Oh my god I would love to write that okay that's
my next one okay but I wasthinking you know what I would
really love to write likethrillers yeah and thrillers are
so commercial sure everyonelikes a thriller yeah and not
not to write for a market oranything but um it would be nice
to write something that peoplelike are excited to read and
(45:39):
like moves them and suretitulates them.
SPEAKER_01 (45:42):
I mean in our book group our last book group a
month ago I mean that was like aconsensus around the table like
trashy thrillers are the you'resuper fun.
SPEAKER_00 (45:48):
Yeah you know not saying that your book would be
trashy but like and if you canwrite one that has something
that brings something differentto the table sure I think that's
really really hard.
Yeah but if you can that'samazing like with like I think
Gone Girl was really um GoneGirl's fun it was so I feel like
it was it did somethingdifferent right because at the
(46:11):
beginning you think you like AmyDunn and you think you hate Nick
Dunn.
Nick Dunn's this piece of shithe's cheating on her whatever
and then you have thisepistolary chapters where Amy is
writing in her journal and she'sso sweet and she loves him so
much and all this stuff um andthen spoiler alert oh yeah
(46:32):
spoiler alert if you haven'theard of Gone Girl and then
halfway through it switches.
Yeah because you realize thatthese are journal entries that
the diabolical Amy wrote s andleft so that the investigators
were would think that she wasthis innocent loving wife who
was killed by her husband.
And her husband you never likehim he like he's never a likable
(46:56):
character but you realize thathe's innocent.
Yeah and so I think that thatthat switch was really
interesting.
Like it was if you could write abook where and maybe there's
lots of books written like thissince or forever but where you
think you like someone and youthink you hate someone and then
(47:17):
halfway through you realize whythey're like the way they are or
that one of them is insincere orwhatever it is and it switches.
Totally that is so sick.
SPEAKER_01 (47:25):
It is that was a good book.
Yeah it was really good and theydid a good job with the movie
too I gotta say that was thatwas one book made into a movie
where they did a decent job.
SPEAKER_00 (47:35):
They did do a good job with that.
Listeners I'm gonna be startingto learn about that whole world
so you're probably gonna behearing more about thrillers
from me.
SPEAKER_01 (47:43):
Fun, fun fun well obviously I like those okay so
story time you have two weeksnow between episodes to submit
something please submitsomething we want to hear from
you.
SPEAKER_00 (47:55):
Yes we want to read your stuff yeah we do have um a
poem from my friend JesseZechniwitz so I can't wait to
play that for you and then I'mgonna read this crazy juicy
story that I haven't written yetwhere the protagonist when she's
aroused her wetness is glitterycyan and it has some kind of
(48:16):
special power.
SPEAKER_01 (48:17):
And then I think I'm going to write another chapter
of my the wolf story.
SPEAKER_00 (48:24):
Yeah wolf not wolf maybe he's a wolf maybe he's not
I really want him to grab her bythe ankles oh my god every time
I get those Instagram stories Iscreen capture it and send it to
you now oh my gosh Rachel sentme one I was like I want these
yeah I don't know why you don'tget them why am I why am I being
pegged for this is the questionbecause I'm like probably the
(48:47):
hours that you're awake you wakeup at like four in the morning
and go on Instagram they're likethis chick's horny.
SPEAKER_01 (48:52):
And I do have quite a few friends who read romanticy
do you have friends who readromantic?
Not really okay so I have atleast two to three friends who
read them and actively like likeprobably follow and look them
stuff up.
SPEAKER_00 (49:05):
Have you mentioned this phenomena to those people
because they um no I don't thinkI have you should they probably
love those I'll ask my friendBritney because she she would
love those.
Be like hey Brittany have youseen this one?
Yeah right okay so in two weeksfrom from the date that we post
this we're gonna do the storytime.
If you want to get on that storytime please send in just either
(49:29):
the text of your short story orpoem or an audio recording to
contact atwriteyourheartoutpod.com.
Okay so we'll see you next timethanks for listening bye
Hi, I'm Kayla Ogden and I'm just there and this is
Write Your Heart Out.
Here we are together.
Woo-hoo.
And now we're bi-weekly, whichhopefully is good for you guys.
Yeah, you don't have to listento us as much.
SPEAKER_00 (00:22):
It wasn't about at all not wanting to meet up and
chat.
It's like I could meet when wefirst started podcasting.
I remember we were so gung-ho.
It's like we wanted to do itevery other day.
Yeah, just come on over andlet's just do this.
Yeah.
I mean, I still have thosevibes, but the only thing that
is, you know, the only hang upis just like the editing process
(00:44):
is kind of long because Kayladoes it herself to speak in
third person.
Third person.
Kay Kayla does it herself andKayla doesn't know what the fuck
she's doing.
So it takes longer than itprobably would for most.
Today we're gonna talk aboutediting, which it's gonna be
good, guys.
Yes.
Rachel, are you in your firstdraft or your second draft?
SPEAKER_01 (01:08):
So I don't even know.
What's the lingo there?
So I have my first draft.
It's a it was a full book.
SPEAKER_00 (01:12):
Yeah.
You wrote it in in justfeverishly at like 4 a.m.
and 5 a.m.
in the morning.
Yes.
Over the course of a month.
A month.
So that's your first draft.
Right.
And then now you're halfwaythrough your second draft.
SPEAKER_01 (01:27):
Yeah.
Okay.
So that's what yes.
SPEAKER_00 (01:28):
This is your first pass of the editing.
Exactly.
And then for me, my book, I knowwhat it needs now.
Like something got unlocked inme, and now I'm doing what we
call like a developmental edit.
Sure.
Yeah, so how is your editinggoing?
SPEAKER_01 (01:46):
So it's a slow plugging away.
It's so much more tedious thaneverything else that was fun.
It's not fun.
It's not as fun.
Um, and then I'm finding, youknow, as I go, little holes that
then I'm able to fix the moment,which is good.
It's a lot more of like, oh,this interaction doesn't
(02:09):
actually make sense with how thebook ends.
So I needed to fix thatinteraction and then add a
little bit more later so thatyou understand why that
interaction happened.
On I mean, to just dive rightin.
The killer changed.
Like pass-through.
It just it makes so much moresense, and I can have so much
(02:29):
more fun with the theundercutting and like I I can do
a lot more with the nuance ofhow they speak to each other if
it's this other character.
SPEAKER_00 (02:38):
Can I ask you, and I won't include it in the pod?
SPEAKER_01 (02:41):
Sure.
