July 10, 2025 • 28 mins
Amy Poeppel returns to the podcast to discuss her latest book FAR AND AWAY.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Lucy was having lunch at Haywire on McKinney, sitting between
Brenn and Harper, the impressive young CEOs who had hired
her only six months before. She found them intimidating.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome to the Public Library Podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Sorry, here's your host.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
And podcast librarian award winning poet, future bestselling author, and
host of one of the most listened to radio shows
in America, Helen Little.
Speaker 4 (00:27):
Hello, book lovers, and welcome to another episode of the
Public Library Podcast. I'm so excited to have a return guest,
Amy Pople is here. Thank you for being here.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
I loved your book Far and Away.
Speaker 4 (00:40):
I'm so excited to be able to talk to you
about it. What's the book about? First, before I jump
into where'd you get.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
This idea from?
Speaker 1 (00:46):
So, the book is about two women who end up
swapping homes. One is in Dallas, Texas, and there's a
huge scandal involving her family and she just wants to
get out of town and go anywhere. And then there's
another woman named Greta and she lives in Berlin, Germany,
and her husband has kind of thrown a curveball and
instead of moving to New York for a sabbatical. They're
(01:06):
going to Texas, and she knows nothing about Dallas, and
all she knows is that she needs in a very
short period of time to find a place to live.
And the two women end up meeting on social media
and they swap homes and get entangled in each other's
lives in ways that they definitely didn't predict.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
At the outset, again, I'm reading, I'm like, this is great,
this is great.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
Where did you get this idea from?
Speaker 4 (01:28):
And ideas come from the darnedest places, so I had
to know where did this one come from?
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Yeah, so the idea of a house swap book actually
came from a cousin on my husband's side of the family,
and she said, you've lived in so many different places,
you should do a house swap book. She's like, I
loved the holiday, but I want to see an amy
Pople version of the holiday. And I was like, okay,
well that sounds entertaining. But then I had to sit
there and think where. And I moved to Berlin when
(01:54):
my kids were very small and lived there for just
about two years, and then spent the last ten years
back and forth between Frankfurt and New York. So I
thought that could be entertaining two urban places but very different,
New York City and Berlin.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
And then I.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
Thought, you know, I'm a Dallas, Texas girl, like I
was born and raised in Dallas, and I know that. Yes,
I lived there until I was about seventeen years old.
And somehow I thought culturally it would be so much
richer and more interesting to do a swap between the
German culture and the Texan culture. And that would just
give me so much more room for humor and so
(02:29):
much more room for misunderstanding and troubles with communication. So
I ended up deciding to swap the families. The rest
of the ideas, like the why are they swapping? The
what happened to each family? I don't really know how
to say where all of that came from.
Speaker 4 (02:43):
I wouldn't say where all of that comes from because
I think that would give away too much.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
Yeah, that's just the stuff that you know when you're drafting.
If you're a pants are like me, we talk about
the plotters and the pants pants are meaning I don't
PLoP my books out at the outset. I fly by
the seat of my pants a lot of us. Do
it just comes in the writing. It comes sort of
in the drafting.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
You know. It's interesting because that was one of the
questions of like, oh, you're an East Coast girl, how
did you come up with Texas?
Speaker 3 (03:11):
But now I understand.
Speaker 4 (03:13):
I lived in Dallas for a couple of years, and
it was nice for me to revisit via your book.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
It was but the heat, I remember, Yes, I had
to get a lot of that. That's why I wanted
this to be a summer swap. Was I was like
the rain in Berlin and the heat in Texas. Already,
those were two contrasts that I wanted. But I love Dallas.
I loved revisiting it. I went back to Dallas. I
go all the time, my sister still lives there.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
But to revisit it.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
In my head and to walk around with Greta as
she's sort of discovering Dallas as a German woman was
really interesting.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Oh that is cool.
Speaker 4 (03:45):
So tell us about the two main characters, Greta and Lucy.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
So Lucy's son at the very outset of the book
gets into huge trouble, and that was a really interesting
conflict for me to have to come up with because
how do you come up with a conflict that as
a mom to get that call from the school where
you hear the voice of the principle or whoever, and
you just know, uh oh uh oh, we are something
(04:10):
big has happened. I'm in big trouble. So I wanted
Lucy sort of to be dealing with that. I wanted
her to be dealing with it by herself. I didn't
want her husband helping. I didn't want him around. How
do you get rid of a husband and I don't
have it and still have him because I didn't want
to kill him off. I didn't want there to be
a divorce because he'd still be around, he'd still be
(04:31):
weighing in on the choices, the decisions to be made
with the family. So I had to find a creative
way to get her husband, Mason, off the grid. And
I started going down doing all these deep dives, and
how do.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
You get rid of a person like right?
Speaker 1 (04:48):
You know, he's a scientist. And I ended up doing
all this research on these Mars biospheres in places like
New Mexico and Arkansas, and I thought that's where I'm
going to put him.
Speaker 4 (04:57):
I'm going to You've created the perfect scenario and what
you did with it in terms of uh with society
and socially was even better. And I'm not going to
say any more than that, but that was one of
my favorite storylines.
Speaker 1 (05:08):
Yeah, So that was really fun to sort of work
on Lucy and her just dealing with this crisis that
she's in with her family, and then Greta really is
sort of reluctantly going to Dallas. Not she doesn't have
anything bad in her head about Dallas. It's not ever
been on her bucket list of places that she wants
to go. So then it was really interesting for me
(05:29):
to think about Greta and her husband Otto, who is
just the most German German ever created, and I thought,
what would they think of Dallas? Like I really, it
was so interesting to me because when I started writing
about these characters, I didn't know which one of the
two in this couple might embrace Dallas and which might
feel it's not really their cup of tea or feel
(05:50):
sort of neutral about it. So that was also just
in terms of being somebody who writes the book as
I go, I don't know how to do that any
other way, because how could I know these characters are
going to think until I get to know them really
well and put them in that scene and then see
what happens. So that's, to me, that's where the joy
of writing comes from.
Speaker 4 (06:10):
I was also fascinated about this theme that I saw
throughout the book about assumptions. You know, because when you
don't know somebody, or you don't know a situation, or
you don't know a city, you make these assumptions about them.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
And we all make assumptions.
Speaker 4 (06:24):
All the time, and we can jump to conclusions that
can be remarkably wrong. What made you choose to weave
this in and out something that we can all be
guilty of into this story.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
So I thought it would be really interesting to have
this character, Jack, the teenager, to be accused of something
and then to sort of talk to sort of work
that out about assumptions. What will some people assume he's
done based on the scraps of information that they get.
