06.21: Derek Craven Day 2024 : Heroes who Yearn with Sanj
It’s February which means it’s time for the biggest holiday in romance — Derek Craven Day! We’re so thrilled to be able to celebrate this remarkable man—born in a drainpipe, named himself, turned to a life of spectacle stealing—with all of you! This year, we’re so excited to have friend of the pod and of Cravens, Sanjana (follow her on TikTok at baskinsuns), to chat with us about her landmark research: A Comprehensive Categorization of Kleypas Heroes. We laugh, we get serious, and yes, we even talk about Zachary Bronson. — calm down, Bronsonettes.
Also — it just feels right that we’re announcing Fated Mates Live on Derek Craven Day! Join us in Brooklyn, NY, at the gorgeous William Vale Hotel, on March 23rd! Join us along with a collection of special guests and a roomful of other romance-obsessed listeners for a night of romance shenanigans at a live taping of Fated Mates! While we’re never sure quite how it’s going to go, we can guarantee there will be books, booze and bantr…and you’ll leave full of joy from all the fun. We’ve even got The Ripped Bodice on hand to sell books, and the room will be available for hanging with other Firebirds after the live! Tickets and info are at fatedmates.net/live.
Next week, we’re deep diving on Natalie Caña’s A Dish Best Served Hot. Find it at Amazon, B&N, Apple Books, Kobo or your local indie.
If you just can’t get enough of us, consider joining our Patreon! You get an extra episode of banter every month and access to the Fated Mates discord, full of people who love romance as much as we do. It’s pretty great, we have to say. Learn more at patreon.com/fatedmates.
Show Notes
Welcome Sanj. You can find her on TikTok or twitter. Her “Comprehensive Categorization of Kleypas Heroes” below went through several iterations during the pandemic, you're looking at v4. Lots of people have organized their thoughts about Kleypas characters, we also liked this one that’s a Venn Diagram.
Kate Clayborn joined us in 2021 to address a deeply silly list of questions and scenarios submitted by Magnificent Firebirds. It is absolutely worth a second listen.
In 2023, we dropped That’s So Craven. And then there’s our Dreaming of You read along.
If you’re looking for hard data about what Derek Craven would or would never do, or just want to browse some absurd memes, the official Derek Craven Day master page has you covered. There are a few new memes this year and an answer to an important new question about Derek shopping at Winterborne’s.
Finally, the YouTube version of the 2021 Derek Craven Day episode will light up any display from phone to TV with an exhaustive list of Derek Creaven would/never scenarios. You can turn down the sound and just have it loop all day long. It’s very possible that only Eric thinks this is a good idea, but you never know.
Oh, and this.
Books Mentioned This Episode
S06.16: Happy New Year: Breeding Kink with Mila Finelli
It’s New Years Eve, and that means tackling some of the more headphones-in stuff in the Romance Pool, we don’t make the rules. Ok. We kind of make the rules, and this is the New Years Eve service we provide. Today, we’re talking breeding kink in romance with one of our faves, Joanna Shupe! She’s here in disguise though, as Mila Finelli, author of absolutely fire mafia romances, including her latest, Mafia Virgin, which features this particular trope and is a full on delight.
As usual, we start out giggling and then get serious as we try to get to the bottom of this very specific thing that seems to have had a recent resurgence in romance. We do patriarchy, body autonomy and heteronormativity, then get into the provenance of this particular romance trope, and finally to the but why tho part of the discussion with a minor detour about spelling. We net out at…well, just give it a listen. But for the love of all that is holy, put your headphones in.
Happy New Year, Magnificent Firebirds. We love you a lot and hope that 2024 is the best year yet. xx Jen & Sarah
Show Notes
Welcome Joanna Shupe, who writes mafia romance under the name Mila Finelli. The 5th book in the Kings of Italy series, Mafia Virgin, is available now.
Our New Years Eve episodes are always...interesting. Listen to past years:
2019: Pegging in Romance with Sierra Simone
2020: Jessa Kane extravaganza with Andie Christopher, Alexis Daria, Adriana Herrera, LaQuette, Tracey Livesay, Nisha Sharma, and Joanna Shupe
2022: Omegaversity with Adriana Herrera and Ali Hazelwood
In 2021 we released the Season 2 Ted Lasso Roy Kent lovefest on New Year's Eve, but we were still pandemic-ing, so please don't blame us for the detour in brand that year. We came back with a bang in 2022, and now, in 2023, we're the full banana, as surely you can agree.
If you haven't listened to the trailblazer episode with Elda Minger, you should.
Joanna mentioned this article from Salon about young conservative men and the tradwives fantasy, and a recent CNN article about the phenomenon.
Books Mentioned This Episode
Sponsors
Meghan Quinn, author of He’s Not My Type,
available in print or audio at Amazon,
or with your monthly subscription to Kindle Unlimited
and
Lucy Morris, author of Snowed in with the Viking,
available at Kindle, Kobo, Apple Books, Barnes & Noble
or your local independent bookseller
and
Avalon Griffin, author of Unbound By Shadows
available at Amazon, or with your monthly subscription to Kindle Unlimited
S05.21: That's So (Derek) Craven
It’s Derek Craven Day 2023—empirically the best romance holiday of February—and we’re celebrating in traditional fashion by talking about why there are two types of Lisa Kleypas readers: The ones who think Derek Craven is the best hero, and the ones who are wrong.
If you’ve been with us for any length of time at all, you know we are mildly obsessed with Lisa Kleypas’s heroes, her writing, the way she writes objects into her books as talismans of emotion, and the way she injects excellent romance directly into our veins every single time.
This year, to celebrate this most high holy of romance days, we asked all of you to help us by filling up a Google spreadsheet with things other Kleypas heroes do in their books…because while St. Vincent and Winterborne will never get a holiday all to themselves, they’re pretty great dudes. Enjoy, friends. It’s -11 degrees on the East Coast, so we give you permission to hang out in bed all day and read a book by Lisa Kleypas.
Our first read along of 2023 (in February) is Tracy MacNish’s Stealing Midnight—we’ve heard the calls from our gothic romance readers and we’re delivering with this truly bananas story, in which the hero is dug out of a grave and delivered, barely alive, to the heroine. Get ready. You can find Stealing Midnight (for $1.99!) at Amazon, B&N, Kobo, or Apple Books.
Books Mentioned This Episode
S05.15: Omegaversity: Class is Now in Session with Ali Hazelwood and Adriana Herrera
As is customary, we’re celebrating New Year’s Eve here on Fated Mates with some of our favorite people in a fully headphones-in episode! Pour yourself a drink and pull up a chair, because Omegaversity is in session with professors Ali Hazelwood and Adriana Herrera!
Jen and Sarah get a crash course in this wild end of the romance/fan fic pool. We’re talking about mating heat (!), knotting (!!), butt babies (!!!) and loads of body fluids (!!!!). Seriously, loads of them. When we say headphones in, we mean it. Enter at your own will, abandon all hope, and bring in 2023 right.
Check shownotes for omegaverse recommendations, and enjoy, firebirds!
Thank you, as always, for listening. If you are up for leaving a rating or review for the podcast on your favorite podcasting app, we would be very grateful.
Show Notes
Welcome Ali Hazelwood and Adriana Herrera, let's just call them AH2, shall we?
The New York Times article about the Omegaverse, which is where a lot of us named Jen and Sarah first learned about so much of it. You can also watch this terrific series of videoes from Lindsay Ellis explaining the Omegaverse lawsuits: Into the Omegaverse: How a Fanfic Trope landed in Federal Court and Addison Cain's lawyer e-mailed me, and it only got worse from there. Also, the video essay The Rise (and Rise) of the Omegaverse by Rowan Ellis.
After the episode went live, one of our listeners, Ana Quiring, shared her terrific essay about why she loves the omegaverse. It's called Into the Omegaverse: Fan Fantasies on Gender Difference Without Women, and it's a terrific read!
Ali recommends reading this quick Omegaverse primer. Or this other list of how the Omegaverse world exploded.
You should read The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller, which is a good example of how there are books out there telling the stories we want about the characters we love.
For your consideration: a list of recommendations of Omegaverse fics from AH2
A quick reminder to please check all tags and CWs as you explore the Omegaverse!
Ali and Adriana both agree that a great starting point for Reylo ABO is Can't Turn Off What Turns Me On by audreyii_fic. But there are tons of Reylo fics recommended by AH2. If you want ABO in the workplace + elevators, try Gonna Get Myself Connected by TourmalineGreen. If you want something sweet and fluffy try (I Want to See You) As You Are Now by walkingsaladshooter or your name (twine it with mine) by lachesisgrimm (olga_theodora). For an enemies to lovers Reylo vibe, Ali recommends like my heart longs for an ocean by hi_raeth. He's the Omega in sharpen your teeth and sink into me by Like_A_Dove. If you want your fic with a sidecar of knitting puns, try The Knotting Shop by crossingwinter. Some others AH2 agree on: Reclaimed by Betts, Juniper and Bergamot by SaintHeretical, and Abash the Little Bird by SecretReyloTrash.
Coveted by OptimisticBeth is a crossover between Star Wars and Mercy Thompson.
If you have a lot of time on your hands, try the Reylo ABO hereafter by voicedimplosives. If you want lots of voyerism with your Reylo, check out An Unexpected Vacation by tigbit
If you're looking for ABO but vampires, try a little death (goes a long way) by crossingwinter
Adriana recommends trying any Stucky fic by GiselleSlash.
Ali recs Hello, Heartbreaker by astoryaboutwar or The Chase by Tipsy_kitty. In this universe, everyone’s a werewolf and Ali says it's a great starting point for ABO, written for a fandom that has tons of amazing ABO fics. Another TeenWolf fic you might enjoy is
If you want to try some Sherlock fic (not with Lucy Liu, but Jen believes it must be out there!), check out The Breath Between Us and The Breath Before Us by fayfayfay.
Sponsors
Piper Rayne, author of You Had Your Chance, Lee Burrows
get it at Amazon, B&N, Kobo or your local indie.
Visit Piper at piperrayne.com
and
Alyxandra Harvey, author of The Cinderella Society series
featuring How to Marry an Earl,
How to Marry a Duke, &
How to Marry a Viscount
Available free in Kindle Unlimited
Bonus: We Wish You a Merry Christmas...and a Happy New Year of Books
Happy happy holidays — our gift to you this weekend is a little bantr, a lot of book recs, and a wish that you get everything you want this holiday season, and throughout 2023. We’re so grateful for all of you…and we wish you the merriest, happiest, brightest, most joyful season. We hope you’re staying warm…see you on New Year’s Eve! xx Sarah, Jen & Eric
Don’t miss our holiday music playlist on Spotify and Apple Music.
2023 Books We’re Excited About!
Stop Book Banning: A Special Episode of Fated Mates
In 2022, book bans in United States schools and libraries are at their highest since the ALA Office of Intellectual Freedom started collecting data. Bans are happening around the country, in every state, and disproportionately affecting books by and about LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC people. What’s more, challenges are likely underreported, because librarians who are resisting them are facing unprecedented workplace retribution and in some cases physical danger.
Book Bans are on the ballot on November 8th, in every state and local election, up and down the ticket. State legislatures, local town councils, county leadership and school boards are being overrun with candidates supported by conservative activists looking to limit access to books and ideas that offer identity, empathy, awareness, and power to young people around the country.
We’re concerned, so today, we’re releasing a special episode of Fated Mates focused on book bans across the country. We interview three experts on what’s happening, who is most impacted, and how we can all help. Show notes are extensive, and we hope you’ll take a look at them.
Thank you to librarians, teachers, and kids and families who are standing up and speaking out. We are proud to stand with you. And a huge thank you to our friends at the Big Gay Fiction Podcast for transcribing this episode.
Guests
Jarett Dapier, librarian, activist and author of Mr. Watson’s Chickens
Lily Freeman, activist and student in Central Bucks County, PA. Read Lily’s op-ed in the Philadelphia Inquirer and follow her instagram at ProjectUncensored.
Melissa Walker, political activist at The States Project, journalist, and Middle Grade and YA author of Violet on the Runway, Let’s Pretend We Never Met, Small Town Sinners and more.
Resources
The Youth Censorship Database at the National Coalition Against Censorship
Book Riot’s censorship coverage is excellent and updated almost daily. They have an excellent explainer for how to find and develop a local anti-censorship group
Intellectual Round Table Freedom Blog: an exhaustive list of links related to news about challenges, censorship, and banning incidents, developing issues, and controversies that is updated weekly
PEN America’s data on School Book Bans and Index of Educational Gag Orders
American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom, full of resources and toolkits on challenges and how to combat them
What’s happening in Central Bucks County, PA is happening all over the country. Kids, families and educators are protesting loudly
Advocates for Inclusive Education, for more information on what’s happening on the ground in Bucks County, PA
A map from ALA Banned Books week at the University of Illinois Library, and another from Red Wine & Blue.
Teens around the country can get library cards from the Brooklyn Public Library. To apply for the card, teens can send a note to BooksUnbanned@bklynlibrary.org, or via the Library’s s teen-run Instagram account, @bklynfuture. The $50 fee normally associated with out-of-state cards will be waived
Learn more about the Book Ban Busters at Red Wine & Blue.
Ballotpedia is a resource for your local ballot and your local election maps
Vote.org, to check your voter registration, locate your voting place and more
How to Help
Educate yourself about the book challenge process in your school district: How it works, who sits on the book challenge committee, how those committee members are appointed.
If there are book bans and protests in your school district, attend local school board meetings and support students, teachers & librarians who are speaking up.
Tell your local public and school librarians they have your support. Write letters. Visit the library. Thank them for standing for intellectual freedom.
Research school board candidates in your district. Vote accordingly.
Consider running for something! Your school board and your state legislature need you! Consider this us telling you seven times! (We’ll phonebank for you!)
Vote to flip your state legislature blue. Rally your friends to join you in a Giving Circle at the States Project.
Donate to organizations (listed below) that support intellectual freedom and combat book bans.
Organizations to Support (and Volunteer with)
You can join PenAmerica, and your membership helps defend free expression, support persecuted writers, and promote literary culture.
Donate to the Freedom To Read Foundation and become a member. The Freedom To Read Foundation effectively conducts important first amendment legal work regarding book bans and censorship.
GLSEN, Creating a Better World for LGBTQ Students
Intellectual Freedom Endowment Fund at the American Library Association
The National Coalition Against Censorship, providing direct intervention for people and groups facing censorship
The States Project, helping to flip (or keep) state legislatures blue
The Trevor Project, supporting LGBTQ young people 24/7, all year round
We Believe in Education, a movement of parents and families fighting for students’ freedom to learn
The Most Banned Books of 2021
Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe
Reasons: Banned, challenged, and restricted for LGBTQIA+ content, and because it was considered to have sexually explicit imagesLawn Boy by Jonathan Evison
Reasons: Banned and challenged for LGBTQIA+ content and because it was considered to be sexually explicitAll Boys Aren’t Blue by George M. Johnson
Reasons: Banned and challenged for LGBTQIA+ content, profanity, and because it was considered to be sexually explicitOut of Darkness by Ashley Hope Perez
Reasons: Banned, challenged, and restricted for depictions of abuse and because it was considered to be sexually explicitThe Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
Reasons: Banned and challenged for profanity, violence, and because it was thought to promote an anti-police message and indoctrination of a social agendaThe Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
Reasons: Banned and challenged for profanity, sexual references and use of a derogatory termMe and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews
Reasons: Banned and challenged because it was considered sexually explicit and degrading to womenThe Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
Reasons: Banned and challenged because it depicts child sexual abuse and was considered sexually explicitThis Book is Gay by Juno Dawson
Reasons: Banned, challenged, relocated, and restricted for providing sexual education and LGBTQIA+ content.Beyond Magenta by Susan Kuklin
Reasons: Banned and challenged for LGBTQIA+ content and because it was considered to be sexually explicit.
Books from our Guests
A huge thanks to our friends at Big Gay Fiction Podcast for transcribing this episode!
Sarah: So we've got an urgent off-Wednesday episode today, Jen.
Jen: Yeah. We've been working on this one for a while, everybody. You've heard us talking about this wave of book banning that has been happening all over the country. We are concerned about this at many levels as readers primarily, as parents, as a teacher, but also as romance readers. Anyone coming for sexual content writ large, as all bad, is eventually coming for romance. And we are foolish if we think that it won't, but also even if it's not sort of...I don't want it to sound like it's just, like, self-motivated. I think it is deeply worrying as a reader to live in a country where book banning is so widespread.
Sarah: Yeah.
Jen: And in a way that isn't just like people saying, "I don't want this book in the library," but that is being written into laws in ways that make it impossible for librarians and teachers to even talk about the presence of these books. It's so...I almost, like, lack the words for it because it's so evil to me. Like, that's really the only word I have for it.
Sarah: And antithetical to what we like to call the fabric of, you know, a nation. When we talk to people who...you know, constitutional purists, like, book banning feels like it's a hard limit, or should be a hard limit in America. It's funny because I just recently did an event with Hilary Hallett, who is a professor at Columbia of women's history. And during our conversation, it came up that in the United States, you can't ban a book before it's written. It has to be written in order to ban it. And that felt for a long time like it was the safety net, like, you can't ban a thought.
But now here we are, and we are in a place where important texts are being written, texts that are about identity, and about culture, and about hope, and that give students and other people, you know, of all ages access to empathy, and storytelling, and identity, and are being stripped from our kids' libraries and our public libraries. And so this episode felt really important.
It reminds me that we have not introduced ourselves. I'm Sarah MacLean. I read romance novels and I write them.
Jen: And I'm Jennifer Prokop, a romance reader, editor, and I'm a teacher.
Sarah: And you are listening to what we would like to call a very special episode of "Fated Mates." Because we've been recording it for a while, you'll hear from three really interesting people on this episode, people who are much smarter than us. And we felt that it was really important that this episode get out in advance of the election. Election day is the first Tuesday in November. And you can check your registration at vote.org, which is essential. Make sure you're registered. We need you at the polls in the United States. And we're gonna do this.
We're gonna hear from three people. We're gonna hear from an author and librarian who has a lot to say. We're gonna hear from a kid who's impacted every day by these bans in Pennsylvania. And we're gonna hear from an author and political activist.
Jen, tell us about our first guest.
Jen: So, our first guest is Jarrett Dapier. He is a Chicago guy. My friend Elisa set us up with him, so thanks to Elisa. He is an author and a librarian. And he also teaches a class at the University of Illinois, like, librarian school, whatever it's called, in censorship. So it was really important for us to talk to someone who has, like, the big broad scope not just of what's happening now, but of censorship, kind of the history of censorship in America. And he does a great job, I think, at laying out sort of what's happening, how it's impacting schools and libraries across the country, as well as teachers and librarians, and the legal ramifications of what's going on.
One other thing I guess I should say before we hear from Jarrett is our goal really with all three people, you'll hear us asking similar questions, is what can our listeners do? What can our listeners do? So we hope that as you listen to today's episode, that you are inspired to take some kind of action. And maybe all you can do is donate money, but writing letters, going to a school board meeting, you're gonna hear similar things from each person voting.
So our goal, everybody, like, we don't usually give you action steps, we give you books to read… is at the end of this, we hope that you will be inspired to do something. And one of those really important things is also, no matter what you are going to do, is to share what you have learned here with other people.
One of the things that I'm shocked to find, I think everybody is, that even though this wave of book bannings is happening, many people are unaware of it. They're unaware of what's happening in their local community, they're unaware of what's happening across the country. Or they feel like it can't happen in their local community, it can only happen somewhere else. And we're telling you that's just not true.
So we hope that you'll vote, you'll share the news, and that you yourself by the end will think, "This is something I can do." So I just wanna be really clear before we hear from Jarrett, like, you have a job to do, too, listeners. And that is to try and make this better in whatever way you can.
Sarah: Two, I just want to, before we start with Jarrett, point to show notes which will be filled with links. All of our guests gave us great links, great resources. Also, I wanna underscore, if you are curious about what's going on in your own community, you can visit the PEN America site, which has a comprehensive list as of now of book bannings and book challenges across the country. You will be shocked by the states where this is happening on the regular, including places like Vermont, which you would never expect to be on this list. So, yeah, it's important.
And, also we should say Jarrett is the author of a book called "Mr. Watson's Chickens," which is possibly the most delightful picture-book concept ever, about Mr. Watson and his partner, who have a house full of chickens.
Jen: All right. Without further ado, here's Jarrett.
Hello, everybody. So, as you know, we are talking about censorship this week on "Fated Mates." And we are lucky to have a very special guest with us. We're gonna let him introduce himself. This is a friend of...I have a friend, Elisa. They were really instrumental, their school librarian. And I was like, "Elisa, help me find the perfect guest to talk about censorship." And they said, "You need to talk to Jarrett." So, welcome, Jarrett, to "Fated Mates."
Jarrett: Thank you so much.
Sarah: Thanks for joining us.
Jarrett: I'm really happy to be here. Yeah.
Sarah: I said this before we started, but Jarrett actually wins Best Guest Award because he came with his own show notes, so it's terrific.
Jarrett: Like I said, also, I'm a librarian, so I have to come prepared.
Sarah: So, Jarrett, just for everybody, tell us a little bit about yourself, like, how you came to...you're an author, too. So, give us the whole frame. And then, why don't you bring us to how you came to be so interested in censorship, and what's happening now?
Jarrett: Yeah, of course. Again, thank you for having me. I've been really looking forward to this all week because things are so upsetting and so difficult right now that any opportunity to speak with people who understand what's happening, and why it's so severe and threatening to a lot of rights that that we hold dear or want to see strengthened, is important. And I think it's important to my own mental health. So thank you for talking with me about this topic.
So, yeah, I'm Jarrett Dapier, and I'm a librarian. I've worked as a young adult librarian with teens in the Chicagoland area since 2009. And I'm also an author of books for children and teens. So I have three picture books out. One is called "Jazz for Lunch!" The second is called "Mr. Watson's Chickens." And the one that just came out is called "The Most Haunted House in America."
And in one year, Chronicle Books will publish my first YA piece of writing. It's a graphic novel about an infamous censorship incident that occurred in Chicago Public Schools in 2013 when the administration for CPS sent out a directive to all schools to remove the graphic novel, "Persepolis" by Marjane Satrapi, from every single school, classrooms and libraries.
And a group of students, it was a almost totally student-led response, they protested and made a very big deal, and were quite savvy about including media and comic artists, and just alerting the public. And as a result, it became a lot bigger than I think CPS ever thought it would be. And they were instrumental in getting the sort of blanket ban mostly reversed. I say that because there was a caveat.
But it's a graphic novel. It's a fictionalization of that whole sort of string of events. But I remember when it happened in 2013, and I've always just felt really, really connected to that story. "Persepolis" is one of my favorite books. And I was really inspired by the teens who organized very quickly to fight back against the censorship of that book. So that comes out in a year, and it's called "Wake Now In The Fire."
Jen: Congratulations.
Jarrett: Thank you.
Jen: What this also tells me is that you have been interested in censorship for a long time.
Jarrett: Yes, I have. My first job out of college was at the ACLU of Illinois. And I was a legal assistant for the First Amendment project. And I was always, first and foremost, passionate about the rights of teenagers, particularly their rights to speech and freedom of expression. It really sort of professionally started there, but I also know when I was a teenager, I felt really passionate about it then, too.
Jen: I'm in my late 40s. And, like, in the '80s when I was a teenager, a really popular movie was called, like, "Field of Dreams." I don't know if you remember this.
Jarrett: Oh, yeah.
Jen: But there's this throwaway scene where the people in this small Iowa town want to ban books. And, like, they're clearly the bad guys.
Jarrett: Yes.
Jen: And it's like Kevin Costner's wife is like, "Is that who we are? Like, book banners?" And I just remember sometimes I think about that scene and think, what happened to my generation, that we grew up with a movie where clear...this was like a easy shortcut for, like, being a bad guy.
Sarah: And it's not like "Field of Dreams" was like a way-out-there movie.
Jen: No. Exactly.
Sarah: It's pretty conservative, like, small C movie.
Jen: Yes. And I keep thinking to myself like, what happened to my generation that, like, now we're the book banners? And I mean, obviously, not we, but when we think about, like, the history of book banning, like, what's happening now does seem qualitatively different in some ways? Is that true or does it just feel that way to me?
Jarrett: I think it is absolutely true. It's unique to our time right now. And that is because the sheer pervasiveness of book challenges and book bans in schools, and also public libraries, it's staggering, and it's nationwide. And it has varying levels of extremity...extremity, extremity, extremeness? You know what I mean?
Sarah: I do.
Jarrett: Depending on the place and, I guess, the sort of twisted imagination of the people who are organizing these bans. So it's nationwide and it's affecting school librarians, teachers, public librarians. It's definitely affecting administrators whose feet are being held to the fire by very aggressive people. And it's, most importantly, really harming teenagers' access to a wide variety of materials that I would argue are life-saving at times, and are definitely affirming for many, many teens.
And the thing about the people who are doing this is that they are organized, they're strategic, and they are well funded. And while a lot of it looks very grassroots, a lot of it is funded by conservative right-wing, you know, political action committees, as well as just private donors in places like Texas and Pennsylvania, Tennessee, so on, and especially Florida, of course.
But looking specifically at American history of censorship, I teach intellectual freedom and censorship at University of Illinois for their library school, and we were just talking about this last week. That while we can say that now feels different, we have to acknowledge the strains of authoritarian laws that have constricted, and ruined, and harmed the lives of people of color, women, LGBT folks, religious minorities, people with disabilities, you know, throughout the history of America to the point that those stories were not allowed to be published. Or if they were, it was underground or it was, you know, even sort of samizdat. That's, like, the Russian sort of, like, underground, like hand-copied zine style, you know, passed from person to person.
Jen: The way people read, like, "Animal Farm."
Jarrett: Exactly. And, so we have to acknowledge that when you look at Jim Crow and the segregation of public libraries, and the fact that, you know, people of color had to go in a different door, if they were allowed in at all, and their materials were garbage. And there was no open access to information for, you know, Black folks before the Civil Rights Movement. And just the country in a lot of ways is founded on censorship of perspectives that are not white, heterosexual, cisgendered, and male.
Sarah: And wealthy, right?
Jarrett: And wealthy. Yeah. And I was listening to your interstitial podcast in 2019. The things you talked about, the patriarchy, and the white wealthy male drive to control bodies and minds has been alive since the beginning, and is alive right now. And we're seeing it in a different form.
But one thing I think is true is that it's good news in a way that these stories are out there to be censored in the first place. Because 20 years ago, they weren't, especially not in schools. Maybe a little bit in public libraries, but publishers just weren't publishing, you know, more than a handful of Black authors writing for teens, or less than that. And certainly not LGBTQ materials or representation unless it was, you know, probably, like, stories that, you know, warned.
Sarah: Exactly. The dangers of this.
Jarrett: Exactly. But, yeah, I think what is different is just how unabashedly out in the open the sexism, and misogyny, and homophobia, and racism going on right now.
Sarah: Can you talk a little bit about what's happening from the perspective of the librarians who are really, like, front-lining this? Like, what is going on among all of you to combat this? Or, I mean, what's it like? Well, I mean, this is sort of a...I mean, what's it like being the person the kids are coming to?
Jarrett: So, I really feel for the school librarians that are being attacked right now, because oftentimes if a school district has a school librarian at all, it's just one. And so that person is in, you know, by its nature, a kind of lonely role already. And they are being scapegoated, absolutely, for so many things.
There's a intellectual freedom expert named Dr. Emily Knox. She's a friend of mine. But she always, always encourages people to try and think about what is behind the motivation to ban a book? Not necessarily because we want to justify it or excuse it in any way, although I do believe, you know, empathy is a very important force. But to be effective and to be strategic in countering it, we have to understand not just what it is on its face, but what is driving it.
And a lot of librarians right now, I just think, are feeling...well, for one thing, a lot of people are running from the profession, because they're getting death threats. In some states, they are being criminalized. So some states are passing laws, or hoping to pass laws that will criminalize a librarian for providing a material that the state or the school board has deemed obscene or pornographic. And this, number one, threatens jail time, but also the possibility of being ruined financially because of lawsuits.
And so you're seeing this...librarians in a lot of ways are a very vulnerable population. We don't have much political power. The school librarians are often on their own, though they have networks online and, of course, professional networks. But I think, to answer your question, we're feeling very demoralized and very scared. Personally, I think public libraries are a bedrock institution of democracy. And the fact that some are closing down because they're being defunded, and the fact that some are closing down because the staff just, you know, in one fell swoop, quit, which I don't blame them for, is really alarming and scary.
Jen: Like, I mean, obviously right now, if everyone could see our faces, we're all just like...it's so scary. The weight of this is so overwhelming.
Sarah: It is worth saying that Nora Roberts...we'll put this in show notes, but Nora Roberts a couple of weeks ago funded a library that was closed by the town board...
Jarrett: Yes.
Sarah: ...because of the materials within. And I love the idea that she just called them up and said, "How much does it cost to keep you open for the year?" And she wrote them a check. And someday...
Jarrett: Absolutely.
Sarah: ...I promise I'll do it if I can. But what can we do in the meantime?
Jarrett: And I do want to be sensitive to the interests of your listeners. We should talk about, like, what materials are being challenged and banned, because I think it directly ties into the interest of your listeners.
Number one, there have been 1,500 or more instances of book challenges/book bannings that have been reported to the Office for Intellectual Freedom at the American Library Association. That is more than has ever been reported to that office in the office's history, which is over 50 years old. And when I say 1,500, that's just reported instances. That's not 1,500 books.
What those 1,500 represent is probably thousands and thousands of books being challenged, removed, banned from school districts, classrooms, and libraries. And over half of them are young adult novels, a sizable sliver is adult novels for sure, but it's mostly children and young adult materials. And among children and young adult materials, it is materials that have even the slightest whiff of LGBTQ content or representation, the tiniest. And anything with that kind of representation is being deemed in, city after city, after city, in town after town, as pornographic or obscene.
So, one that I always talk about is Raina Telgemeier wrote a sweet, little graphic novel called "Drama." And it's for, like, third, fourth, fifth, sixth graders. And there's two boys who have a crush on each other. And I think maybe one kisses the other on the cheek, or maybe they just hug, but this book has been assailed as pornographic and obscene by hysterical parents and motivated school boards. And that's the thing. We have to acknowledge that they have targeted, like, extreme right-wing conservatives and Christians, you know. Or maybe they're all one and the same, but they have targeted school boards and library boards.
And so this is something I think they've been building towards for a while, but it's been a very big takeover. And usually when they just tip the balance of power, they go to town on the literature. And they have friends in town who bring challenges, and so on and so forth. But LGBTQ materials, absolutely, and then materials that depict, or show, or talk about, or feature characters of color. And then on top of those two, anything that deals with human sexuality.