SPEAKER_00 (02:41):
Is it the husband?
SPEAKER_01 (02:43):
No.
Wait, who's gonna kill him?
SPEAKER_00 (02:45):
Yeah.
No.
Kill him?
Oh, the the the evil guy dies.
unknown (02:51):
I don't want to.
SPEAKER_02 (02:52):
Oh my god!
SPEAKER_00 (02:53):
Okay, okay, okay.
I'm done.
SPEAKER_01 (02:54):
I'm done.
Okay, you can keep any of thatsince it's you got nowhere.
Nowhere.
Okay, obviously.
Well, no, no, take that out.
Sam, you know, I don't want to.
Don't take the photo of Sam.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Um, okay.
This character was a lar a bigcharacter.
And then I have to kind of beefup w her motives.
(03:14):
So there's a lot of like umundercurrent in what she says
that needs to become morepresent.
Like it needs to become moreapparent in like her actions.
And actually, the the thought ofit came while during one of our
conversations of like how I canadd more undercurrent to what
she's saying.
And it has to be it has to comefrom missiness, you know, like
(03:35):
it that's where it has to comefrom.
There's no other way, becauselike she can't say it, and we're
not in her head.
It's not this is not a say it'snot Sam's, and she's first
person.
So it has to come from somethingelse, and it's been fun.
SPEAKER_02 (03:47):
Yes.
SPEAKER_01 (03:48):
And I feel like I'm good at it in the moments, but
like finding the scenes withthis character and adding those
moments is like a lot of notesto take.
SPEAKER_00 (03:57):
I I think um it yeah, it reminds me of the idea
that when the reader gets to themurder or the reveal of who the
murderer was, that they want tohave figured it out like two
beats before you tell them.
Right, yeah, yeah.
Which is I don't know if you canreally plan for that, but they
(04:18):
also want to be able to lookback and tell themselves that it
was all there, that it isn'tjust it wasn't like, oh, someone
snuck in through the window anddid it, and we never could have
figured that out.
There needs to be yeah, thatundercurrent that you're talking
about, and things that you cango, oh damn, that's why she had
sugar on her fingertips.
Totally.
Yeah, the thisness, like thelittle details.
SPEAKER_01 (04:41):
The the murder itself within the book is a
little bit of a shock.
Right?
Like that, you don't really seethat coming, as far as I can
tell.
And I don't want it to beobvious there's gonna be a
murder coming.
SPEAKER_00 (04:54):
Does the the murderer is it premeditated?
SPEAKER_01 (04:57):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (04:58):
So like but you have to show that there was a reason
that there was a reason that shehas mo that he or she has
motive.
Right, exactly.
SPEAKER_01 (05:07):
But then also kind of give everyone a little bit of
a motive.
You know, like I don't knowYeah, everyone else has to have
a bit of a motive.
SPEAKER_00 (05:12):
I want it It seems like this whole like dinner for
eight thing where there's likeall these different characters
and somebody's gonna die.
It does seem like the thing todo for everybody to have a
little bit of a motive.
SPEAKER_01 (05:25):
Right.
And I and I as I you know as Istarted the book, it was very
much of a I wanted it to be amurder mystery and them to be
playing a murder mystery gamewithin the book, which they do.
And life becomes art, art whichcomes first, like you know, life
imitates art sort of a thing.
I don't know.
SPEAKER_00 (05:44):
Because of your birth Oh, because in the story,
because the art is happening andthen it happens Yeah.
Um I was gonna say becauseRachel had her 40th birthday
party.
I'm 40 now.
Woohoo! Oh my god, this was thebest party I've ever been to.
Yay! And that was what I wasgoing for.
I told you I had to focus a loton it.
(06:04):
I know.
She was like, I can't do thatnow.
I am working on my party.
I'm like, really?
And then it turned out she toldme she had had 80 people coming
to a dinner party, which wasalso a murder mystery party.
Dinner for 80.
Dinner for 80.
Dinner for 80.
SPEAKER_01 (06:20):
Dinner for 80.
Oh my god.
SPEAKER_00 (06:21):
Me, Sean didn't believe me when I said there
were 80 people coming.
He's like, no, they can't do amurder mystery with 80 people
because we had been to one withlike 20 people and we all were
characters, like all the people.
And we're we're like, how are 80people gonna be the characters?
But then the there were so manyactors involved.
There were like at least 10actors.
(06:43):
10 actors, yeah.
And they basically put on a showfor us and planted clues.
Yeah, it was amazing.
Was there anything that youlearn from that experience
that's going to like imbue yourbook, whether it be details or
or bigger things?
SPEAKER_01 (07:01):
Or so yes and no.
There's a crew that works withinmy book that is like the dinner
party crew.
And so two servers and a chefwho all work at this at this
house.
There that I felt like washelpful, watching the way the
actors work together and kind ofshifted roles throughout the
night because at the beginningof the night there were
(07:22):
paparazzi and they're the samepeople who then shifted into
different characters for theactual mystery part.
And I thought that that was fun,and I that that hadn't occurred
to me that that was a thing thatthey could do.
SPEAKER_00 (07:35):
Oh, right, that they could be different things.
Oh, I wanted to mention onedetail.
I don't know if you'll use it ornot, but I went outside at one
point and there were two actorsfrom the show and they were
standing outside of the door andthere was nobody else out there.
And I went down to have acigarette, let's be honest.
And I just saw the two actorslike talking to each other, and
(07:58):
it looked like they were ahaving a little bit of a
breather, doing a little bit ofshop talk, like you know what I
mean, just having a sack.
Then somebody else came out ofthe door, and I think that they
were coming down to talk to me,but then they saw the two actors
and they started like hamming itup with the actors.
Um, they were like, oh, it's themaid and it's the this and like
(08:20):
you know, the your friend,whatever.
And I just saw the actors likethey were so professional, they
just sort of like uh shouldersback, straightened up, turned
turned it right back on.
Oh wow, and started just youknow, doing the party with the
person again.
Like they didn't let the personsee behind the curtain.
SPEAKER_01 (08:39):
Oh, yeah.
Um just you who was sneakingaround.
SPEAKER_00 (08:42):
But just me who was going out and but and I was like
looking at them and I was like,oh, you poor people, you just
needed a second to breathe.
And here comes Johnny drunkyMcJo coming out here being like,
Oh, hello little maid, what doyou say to me?
Like, you know, but hey, yeah.
They were on they were supposedto be, but I I thought about
(09:04):
that in terms of like um like astory, like the story, right?
Like totally.