Greta's daughter Emmy, ends up hearing scraps of information, and
(06:56):
what will she assume about this boy that she's never met,
who's actually living in her home and she's visiting and
staying in his home, And what assumptions will they make?
And which ones are right and which ones are wrong.
We do this as kids, we do this as adults.
I think it's often not the right idea, and we
do it about place.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
Also.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
I've moved a lot in my life, and I always
tell my kids when they say, oh, I've moved, as
you know, they're ending up in a new place. I
don't think I like it here, And I always say,
you need twelve months in a new place before you
can even ask yourself the question do I like it here?
You can start to collect information, but you need a year.
In my experience, you need a year, I agree, in
(07:38):
a place before you can truly sort of settle on
how you feel.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
But do we do that.
Speaker 4 (07:42):
No.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
We go to places and we immediately have one interaction
with one person and we say, oh, that must be
representative of this place. And that's not the case, of course,
but it's human nature, I think, to jump to conclusions
and to just make assumptions about things where we don't
have all the information.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
I've felt like that was.
Speaker 4 (08:00):
Such a dominant theme throughout the book, and I loved
it because it made me check myself. It made me
stop and think because I knew what was going on
behind the scenes, but the characters didn't. And I thought
to myself, humm, I need to remember this.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
I mean that was true in the case of Mason too,
and that when Greta hears he's doing a stretch out west,
she jumps to the conclusion that, oh, he's in jail.
This guy must be in jail. And then it's not
until later when she actually starts to google him and
find out things. She finds out that he is in
fact locked up, but he's locked up in a NASA biosphere.
So yes, I think you're absolutely right. All the characters
(08:36):
in this book, I think make assumptions when they should
have just slowed down and you know, just sort of
think a little bit before you jump to conclusions.
Speaker 4 (08:44):
I also loved the storyline about Greta's career and Maria Vermier.
Speaker 3 (08:50):
Yes, how did this idea end up in your story?
Because you know what I did.
Speaker 4 (08:55):
I went to my laptop and I'm like, sure, oh,
this is real, and I started reading about her. I'm like,
go back to the book, but I went down a
rabbit hole learning about her story.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
So kind of tell us a little bit about it.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
Yeah, So when I was living in Berlin, my husband was,
and he was a fellow and in this academic institution
in the American Academy of Berlin, and I went to
a lecture one night with this man, a professor Ben Benstock,
and he gave this lecture about Maria Vermir, and it
was so well argued and it was so fascinating. It
sounded like fiction. But he's quite convinced that he's accurate
(09:30):
about this. But he does this outline of all the paintings,
and he was quite convinced that Johannes Vermir did not
paint about six of them. Since I heard him give
that lecture. Museums like even the National Gallery, I think,
don't quote me on that because I'm I'd have to
look it up. But I think it's the National Gallery
who now says about one of their Vermir's it's it's
probably not a Vermir, but we don't know who it is, okay.
(09:51):
And in Ben's opinion, you're right, it's not a Vermir,
and it's his daughter, because he really believes that there's
nobody else who could have done these paintings that are
being questioned right now. The fact that it was a
woman that he thinks painted it a young woman, the
fact that the entire family was sort of in on
passing these paintings off as Johannes Vermeirz because they had
to sell them, so they were sort of all in
(10:12):
on something. It was such an interesting scandal. So then
I read his book cover to cover the secret apparent
and what was it called Vermier's Family Secrets. I've gotten
to be friends with Ben and his wife. Wow, And
I called him and I was like, I want to
put this thread into my book and how can I
do it?
Speaker 3 (10:31):
And what can I do?
Speaker 1 (10:32):
And we had a long talk about the fact that
I decided it would be best to make up a painting,
so the painting is absolutely fabricated. I make up a
painting that Greta discovers. She's a person who buys art
for very, very wealthy families, and she has this happens
all the time in a Swiss vault, a painting is
you know, emerges and all the experts say that it's
(10:54):
a vermir and she, you know, facilitates the purchase of
this extremely expensive painting. And then I have Ben himself
pop into the book and say, such a cool purchase.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
Can't wait to see the painting.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
I have some interesting theories to share with you, and
it's the last thing Greta wants to hear because it's
casting doubt on something where she was an expert and
she put her reputation on the line. So to bring
that into a work of fiction was so much fun
for me.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
Yeah, because I just now I did not realize that
he was a real person. I didn't even look that
part up, but I was like, this is fascinating, and
I mean, it really just took me into an area
of something else I wanted to learn, and to the
point that I'm like, I had to stop and come
back to the rates. I mean, it really just fascinated me,
(11:41):
and I'm like, this is really cool stuff.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
And if you go to the met you can see
the whole wall of paintings, and if you read Ben's book,
it'll tell you exactly which ones he's convinced Johannes Vmir's
daughter painted and not Johanna Vmir.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
It's just his theory.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
But it's a lot of fun to go to the
Metropolitan Museum of Art and check those paintings out.
Speaker 4 (12:00):
I have to do that now because that is fascinating
to me. Another thing that was fascinating and I have
to know the answer to this. We talk about Jack
and Jack was Jack's a very bright kid and potentially
going to MIT. And part of his gifts is math,
and it's a formula in your book, and I'm like.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
I saw that on the page.
Speaker 4 (12:24):
Tell me me, is that your gift to or someone
help you with the math?
Speaker 1 (12:29):
Someone helped me with the math. I'm going to tell
you I am not gifted when it comes to math.
I knew what I wanted the scandal to be. I
knew that I wanted it to be something that if
you saw this issue from one angle, you would assume
that Jack was a terrible person who had done a
terrible thing. If you looked at it from a different angle,
you might see that it was bad judgment. It wasn't
(12:52):
a great thing that he did. But it's not being
interpreted the way he meant it, because I think with
teenagers especially, and back to what you were saying about
assumptions and misunderstandings, jumping to conclusions. I wanted there to
be a scandal where it appeared to be very clear
one way, but once you get to know the character better,
once you get to know the story better you can
(13:13):
see it from his side, and that you might think, could.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
He have shown better judgment?
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Sure, but I mean seventeen eighteen year old boys aren't
exactly known for having most well.
Speaker 3 (13:23):
Formed frontal lobes.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
So I really thought it made sense for him to
jump to do something that wasn't bright. So then it
was a matter of the math, you know, yes, like
how could I actually make this where it's you know,
actually possible. So I my nephew is getting a PhD
in math right now. So the first thing I did
was like explain the situation to him, and he wrote
(13:47):
the formula for me. But I live at NYU. I
live in faculty housing, so just to be sure, I
ran down the hall and knocked on the door of
the head of the math department at NYU, and I
was like, can we go over this one time because
some things had changed the book also, and he reviewed
it and he was like, you're good, Like this works,
like this makes perfect sense that if you were a
mathematician and you looked at this formula, you would be like, oh, yeah,
(14:09):
I see what he was trying to do. I get
what he was doing. But if you don't speak that language,
of the formula, You're going to be like, that's that
means nothing to me. It must be what I assumed
it was, instead of actually interpreting in the formula.