A lot of the non-fiction books that are being targeted are books that provide just basic, respectful information about physiology, relationships, consent sex, and how it works. And if you look at...PEN America has an index on banned titles. And if you scroll through that...I was doing it yesterday. And it's not funny because it's so serious, but so many of these books on sexuality have titles like "It's Perfectly Normal," or, you know, "Sex." And they are written respectfully and appropriately for their audience.
Sarah: For "Field of Dreams" watchers.
Jarrett: Yes. Baseball fans who love Kevin Costner will love these books. But those are being removed completely from the shelves. And a writer in "The Washington Post" yesterday wrote something that, also, I was thinking about your listeners because romance readers are so passionate about the genre, and read so much. And I also teach a class on literacy and reading, and we talk about the romance genre as truly being a genre of readers, or the fan base is a fan base of true readers. And so many of them, as I'm sure you can attest, and I think you did in one of the episodes I listened to, read romance on your own, or motivated to read it, loved it, and it was your choice. It wasn't assigned to you, obviously. But you came to it on your own.
And this writer in "The Washington Post" was talking about what is different about now is that the books that are being targeted are overwhelmingly books that are available to teens and kids to choose to read instead of being assigned to read. And what we know about the motivation to read is that, number one, being able to freely choose your own book is crucial, and two, being able to see yourself or see some information that is identifiable or pertinent to you and your life, and your interests, those two things are the basis for the motivation to read.
So, you know, romance readers...romance has been, like, mocked and dismissed by critics and elites, you know. I mean, I don't think you can...maybe horror fans and mystery fans are, like, the other two fan bases, but I can't think of another fan base that, like, reads more books just from being in a library. Like, I know that and I've seen it, and having friends who own bookstores, you know.
So the fact that books that kids and teens can see themselves in and choose themselves are being yanked out of their hands is a disaster for literacy, but it's also a disaster just for their own education. And, I can't remember, one of you was talking about just learning about sex and body parts from romance books.
Sarah: Yeah.
Jarrett: And how that happened for you. And, so think about this country does such an abysmal job of educating children and teens about sex to begin with. And now, you know, any kind of mention of it or depiction of it in a graphic novel is just...it's verboten.
Sarah: Well, we talked about this on that episode, too, but, you know, understanding mitigates fear. So if we understand how our bodies work, which all of these books...which books like, you know, "Sex" teach us, then suddenly they can't use fear of what our bodies are and how they work to control us.
Jarrett: Exactly. Yeah.
Sarah: And these kids need that. I mean, they should not be learning about their bodies from romance novels. They should be learning about them from, like, real books.
Jen: Porn is easily accessible.
Jarrett: Yes.
Sarah: Yeah.
Jen: At least when I learned about sex from romance novels, like, it was deeply entrenched in the idea that, like, women and their pleasure were important. I learned that from romance. I didn't learn that anywhere else. If I learned about sex from porn, I don't think that's what I would have learned.
Jarrett: Absolutely.
Jen: It just, like, hurts. Everything in my brain hurts thinking about not every child is a reader. And as time goes on, less...like, there's so much competition for reading time.
Jarrett: So much. Oh, my God.
Jen: And as an adult, I'm already entrenched as a reader. Like, nothing's gonna take that away from me. But I have watched kids become less interested in reading over the course of a school year as they become really interested in something else. So when I think about what this will do, the long-term effects on an entire generation of kids who are told, "You aren't allowed to read the books that are interesting to you, that speak to you. That are real about the experience of, like, what it means to be in a relationship, to have human sexuality, that is not just like a binary. It only means this," it's painful for me to think about.
Jarrett: Me, too.
Sarah: Well, and empathy.
Jarrett: Absolutely.
Sarah: Like, raising a generation of kids who have no empathy or understanding of people outside of themselves. Which is maybe the point. I mean, it has to be the point.
Jarrett: Yeah. In a lot of ways, if you take it back to the patriarchy, which we have to, it's about like returning humans to being objects, you know, for the pleasure of white males. And easily manipulated and exploited. And that's the thing, is ignorance really begets suffering. And it's very ignorant to go attacking these books. But you're also spreading ignorance. And the irony is a person might be afraid, understandably, of a really wild and ugly world of imagery, sexual imagery online. A parent might be really upset about that and feel out of control. And I completely sympathize.
But the irony is that by removing well-written books about sexuality and relationships, you're sort of leaving the kids to only go looking for...because they're gonna go looking for information about it.
Jen: Yes.
Jarrett: And unless they're, like, naturally skilled at, you know, critically...
Jen: Discovering Scarleteen.
Jarrett: Yeah. Exactly. Critically surfing the web. Showing my Gen X roots by calling it surfing the web. But...
Sarah: The world wide web.
Jen: I support you.
Jarrett: Yes. Surfing the internet.
Jen: I think that, for parents who are not readers, there probably is nothing more threatening than seeing their children read books that they don't understand, or were not privy to, or did not...you know what I mean? And I will admit I also think, like, a lot of parents are wildly, to the point of hilarity, honestly, oblivious to what their kids can easily find on the internet.
So the book banning probably seems like, "Well, look, this book is in front of me, and I see that it's bad, and I don't agree with it." And it doesn't even occur to them what these kids can find in 0.3 seconds on the world wide web. And so there's part of me, too, that's like, it just shows also a really profound kind of ignorance about, like, what's out there.
Jarrett: Absolutely.
Jen: Like you're closing...it's not even like closing the barn door after, like, you know, the cow is out, or wherever that saying is. It's, I mean, like closing the mouse hole and the entire rest of the barn is open.
And as you said, and the thing I just want to reiterate over and over again, is, like, these books are the ones that are the safest. They are fact-checked. They are coming out of traditional publishing probably, if they're in a library. These are deeply researched. You know, these are people who've talked to psychologists and wrote there. Like, it's perfectly normal. You're not getting that from some rando site on the internet that kids aren't...you know, so it's just so backwards, if you love your children and you want them to be happy and successful. I am dumbfounded by it.
Sarah: So, Jarrett, we are going to talk in a bit with somebody about the political ramifications of all of this, how politics are impacted by, and are impacting this whole world. But for people who can't run for...you know, are not people who run for office, and, you know, people who... "Yes, I'm gonna go vote in November." But what can they do on the ground in their school districts, in their libraries, at their school board meetings? What are the things that our listeners can do today, tomorrow, next week to help?
Jarrett: Yeah. This is so important, because they're so organized and well-funded. We have to speak up and we have to show up. And absolutely, we need to look locally as much as possible. So, everybody needs to look locally, locally, locally. What is going on in your school district? What is going on at your public library? Who is running for school board coming up maybe this year or another year? Who's running for library board? What is their platform? Be very wary of the term "parental rights" because that's code for suppressing all of the stuff we've talked about today.
So find out about upcoming elections and do everything you can to support the people who are going to defend the right to read and the right to access information that children and teens need. One very tangible thing is, please thank librarians. Go into the library and tell them you support them. Because we do feel very lonely right now and feel very attacked. And honestly, a number of them feel extremely scared.
And I was just listening to a podcast the other day, or, no, it was an NPR interview with a librarian in Louisiana who was sobbing in this interview because her life has been threatened multiple times. And we shouldn't ignore the fact that predominantly this is a profession staffed by female workers. So that's another layer that, you know, makes, you know, them a target for scapegoating and attacks. But if you have children, please let your school librarian, if your school has one, know that you support them and that you are not down with this.
The Freedom to Read Foundation is an independent organization associated with the American Library Association. The Freedom to Read Foundation, they don't bring legal actions, but they join legal actions and reinforce legal actions to protect the right to read. And so, if you could donate and become a member of the Freedom to Read Foundation, it would be hugely helpful because they are all over the country, but they are a staff of, like, two people right now.
Make art and get it out in any way possible. You know, authoritarian systems depend on people, you know, isolating, not expressing themselves creatively, and not connecting with each other. And especially, they suppress art. So, especially if you're not in one of, like, the elite centers, you know, LA, Chicago, New York, definitely make art because your perspective and your point of view is important, and we need that in every community.
So, part of showing up, too, is if there is a challenge going on in your community, show up at those school board meetings to speak out to defend the materials being challenged. Because more often than not, it's just the teens showing up, and sometimes it's, like, one or two of them. And they feel terrified because there might be 50 or 60 parents who are enraged. And then you have two teenagers speaking up to say, like, "Leave us alone, and let me live."
Jen: How can people find out? I mean, I guess I would assume, like, your local newspaper. But, you know, of course, local news is...
Jarrett: Yeah, I know.
Jen: ...you know. I mean, it's like when you think about all of the ways the safety net for this...
Sarah: It's a big mess.
Jen: ...has been removed, is there, like, a clearing house or a place that is kind of keeping track of that? You know what I mean? Like, someone could find out, like, "Oh, this is happening in my community?"
Jarrett: So "Book Riot" is doing fantastic work to update readers about censorship news on a weekly basis. So is the Office for Intellectual Freedom. They've got a long sort of clearinghouse list of new developments. But PEN America now has not only just exhaustive, constantly updated index of book bans that is searchable, so you can search for your own town, you could search for certain titles, certain states, they also have an index on gag orders, which affects librarians, too.
We didn't even talk about how in Oklahoma you can be arrested for providing information to a patron about where they can obtain an abortion locally, which would be considered illegal there. That's criminal now. Gag orders are a new sort of weapon where librarians aren't even allowed to talk about certain things. And so, PEN America runs these indexes, and you can search both book bans and, sort of, like, actions against librarians and information professionals.
And then...yeah, those are the big ones. For me it's PEN America, "Book Riot." Kelly Jensen there does amazing work. And then there's a person on Twitter, Tasslyn Magnusson. And I wanna say that the index on PEN America is her index that she created. And she may be the one updating it, but she is doing incredible work advocating for readers. So follow her if you're on Twitter. But, yeah, make your support for freedom of expression as visible as possible. Talk to neighbors. And so many people don't even know this is going on. I was talking to a neighbor yesterday who has a child who would definitely be affected by this, and she had no idea.
Sarah: Well, I also just want to say, because I spent some time this summer in a small town in Rhode Island, and there were school board election signs everywhere, which is a great tell because that didn't used to happen, where there would be tons of school board with whole slates. Like, "Vote for this entire slate of school board officials this November." So if you see those around, that could be a very easy red flag that something's up on your ballot in November.
Jarrett: Absolutely. And I think we need to develop language to push back against the really vile language that the opposition is using to vilify librarians. They're calling them groomers, and they're calling them pedophiles for providing materials that might have sexual content or might have LGBT content.
And I think we need to really push...nobody wants to engage with those terms because they're so terrible, but it's also incredibly insulting to call a librarian a groomer, especially to people who have been targeted by predators, and have survived assault. It's just despicable, and we need to call it out for what it is, as just like a despicable tactic. And we need to come up with wording that, I think, counters their arguments about, like, "Well, how can you defend this graphic novel when on page 67, there's a penis, right there? It's drawn in this graphic novel."
And I think a lot of people shut down because it's like, then the second you go, "Well, what's the context for it?" You know, then they scream, "Groomer," at you, you know. So they pull things out of context. And we have to find an effective way to counter it, but I think strength in numbers is the key. The more of us that are there to say...
Sarah: And you don't have to be a parent to go to school board meetings. You don't have to be a parent to thank school librarians. It's okay, you vote for these people, you have a place at those meetings as well.
Jarrett: Absolutely. You're part of the community that...I mean, you're a part of creating the community you want to see. So that's a great point.
Jen: And I would even say, even if there are no challenges in your town, it's still worth it for you to write a letter to your local library, to your local school saying, "I hope this doesn't happen here. And if it does, please know that you have my support that kids in our community deserve to have books that represent who they are, to see a different world. And I hope that, you know, if a book banner comes along, you'll say, 'but, like, we've received these letters in support." So you don't also have to wait for it to be a crisis in your town, you can preemptively decide to, like, sort of make your voice heard.
Jarrett: Absolutely. Yeah. I wrote a letter to the staff of Downers Grove Public Library, locally here, just to thank them for their efforts to support LGBT, not just materials, but programs at their library. And they just shut down a Drag Queen Storytime because they were...nobody knows the details but people have been saying it must have been pretty severe what was coming in on the phone lines and on email, that they would shut it down. So, yeah, the opposition is a mix of Christian sort of fascists and white power groups like the Proud Boys, and, I think, misinformed parents who feel out of control in a really out-of-control world. It's a sort of confluence of a lot of factors, but it's all ugly.
Sarah: But there are more of us than there are of them.
Jarrett: There are. That's the thing.
Sarah: I know.
Jen: We just gotta all say something. One last thing is, if you are in a town like this and your child's access to these materials has been compromised, the Brooklyn Public Library has committed to essentially giving a library card to every teenager in America, if they ask for one. And so, we'll put out those links in show notes as well.
I mean, the thing that's really hard, I also think it's scary and not something we can predict right now, although, you know, publishing is a business, and one that I think has shown...I don't know, they seemed very quick to roll over. I've been really unimpressed in a lot of ways with publishing's response to this. It is not hard to imagine that the pipeline of why literature is now deeply compromised.
Jarrett: Yes. I agree.
Jen: And so, I think the other thing that's gonna be really important, I mean...and I think people sort of like to think, like, "Well, I'll just buy a copy and put it in my little free library." But, you know, that is not gonna stop necessarily what's happening. And if it is clear to publishing that these books are just too much trouble for them to deal with, they won't acquire and publish them. And that is tragic.
Jarrett: Yes.
Jen: The tragedy of this is like a ticking time bomb that's gonna explode at different levels at different times, like, a month from now, a year from now, five years from now. And so the important thing, too, is for us not to give up, to keep saying, like, these books are important to us, important to our community, important to our children, important to us as parents and teachers, and Americans as opposed to just saying, like, "Okay, fine."
Jarrett: Absolutely. The more points of view, the better. Yeah.
Jen: Jarrett, what else should we know, you know, before we go? Any last words of hope? Are there ways in which...are there, like, good stories out there we can share? Something?
Jarrett: I personally have a good story. "Mr. Watson's Chickens," my picture book, features a loving same-sex couple. And it was challenged in a very small town in Alabama. And a mom there who's very, you know, tapped in to the library and what's going on in town contacted me to let me know. And she was certain this book is done for at the public library. Everything you've seen in the movies is what my town is like, you know, small town, Alabama. She said it's just a matter of time till when they make the decision.
But, she did just absolutely heroic work gathering together 16 or 17 letters of support for "Mr. Watson's Chickens," including her ex-husband who wrote about raising their son who's gay, and friends and neighbors. And she made this package she handed out to every board member. She spoke passionately at the school board meeting. And then shockingly, they unanimously voted to keep the book. And that was huge. We were shocked.
Sarah: Listen, that's one person.
Jarrett: Yeah.
Sarah: Everybody out there...it takes one of you. One of us can do that. We can save "Mr. Watson's Chickens."
Jarrett: "Mr. Watson's Chickens." And books like it. You know, a book came out called "Bathe the Cat," maybe a couple months after "Mr. Watson's Chickens."
Sarah: Well, that does seem dangerous, bathing cats.
Jarrett: It is. The cat does not wanna be bathed. But, you know, it's a family with two dads. And they're a loving family, and they're dealing with having to get ready for a relative who's coming to visit. And one of the tasks is, someone needs to bathe the cat. And the cat keeps, like, subverting that. But, like, a book like that is an absolute target. And it's so delightful. And what a wonderful hopeful thing for kids to just read books with representation like that and not even question it, because the story is really about the cat, and the chickens. There's no issue with the relationship.
Jen: And I guess that's probably what makes it so dangerous to people, right?
Jarrett: Yeah. Exactly.
Sarah: We say all the time, happiness is subversive. The reason why, like, reading romance is powerful because joy is subversive. And...
Jarrett: So many books, especially the YA books that are being challenged, especially the LGBT content, are very, like, affirming books. They provide visibility. And a lot of them are stories of self-acceptance. And "Gender Queer," the number-one banned book now in America, even the scene that parents object to as, you know, graphic and obscene, it's a scene of consent. It's a scene where two people are trying to figure out, "What works for us sexually given the fact that one of us doesn't like certain things, and the other one does. But we're figuring it out."
I mean, if you look at the scene as a whole, it's two people communicating openly and lovingly with each other, and with respect. And that is what I took away from that scene when I read it.
Jen: Yeah. I think it's also just really important to say if you see, you know, a list of banned books, and it has, I don't know, like, "Catcher in the Rye," listen, that's not what they're trying to ban right now. We are talking about, like, the wholesale banning, essentially, like, trying to pull us all back, 35 or 40 years to a time when every queer kid had to be in the closet, preferably for the rest of their lives. And we just aren't gonna go back to that.
Jarrett: We can't.
Jen: We can't. And what we say inside the industry, and you mentioned at the beginning, is, like, having these books on your shelves, in your home, in your classroom, in your library, it is suicide prevention.
Jarrett: Yeah.
Jen: And the idea that anyone would take...I'm gonna cry. Like, we just can't. We can't go back. We deserve better, our kids deserve better. And this is just the most urgent work of any reader, has to be making sure that every other reader gets to read whatever they want.
Jarrett: Absolutely. Thanks for saying that. And the fact that even online resources like The Trevor Project are being filtered out of schools, projects and organizations that provide information about suicide prevention, and the fact that you're not alone, and there is help available, is really grim. And one thing I noticed in the list, too, is there are a lot of books that if there's sexual assault involved in the story, or if the book is about that, it's attacked. It's removed.
And one thing that is different about this time is boards are removing books when they're challenged instead of leaving them on the shelves until we decide whether or not we're gonna remove them. So that's how parents are getting away with submitting a list of 380 titles that they're challenging, and then half the library's gone. And so this is happening more and more, and boards just don't seem to care that they're violating, you know, their own policies.
Jen: And presumably they're pulling these lists. These are just lists that they have. And so they haven't looked at the books.
Jarrett: There's a story of a northern Idaho librarian who was vilified in her community by parents who were angry at her. They came in to ask if they had "Gender Queer," and they didn't. And this parent had a list of books, and they didn't have any of them. But they somehow turned it around on the librarian that she was...she quit. I mean, she quit and is moving from the town she'd lived in for, like, 20 years. But they vilified her, and she wasn't even providing the books they wanted to ban. She just...
Jen: Was a librarian.
Sarah: Right.
Jarrett: Absolutely. So...
Jen: I don't know. I mean, like, we're really far afield. I said we'd be on for 30 minutes, it's an hour later. But I think the thing I think about a lot is, like, you have to believe. I hope all of our listeners believe, like, your child is his or her, their own person. And book banning is really instead about control. Is, like, "I want to control the type of person my kid is." And let me tell you, it just doesn't work that way.
Jarrett: No.
Sarah: No. They fail. This will fail.
Jen: Yeah.
Jarrett: Completely. They're in for a big shock. But I think, if nothing else, let your motivation be the fact that the people doing this are trying to control what your child can have access to. And they're doing it under the mantle of parental rights. And what about the rights of parents who have LGBT kids, or who are passionately allies of LGBT folks, or have family, whatever, I mean, or are people of color? What about their rights? They're talking about a subset of certain parents' rights.
Jen: Well, as you said at the beginning, in America, that's always been our subtext, right?
Jarrett: Yeah. But do believe one person can make a difference. I'm glad you said that because that mom in Alabama gives me hope, because it might just take one person knowing about this, hearing this podcast, and then doing something. That might be enough.
Jen: Yeah. So if you're looking for the one thing to do while you're all listening right now, we're all book lovers. We all know how important school librarians and public librarians were to our own reading journeys. It takes no time for you to google what's going on in your own town. And that's your job right now. That's the task you can do today, and go from there.
Jarrett: Yeah.
Jen: Jarrett, thank you so much for being with us this week.
Jarrett: Thank you.
Jen: We really appreciate it. Jarrett gave us tons of information in show notes, which you'll see. We'll also put it on social media. But this is really all hands on deck. If you care about reading, if you care about freedom to read, then it's starting in YA, it's starting with kids. It's coming for all of us. And that doesn't mean it's, like, selfish or self-motivated. I guess it maybe is. But I care about kids, and I care about making space for them to be who they are. And librarians do that more than probably anyone, so they really need our support.
Sarah: Thanks so much, Jarrett.
Jarrett: Thanks for having me.
Sarah: What a delight.
Jen: I know. Amazing.
Sarah: Look, there is a double-page spread in "Mr. Watson Chickens" of the house full of chickens. And it's too many chickens, is what it is.
Jen: Yeah. It's like Richard Scarry's Busytown, only chicken town.
Sarah: If I can find all the chickens.
Jen: So, anyway, I was so grateful to have him really paint the picture of, like...
Sarah: What's happening and how scary it is for librarians and teachers.
Jen: Yeah. Absolutely.
Sarah: We can't afford to be losing librarians in this country right now.
Jen: I don't think...again, I keep using the word "evil." Like, the very idea that you would fire people for supporting their students is, like, beyond for me. I can't even wrap my head around it really.
Sarah: And the big takeaway for me from the conversation with him aside from all the obvious things is, like, just being a presence, a supportive, positive presence for librarians, and teachers, and other activists in the community, but particularly, like, sending a letter to your local library. You know, dropping in and telling them that you support them, even if, even if it's not happening in your community.
You know, we talk all the time in writer circles about how essential libraries and librarians are to not only how we became readers, but also how we became writers, and how readers find us. You know, those of us who are here, and able, and lucky enough to make a living doing this work, like, we wouldn't be here without librarians. And, so...
Jen: Yeah.
Sarah: I, sort of, was instantly, sort of, thoughtful about who are the librarians who I can write a letter to right now, and say thanks to?
Jen: I think the thing about school board meetings, I'm thinking back to a conversation… I was at a conference away, like, conference in Las Vegas. And one of the authors was talking about how, you know, these kids mobilized to show up at these school board meetings. And, like, maybe one teacher, or one author, or whatever, is with them to support them, and then it's like all these rabidly angry parents who have been stirred up by, like, watching Fox News.
Sarah: It's scary.
Jen: That is scary. I mean, and I know it's hard, but if you hear that there is a action happening at a school board meeting, one of the most important things you can do if you are free is to go and just sit there, and be a support to those students who need to see that not all adults feel that way. So those in-person meetings can also be very contentious and angry. And it is hard for me to imagine how brave it must be as a high school student or an elementary school student to get up and say, like, "You should let me read the books I want," right?
Sarah: Right. So, let's talk about students.
Jen: Yes.
Sarah: Because our next guest is one. Lily Freeman is an 11th grader in Bucks County, Pennsylvania. And we discovered her because Jarrett actually pointed us in the direction of her incredible op-ed in the "Philadelphia Inquirer" about being Jewish woman of trans experience, and her experience with book bannings in Bucks County. Bucks County feels like it's the county that we hear about the most in the media, I think, because the school board and the superintendent have really made a coordinated effort to...
Jen: Allow book banning to go forward essentially.
Sarah: I mean, right? It's a very restrictive, really concerning level of book banning that's going on there. It's not that far from Philadelphia. Pennsylvania is somewhere we think of as a swing state, but it's usually blue. Like, it's an okay swing state. And I think Pennsylvania is a great example of, like, a real bellwether for what's happening for the rest of the country. But Lily is here to talk to us about how these book bans are impacting kids specifically, and families in schools every day, and how we as grown-ups, adults, and parents, and family members can do our part.
Jen: Hi. Good morning, Lily. Why don't you introduce yourself to our listeners?
Lily: Yeah. So, I'm Lily. My pronouns are she/her. Some stuff about me, one thing is that I am a GLSEN National Student Council member. And GLSEN is an organization dedicated to disability, racial, and LGBTQ justice in schools. I am also a Jewish female of trans experience, and I am an 11th grader at Central Bucks High School East. But what I like to think of most importantly is that I'm a daughter, I'm a sister, and I'm a student in school. It's more than anything else.
Sarah: So, Lily, we found you because you have been a really active participant in combating a sort of move toward book banning in your home county, Bucks County, Pennsylvania. And I wonder if you could talk a little bit about what's going on actually on the ground in Bucks County, because it feels like it's just one example of what's happening nationwide.
Lily: Yeah. So, in my opinion, I feel like there's always been sort of, like, a discriminatory culture in Central Bucks. When I first started my transition, it was a lot of, like, harassment and just general lack of support from the school. But I feel like with the pandemic and with the increase in a lot of these situations happening in other states, our district has kind of taken on those...how do I say it? Like, they've taken on the challenges that have been brought up, which aren't really supposed to be challenges.
So one thing that's happened is a lot of book banning and censorship happening in my area. First it started off with a neighboring school district called Pennridge. And they start by pulling the book, "Heather Has Two Mommies" off the shelf in December of 2021. And me and my family, we were a little concerned because this district was very close to ours. And it didn't really make sense why this book would be pulled off. Like, we read it. It was very innocent. It was just about a little girl and her two moms. Like, nothing anything inappropriate in that book.
So, what we really wanted to do is, like, bring attention to this and highlight LGBTQ literature in K-12 schools, and why it's so important to have on shelves, and why censorship and banning is wrong. So I started my own little project, which I'll talk a little bit about later.
But our book policy that my district has adopted now, which was just passed this past summer, so it's the most restrictive library policy in all of Pennsylvania. And it was actually stolen from a school in Texas. So they have this policy. What it is, it's very, like, highly restrictive, and most importantly, it's very vague. So people could challenge books, they have the right to do that.
But the main focus that a lot of groups in my area are focusing on is that these books with LGBTQ and racial themes are sexually explicit, nudity and sex acts. Which, it doesn't really make any sense because a lot of people are pulling excerpts from the books when… how the librarian said it before is they would take a look at the entire book and they would kind of score it on who it was appropriate for, what grades they were appropriate for. But just in general, the wording of this policy is very vague.
So the superintendent gets to put together a committee of teachers, librarians, and parents to decide if the book gets removed. And then if it does, what book does it get replaced with? Which, again, it's like, what kind of parents? Who has the qualifications to read these books and decide whether it's appropriate or not?
Sarah: So, what's going on? Because that was enacted at the beginning of the school year. No, I'm sorry, last year.
Jen: That's over the summer.
Sarah: Over the summer. Tell us what you guys started doing. Yeah.
Lily: So, right now librarians can't even decide on their own anymore what books get to go into the libraries. And the superintendent will now...or the superintendent and the school board now have a say with this, like, whole committee and stuff. And so new books that have LGBTQ and racial themes won't be able to get into these libraries.
Jen: And I think it's worth pointing out, and I share in other segments, like we've mentioned this. But, like, "Heather Has Two Mommies" is a great example of, if this book had had a heterosexual couple, a mom and a dad, there would be zero objectionable things about it. So what these bans are really objecting to is the very presence of gay or queer people, or people that aren't white, and in the most benign ways as parents, as community members, as people who have chickens. So this is the thing that is really scary about these bans, is there's no sexual content in these books. They're queer people just living their lives.
Lily: Yeah. And there's, like, this whole vilification of librarians and teachers, that they're trying to indoctrinate kids or stuff, but really it's just getting that representation in schools and just putting these books that are good to read. And I'll talk a little bit about that later. But, yeah, there's really just no trust for, like, the teachers. And, like, one of the reasons school board meetings where this policy was put into place, like, teachers were crying, and they're honestly just scared to speak out against these policies because of fear of backlash and...
Sarah: And of losing their jobs, right?
Lily: Yep. They have to choose between supporting their students or being fired. And I really think that these books are just so important for kids because not only are they like mirrors for these kids, but for other people, for all students, they're like windows into other people's lives. And they can be used as, like, a really good education tool. Like, what I like to say is that, like, these books lead to education. And when you don't have that education, you're ignorant. And ignorance leads to that hate, and it causes that discriminatory culture which was seen in schools before these policies went into place.
Jen: Lily, do you think...one thing that I think people maybe don't quite realize is how highly organized these groups are that are bringing these bans. You know, this isn't necessarily like a grassroots group of people in Bucks County. Like, it's probably a couple of people backed by these big organizations. So, like, one of the goals of this podcast for our listeners is, like, what can people really do? What kind of support do you and your students in Bucks County need?
But the truth is every student everywhere is gonna need this. These bans are spreading really fast, even to places that, you know, people might be surprised to find out. Suburban Philadelphia doesn't really seem like a place where, you know, it's like the most discriminatory, you know, laws in the state of Pennsylvania. That's not where I would have guessed they would be. So one of the things that you can talk about maybe with GLSEN or other organizations is, how can people help?
Lily: I think that the number-one thing that, I mean, students like me are looking for is just speaking up in general. That's the most important thing, because a lot of us students, even though we're, like, speaking at school board meetings, we're not necessarily being listened to, because it's the school board and superintendent that are making all these decisions. For example, like pride flags being taken down in classrooms, and also with our, like, student portal, about name changes and stuff, it just...we are kind of being, like, silenced a little about these things. We're not being listened to.
And actually, the superintendent came to each of our schools to ask us, like, what they should do, and this was last year. And we were like, all this horrible stuff is happening to us in schools. And I actually said to him, like, "Well, what are you gonna do about it?" And he was like, "I'll bring it up with the board." And then at the next school board meeting, he said, "Well, why don't we all just move on?" But clearly that's not the issue. And I think we really need, especially adults and communities to really say, "No. This isn't something we have to move on from. This is something that we have to learn from, and we have to continue to fight for."
I think, like, another thing is to vote. Voting is, like, a huge thing because...or even running for school board. We really need those people who are willing to educate others, and who are willing to learn for themselves. And I think those two things are the most important.
Sarah: Lily, in your school district, are you finding that there are a lot of kids who are protesting? And, you know, I saw that you've had walkouts. I wonder if you could talk about, like, what is the support network that you have, that Lily has in Bucks County working against these bans?
Lily: Yes. So, definitely, in my community, we do have a lot of adult and student support. I know there have been, of course, like, community events. And I've had really supportive teachers in my school, so that's one thing. But yet again, it's been really hard for… and their students.
Yeah. So I've been working with this group called Advocates for Inclusive Education, which has a website that lists what's going on in Bucks County and stuff. And a lot of the things that we do is just educating on what's happening because a lot of people don't know. Like, a lot of my friends don't even know that these book bannings are happening in my school, which is kind of crazy. But, yeah. So, along with that, well, what we're really trying to do is just speak to the silent majority, which, kind of, don't know about what's going on, or don't really know how to help. And that's, kind of, what we've been doing, and that's kind of the student support network right now.
Sarah: That's what we've been saying in some of the other conversations that we've had for this episode. There are more of us than there are of them, but we need to be louder.
Lily: Exactly. Yeah. And I think that with a lot of people, they don't necessarily want to get involved unless it affects them. And I feel like the word that needs to be put out is, well, this affects all people. This affects all people. This affects all education because, again, if you don't have this education, and if you don't learn to be kind and to accept others, then that ignorance leads to hate, and it leads to a discriminatory environment in schools.
Sarah: So, Lily, what's happening in November in Bucks County? Is there an election that is important? Are we electing out a superintendent? What are we doing?
Lily: Yeah. So, in November in my area, it's some school board members that are being elected out. So that's definitely something that we've been trying to get running about the election, stuff like that, even with the governor, and with the House, and just voting in general. I feel voting is so important. It dictates everything this year.