SPEAKER_01 (09:08):
I feel like that's very helpful actually.
SPEAKER_00 (09:10):
Like the humanity of the actors, like how it can like
slip through how they might justneed a fucking break and or
something.
Totally.
But they they did seem happy,they didn't seem like they were
like, I need a fucking break.
SPEAKER_01 (09:22):
But when are they in character?
When are they not?
Is like behind closed doors, atwhat point are they not in
character anymore?
It's a good little Yeah layer.
SPEAKER_00 (09:31):
Oh my gosh, and you know what would be funny?
Okay, I'm doing that thingagain.
You are like it.
Um, is like if say so say you'relike all in character and
everything, and then and you'rein the party and you're acting
like you're a newswoman, andyou're like, oh, what do you got
the scoop?
And then this other person'ssupposed to be um like a king,
(09:53):
and he's like, Oh, my liege, andthen you grab him and pull him
into the closet to have like areal conversation, but then he
like keeps on going with likefully not understanding.
SPEAKER_01 (10:02):
And you're like, no, shut up, we're just be you.
SPEAKER_00 (10:05):
That would be funny.
SPEAKER_01 (10:06):
That would be funny.
I don't have a moment like thatin the book, but maybe I should
add one.
SPEAKER_00 (10:10):
You never know.
SPEAKER_01 (10:12):
Well, so that's where I'm at.
I still am using the physicalcopy of my book to as like
keeping me as a placeholder.
And then as I'm adding notes,I'm finding it in the physical
copy of the book and tucking thenote in at that chapter so that
I don't forget where it is,instead of scrolling ahead in
the Google Doc.
Because if I scroll ahead in theGoogle Doc, then I'm fucked.
(10:33):
I will go down that rabbit holetoo quickly.
SPEAKER_00 (10:35):
Oh, yeah.
I was watching a video um of a awriter giving like 10 tips on
editing just to kind of get myhead in the space to record
this.
So she was saying, which I thinkis really good because I wasted
so much time on this editingline by line and taking out
typos and also just addingwords, fixating on sentences and
(10:57):
that kind of stuff on the secondpass or the third pass.
You can do that, but for me, itwasted so much time because
later on there was so much thatgot cut.
Sure, right.
And I'm cutting a lot of stuffright now.
Um, so what she was saying, andwhat I think is really, really
smart, and it sounds like whatyou're doing is to do like on
your second pass more of adevelopmental edit.
(11:18):
Yes.
So you're not doing a line editright away.
So you're thinking aboutcharacter arcs, you're thinking
about the story structure,you're thinking about all the
scenes, and like, do I need thisscene?
What is the scene giving?
Like, what's the conflict?
How does this move everythingforward?
Um, the reason I'm saying thisis because she was like saying
(11:39):
that she used a hard copy fordevelopmental edits for that
reason.
SPEAKER_01 (11:43):
I thought I was the only one.
SPEAKER_00 (11:44):
Because it slows her down and she so she doesn't get
like lost in the weeds.
Sure.
Yeah, you can totally I can sitthere and do a sentence for so
long.
Sure, yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (11:55):
The the nice thing about the hard copy is that
anything glaringly grammaticalsh pops out to me on a page,
like on a physical page.
So then as I'm the going therein the book in the on the Google
Doc, I can fix that as I go.
And I'm only fixing the glaringones.
And then honestly, I I lovegrammatical editing.
(12:17):
However, I don't think thatthat's gonna be my place in this
book.
I think that I have to havesomeone else do it when when it
comes to that.
Oh.
Um, because I think that once Iget to the place in what you
were just talking about, thedevelopmental editing, once I
get to a place that I feel likethat's good, I think I'm gonna
need to hand it off to somebodyelse to do the grammatical.
Like I think that that's whenit's smart.
(12:38):
Yeah, I don't think that um I'mthe girl for that job.
Yeah.
Do you what did you end up doingfor your grammatical stuff?
SPEAKER_00 (12:45):
Well, I thought that I was pretty good with it.
And my beta readers didn'treally flag too much, so I felt
really good about that side ofit.
Also, like, you know, you'reusing a word processor, so they
catch, you know, your spellingerrors and stuff.
But then I had lucky lucky me.
I had Angie Woo.
(13:06):
Yeah, Angie, you gotta loveAngie.
Yeah.
She looked through my book, andshe not only looked through my
book, she edited the book on aline level.
She didn't give me very muchdevelopmental notes, except for
she told me she told me that atthe end she wanted, you know, a
certain relationship to havelike a better conclusion.
(13:26):
Sure.
Um, that kind of thing.
But she told me stuff like I wasalways capitalizing the word
bishop and it didn't need to becapitalized.
So thing I was capitalizing alot of things that don't need to
be capitalized.
Okay.
And I think that's hard to know.
Sure.
I I don't know.
I I I don't have that knowledgeingrained about due seasons and
(13:48):
um directions and um titles andjobs and like those kind of
things.
Like I don't just have that inmy head whether they're totally.
SPEAKER_01 (13:57):
Sometimes I second guess myself as like when I
write something in like mommy,should mommy have a capital M?
No, it shouldn't.
Like I know that logically inthis moment, but like when I'm
actually writing it, I put itcapitalized because I think of
it as a proper noun.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (14:13):
It is if you're calling them their your that.
Like if I'm like yeah, if I'mlike, mommy, can I have a
biscuit?
Then it's capitalized.
If I'm like but if I'm like butif I'm like my mommy gave me a
biscuit, then it's not.
So it's like a nickname.
SPEAKER_01 (14:31):
Yeah.
unknown (14:31):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (14:32):
Did you say mummy?
SPEAKER_00 (14:33):
Mummy.
SPEAKER_01 (14:34):
You're so Canadian.
That's what you were saying.
No, I said mommy.
Oh.
But you know what?
I'm hosting a kindergartenbuy-in party today for my son's
kindergarten class, and it'slike a school fundraiser thing,
and everyone bought a ticket,right?
And it's a bluey theme.
So on the invitation I wrotehosted by the mums of M-U-M.
(14:56):
Yeah, and I was like, oh, are Iclever?
And you just said mummy.
It was so cute.
SPEAKER_00 (15:01):
Oh, I I never knew that that was a thing.
I I spell it M-O-M.
Yeah, but you know But I don'tsay it.
unknown (15:07):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (15:08):
Um, okay, so yeah, so that stuff she got, which was
amazing.
And then there was this otherthing that I was doing where I
would say, um, she shrugged hershoulders, comma, quotation.
Uh-huh.