Speaker 3 (14:23):
Well, the interesting thing is I understood the German oh
good better than the math. Yes, yes, that is really funny.
What was your favorite thing about working on this book?
Speaker 1 (14:36):
I think my favorite, well, there were. One of my
favorite parts was having the two families' lives criss crossed
in ways that they didn't expect or see coming. That
was sort of the most fun was finding all like
the neighbor. There's a neighbor in Dallas, Texas who's sort
of a very minor character at the outset of the book,
(14:58):
but I thought, well, if she's living right next door,
or how could she keep coming back into the story.
And I won't do any spoilers, but you know, ultimately,
how could she end up playing a big role, a
bigger role than we might expect in this book? So
those things were really fun. The other thing that I
really enjoyed was now that I had Mason off the
page and in this biosphere where he's not aware of
(15:20):
anything that's happening, but he is able to write emails
out he can't get anything in, so to write his emails,
to write his messages was I mean, I had so
much fun doing that because we get to really track
how he feels. Part of what they're doing in this
experiment is tracking the sort of psychological impacts of isolation
(15:41):
with a small group of people. I also decided to
add a little twist that it's Mason alone with all
female scientists in this biosphere, just because I thought that's
kind of interesting and to sort of see what happens
to his mood over time, and to see sort of
how he thinks about his decision to go into this
thing over time.
Speaker 3 (16:00):
It was just.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
Writing those that I had a ball writing those messages.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
That was really fun. That is interesting.
Speaker 4 (16:06):
One of the things too that was very fun for
me was I'm an avid traveler, so I love to travel.
I've never been to Berlin, and that is like high
on the list. But the Cottage by the Sea really
intrigued me.
Speaker 3 (16:18):
Is that somewhere you've been I have.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
I've been there. I went. I'd heard about that north
coast of Germany so many times and I'd never been.
And as I was writing the book and I was
trying to figure out where did I want this other
location to be. I have spent a lot of time
in Copenhagen. Copenhagen works into the book, and I've spent
a lot of time there. So I said to my husband,
guess what, because we were in Frankfurt at the time,
(16:43):
and I was like, we're taking a trip, and we
got in the car and drove there. And for me,
that's all the difference in the world to write about
a place if I've seen it and been there and
spent a few days there.
Speaker 3 (16:54):
Walking the beach, I.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
Mean I found the house.
Speaker 3 (16:57):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
I literally drove around until I found the house where
I was like, that's the house there. That's going to
be the slightly needs a lot of work, but it's
lovely and has so much character, and it's old and
it has a thatch roof, and for me to go
there and actually see it, it just makes the writing
process so much more pleasant for me, because you just
(17:19):
are relying on your own memory and your notes and
the smells and the feel and the places and the
restaurants and what it feels like when you drive into
the town. So Hiligenhoffen was one of the places where
I said, if I'm going to write about this place,
I got to go there. And fortunately for me, it
was not an international trip because I was in Germany
at the time. So just went up there and took
(17:39):
a look and I loved it, and I want to
go back.
Speaker 4 (17:41):
Well, it's better to drive up on a house and
to walk up on a person. I saw a woman
on the sidewalk the other day.
Speaker 3 (17:47):
I'm like, that looks like what I'm thinking in my head.
Speaker 4 (17:51):
But I was behind her, and I'm like, I wanted
to walk around and see what her face look like
without being creepy about it. Yes, So I picked up
my face and then I've acted like I forgot something,
turned around around and I'm like, that's her.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
And did she disappoint her?
Speaker 4 (18:06):
She did?
Speaker 3 (18:06):
Was her face?
Speaker 4 (18:07):
Yeah, it was exactly what I was thinking, man in
my head. And I'm like, now I have a visual
yeor I can describe.
Speaker 3 (18:12):
What it is that I'm looking at.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
Yeah, And I'll sometimes do that, not with character, but
just I don't put a lot of physical descriptions in
my books, but they're in my head because I'm fine
for the most part with letting the reader add those
pieces in themselves. And envision that person themselves, but do
but I have that in my head all the time.
And sometimes it will be somebody I went to college
(18:36):
with and just her style or her look. Or it'll
be sometimes I'll picture an actor and sort of the
way they dress and the way they carry themselves, so
that I have to have that in my head. It
doesn't always end up on the page, but I but
it's always in my head.
Speaker 3 (18:50):
So what is next for you? I know you're probably
already working on the next thing. I know you're like,
this just came out. Can I get a break? But yeah,
what is next for you? Never a break. That's not
a bad thing.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
It's not a bad thing. We got to keep going.
So one exciting thing is that my last book, The
sweet Spot, is being adapted into a film with Jennifer
Westfeldt is writing the script and she's attached as a
co star in the movie, and so great fingers crossed
that it will continue. Because you know these things, there's
always any At any moment, this projects can come to
(19:26):
a stop. But for now it's moving forward and I'm
super excited about that. I am working on a next
book and I think that it might end up surprising
readers a little bit because I'm I'm going in a
slightly different direction with that one. And the other thing
that I'm doing is I read. I read and read.
When I'm sort of in between projects, I like to
(19:46):
read as much as I possibly can, because I mean,
I read all the time.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
I read.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
Some people say they can't read while they're writing. That's
not something that I can't. Yeah, that you can or can't.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
I can absolutely say I need to.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
I need to same, and I feel the same way
about going to theater and you know, going out into
the world. I sort of need input.
Speaker 3 (20:05):
In my mind.
Speaker 4 (20:07):
I wonder if that's more common with pantsers, because you're
kind of stimulated by things around you.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
But if you have a plot, you're like, I have
to stick to this.
Speaker 4 (20:18):
Yes, I wonder if that has something to do with
that's fascinating, I would tell you so. I think.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
I think it definitely has something to do with the
fact that we're looking. We're looking for the next little direction,
the next little turn that the book is going to take,
the next sign. Honestly sign. I mean that might sound
woo woo, but sometimes something's in my head and then
I see something and I'm like, Oh, that's just like
the thing I was thinking, and it just feels like
it all makes sense. Yes, I am reading some nutty
(20:47):
things this summer, and I mean that in the best
possible way. I loved Annie Hartnett's Road to Tender Hearts.
Just a fascinating road trip book about a middle aged
alcoholic daughter, two random children, and a cat who go
on a road trip across America. And it's fascinating and
just a wild ride. I absolutely loved that book. I
(21:12):
am currently reading. I'm actually listening to the audio version
of Margo's Got Money Troubles.