Jen: One thing I also feel is, like, really important to mention, we in this segment just mentioned "Heather Has Two Mommies." Is that the title, right? And that's a picture book. That's a book for little kids.
Sarah: Like "Mr. Watson's Chickens."
Jen: Right. But a huge number of the books that are being targeted are actually young adult books, books that you would choose for yourself. And unlike, you know, "Heather Has Two Mommies," which is just about a family, these books are really about kids and teenagers exploring their own identity, making choices for themselves. And these are books that don't get...you know, kids by that age are picking out books for themselves really at the library, or in the school. And it's really important to realize this, too, like, these fights are not about curriculum. These aren't fights where, you know, someone was teaching with...although they could. I would have no problem with it.
But these are books that are, like, free reading. These are just widely available in the library. And so it's especially pernicious because, again, to have adults say, "I don't want these materials available for anyone," as a choice. And so that's the other thing that, I think, people don't realize, is, you know, it's not targeted like, "I don't think this class of kids should be reading 'To Kill a Mockingbird.' I don't want any books that have to do with an identity that's not white, straight, cishet in the library at all." And that raises, like, what are libraries for? They're not just for, you know, that constituent group of people. They're for everyone. And I think that that's part of what is really scary about it to me. Yeah.
Lily: Yeah. Exactly. And a lot of people, I mean, especially, like, in my community, people that are for the book bannings, they just say, "Well, those students, they can just, like, buy it off of Amazon." They can do that, but not every student can. Not every student can go to a public library. Not every student has a supportive family to bring those books home to. And it's the school's job to best support those students as they're discovering their…
Jen: I think the other thing about people who are like, "I can just buy these books," is what they don't also understand. And I think we talked about this maybe with Jarrett, is the pipeline for these books is gonna dry up. Publishing is a business. And if they think libraries won't buy these books, they're not gonna take a stand because it's the right thing to do. They're gonna be like, "Well, we shouldn't publish these." And that's my other, like, big concern, I think, all of us, is fighting for these books now isn't just fighting for kids who are in school now. It's fighting for kids who are gonna be in school in 10 years and in 20 years. Like, it's keeping this robust and available for everyone, everywhere.
Lily: Yeah. Exactly. I think there's, like, this big question right now. It's like, where does this end? When is it gonna end where we're banning books and taking down pride flags, and stuff, you know? I'm reading "Nineteen Eighty-Four" in school right now, and I'm like, "This… is, like, crazily similar right now."
Sarah: That's so ironic to me that you're reading "1984" in school and the school district is doing this. I mean...
Lily: I know. And it's all about, like, banning books and media.
Sarah: It's like the school board has not read "1984." So that's a lot. I'm gonna just have to sit with that for...
Lily: All of these classics have that, like, "pornographic material" or, like, allusions to stuff that they're trying to ban from schools. I mean, it's very hypocritical that when it involves an LGBTQ couple or people of different races that it's seen as inappropriate.
Sarah: Lily, can I ask a more personal question about your family? Your mom is so active in all of the work around protesting these bans. And I wonder if you could just give us...because we have a lot of parents who listen to the podcast who wanna know, like, how to be the best parent they can be in situations like this. I wonder if you could talk a little bit about, like, ways your mom and dad, or, you know, your whole family have helped you with this.
Lily: I think something that has been, of course, taken away by all this stuff in the school district is just having a safe place. And my parents, they really strive to make a safe place for anybody. So if they want to talk, then they can talk, and just kind of highlighting other students' voices and helping to uplift people. I feel like that's the best thing that you can do to best support students right now.
Jen: Lily, anything else you wanna tell us about or, you know, organizations that our listeners can support?
Lily: Yeah. So, like, besides GLSEN, which I work with, I also have an Instagram account called Project Uncensored where we're sharing student stories and, like, different LGBTQ books. I would go follow that. And, of course, The Trevor Project and the National Coalition Against Censorship are also really good places, as well as that website I talked about specifically with Bucks County, advocatesforinclusiveeducation.org.
Sarah: We'll put all of that stuff in show notes, everyone. You'll have access to it all. And, Lily, you're the best. So, I'm watching you from New York City, Jen's watching you from Chicago. We want to help however we can, and you're doing amazing work. So thank you.
Lily: Thank you.
Jen: Thanks for being with us today, we really appreciate it.
I think it's impacting students the most right now, and so we really wanted to have a student voice on. And, you know, everyone, we'll put in show notes, Lily wrote an amazing op-ed for the "Philadelphia Inquirer." And I think that's one of the things where we first kind of found her. And, you know, just really teaching your kids...what I think people don't realize is you teach your kids to stand up by standing up yourself. And sometimes kids stand up and we have to support them, but ideally we're all doing it. We're all in it together.
Lily: Yeah. I mean, what my mom tells me the most is, like, "Even though you're feeling, like, down, and even though you are not being supported in schools, you're paving the way for other people to be supported in schools." And I feel like that's what really motivates me, is that it'll be an easier time for people like me going through schools.
Sarah: Yeah.
Jen: Well, you're a rock star, Lily. We love it.
Sarah: Thanks so much for joining us, Lily.
Lily: Of course. Thank you so much for having me.
Sarah: The kids are all right.
Jen: I know. I'm like, what an amazing kid. But also, I just think I know how proud I am of, like, my... Little Romance, when, you know, he does something. And I'm just like, "God, her parents must be amazing." I don't want to, like, give all the credit to them, but, like, what an amazing kid. Yes.
Sarah: I wanna bring my daughter to Bucks County to meet Lily and, like, hang out.
Jen: Yeah. Well, and the truth is, you know, Lily spoke really powerfully about, like, organizations that helped her and her fellow students, but also, you know, how hard it is to have adults, sort of, ask you...you know, like to have the superintendent come and have a meeting, and say, "How can we support you?" And then not do any of those things.
Sarah: And then, like, pat you on the head and send you along like Cindy Lou Who, like you don't really have opinions.
Jen: Yeah. So that's the thing, I think, one of the...it's just really important, I think, for us to hear from students because they know that the teachers that support them. And to have that support be something that can be litigated by the school, or that teachers can be punished for, like, that's our job as teachers to support students. And so to be snipping away the safety net under these kids as they are actively in school. And that takes a lot of bravery for Lily to be such an active voice, but also is really inspiring to hear her say, like, "I'm doing it because I know it's gonna make it easier for the kids coming after me."
Sarah: Yeah. I wanna talk about two things that came to me after we talked to Lily. One is, your school district, wherever you are right now, has a system in place for challenging books.
Jen: Yes.
Sarah: And in many, many school districts, part of that system is a board of...it's not the school board. It's usually sort of connected. There's maybe a school board member on it. But it's a panel of adults whose job it is to read these books when they are challenged. You, whether or not you have a child in the district, or whether or not you have a child, period, are able to volunteer to sit on these boards. It's a really powerful volunteer position that needs more people who...like us. Yeah.
Jen: I think the thing that's really become clear to me, though, is that...and this, like, will shock no one, is watching conservative, evangelical fascists essentially run the table using the rules that are...essentially, like, using the rules against us. Because in a normal school year, this rule exists. Like, these sort of, like, procedures exist. For like, you know, one parent who, like, "I'm worried about this one book," or whatever. But when people bring hundreds of books or list hundreds of books, you essentially are, like, jamming up the law.
Sarah: Sure.
Jen: And it's all bad faith. That's, like, a bad faith effort. They have not read these books. They don't actually have any kind of knowledge of what's in these books. They just know that they don't want books like this to exist.
They don't want books that make kids feel safe to exist. They want everyone to just crawl back in their holes so they can do whatever they want. And I feel really strongly like...I will be honest, and I don't know if it's ever gonna happen. But until school boards refuse to, like, let people use these procedures in this way, it's gonna continue to be really messy. I just feel really strongly, like, you know...I don't know if I'm explaining that right. Like, at first I was like, "Yeah, just use the procedures." And I'm like, "Oh, no. They're using the procedures." And it's different.
Sarah: You're saying we need to be ungovernable?
Jen: Yeah. Right.
Sarah: Yes, cool. But also there are the...you should know in your own district how school book challenges and public library book challenges work. Yeah. And if you have time to help be ungovernable by being on this committee, we love you, and we'll send you "Fated Mates" stuff.
The other thing that I just wanted to say, too, is the city of Brooklyn, my home city is providing young people across the country free library cards to the Brooklyn Public Library collection so that they can access eBooks through the Brooklyn Public Library anywhere in the country. So if you and your children or students, or friends of yours live in a district where these bans are restrictive and pernicious, as Jen says, you can access the Brooklyn Public Library and get a free library card from them. We'll put links to that in show notes. I'm really happy that my tax dollars are going to do this, be ungovernable.
Jen: Yeah. I mean, and that's it. It's, you know, look for the helpers.
Sarah: Okay. Oh, next. Our final person is Melissa Walker who, aside from being a friend of mine, is a magnificent YA writer. She's written YA, she's written middle grade. And after the 2016 election, Melissa got very active, became very politically active with an organization called The States Project, which, it's a fundraising organization that connects the importance of state legislatures to every aspect of our lives, the idea being that these laws, particularly laws around school boards, around book bannings. And lots of other laws...I mean, we just saw the overturning of Roe v. Wade, all these laws are built at the state level.
And this is a perfect time to talk about state legislatures because this is an off-year election. Off-year elections tend to get fewer and fewer voters out. The name of the game in off-year elections is voter turnout, and it's voter turnout for, yes, Senate seats and House seats, and sometimes governorships, but it's also voter turnout for literally your school board representatives in a lot of places, for your local district, for your local House, for your state House, for your state representatives, for your mayors, your, you know, town councils, all of this stuff up and down the ballot.
The State Project, and Melissa work really hard to flip these state legislatures that are eminently flippable. So we'll put links to the project in show notes. You'll hear more right now from Melissa. But this is really about what we have to do in November.
So, thanks, Melissa, for joining us.
Melissa: I'm so happy to be here.
Sarah: We're thrilled to have you. Can you tell us a little bit...why don't we start with The States Project first, which is where you are? And tell us what the project does and how it works.
Melissa: Yeah. Absolutely. So, at The States Project, we focus exclusively on state legislatures, which are an area of government that often gets overlooked. And we work to help elect majorities that are focused on improving people's lives. So that's electing folks into state capitals that are people-focused and ready to pass bills that will help. And we do that through the work of Giving Circles, which are people organizing their communities to… target state and help change the balance of power, and also through our broader community and amazing groups of lawmakers who are working on all of these policies as well.
Sarah: I think a lot of people when they think about, like, law making think of Congress. So, why focus on states? Why is that so important?
Melissa: Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, I will say that I am a little bit new to this world, since 2016, which, I think, is an activation point for a lot of folks. And I really realized how important state legislatures were when, really, I attended a holiday party. I heard a New York state senator speak, and I started to realize that everything that he was talking about and everything that I cared about was being controlled in state legislatures and not in Washington D.C. So everything from education policy to environmental protections, to gun safety, to healthcare, to civil rights, and then to the core of democracy, voting rights, controlled state by state. And, of course, gerrymandering, the drawing of the district lines that decide who goes to Congress.
And I started to see state legislatures as the ultimate power center, because they were controlling the kitchen table issues. Things like, I started realizing I'm in my home state of North Carolina right now visiting my mother. This is the state where the bathroom bill was passed under President Obama, and I started realizing, "Oh, that was lawmakers in Raleigh who did that." And thinking about Florida and the stand-your-ground gun law that let Trayvon Martin's murderer go free, and realized, "Oh, that was Tallahassee that did that." And then it passed in 25 other states.
And things like the Flint, Michigan water crisis. I started to realize, "That's a Lansing problem, not a Washington D.C. problem." So I started to see the power of these state lawmakers. And most people don't really know who their state lawmakers are. Most people don't know who's in their state capital for them. They're not the names we see on TV.
But they have this immense power. And they also have the power, again, over voting rights and deciding who goes to Congress. So they touch the kitchen table issues. They also touch who's in power in Washington D.C. And it's a real lever of control that the radical right wing has built up and co-opted over decades, while we stared at Washington D.C. and felt good about the direction the country was headed in.
And, you know, I learned that from 2016, we lost nearly a thousand state legislative seats as we stared at Washington D.C. And in those states where right-wing lawmakers took over, they made people's lives bad. They defunded education, they put in right-to-work laws, they gutted environmental protections. But when people's lives got bad, they didn't say, "Oh, that must be my state legislator," because no one knows who their state legislators are, or sometimes even that they have one. But they look at Washington D.C. and they hit a change button there because that's what we hear about on the news every night. Little did they know that the roots of Trumpism were being seeded in state legislatures, and they are such immense power centers.
Sarah: And we're really seeing that right now in the...I mean, we've been seeing that for so many years. But obviously the reason why we're doing this episode is about a very specific kind of state and local problem, which is book banning. And obviously we've talked on the podcast about the ban on trans books and books that touch on sex and sexuality for kids. In a lot of these states, we've talked about the "Don't Say Gay" bill in Florida.
And then, of course, this month we've seen in Oklahoma a ban on both sexual assault awareness programs and romance novel book clubs in local libraries. Which, you know, feels like the sublime to the ridiculous in a lot of ways, but obviously is like a much larger question of sex and sexuality, and identity, and experience, that is being silenced. And so we're really interested in how these kinds of laws come to pass, and, you know, I'd love to hear your thoughts on how books, and libraries, and schools, and all of that gets sort of rolled together.
Melissa: Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, I think, you know, this has been happening for a little while. So, you know, it's nothing new to have certain books banned. And, you know, for a long time, like, in publishing, we've known that states like Texas, which is a huge book market, has requested changes in textbooks in order to sell to their education market. And because of the size of the Texas market, publishers are willing to do it. And so, you know, conservatives influenced what's been taught to all American kids for a while, you know. And that has been happening.
This new wave is something a little different and bigger. You know, these bans that target first, kind of, school libraries, and then school librarians and teachers, and then moving to public libraries, this is expanding. And really, like, make no mistake, these bans which can look very local and small, and battles to be fought district by district, are much bigger than that.
I know that the American Library Association has reported that in 2021, it recorded 729 efforts to ban books at school or public libraries, which is the most that had ever happened since they started tracking this in 2000. And, of course, the most challenged books were from black and LGBTQ+ authors or centered on characters from those communities.
But, you know, this fight is expanding to right-wing state legislative efforts to create statewide policies, which is what you're talking about laws designed to… more books, and the silencing of more of these voice voices. You know, Florida just rejected 40% of math textbooks for claiming they included things like social-emotional learning and critical race theory. You know, that just happened. And this is a long-standing multi-pronged effort to undermine faith in public schooling. It's part of the work to dismantle public education. It's a decades-long campaign, and this is one prong of the takeover at the state level for the right wing.
So, in thinking about it, you know, how does it connect to these other laws that we've been hearing about passing state by state? So, Oklahoma legislature just proposed a state law that would allow parents to seek up to $10,000 for each day a book is kept in their child's school library after it was nominated for removal. And that hasn't passed but it's been introduced. And it reminded me of something. It echoes the abortion bans that Texas passed, where you can have a… on your neighbor. And how terrifying is it that you can turn your neighbor into the government? I mean, these are wild, and they are part of a larger plan.
Sarah: So, I guess, I mean, that's a terrifying thing to think about, especially when you're...many of our listeners are women and non-binary people, marginalized people.
Jen: And also I would like to say, like, living in states that they love with their families, and, you know, having people sort of partly be like, "Well, why don't you move?" And I feel like this is such a grave misunderstanding of, you know, the world and the way it works, and fascism, and how it spreads. And I think one of the things that we are really concerned, I think it's so easy when it's summed up like that to have the, like, "let me go lay down now" moment, and feel powerless. And I think what we really want to give our listeners is a sense of power. What can we do? More than just raising money, maybe. What can we do?
Melissa: Yeah. Absolutely. So, thank you for asking that question, because I start with doom, but I'm really here to deliver some hope because I give a lot of hope. You know, and this is true for the book bans. It's true for the other laws that we've talked about today. And it's also true, honestly, for the death of democracy, which we also are reading a lot about lately at election subversion efforts, fraudits, all of those things. But this is all being organized through state legislatures. And there is a path to action here. And the path to action is changing the balance of power in state legislatures.
So, here's a sentence that'll give folks a little bit of hope. It is often cheaper to change the balance of power… than it is to win a single competitive congressional seat. Congressional races cost millions and millions of dollars. State legislative races do not. They are still local, they are still small, and there are many states that are very close to shifting majorities. And when you shift the majority, everything changes in the state. And state laws spread.
So states are meant to be laboratories for democracy, they're meant to be marriage equality going from state to state, to federal, or healthcare going from Hawaii to Massachusetts to becoming the ACA. And that's what they can be. Right now, too many are laboratories for other laws that are passing state by state. But if we can win back some of these majorities, we can shift the tide there.
And some more hope, there are many states that are close. In Arizona, we are one seat away in each chamber. One state house seat, or one state senate seat stops right-wing control in Arizona in 2022, in November. In Michigan, it's three state senate seats or three state house seats to tie, four to flip the chamber entirely, stopping right-wing control, or gaining Democratic control in Michigan in 2022. In Pennsylvania, it's 12 seats in the House on better maps than we've had in a decade. So there's real places for movement here and real places for action, in terms of focusing on state and local elections.
And I live in New York which is a state that has a majority, that is mostly focused on improving lives. There can always be improvements anywhere. But I really care about these other states, because this is where the foundational stuff is decided for our country, you know.
If we think about something like the ACA, we think about how, okay, that was the law of the land. But 12 states still haven't expanded Medicaid because their right-wing-led legislatures don't feel like it. So there are people who don't have the full benefits of the Affordable Care Act in their states, and that's because of their legislatures. And so what happens at the federal level, yes, has a lot of power, and carries a lot of weight. But when we feel frustrated at watching not a lot get through in Congress in D.C., we have to understand that anything that gets through gets implemented at the state level, and that is determined by who's in the majority there. Focus there, watch things move very, very quickly.
So, there is hope in focusing on these state elections, and knowing who goes to your state capital for you is a huge piece of it. Most people don't. I will admit that I did not, until I heard that New York state senator Daniel Squadron, who's also now...he's the… Project, by the way. He started it in the summer of 2017. But I realized that, you know, this is a place where people aren't looking, even people who feel really well-informed. So focusing there and knowing whether your state has a majority that represents your values is key. And then helping to change the bounce of power is key.
Sarah: Melissa, is there a website or somewhere that we can go...?
Melissa: Yes. So, to find your legislator, there's a great site called openstates.org. So you can go there and you can find your state legislator. It's actually kind of hard to find, so that's a great site resource. If you go to statesproject.org, which is my organization site, in our states, it'll show where we're targeting this year. And it shows the current balance of power, the stakes, the landscape, the opportunity, and then some clicks for how to get involved. We mainly work through Giving Circles, which is people organizing their friends and family to raise money to try to change the balance of power in a state. And it is about raising, you know, our electoral dollars. It is also about organizing, about learning how to bring attention and resources to something that you care about.
So we do kind of core trainings and storytelling, fundraising, and organizing, because those are the three key elements of leading a Giving Circle and getting involved. And when you have those skills, you'll be able to bring attention and resources to anything that you care about throughout, you know, in your local area, for a Giving Circle project, for all of these things. And you walk with more power and more hope when you do that. And when you walk with power and hope, people will walk with you, because everyone is looking for a way to get involved right now.
Everyone...the path that feels impactful, and organizing friends and family is incredibly impactful. So it is about giving a little bit, but then organizing 10 other people to give the same amount. Because that is where real power lies. And I have to be honest, we are up against a very, very well-funded right-wing machine, and money is the sharpest tool in the drawer… We have to level the playing field on that to win some of these races. So that is one way that folks can get involved in. We give everyone the tools to do so through our Giving Circles program. So that is a big way. I also have some other ideas for local involvement.
Sarah: Yeah. Tell us.
Jen: Good.
Melissa: Great. So, there's an amazing group called Red Wine & Blue. Their website is redwine.blue. They've created a resource to help people fight back against far-right extremism in kids' schools. So there's a ton of helpful information. They have a handbook that kind of tells how to organize a group within your community and get the message out on social media, how to speak out at school board meetings, and how to run for school board.
Sarah: Which is so important. For those of you listening and thinking about how to protect your kids and how to keep this kind of stuff from happening in schools and from your kids hearing about it in schools.
Melissa: Absolutely. Know what majority of your school board looks like. And if it doesn't reflect your values, run, or find someone in your community to run. There's a stat that says that women, to run, need to be asked seven times, or it needs to be suggested to them seven times. Men, it's more like once, or they usually...
So, you know, definitely, I know that running for office isn't for everyone, it's not for me. But I do also know who of my friends, every once in a while, say, "Thought about running? Thought about running?" Because that's really important, too. And I will say, you know, school boards, again, like we talked about, they're really important. They're a great way to get…
I would also encourage folks to run for state legislature because, again, these are still local races. It sounds bigger, but it's a part-time job. It pays very little in 40 out of 50 states. And, you know, people are going to their state capitals once a year for session and deciding whether to ban abortion, and deciding whether to expand healthcare, and deciding on gun safety laws for your state and your kids, and deciding on these curriculum decisions that, like Florida is making in this wild way.
And, by the way, those laws that have passed in Florida, we're now seeing pop up with almost the exact same language, state by state, by state, being spread. So if it's not your state, it can be. And we have to make sure that we are protecting democracy, electing majorities that stand for your values. And, you know, running for state leg is not a bad idea either, because school boards are important, but the rules of the road, the laws are determined at the state level. And the laws will rule what local is doing, what school board is doing at the state level. So that's where we have to secure these foundations.
Jen: And I would also...you know, I think the three of us...I live in Chicago, or, you know, kind of live in...I don't know, it feels like "safe," you know, "states." And, you know, they are still organizing in Illinois. So it's also really important to, you know, call your state legislators, you know, keep up the pressure that says, "This is, like, who we are and what we stand for." Continue to vote and support, because, you know, they are working just, you know, as hard as we are working. They are working the same way.
And so I feel like that's the other thing is, like, you know, what does it...I mean, I live in the blue bubble, but I would like to keep my state that way. So, you know, I can't just let...you know, if you are in that lucky position, you have to work to keep it that way. And I feel like in Illinois, you know, we had a Republican governor, and then now it's J. B. Pritzker, who is a great governor. And I really was like, wow. Those four years, you know, where we had a Republican, like, I noticed. And so, you know, that's the other thing is...I know I'm preaching to the choir, but it's, you know, don't feel like, "Okay, I don't have to worry about that in my state." We all have to worry about this.
Melissa: Absolutely. You feel it. You feel it when it's coming out of your state capital in a way that you don't from Washington D.C. I think that's, like, an important point for folks to know, you know.
And the other thing is this is 2022, and there's a lot of talk and chatter about the federal elections, and what's gonna happen there. And not that they're not important, but the thing that's not getting attention is actually foundationally important for our country. And it is where this right-wing movement grew. It is where we have to push back. And, like I said, it is also a fraction of the cost. These races, getting involved in them with your time, your talent, and your treasure, as the Giving Circles world likes to say, is a huge bang for your buck. Huge bang for your buck.
I mean, you know, after 2020, we saw things like, you know, Sara Gideon, who mounted an unsuccessful campaign against Susan Collins in Maine, finished her campaign with $15 million left over… And that's because this is where we focus, this is where we give emotionally. There will be so much emotional giving in 2022.
If you are organizing for a state legislature, and you're doing a Giving Circle, or you're working in a state, you know, locally, when you can channel people's emotional rage, sadness, donations into a pot, that actually has this impact and they can watch what it does, that feels really key, as well. It helps people come together and have a shared goal and mission, and, you know, impactful total to bring to these things. And it's really...like I said, it's the sharpest knife in the drawer at this point.
Jen: So, the other knives, the knives that are less sharp, I think that one of the things that we keep coming back to and we think about a lot here is, you know, we flipped the country in 2020 without Democrats even knocking on one door. But this year, we get to knock on doors. So all of the things, all of the people who joined us for "Fated States," the phone banking, the door knocking, the canvassing, the postcards, everything, that's all still in play, right? And is it in play locally, as well?
Melissa: Yeah. That's a great question. And it's huge, I would say. We have a very specific lens on state legislative races, which is that door knocking, door knocking, door knocking, door knocking. And specifically candidate door knocking, the candidate themselves going out on doors. We actually measure and we get weekly door knocking reports from all the candidates we endorse because it's a really key piece.
Jen: So here's something fascinating. Everybody knows that I moved in February. Within 10 days, our local person knocked on my door.
Melissa: Wow.
Jen: I mean, we're having primaries this year, just like everywhere else, so, you know, he was introducing himself and telling us about the primary. But he knew we had just moved in, and I was like, "This is wild." I mean, because we live in New York City, so...
Melissa: That's good organizing.
Sarah: Yes.
Melissa: That's really cool. Yeah. It's absolutely about that. And I would say that, like, door knocking is incredibly important. And, you know, the other things that you mentioned, too, it's all about how many touches a candidate has, how high their name gets. Something that often happens in states is that we organize for the state level races, so for governor's races, secretary of state races, attorney general races, and then we watch something happen like what happened in Georgia, which was incredible. It's like organizing on the ground for 10 years, Stacey Abrams in Fair Fight, and all the other groups that worked on that. Incredible, incredible, incredible. We win those two federal senate races.
And it didn't touch Atlanta. Atlanta still has a Republican super majority that then gutted more voting rights, closed more polling places, and still holds the power over voting rights in Georgia and over all the other things that we've talked about. And so, when people say Georgia went blue, we have to say, "Look, the frosting on the Georgia cake may be blue, but the inside is deep red. And unless we focus on these target districts to shift, we're not gonna be able to get to this foundational level of power."
So, I would ask folks to get involved and organize in phone banking, postcarding, door knocking, all of those things, and look at state legislative districts. And it's not easy to do. Whenever people are talking about gerrymandering, they're talking about congressional districts. But the truth is that state legislators also draw their own districts. They're different from the congressional maps, but they're drawing themselves back into power in many cases, and that's a key piece of why they're doing it. And so, looking at state legislative districts and knowing whether you're in an area that you could really make a difference in with your volunteer time is huge.
Sarah: So, is that something that The States Project also has for states that you're not, you know, super focused on? Where do we find those districts? And how do we understand those maps, I guess?
Melissa: Absolutely. Yeah. No. It's difficult. And I think it's difficult by design in a lot of ways. But I think it's about kind of just looking up where you live. Looking up your state legislator, and understanding, "What's the balance of power in my state?"
We have a lot of states listed on our website. If your state's not there, Ballotpedia is a great site to go to look at maps. And, you know, understanding, like, is there a place where I can work in my local area to knock on doors and try to shift a district? Or try to protect a district. I mean, these races are really won on the margins. That's something else. You know, that's one reason why it gives me a lot of hope.
In Arizona in 2020, you know, if we'd shifted 1,024 votes, we would have won in Arizona. And in Michigan, it was something like 2,600 votes over 3 districts. So knowing that, like, these are the margins, and this is what we're fighting for, it can go either way. We have to hold ground. We have to win a few more seats in these states. But shifting power would change everything.
Jen: And also getting involved even on the things that don't feel so political like joining your local library board. I mean, it feels like everything is political these days. And we've talked about this a thousand times on the podcast, but it's all politics. But the truth is that, you know, you can join your local library board pretty easily. That is not an elected position. So, thinking about those kinds of things, too. And that's a nice low-hanging fruit for somebody who's, like, interested and doesn't quite wanna run, or doesn't quite know how to get involved. It's a good place for passionate people to get started.
Sarah: And just to go back to your recommendation, Melissa, for Red Wine & Blue, those documents also have ways to speak up at school board meetings, ways to participate. So we'll put everything in show notes, guys.
Melissa: Absolutely. And I think, you know, once people do kind of tiptoe into involvement, which is really what I did, it can really sweep you away in a very powerful and positive way. And when you're the person in your community who kind of rallies people, who organizes people, who does that, it just gives you a lot of hope and you start to recognize that you're part of this long chain of people who've come before, and people who've had to push back and fight for democracy in ways that our generation has never known.
I mean, I will say I didn't know that I was stepping into a place where I was gonna need to tend to democracy for the rest of my life when I started doing this, but I know that now. And I know that it's an area where a lot of us feel tired and, like, we want to lie down and pull a blanket over our heads. But that is not the way, you know.
And for me, I always think to myself, like, I lead a very comfortable life. You know, the pain of what's happening in this country has not knocked on my doorstep yet. And so it is my job to not get tired, and to get up and do what I can, and, of course, to protect my joy around certain moments, like those Georgia senate races, yay. And then to say, now what's next? What else can we look at? What are the… we need to impact here? And I will say one more piece of hope is that...I don't know if y'all have talked about this yet, but the Brooklyn Public Library.
Sarah: Yes!
Jen: Yes.
Melissa: Yes. Okay, great. Shout out to the Brooklyn Public Library for making books accessible to kids around the country. It's really super exciting.
Jen: Yeah. It's a beautiful thing.
Sarah: Melissa, thank you so much for joining us.
Jen: Yes. Thank you.
Sarah: Thanks for making time for us. Thanks for being so quick to turn around and say yes. And thank you for all the work that you've done since 2016. I've known you from the jump, and I'm so proud to know you. So...
Melissa: Thank you. Thanks for all…
Jen: Can we just have, like, two minutes where you talk about your books? We didn't even say that you're a writer. Melissa is a fabulous YA writer, and middle grade. So just give us a little bit, a little taste of what you've got.
Melissa: Sure. So, I write mostly contemporary coming-of-age stories, some YA romance and some middle-grade dabbling into romance, I would say. And I think I miss writing, I have to say. My last book came out in 2018. It's called "Why Can't I Be You." It's available, if you all want to check it out. And I do miss writing, and I've talked to my writer friends about this a lot. And they've all said to me very comfortingly that life is good for writing, and that when I sit back down at my writing desk one day, I will have a lot more stories to tell, and writing is always there.
So...exactly. I'm really excited about it. I will say that, like, my inner introvert is, like, crying in a corner somewhere because...but I will absolutely return to it. And I miss writing. And just so grateful to, like, all the readers who are still reading and all the writers who are still writing, because I think it is a way for us to see each other, you know. And it's so important and so valuable. And we have to work to make sure it doesn't get taken away. So just appreciate all the organizing y'all are doing around this.
Jen: We will put links to Melissa's books in show notes so you can hear more from her in all the ways. So, thank you so much. Thanks to The States Project for all of the work that you're doing. Everyone, all of the resources that Melissa has referenced and that we talked about during this segment will be in show notes. And, Melissa, let us know if "Fated Mates" can ever help.
Melissa: Thank you so much. I really appreciate it.
Sarah: Feels like we ought to talk about "Fated States," Jen.
Jen: I think we should.
Sarah: Look at us. We're so...