I don't know, period, quotation.
Okay, okay.
So rather than saying she said,I would do I would just say her
(15:29):
body language.
Right.
Okay.
And that's not you, that's asentence.
The she shrugged, period.
And then the next sentencestarts with a quotation, a
capital letter, da-da-da-da.
Sure.
I didn't know that.
I thought that, you know, youcould just be like, he ran
towards her with his arms open.
Comma, quotation.
(15:50):
I missed you.
Exclamation part quotation.
I thought that that was the sameas saying he said.
Sure.
Sure, sure.
Okay.
I feel like I've seen that a lotthough in books.
She corrected that for me athousand times.
Every single it was allthroughout my text.
She didn't just message me andsay, Hey, when you do this, it
means this.
You should go back through.
(16:10):
She did it for me every singletime.
Oh, Angie, what a gem of ahuman.
I know.
And like, I there's nothing Ican do.
Like, I I could, I guess I couldpay her.
I took her out for dinner.
SPEAKER_01 (16:22):
I could pay her.
Well, I didn't pay her.
It would have been weird to belike, here's a thousand dollars,
Angie.
Yeah, like you take her todinner, she's your friend.
She did it without asking,right?
SPEAKER_00 (16:32):
Without me asking.
No, I I said, Can you read thisI'd love to hear your thoughts?
SPEAKER_01 (16:36):
I don't feel I think she did that out of love and
friendship, and that's likewonderful.
And you took her to dinner toshow you appreciate.
That's I think that's what youdo.
SPEAKER_00 (16:44):
Yeah.
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (16:45):
Like if I went to her and I was like, here, I hear
I hear you edit Kayla, youedited Kayla's book.
Here's mine.
Then I think that would be awhole different story.
SPEAKER_00 (16:53):
It took her a lot of time.
Of course.
I don't think she enjoyed it.
SPEAKER_01 (16:58):
Well, she probably did.
That was that's her professionthat she no longer does.
And she probably finds herselfdoing it anyway.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (17:06):
You know, and honestly, I'm just putting words
in her mouth.
I don't know how she felt aboutit, but you know, I guess I
think she wouldn't have done itif she didn't.
SPEAKER_01 (17:16):
I don't I don't think so.
I don't bake things for peopleif I don't want to.
SPEAKER_00 (17:19):
Oh, you don't?
No.
You just don't bother.
SPEAKER_01 (17:22):
Or I ask them to pay me.
Like if I if someone wants me tobake something for them and I'm
don't want to, I say, okay, it'sgonna be four dollars a cupcake.
Not gonna just make it for them.
But I will hand people loaves ofsourdough all the time.
Because like Right, because youwant to, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (17:38):
Um so I was wondering about your work as you
go through, has a theme emerged,or do you have a theme for your
book?
SPEAKER_01 (17:47):
You know, besides the like overarching murder
mystery thing.
SPEAKER_00 (17:51):
Yeah, like you know, when you learn at English
literature course, like they'llsay, and what is the theme of
this story?
And it's sort of like a deeper,sometimes it's like sort of like
a lesson or it's like aphilosophical or it's just like
the overall vibe or message whenyou put it all together, what is
it kind of about in essence?
SPEAKER_01 (18:10):
Yeah, I think that this is very much like um owning
who you are, not squashing downfeelings that you just don't
think serve you, because all ofthose things do serve you.
And like so this the maincharacter Sam totally squashed
down a part of herself that washuge, thinking that that was the
(18:31):
right thing to do, and then itends up exploding, you know,
over this night.
And um on the other side, as wetalked about with the Enneagram,
I do feel like she started, youknow, so in her type oneness,
and by the end she's likeemerged into like understanding
more of herself.
The overall theme would beaccepting yourself, uh, who you
(18:54):
are and like what you actuallywant and surrounding yourself
with people that help you beyou.
SPEAKER_00 (19:00):
That's awesome.
I vibe with that a lotpersonally, as somebody who's
probably in a similar life stageas your character, Sam.
I mean like as a mom with youngkids, it's like the person I was
before I got married, how muchdoes that person resemble the
person that I am now?
And what sides of myself have Isquashed down or suppressed
(19:24):
because I don't feel like theyfit in with the mother and wife
lifestyle that I have going onright now?
SPEAKER_01 (19:33):
If this book was to go, you know, go on and be
published and lots of peopleread it, the I think that it's a
stage of life and you know,obviously a much more dramatic
version, but like so it's atheme that so many people,
especially our age, will relateto, you know.
SPEAKER_00 (19:52):
Um, so just for those who didn't who don't know
what the Enneagram is, Racheland I talked about it really in
depth last episode.
Don't be scared to listen tothat one.
I know it says us it's an hourand 40 minutes, but you don't
have to listen to it all atonce.
And it's pretty fun and it'spretty interesting.
Um, but one thing that we weresaying, so the type one that uh
(20:16):
Rachel has characterized Sam,her protagonist, as is somebody
who needs everything to beright.
SPEAKER_01 (20:24):
Yes, everything is right or wrong, black or white.
It's hard.
Everything has to have likejustice involved.
There's gotta be like a reasonbehind every action.
SPEAKER_00 (20:35):
Yeah.
So I took something that wediscussed in the last episode
was that I said that I wanted totake the Enneagram test as my
protagonist, Lonnie, to learnmore about her.
Did you do it?
And I did.
Oh, but before I get to whattype my protagonist turned out
to be, which was like really,really helpful for editing, was
I learned something about myselfin the um taking this like 200
(21:00):
question test for the Enneagram.
And it's not because of what mytype is, which is type four, but
one of the questions said, um,when I am stressed out, I tend
to rebel or act rebellious.
And I said no.
And then as Lonnie, as yourself,no, as me.
Okay, yeah.
(21:20):
And then over the next week,I've realized that whenever I am
stressed, I am so rebellious.
Like, look at that.
For example, okay, so at mykids' school, it is so
frustrating because they have a10-minute window that you can
get your kid in the gate.
SPEAKER_01 (21:39):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (21:39):
Literally between 8 15 a.m.
and 8 25 a.m., you can you gottabe there and your kid has to
walk through that gate.
And if you're not there at thattime, you have to go all the way
around to the principal's officelike a fucking loser.
And you have to sign the sheet,and the lady like is like, why?
(21:59):
and stuff.
And even if you're like oneminute late, like I've been
walking up there before, andwhatever the volunteer will
literally shut it as she watchesme and my kid walking up to it.
Ew.
Like she's there's such see nextTuesdays.