Speaker 3 (21:18):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Not what I expected. I don't know what I kind
of went in with. I like to go into books
with no expectations. Sometimes when there's a lot of hype,
you know, you hear a lot in advance, And in
this case, I'm sure there's been a lot of hype,
but I just happened to have not come across it.
So every page of this book is a surprise to me,
and I'm absolutely loving it.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
I read a book called The Red House.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
Recently by Andrea I'm going to check my good Reads
because that's what I always do Andrea Lee, and it
was if you like travel so far and away, I
really do think of it as a travel book. The
Road to Tender Heart's definitely a travel book. The Red
House is also a book about a woman who grew
up in California, moves to Milan, and then end that
marrying a man who has a house in Madagascar. So
(22:03):
it's all about her life between Milan and Madagascar, two
places I do not know. So for me it was
just the best kind of armchair travel. I just really
have enjoyed Milan Madagascar now don't even have a picture
in my head, you know. So for me to see
this American woman living in Milan seeing Madagascar for the
(22:23):
first time in the history of Madagascar, which is not pretty,
and her sort of experiencing that is just It's a
fascinating read.
Speaker 3 (22:31):
Deadly loved it. What about you, Helen? What are you
reading right now?
Speaker 4 (22:35):
I'm reading On a Judge, which is the story of
a woman who belonged to Martha Washington, and it's a
here two characters, one is in the present and one
is in the past. Is fascinating. What did I just
finish that? I absolutely loved.
Speaker 3 (22:54):
Kylie read such a fun age. Oh yes, I'm catching
up on some stuff.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
And before that, actually a nonfiction book about yoga from
a guy named sad Guru who is I follow him
on social He's fascinating.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
On my candle is tar Baby by Tony Oh gosh. Yes.
Speaker 4 (23:15):
I usually have something on the candle that I'm reading,
something that I'm listening to, and something that's tactile. So
I mean oftentimes reading three things at a.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Time, yes, And I like the fact that we can
do that now, because I can't read three physical books
or two physical I can't go back and forth between
two physical books. But I love the fact that I
can hop in my car or on the subway and
listen to the audiobook that I'm hooked on, and then
if I'm on a plane, I can just get my
kindle out. I just read Jamie Brenner's new book The
(23:46):
Wedding The Weekend Crashers, which is going to come out
this fall, and it's a book about a woman and
her daughter who go on a knitting retreat together. Interesting
and at the same retreat there happened to be a
bunch of guys. Is it basically a bachelor weekends? If
you could think of two more different groups of people,
a group of women, knitters and a group of dudes
(24:06):
at a bachelor party in the same little bed and
breakfast and comedy and drama, and so it's really it's
a lot of fun.
Speaker 4 (24:14):
Speaking of Jamie, I read your acknowledgments to your writers group,
many who I've met and have had on the show.
What you may not know is that you indirectly connected
me with mine. There's a wonderful group of authors in
Bucks County and over the past six years we have
been brunching on Palema Mosa's and supporting each other. Jenny Wall,
(24:37):
Jenny Way, VICTORYA Shade Yes, Suzanne Baltzar who also writes
under Sophie Andrews.
Speaker 3 (24:43):
And for the past six years we've had this little
group where we get together.
Speaker 4 (24:48):
And you were in Doylestown and I think you and
Jenny were doing something together exactly, and that's where we
all met because I came out there because you were
out there.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Yes, I mean, I have to say I started this
career at h just had my sixtieth birthday, So this
is five books and ten years, a totally unexpected career
change for me. From teaching high school and working in schools,
I worked as an admissions person. Total surprise that I'm
doing this at all. But the biggest surprise to me
(25:17):
is the female support and companionship.
Speaker 3 (25:19):
I don't know what.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
I didn't see it coming. I didn't know that was
going to be a bonus gift with this. I did career,
but this group of women who I've gotten to know
and to support, they support me so much. I don't
know what I would do without them, because there's so
many questions with this career at every stage of this career,
and to be able to have other writers to call
(25:40):
and say, hey, did this ever happen to you? Or
did you ever consider this or did you know? Because
we're all just trying to sort of find readers, you know.
And I did not know that the group of women
writers would end up being like such a wonderful group
of friends and companions. And I honestly could I talking
(26:00):
about it because I don't know what I would do
without them.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
Oh, I completely get it.
Speaker 4 (26:04):
Yeah, if you live in New York City, you expect it.
But I don't live in the city. So to have
a community outside of the city, in a suburban slash
rural area, it was even a bigger gift.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Yes, to find your people is just so great. And
the thing is so much of what we do as solitary.
So much of what we do is spent hunched over
our laptops in our own little worlds. And to be
able to come out of that world and talk to
people and celebrate with people and commiserate with people who
are going through the same things and who understand this
(26:38):
world is just the biggest gift of all.
Speaker 4 (26:40):
So if people want to celebrate with you and far
and away your latest book, how do they find you?
Speaker 1 (26:45):
On social So I'm on Instagram mostly these days at
Amy pople You can always take a peek at my website,
sign up for my newsletter. I'm not as good about
sending my newsletter out as I need to be, but
that's the kind of thing that I would call my
group of friends and be like, let's talk about newsletters.
Who do people want to get in a newsletter? So
(27:05):
you can mostly find me on Instagram?
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Yeah, do you use substack? Bind mey chance?
Speaker 1 (27:11):
I read substack?
Speaker 3 (27:13):
I am.
Speaker 1 (27:13):
I am not writing on substack, but I love I
have my regular things that I get and I just
think of that. Yeah, it's it's a terrific platform.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
I think.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
I think it's really great and I'm not adverse to
getting on it. I just one thing though, exactly. I mean,
it's interesting also that we end up being marketers. I
didn't know that was part of my job in marketing.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
My whole life, though we're used to that. Yeah, that
part I get. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (27:39):
Well, thank you so much for joining me today. Thank
you for coming back on the show. Thank you for
this book. Far and away, everybody pick it up. It's
really good. You will enjoy it and I can't wait.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Hope to see the sweet spots. Hope me too, fingers crossed.
That would be awesome. Great, and thank you again. Thank you, Helen.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
Another show in the books. Join us for the next
episode of the Public Library Podcast, a place to check
out books.
Lucy was having lunch at Haywire on McKinney, sitting between
Brenn and Harper, the impressive young CEOs who had hired
her only six months before. She found them intimidating.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome to the Public Library Podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Sorry, here's your host.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
And podcast librarian award winning poet, future bestselling author, and
host of one of the most listened to radio shows
in America, Helen Little.
Speaker 4 (00:27):
Hello, book lovers, and welcome to another episode of the
Public Library Podcast. I'm so excited to have a return guest,
Amy Pople is here. Thank you for being here.