Jen: Bringing it right back around to the states. It's like we planned it all in advance. We didn't think. That's what's great about everybody. So, everyone, one of the...so we've talked a lot about what you can do, how you can support your local school district, your local library, your kids.
We also think that we can support people in other states, and that is what "Fated States" is all about. This is our phone banking initiative where we are calling a different state pretty much every weekend to phone bank on behalf of Democratic candidates, and for abortion access. And, you know, although there aren't...we can't really phone bank to a library district. Like, trust me, we've...
Sarah: We're school board members in tiny places.
Jen: They're not enough numbers in the dialer for this. That's an inside joke for all of our phone bankers. We can get on Pennsylvania State, you know, voters' lines and talk about John Fetterman. We can call Georgia and talk about Stacey Abrams and Raphael Warnock. So we hope that if you are inspired by this, one of the other things you might consider doing is joining us between now and election day, every Saturday from 3:00 to 5:00 Eastern, where we will be calling a variety of states, like, one state every weekend, or a different call in order to help keep the Senate and Congress blue, and to try and get governors to be Democratic in some of these places, again, that we feel are really close.
Sarah: Yeah. We have a friend who's a constitutional scholar, and he was here yesterday. And he said that one of the things that he's most concerned about with the Supreme Court over the next term is there's a sort of obscure reading of a law that would allow for secretaries of state and state legislatures to basically deny election results. And there is precedent at the Supreme Court level for that to potentially be legal, and he thinks that's not great, and we think that's not great.
So the answer is, don't give them the chance. Which means, Tuesday, November 8th is election day. You can go to vote.org to check your registration, to check registration deadlines, to check absentee ballot deadlines, mail-in ballot deadlines. And, of course, you can always volunteer for your local candidates. There are more of us than there are of them. And there are kids like Lily, and librarians like Jarrett, and people like Melissa working every day to do everything they can. And we can help them.
Jen: I know. A very special episode of "Fated Mates" is sometimes a downer, but I also feel really inspired by hearing people that are doing good work, and being told really explicitly what we can do to help. So, you know, it's only hopeless if you let it be. The thing is we can't afford that mindset or attitude. So we hope that you have heard some ideas today that you feel like you can, like, you know, turn off this podcast and take some action.
Sarah: Show notes, show notes.
Jen: That's what's really important.
Sarah: I'm gonna make it as easy as possible.
Jen: Get out there and read a banned book.
Sarah: Yeah. We'll see you on Wednesday when we're back on our bullshit.
Bonus! Fated Mates Live in Alexandria, VA
We're on hiatus until September 14, when we'll start Season 5, but you won’t miss us, because this week, we have the recording of Fated Mates Live, our first-ever in-person live! Headphones in for this one, y’all.
We were joined in Alexandria, VA by Kate Clayborn, Adriana Herrera, Tracey Livesay, Naima Simone, Ali Hazelwood, Diana Quincy, Andie J. Christopher, and Sophie Jordan, and we had the best time! This audio is imperfect, but there’s so much laughter here — we hope you’ll join us for the next one (which will hopefully be in the spring)…stay tuned on that front!
Be sure to subscribe to the podcast in your favorite podcasting app so you know the moment we return.
Thanks to Fox & Wit, creators of the Foxglove Special Edition Book Box of Kennedy Ryan's Before I Let Go, available for preorder now. The box comes with a special edition cover of Before I Let Go, a signed book plate, and a letter from Kennedy herself.
Season 5 starts in two weeks! Our first read along of the season is Lisa Kleypas’s Marrying Winterborne. Get it at Amazon, Apple Books, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, or at your local indie.
Show Notes
Our first in-person Live event was a smashing success! We welcomed Kate Clayborn, Adriana Herrera, Tracey Livesay, Naima Simone, Ali Hazelwood, Diana Quincy, Andie J. Christopher, and Sophie Jordan. Thank you to Old Town Books for partnering with us on this event.
Thank you to the audience for their participation! We used a platform called Menti, which turned the screen behind us into an interactive platform (like an Instagram Live) where our audience could respond and comment. If we all have a reaction to something you can't hear....it's because someone in the audience said something brilliantly funny using Menti.
The book Sarah accidentally interstitialed during the recording is C.M. Nascosta's Sweet Berries.
Sponsor
This week’s episode of Fated Mates
is sponsored by:
Fox & Wit,
Book subscription boxes delivered right to your door.
Get a beautiful, exclusive edition of Kennedy Ryan’s Before I Let Go
from their Foxglove series of romances at foxandwit.com
S04.17: Roy Kent Redux, Happy New Year!
It’s New Year’s Eve and that means it’s time for a special episode of Fated Mates! Also, Ted Lasso Season 2 is complete and that means it’s time for another Roy Kent episode, so we’re saying, “Why not both?”
Both it is! Come for this two-hour deep dive on former AFC Richmond team captain and current AFC Richmond coach, Roy Kent and his bangin’ girl, Keeley Jones, Independent Woman…stay for the Bantr about Isaac, Rebecca, Ted and more. We’re talking about the whole season (except for that one episode we’re going to pretend doesn’t exist). Spoilers abound, so if you haven’t watched, do that first!
Happy happy new year, Magnificent Firebirds. You were the best thing about 2021 for us.
Thank you, as always, for listening! If you are up for leaving a rating or review for the podcast on your podcasting app, we would be very grateful!
We are starting as we mean to go on in 2022 — our first read-along of the year will be Lisa Valdez’s Passion, an erotic historical published in 2005 that is W-I-L-D. There is a lot of biblical stuff at the world’s fair. Also some truly bananas stuff that…sticks with you. We haven’t read it in a while, so we’re telling you to be careful because…honestly, it’s just good sense with this one. Get it at Amazon, Apple, Kobo, or B&N.
Show Notes
In January of 2021, sex columnist Sophia Benoit was our guest, and we talked about Ted Lasso. In June of 2021, we aired our first Roy Kent episode.
Doc Martens have never been gone, but they are definitely back.
Cheers was one of the all great sitcoms, which aired from 1982-1993.
Jen's Christmas gift from Mr. ReadsRomance was the BusyBox; Sarah’s Christmas present from her in-laws came from Spare Time Used Books in Paso Robles, California.
Hearst Castle is pretty wild, and not just because it has literal wild zebras roaming around on its grounds.
You, too, can make a donation to Flatbush Cats.
To clarify, Jen watched The Bear Episode the first time around, but skipped in on this rewatch.
The “Roy is sorry for not understanding keely” playlist on apple music and also on Spotify.
Apple TV+ is available nearly everywhere people watch video. An Apple device is not required. You can binge both seasons with a seven day free trial.
04.16: (Short and) Sexy Christmas Recs
Holidays are about traditions and it's a Fated Mates tradition to rerun the previous year's holiday episode. So here we are! This year, we’ve added 30 minutes of chatter about two Christmas romances we loved in 2021. You can take Fated Mates to work, but you can’t take the very unsafe for work discussion out of Fated Mates, so headphones in!
Much love and many thanks for being with us!
Please enjoy this short playlist of holiday music featured on the podcast.
For full show notes, see:
Roy and Keely's Sexy Christmas.
Check out Whores of Yore.
Seamen sing shanties. Sarah's talking about something else.
Jen did not make up this thing about St. Nicholas and shoes.
The Black Forest in both a place in Germany and a delicious cake.
Fated Mates LIVE! Bombshell Launch Event
We promised you fun stuff while we are on Hiatus, and here we are!
Last week, more than 700 of you joined us for a Fated Mates LIVE to celebrate Sarah’s new book, Bombshell! We had a great time talking to some of our favorite people, playing games, talking about thighsexuality, 19th Century surgery, and, of course, girl gangs in pop culture.
Thanks to our faves: Andie J. Christopher, Kate Clayborn, Alexis Daria, Adriana Herrera, Sophie Jordan, Christina Lauren, Tracey Livesay, Diana Quincy, Kennedy Ryan and Joanna Shupe for celebrating with us, and to Northshire Bookstore, East City Bookshop, Katy Budget Books, Old Town Books & Mysterious Galaxy for being fabulous independent bookstores that always support romance novels.
We’re starting Season 4 in two weeks…we hope this helps tide you over until then!
For more from the event, check this Twitter thread.
S03.48: The Ted Lasso Interstitial: Is Roy Kent a Romance Hero?
“Hang on,” we can hear you saying, “isn’t this a romance novel podcast?” It absolutely is, and that’s why we’re dropping a very special episode about the character who is the most perfect on-screen version of a romance hero that ever there was: Captain of the AFC Richmond team, Roy Kent. Added bonus, we’re joined by Jen’s brother Erik to talk sports stories (and check in on Jürgen Klopp).
Spoilers abound, so if you haven’t watched Season 1, do that first!
Our next read along is Cat Sebastian’s wonderful Unmasked by the Marquess. Get it at Amazon, Apple Books, B&N, Kobo, or Bookshop.org.
Thank you, as always, for listening! Please follow us on your favorite podcasting app, and if you are up for leaving a rating or review there, we would be very grateful!
Show Notes
Ted Lasso season two starts this Friday, and the reviews look great. Also, if you haven't read this GQ profile of Jason Sudeikis, you are missing out.
In season 2, we talked about Cinnamon Roll heroes, as compared to Alpha heroes. Grunting is definitely an alpha hero trait.
We love Hannah Waddingham (Rebecca) and Juno Temple (Keeley) and that’s all we have to say about that.
Apparently, there are ways to watch Apple TV Plus shows even if you don’t have an Apple Device. Who knew!
You, too, can bake Ted’s biscuits.
USAians have a different relationship with Soccer than the rest of the world. Perhaps you need a primer on the Premier League, promotion and relegation, the average age of Premier League players, and just how popular is Premier League football really is.
Fated Mates has a favorite team, it’s Liverpool, and it’s basically because of our favorite stern brunch daddy TM, Jürgen Klopp. Stern Brunch Daddy(tm) is the invention of Andie J. Christopher, friend of the pod, who has a new book out this week!
Richmond is a fake team, but that won’t stop you from buying gear to show your team spirit. This year, London was home to six Premier League teams: Arsenal, Chelsea, Crystal Palace, Fulham, Tottenham, and West Ham United.
Yes, Jen hates it when young characters make ancient pop culture references in romances, but in this case, Indiana Jones is appropriate for people our age! Go ahead and write I Love You on your eyelids!
More about the story of how Brett Goldstein got the part of Roy Kent.
Jen’s sister-in-law Janine writes for TV and she’s kind of a big deal!
Susan Elizabeth Philips was a guest a few weeks ago, and she talked about the trope of the grizzled veteran at the end of his career and how it’s a hallmark of the Chicago Stars series.
Jen mentioned a series of soccer romances--it’s the Atlanta Skyline series by Rebecca Crowley.
You know, Roy Kent really should have tried to get that Rolex back.
In a New York Times article about adapting romance to TV and film, Outlander showrunner Matthew B. Roberts “found that voice-over sequences left actors standing around with nothing to play against. Interior monologue has to become exterior dialogue. ‘That’s our biggest challenge always.’
“It’s witched” was a joke from our very first episode, in case you’re into that sort of thing.
That German word (phrase?) is sturm und drang and it means turmoil.
Maureen Murdock’s Heroine’s Journey is an archetype that values community building over individualism, we like the latest iteration from Gail Carriger.
Rupert Mannion is the woooooorst. That darts scene is awesome though, and if you want to read a contemporary romance set in a pub that includes darts playing, Sarah wrote one!
Other sports TV shows and movies we mentioned: Friday Night Lights, Sports Night, The League, Bull Durham, and Major League.
Maybe you didn’t know that the character of Ted Lasso originated in a series of TV commercials for NBC.
Bill Lawrence was a producer for Spin City and Scrubs, which were other funny workplace comedies.
In the past few weeks, Italy won the Euro 2020 and Argentina won the Copa America. And the Olympics football competition will be interesting since men’s teams are limited to players under 23 years of age. FYI, the US Soccer Federation is pretty awful.
For Generation X and Millenials, soccer was a big deal. If you are interested in a family friendly sports outing, maybe your city has a professional soccer team! The Chicago Fire is awesome, and New York has two teams!
The 1994 World Cup was played in the USA, and Sarah remembered the name of defender Alexi Lalas. Now he’s a commentator and we would like him to do better.
So there are trick plays in football and . . . well, football.
The last few decades of television have focused on the antihero, and lots of people wonder if that didn’t help create our recent political moment.
It’s hard to beat the fan experience of singing You’ll Never Walk Alone at Anfield; but Erik recommends this 2019 video of the team and fans singing after Liverpool defeated Barcelona. The version in the last episode of season 1 of Ted Lasso is this one by Marcus Mumford.
Follow AFC Richmond, Ted Lasso, Hannah Waddingham and Brett Goldstein on Twitter. Jürgen Klopp does not have Twitter because "he is a grown man with a job."
You can also follow Brett Goldstein's podcast.
You can preorder signed copies of Bombshell from Word in Brooklyn, buttons and stickers from Best Friend Kelly, and Fated Mates merch from Jordan Dene.
Bonus: 99% Invisible Podcast on The Clinch
Monday Surprise! We’re so excited to share an episode of 99% Invisible with Fated Mates listeners — Sarah’s favorite podcast did an episode about romance covers, and interviewed authors, experts, and the artist and legend Max Ginsburg. It was thoughtful and respectful and perfect….and not only because Sarah was on it.
She’s so grateful to the team at 99% Invisible for having her, and we’re so grateful to them for letting us share the episode with all of you. Enjoy!
Show Notes
Sarah was a guest on last week's 99% Invisible podcast called The Clinch. We're huge fans of the podcast, but it's especially because their episode about locks called Perfect Security was the inspiration for Felicity Faircloth in Wicked and the Wallflower.
Although we haven't talk about the cover of Tender is the Storm on Fated Mates, we did discuss another Johanna Lindsey fan favorite, Gentle Rogue.
One of Jen's favorite episodes of 99% Invisible is about flag design, probably because it was very complimentary to the Chicago flag. You can also watch Roman Mars's TED Talk on that here.
Sarah's favorite is obviously Perfect Security, but she also loved this one on water fountains. Fated Statesers might be interested in the Ballot Design and Gerrymandering episodes. And of course, libraries are palaces.
If you're looking for other great reads about romance covers, Kelly Faircloth wrote about clinch covers for Jezebel and it is a must read. And Jen wrote about the art of the Harlequin romance cover for Kirkus.
This episode of 99PI was produced by Katie Mingle and inspired by her mom, Pamela Mingle, who writes historical romances. Try her debut (with that gorgeous clinch!), A False Proposal, or her most recent, Game of Spies.
Jessa Kane New Year's Eve Extravaganza
WELCOME 2021!
As is customary on Fated Mates, we’re releasing a special New Year’s Eve episode that requires headphones if you’re in mixed company! We brought some of our most favorite people together for a very special crossover episode of Fated Mates and Andie J. Christopher’s Instagram TV Juggernaut: Drunk Romance History, during which we drink a delightful mix of alcohol and talk about a delightful mix of erotic romance by the queen of the quick and dirty novella—Jessa Kane.
We’re talking priests and daddy kink, mafia hitmen, billionaires, husky heroes, stepbrothers and what Joanna Shape refers to as the Kane-Trope-Wheel. Tracey Livesay has a mug with penises on it. Bring in 2021 right. (Also, if you, like Joanna and Jen have read all of the Jessa Kane’s, no worries! She released a new one today—BURLY—just in time for this episode! Shero!)
Head over to Andie’s IGTV channel for the video version.
Next week, we have a special guest episode, and in two weeks, our first read along of 2021, Alexis Hall’s For Real. Get it at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, or Kobo.
Show Notes
One more chance for phone-banking is Monday 1/4/2021 at 5pm central.
Listen to last year's New Year's Eve epsiode on Pegging with special guest, Sierra Simone!
Have we mentioned Drunk Romance History on Andie's Instagram?
We are joined today by our friends: Andie Christopher, Alexis Daria, Adriana Herrera, LaQuette, Tracey Livesay, Nisha Sharma, and Joanna Shupe.
Get Tracey's penis mug here.
Normalize sex toys. Today's guests are big fans of LELO products and recommend: The Ora2, The Sona2, and The Gigi2.
Jessa Kane: Starter Level
The Two Ps, One V Level
The Daddy Level
The Voyeur Level
He’s a Big, Big Man Level
He’s a Bad, Bad Man Level
Books from our Guests
Jennifer Prokop 0:04 / #
Sarah, it's New Year's Eve and you know what that means?
Sarah MacLean 0:06 / #
We have what like, six hours till 2021! We've just got to hold it down you guys.
Jennifer Prokop 0:13 / #
Some of our listeners are already living in that 2021 future.
Sarah MacLean 0:17 / #
My God, is that amazing? Report in Australia, India, Russia! Hello anyway, but what are we doing, because we don't usually release on a Thursday?
Jennifer Prokop 0:31 / #
No, we certainly do not! But it is New Year's Eve. What we do usually do though, around New Year's Eve is release an episode that is going to be the flat out dirtiest one of the year.
Jennifer Prokop 0:43 / #
I don't know the first year, maybe we weren't on this train. But last year, we released our pegging episode, which is probably one of our best episodes ever.
Sarah MacLean 0:50 / #
Aside from 50 shades. I'm pretty sure that episode is our most popular episode.
Sarah MacLean 0:54 / #
And why not? Why would it not be?
Jennifer Prokop 0:58 / #
Start your new year with a new resolution? Try new things. So, we were talking...
Sarah MacLean 1:05 / #
No, you weren't there!
Jennifer Prokop 1:05 / #
So tell us what happened.
Sarah MacLean 1:07 / #
I have a group of friends. You know a lot of them because they've been on the podcast. And we were having a holiday drink via zoom. And during this holiday drink via zoom, and one of those people is Andie Christopher, who is running an Instagram Live fun thing every Saturday called Drunk Romance History, where people drink and then talk about an old romance novel that is bananas. And that's extremely fun. And you should go watch all of them on her Instagram feed. Anyway, so as we were talking, we got into a discussion of Jessa Kane, who we've not talked about, I don't think, on the pod even when we did those quick and dirty episode.
Jennifer Prokop 1:47 / #
I think we mentioned one of them on the mafia interstitial.
Jennifer Prokop 1:52 / #
It's because it's really like a erotica. It's not really quite erotic romance.
Sarah MacLean 1:56 / #
I also feel like we came to Jessica Kane a little later. Because when we did the quick and dirty episode, the fact that we did not reference her would be just very remiss, but maybe we weren't reading her then. I don't know. But the point is, she's very quick and very dirty. And so we started talking about how she really does like, she sort of takes the finger constantly. Like there's just there's no, there's no level of Jessa Kanedom that you can get to where it feels like it's too much.
Sarah MacLean 2:28 / #
It takes the finger and puts it everywhere a finger could go.
Sarah MacLean 2:31 / #
Indeed she does.
Sarah MacLean 2:32 / #
And so we you know, we're drinking at the time, and we were laughing and there was some suggestions and somebody suggested, "Oh, Andie, you should do a just Kane episode of drunk romance history." And I said, "Well, what if we recorded a big zoom conversation about Jesss Kane and our respective favorite books, or the first book we read? Some of them were Jessa Kane virgins. And we all came together this week to record what was an extremely fun zoom about Jessa Kane. It is a crossover episode. So you are about to get Fated Mates - slash - Drunk Romance History. So you can hear the audio right here in your earholes. And then if you want to see LaQuette's face, which is very worth worth watching, to be honest, you can head over to Andie's Instagram account, which is @authorAndieJ. And we'll put links in show notes and you can watch the video version of this very fun hour and a half. As we did last year with the pegging episode, we're going to drop this early in the evening. So if you are staying safe, and masked, and solo New Year's Eve style, you have many hours and many Jessa Kane books to get through.
Jennifer Prokop 3:58 / #
One last serious order of business before we turn it over. It is New Year's Eve. On Monday, which is January 4, we are doing our last Fated States phonebank for Ossoff Warnock with the indivisible team. It will be from five to seven Central, I will drop the link to sign up and show notes. And this is our last big push everybody. A huge number of voters have already voted in Georgia. I will be honest, last time we phonebanked, we talked to a lot of people who said, "I already voted." And so it feels great to just hear all those Georgia voters who have already done their part and maybe we'll catch somebody who hasn't. So if you are looking for one last way to turn this ship we call democracy around, we would love to have you with us phone banking on Monday night
Sarah MacLean 4:45 / #
And if you're in Georgia, vote your Ossoff. I love that phrase.
Jennifer Prokop 4:51 / #
It's actually great.
Sarah MacLean 4:57 / #
I wish there was a vote your Warnock but that's not a thing. Yeah, that doesn't mean anything, but vote your Warnock too. We love you guys. Happy New Year. Thanks for being with us through 2020 it really made the big a big difference for us to have you and to know that you were out there listening. And 2021, is it's gonna be great. I feel great about it. Me too. I got a feeling 21 is going to be a good year. Wait a second. Eric. That's a song.
Music Lyric 5:28 / #
Got a feeling 21 is gonna be a good year. Especially for you and me, seeing it together. So you think 21 is gonna be a good year. Could be good for me and Herman
Andie Christopher 5:50 / #
Drunk Fated Mates?
Nisha Sharma 5:55 / #
Me? I like it.
Sarah MacLean 5:58 / #
It kind of began with Drunk Mates. So, Andie Christopher, why don't you tell everybody what they won. Oh, wait, wait, Hang on. Hang on. Eric wants to check. Oh, okay. All right. We're good. We're good to go. We've been approved.
Adriana Herrera 6:19 / #
Thank you, Eric
Andie Christopher 6:21 / #
This group, I think minus Jen. Jen wasn't able to join us, got drunk a couple of weeks ago to celebrate all the Sagittarius birthdays. And we got to talking about some of our favorite bananas books. And one author that I think most of us discovered this year during the quarantine, is the prolific, the filthy, the bananas, Jessa Kane. And so we thought it would be fun to do a crossover Drunk Romance History/ Fated Mates episode about Jessa Kane in general. Yes. And so some of us are have read all of the Jessa Kanes. Some of us have read some of the Jessa Kanes. Some of us had read like one of the Jessa Kanes
Sarah MacLean 7:19 / #
New to Jessa Kane.
Andie Christopher 7:24 / #
And so we're coming together to just talk about our love affair with these with these books that. I mean,
Jennifer Prokop 7:34 / #
they really defy description in some ways, don't they?
Andie Christopher 7:37 / #
They really do. I mean, they're a shot of ID right into your veins.
Sarah MacLean 7:42 / #
On her website, I just went to her website because I wanted to be an actual professional tonight and have something to say about Jessa Kane. There is no information about her on her website. So whoever you are, thanks for playing! Jessa we love you.
Adriana Herrera 7:55 / #
There's a burner phone feel to it. And I love it.
Sarah MacLean 8:00 / #
Her website says Jessa Kane, and underneath it says "satisfying."
Adriana Herrera 8:09 / #
That's all you need to know.
Sarah MacLean 8:12 / #
That is a flex. She's like, I just have this is the word.
Andie Christopher 8:16 / #
Okay, so so we should all identify yourselves. Yes.
Jennifer Prokop 8:19 / #
Can I call it? Can I call the fucking group to order please? We've gotta do this thing. Okay, so Hi, I'm Jen ReadsRomance. And we are doing a Fated Mates Drunk romance podcast crossover. And we have a group of people with us. So let's have everybody introduce themselves quickly and say, if they think your commentary tonight is stellar and amazing, perhaps they would like to read your book. So tell us more about who you are.
Sarah MacLean 8:49 / #
Well, Jen, there's There are six of them. Okay, you're gonna call on them.
Jennifer Prokop 8:53 / #
Okay, I think that's best I'm gonna call on people. Ok, Alexis, you're first.
Alexis Daria 8:59 / #
I'm Alexis Daria. I write contemporary romance. My latest release is YOU HAD ME AT HOLA. and I'm in New York City. So you might hear some honking
Sarah MacLean 9:09 / #
Wait, and I also think you need to tell everybody where on the Kane spectrum you are...
Andie Christopher 9:16 / #
We need to know that.
Alexis Daria 9:19 / #
Due to the quarantine, my focus is shot so I've been having a hard time just sitting down and reading books lately, so I mostly do audiobooks. So I've only read one Jessa Kane book in full, but I've started a couple others and I have more on my Kindle.
Jennifer Prokop 9:33 / #
Jenny Nordbak, I think has done some audio for Jessica Kane and Jenny Nordbak's voice is like one sex on a stick. She's the wicked wallflowers podcast cohost, so I don't know if she's done all of them. I think she talked about what doing one maybe it's not out yet. I'm not sure so all of you who think oh, could Jessa Kane be sexier. [editorial note: Jen was wrong. Jenny recoreded a Brill Harper book on audio]
Sarah MacLean 9:56 / #
When Jenny reads it. When Miss Scarlet reads it.
Jennifer Prokop 10:01 / #
Exactly. So there you go. I can't, I don't even know if I could listen to it. I think it would, literally I'd have to like... well, you know, I probably could listen to it. it's fine.
Alexis Daria 10:09 / #
Okay, nice listening while I'm washing the dishes.
Jennifer Prokop 10:11 / #
See there you go.
Nisha Sharma 10:15 / #
Hi, everyone. This is Nisha Sharma. I'm back on the pod. My book, THE LEGAL AFFAIR came out in August and pre orders for my second YA, RADHA 7 JAI'S RECIPE FOR ROMANCE are also available. And that comes out in July.
Jennifer Prokop 10:35 / #
And where are you on the Kane scale?
Nisha Sharma 10:36 / #
I'm probably in the middle of the road. I have about, I've finished about five or six Jessa Kane books. And I have to clear my Kindle Unlimited list in order to get the rest of them. So right now it's very dramatic. I'm trying to figure out what I have to like offload in order to download more.
Sarah MacLean 11:00 / #
And this is the problem with that Kindle Unlimited list is you have to be like: am I really ever going to read that thing? Because I want to read HUSKY...
Adriana Herrera 11:08 / #
...or HEFTY.
Jennifer Prokop 11:15 / #
Again, they do let you check out Kindle unlimited books again, everybody.
Sarah MacLean 11:21 / #
But it does feel like Nisha and I are on the same page here, which is once it goes off the list, It's never coming back. Jen probably has a spreadsheet. She's been on, you've been on the phone with Amazon all day yelling at them about...
Jennifer Prokop 11:37 / #
I don't really want to talk about it. That's fine.
Sarah MacLean 11:40 / #
That's private.
Jennifer Prokop 11:42 / #
No, it just wasn't helpful. And then you just feel like you're gaslit by Amazon. And so I had let it go.
Andie Christopher 11:46 / #
It sounds less satisfying than my experience,m spending two hours on the phone with Verizon today just on hold.
Jennifer Prokop 11:54 / #
No, that's not great. At least with that, Because then you can do other things and then kind of leave when it's...
Andie Christopher 12:01 / #
no, I was I was peeing when Verizon finally picked up. So I had to run out of my bathroom.
Jennifer Prokop 12:08 / #
Of course
Andie Christopher 12:09 / #
running across the floor to get the phone.
Jennifer Prokop 12:11 / #
I know you introduced yourself, but I think you can talk again about what book you have out, and your place on the Kane spectrum.
Andie Christopher 12:17 / #
Okay, so I'm again I'm Andie J. Christopher. I am the host of the Instagram Live series probably soon to be podcast, Drunk Romance History. My latest book that I have out-- I put out two books this year, I'm very proud of that. NOT THAT KIND OF GUY came out in April. It is a workplace romance and oops, we got married. There's definitely banging, not as much as the Jessie Kane book. But there's banging and then I have a short, if you're still interested in a little holiday novella, I have a very dirty holiday novella called ALL THEY WANT FOR CHRISTMAS, which is a Snowed-in, MMF bang fest. if you're a fan of Jessa you're going to be a fan of ALL THEY WANT FOR CHRISTMAS.
Jennifer Prokop 13:03 / #
Well speaking of filthy Christmas shorts. I guess we should go to Adrianna, next.
Adriana Herrera 13:12 / #
Hi. Hello. I'm Adriana Herrera, and I write romance. So my release is HER NIGHT WITH SANTA, which is a very short, very dirty novelette about a lesbian, female Santa who hooks up with King Melchior's neice on a secret beach villa in the Caribbean.
Jennifer Prokop 13:36 / #
And a bag of toys.
Adriana Herrera 13:37 / #
And then yes, and a bag of toys.
Andie Christopher 13:41 / #
It's so hot. You guys. It is is scorchingly hot.
Adriana Herrera 13:45 / #
It is what happens with when I go into my head. When I go into my head, there are sex toys. And there's Megan Rapinoe.
Sarah MacLean 13:55 / #
I think Adriana knows this already. But this week, obviously we have we have been through Christmas in my house with the seven year old. And I told her that I read this book where the theory about Santa is that it's a family of Santas, and the current Santa is a woman. And she's like, "That's amazing. Tell me more." And I'm like, "that's all I can tell you about that."
Jennifer Prokop 14:21 / #
And where are you on the Kane scale, Adriana?
Adriana Herrera 14:26 / #
I'm pretty far into it. I just I realized that there's a few that I've missed. But I have read quite a few of them. I would say most of them. And I discovered her over Thanksgiving. It was very recent. I bought a new Kindle and got a KU subscription. And I had heard someone talk about her. Maybe it was one of you, I don't know who... I
Andie Christopher 14:51 / #
I think it was me, because I've read all of them and I just remembered I started my first one when I was still working in my office. So this was either like late February or early March,
Adriana Herrera 15:01 / #
It must have been you. I think we were chatting or something and it must have been Andie and I read one of them. And then I read a lot more of them. And I enjoy them. Like it's one of those things where some of the things, some of the elements to them are not particularly my buttons, but it's still so bananas. That I need to know what happens. So, yeah, I'm a fan.
Jennifer Prokop 15:32 / #
Fair enough. Okay, LaQuette, your're next.
LaQuette 15:34 / #
Hey, everyone, I'm LeQuette, but I write romance-- sometimes very steamy. Okay, erotic romance. My next book coming is coming out in February and it's titled Jackson. It's about a hulky, grumpy, Texas Ranger who falls in love with a sassy New Yorker who puts him in his place. It's loads of fun.
Jennifer Prokop 15:58 / #
And you are a newcomer to the Kane family. Yes?
LaQuette 16:01 / #
Yes. I've only read one at this point.
Jennifer Prokop 16:04 / #
That's okay.
Sarah MacLean 16:06 / #
Thanks, y'all.
Jennifer Prokop 16:12 / #
Tracey, what about you?
Tracey Livesay 16:14 / #
Hi, I'm Tracey Livesey. I write contemporary romance. My latest release was LIKE LOVERS DO, which came out in August and is still available. So go buy it. And just saying, I am new to Jessa Kane. During our zoom that Andie mentioned earlier, y'all couldn't stop talking about it. And so then y'all talked about doing this and I was like, I want to come. so I bought a Jessa Kane book. And here we are.
Sarah MacLean 16:57 / #
With your penis mug.