Like I and I like this school,and like I am, you know,
generally like as peppy as canbe when I get there.
(22:20):
I'm trying to talk to the otherparents, I'm addressing the
children, I'm being like a goodmember of like the culture and
everything.
But the other day, it happenedagain.
The lady shut the door in myface, and I have both my kids
with me, and I'm walking alongthe fence.
Just as another mom passed me, Isaid it so that she could hear
it.
I hate this place.
(22:41):
Oh, ooh.
Which, okay, I don't know howwhoever's listening, if you have
kids that are in like anelementary school or whatever,
but basically, when you haveyour kids in a school, you are
team that school.
Like you can support all theother schools and be nice about
all the other schools, butbasically you are on that
school's team.
Agreed.
You volunteer at that school.
(23:02):
When you talk about that school,you say nice things about it,
you promote that school.
Yes.
You know, and I was being alittle rebel bitch because I was
stressed.
Yeah.
I hate this place.
Like, who does that?
I'm like a it was like a child.
And I was like, oh my gosh, atype four.
Do type fours?
SPEAKER_01 (23:22):
It didn't say that that was a type four thing.
Maybe.
I would say type foursdefinitely knew that.
SPEAKER_00 (23:26):
I also noticed, like, yeah, with my husband,
like I rebel, not that he's um aleadership figure, but we are
partners and I'll rebel againstthe partnership when I'm
stressed.
Sure.
And it's so weird to like lookat that and be like, wow, you
know, you need to not go there.
(23:47):
Like, why are you going there?
SPEAKER_01 (23:48):
Well, yeah, I mean, sometimes you gotta go there.
SPEAKER_00 (23:51):
But it also makes me think whenever somebody's
driving in the car and they'regetting like the people who are
in traffic and stress out andflipping people the bird and
honking their horn, so that'sme.
Sure.
Like, I don't usually honk myhorn, but I do give people the
finger.
So it's like that's all thosepeople, yeah.
They're whatever Enneagram isrebellious when they're
(24:13):
stressed.
SPEAKER_01 (24:14):
Sure.
The or or type eights who arelike, it's my way or the
highway, you know?
There's I mean, there's there'stypes that just straight up
don't give a fuck.
SPEAKER_00 (24:23):
Okay, so you know, three four go to eight when
they're stressed, because I do.
SPEAKER_01 (24:28):
Um I think threes might go to eight.
I'm not sure.
We would have to look it up.
I feel like if you listen to theEnneagram episode, you're gonna
be like, oh my god, are theygonna do this again?
Um but I also do that.
So I feel like what you'redescribing is very four because
when ones go to four, which iswhen they're stressed, is when
(24:49):
I'm like, okay, I can find aworkaround of the rules now.
Like, and oh, and it's that'swhen that's when a one's willing
to get rebellious, is when likeI've been scorned, no one's
doing it right, so fuck you all.
I'm gonna do it wrong too.
And then that's when a one willget super rebellious, and like
it and that does ring true.
SPEAKER_00 (25:08):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (25:08):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (25:09):
Okay, I know maybe this is boring, but I just want
to say one more thing.
Oh sure, yes, do it.
Okay, so I wonder if that'spartly because so the four is
the individualist.
Yes, and as somebody who wantsto be like like different,
trying to shove me into a littlebox that is the rules really
pisses me off.
Yeah.
(25:29):
Saying that, like somebodysaying, I can't make an
exception for you and your kid,I can't open this gate for 20
more seconds.
Sure.
I'm like, but can't you just bedifferent for a second?
Totally.
Like, can't you be flexible andbe different from the rules for
a second?
Yeah, I think that that's whatthat is.
But I did take the Enneagramtest as Lonnie, and I that's my
(25:51):
protagonist.
I really recommend doing this umfor character development.
It was super helpful, especiallyduring the developmental phase
of editing, because I found outthat Lonnie is a two.
Okay.
Which is like the helper.
Yeah.
And it's a very loving, helpfulperson.
Yep.
And so I I realized that justbasically I'm reading these
(26:17):
questions and I'm thinking aboutmy protagonist, and I'm just
answering as she would.
I wasn't actually thinking, oh,what does she do throughout the
story?
Like, how does she act?
I was just kind of likeembodying her.
Sure, yeah I guess.
I think that I've I think thatI've just um absorbed her
because I've been writing herfor so long.
But then as I was going backthrough the book, I'm like, she
(26:37):
is helping people all the time.
Yeah.
In every single scene, like ifsomebody needs something, she's
hopping to it.
Yeah.
And so I'm like, all right, sothen what if what if she's
stressed?
Like, how does she act?
And does that line up?
Sure.
And like if there is anopportunity for her to help in a
scene, is she helping?
(26:58):
Uh-huh.
And so if she's not helping,then that's going against her
character, right?
Yeah, right.
So it's really nice to um tohave that.
And I think that makes her verylike lovable, right?
If she's always sort of steppingup and helping.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I wonder what do you know whatthe twos are?
Oh, twos go to eight.
SPEAKER_01 (27:16):
Twos, I I'm not sure.
We'd have to look it up.
We'd have we'd I don't want tolook it up.
I feel like that's a rabbithole.
SPEAKER_00 (27:21):
If you take the one of the free tests as a
character, even if you don't usewhatever the type is, and you
don't say, Oh, my character's atype two, so I'm gonna write
her, you know, buy the Enneagrambook because this is truly what
human nature is.
I completely buy into thesepersonality types, whatever.
(27:43):
Even if you don't care aboutthat or don't do that, just
taking the questions andthinking through it, like
thinking through, um, you know,I'm my character.
Am I rebellious when I get mad?
And then thinking, no, I wouldnever do that when I'm stressed.
Oh, okay.
I would never do that when I'mstressed, you know.
Um, then you could go, well,what does she do when she's
(28:04):
stressed?
Well, she has this chapter whereshe's stressed and she acts this
way.
She should do something similarwhen she's stressed later on in
these other chapters just tokeep things consistent and make
them like a real person.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, so totally, totallyrecommend that.
It really, really worked.
SPEAKER_01 (28:19):
Okay, well, I love that.
I'm so glad it worked.
Yeah.
I am so curious as to where youare in your editing process.
And like you printed out thebook, you hated it, you put it
in a drawer.
Is it still in the drawer?
No.
SPEAKER_00 (28:32):
Well oh no, no, yeah.
The that um that copy, so I Iwanted to do what Rachel was
doing because it was super cool.
So I had one made.