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 3 (00:38):
I loved your book Far and Away.
Speaker 4 (00:40):
I'm so excited to be able to talk to you
about it. What's the book about? First, before I jump
into where'd you get.
Speaker 3 (00:45):
This idea from?
Speaker 1 (00:46):
So, the book is about two women who end up
swapping homes. One is in Dallas, Texas, and there's a
huge scandal involving her family and she just wants to
get out of town and go anywhere. And then there's
another woman named Greta and she lives in Berlin, Germany,
and her husband has kind of thrown a curveball and
instead of moving to New York for a sabbatical. They're
(01:06):
going to Texas, and she knows nothing about Dallas, and
all she knows is that she needs in a very
short period of time to find a place to live.
And the two women end up meeting on social media
and they swap homes and get entangled in each other's
lives in ways that they definitely didn't predict.
Speaker 4 (01:22):
At the outset, again, I'm reading, I'm like, this is great,
this is great.
Speaker 3 (01:26):
Where did you get this idea from?
Speaker 4 (01:28):
And ideas come from the darnedest places, so I had
to know where did this one come from?
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Yeah, so the idea of a house swap book actually
came from a cousin on my husband's side of the family,
and she said, you've lived in so many different places,
you should do a house swap book. She's like, I
loved the holiday, but I want to see an amy
Pople version of the holiday. And I was like, okay,
well that sounds entertaining. But then I had to sit
there and think where. And I moved to Berlin when
(01:54):
my kids were very small and lived there for just
about two years, and then spent the last ten years
back and forth between Frankfurt and New York. So I
thought that could be entertaining two urban places but very different,
New York City and Berlin.
Speaker 3 (02:06):
And then I.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
Thought, you know, I'm a Dallas, Texas girl, like I
was born and raised in Dallas, and I know that. Yes,
I lived there until I was about seventeen years old.
And somehow I thought culturally it would be so much
richer and more interesting to do a swap between the
German culture and the Texan culture. And that would just
give me so much more room for humor and so
(02:29):
much more room for misunderstanding and troubles with communication. So
I ended up deciding to swap the families. The rest
of the ideas, like the why are they swapping? The
what happened to each family? I don't really know how
to say where all of that came from.
Speaker 4 (02:43):
I wouldn't say where all of that comes from because
I think that would give away too much.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
Yeah, that's just the stuff that you know when you're drafting.
If you're a pants are like me, we talk about
the plotters and the pants pants are meaning I don't
PLoP my books out at the outset. I fly by
the seat of my pants a lot of us. Do
it just comes in the writing. It comes sort of
in the drafting.
Speaker 4 (03:06):
You know. It's interesting because that was one of the
questions of like, oh, you're an East Coast girl, how
did you come up with Texas?
Speaker 3 (03:11):
But now I understand.
Speaker 4 (03:13):
I lived in Dallas for a couple of years, and
it was nice for me to revisit via your book.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
It was but the heat, I remember, Yes, I had
to get a lot of that. That's why I wanted
this to be a summer swap. Was I was like
the rain in Berlin and the heat in Texas. Already,
those were two contrasts that I wanted. But I love Dallas.
I loved revisiting it. I went back to Dallas. I
go all the time, my sister still lives there.
Speaker 3 (03:36):
But to revisit it.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
In my head and to walk around with Greta as
she's sort of discovering Dallas as a German woman was
really interesting.
Speaker 3 (03:43):
Oh that is cool.
Speaker 4 (03:45):
So tell us about the two main characters, Greta and Lucy.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
So Lucy's son at the very outset of the book
gets into huge trouble, and that was a really interesting
conflict for me to have to come up with because
how do you come up with a conflict that as
a mom to get that call from the school where
you hear the voice of the principle or whoever, and
you just know, uh oh uh oh, we are something
(04:10):
big has happened. I'm in big trouble. So I wanted
Lucy sort of to be dealing with that. I wanted
her to be dealing with it by herself. I didn't
want her husband helping. I didn't want him around. How
do you get rid of a husband and I don't
have it and still have him because I didn't want
to kill him off. I didn't want there to be
a divorce because he'd still be around, he'd still be
(04:31):
weighing in on the choices, the decisions to be made
with the family. So I had to find a creative
way to get her husband, Mason, off the grid. And
I started going down doing all these deep dives, and
how do.
Speaker 3 (04:45):
You get rid of a person like right?
Speaker 1 (04:48):
You know, he's a scientist. And I ended up doing
all this research on these Mars biospheres in places like
New Mexico and Arkansas, and I thought that's where I'm
going to put him.
Speaker 4 (04:57):
I'm going to You've created the perfect scenario and what
you did with it in terms of uh with society
and socially was even better. And I'm not going to
say any more than that, but that was one of
my favorite storylines.
Speaker 1 (05:08):
Yeah, So that was really fun to sort of work
on Lucy and her just dealing with this crisis that
she's in with her family, and then Greta really is
sort of reluctantly going to Dallas. Not she doesn't have
anything bad in her head about Dallas. It's not ever
been on her bucket list of places that she wants
to go. So then it was really interesting for me
(05:29):
to think about Greta and her husband Otto, who is
just the most German German ever created, and I thought,
what would they think of Dallas? Like I really, it
was so interesting to me because when I started writing
about these characters, I didn't know which one of the
two in this couple might embrace Dallas and which might
feel it's not really their cup of tea or feel
(05:50):
sort of neutral about it. So that was also just
in terms of being somebody who writes the book as
I go, I don't know how to do that any
other way, because how could I know these characters are
going to think until I get to know them really
well and put them in that scene and then see
what happens. So that's, to me, that's where the joy
of writing comes from.
Speaker 4 (06:10):
I was also fascinated about this theme that I saw
throughout the book about assumptions. You know, because when you
don't know somebody, or you don't know a situation, or
you don't know a city, you make these assumptions about them.
Speaker 3 (06:22):
And we all make assumptions.
Speaker 4 (06:24):
All the time, and we can jump to conclusions that
can be remarkably wrong. What made you choose to weave
this in and out something that we can all be
guilty of into this story.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
So I thought it would be really interesting to have
this character, Jack, the teenager, to be accused of something
and then to sort of talk to sort of work
that out about assumptions. What will some people assume he's
done based on the scraps of information that they get.
Greta's daughter Emmy, ends up hearing scraps of information, and
(06:56):
what will she assume about this boy that she's never met,
who's actually living in her home and she's visiting and
staying in his home, And what assumptions will they make?
And which ones are right and which ones are wrong.
We do this as kids, we do this as adults.
I think it's often not the right idea, and we
do it about place.