Tracey Livesay 16:58 / #
With my penis mug.
Sarah MacLean 17:00 / #
She came prepared.
Adriana Herrera 17:01 / #
I wish I had a penis mug.
Tracey Livesay 17:03 / #
I'm having a hot toddy in it.
Sarah MacLean 17:04 / #
So she came on brand
Nisha Sharma 17:06 / #
But that's not a Jessa Kane penis, mug, those are too small.
Andie Christopher 17:12 / #
No, a Jessa Kane penis mug would... go All the way around the mug
Adriana Herrera 17:16 / #
You could see it from space.
Tracey Livesay 17:20 / #
If you put them all together like an extension cocks, you know,
Adriana Herrera 17:26 / #
Extension cocks! like Christmas lights?
Tracey Livesay 17:32 / #
If one doesn't work, they all don't work, and you got to figure out which one works and then plug another one in, you know?
Jennifer Prokop 17:41 / #
Joanna Shupe.
Joanna Shupe 17:43 / #
Hi, I'm Joanna Shupe. I write historical romance. If you like Jessa's books, you might like the anthology DUKE I'D LIKE TO F, which I did with Adriana and some others. Those stories are bananas and very, very hot. On the Kane scale, I have read them all. I don't think I would have gone through 2020 without Jessa Kane. I'm just gonna put that out there. I just think they would have been a much different year for me had Jessa Kane not come into my life.
Jennifer Prokop 18:19 / #
I feel that. okay, Sarah MacLean.
Sarah MacLean 18:23 / #
I, Sarah MacLean, write romance novels and I read them and I'm on the "middle of the road" Kane scale. Here's the thing. I just looked at it, I just pulled up Amazon because like I said, all we know from Jessa's website is that she's satisfying and I can confirm it. But on Amazon there are so many of these books.
Joanna Shupe 18:42 / #
So many.
Sarah MacLean 18:43 / #
And like Nisha, I'm compulsive about my Kindle Unlimited list. So there's, I can only spare one slot at a time.
Jennifer Prokop 18:53 / #
Today, we were like, "who's going to talk about which one?" and I was like "yeah, whatever I read them all." I'm a 100 on the Kane scale and Sarah's like, "I read the one about the stepbrothers." And I was like, "that's like seven of them!"
Sarah MacLean 19:05 / #
No, no, I read the one where there are two stepbrothers! THEIR SUMMER INTERN, but then when I got on the website, there is also a HIS SUMMER INTERN, which is similar title but clearly different.
Adriana Herrera 19:21 / #
Not what you would expect.
Sarah MacLean 19:25 / #
Wait, what would I expect?
Adriana Herrera 19:29 / #
You would expect an office building? Yeah? Yeah? No.
Andie Christopher 19:36 / #
I haven't read this one.
Nisha Sharma 19:38 / #
Wait, what are we... this is like cabin in the woods.
Sarah MacLean 19:43 / #
Why would he need an intern in the cabin?
Joanna Shupe 19:46 / #
He doesn't.
Adriana Herrera 19:47 / #
He doesn't.
LaQuette 19:51 / #
You're asking for things to make sense. There's no logic.
Adriana Herrera 19:54 / #
He's a survivalist.
Sarah MacLean 19:56 / #
He's a survivalist who requires an intern? this feels Like a serious like workplace violation
LaQuette 20:04 / #
All of them are workplace violations.
Jennifer Prokop 20:13 / #
I'm gonna call it. I'm gonna run have to run this thing. Everybody we're just gonna let me do this, okay?
Jennifer Prokop 20:16 / #
LaQuette and Tracey, because otherwise it's gonna be nine people talking and Eric will be mad. He'll be like, "that wasn't fun. It's too many people talking." LaQuette and Tracy you have each read one. Which ones have you read?
Sarah MacLean 20:29 / #
Oh, and Alexis, too.
Jennifer Prokop 20:31 / #
Oka, so Alexis, too. I would like to hear about the people who are brand new to the Jessa Kane universe.
LaQuette 20:40 / #
I read HEFTY which I thought was super adorable. I will say that I didn't find it as hot as I expected considering all of the feedback I was getting about Jessica Kane. So I think I'm telling on myself a little bit with what I actually read.
Jennifer Prokop 20:57 / #
My theory actually is that if it's a Jessa Kane that's not about a stepbrother or a daddy. It just feels like regular heat.
Sarah MacLean 21:07 / #
Also HEFTY is about high school students. So let's all settle down.
Jennifer Prokop 21:11 / #
wait, no, that's the one about the model
LaQuette 21:16 / #
That was the one with the model and the bartender. I it was cute. I thought it was hilarious. His especially the hero's perspective I really enjoyed. Because it was really fun. It was really fun to get to read someone who's aware of their size, and not really apologetic for it. Right? Like, he gest caught, he's looking at her. And he's kind of questioning whether she's actually checking him out or not. And he's like, Nah, she wouldn't be after my thick ass, you know? And I was like, Dude, I love this. I love that he was so in love with his own, he was just settled in his own body, he didn't care. And the only time he ever seem to feel uncomfortable, outside of when she's teasing him, so to speak. But the only time he's ever uncomfortable is when someone, when the I guess you can't call them a villain, her. But the antagonist in the story, her best friend, is the only time that you see him feel some sort of insecurity about his size. And it's not because he feels that, but it's because someone else has that thought about him. And I think that's a very important distinction because there are a lot of romances that I've read with plus size heroines, not plus sized heroes, but there's always this thread of this person feeling like they can't be loved, or there's something wrong with them. Because they are plus size. And I love that he knew he was thick, he didn't care. And it was just and I love that she loved everything about him. And through her eyes, you get to fall in love with this man. And I think that's that's how you write a plus size person. You allow them to be comfortable in their own skin, as well as allow the person or people who love them to adore everything about them, including their 3x size.
Adriana Herrera 23:32 / #
Yeah, and I appreciate her writing plus size men because you never see never, never see plus, larger men in romance. I mean, the reality is that most people are married to larger size men. So the idea of both HEFTY and HUSKY. Like the heroine is specifically into their bodies, like they find them sexy. They find them attractive. But it's for and, and HEFTY, It's baffling to her that the other girls in the school aren't so into him because to her he's so attractive. And so
Andie Christopher 24:22 / #
I mean, what I really love about these books is how much emotion she packs it sometimes Yeah, we can pack into like 60, 70 pages. Oh yeah, like there's a lot
Adriana Herrera 24:33 / #
There's a lot of skill there like with HEFTY the the high schoolers. Like I'm like, Okay, these are high schoolers with the heat. It was a little harder for me but this romance
Sarah MacLean 24:44 / #
We should say they're both over 18
Adriana Herrera 24:46 / #
They both are over 18.
Sarah MacLean 24:49 / #
Very clear, very important that they are 18.
Nisha Sharma 24:52 / #
Do you know what I love about Jessa Kane? In these situations is that you see a lot of people try to tackle these issues. Or not even issues like these concepts in romance, and they skirt around it, because they're afraid of saying what everyone already knows. Jessa Kane is not afraid of just saying it and just putting it on the page. And I just love it because it feels so much more authentic. And so like the emotion is just so raw in it because she's just flat out just puts it all out there and I love that.
Joanna Shupe 25:28 / #
There's no fear. Of any topic, at any level. Any subject, any kink, no fear.
Adriana Herrera 25:36 / #
Yeah, and I think it's, and I wonder how how it is for her to write those books. Because it feels to me like I was really saying this about the novelette that I wrote, HER NIGHT WITH SANTA, was everything that is, I was like, here are my ID-list things. So let me just write it. And that just poured out of me because it was so satisfying and delicious for me to write about it. Because this stuff I love to read. And I find super hot. So I and I think for me, even the books that don't quite work for me in terms of the kinks. I still enjoy them because I can tell the enjoyment that was happening when those stories were being written.
Sarah MacLean 26:16 / #
Yeah, it doesn't feel the same way as I mean, we should say for those of you who've never read Jesse Kane, like these are shorts.
Jennifer Prokop 26:23 / #
They are! Oh, yeah.
Adriana Herrera 26:26 / #
It's a one hour read.
Sarah MacLean 26:28 / #
Yeah, exactly. And so you can really tear through them. I mean, I read like seven and a night one night. But the what's interesting about that is that it really does feel like she just sits-- I wonder, I mean, I wonder how long she actually, I wonder if it's just a one sitting story because it does sort of feel like she just opens up a vein and, there now you've got this.
Jennifer Prokop 26:53 / #
There's not a lot of attention to plot. It is really all about like emotions and about
Sarah MacLean 26:58 / #
Well the plot is twisty turny like this, the the stepbrother one. THEIR SUMMER INTERN, Oh, okay. You guys.
Jennifer Prokop 27:09 / #
Yeah, we talked about the cute stuff. No, I think we're like: yeah, it's kind of normal. Then You have THEIR SUMMER INTERN.
Sarah MacLean 27:17 / #
The Plot of THEIR SUMMER INTERN is this woman, that the heroine-- all her heroines, I think, somebody, Joanna and Jen, correct me if I'm wrong, but her heroines are always very young, right?
Sarah MacLean 27:29 / #
I they all get bred by the end.
Adriana Herrera 27:31 / #
Usually virgin, enthusiastically bred.
Jennifer Prokop 27:37 / #
You know what, she does do some virgin heroes, too
Sarah MacLean 27:43 / #
These two heroes are not virgins. Just to be clear.
LaQuette 27:47 / #
What I what I appreciated about the about HUSKY anyway, was that you have this hero who is and in most of our books, we read these books where the hero is so virile, and, you know, and his stamina is ridiculous. And this guy is just like, Look, I'm not gonna make it. It's not gonna happen. This is gonna be a 1-2-3 pump kind of situation. And I thought that was so refreshing that they weren't having this hour long love fest and that it was just quick and dirty. And I thought it was so hilarious that he was like, "fuck it. You can laugh at me later. But for the rest of my life, I'm going to hold on to this scene where I got to be with you. It doesn't matter that I only lasted three seconds."
Andie Christopher 28:41 / #
He made up for it like with the coat on the boardwalk.
LaQuette 28:48 / #
Still, it was great to read that because I think so often, we get caught up in the fantasy of the romance, of sex. And we don't really portray it always in a realistic fashion. Because, you know...
Nisha Sharma 29:05 / #
Let me tell you, that is not the typical Jessa Kane, the ones that I read it was like, Oh, this is what you have to deal with when you're sitting on a nine inch cock.
Sarah MacLean 29:22 / #
That's not realistic?
Sarah MacLean 29:27 / #
They're all the size of a two liter bottle of Coke.
Adriana Herrera 29:33 / #
Yes, I mean, they are for breeding. Um, so one thing I would say is there's this very raw. And again, it's a slice of America that sometimes, it's a little jarring for me as a naturalized citizen of the United States. I think... Like what? What always gets me about it, I was re-reading PREACHER MAN this afternoon because Andie mentioned it
Andie Christopher 30:09 / #
It's my favorite, it's my first
Adriana Herrera 30:12 / #
And I'm like you know
Sarah MacLean 30:13 / #
I'm so surprised by that, by the way Andie, definitely that's your Id.
Jennifer Prokop 30:17 / #
I'm pretty sure I told Joanna about Jessa Kane because I really... I remember Joanna being like... THE MOBSTER'S MASSEUSE? I'm in!
Joanna Shupe 30:25 / #
I'll be right back in two hours.
Sarah MacLean 30:30 / #
Isnt' PREACHER MAN , the one where he watches her through the window?
Andie Christopher 30:34 / #
Oh, it's five different books.
Sarah MacLean 30:38 / #
She masturbate during his sermon, too?
Andie Christopher 30:41 / #
She masturbates while he watches her through the window. And he masturbates outside.
Sarah MacLean 30:47 / #
And she's wearing like a white nightgown the whole time?
Andie Christopher 30:53 / #
A slip to get baptized. That's later she..
Adriana Herrera 30:57 / #
That's before we find out he's actually a mafia assassin. Her mom hires him to give her an exorcism
Andie Christopher 31:10 / #
on the edge of the woods in her Mississippi town.
Sarah MacLean 31:12 / #
I forgot about the exorcism,
Adriana Herrera 31:16 / #
There's an exorcism
Andie Christopher 31:18 / #
that he does with his mouth on her pussy.
Adriana Herrera 31:22 / #
Exercises that right out of her
Sarah MacLean 31:25 / #
I mean, they take the finger every one.
Adriana Herrera 31:33 / #
Completely up. I mean, I think that's what I find very, I think that's why I connect and I don't read a lot of like bananas bonkers super taboo stuff. I really don't. But first of all, I think it's because it's that quick shot, it's so short, I don't need to read 40 different kidnappings. You know, like, there's one.
Nisha Sharma 32:01 / #
That's my entire Kindle! Like all the kidnappings, me and Joanna, we're like, oh, did you read this?
Adriana Herrera 32:12 / #
It's not my thing! But if it's one short one, I can handle it.
Sarah MacLean 32:17 / #
But if it's a kidnapping on top of an exorcism on top of stepbrothers, then you're like, Okay!
Adriana Herrera 32:22 / #
But it's moving. It's moving. The momentum is moving.
Jennifer Prokop 32:29 / #
I really want to hear from Tracy and Alexis, who just look disturbed by all of it.
Jennifer Prokop 32:36 / #
Tracy, what did you read?
Joanna Shupe 32:40 / #
Tracey is like, is it too late to back out?
Sarah MacLean 32:47 / #
Tracey came With a cock mug, it's fine. She can handle that.
Tracey Livesay 32:53 / #
Um, I've read SACRIFICED TO THE BEAST.
Andie Christopher 32:57 / #
Oh, that's such a good one.
Tracey Livesay 33:02 / #
Okay. So I'm going to start off despite my facial expressions by saying like, LaQuette, it was not, It was a little tame for me. And that might be telling about me, but it was a little tame for my reading. And I wondered if, as she was writing, she delved deeper into her Id. I wonder if that came before the preacher book because I want to read that, or the Intern book. Like, I want to read that. So I don't know if that was like, progression.
Jennifer Prokop 33:38 / #
Ok, well I have a theory. Do you want to hear my theory about this? Yeah, yeah. Those of us that are that are Jessa Kane One Hundreds would like to bring people on board to the Jessa Kane train, but you can't start them with THEIR SUMMER INTERN, you have some that are like kind of normal-ish. And so that, okay, the beauty and the beast one it's fine, right?
Tracey Livesay 33:59 / #
I did I read something called SACRIFICED TO THE BEAST. So I don't know, like, what kind of on-roading do you like?
Adriana Herrera 34:09 / #
Yeah, the one with HIS SUMMER INTERN, with the survivalist on the cabin.
Tracey Livesay 34:15 / #
Okay, so SACRIFICED TO THE BEAST was beauty in the beast. And it starts off with her father and the villagers pretty much taking her to the forest to be sacrificed to the beast. And I have to admit that throughout, as I was reading the story, the soundtrack to the Disney Beauty the Beast kept playing in my head. So I kept imagining the villagers like: "he will make off with your children," with singing and torches and stuff. That was just that was just my mind. Um, and so they so apparently in the village, This is modern day, but it goes back and forth between modern day and feeling like the 1950s, I don't know. But anyway, so the village animals have been slaughtered. And so they have had this happen before and they say, it's a beast that lives in the woods. And so to appease the beast, so he won't slaughter their animals.
Adriana Herrera 35:23 / #
They need human sacrifice.
Sarah MacLean 35:27 / #
This is 2020 like modern, you're like... we need to sacrifice a virgin
Adriana Herrera 35:35 / #
We need to sacrifice the virgin.
Tracey Livesay 35:41 / #
She's the only one...
Tracey Livesay 35:42 / #
The only virgin?
Nisha Sharma 35:46 / #
If I was in that town, I'd be getting like laid in the eighth grade just to make sure that I wouldn't be...
Adriana Herrera 35:59 / #
I think maybe her dad gives her away. I think her dad is okay with it.
Tracey Livesay 36:04 / #
the entire village! He's like, yes.
Sarah MacLean 36:07 / #
So on the Id list, the Jesse Kane Id list is: dads who are like: "fuck off. I don't care."
LaQuette 36:12 / #
I think that's on everyone's Id list.
Tracey Livesay 36:16 / #
They tie her to a tree and leave her and, and then the beast is silhouetted against the night and he roars and it's very scary. And I'm thinking, "oh my god, is it like an actual beast?" Which I don't know! And it was not an actual beast. It was just a big man. He's like seven feet tall. Apparently, he's very hairy, he might need a haircut and a shave, but they don't do that in the book.
Tracey Livesay 36:54 / #
And, um, and so yeah, they have sex.
Sarah MacLean 36:58 / #
So she just had sex with this hairy beastie dude.
Tracey Livesay 37:01 / #
Yeah, she puts up a you know, she goes against him for the evening. But then the next day they just do it.
Andie Christopher 37:09 / #
Doesn't he go down on her first? isn't that kind of sweet?
Adriana Herrera 37:15 / #
He doens't really know, he's like: I feel like this would be nice for her.
Tracey Livesay 37:24 / #
he was very sweet. Very nice and sweet. He was not beast-like at all. He's very nice, sweet, and he fell in love with her and her long blonde hair. And so he was very sweet and as tender with the virgin as you could be when you have a 12 inch. 12 inch!
LaQuette 37:49 / #
Yeah, I'm right with you, and I appreciate
Sarah MacLean 37:51 / #
For the people who are just listening to the podcast, Tracy just pulled out a ruler, as though she had come prepared for this.
Tracey Livesay 38:04 / #
Like the subway footlong, and she's a virgin.
Adriana Herrera 38:10 / #
a foot Long
Jennifer Prokop 38:16 / #
so you enjoyed it but not as dirty as you liked. Okay.
Tracey Livesay 38:19 / #
Yes, yes,
Tracey Livesay 38:23 / #
They will be a scene, because there was a scene where she like-- I shouldn't be too loud, my kids are up-- but there was a scene where she goes down on him in front of these like evil guys.
Jennifer Prokop 38:35 / #
There is a voyuerism angle in a lot of them
Sarah MacLean 38:40 / #
there's another one like that and somebody I can't remember later one but it's it's in a cabin and he makes her dad watch it too. Yeah
Nisha Sharma 38:54 / #
And he puts her on the table.
Sarah MacLean 38:56 / #
And LaQuette is like, now what?
Adriana Herrera 38:59 / #
Which one is that one?
LaQuette 39:04 / #
Tell me which one that one is, because I cannot read that.
Sarah MacLean 39:07 / #
which one is that one?
Nisha Sharma 39:08 / #
It's called THE FIGHTER'S PRIZE and he races in to save her because the dad wanted to marry her off to this other dude. And she's like, "no I'm with you!" and he's like "well then prove it" and basically does her on the table, is like watch me claim this woman.
Adriana Herrera 39:25 / #
Okay, first of all, I just want to premise this by saying that her dad was total trash and sold her
LaQuette 39:31 / #
I don't care!
Sarah MacLean 39:37 / #
There's also one where the cabin one.
Andie Christopher 39:40 / #
There's also when where, shit, where the heroine gets auctioned off because she went to a party with her friends
Joanna Shupe 39:47 / #
SUDDENLY HIS! SUDDENLY HIS!
Nisha Sharma 39:49 / #
I love SUDDENLY HIS! that one was so good.
Joanna Shupe 39:55 / #
That one doesn't leave my Kindle. I don't ever return that one, that one is a perma-lend.
Sarah MacLean 40:07 / #
isn't there one more there in a cabin? And the he brings in a priest to watch?
Jennifer Prokop 40:12 / #
Okay, that one, listen is the one with Alexa Riley so it is no longer available on KU. You have to get that one on iBooks. Ask me how I know. it's like the Russian... Wait, I'd have to look at up [TAKEN BY THE RUSSIAN.]
Joanna Shupe 40:29 / #
Wait , I haven't read that one.
Sarah MacLean 40:30 / #
Oh Joanna get going. Joanna has to go
Jennifer Prokop 40:33 / #
In the middle of the wedding ceremony, She's whispering dirty stuff to him. And he basically starts fucking her while the priest is marrying them. And he says to her, he says to the priest, he says, make her my wife while I make her a mother.
Sarah MacLean 40:49 / #
Yeah. That is some weird shit.
Sarah MacLean 41:07 / #
Nisha is like, get it in my veins. Here's the thing, everybody that listens to the podcast knows that all I care about is when writers do like crazy, when they're like, I'm just gonna do it. We're just gonna see if this works. I love it. I will always buy your next book if you try that? That is some weird shit.
Adriana Herrera 41:26 / #
That is some weird stuff.
Alexis Daria 41:28 / #
What if we cross referenced all of the tropes? Like this is the one that has voyeurism in it and we can reference, okay, these are the five that have that and these are the ones that involve kidnapping.
Sarah MacLean 41:42 / #
Yes, Alexis, you're in charge now
Alexis Daria 41:46 / #
Some are gonna hit your buttons.
Adriana Herrera 41:52 / #
Now there's a lot of recurring themes in her in her stories, I mean, "enthusiastically bred" is in almost every one, Hello.
Sarah MacLean 42:01 / #
"I'm gonna put a baby in you" is like...
Andie Christopher 42:04 / #
or three in her! and I'm like, that can't be comfortable.
Sarah MacLean 42:07 / #
And then there's the firemen one where its, "I wonder which one of us is going to be the dad." And it's like, that feels weird.
Adriana Herrera 42:15 / #
that's weird.
Tracey Livesay 42:18 / #
What was that one called?
Jennifer Prokop 42:19 / #
And also in THE FARMER'S DAUGHTER and also THEIR SUMMER INTERN, I think has that "who's gonna be the father since we're both fucking her."
Sarah MacLean 42:28 / #
It's HER 2 PROTECTORS, number two, Her 2 protectors.
Adriana Herrera 42:32 / #
Her 2 protectors, So there's two possibilities.
Joanna Shupe 42:37 / #
He's obsessed with the heroine from the jump.
Alexis Daria 42:40 / #
The one that I read...
Adriana Herrera 42:41 / #
It's Alexis's turn. Eric is gonna have so much fun with this. Sorry, Eric.
Alexis Daria 42:50 / #
So I read QUEEN SIZED, which is technically like, maybe a fantasy romance.
Adriana Herrera 42:59 / #
It should be time travel
Alexis Daria 43:00 / #
Medieval times-y era in like, a place that is not a real place except people say Jesus Christ. Yeah, the guy's like "Jesus Christ. She's so hot."
Sarah MacLean 43:18 / #
it's not actual Jesus Christ?
Alexis Daria 43:24 / #
I mean, this book could be set on a reality show, it could be set at a Ren faire. Who knows where?
Adriana Herrera 43:32 / #
I've said this before, he should have been, it should have been time travel. He should have been a bouncer from Queens who goes through a portal and ends up in the medieval times.
Alexis Daria 43:43 / #
Yeah, and he becomes the king of this, like one kingdom, that's
Sarah MacLean 43:46 / #
in New Jersey,
Adriana Herrera 43:48 / #
in Hollis, Queens.
Alexis Daria 43:51 / #
They're having this like event between the two kingdoms called the joining, which is kind of what it sounds like. Celebrating the peace or something like that. But a lot of people end up hooking up and, you know, going off with each other and getting married after joining.
Tracey Livesay 44:07 / #
is the orgy on the page? is the orgy on the page?
Alexis Daria 44:12 / #
I know. I also felt like it was a little
Sarah MacLean 44:15 / #
Tracey's like, I got it.
Alexis Daria 44:17 / #
...other things that I've read or what I had been led to believe. But also the heroine is a virgin and she's trying to stay a virgin throughout the story because she is a farmer and she's got two sisters. She has to take care of them and she's like, I need a husband. We haven't had good crops last two years, and I need to marry a guy with money so that my sisters can be provided for
Sarah MacLean 44:39 / #
That's just sensible.
Alexis Daria 44:43 / #
And the king, he's like this giant warrior looking guy, of course. And he's walking with his friend and his friend is like, "you know, you really should think about getting a wife and if you ever want to talk about your traumic childhood, I'm here for you." And he's like, "No, I don't want to talk about my feelings. And I definitely don't want a wife. I'm so not into that--- Oh my God, Who is she?" And he's just been saying all the reasons why he doesn't want anything. And then he's like, "Oh my God, Who is she? I love her." So he goes over to her, and she tells him to drop dead. And he
LaQuette 45:22 / #
Does she know he's the king?
Alexis Daria 45:23 / #
So hilarious.
Jennifer Prokop 45:25 / #
She doesn't know, he just thinks he's too much for her, right?
Alexis Daria 45:29 / #
No, She's just, she doesn't know who he is, for one thing,
Jennifer Prokop 45:34 / #
Random man, I have things to do right now! Right?
Alexis Daria 45:37 / #
I'm here to find a husband. And I'm not gonna mess around with you going for a walk by the water. Sure. I know what that means. And she finds out he's the king and she's still just kind of like, Alright, fine, I'll go with you. And she's very much. He's like, "I don't want a wife. You're gonna be my mistress." And she's like, "Hell no, I'm not gonna be your mistress." But then he goes down on her and she goes down on him, like over in a cave. And then she's like, I gotta find a husband.
Adriana Herrera 46:10 / #
as you do!
Tracey Livesay 46:10 / #
it's compromising they're compromising already. It's...
Adriana Herrera 46:14 / #
....meeting halfway.
Tracey Livesay 46:17 / #
Yeah, it'll work.
Sarah MacLean 46:19 / #
So what I love about this is she's like, Alright, they have to have sex where they're gonna have sex. There must be a cave nearby
Alexis Daria 46:24 / #
A cave! They're like...
Sarah MacLean 46:25 / #
In my lifetime, I have never stumbled upon a cave
Adriana Herrera 46:33 / #
Everybody knows medieval times are full or caves, okay.
Alexis Daria 46:37 / #
The thing about this book was how how funny it was. So she tells him at one point like, well, Your Majesty, it's like you're between a loch and a hard place because you're there walking along the line. I laughed out loud.
Sarah MacLean 46:50 / #
She's funny. That's crazy. It was very funny. these books are great. They're very well written, she's a good writer.
Alexis Daria 47:00 / #
The first third was kind of out there. Like with setting everything up. There's not a ton of world building. But I think that if you like things like Reign or A Knight's Tale or stuff like that, where it's kind of old timey but not completely. You would like this.
Sarah MacLean 47:18 / #
You like men in armor.
Jennifer Prokop 47:20 / #
On Heaving Bosoms, they call it like England times. This world building is like medieval times....
Adriana Herrera 47:27 / #
they're wearing chain link and...
Sarah MacLean 47:29 / #
somebody eating a turkey leg with just their teeth.
Alexis Daria 47:35 / #
So they have a couple of these competitions for the women to compete so that the men can pick a wife.
Sarah MacLean 47:44 / #
And what do they have to do?
Alexis Daria 47:45 / #
So the first one is a pie pie baking competition. And she's like, I can't believe I have to make this fucking pie for these men. But it's a good ass pie. I was thinking, "This woman has better things to do than making a pie. She's busy." Her pie is next to this other lady's, who clearly needs help and is in more dire straits than she is. And her pie sucks. So she swaps her pie. And he notices that, he's like, "Oh my god, she's amazing." And then the other thing is carrying water, and she helps the woman carry the water. So she's very good-hearted. But from there on, It's just the emotions really get you. She's got these two younger sisters. And the king starts to really think they're adorable, too. And she's very concerned about what values she's showing her sisters, which is why she won't be his mistress. She's like: not that there's anything wrong with that. But that's not what I'm trying to do.
Jennifer Prokop 48:41 / #
One of the things that's really interesting about these books is in a typical romance setup, there's the seeds of misunderstanding are sown, And then the hero doesn't believe the heroine, right? But in these books, the hero always is like, "she would never fucking do that. So something else must be going on." Like, there's not just like, instant love, but there's also instant trust. And so there's one for example where I think it's called, Oh, THE PERFECT GIFT, where her sisters are like, "you have to go catch this really rich man and trap him." And she is like, "but I'm in love with him." Right? She falls in love with him. And he, and then they're texting her like, "have you done it yet?" And, and she is so freaked out. She's like, "I'm going to go see my sisters and tell them that I'm not going to do this." And he finds the phone with these really incriminating texts. And he's like, instantly like, MMMM, And he's like, "wait, no, she would never do this." Right. And so then he goes down and to prove his love to her, He fucks her in front of the sisters.
Adriana Herrera 49:49 / #
Yeah, as you do.
Sarah MacLean 49:52 / #
very reasonable.
Nisha Sharma 49:54 / #
are these young children?
Adriana Herrera 49:57 / #
Okay, no.
Andie Christopher 49:57 / #
they are evil olders sisters
LaQuette 50:10 / #
I have brothers and sisters this is not somthing that would ever happen.
Alexis Daria 50:15 / #
"So of course she doesn't want to be my mistress. Yeah, like, how could I have just asked her out right like that, that was so rude of me" So he goes, and he's like, I had a terrible childhood. And she's like, I feel so bad for you someday you're gonna find a woman you can really love without that. And then she leaves, because she's still not going to be his mistress. I would say the first third was very funny and a little bit silly. But then after that, I was just completely hooked in the story, because all of the emotional beats are there.
Sarah MacLean 50:46 / #
This is the crazy thing. Yeah, this is the wild thing about these books is, so HER 2, Her number 2 PROTECTORS, which is about a girl whose father was in the mafia, and her house gets set on fire, and she's asleep and like half naked asleep, and in come two brawny firemen who collect her and they're together when they see her. So they see her at the exact same time, right?
Sarah MacLean 51:21 / #
Exactly LaQuette, because we know that that's how it works.
Adriana Herrera 51:27 / #
It's like there's an imprinting that happened
Sarah MacLean 51:30 / #
It's fated mates. Every one of these books,
Nisha Sharma 51:33 / #
every single one of them.
Sarah MacLean 51:35 / #
And so the two of them [HER 2 PROTECTORS] So one carries her while the other one axes his way out of the burning building. And then they're like-- and the dad's dying. And he's like, "you got to take care of her." And they're like, yes. And so they just immediately take her to one of their houses and then all three of them are living together. And there's some kind of, swords do not cross in this, or the other one, well because they're brothers. I read both of the menages
Jennifer Prokop 52:02 / #
I will say, though, it is highly implied in the one with the actual real brothers [SUDDENLY THIERS] and then the step sister that they're crossing off page.
Sarah MacLean 52:13 / #
Oh, boy.
Jennifer Prokop 52:18 / #
it was too much for me!
Sarah MacLean 52:23 / #
No, but in this firemen one. So here's the thing, so I'm reading it and I'm like, Okay, cool. And then there's a little bit of, I wish she was mine alone. I wish she was mine alone Alpha douchebaggery. but then she's like, I need you both, You both give me different things. And then the older one is like, "I'll be your daddy and he could be your brother." And I'm like, "Oh, what?!" I was not prepared for this by the group! , but I'm gonna read the rest of it. I don't even know Myself.