I printed out my book and had itin a it was like it's bound, it
has like a cover and everything,and I was gonna go through like
she did, but I just couldn'tdeal with it.
So it went in the drawer, it'sstill in the drawer.
(28:54):
But in terms of editing, whatI'm doing now is so I have a
three different point of viewcharacters.
Okay.
Do you have different point ofviews?
Or no.
SPEAKER_01 (29:02):
Uh oh well, now I do.
I didn't.
Um, but there's a chapterinterspersed every once in a
while that's from a differentpoint of view.
That's cool.
Yeah.
And it and they're two differentpeople points of view.
First half of the book issomebody's point of view
interspersed in there, and thenthe second half of the book is
somebody's points of viewinterspersed in there.
SPEAKER_00 (29:22):
And they're different when the interspersal
are different people, but themain point of view is always
Sam.
Yes.
Cool.
Okay, so I love how creativethat is.
For some reason, I thought thatI had to do so, these are the
character names John, Jelene,and Lonnie.
Okay.
I thought it had to be likeJohn, Lonnie, Jelene.
John, Lonnie, Jelene.
(29:42):
Well, it is a pattern that I'veseen in books before.
Yeah, and then yeah.
I think I just thought that thatwas the way that it had to
happen, even though I wrote mostof John first.
Um so now what I'm doing is I'mpulling out all of the Lonnie
chapters because what I heardfrom my beta readers was that
it's her story.
(30:02):
Okay.
Like even though the othercharacters get pretty much as
much time on the page, they'rejust like, it's really Lonnie's
story.
Yeah.
I'm I'm going through all of herchapters and feeling like, do
they read like a book?
Sure.
Like if this were a standalonenovella or whatever, to how's
her arc and how's everything?
And so that's been really,really great.
Totally.
(30:22):
And then I'm gonna put that backin and then I'm gonna make sure
I'm gonna do that for eachcharacter and then I'm gonna
make sure that they're in theright place.
Yeah.
So something that was happeningbefore was I have these really
high octane chapters for allthree characters in um in a row.
(30:43):
Okay.
So literally one gets abused,one dies, one's friend dies.
Like all in the same part of thebook.
It's like they all like there'sa crescendo like they all climax
at once.
And if it were a book with onecharacter, these really big
moments of conflict wouldusually be followed by a chapter
(31:05):
or a scene or something of kindof like reflection.
Sure.
So that the um reader has abreather so it's not like just
listening to like a heavy metalsong like bring them down a
little.
Yes and put some white spacearound the intense moments so
that they stand out.
(31:25):
Sure.
Right.
Um so when I'm looking at theLonnie chapters together, they
do that I have, you know, thisreally crazy thing happens and
then she's traveling somewhereor she's in conversation with
someone or there's like just alittle bit of a dip before we go
get back into things.
And I have that with eachcharacter but when you put them
(31:47):
together all the intense partsseem to line up and all the dips
seem to line up when it almostshould be opposite.
Okay.
Are all of their points of viewthey their story all interlocks?
It no they're all in differenttimes.
Oh okay but they're you don'trealize that they're related to
each other.
Sure sure sure sure yeah okay soanyway so that's pretty complex
(32:13):
um but right now where I'm at isI'm about halfway through doing
Lonnie and one thing that I'mlearning is that um so I'm
cutting a lot of stuff out I'mreading it through and I'm like
what do I need this chapter todo?
I need her to so there's thisone chapter where she arrives at
(32:34):
Waterfront Station in Vancouver.
She realizes that she doesn'thave her purse or any of her
money or her ID or anything onher and she has nowhere to go
and she gets her tarot cardsread and then she meets a
friend.
So I need her to lose her moneytarot cards read and meet a
friend.
(32:54):
But at the beginning of thechapter I have like four
paragraphs where she gets on thebus to go to Waterfront station
and she has these funnyinteractions and you know it's
all like mood and it's likeshowing like how downtrodden she
is and how lost and naive she isand everything.
And then I was like you knowwhat I don't need to show the
reader how she got there justlike just because she was
(33:18):
somewhere else in the last scenejust because the last time you
saw her she was at thisapartment building doesn't mean
I need to show her getting toWaterfront station.
I can just have her getting offa bus.
Yeah and and I can lose all ofthese darlings like I have these
darling little moments darlingdarlings where she comes across
like this teenage girl and theteenage girl's like kind of mean
(33:40):
to her and then this is how shefeels and then she's isolated
and whatever and it's like wellwe already know she's lost we
already know she's isolated wealready know she's socially
awkward so sorry bitch that weall gotta go and then it
tightened things up so much it'slike I just gave the like you
would say like the chewable partsure to the person.
So um I'm cutting a lot andthat's good because I have way
(34:02):
too huge of a word count.
SPEAKER_01 (34:04):
So how um how much time passes within your book
like just we don't even have totalk about the whole book but
like with all the characters butlike the from Lonnie's point of
view is this like a year, a weeka day?
A year.
Okay.
Yeah.
I'm gonna be so curious inDinner for eight when it when
somebody else has eyes on it asto like there's a lot of because
(34:25):
everything happens in one nightin my book.
So I'm so cu you know because sothere's a lot of like going up
the stairs coming down thestairs walking from room to room
and like really having to showlike this this house layout.
You can't hear what's happeningfrom one room to the other
because it's like an old housewith lots of walls and all this
stuff.
And um I don't know if all ofthis click clacking in heels
(34:49):
around the house is reallynecessary.
You know can she just jump fromroom to room?
Because I feel like thetraveling there is an important
part or is that a darling youknow like how will that all
flesh out and hearing you saythat you know the the you know
her traveling to the stationisn't actually necessary.
SPEAKER_00 (35:09):
Yeah isn't actually necessary that really makes me
wonder like yeah it'sinteresting when you talk about
the the layout of the house andhow you do need to know really
where they are because of whatpeople can hear and how long it
takes people to get to a placefrom another place.
So yeah that is interestingsometimes in books they'll have
a little map at the beginning.
SPEAKER_01 (35:30):
I've thought about a map I actually my friend is an
architect and I actually wasthinking about having her draw
up something for me because Ilike there's a place around the
side of the stairs that I canclearly see in my mind's eye but
I don't know if I'm properlydescribing it.
And I I feel like if I see alayout in real time or like if
(35:54):
in front of me maybe I'll beable to describe it better.
Cause like there's this mainstaircase and majority of the
house is like two thirds on oneside of the staircase and then
on the other side there's a likea third with just like a couple
rooms on this other side and itwas more like servants quarters
because it's an old house.