Speaker 4 (07:16):
Also.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
I've moved a lot in my life, and I always
tell my kids when they say, oh, I've moved, as
you know, they're ending up in a new place. I
don't think I like it here, And I always say,
you need twelve months in a new place before you
can even ask yourself the question do I like it here?
You can start to collect information, but you need a year.
In my experience, you need a year, I agree, in
(07:38):
a place before you can truly sort of settle on
how you feel.
Speaker 3 (07:41):
But do we do that.
Speaker 4 (07:42):
No.
Speaker 1 (07:44):
We go to places and we immediately have one interaction
with one person and we say, oh, that must be
representative of this place. And that's not the case, of course,
but it's human nature, I think, to jump to conclusions
and to just make assumptions about things where we don't
have all the information.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
I've felt like that was.
Speaker 4 (08:00):
Such a dominant theme throughout the book, and I loved
it because it made me check myself. It made me
stop and think because I knew what was going on
behind the scenes, but the characters didn't. And I thought
to myself, humm, I need to remember this.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
I mean that was true in the case of Mason too,
and that when Greta hears he's doing a stretch out west,
she jumps to the conclusion that, oh, he's in jail.
This guy must be in jail. And then it's not
until later when she actually starts to google him and
find out things. She finds out that he is in
fact locked up, but he's locked up in a NASA biosphere.
So yes, I think you're absolutely right. All the characters
(08:36):
in this book, I think make assumptions when they should
have just slowed down and you know, just sort of
think a little bit before you jump to conclusions.
Speaker 4 (08:44):
I also loved the storyline about Greta's career and Maria Vermier.
Speaker 3 (08:50):
Yes, how did this idea end up in your story?
Because you know what I did.
Speaker 4 (08:55):
I went to my laptop and I'm like, sure, oh,
this is real, and I started reading about her. I'm like,
go back to the book, but I went down a
rabbit hole learning about her story.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
So kind of tell us a little bit about it.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
Yeah, So when I was living in Berlin, my husband was,
and he was a fellow and in this academic institution
in the American Academy of Berlin, and I went to
a lecture one night with this man, a professor Ben Benstock,
and he gave this lecture about Maria Vermir, and it
was so well argued and it was so fascinating. It
sounded like fiction. But he's quite convinced that he's accurate
(09:30):
about this. But he does this outline of all the paintings,
and he was quite convinced that Johannes Vermir did not
paint about six of them. Since I heard him give
that lecture. Museums like even the National Gallery, I think,
don't quote me on that because I'm I'd have to
look it up. But I think it's the National Gallery
who now says about one of their Vermir's it's it's
probably not a Vermir, but we don't know who it is, okay.
(09:51):
And in Ben's opinion, you're right, it's not a Vermir,
and it's his daughter, because he really believes that there's
nobody else who could have done these paintings that are
being questioned right now. The fact that it was a
woman that he thinks painted it a young woman, the
fact that the entire family was sort of in on
passing these paintings off as Johannes Vermeirz because they had
to sell them, so they were sort of all in
(10:12):
on something. It was such an interesting scandal. So then
I read his book cover to cover the secret apparent
and what was it called Vermier's Family Secrets. I've gotten
to be friends with Ben and his wife. Wow, And
I called him and I was like, I want to
put this thread into my book and how can I
do it?
Speaker 3 (10:31):
And what can I do?
Speaker 1 (10:32):
And we had a long talk about the fact that
I decided it would be best to make up a painting,
so the painting is absolutely fabricated. I make up a
painting that Greta discovers. She's a person who buys art
for very, very wealthy families, and she has this happens
all the time in a Swiss vault, a painting is
you know, emerges and all the experts say that it's
(10:54):
a vermir and she, you know, facilitates the purchase of
this extremely expensive painting. And then I have Ben himself
pop into the book and say, such a cool purchase.
Speaker 3 (11:04):
Can't wait to see the painting.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
I have some interesting theories to share with you, and
it's the last thing Greta wants to hear because it's
casting doubt on something where she was an expert and
she put her reputation on the line. So to bring
that into a work of fiction was so much fun
for me.
Speaker 4 (11:20):
Yeah, because I just now I did not realize that
he was a real person. I didn't even look that
part up, but I was like, this is fascinating, and
I mean, it really just took me into an area
of something else I wanted to learn, and to the
point that I'm like, I had to stop and come
back to the rates. I mean, it really just fascinated me,
(11:41):
and I'm like, this is really cool stuff.
Speaker 1 (11:43):
And if you go to the met you can see
the whole wall of paintings, and if you read Ben's book,
it'll tell you exactly which ones he's convinced Johannes Vmir's
daughter painted and not Johanna Vmir.
Speaker 3 (11:54):
It's just his theory.
Speaker 1 (11:55):
But it's a lot of fun to go to the
Metropolitan Museum of Art and check those paintings out.
Speaker 4 (12:00):
I have to do that now because that is fascinating
to me. Another thing that was fascinating and I have
to know the answer to this. We talk about Jack
and Jack was Jack's a very bright kid and potentially
going to MIT. And part of his gifts is math,
and it's a formula in your book, and I'm like.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
I saw that on the page.
Speaker 4 (12:24):
Tell me me, is that your gift to or someone
help you with the math?
Speaker 1 (12:29):
Someone helped me with the math. I'm going to tell
you I am not gifted when it comes to math.
I knew what I wanted the scandal to be. I
knew that I wanted it to be something that if
you saw this issue from one angle, you would assume
that Jack was a terrible person who had done a
terrible thing. If you looked at it from a different angle,
you might see that it was bad judgment. It wasn't
(12:52):
a great thing that he did. But it's not being
interpreted the way he meant it, because I think with
teenagers especially, and back to what you were saying about
assumptions and misunderstandings, jumping to conclusions. I wanted there to
be a scandal where it appeared to be very clear
one way, but once you get to know the character better,
once you get to know the story better you can
(13:13):
see it from his side, and that you might think, could.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
He have shown better judgment?
Speaker 1 (13:18):
Sure, but I mean seventeen eighteen year old boys aren't
exactly known for having most well.
Speaker 3 (13:23):
Formed frontal lobes.
Speaker 1 (13:25):
So I really thought it made sense for him to
jump to do something that wasn't bright. So then it
was a matter of the math, you know, yes, like
how could I actually make this where it's you know,
actually possible. So I my nephew is getting a PhD
in math right now. So the first thing I did
was like explain the situation to him, and he wrote
(13:47):
the formula for me. But I live at NYU. I
live in faculty housing, so just to be sure, I
ran down the hall and knocked on the door of
the head of the math department at NYU, and I
was like, can we go over this one time because
some things had changed the book also, and he reviewed
it and he was like, you're good, Like this works,
like this makes perfect sense that if you were a
mathematician and you looked at this formula, you would be like, oh, yeah,
(14:09):
I see what he was trying to do. I get
what he was doing. But if you don't speak that language,
of the formula, You're going to be like, that's that
means nothing to me. It must be what I assumed
it was, instead of actually interpreting in the formula.