Adriana Herrera 52:52 / #
That's me like 89% of the time reading these stories. I'm like, this is not okay. But I will continue to read this.
Jennifer Prokop 53:01 / #
Right? Yeah, sure. So
Andie Christopher 53:03 / #
we're talking about starter Jessa Kanes. There is one series that I think it's A PINCH OF SUGAR, which is a program and they're super filthy. When they're not.
Jennifer Prokop 53:20 / #
There's, um, they're all strangers to each other.
Andie Christopher 53:25 / #
They're all strangers. They see each other.
Adriana Herrera 53:34 / #
The series is called Lights, camera, Instalove.
Sarah MacLean 53:38 / #
I'm getting them.
Jennifer Prokop 53:40 / #
There you go. clear up some room in Kindle Unlimited.
Sarah MacLean 53:42 / #
Joanna? What about you.
Joanna Shupe 53:48 / #
So I think my, my favorite one, my gateway was THE MOBSTER'S MASSEUSE which I know is
Nisha Sharma 53:56 / #
don't be touching my book, Joanna.
Sarah MacLean 53:58 / #
It's a weird title.
Joanna Shupe 54:01 / #
What I love is like every title is exactly what You get. The titles are spot on. The covers are spot on. I also love that. When you read it... I will read a description of a Jessa Kane book and I'll be like, is that really? Is that for me? And then I'll start reading it. And there's another four tropes in there that are me that were not in the description. It's like she has a trope wheel in her writing room and she spins it and sees what it lands on. She's like "billionaire," done. Spin again. "Exhibitionism," spin it again, "daddy kink," done, spin it, done. And it works! So like, SUDDENLY HIS is my favorite, which is the one where she goes out with her girlfriends. They take her to a sex auction. Then they find out she's a virgin and she can't leave. So she's got to sell her virginity because she needs the money. And guess what? There's a billionaire who's secretly in love with her and he shows up and buys her, and they have to have sex in front of his buyer.
Andie Christopher 55:10 / #
His butler calls him because he's been following her.
Sarah MacLean 55:14 / #
Butler?.
Adriana Herrera 55:15 / #
Saturday night in Manhattan.
Joanna Shupe 55:17 / #
It's a PI. It's a private investigator that's trailing her. He's like, Hey, you got to get over here but
Sarah MacLean 55:22 / #
I'd rather it was a butler, honestly.
LaQuette 55:28 / #
Just thinking it's like Albert calling Bruce Wayne.
Joanna Shupe 55:35 / #
It's his Man, his man is there.
Andie Christopher 55:41 / #
Like, it could be Batman fanfic.We don't know.
Adriana Herrera 55:45 / #
It could it be his consigliere because it couldn't be a mafia boss. It doesn't matter.
Alexis Daria 55:57 / #
You know what I though, if she rewrote the same story on reality show or at a Ren faire? I would still read it both ways.
Joanna Shupe 56:04 / #
Yeah, absolutely.
Adriana Herrera 56:06 / #
Yeah, QUEEN SIZE is time travel. Tessa, If you're watching this. Give me the time travel.
Sarah MacLean 56:16 / #
Time travel! She just needs to add time travel to the trope wheel.
LaQuette 56:21 / #
I want An alien
Sarah MacLean 56:23 / #
[laughs] an alien.
Jennifer Prokop 56:24 / #
Alien seems destined for the trope wheel? Oh, wait, Nisha, you want to talk about THE MOBSTER'S MASSEUSE? Since it was brought up?
Nisha Sharma 56:32 / #
I took notes.
Adriana Herrera 56:34 / #
Of course you did?
Andie Christopher 56:38 / #
We know you. Of course you took notes. We love it.
Sarah MacLean 56:41 / #
Nisha's in charge always
Nisha Sharma 56:42 / #
I love THE MOBSTER'S MASSEUSE because it exactly exactly speaks to my Id. First of all, yes, there's obviously mafia involved. But it's, the the hero goes in for a massage. That his best friend got him for his birthday. And he has no intention of taking the massage. He's like, oh, she'll just play on her phone in the corner. And I'll sit in the corner and just work and we'll pretend that we got it because I would never turn my back to the door or be vulnerable. I can never be vulnerable. I love that. So he sees her, Fated Mates instant love. And he's like, will you grant me the honor of massaging you?
LaQuette 57:29 / #
from the waist down.
Sarah MacLean 57:33 / #
It's just a service. It's him being magnanimous and wanting her to have pleasure. That's it has nothing to do with him. Yeah.
Nisha Sharma 57:41 / #
He gives her, he's like, I'll give you whatever money you want. And she's like, okay,
Andie Christopher 57:47 / #
To massage her!
Alexis Daria 57:50 / #
And a massage.
Nisha Sharma 57:51 / #
Wait, what?.
Alexis Daria 57:52 / #
She's getting money and a massage?
Nisha Sharma 57:54 / #
She's getting money and a massage... on her vagina.
Tracey Livesay 58:00 / #
that's a Massage
Nisha Sharma 58:01 / #
It is obviously orgasmic and she's a virgin. And she's like, "if this is what I've been missing, and you know, obviously, yes, let's go all the way." And fabulous because Jessa Kane, she writes in the story this one line that I kind of think epitomizes a lot of the way that she uses language across all of her books, which is "I say the things that I say to shock her into remembering me forever." And it's like, Okay, well that makes sense to me. Because the way that Jessa Kane uses language in a lot of these high tension / high passion scenes is very much shock value and I 100% remember it. It's like, she calls a vagina a gash multiple times. And it's like, what?
Adriana Herrera 59:02 / #
it's very primal.
Jennifer Prokop 59:03 / #
Yeah, well.
Nisha Sharma 59:05 / #
I'm like, Oh, this is, well hello. And it's great. And then the best part about THE MOBSTER'S MASSEUSE is okay, instant love. Then of course she's in danger. And then he goes to her. He's like, ride my-- there's like a bunch of stuff that happens, romance things happen-- And then there's a scene towards the end where they've declared their love for each other. And he's like, "ride me. I just killed someone for you." And she's totally turned on by it. And like, just score and she's like, "yes, you killed someone for me. I'm all about it." And then he's like "you have to call me your king." And she's like, "yep I'm on it. Yes." calling you King. And he's like, "I'm going to fill you up with your your tummy's favorite juice."
Tracey Livesay 1:00:03 / #
No, thank you.
Sarah MacLean 1:00:07 / #
Wait! Actually the word "Tummy."
Nisha Sharma 1:00:11 / #
I have to do a search for it.
Jennifer Prokop 1:00:13 / #
Oh my god,
Adriana Herrera 1:00:14 / #
But you know what? I was thinking yesterday when I was trying to explain to my spouse Jessa Kane. I was like, imagine if 80s movies had just a lot of sex. Like imagine Grease with a ton of boning. Shit is happening, a crazy ass thing is happening, like there's a car coming down from the sky. Oh, there's Frankie Valli. And then there's...
Nisha Sharma 1:00:38 / #
She actually uses the word "Tummy" like I highlighted it. It's "eat it all up. There you go gorgeous. Take it down. Let it work its magic in your tummy."
Tracey Livesay 1:00:50 / #
That's not how it works.
Nisha Sharma 1:00:57 / #
at the end, the last line of the book, in the epilogue is she tells him "breed me, my king."
Adriana Herrera 1:01:06 / #
But hey, let's be honest. What is this be exactly, Let's say, how Sonny Corleone would be with his mistress?
Adriana Herrera 1:01:17 / #
This is literally what Sonny...
LaQuette 1:01:22 / #
He would have more finesse.
Adriana Herrera 1:01:26 / #
No. Sonny would!?
LaQuette 1:01:30 / #
He was very crude, but he was he wasn't that corny is what I'm saying.
Sarah MacLean 1:01:35 / #
He would never say "tummy." Sonny Corleone would not say tummy.
Adriana Herrera 1:01:40 / #
He would not say "tummy." that would be Fredo.
LaQuette 1:01:48 / #
Fredo, yes.
Adriana Herrera 1:01:49 / #
Oh, okay. Great. This is Fredo's story.
Jennifer Prokop 1:01:52 / #
I will say, if you are ever are unsure of how to define "daddy" for someone Jessa Kane has done it for us in the book HIS PRIZE PUPIL. I literally, when I read this, and I was like, "I'm gonna go ahead and highlight this because if I ever need to describe to anybody I will." So she's of course about to sell her virginity, same dealeo, right? She goes into this room, and the madam is giving her essentially a crash course in Daddy, and she is like, what is this gonna mean? And so Estelle, that's the madam says, "Look dear. I don't have time for a long psychology lesson. So here's the condensed version. A father is an accountant in a sweater vest who yawns through her dance recitals. A daddy pulls your hair, fucks you on your hands and knees, then buys you a pretty necklace. There's a difference. You're allowed to enjoy it."
Sarah MacLean 1:02:42 / #
That's a great line.
Andie Christopher 1:02:43 / #
I'm addending that to the definition of stern brunch Daddy, a Daddy who buys your brunch? And then does the rest of that. Yeah.
Jennifer Prokop 1:02:58 / #
But I was like, there it is, right there. I mean, so this is like, someone who is very in touch with exactly what it is. Like when we, especially those tropes because there really is a core story here. Or there's several of them, I think, but a lot of it is just like, like the Fated Mates instant lust. Like we will instantly both fall in love with each other. Nothing will stand in our way
Sarah MacLean 1:03:25 / #
I have questions about MY HUSBAND, MY STALKER, which I have not read
Andie Christopher 1:03:31 / #
I read that.
Sarah MacLean 1:03:31 / #
Largely because the title freaks me out.
Joanna Shupe 1:03:35 / #
Yeah, but on Amazon It has the most reviews of any of her books, that is the most highly reviewed.
Sarah MacLean 1:03:44 / #
So tell me about it, Joanne Shupe.
Jennifer Prokop 1:03:53 / #
Okay, this one, again, I was like, I'm gonna read them all. Because I know that even if I'm like, "there's no fucking way!" I'm gonna be like, "Alright, it was fine." He is, he saw her on TV, I think. And instantly Of course, fell in love with her.
Sarah MacLean 1:04:08 / #
Yep.
Jennifer Prokop 1:04:09 / #
And what is... then he essentially finds a way to essentially meet her. And marry, He meets her and marries her.
Joanna Shupe 1:04:19 / #
He tells her he's an insurance salesman or something.
Jennifer Prokop 1:04:22 / #
Yeah, exactly. And, and really, he's a hitman, I think right? And so I was like, he's a cop?
Adriana Herrera 1:04:28 / #
That was a TV show in the 80s.
Sarah MacLean 1:04:31 / #
They are always also a hitman. All of them are also a hitman.
Jennifer Prokop 1:04:35 / #
That's it. This woman [Jessa Kane] is definitely my age, these 80s tropes are really in their heart. Yes. So essentially, he dates her under this assumed identity and marries her. And she doesn't realize that he essentially kind of stalked her, like he fell in love with her from afar. And then when she goes off to work and does her things during the day if he does not have any assassinations planned, he will instead follow her around and keep an eye on her.
Adriana Herrera 1:05:17 / #
Can we just, I wish that the people listening could see Jen face, because she's got her full on middle school teacher. Right now as she's talking about this Hitman stalker.
Jennifer Prokop 1:05:31 / #
I know, I'm like and then the symbolism is...
Sarah MacLean 1:05:35 / #
she's like animals are symbols.
Jennifer Prokop 1:05:36 / #
All animals are gonna fall in love with you.
Adriana Herrera 1:05:41 / #
I would really like to talk about THE KINGPIN'S WEAKNESS.
Jennifer Prokop 1:05:48 / #
Yeah.
Sarah MacLean 1:05:49 / #
Look at Nisha! Yeah!
Joanna Shupe 1:05:51 / #
that's a good one.
Jennifer Prokop 1:05:53 / #
My favorites.
Adriana Herrera 1:05:55 / #
I think it's the one that's, other than HEFTY, which I've discussed and I enjoyed very much and that was really sweet. THE KINGPIN'S WEAKNESS was so mind blowing to me, because it is so it's like, okay: you're telling me he's a kingpin, but you're presenting me with an angsty cinnamon roll. That's like, that's what I'm getting. You can tell me he's the greatest criminal mind in modern time.
Sarah MacLean 1:06:30 / #
Wait, can we talk about his name, which is Easton Brawn with a W?
Adriana Herrera 1:06:36 / #
Easter Brawn
Sarah MacLean 1:06:39 / #
Because name is destiny.
Adriana Herrera 1:06:39 / #
Who thinks of himself as the greatest criminal mind in modern history. And he is at the MMA fight in his box. I personally have never been to an MMA fight, so I don't know if they have VIP boxes, I assume they do. So he sees her, then asks his man to bring her up to him, which you know, checks out very 80s, very 80s, very 80s. I imagine him in a shiny gray suit. So they bring her up to him. And then immediately, you know, he wants her but she's,
Nisha Sharma 1:07:22 / #
you have to start with her passing out.
Adriana Herrera 1:07:26 / #
she passes out when she realizes it's him because everybody knows Easton is the greatest criminal mind in modern history. She passes out.
Jennifer Prokop 1:07:37 / #
She read a profile of him from New York magazine or something.
Adriana Herrera 1:07:40 / #
She passes out?
Sarah MacLean 1:07:41 / #
Wait, she read a profile of him.
Adriana Herrera 1:07:44 / #
Everybody knows. Everybody knows him.
Sarah MacLean 1:07:47 / #
I don't know, Jen. It all feels plausible.
Adriana Herrera 1:07:50 / #
He's from the underworld, but everybody knows him. Everybody knows about him. and he's so handsome too. Like, he should not be this... anyway. So she goes up, she passes out then you know he wants to fuck her of course. But then she tells him she's a virgin. So he was like, Well, let me take you out on a quick date first.
Sarah MacLean 1:08:14 / #
Somebody should buy you dinner.
Adriana Herrera 1:08:16 / #
I don't want to take your flower without buying you dinner. So they go and they get in the car.
Sarah MacLean 1:08:22 / #
What a gentleman!
Andie Christopher 1:08:24 / #
Do they unshell the lobster while they're still on the way to the restaurant?
Adriana Herrera 1:08:30 / #
On the way to the date, she's like, "oh, shoot, my sister. My dad sold her. So if the one guy wins the fight, she has to go with him. And can you find out who won the fight?" So I'm like, okay, but your sister like you left her? so anyway...
Nisha Sharma 1:08:51 / #
It crosses with THE FIGHTER'S PRIZE.
Adriana Herrera 1:08:53 / #
The FIGHTER'S PRIZE, right?
Sarah MacLean 1:08:54 / #
That's where they fucking in front of the priest later?
Nisha Sharma 1:08:57 / #
No, they fuck in front of the dad and the competitor.
Sarah MacLean 1:08:59 / #
Dad.
Adriana Herrera 1:08:59 / #
Yes. Yeah. But I mean, in hindsight, the stakes were a little bit different so it was not... anyway, so her sister could have been sold but she was on a date. She was gonna check in.
Sarah MacLean 1:09:14 / #
It worked out fine.
Nisha Sharma 1:09:16 / #
they didn't like the date place. So they went to like her watering hole
Adriana Herrera 1:09:20 / #
her watering hole
Nisha Sharma 1:09:21 / #
She is like 18 years old, By the way.
Adriana Herrera 1:09:23 / #
Everybody knows her because her dad who's like a deadbeat who sold her sister was like a patron in this watering hole type pub. Everybody knows it's him. But they're like, oh, look how sweet he is with her. So I guess it's fine that he's the greatest criminal mind in modern history. He's dating this little, I can't even remember, she'll be 19
Sarah MacLean 1:09:47 / #
they are all 18
Adriana Herrera 1:09:49 / #
she's in college.
LaQuette 1:09:50 / #
She's 19 maybe
Sarah MacLean 1:09:53 / #
they have to be...
Jennifer Prokop 1:09:55 / #
The sisters is 18
Sarah MacLean 1:09:56 / #
Super fertile because the id list, I mean like the only thing that is on every one of these id lists is she's got to get bred and I
Adriana Herrera 1:10:06 / #
happen like, waiting nights.
Sarah MacLean 1:10:09 / #
I know anybody who has children is like no thank you
LaQuette 1:10:13 / #
I feel like there's just, Jessa Kane, we have to talk about some of these things that she's been writing.
Sarah MacLean 1:10:19 / #
But this breeding thing is really to me, we've never talked, we've talked about it sort of vaguely on the podcast, the breeding thing, but like, it is a thing. It is like a real kink. That like a lot of
Adriana Herrera 1:10:31 / #
like, the omega verse is all about being bred like, yeah, it's literally millions of people read these.
Jennifer Prokop 1:10:42 / #
I'm gonna tell you I had to take to my bed when I had this realization. This is not an exaggeration. I read all these fucking books. And the one that is like a hardcore no go for me is the one where they're in high school. Now, part of this is because I have a son in high school and I was like, this is really fucking gross. And then I was like, these are the only two that are actually age appropriate. This is age appropriate for this eighteen year old to be with another eighteen year old, but I'm so grossed out by it, and instead I'm reading all the books where she is 18 and he is like 30 and then I had to like lay down
LaQuette 1:11:11 / #
You just have to come to terms with that.
Adriana Herrera 1:11:16 / #
No no HUSKY, their age difference.
Sarah MacLean 1:11:19 / #
What did you say? Alexis?
Alexis Daria 1:11:20 / #
In HUSKY, she's like, 21 Oh,
Sarah MacLean 1:11:24 / #
In QUEEN SIZED, she's 21. She's practically on the shelf.
Alexis Daria 1:11:27 / #
An old lady.
Adriana Herrera 1:11:29 / #
She's a
Sarah MacLean 1:11:31 / #
spinster.
Andie Christopher 1:11:32 / #
So okay, so can I just interject? I'm just, I'm just sitting here thinking about after this pandemic is over, after we can leave our houses again, after I can date again. I'm gonna have to tell Adriana about my dates.
LaQuette 1:11:53 / #
Why is it that only Adriana gets to hear though?
Sarah MacLean 1:11:56 / #
Yeah, I mean, why can't we just do this?
Andie Christopher 1:12:02 / #
Adriana is gonna be the one who is like, wait, he took you where?
Sarah MacLean 1:12:06 / #
No, it's gonna be like that one time. Do you guys remember the one time
Adriana Herrera 1:12:10 / #
Where did he take you before you gave him your flower?
Andie Christopher 1:12:17 / #
the pandemic flower
Sarah MacLean 1:12:19 / #
No, everyone, there was a time when LaQuette was like I have something to say. And literally, it was like, Oh, I envision the video of that montage in the film of us all, like leaping over furniture to get to our zoom. It's gonna be like that, Andie, every time you have a date, we're gonna leap over furniture to get to the zoom.
Adriana Herrera 1:12:40 / #
We're gonna have to start a whole new texting thread just for your date.
Sarah MacLean 1:12:43 / #
Because we don't have enough
Nisha Sharma 1:12:46 / #
Can we get back to THE KINGPIN'S WEAKNESS where he basically is like, I killed for you. And she's like, I'm so turned on! Andie, just make sure it's not that
Sarah MacLean 1:13:00 / #
I've got to say though, that works for me, if somebody killed for me, I probably do the same. It's hot.
Adriana Herrera 1:13:08 / #
if you're dating, if you're dating the greatest criminal mind.
Sarah MacLean 1:13:14 / #
He better kill For me, he better kill for me. It's Chekov's Gun is right there on the table.
Jennifer Prokop 1:13:21 / #
I could come back from the dead. She would thank him after he killed all those people. That is just how it goes.
Alexis Daria 1:13:28 / #
Yep. Yeah. As an aside, I was listening to Joanna's book. What was the third one in the Uptown Girls trilogy?
Jennifer Prokop 1:13:36 / #
The Devil of Downtown.
Alexis Daria 1:13:36 / #
I was listening to the audio book without headphones on while doing a puzzle, and my boyfriend was in the room, and they were describing him, Jack?
Adriana Herrera 1:13:51 / #
He dirty.
Alexis Daria 1:13:52 / #
He was the biggest criminal mastermind in all of New York City. And he also spoke 12 languages and played the piano like a god and my boyfriend was like...what?!
Sarah MacLean 1:14:03 / #
I mean when Jack killed you're like, what can we do? Can I get On top of him right now? Yeah, jack doesn't have to say it though. I would know I'd be like, Jack I saw what you did.
Andie Christopher 1:14:16 / #
I need to see the Uptown girls on Netflix.
Adriana Herrera 1:14:20 / #
Oh my god. Oh, yeah, please, please.
Sarah MacLean 1:14:23 / #
Where do I sign that change.org petition
Adriana Herrera 1:14:26 / #
The only person I would let have Henry Cavill for that part Is you, for Jack.
Jennifer Prokop 1:14:36 / #
Another really weird thing I love about Jessa Kane books that has nothing to do with any of the sex stuff. A lot of these bitches have real interesting jobs. And I just appreciate that. There is one where the woman wants to be a roller coaster designer,
Jennifer Prokop 1:14:54 / #
You know what, this is fucking great because again, it reminds me a lot of 80s romances where they all have, they want to go to school, you know what I mean? And not all of them, sometimes they're just ingenues, but this one with the roller coaster designer I was like that is so nice and specific.
Sarah MacLean 1:15:10 / #
In THEIR SUMMER INTERN, she is a bungee jumping tester. She tests the bungee jumping harness.
Adriana Herrera 1:15:21 / #
You know Jessa is watching National Geographic and being like I'm gonna make the next one a bungee jumper,
Sarah MacLean 1:15:27 / #
But, you guys it all ties together, it's just very clever. She's testing the harness and then their evil mother, she rigs the harness and there she is just dangling off the edge of a bungee cord. Luckily, she has upper body strength for days, able to hang on and twist herself into it like an aerialist. And then they pull her up, and they're so upset and then they go fuck her. They take her home, they fuck her, they go after their mother who then like somehow escapes jail, or makes bail and gets out, and then finds her and tries to drown her in a swimming pool. But then, they get there, too.
Alexis Daria 1:16:08 / #
Which book is this?
Sarah MacLean 1:16:10 / #
THEIR SUMMER INTERN.
Tracey Livesay 1:16:14 / #
I was like, it could be HER 2 PROTECTORS, it's all, it all of them. Are
LaQuette 1:16:17 / #
Are there any like relatives in this with the intern?
Sarah MacLean 1:16:20 / #
Yeah, two brothers! LaQuette, I know. I'm so sorry. I'm very gauche.
Andie Christopher 1:16:32 / #
I literally read these and I'm like, Oh, that's gonna be a problem for me. And by the end of the book it's not.
Sarah MacLean 1:16:37 / #
And then I'm like, sure.
Adriana Herrera 1:16:39 / #
You know what, I feel like there's just, first of all, and again, this is what I have discovered about myself with taboo romance. You give it to me, in short, short, small portions. I can roll with most things.
Sarah MacLean 1:16:53 / #
You can't put it down, that the trick. If you put it down, you're not going back.
Alexis Daria 1:16:57 / #
I was thinking about how we're telling a lot about these stories, but we're barely scratching the surface of what is happening in these books. And they're a dollar!
Alexis Daria 1:17:11 / #
99 cents or you can get it for free on KU.
Adriana Herrera 1:17:14 / #
In HIS SUMMER INTERN, she escapes and asylum! they've been keeping her captive!
Sarah MacLean 1:17:23 / #
WHAT! and then she becomes an author's
Jennifer Prokop 1:17:25 / #
No, she runs away and she stumbles across his cottage
Joanna Shupe 1:17:29 / #
in the woods.
Jennifer Prokop 1:17:30 / #
And he thinks, Oh, this is my intern.
Adriana Herrera 1:17:34 / #
And he's like, wait a minute, she's not but I'm not gonna tell her I know, because I'm really into her.
Alexis Daria 1:17:40 / #
Because now he's in love with her already.
Adriana Herrera 1:17:42 / #
He's imprinted on her
Alexis Daria 1:17:45 / #
there's a lot of cabins in the woods.
Sarah MacLean 1:17:47 / #
As a Life PSA, you should not be interning with a survivalist author in the woods. Like if you get that internship you need to not go
Joanna Shupe 1:17:59 / #
that's the unabomber right there.
Adriana Herrera 1:18:01 / #
Yes, yes.
Andie Christopher 1:18:03 / #
Can we talk about THE LONER'S LADY, with like the girl who went to her like, Oh, she was pretending to be this, young gay man's. She was a beard.
Jennifer Prokop 1:18:17 / #
Right. Wait, it's her and her best friend.
Andie Christopher 1:18:19 / #
It's her and her best friend, going to visit his dad because he didn't think his dad would accept him for who he was. But it turns out that the dad knew [he was gay] and he was like, "that's cool, whatever." And but then the dad was like, but I want to fuck your best friend.
Jennifer Prokop 1:18:39 / #
Yeah, and the best part is the friend kind of sees the attraction between these two and pretends to have a bunch of homework. So those two can get it on all over the woods.
Sarah MacLean 1:18:50 / #
Is this another Jessa Kane book that we're talking about? [it is! The Loner's Lady]
Adriana Herrera 1:18:53 / #
Yes. Yes. And also there's a lot of having sex on the grass.
Jennifer Prokop 1:18:58 / #
Yes. Oh, God she can do anything
Sarah MacLean 1:19:00 / #
Very outdoors, against the house. against a tree.
Adriana Herrera 1:19:05 / #
Yeah.
Andie Christopher 1:19:08 / #
A lot of things that would chafe.
Adriana Herrera 1:19:10 / #
There's a line, there's a line in PREACHER MAN when he tells her, "I've come so many times against your house, like the wall of your house, I've worn down the paint." And I told myself, "the quarantine has done things to you Adriana."
Tracey Livesay 1:19:39 / #
It's not healthy.
Adriana Herrera 1:19:44 / #
Look at Tracey! It's not healthy, it's not.
Sarah MacLean 1:19:47 / #
Tracey is concerned about his liquid intake.
Tracey Livesay 1:19:53 / #
Also, they have a lot. There's always like there's so much
Adriana Herrera 1:19:58 / #
Oh yeah. Mmm, hmm. there's a very like Pornhub feel to it.
Sarah MacLean 1:20:04 / #
Like a sprinkler like a garden sprinkler.
Tracey Livesay 1:20:07 / #
A gusher. Yeah.
Jennifer Prokop 1:20:12 / #
A friend of mine read some romance for the first time and she was like, there's a lot of really weird things about romance like, but one is the idea that like individual jets of sperm can be felt.
Adriana Herrera 1:20:28 / #
we roll with it.
Andie Christopher 1:20:31 / #
LaQuette is Done with all of us. She's like,
Sarah MacLean 1:20:36 / #
I would like my voice removed, my track removed.
Adriana Herrera 1:20:41 / #
Take My square out.
Sarah MacLean 1:20:43 / #
LaQuette is president of RWA
LaQuette 1:20:46 / #
I am not the president of RWA, I am the president elect of RWA
LaQuette 1:20:52 / #
either way, If you like it, I love it.
LaQuette 1:20:55 / #
I don't you know, I don't yuck on other people's yum.
Jennifer Prokop 1:20:59 / #
Back when we did the pegging episode, Sarah. Yeah. I just feel like maybe this is like our New Year's plan is
Sarah MacLean 1:21:10 / #
Oh, well, this is what I was gonna say. Right? Well, yeah, we we are putting this episode out on New Year's Eve as like, last year, we did pegging on New Year's Eve and we put it out a little early on New Year's Eve. So this year, we'll do the same and it'll be like the fun kind of raunchy episode for New Year's Eve, but it was really fun. And maybe we just have this crew back every year.
Joanna Shupe 1:21:34 / #
I don't think Jessa has pegging on the trope wheel.
Andie Christopher 1:21:37 / #
She doesn't!
Adriana Herrera 1:21:39 / #
She should put it in.
Nisha Sharma 1:21:40 / #
Yeah, I want to call her and tell her aliens and pegging
Sarah MacLean 1:21:43 / #
time travel pegging. I'd have
Adriana Herrera 1:21:47 / #
Barbs. pegging aliens.
Alexis Daria 1:21:50 / #
I thought QUEEN SIZE was gonna go there because she was like, can't get my virginity because I got to participate in the stupid wife auction. And like, they kind of like skirted around that like, oh, maybe this, but like they didn't do that they did something else instead.
Adriana Herrera 1:22:06 / #
I mean, if she needs to take it to pegging, she should just take it and normalize it
Jennifer Prokop 1:22:14 / #
it's 2021 So yeah, that's, I guess. Okay.
Jennifer Prokop 1:22:18 / #
And so we have time travel , pegging , aliens , Barbs, those go together.What else?
Sarah MacLean 1:22:24 / #
Wait, can I ask the teacher one is HIS PRIZE PUPIL but they're not really teacher student.
Joanna Shupe 1:22:29 / #
So they are.
Andie Christopher 1:22:30 / #
they eventually are. Yeah.
Joanna Shupe 1:22:33 / #
Not at first
Jennifer Prokop 1:22:33 / #
She's taking a photography class from him. And he is her
Joanna Shupe 1:22:37 / #
she's got to sell her virginity. So she ends up at the town, Like madam's, you know, place.
Sarah MacLean 1:22:45 / #
every town has a madam.
LaQuette 1:22:47 / #
It's Always transactional, like why?
Adriana Herrera 1:22:55 / #
I honestly think Jessa has her ID list, laminated and on the wall of her desks. And it's like, it's like 10 things and that's what she's doing.
Jennifer Prokop 1:23:07 / #
It's like a deck of cards and she just shuffles.
Alexis Daria 1:23:09 / #
So that's all of our homework assignment is to like print out our ID list.
Joanna Shupe 1:23:13 / #
Yeah, make me into a wheel.
Adriana Herrera 1:23:17 / #
I don't have a wheel but I might do that. That's a good idea.
Joanna Shupe 1:23:27 / #
For whatever you come up with, take three or four of them, make them work somehow
Sarah MacLean 1:23:32 / #
that moment when you get stuck at the end of a chapter and you're like what comes next just spin the wheel done.
Nisha Sharma 1:23:38 / #
So for...
Sarah MacLean 1:23:39 / #
virginity sale
Nisha Sharma 1:23:41 / #
I think what we should do is we should get our ID list together and create summaries of stories and in 2021 be like, is this a Jessa Kane book or not? Or is that like part of Nisha's ID?
Sarah MacLean 1:23:54 / #
Yes, very fun. Anyway, we hope that Jessa Kane, This episode was really done out of love. Jessa if you are listening, we really do love you and we're we think that you're fabulous. If you've never read a Jessa Kane book, you can get them all on Kindle Unlimited, except for the one where they fuck in front of a priest, which you have to get on iBooks.
Sarah MacLean 1:24:26 / #
Sorry, what did you say Jen?
Jennifer Prokop 1:24:29 / #
There is a second Jessa Kane / Alexa Riley crossover book that is also available on iBooks only because Alexa Riley, you know,
Sarah MacLean 1:24:36 / #
isn't in Kindle so you can do that. They are all on Kindle Unlimited, but you don't have to have Kindle unlimited. You can also buy them for 99 cents a pop on your Kindle.