And like yeah people don'treally go over there but then
(36:16):
like some people do go overthere.
SPEAKER_00 (36:18):
You know like I think you should I think having
a map would be I feel like a mapwould be cool.
Especially if you could have itas part of your first five pages
that you send to agents.
How cool is that so I read abook recently that oh I wish I
could just say what it was justto but it wasn't that good.
Oh yeah I think oh fuck I thinkit was called the neighbors or
(36:39):
something like that.
Okay.
But basically there's thesepeople when they live in this
neighborhood and each person ineach house on the block is part
of the murder mystery story.
Okay.
So you really need to like it'sit's good to know like who's at
the end of the block, who's inthe middle who's beside each
other.
And at the beginning of the bookthere's just like a little map
(37:00):
and I found myself referencingthat a lot.
I was like oh who is she marriedto and you just go back and
you're like oh they live therethey live there is awesome.
Yeah.
Um so say everybody's at thetable in the dining room and um
you're you show that Sam wantsto go to the kitchen or you have
her say excuse me I need tocheck on the hors d'oeuvres and
(37:20):
then some things happen and thenit's the end of the chapter and
then the next chapter you couldjust start with her in the
kitchen.
Right.
You know what I'm saying?
But it seems like because of howyour story is written in one
night and all the movementsreally matter it seems like you
(37:41):
might have to find a way to putthat in without um boring the
reader.
Like if so like say she isclimbing the stairs she should
be thinking about stuff.
Totally um but if you don'treally need that then it should
be a line.
Right.
Like up the stairs she wentagain to the on the left hand
side of the house period.
SPEAKER_01 (38:01):
Like that's enough right totally I I mean I guess I
do do that.
So like there's this backstaircase that was like the
servant stairs um that it waslike kind of behind the kitchen
and like she goes up like that'sher favorite staircase because
that's like the easy one and shedoesn't like the tea like the
the first time she climbs upthat staircase she's like
thinking about how like it'sit's ugly and so much better and
(38:24):
so much more homey in the backof the house because that's the
servant's area.
SPEAKER_00 (38:28):
Is that character development what you were doing
there or is it foreshadowingthat something crazy happens on
one or the other of thestaircases?
SPEAKER_01 (38:35):
Oh definitely both.
SPEAKER_00 (38:37):
Okay well that's great.
Yeah yeah then that's great.
From what I'm gathering fromyour what you're saying about
your book I feel like it wouldbe almost impossible for it to
be slow.
It's impossible it's impossiblelike and boring it's one night
it's not like you have a crazyword count you have like eight
(38:57):
characters to describe at leastand you have a whole game like a
whole like presumably kind ofexciting little game playing out
underneath it.
And so it's like how the fuckcould that possibly be?
SPEAKER_01 (39:11):
And somebody is murdered I can't imagine but
okay sorry we need to get backto yours I'm sorry I didn't mean
to derail it into dinner foreight again.
SPEAKER_00 (39:18):
No I don't know what I was even saying I'm just
saying that I I'm taking out alot of stuff I'm making sure
that Lani when she needs to behelping is helping um and I also
want her to really gain agencyby the end of the book because
she's so controlled andmanipulated by her mother at the
(39:39):
beginning that she really andyou really need to show her
flourishing at the end.
Yeah.
And I think that I like I was soready to be done writing it that
the last scenes are very likeand then happily ever after but
like what Angie said to me was Iwanna she's like really would
they really be okay already likeI really want to see like this
(40:02):
how this shook out and thingslike that.
So and that's really important.
I don't like the end note ofyour book like if people don't
like the ending they're gonna bepissed.
SPEAKER_01 (40:10):
Oh yeah nobody wants it to be wrapped up too quickly.
Yeah you know like yes I meanyou don't want it to slog on but
you also don't want it to bewrapped up too quickly.
Yes.
That's why like Breaking Bad wassuch a great show is like it it
tied did you watch Breaking Bad?
Yeah.
You know how like the last fewepisodes it was like I'm ready
for this to be over but all ofthis still needs to happen and
then they tied it up soperfectly but they didn't drag
(40:32):
it out.
Right.
And it was like okay I feelsatisfied and it's horrible it's
a shitty ending but it's likewhat needed to happen.
SPEAKER_00 (40:39):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (40:40):
You know that's what people want is they they want it
to be able to be tied up withoutloose ends.
SPEAKER_00 (40:45):
Yes.
SPEAKER_01 (40:45):
And also without like nobody wants a rushed
wrapped up job.
SPEAKER_00 (40:50):
Yeah yeah so I can't rush it.
You were asking me before do mycharacters surprise me and
actually yes they do totallysurprise me because when I was
writing the first draft Lonnieends up falling in love with
someone that surprised me andher and each other.
Like there so it surprises them.
Yeah.
And I don't know if I showenough of their like it's almost
(41:14):
like with a murder where if themurder happens and there you
don't you didn't sense anythingbuilding it's sort of not earned
right sure.
I kind of feel like her lovestory with this person isn't
really earned.
Like it's like they have allthese scenes together where
they're kind of confused abouteach other but there isn't this
like a chemistry or connectionbuilding.
Yeah it just sort of like theyjust end up in bed together kind
(41:37):
of out of circumstance andthey're all of a sudden like
whoa yeah and I don't know ifthat's a good thing or a bad
thing.
Okay.
Has that ever happened to you?
Ended up in bed with someone andthen all of a sudden been like
whoa um I don't know has thatever happened to you?
SPEAKER_01 (41:52):
I'm trying to think I mean I've definitely slept
with people where I'm like oopsthat was a stupid choice.
SPEAKER_00 (42:00):
Like was it like that you made that choice
because you were in the moment?
Yeah it was like all right wellwe're here but it's it's not
like that with them.
It's like they're friends.
Right.
Um but I don't think anyone'sexpecting them to get to get
together because oh it's likeI'm gonna give everything away.
Yeah like I'm thinking thatthere was this one time when I
(42:23):
was traveling and we were with agroup of people and there was
like this other group of peopleand the people that we were
hanging out with were locals andthen we were gonna leave and go
and I was like oh hey to thisguy I was like can I get your
number like so because you guyslive over there we can all hang
out and stuff.
And I thought nothing of itbecause he was like five years
younger than me or something orlike three years younger than
(42:44):
me.
I just didn't think anything ofit and then I guess he took it
like I wanted to be with him.