Speaker 3 (14:23):
Well, the interesting thing is I understood the German oh
good better than the math. Yes, yes, that is really funny.
What was your favorite thing about working on this book?
Speaker 1 (14:36):
I think my favorite, well, there were. One of my
favorite parts was having the two families' lives criss crossed
in ways that they didn't expect or see coming. That
was sort of the most fun was finding all like
the neighbor. There's a neighbor in Dallas, Texas who's sort
of a very minor character at the outset of the book,
(14:58):
but I thought, well, if she's living right next door,
or how could she keep coming back into the story.
And I won't do any spoilers, but you know, ultimately,
how could she end up playing a big role, a
bigger role than we might expect in this book? So
those things were really fun. The other thing that I
really enjoyed was now that I had Mason off the
page and in this biosphere where he's not aware of
(15:20):
anything that's happening, but he is able to write emails
out he can't get anything in, so to write his emails,
to write his messages was I mean, I had so
much fun doing that because we get to really track
how he feels. Part of what they're doing in this
experiment is tracking the sort of psychological impacts of isolation
(15:41):
with a small group of people. I also decided to
add a little twist that it's Mason alone with all
female scientists in this biosphere, just because I thought that's
kind of interesting and to sort of see what happens
to his mood over time, and to see sort of
how he thinks about his decision to go into this
thing over time.
Speaker 3 (16:00):
It was just.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
Writing those that I had a ball writing those messages.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
That was really fun. That is interesting.
Speaker 4 (16:06):
One of the things too that was very fun for
me was I'm an avid traveler, so I love to travel.
I've never been to Berlin, and that is like high
on the list. But the Cottage by the Sea really
intrigued me.
Speaker 3 (16:18):
Is that somewhere you've been I have.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
I've been there. I went. I'd heard about that north
coast of Germany so many times and I'd never been.
And as I was writing the book and I was
trying to figure out where did I want this other
location to be. I have spent a lot of time
in Copenhagen. Copenhagen works into the book, and I've spent
a lot of time there. So I said to my husband,
guess what, because we were in Frankfurt at the time,
(16:43):
and I was like, we're taking a trip, and we
got in the car and drove there. And for me,
that's all the difference in the world to write about
a place if I've seen it and been there and
spent a few days there.
Speaker 3 (16:54):
Walking the beach, I.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
Mean I found the house.
Speaker 3 (16:57):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
I literally drove around until I found the house where
I was like, that's the house there. That's going to
be the slightly needs a lot of work, but it's
lovely and has so much character, and it's old and
it has a thatch roof, and for me to go
there and actually see it, it just makes the writing
process so much more pleasant for me, because you just
(17:19):
are relying on your own memory and your notes and
the smells and the feel and the places and the
restaurants and what it feels like when you drive into
the town. So Hiligenhoffen was one of the places where
I said, if I'm going to write about this place,
I got to go there. And fortunately for me, it
was not an international trip because I was in Germany
at the time. So just went up there and took
(17:39):
a look and I loved it, and I want to
go back.
Speaker 4 (17:41):
Well, it's better to drive up on a house and
to walk up on a person. I saw a woman
on the sidewalk the other day.
Speaker 3 (17:47):
I'm like, that looks like what I'm thinking in my head.
Speaker 4 (17:51):
But I was behind her, and I'm like, I wanted
to walk around and see what her face look like
without being creepy about it. Yes, So I picked up
my face and then I've acted like I forgot something,
turned around around and I'm like, that's her.
Speaker 1 (18:05):
And did she disappoint her?
Speaker 4 (18:06):
She did?
Speaker 3 (18:06):
Was her face?
Speaker 4 (18:07):
Yeah, it was exactly what I was thinking, man in
my head. And I'm like, now I have a visual
yeor I can describe.
Speaker 3 (18:12):
What it is that I'm looking at.
Speaker 1 (18:13):
Yeah, And I'll sometimes do that, not with character, but
just I don't put a lot of physical descriptions in
my books, but they're in my head because I'm fine
for the most part with letting the reader add those
pieces in themselves. And envision that person themselves, but do
but I have that in my head all the time.
And sometimes it will be somebody I went to college
(18:36):
with and just her style or her look. Or it'll
be sometimes I'll picture an actor and sort of the
way they dress and the way they carry themselves, so
that I have to have that in my head. It
doesn't always end up on the page, but I but
it's always in my head.
Speaker 3 (18:50):
So what is next for you? I know you're probably
already working on the next thing. I know you're like,
this just came out. Can I get a break? But yeah,
what is next for you? Never a break. That's not
a bad thing.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
It's not a bad thing. We got to keep going.
So one exciting thing is that my last book, The
sweet Spot, is being adapted into a film with Jennifer
Westfeldt is writing the script and she's attached as a
co star in the movie, and so great fingers crossed
that it will continue. Because you know these things, there's
always any At any moment, this projects can come to
(19:26):
a stop. But for now it's moving forward and I'm
super excited about that. I am working on a next
book and I think that it might end up surprising
readers a little bit because I'm I'm going in a
slightly different direction with that one. And the other thing
that I'm doing is I read. I read and read.
When I'm sort of in between projects, I like to
(19:46):
read as much as I possibly can, because I mean,
I read all the time.
Speaker 3 (19:50):
I read.
Speaker 1 (19:50):
Some people say they can't read while they're writing. That's
not something that I can't. Yeah, that you can or can't.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
I can absolutely say I need to.
Speaker 1 (19:57):
I need to same, and I feel the same way
about going to theater and you know, going out into
the world. I sort of need input.
Speaker 3 (20:05):
In my mind.
Speaker 4 (20:07):
I wonder if that's more common with pantsers, because you're
kind of stimulated by things around you.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
But if you have a plot, you're like, I have
to stick to this.
Speaker 4 (20:18):
Yes, I wonder if that has something to do with
that's fascinating, I would tell you so. I think.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
I think it definitely has something to do with the
fact that we're looking. We're looking for the next little direction,
the next little turn that the book is going to take,
the next sign. Honestly sign. I mean that might sound
woo woo, but sometimes something's in my head and then
I see something and I'm like, Oh, that's just like
the thing I was thinking, and it just feels like
it all makes sense. Yes, I am reading some nutty
(20:47):
things this summer, and I mean that in the best
possible way. I loved Annie Hartnett's Road to Tender Hearts.