Jennifer Prokop 1:24:51 / #
This is like, you know, deplatforming of certain Jessa Kane books out of your Kindle unlimited library. They just stay there forever. Yeah, I believe
Andie Christopher 1:25:01 / #
These books literally became a part of my soul during quarantine. I mean they probably really are really going to send me to hell.
Andie Christopher 1:25:10 / #
but we are also
Adriana Herrera 1:25:16 / #
There's no Hell in Jessa Kane's universe.
Sarah MacLean 1:25:18 / #
No, no, no. We are releasing this early on New Year's Eve. So if you have nothing to do this New Year's Eve if you are in your house quarantining and being safe, we hope you are being safe and everybody's being healthy and wearing their masks and if you're in your house and you're looking for something to do, you can read like five or 10 of these tonight.
Andie Christopher 1:25:42 / #
Charge your Lelo vibrators before you download.
Nisha Sharma 1:25:49 / #
Plug everything in, sanitize, please.
Adriana Herrera 1:25:55 / #
Be sanitar!
Tracey Livesay 1:25:57 / #
I just went Oh boy.
Sarah MacLean 1:26:00 / #
No, this has been Andie Christopher and Joanna Shoop and Alexis Daria and Nisha Sharma and Tracey Livesey and LaQuette and Adriana Herrera. I'm Sarah MacLean. Jen is Jen reads romance. And this has been a very special episode of drunk romance history and Fated Mates, watch drunk romance history at Andie's Instagram feed. Andie, where can people find you?
Adriana Herrera 1:26:28 / #
ATauthor AndieJ. Almost everyone on this chat has been on drunk romance history. Joanna is scheduled in January, Alexis, we're still putting you down. You're gonna get Valentine's Day just so you know.
Alexis Daria 1:26:45 / #
I still have to pick a book.
Sarah MacLean 1:26:47 / #
But we will put on show notes for Fated Mates. We will put links to everybody's drunk romance history. We'll put links to everybody's website so that you can find all these people in their amazing books. These are some of our favorite people. And we are so excited. Thank you all for making time for us this week on a holiday week.
Jennifer Prokop 1:27:05 / #
Yeah. I'm gonna get off the phone and we're gonna make the Jessa Kane trope wheel, have you have that. And then to help us with the making the spreadsheet pretty and that's all going to be amazing.
Sarah MacLean 1:27:17 / #
And you can find us at Fated mates.net and Happy New Year everyone makes 2021
S03.14: Our 100th Episode! Fated Mates Live
ONE HUNDRED EPISODES!
You’ve seen us through Immortals After Dark, through Books that Blooded Us, and through a presidential election, so if there was any doubt that you’re stuck with us, put that right out of your mind! We love you so much for listening…and we hope you have as much fun listening to this episode as we had recording it!
Thanks to Tracey Livesay, Andie J Christopher, Kate Clayborn, Christina Lauren, Adriana Herrera, Nisha Sharma and Joanna Shupe for joining us, and to Steve Ammidown for popping in to say hi!
Next week, we have an interstitial coming, and the following week, we’re back on read alongs with Sally Thorne’s The Hating Game! Get it at Amazon, B&N, Kobo, Apple or at your local indie via bookshop.org.
Show Notes
In between when we recorded and when you're listening, something great happened.
How did Hollywood Squares work? What did the theme song sound like? What does Whoopi Goldberg have to do with it?
Fated States will be back! One of our dedicated phone bankers and the head of the OSRBC-IAD book discussion, Caroline, had an amazing experience when she was phone banking the week before the election. And we are not at all jealous about her amazing gift basket from Kresley Cole!
Check out Milla Vane on the Wicked Wallflowers podcast.
Andie Christopher hosts Drunk Romance History on her Instagram feed every Saturday and it’s hilarious. Sarah joined her Saturday after a full day of Election drinking to talk Suddenly You.
Do you know the book where a wave causes accidental penetration for a couple on a beach? NEITHER DO WE!
Here’s the link to all the slides for Fuck, Marry, Kill and Would Derek Craven. And here are all the Title Smash slides.
We invented a holiday. No big.
We love Philadelphia. Gritty was an unexpected hero of the 2020 election. Now you know all about the Philadelphia Left.
The Danielle Steele thread from Steve Ammidown at the Browne Pop Culture Library.
We really need to talk about the 80s blockbusters The Thorn Birds, Clan of the Cave Bear, and Flowers in the Attic (and powdered donuts).
It was Buffy and Spike in the mausoleum, not Buffy and Angel.
We can't find the TikTok of Paul Rudd and his son, but instead we'll discuss if anyone knows where Michael J. Fox got his cloning machine?
We’ll leave you to contemplate the whole “hero pooping” theory on your own, but we all know for sure that Elvis poops.
Representation of Trauma Survivors in Romance: Adriana Herrera and Jen Prokop
Surely the silverest lining of the Pandemic is how many fabulous conversations are happening all around us. A few weeks ago, Jen had an incredibly important conversation about the work of romance and writing trauma and trauma survivors. You can follow Adriana on Facebook and watch the video of the conversation there!
As you know, Adriana is one of our favorite people…preorder her next book, Here to Stay—you deserve a treat!
Thank you, as always, for listening — we hope you’re having a great (and safe!) summer! While we’re apart, if you are up for leaving a rating or review for the podcast on your podcasting app, we would be very grateful!
Oh, and did you know Sarah has a new book out? Daring & the Duke is officially here! Get it at Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Books-a-Million or from your local indie.
We’ll see you next week, for the first episode of Season 3!
No Write Way With VE Schwab and Sarah MacLean
Since the start of the Pandemic, brilliant VE Schwab has been hosting authors from across the spectrum of genres on Instagram Live Saturdays at 3pm et for her No Write Way series, talking about books, writing, the world and whatever else comes at them. Several weeks ago, Sarah joined her, and they had a great conversation about romance and writing, and we’re thrilled to share the audio with you this week!
Follow VE on Instagram, preorder her next book, The Invisible Life of Addie Larue, and don’t miss her lives on Saturday afternoons!
Thank you, as always, for listening — we hope you’re having a great (and safe!) July! While we’re apart, if you are up for leaving a rating or review for the podcast on your podcasting app, we would be very grateful!
Oh, and did you know Sarah has a new book out? Daring & the Duke is officially here! Get it at Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Books-a-Million or from your local indie.
Fated Mates on the Deerfield Library Podcast
We're still on hiatus between seasons, but your earholes don't have to be! This week, the Deerfield Illinois Public Library turned the tables on us and interviewed us for their podcast! We had a great time talking about romance and why it's the very very best. Subscribe to the DPL Podcast for more great interviews!
Thank you, as always, for listening — we hope you’re having a great (and safe!) July! While we’re apart, if you are up for leaving a rating or review for the podcast on your podcasting app, we would be very grateful!
Oh, and did you know Sarah has a new book out? Daring & the Duke is officially here! Get it at Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Books-a-Million or from your local indie.
Fated Tropes! A Live Episode with Learning the Tropes
We are on hiatus for the rest of July, but never fear! We're still bringing fun content to your earholes!
In June, we recorded a live crossover episode of Fated Mates/Learning the Tropes, during which we played delightful games, talked about books, and got to the bottom (or maybe not) of Learning the Tropes's Clayton's interesting romance kinks. We are delighted to share that episode with you this week!
If you subscribe to both of our podcasts, this will be a duplicate episode this week. If you *don't* subscribe to both podcasts...you definitely should. Find Learning the Tropes wherever you listen to podcasts! Erin and Clayton are two of our favorite people.
Thank you, as always, for listening — we hope you’re having a great (and safe!) July! While we’re apart, if you are up for leaving a rating or review for the podcast on your podcasting app, we would be very grateful!
Oh, and did you know Sarah has a new book out? Daring & the Duke is officially here! Get it at Amazon, Kobo, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Books-a-Million or from your local indie, or order it signed from the wonderful independent bookstore, Savoy Bookshop in RI, where she is through the end of July!
S02.17: Pegging Romance
It’s the start of a new year, Romance is on fire, and we all need a palate cleanser, so we’re doing it right, with the bonus episode that was an item in the Romance for RAICES auction, hosted by Love in Panels. The bidding didn’t go quite the way we expected but we are honestly thrilled, because we were a tiny part of raising $23,000 for refugee services and immigrant families on the border. Please donate early and often to RAICES and The Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights.
Please welcome friend of the pod, Sierra Simone, for our very special Pegging Episode (And thank you to the Pegging Collective for your generous donation, and for being wonderful listeners)!
Auspicious beginning, right? Don’t miss a single moment of our 2020 episodes — subscribe on your favorite podcasting platform and like/review the podcast if you’re so inclined!
We’re back next week (WE PROMISE!) with Born in Ice, by none other than the queen herself, Nora Roberts. Read Born in Ice at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Kobo or your local indie.
Show Notes
Jen misquoted a famous scene in Chinatown; it's actually "my sister and my daughter." Yikes.
Pretty sure if you're fancasting us into this clip from Grease about the Pink Ladies, Sierra is Rizzo.
We've talked a lot about Sierra's books on the podcast, but it was on the Small Town Romance interstitial that Sarah joked all of Sierra's books take place in Menage County, Kansas. [14]: https://twitter.com/JenReadsRomance/status/1212092587114467329 The Romance for RAICES auction was the brainchild of Suzanne from Love in Panels and raised TWENTY THREE THOUSAND DOLLARS! You should definitely support her blog and patreon if you can. The crisis on the border is ongoing and getting worse. Please continue to support romance's teams at RAICES and The Young Center.
We were going to rickroll you by talking about Peggy Sue Got Married and pirate romances, but we're nice that way and didn't. FWIW, Jen still thinks the plot of Peggy Sue Got Married is haunting.
Sierra is also, of course, the founder, owner, and operator of [The Simone Scale][14], which does not include teabagging even, but has been, because she loves us, updated to include pegging. The image is on our website in show notes.
Everyone wants the right pegging playlist, and of course there's one on Spotify. What a world! Besides Ariana Grande's Dangerous Woman, we offer up for your consideration Back It Up, Boys by Peaches and Behind the Wheel by Depeche Mode.
Here are some Sierra Simone recommended [toys ][24]and [harnesses][25]. She says of the toys, "The small is VERY gently sized and some men may feel more comfortable with a toy is that isn’t a hyper-realistic reproduction of a cock." [24]: https://www.tantusinc.com/collections/dildos/products/silk-small [25]: https://www.myspare.com/product/joque
Elia Winters is a Fated Mates favorite, and we want to thank her for her help thinking through the implicatons for gender essentialism and cisnormativity in this discussion. Buy her books! Her latest Three For All has pegging.
Sierra mentioned "that law about gas expanding to fill a space" -- well, I phoned Jonathan, a friend who teaches chemistry, and he says that's called entropy or Boyles Law of Kinetic Molecular Theory. Learn more about it here from Professor Dave, a Jonathan-approved chemistry youtube instructor.
Samhain and Ellora's Cave (which was especially messy) were two earlier and now shuttered publishers of erotic romance.
Jen Porter wrote a great twitter thread about erotic romance and character development.
Sarah mentioned "the RITA entry window" and goddamn if that's not a bitter pill to swallow right now. She's sorry.
A little about what it means to be allosexual.
Check out Roan Parrish's short story A Good Old Fashioned Chanukah Pegging, starring Ginger and Christopher from Small Change.
Everyone knows you need a flared base on your butt plugs, or at least anyone who follows Jenny Nordbak knows.
Romance as sex ed is complicated, but Scarlteen is on the job, and Teen Vogue would never steer you wrong.
The Pegging Song that Adriana sent us from Twitter is amazing, and we want to thank @shutupaida for being so gracious about letting us play it during the podcast. Also, be sure to watch Big Mouth on Netflix, because she's writing for it now!
I guess Katee Robert isn't the only one staging elaborate scenes with her Barbie dolls.
The Rogue Anthologies are pretty great and there are quite a few of them.
Jen had to do a major "retcon" on this hero in the Tamsen Parker book in order to read it. It's fine, really.
Special thanks to our special guest Sierra Simone! You can find her on Instagram or Facebook. Read her New Camelot series, the first is American Queen! She also joined us on our MacRieve episode, and we talked about Priest, a book that blooded Sarah.
You can buy a Pegging the Patriarchy button and other Romancelandia buttons at stickers at Jen's shop run by her best friend Kelly, and Sarah's t-shirts and swag from Jordandene.
Next week, we'll be talking about Born in Ice by Nora Roberts! We mean it!
Much thanks to all the members of the Pegging Cabal for their amazing, generous donation, and for asking us to do this episode: E is reading, Jennifer, Stephanie Blackhart, Amanda, Kini, Melinda, Tempest Bonds, Michelle Boule, JS Lenore, Eve Pendle, and Isabel. Give them a follow, or maybe this related account, Is There Pegging? But whatever you do, don't make everyone think that something is wrong with Colin Firth. We hope you enjoyed the episode!
Check out the transcript.
Jen Prokop 0:39
I don't even have words right now but we do have a very special guest
she's been cursed by podcast fairies though.
Sarah MacLean 0:50
It may be like it may be at some sort of flu podcast
flu podcast. Oh, there you go
Sierra Simone 0:56
just as pegging itself takes multiple tries to get Alright, so to the pagan podcast
Jen Prokop 1:05
Well, there you go. I guess y'all know what we're talking about tonight.
Sarah MacLean 1:09
Everyone Sierra Simone is with us today. Hello
Sierra Simone 1:12
everyone you know
Jen Prokop 1:14
Sarah and I are not messing around and sometimes you just need to bring in an expert so on this faded mates Welcome everyone we have a very a very special episode. It's kind of like a Lifetime movie. If you remember those when you were a kid only like way more instructive?
Because
Unknown Speaker 1:32
we got help and support I said, see nothing like those Lifetime movie.
Sarah MacLean 1:40
Like, my sister is my mom.
Jen Prokop 1:50
But okay, sure.
Sarah MacLean 1:54
Okay, so we should talk about so yes. Welcome, everybody to faded mate. I'm Sarah McClain.
Jen Prokop 2:01
I'm generally romance
are we going in
Sarah MacLean 2:07
you and then if we have to introduce our
Unknown Speaker 2:08
guest, I mean, right.
Sarah MacLean 2:11
And then we are here today with Sarah Simone who everyone remembers from our McRib episode. Sarah, have you only been here for one episode?
Jen Prokop 2:19
No.
Sierra Simone 2:21
I think it's just been one. Yeah, I mean, I feel like I'm present.
Jen Prokop 2:26
We have to do everyone several.
We've recorded with her four times, but she's gonna only be on twice
Sierra Simone 2:36
but you only get to hear okay, but
Sarah MacLean 2:38
here's the deal. So this is well and we also we have a third one even we have a third lined up already. We already know you're coming back. Yo, it's like, Saturday Night Live where people get t shirts. People get gifts when they hit milestones like maybe when you hit five will send you like a
amazing
Sierra Simone 2:58
amazing
Sarah MacLean 3:06
Kansas.
Sierra Simone 3:08
It really is. I mean, I'm the mayor of Minaj. County, Kansas.
I don't know, but I'm the mayor of it.
Well, thank you for having me on. I'm really excited to be here. We're so happy to have you and
Sarah MacLean 3:25
so let's give a little background on where how this started. We so Suzanne over at Levin panels, who is fabulous, and was looking around in 2019 at the world and going like what the fuck is happening is that none of us could could really stop saying that, and I was paralyzed, but, but Suzanne decided that she was gonna put her good work into mobilizing romance to into a auction to benefit nonprofit organizations on the southern border of the United States working with displaced families, children who have been displaced or taken from their parents and other people who
Jen Prokop 4:15
are really going through it
Sarah MacLean 4:17
down there. And romance really delivered in a huge way. The auction was massive, I think bigger than Suzanne could have imagined. Oh, I think it raised like 15 or 20 grand It was a lot. Yeah, you guys did awesome. So thank you to everyone who donated time money. product to that. We Jen and I were really really excited to be able to donate an episode of fate of mates, by which we meant like you pick the topic.
Like, we'd like you to talk about the bridgeton series
episode on princesses.
Jen Prokop 5:04
Women with really nice shoes.
Sarah MacLean 5:09
You Joker's a group of you got together and you raise a shit ton of money. Thank you so, so much. And you called yourself the pegging cabal. We have your name, we're going to name you at the end of this episode with pride. And you won the auction and you asked us to do an episode on pegging. And after sort of a couple of non starter ideas like what if we do a whole episode of characters named Margaret or
Sierra Simone 5:42
totally forgot we're
Jen Prokop 5:43
gonna do that. I was like, we're gonna rickroll them.
Sarah MacLean 5:49
Pirate romance.
We decided to really get serious get down to business, so to speak, and we called in the dirtiest person we know
Sierra Simone 6:00
The owner, thank you operator
Sarah MacLean 6:01
and developer of the Simone scale tm.
Simone, like pegging on the small scale is like, slightly to the north of Darcy looking at.
Jen Prokop 6:17
Like, making a cup of tea with two tea bags. That's about how sexy it is in your world. Like, we're gonna need help.
Sierra Simone 6:25
I mean, also actual teabagging is on, but like,
Jen Prokop 6:31
but yes, like, we're
Sierra Simone 6:32
talking like real, real mild stuff for pegging. So I was like, yeah, hell yes, I'm here. Yeah. What
Unknown Speaker 6:38
do you mean you need an expert? What's wrong,
Jen Prokop 6:42
guys? Important point, Sarah tweet. I think I've done more research episodes I ever had for like, my advice.
Sarah MacLean 6:52
was like, I'm getting it together.
Sierra Simone 6:55
That wasn't real good week. Like I feel like our text thread that week was probably like top 10 texts. threads of all time. Okay.
Yeah, we found that playlist, the music playlist, which we will
Sarah MacLean 7:09
course link in show notes and also the peaches song is is is going to play over the course of this episode because
Jen Prokop 7:33
Is this the woman the woman on Twitter who has the pegging? Like new jingle you guys we found some amazing things we're gonna
Sarah MacLean 7:42
get to her she's amazing cuz she's given us permission to play the whole thing. But no, there's there's a peachy song that is like, frankly like meaning.
It also includes meatloaf I would do anything for love.
Jen Prokop 8:02
But I won't do that.
Sarah MacLean 8:15
There is like a three part dissertation on on the internet about Ariana Grande a having
Sierra Simone 8:23
to pegging Dangerous Woman don't know how
Unknown Speaker 8:29
to spend the money.
Unknown Speaker 8:33
completely focused.
Sierra Simone 8:36
It is the classic, dangerous woman.
Jen Prokop 8:41
I think my favorite song on that playlist though, is
Sarah MacLean 8:53
that Eric pops in and production. There's gonna be a lot of great music in this episode. We'll put it all in show notes.
Jen Prokop 9:00
I think also a lot of show notes are going to be like Jen was unable to Google that good luck.
Sarah MacLean 9:07
Jen does show notes at work.
Jen Prokop 9:10
We suggest the search terms x y&z been able to execute that search and keep my job.
See the gray zone is now radioactive.
Sierra Simone 9:27
Well the great thing about Sarah Nice job is that like, if we didn't do this research on our computers, really we'd be letting our job down. So solemn duty Yeah, to investigate every corner of pegging.
Yeah, that's what she said.
Sarah MacLean 9:45
There's no corners in pegging.
Sierra Simone 9:49
I've learned that. That's rule number
one. Corner.
Jen Prokop 9:56
No corners. It's real soft. Round. Yes.
Unknown Speaker 10:05
All right.
Jen Prokop 10:06
Okay, so real serious now, Sarah, I think we'd like Sierra to maybe define pegging for us for
Sarah MacLean 10:13
those of you who don't know, welcome to fate of me. Welcome to this episode.
Okay, good welcome. If this is your first faded mates episode, welcome to the deep end of the pool.
If you combine a series someones newsletter, Twitter account, Facebook, or
Unknown Speaker 10:45
Welcome
Jen Prokop 10:48
Welcome to the kiddie pool.
Unknown Speaker 10:52
perspective, time is a flat circle
Unknown Speaker 10:59
All right.
Jen Prokop 11:00
Sierra, tell us about what pegging is, that's your job. That's why we brought you do all the heavy lifting.
Sierra Simone 11:07
So, um, so this is something that when we were kind of formulating how we were going to talk about pegging in the episode, you know, we did do a little bit of discussion. So sort of the traditional definition of pegging has been penetrative sex, where the penetrating object is actually a toy like a strap on, and the toy is usually worn. And the receptive partner is a man and the active partner, the penetrating partner is a woman and that is, I would say the majority of the pegging you come across in romance, which is a woman wearing a strap on penetrating a man easily. But while we were talking, I think, Jen Was it you who talked to Ilia winters a little bit, I bow Yeah, kind of making sure that there is some inclusivity The definition and that, you know, acknowledging that there can be some biological essentialism and the way that we sort of talk about what pegging is and isn't, and making sure that you know, it's kind of for everyone.
Jen Prokop 12:14
I just want to say like, huge shout out to Elio, who like, was really gracious about taking our questions because we want it I mean, obviously, we're having a lot of fun with this episode, but we don't want to be offensive either. And, you know, it's like kind of this always this question now about gender essential ism. You know, obviously, there are women who do have penises, right? If she's using her own anatomy, is it? Is it pegging? Or is it just like fucking and really, one of the things that Ellie and I ended up talking about was the idea that like people, if, if, if people kind of self identify that the activity they're doing is pegging like than it is, and it's not really like are you know, people get to decide how to like, a sheet put it like deviate from sis normativity in whatever way they Want to. So although I think in the episode work in a really kind of stick to that standard definition, we do want to just sort of, like throw out there that like that. That's not the only way that like pegging works. It's sort of maybe a most common one at this point. But, you know, we fully anticipate that, like, these things are going to just like everything. You know, there's not like really, highly defined borders around it. Like this is an activity that like all people can enjoy in whatever way they want to about that. Yeah,
Sierra Simone 13:28
yes. I love that. And I think that I think that pegging and I hope this is the case that in romance pegging is going to start to expand as it's sort of drifted into the popular consciousness, the way we see it represented and romance will start to expand and kind of breathe into the corners of the room. You know, I kind of think of that, like, what's that science law about how gas will always fill the volume of the container and nice and I feel like I do. like this and romance and inclusivity they do do that. Like once people start bringing awareness of it into the conversation, then you do start to see these stories and narratives pop up that really expand and play with, like, what are the limits of what this can do. And I hope that's the case for pegging. Yeah.
Sarah MacLean 14:18
I think this is really an interesting question, because I think, I think that when we talk about pegging, we're talking about really flipping the script on what sex has traditionally like, is traditionally in like old school, you know, sis hat. romances were like, the penetrative experience is the masculine experience. And I think that that that the idea of normalization of pegging and this these kind of questions about like, how do we rewrite the script on sex so that there is more parity and experiences kind of more We're balanced across or maybe not even balanced, but it's about pleasure. It's about your own desire and your consent within a relationship. And to Missy to write the idea that you're sharing something that maybe is like a stretch for you or like a writer or something you're kind of interested or curious about together and that is also a way that people's relationships develop. And yes is a gift from erotica and from erotic romance. I mean, this has I think, part of the reason why pegging has become more a part of romance and truthfully, when we got this sort of call for this being the fate of mates episode that people wanted, we part of the reason why we felt like we needed an expert to come in and talk was because we wanted somebody who was really deeply connected to erotic romance, who writes erotic romance who understands
the world
of writing for erotic romance readers and who, unlike and somebody who is in in that world right now because it isn't it's a new This is a whole new world opening up from erotic romance I think so much about that really the conversation that we've had with adrionna we had with audrianna Herrera when she was here about like, romance is constantly now it feels like romance of 2019 2020 is pushing the walls down and sort of again like gas right expanding? Yes, you further space.
Sierra Simone 16:34
Well, and I think that that's such an astute observation that because it to me, and I'm not nearly the romance historian that you guys are but when I encountered a lot of sort of older pegging, like I would say around like 2004 to 2007 ish in like Sam handbooks and a Laura's cave books.
Jen Prokop 16:52
Um, it definitely happened
Sierra Simone 16:55
within a very specific BDSM sphere. There was a Definitely like a very certain paradigm that could allow for a man to be penetrated by a woman. And now I think that's completely not the case. And one of the reasons why is that I think it's such a valuable tool or method to explore what power and gender mean inside of a relationship, that it actually connects to a lot of conversations that we're having in 2019. And, you know, in the last few years, and so this idea that like it can move out from just being purely like a symbol of, I mean, almost dominance, like femme Dom culture, to being something that even like limitedly kinky people or not kinky people at all can experience and it can be used on the page as a as a seen as a chessboard for navigating some other bigger, deeper theme.
Jen Prokop 17:56
One of the things I think might be really interesting before we'd like to Talk about specific, like examples is one of the things I like. And I know Sarah, you and I've been like noodling around when we like sort of tried this. The first time is, when people talk about erotic romance, they often talk about, like how sex has to be a really integral part of the plot. Hmm. And one of the things and I and I think that's true, right, like they're the relationship gets, like sort of shown through like, the sexual evolution of their emotional relationship is like really shown through the evolution of their sexual relationship. Right, right. I think one of the other things that I'm I'm really moving towards is the idea that I'm really good. erotic romance, though is also about character development. Yeah. And so you get people really exploring who they are, as they explore, like, their sexual identity, whether and that happens, like with a partner or partners, right, yeah. And I think that that's something that It's really funny because for like a long time, I've kind of really struggled with that first definition of erotic romance like it felt right, but somehow not entirely right. And when I think about it instead is someone really saying, like, I want to explore something new with you. I am learning something new about myself through what we're doing together. I find that to be a really like, electrifying and exciting way of thinking about erotic romance. And I think it's also when I think about the best erotic romance, it's the ones that do that. And I think that that's why like pegging could then be like a really interesting kind of model for this because often it is like, it's not where a book starts, right. It's something that's going to happen later. And, and I think so I just think that's like a really interesting way of thinking about it that like, I don't know, it really makes sense to me. It's like something I feel like I really enjoy and I think Maybe I'll look it up Jennifer Porter on Twitter was maybe one of the people who first like got me thinking in this way and I will definitely try and dig up that thread because I, I really, it was like one of those things where I read it and I was like that I love that idea a lot.
Sarah MacLean 20:15
Well, and I think that that's such an important piece of the puzzle for erotic romance. Like I my biggest one of my biggest frustrations with the way we talk about romance novels in the world is that for so long, I mean, when I started writing Romance A decade ago, which feels like an eternity ago, and like I started reading romance before ebooks existed, like that's, that's kind of the frame of reference that we're talking about here. Right. So like, the most erotic romance at the time that was readily available that you could go to your local library and pick up was someone like Laura Lee right, who was writing a very specific kind of again, like sis heteronormative erotic romance that was not including these kind of these kind of kinks that now no longer feel as kinky, right? But so an interestingly and her and her heroes were completely impenetrable. That's what she said in both
Sierra Simone 21:25
episode we one done
Sarah MacLean 21:30
right, I'm never gonna be able to call a hero.
Jen Prokop 21:36
They all need to just understand that they're all penetrable. It's a better world that way.
Sarah MacLean 21:43
But my point being that
for a long time written my, when I started, there was this sort of sense that we didn't talk about the sex parts of the book like we as writers, as an industry. Kind of glossed over that for I think lots of reasons. But certainly the one of the damage, one of the most damaging parts of that silence about the sex parts was that we never really nailed down a solid definition of what it means to be erotic romance like Yeah, and I think we talked about this a little bit during the mcgroove episode where like, I there's still a question I still see people right now there's the Rita not the Rita entry. window is open, and people are like, well, if I had five sex scenes in my book, is that a contemporary is that erotic and it's like, well,
Jen Prokop 22:43
that's not the that shouldn't be. The crazy number is not that the number is not what's defined,
Sarah MacLean 22:50
but I think we're not look, romance is having a lot of very important conversations right now that need to be had but this is one that also needs to be had in service of This part of the genre, right? Because we should be able to talk about what the value of the erotic romance is. And I think you're right that it is about character. Evolution is through action in this particular way.
Sierra Simone 23:15
I love that idea of evolution through action. Like I think that's such an incredible, just sort of pithy tagline for it. And I want to acknowledge that, you know, we're the sphere in which we're talking about erotic romance is largely geared towards and representing Allah sexuals. And so just with that caveat, I do think that for Allah sexual people, meaning people who are just non Ace, or you know, naturally sexual beings, that sexual identity actually ties into some really super elemental parts of our identities that I think are hard to access and other ways. So like it can be profoundly vulnerable making it can be profoundly therapeutic. Or profoundly traumatizing or, you know, breaking you open to have powerful transformative sex. And so if you have an erotic romance where the It doesn't matter how many sex scenes you have, necessarily, but the sex scene itself is doing work by using sex as a as a gateway into this identity arc that the characters undergoing, I think that that is what makes a compelling erotic romance. And then I think the, a lot of that journey usually is coupled with sort of, I was raised or just sort of the overall culture created these ideas about sexuality inside of me. And so like some of that identity is usually kind of coming into your own and letting go of the harmful paradigms that society has given you. And I think with pegging in particular, that can have a lot to do with like, what is masculinity? Like? What is the matter masculine role in sex. And and I think we can acknowledge probably that there are there are some strains of homophobia right within talking about pegging and how men might feel about it.
Jen Prokop 25:15
If I could just like shout out like literally today, Rome parish dropped a little book in main bite, called a good old affection Hanukkah pegging. And it is a if you read small change, it's ginger and Christopher so these are like characters you kind of already know. But one of the things I really liked about this little and I mean, it's pretty short. I read it in a couple minutes is it starts off with Christopher talking to his friend, because he is like curious it his friend is gay and he's curious about like, Ginger has like wants to try pegging. Christopher is like I think I want to try it but he talks to his friend hearse Question is sort of like, does it hurt? Like, does it hurt to have something up your ass? Right? And the friend is kinda like Jude is like blinking, right? And, and he's like, and they and he's really interesting because he's, he'd like, go, it's I thought it was really great. Like, he's like, I need to go to a friend first who's experienced this to like, talk about, like, my questions and my fears. And you know, it's like, really funny because, like, one of the things he says is like, like, What's the situation? And I was like, You know what, I think that makes it I loved it. Like, I felt like, oh, like, that really is getting out. Like what I think a lot of people would have like, questions about the mechanics of it, and I just thought it anyway, it's like a terrific story. And it's really short and we'll link to it in show notes. But you know, that that whole idea of like him, you know, and and you can tell Jude his friend is like, you know, it doesn't make you gay and he's like, I I'm not trying to say that, like, I really am like, Is it going to hurt like, what do I do to prepare? How do I get ready?