Yeah men get a little excited Ihad no idea I really had no idea
like I was asking sort of themfor their numbers and I got him
and then they come over to watcha movie like it's just like a
whole group of us and all of asudden he's trying to hold my
(43:04):
hand and I was like oh I wasvery like shocked.
SPEAKER_01 (43:09):
Try to hold your hand but a little buttercup.
SPEAKER_00 (43:12):
It was like when he touched my hand it was like fire
like it was like tingles.
It was like oh like I wonderwhat that is you know it's like
you someone's not even on yourradar and then they touch your
hand and it's like boom.
Well it sounds like you do havethat in common with Lonnie then
yeah so oh so I should showmaybe like her surprise.
SPEAKER_01 (43:36):
Yeah I think that I think so.
SPEAKER_00 (43:38):
She's not surprised at all when it happens for some
reason.
SPEAKER_01 (43:40):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (43:41):
She's just sort of like floating into it.
She's sort of like oh look atyeah but she should be like whoa
this is but she's kind of usedto being told what to do right?
SPEAKER_01 (43:50):
Yeah.
So is it like a she's being toldwhat to do?
SPEAKER_00 (43:53):
Nobody's nobody would ever tell her to be with
this person.
SPEAKER_01 (43:57):
Okay but in the moment is he kind of like
telling her what to do?
Yeah like kind of ushering thesituation.
SPEAKER_00 (44:03):
No sort of falling into each other because they've
just been through a trauma.
SPEAKER_01 (44:09):
So then maybe the electric moment of like she's
surprised is being surprised isfun.
Being surprised is fun and I dothink that that little firework
chemistry moment whether it'sreal or just perceived in the s
you know in the in that onetouch that does happen.
SPEAKER_00 (44:25):
It does happen and it's magical like it's there's
something strange about itbecause it's like somebody
attractive could touch your handand you would feel nothing.
Totally and then somebody thatyou're not expecting could touch
your hand and you just feelsomething.
Totally why it could be becausewhere you're at in your cycle oh
it could be literally the dayyour egg is just hovering there
(44:48):
waiting for a spur.
Population changes everythingmaybe that's all it is or maybe
it's pheromones or maybe it'sfate.
I think it's all of it.
I think it's all of the abovemaybe you knew that person in
another lifetime.
Maybe I believe in all of thosethings so oh that's so sweet.
I if I believe I feel like if Ibelieve in anything it's other
other lives.
(45:09):
Yeah that would be a really coolbook or story like that whole
other lives vibe.
SPEAKER_01 (45:14):
A past lives situation.
SPEAKER_00 (45:15):
Oh my god I would love to write that okay that's
my next one okay but I wasthinking you know what I would
really love to write likethrillers yeah and thrillers are
so commercial sure everyonelikes a thriller yeah and not
not to write for a market oranything but um it would be nice
to write something that peoplelike are excited to read and
(45:39):
like moves them and suretitulates them.
SPEAKER_01 (45:42):
I mean in our book group our last book group a
month ago I mean that was like aconsensus around the table like
trashy thrillers are the you'resuper fun.
SPEAKER_00 (45:48):
Yeah you know not saying that your book would be
trashy but like and if you canwrite one that has something
that brings something differentto the table sure I think that's
really really hard.
Yeah but if you can that'samazing like with like I think
Gone Girl was really um GoneGirl's fun it was so I feel like
it was it did somethingdifferent right because at the
(46:11):
beginning you think you like AmyDunn and you think you hate Nick
Dunn.
Nick Dunn's this piece of shithe's cheating on her whatever
and then you have thisepistolary chapters where Amy is
writing in her journal and she'sso sweet and she loves him so
much and all this stuff um andthen spoiler alert oh yeah
(46:32):
spoiler alert if you haven'theard of Gone Girl and then
halfway through it switches.
Yeah because you realize thatthese are journal entries that
the diabolical Amy wrote s andleft so that the investigators
were would think that she wasthis innocent loving wife who
was killed by her husband.
And her husband you never likehim he like he's never a likable
(46:56):
character but you realize thathe's innocent.
Yeah and so I think that thatthat switch was really
interesting.
Like it was if you could write abook where and maybe there's
lots of books written like thissince or forever but where you
think you like someone and youthink you hate someone and then
(47:17):
halfway through you realize whythey're like the way they are or
that one of them is insincere orwhatever it is and it switches.
Totally that is so sick.
SPEAKER_01 (47:25):
It is that was a good book.
Yeah it was really good and theydid a good job with the movie
too I gotta say that was thatwas one book made into a movie
where they did a decent job.
SPEAKER_00 (47:35):
They did do a good job with that.
Listeners I'm gonna be startingto learn about that whole world
so you're probably gonna behearing more about thrillers
from me.
SPEAKER_01 (47:43):
Fun, fun fun well obviously I like those okay so
story time you have two weeksnow between episodes to submit
something please submitsomething we want to hear from
you.
SPEAKER_00 (47:55):
Yes we want to read your stuff yeah we do have um a
poem from my friend JesseZechniwitz so I can't wait to
play that for you and then I'mgonna read this crazy juicy
story that I haven't written yetwhere the protagonist when she's
aroused her wetness is glitterycyan and it has some kind of
(48:16):
special power.
SPEAKER_01 (48:17):
And then I think I'm going to write another chapter
of my the wolf story.
SPEAKER_00 (48:24):
Yeah wolf not wolf maybe he's a wolf maybe he's not
I really want him to grab her bythe ankles oh my god every time
I get those Instagram stories Iscreen capture it and send it to
you now oh my gosh Rachel sentme one I was like I want these
yeah I don't know why you don'tget them why am I why am I being
pegged for this is the questionbecause I'm like probably the
(48:47):
hours that you're awake you wakeup at like four in the morning
and go on Instagram they're likethis chick's horny.
SPEAKER_01 (48:52):
And I do have quite a few friends who read romanticy
do you have friends who readromantic?
Not really okay so I have atleast two to three friends who
read them and actively like likeprobably follow and look them
stuff up.
SPEAKER_00 (49:05):
Have you mentioned this phenomena to those people
because they um no I don't thinkI have you should they probably
love those I'll ask my friendBritney because she she would
love those.
Be like hey Brittany have youseen this one?
Yeah right okay so in two weeksfrom from the date that we post
this we're gonna do the storytime.
If you want to get on that storytime please send in just either
(49:29):
the text of your short story orpoem or an audio recording to
contact atwriteyourheartoutpod.com.
Okay so we'll see you next timethanks for listening bye
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Bobby Bones Show
Listen to 'The Bobby Bones Show' by downloading the daily full replay.