Just a fascinating road trip book about a middle aged
alcoholic daughter, two random children, and a cat who go
on a road trip across America. And it's fascinating and
just a wild ride. I absolutely loved that book. I
(21:12):
am currently reading. I'm actually listening to the audio version
of Margo's Got Money Troubles.
Speaker 3 (21:18):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
Not what I expected. I don't know what I kind
of went in with. I like to go into books
with no expectations. Sometimes when there's a lot of hype,
you know, you hear a lot in advance, And in
this case, I'm sure there's been a lot of hype,
but I just happened to have not come across it.
So every page of this book is a surprise to me,
and I'm absolutely loving it.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
I read a book called The Red House.
Speaker 1 (21:40):
Recently by Andrea I'm going to check my good Reads
because that's what I always do Andrea Lee, and it
was if you like travel so far and away, I
really do think of it as a travel book. The
Road to Tender Heart's definitely a travel book. The Red
House is also a book about a woman who grew
up in California, moves to Milan, and then end that
marrying a man who has a house in Madagascar. So
(22:03):
it's all about her life between Milan and Madagascar, two
places I do not know. So for me it was
just the best kind of armchair travel. I just really
have enjoyed Milan Madagascar now don't even have a picture
in my head, you know. So for me to see
this American woman living in Milan seeing Madagascar for the
(22:23):
first time in the history of Madagascar, which is not pretty,
and her sort of experiencing that is just It's a
fascinating read.
Speaker 3 (22:31):
Deadly loved it. What about you, Helen? What are you
reading right now?
Speaker 4 (22:35):
I'm reading On a Judge, which is the story of
a woman who belonged to Martha Washington, and it's a
here two characters, one is in the present and one
is in the past. Is fascinating. What did I just
finish that? I absolutely loved.
Speaker 3 (22:54):
Kylie read such a fun age. Oh yes, I'm catching
up on some stuff.
Speaker 4 (22:59):
And before that, actually a nonfiction book about yoga from
a guy named sad Guru who is I follow him
on social He's fascinating.
Speaker 3 (23:11):
On my candle is tar Baby by Tony Oh gosh. Yes.
Speaker 4 (23:15):
I usually have something on the candle that I'm reading,
something that I'm listening to, and something that's tactile. So
I mean oftentimes reading three things at a.
Speaker 1 (23:25):
Time, yes, And I like the fact that we can
do that now, because I can't read three physical books
or two physical I can't go back and forth between
two physical books. But I love the fact that I
can hop in my car or on the subway and
listen to the audiobook that I'm hooked on, and then
if I'm on a plane, I can just get my
kindle out. I just read Jamie Brenner's new book The
(23:46):
Wedding The Weekend Crashers, which is going to come out
this fall, and it's a book about a woman and
her daughter who go on a knitting retreat together. Interesting
and at the same retreat there happened to be a
bunch of guys. Is it basically a bachelor weekends? If
you could think of two more different groups of people,
a group of women, knitters and a group of dudes
(24:06):
at a bachelor party in the same little bed and
breakfast and comedy and drama, and so it's really it's
a lot of fun.
Speaker 4 (24:14):
Speaking of Jamie, I read your acknowledgments to your writers group,
many who I've met and have had on the show.
What you may not know is that you indirectly connected
me with mine. There's a wonderful group of authors in
Bucks County and over the past six years we have
been brunching on Palema Mosa's and supporting each other. Jenny Wall,
(24:37):
Jenny Way, VICTORYA Shade Yes, Suzanne Baltzar who also writes
under Sophie Andrews.
Speaker 3 (24:43):
And for the past six years we've had this little
group where we get together.
Speaker 4 (24:48):
And you were in Doylestown and I think you and
Jenny were doing something together exactly, and that's where we
all met because I came out there because you were
out there.
Speaker 1 (24:56):
Yes, I mean, I have to say I started this
career at h just had my sixtieth birthday, So this
is five books and ten years, a totally unexpected career
change for me. From teaching high school and working in schools,
I worked as an admissions person. Total surprise that I'm
doing this at all. But the biggest surprise to me
(25:17):
is the female support and companionship.
Speaker 3 (25:19):
I don't know what.
Speaker 1 (25:19):
I didn't see it coming. I didn't know that was
going to be a bonus gift with this. I did career,
but this group of women who I've gotten to know
and to support, they support me so much. I don't
know what I would do without them, because there's so
many questions with this career at every stage of this career,
and to be able to have other writers to call
(25:40):
and say, hey, did this ever happen to you? Or
did you ever consider this or did you know? Because
we're all just trying to sort of find readers, you know.
And I did not know that the group of women
writers would end up being like such a wonderful group
of friends and companions. And I honestly could I talking
(26:00):
about it because I don't know what I would do
without them.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
Oh, I completely get it.
Speaker 4 (26:04):
Yeah, if you live in New York City, you expect it.
But I don't live in the city. So to have
a community outside of the city, in a suburban slash
rural area, it was even a bigger gift.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Yes, to find your people is just so great. And
the thing is so much of what we do as solitary.
So much of what we do is spent hunched over
our laptops in our own little worlds. And to be
able to come out of that world and talk to
people and celebrate with people and commiserate with people who
are going through the same things and who understand this
(26:38):
world is just the biggest gift of all.
Speaker 4 (26:40):
So if people want to celebrate with you and far
and away your latest book, how do they find you?
Speaker 1 (26:45):
On social So I'm on Instagram mostly these days at
Amy pople You can always take a peek at my website,
sign up for my newsletter. I'm not as good about
sending my newsletter out as I need to be, but
that's the kind of thing that I would call my
group of friends and be like, let's talk about newsletters.
Who do people want to get in a newsletter? So
(27:05):
you can mostly find me on Instagram?
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Yeah, do you use substack? Bind mey chance?
Speaker 1 (27:11):
I read substack?
Speaker 3 (27:13):
I am.
Speaker 1 (27:13):
I am not writing on substack, but I love I
have my regular things that I get and I just
think of that. Yeah, it's it's a terrific platform.
Speaker 3 (27:21):
I think.
Speaker 1 (27:22):
I think it's really great and I'm not adverse to
getting on it. I just one thing though, exactly. I mean,
it's interesting also that we end up being marketers. I
didn't know that was part of my job in marketing.
Speaker 3 (27:34):
My whole life, though we're used to that. Yeah, that
part I get. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (27:39):
Well, thank you so much for joining me today. Thank
you for coming back on the show. Thank you for
this book. Far and away, everybody pick it up. It's
really good. You will enjoy it and I can't wait.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Hope to see the sweet spots. Hope me too, fingers crossed.
That would be awesome. Great, and thank you again. Thank you, Helen.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
Another show in the books. Join us for the next
episode of the Public Library Podcast, a place to check
out books.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.