Unknown Speaker 27:00
Right. You know,
Sarah MacLean 27:02
I think that's a really it brings up a whole separate batch of questions about romance in general and how well or not well, it prepares readers for sex. Yeah, right. I mean, I, I think, because I think a lot about the fact like, I think about anal and I think about how I had no idea like romance did not prepare me in any way to like, understand how anal works. Right, right. Oh, yeah. Right. So like, I think so i think that that kind of conversation in romance is really fresh and interesting and should happen more on the page. And, again, it's the place where erotic romance can be doing some really interesting and I think important work. Yeah, you know, the last time we this is the second time we've recorded this episode, because we had a little bit of a problem the first time and that day, I had just been to have an extra While I was sitting there, I was not discussing this episode with the X ray tech surprisingly. But the X ray tech while I was there was saying, Oh, we've had a really interesting day today because you know, your story is definitely the most boring story and somebody else would come in was younger a young man and he had a tube of mascara.
Sierra Simone 28:28
Oh no loss Oh, no,
Unknown Speaker 28:30
no, no
Unknown Speaker 28:31
No learn base everybody know that. Here's the thing, right? Like,
Sarah MacLean 28:36
that's a thing where like, okay, there's this is there's a lot going on, like his, the X ray text response was his mom was real pissed.
And
I can't imagine like I was like, well, it's probably worse for him. And truthfully, like this entire experience is going to be a terrible experience between him and his mom if they can't figure out a way to talk about it. But the reality is like who's was having how are we having these conversations? Like is it romances job to teach us? Like? There's some interesting questions here, right? Like, you know, it is not romance this job to teach us. But like, we don't want porn teaching us. So where do we learn? So I guess in this I mean, this is sort of a much bigger kind of academic and like parenting and you know, a traditional question, but
these
I'm really happy to hear about that conversation in Ron's book because
Jen Prokop 29:32
Yeah, right, exactly. Because I do think it's tricky. Like, I agree with you that this is not exactly it's not romances job to teach. But at the same time, I think it probably behooves at least most writers to know that many people are learning about sex through romance. Yeah. And like, that's like a real tricky thing. I will say I will put a link in show notes to a website that I just think is actually terrific. for teaching about sex, it's called Scarlett teen. And it is literally called, like sex ed for the real world. And it's really aimed at teenagers and like emerging adults, right, like young people, but I, I, I think anybody would benefit like, everything's really straightforward. It's pretty non judgmental. I think it does a pretty good job about addressing like, gender identity. It's not like gender essential, you know what I mean? It's not just like, this is what women are. And I so I do think that like, but I tell a lot of people about Scarlett teen and they're like, I've never heard of that before. And I don't know if I'm just lucky because I work in a school and I know the folks who teach sex ed, but there are resources out there that I think you know, if you're too embarrassed to talk to your kids about sex, like I will say, I know that it's like really hard, but I do think it's like a really important part of our job as parents sprite because
Otherwise you're in the ER
Unknown Speaker 31:03
Yeah.
Sierra Simone 31:04
Lost your $13 tube of mascara.
Jen Prokop 31:10
I mean, who knows how much of the bill is for that?
Sarah MacLean 31:14
Oh god no, but not in you know i'm i'm thrilled that there are resources like this but like also just PSA moms and dads out there listening like, you know talk to your kids about all kinds of sex. Oh yeah things that they might be getting into it's going to be horrifying but enjoy embarrassing them
Sierra Simone 31:36
I think there is a there is a corner of fiction that does sometimes get a little bit more into these things and that's fanfiction because I know I have read fanfiction that is a little bit more detail oriented because it's you know, maybe it's written by a young person who like actually googled how to peg the I know I've read some fanfiction that was really illuminating and taught me some things. And I think I actually think in 2019 there's actually a lot of permeability between fan fiction and romance right now. Sure, I think I think a lot of fan fiction readers have grown up to be romance readers because they've been trained by slash fig by you know, reading these alternate universes with their favorite characters falling in love. And so they just sort of naturally graduated into romance, but they expect the same diversity and the same sex positivity that they found in fanfiction, which is really like it's a breath of fresh air, I think.
Jen Prokop 32:40
Yeah, I think that's awesome. I guess I would just like one more thing I would like to turn to in terms of like, cuz I guess my, my, of the three of us, my child is the oldest so I've actually done some of this work. Like I mean, we all you should all you know, you'd be talking to your younger kids about all sorts of things about their rights to their body and all that kind of stuff, right? But, and I can put up like lots of like links and show notes about like, how to talk to your kids about sex and, but like one of the things to like, for me that's really worked and I tell people this is that I like very much like when I sit my son down and we're like talking about this stuff, like just him, like I say to him, I'm like, I get that you're embarrassed, and you don't have to say anything, just like listen to me. And then I like really make it clear. Like, I feel like this is part of my job as your parent like, I'm just doing my job right now. I'm not here to embarrass you. I'm not here to like horrify you I but this is stuff that's like really important to me, that you are that you know about consent that you are being careful that you are like watching out for your friends that you know these like warning signs of like when someone might be in a dangerous situation. right and i think that you know, it's it's something that I think of is like a real responsibilities. Like, you're not going to send your kid off to college without them knowing how to like, do their own laundry. So make sure they know how to like buy condoms, and, you know, like talk about sex. And the thing that I have told my son is over and over again is like, if you can't talk to your partner or like about what you want to do, if you can't say, like, this is what I want to try, this is what I want to do, then you probably shouldn't be doing it. Yeah, right like that. That to me is like, just like the baseline. Like you have to be able to talk to your partner. It's something you're doing together. And that to me, I think feels like you don't have to really get too into the weeds about that is but it's like, if you can't even talk about what you want to do, then maybe you're not ready to actually try doing it.
Sierra Simone 34:44
You know, I think that that actually ties really well into pegging because I think pegging is one of the acts that requires a huge amount of communication. Because if you are penetrating someone with a toy like you yourself are not having a whole lot of Like biofeedback. So what is happening inside their body? And so there's just there's no way to do it without actively communicating as you go along, like you communicate before, like, you know, just basic things like what's the weather today? Like? Is it good about weather? Is it bad weather? Like? It's like a tornado warning then like, we're not going in, but, but then it's like a constant process of communicating throughout and then after, as well to say, like, how did that feel? Was that okay? And there's just, I mean, I don't think I've ever read a pegging scene where there hasn't been some degree of communication, because I think that if you wrote something like that, it would actually be really uncomfortable like emotionally to read because it's such a, it's it just requires that in this it necessitates it.
Jen Prokop 35:56
So do we want to talk about some actual books?
Sarah MacLean 35:59
Well, actually, I want to talk About my book, if if I can go first. Um, so I was thinking I'm, I'm just really, I'm really drawn to what you both are saying about, you know, one being mature enough to be able to ask for what you want. And with, you know, with purpose and with an understanding of your own your own ability to want and, and behave in a certain way but also in this sort of sense that like trust that I'm really interested in the trust that is implicit in asking for in broaching the topic with your partner. Yeah. Because it feels like once you're actually like, in the sheets, like
you've, you've come over the
most impressive hurdle, which is like asking for it right, which is hard. Right? All right. This feels dirty, by the way. Like I feel like every word coming out of my mouth
Jen Prokop 37:00
We're gonna get we're giving the people, Sarah.
Unknown Speaker 37:04
I know.
Sarah MacLean 37:05
So
anyway,
I so anyway, my point is that I think this this issue of trust in conversation with your partner the ability to say, I want this thing I want this thing that's kinky or not kinky or whatever in our relationship and frankly, I mean sexual or otherwise, is a massive hurdle for a relationship, especially in the beginning. And I mean, especially when it comes to sex like, which is awkward and weird and funny and stupid and all those things all right, it's never as perfect as it's certainly not the beginning ever as perfect as it is to pick a page. And so my pick for this is aelia winters. I mean, it feels like she keeps coming back, but winters winters is tied score, which is the second book in her slices of pie series, which follows. It's basically an erotic series focused and centered around gaming company. But in this particular you don't have to
the heroine of this book is
the HR person at this gaming company. And here is a baker.
And we all know I love the baker.
And basically like she goes in to the bakery every morning, I really love the way this flips the script. There are a lot there are a lot of romances where like the businessman hero gets his coffee every day from right like everything about this book kind of turns these, like classic tropes on their head. But he goes into she goes into his bakery every day and she buys coffee every day and they sort of make eyes at each other and they were kind of into each other and then like suddenly they're you know, they're into each other and She is a it's a little BDSM she is in them in, she likes scenes, she likes to be a DOM. And and he has a submissive streak that he knows he has but hasn't like thoroughly explored. And I really like as you all know, like I really like this dynamic with the with the heroine as DOM. So this I knew going in like I picked up this book because I knew going in this was going to scratch an itch for me that you don't see very much but in this particular case, um she's also like she knows she's, there's nothing about this that feels prescribed in the way that erotic romance can often produce a DOM and a submissive where it's like everyone knows their own rules. Everyone knows like exactly how everything goes Dom's know everything is perfect in every way. That's just not how this goes and it lovely And there's this
moment about
halfway through the book and I think about the fact I think it was Eugen who said, like pegging doesn't happen on page one like it. Yeah, it's an act that comes out later.
Jen Prokop 40:12
Meanwhile, I said that and I'm an ally when I talk about mine, but it's gonna be okay. That's like exception that proves the rule. Exactly.
Unknown Speaker 40:20
So
Sarah MacLean 40:20
there's, they go into the two of them together, go into a sex, like a sex shop. And the woman behind the counter is like, very friendly. And she's like, welcome. And he turns to the hero turns to the heroine and says, What did you have in mind and I sort of, it feels it all feels very light. There's this new sex shop in our neighborhood that like where there's nothing like the windows are all like open to the street and like it feels like a revelation to go in there. It doesn't feel secret or sword in any way. And I like that about this representation on the in the book. That's sort of an aside. And she says, The heroine says, I thought,
um,
maybe a harness.
Like ellipses in the sentence like it's clear that she feels we're in his POV right so we can't see when we can't see what she's thinking. But like it's so clear that she's like, I know what I want but I feel weird saying it to you like I don't I'm not sure how this is going to go I'm not sure that you'll have me after this like I'm not sure we'll be in the same place anymore. I could be fucking up
and then he says
that sounds fun is it's like to try and then he touches her but just like with one finger like he just like runs a finger down her spine. And she says Yeah, I think so if your game and he says and then he bends down is like super sexy and is like, you want to peg me, Miss Parker and like it's This moment where you're like they're having this like hot, consensual moment, and it's filled with like her. And it begins with her uncertainty with like, yeah, her not being like the perfect DOM and not being able to read like, being in a place that's very authentic and real. It felt like to me. Yeah, that's awesome. Anyway, the rest of the pegging scene is great. All this is to say, like, the rest of the book is fabulous. The pegging scene is great. It's super hot. ilias really, incredibly skilled at this. And, you know, you've heard us talk about early on the podcast before, so I don't have to oversell but I wanted to really, you all said that in it. I just I found that moments. So real. So great. Great.
Jen Prokop 42:48
Yeah. Just a quick shout out. Her latest book three for all also has a pegging scene.
Sierra Simone 42:55
Oh,
Sarah MacLean 42:56
I also think I'm not gonna a good time to break are a person on Twitter who
peg someone in a different way through song?
Jen Prokop 43:15
It's honestly I feel like the most brilliant thing I've ever heard at
least at times when you are the one who like reached out, and we're like hello
Sarah MacLean 43:29
King delighted by it. Her name is Aida. And she is awesome. She's hilariously funny her Twitter handle is shut up Aida. And actually just recently she announced that she has a new job she's joined the writers room at Big Mouth the the the animated show on Netflix that is about teenagers going through puberty, which I think is like the most I'm wild about this show. It's awkward and weird and it's exactly the right representation of what puberty feels. Like, so congratulations to Ada for this but
more importantly, she is the creator
of and we will post this tweet and we will put the music in right now.
Unknown Speaker 44:19
Real quick. No, it's not gay bro. I'm just having fun, bro. I just wanna stick. But bro, I'm being truthful and make yourself visible and let me just imagine a
Unknown Speaker 44:29
bag. I got a strap.
Unknown Speaker 44:30
I gotta press pay for your ass. Hey, I've got a question to ask.
Unknown Speaker 44:35
Do you get your booty in
Unknown Speaker 44:36
the air? Maybe we could do each other's hands stop being homophobic and benya as over it's not like your homies are here. And to be clear, I know you would love it.
Unknown Speaker 44:49
You got a big
Sarah MacLean 45:03
The tweet reads unnormalized pegging at all costs
fucking fabulous rap.
And with that she had that she wrote in like a heartbeat. And my favorite line of it is, uh, I got a strap. I got a fresh peg for your ass. I got a question to ask. Do you see with your booty in the air? Maybe when we're finished, we can do each other's hair.
Jen Prokop 45:36
Anyway, let's feel blessed everybody. It's great.
Sarah MacLean 45:38
You guys my favorite song. My favorite song.
Jen Prokop 45:42
It's amazing. It really is.
Sarah MacLean 45:44
What's important here is that we all get to the point where we've asked, and that's right. enthusiastic verbal vocal consent.
Jen Prokop 45:52
There you go.
Why don't you go next, Sarah?
Sierra Simone 45:57
Yes. Okay. I My book this time is learned my lesson by Katie Roberts. And this is part of her wicked villains series. Which, if you're not on Instagram obsessively following her staging her sex scenes with Barbie dolls, then you should be. But this series follows different Disney villains and sort of kind of alternate universe. They're all in the same city, kind of squaring off against each other. And learn my lesson is about Hades, Hercules and Meg. And it kind of starts out with so Hades owns a kink club. And in in owning this kink club, he's kind of got control over the entire city. His King club is the only neutral ground in this city. And he has information on everyone and Megan's really his His right hand person like she's his submissive, but she's also a switch in the club. And she manages the day to day running of the club like she is as much the mistress of it as he is the master. But at the beginning of the book, they kind of start out in this sort of marriage and trouble place. So they've been together for you know, long time, like 10 years. And something shifted in Hades, right? And like Megan's really feeling like something's changed between them. And so the book opens there at a restaurant and it's supposed to be kind of like a nice dinner date, but it's not going that well. And then this waiter walks in, and he's just like six foot five of like, golden puppy muscle boy. And Hades is like, I want you to seduce him. And you find out later that like Hades has sort of like revenge reasons for wanting this thing to happen. But what happens between Meg and Hercules ends up being Super genuine. And then Hades and Hercules end up having this really genuine connection. And Hayes is definitely like the slither in hero who's anti hero who's kind of bent on revenge who's like, I love zero things. And then by the end of the book, he's like, Damn, and I love two things I'm
Unknown Speaker 48:16
supposed to.
Jen Prokop 48:23
Perfect. So great.
Sierra Simone 48:26
There's a really beautiful pegging scene that were made pigs Hercules while he is, is getting oral sex to Hades.
And what I love
about it is it's everything that I want out of the pegging scene, right, like there's sort of this flip of gender and who's the passive partner and all this stuff. But I also really love I don't want to say how casual It is like, because there is consent involved and there is like, planning and emotional preparation, but it's just a given the Hercules' would be open to this kind of thing. And so it really, it almost makes the default as it should be, which is that there's no stigma attached. You know, in this world that Katie is created, there is no stigma to what we want and what we need to do for ourselves in bed. And so it happens and it's this really like, coalescing scene between the three of them, like it's really the scene where you begin to see like what they could be as a threesome. And not just as an antihero, a puppet and his, you know, like, jaded submissive. And I love the whole book, and I love all the books in the series and she has more books in the series coming out. I think the next one is going to be hook and Tinkerbell. So if you're into that kind of thing, I think that's coming in late, like late winter, like early 2020.
Unknown Speaker 49:56
There you go. Keeping
Unknown Speaker 49:59
Yeah. Um,
Jen Prokop 50:00
that's really interesting because I think that it sounds like we have all found like really different like pegging examples I am going to talk about, and I'm going to preface this by saying it was written right after the election in 2016. And it has a plot that I think, like the most ridiculous part of the plot. The hardest thing to believe is not the pegging on the first date. That is easy to believe it's that this is a love story between a democrat and a Republican. Which I know and I hate myself for recommending it but I feel like I love it so much but I feel like four years ago even it kind of felt like this was a plot that could happen. He really he at the end the republican completely gives it up he like he
quits the party he understand is wrong, but Still, like I don't even know he
Sarah MacLean 51:02
legit pegs the patriarchy is what you're saying.
Jen Prokop 51:07
Yeah, it's
called life, liberty and worship by Tamsin Parker. And it was in the first rogue anthology. So it's called broke desire. And I'm going to guess that if Tamsin was writing this right now, she would write it about like, a Democrat and then like, I thought about voting for Bernie for five minutes. But didn't actually do it like, right anyway.
I voted for George, local. You know, like, when I was eight, in my local school board election, there was only one republican running. So I had
three or four years like a lot of changes what I'm trying to tell you anyway, so here's it's a great, it's a great book if we can just like read Gone away. That one part of it. So, Paige is goes every like, you know, however often to like a spinning class and the guy in front of her, she like thinks he's really cute but she notices that he wears these sort of like political t shirts and she just and then he like gets all sweaty and takes them off and she's like, Oh, I hate this guy. And but he of course it turns out is just like one of those like, sad boys who doesn't want to talk to anybody. And so he finally like sort of, you know, get up the gumption to like ask her out. But unfortunately for him he does it after she sort of overhears like another guy like being real Brody and saying something stupid and and she is just like, fine. I'll go out with you like, come to my come to like this address at 10 o'clock. And in the meantime, she actually is sort of figured out That he writes policy papers for you know, like some sort of competing, whatever wonky thing and she like does respect the way he thinks like even though she doesn't quite agree with his politics because at one time and the school board election he voted Republican. She She liked it so he like shows up and she's basically like, he's like, What's your name? And she's like, you can find out after I have my way with you and basically like, brandishes this her harness, I mean, like, and he it's really amazing. She basically thinks she's gonna like, scare him away. And it's like, the greatest line in this book is he's like,
I've never done this book.
She's, you know, she's like, and she's like, what, fuck the Democrat.
But the thing is, is that she is she takes the response. ability of like penetrating him, like of pegging him really seriously, right. So even though she's, like, furious at him, and really does almost view this as like an act of revenge in some ways for what she thinks he stands for, she is still so careful with him. And she is and he and she's really surprised that he goes for it. She's like, wait, I thought you'd essentially like run, you know, run away. And they, she, like fucks up and basically kicks him out the door. You know, it ends up being like a really like for his show. You know, sometimes I'm just really amazed at what a great author can do with a short amount of time, right. And so, in this case, one of the things I think we really get is, you know, we talked about like, trust a lot right so far and like the other books that you guys have talked about, but pegging is also about power. And I think that's something that page really knows but it Not a power that she takes lightly and she doesn't like cross her like emotional feelings of anger disappointed with him and his kind of what she thinks he stands for, with like the, the very careful like power kind of and responsibility she she has with him in the bedroom. So I think it's like a really interesting one because because there isn't that emotional, or like trust there. It really is like sort of more of a of an act where she's like, I, this is what I want to do. And he's like, yeah, I kind of want you to do it too. But I think it's really hot. I think it's real sexy. And I think it's ultimately she is able after the physical act of begging him to sort of emotionally when they sort of eventually do kind of come clean. Like really say to him like I could never be with someone who believes the things that you believe and he has really has to face like, okay, the republican party I grew up in when I voted in the school board election. No like, right?
It's not
like what I stand for either, right? I mean, he's pro choice and he and he really has to sort of face like, Oh, I this this has changed and and you're right. And so he basically agrees to do the right thing and come over to the side of rightness and goodness and pegging.
Sierra Simone 56:30
We have pegging nice, you know, I really love but that's
I really love that this is your choice because I feel like it more maybe more than Sarah and I as pics represents, like where pegging can go in romance, like outside of like latex and safe words and you know, like, really intentional power structures that are built ahead of time. Like I think that it can represent like that picking can end up being kind of like how anal play is now where it used to be really restricted where you would find anything about the butt. And now, I mean, I sometimes I'm even kind of surprised when it doesn't come up in some contemporary romances as at least like a thing that someone's thinking about. Right? And so I hope that I mean, I really hope that like this is kind of a good bellwether of like, where we can go with it. We can use it as a metaphor as shorthand, but we can also use it as like, spontaneous you know, first aid sex. Yeah.
Love that. I'd be a hell of a first date.
Unknown Speaker 57:39
very memorable.
Sarah MacLean 57:46
That would be a fun thing to try on Tinder. Like just
Unknown Speaker 57:49
we like
Sarah MacLean 57:51
surely swipe right if I will, if I can pay you on the first day.
Jen Prokop 57:57
Yeah, I mean, it would sell you lucked out. Hello. Man, you would lose a lot of Yeah, stinkers.
Sierra Simone 58:04
A lot of stinkers. I mean
Jen Prokop 58:09
you said stinkers.
Sierra Simone 58:13
We need to do you know how we did like the last limb count for ID it's like, we need to have the unintentional pun. count for Sarah.
Unknown Speaker 58:31
Sarah,
Sierra Simone 58:33
yeah, don't don't make a sale.
Jen Prokop 58:38
As we like wrap up, I would like to tell you one of the greatest Twitter accounts ever to be created is at is there pegging? And if a book has pegging in it, they will retweet it.
Sarah MacLean 58:52
So girls,
Sierra Simone 58:52
yeah.
Jen Prokop 58:56
I don't know.
But based on the followers, I know it seems highly likely that someone we know
Sarah MacLean 59:07
guys
doing the Lord's work out here.
Jen Prokop 59:12
That's right now I have got to say it was my job to like list the names of the Peggy and Caldwell and I forgot to get it. I you know, it's like notes I had when we first recorded a month ago. So I think we'll have to put it in show notes, but I do know that like, the person I communicated with, is he is reading and she is famous actually in the past month for freaking out everyone on the fucking internet by getting Colin Firth trending. Remember that? She posted? Like, like, you know, which what's your age? And which, which Darcy Do you like, and all of a sudden, like 50,000 people or something answered her tweet, and everybody else was like, why is Colin Firth trending because they thought he was dead. And I was like, you need to like use your powers for good and not evil. So,
Unknown Speaker 1:00:07
here we are. And here Here we are, here we are.
Jen Prokop 1:00:15
Any last thoughts on
pegging? Before we wrap up this very special episode?
Sarah MacLean 1:00:20
You know what, I'm just going to say that I, I'm always so fucking delighted when Sierra joins us, even though it feels it feels only been once before. It feels like it's been a lot, but it's just been once before. So if you have not, if you skip the first season, or you skip reading ID, I highly, highly recommend you listening to the mcgroove episode of this podcast is not just I mean, you'll learn the plot of margrave which is banana.
But also, there's a lot of
really thoughtful conversation about erotic romance. And there were Sierra I think both of our minds a little bit.
Jen Prokop 1:01:02
Oh my god. Yes. Well, and before Sierra goes to wait, I know I'm not sure if you're going to say this, but I'm pretty sure that she has written a book with pegging. And I was hoping he would end up by
like, talking about your book or giving you a chance to talk about your book too. I mean, hell I'm
Sierra Simone 1:01:20
I'm just such a I'm like such a retiring like shrinking violet.
Jen Prokop 1:01:26
Special guest who has written about this in her books, and somehow she is not doing the right thing by telling us about it. So that's where we're going to like, make sure we go before Well,
Sierra Simone 1:01:35
I didn't want to horn in or maybe I do, maybe morning.
Jen Prokop 1:01:42
I was like, Oh, yeah, he does spam.
Sierra Simone 1:01:51
Yes. So if you are interested in reading any of my books, or reading about pegging or reading and pegging Sienna I have novella called the moon, and it is a very kind of broody, sexy contemporary retelling of Merlin and then way and I know Jen is probably making a face right now. So, I love Even I promise even of Merlin. I love you too. Even if Merlin's not your thing, that's totally okay. Um, but it is. It's a really sort of, I really kind of wanted to explore sort of like, what a spiritual kind of feeling that pegging could generate. So, I use the the pegging scene between the two of them as sort of this final act of like, complete elemental joining, I guess between them. And I think that it's a lot of fun. But if, like, you know, magic and pegging aren't your thing I totally understand. But yes, that is called the
Sarah MacLean 1:02:59
moon. And it's a In the world of the new Camelot series
Sierra Simone 1:03:02
Yes, so I wrote a series called New Camelot. It's a trilogy and it is a contemporary retelling of Are there going to be are and Lancelot. But everyone's in love with each other, and they all have lots of like very angsty sighs amazing. And the moon takes place after the trilogy, but you don't need to read the trilogy. To understand what happens in the moon. It can it can stand on its own.
Sarah MacLean 1:03:27
Got it. And then I just want to say and you know, you can plug your ears if you want here. But if you are new to the podcast this week, and you are a car fan, we did a deep dive read of priest, we will link to that in show notes as well. Don't miss it. We love it. It is one of the transformational texts of the genre. According to me, Oh, stop.
Sierra Simone 1:03:53
So I'm plugging my ears. Now. I'm plugging, I'm plugging.
Unknown Speaker 1:03:58
There's another one.
Jen Prokop 1:04:00
Got it, man.
They got us we got to squeeze them all in before they got
Sarah MacLean 1:04:09
as much as possible.
Unknown Speaker 1:04:12
So there it is. All right. Yeah, picking that was great. That's
Unknown Speaker 1:04:17
what she said,
Sarah MacLean 1:04:19
Where can people find you online after they've decided they love
Sierra Simone 1:04:23
you?
Jen Prokop 1:04:25
And they want to read everything you've ever written?
Sierra Simone 1:04:27
Yes, you can find me on Instagram as the car Simone or on
facebook.com slash the car Simone. And then also I have a Facebook group,
which is pretty awesome. And there's a lot of people who like kind of the dirty books in there. So if that describes us, and that might be a group of people that you would like to talk about 30 books with. And I have a Twitter but I don't go on to twitter.com so don't tweet me because I
Unknown Speaker 1:04:58
guess it's just good.
Sarah MacLean 1:05:01
Yeah, it's just good. Thank you. As always we are already as I mentioned earlier in the podcast we already have a plan for Sears third Oh yeah.
Unknown Speaker 1:05:13
Third time's a charm. Oh god.
Sarah MacLean 1:05:19
Jen what else we have
Unknown Speaker 1:05:20
to say? Please remember to
Sarah MacLean 1:05:22
like and subscribe if you're new to the podcast and you really enjoyed this this is what it's like every week. I mean not always with Sarah but with
you can subscribe and like and leave a review if you feel so inclined.
We you get buttons and other fun things
Jen Prokop 1:05:42
and there is a pegging the patriarchy button actually. And it comes it's like round and then there's like a little like side button. That's just a carrot.
Unknown Speaker 1:05:50
Yes. Yes. There's
Sierra Simone 1:05:52
like a little tiny button that goes with it. This a little carrot and sort of like the
Unknown Speaker 1:05:57
secret
Jen Prokop 1:06:00
Yeah, we could all wear it at like kiss
Sarah MacLean 1:06:02
cons in rW ways and really show and we would know.
Unknown Speaker 1:06:07
Yeah.
Sarah MacLean 1:06:09
So you can do that through Jen's website links and show notes. You can buy
some gear, romance gear t shirts, and other things from my partnership with Jordan Denae links and show notes more to come in the new year in February. So coming soon, a much bigger collection. Our producer is Eric Mortensen.
Jen Prokop 1:06:30
Don't forget to vote the right way and all of your upcoming elections whether they be for the local school board or for you know, the future of American democracy. Share
Unknown Speaker 1:06:41
that to
Jen Prokop 1:06:48
2020 all we gotta do is
Unknown Speaker 1:06:49
vote every election year guys we're
Sarah MacLean 1:06:51
in. Oh my god.
This year's gonna be 40,000 years long.
Jen Prokop 1:07:01
All right, everybody have a good one
Sarah MacLean 1:07:02
you all so much?
Sierra Simone 1:07:12
Real quick
Unknown Speaker 1:07:21
let me maybe
Unknown Speaker 1:07:33
stop being homophobic and benya
Unknown Speaker 1:07:38
No, you wouldn't love it.
Unknown Speaker 1:07:46
Let me show me
Elizabeth (Voicemail) 1:08:14
Hi, this is Elizabeth, aka is reading can remember the pegging crew. I wish I was sure which one was my first romance. It was so long ago. I think it was either seadrill by Penelope nary Dark of the Moon by Karen robarge. But beloved rogue by Penelope Williamson.
What I am sure is that it was hella problematic and would not hold up to now.
So, the more as to why we asked for this to be this episode to be tagging, I've talked a lot with the members of the peddling crew about why we're so interested in things enrollment. And I think is one of the goals of writing or and or reading romance is to dismantle the patriarchy, there is no clearer metaphor for that then tagging, as per the button taking the patriarchy. And this is sort of a way of undoing all that problematic. text that we read when we were younger, especially those of us who Kingdom romance in the 80s and 90s. Like Ilana, and Broad City says, things have been terrible for women up to and including today. And 2019 has definitely been for me the year of misogyny fatigue along with a lot of other fatigue. romance provides a safe space for fantasy and wish fulfillment. And I think that heading is something that a lot of women can relate to right now in
in not never avenge sense but in a way of taking back power.
I hope that makes sense. And that will and thank you for recording this episode for us and with you guys for doing this. Thank you
S02.16: Christmas Romance Novel Recommendations
Merry Merry Happy Happy Joy Joy…it’s Christmas and we can’t quit you, so we recorded a little stocking stuffer for you—fifteen minutes of Christmas novella recs, along with a far-too-long discussion of our favorite Christmas Songs.
If you want to give us a gift this year, please like/subscribe to/review the podcast in your favorite podcasting platform!
We’re back next week with the seasonally appropriate (at least in title) Born in Ice, by none other than the queen herself, Nora Roberts. Read Born in Ice at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Apple Books, Kobo or your local indie.
Show Notes
Sarah and Jen like a lot of Christmas songs: Silver Bells, Fairy Tale of New York, Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas (which in fact does have a sad and not-sad version!), God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen, Carol of the Belles, Rockin' Round the Christmas Tree, Santa Baby, and Baby It's Cold Outside (which just might be super feminist?).
This year, there's a new Chanukah romance anthology you should check out called Eight Kisses, and Roan Parrish just released a little snippet of a story about Ginger and Christopher from Small Change called A Good, Old Fashioned Chanukah Pegging.
Oh, you aren't familiar with the Carina Dirty Bits line? They are quick and dirty--not thiccand dirty. But whatever works. Also, check out Jen's list of which romances have the best sex in the library.
We have lots of favorite romance librarians, but we love Bandherbooks and our favorite archivist is Steve Ammindown at the BGSU Pop Culture Library in Ohio.
The Sierra Simone story with the bear is from Hot for the Holidays anthology, but she also has a story with Kennedy Ryan in a 2019 release called Christmas in the City.
Did someone say only one circulation desk? Just kidding. It's only one bed.
If you want show notes for last year's holiday episode, click here.
Our first episode of 2020 will be Born in Ice by Nora Roberts, a book that blooded Jen.