Gilmore To Read: Game, Set, Edward Schmit Has An Unexpected Gilmore Match

0:00 [SPEAKER_00]: 5, 6, 7, 8, Austin. [SPEAKER_00]: Hi y'all, welcome and welcome back to Gilmour To Read, I'm your host Haley and I am so glad you're here. [SPEAKER_00]: Especially because y'all are going to love the hot takes from today's guest USA today by selling author of his debut novel, Edward Schmidt.

0:23 [SPEAKER_00]: I got a message from a friend of ours a few days before we recorded to say that he had a hot take about Gilmour Girls. [SPEAKER_00]: Of course, and he told me what it was before we started recording, and I actually guess, and I wish that you'd waited to tell me when we were recording, so you guys could have heard my real reaction to it.

0:37 [SPEAKER_00]: But here him out, when he talks about it in the episode Besties, because beyond his Gilmore thoughts, Eddie was an absolute delight in a half to have on, and his novel, The Open Era, was one of my favorite reads that I've read this year. [SPEAKER_00]: which is so much of why it was included in reading a sexy as the book club pick for June.

0:54 [SPEAKER_00]: I only want to read books that I absolutely absolutely love and this totally falls into that, and it is about tennis where love means nothing, but my love means everything for this book. [SPEAKER_00]: The open era is about the first openly gay male tennis player to compete in a grand slam, and that is our darling anxious, Austin Hardy, who must battle his mental health, media tension, and a handsome new rival, Diego Cruz, who is quite handsome.

1:19 [SPEAKER_00]: This was one of those, cannot go to sleep until I know what happens sort of stories, with writing that feels so cinematic and perfect, and he talks more about in this episode how his writing came to feel like that. [SPEAKER_00]: But a bit about Edward, Edward Schmidt is a bestselling author based in New York City, from theater kid to graphic designer to creative director.

1:36 [SPEAKER_00]: He's always exploring new ways to tell stories, a passionate mental health advocate he's worked in the non-profit space for over seven years. [SPEAKER_00]: His debut novel, The Open Era, became an instant USA Today Best [SPEAKER_00]: Described as a beautiful romance full of longing by the Los Angeles Times and a glittering triumph by Teen Vogue, the open era combines three things close to his heart.

1:55 [SPEAKER_00]: Queer love stories, mental health awareness, and the most beautiful sport in the world, tennis. [SPEAKER_00]: Now, I might not know much about tennis, but Eddie was very forgiving of that because I absolutely loved the back and forth of this book. [SPEAKER_00]: I also love the back and forth in this episode because Eddie is just so much fun to talk to, especially as he shared more about what kind of high school student he was, how he switched from screenwriting to novel writing, why he decided to write a romance at the U.S. Open.

2:20 [SPEAKER_00]: And the hot take that you'll have probably already guessed at least with the title of this episode, but hear him out, hear him out because I kind of saw his point my besties, and let me know if you do too. [SPEAKER_00]: But without further ado, here is Edward Schmidt. [SPEAKER_00]: So, Eddie, you said on Instagram that this was a strong contender for your best June ever.

2:40 [SPEAKER_00]: Can you walk us through why this was such a great June for you? [SPEAKER_01]: First of all, hi, Haley, and thanks for having me on. [SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, this is my debut novel, and I came out in June second, and that kicked off June for me, and it kicked off Pride Month. [SPEAKER_01]: And then a bunch of friends and family were at the launch, and also new friends and strangers and new readers were there.

3:04 [SPEAKER_01]: We launched it, Stranded Bookstore, and New York City, which is one of my favorite bookstores ever on an existence. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it was an amazing, it's been an amazing month, and I did a teeny tiny little tour for the open arrows in Boston and Charlotte in a few events in New York too, so it's just been very, very booky and epic gate tennis.

3:29 [SPEAKER_00]: Perfect, and just full of love, which didn't mean nothing this month. [SPEAKER_01]: Exactly, it meant everything. [SPEAKER_00]: At the time of recording this, it's been almost a month since your debut novel came out. [SPEAKER_00]: You are fully a published author. [SPEAKER_00]: How does that feel to like you who probably dreamed of this for a while?

3:44 [SPEAKER_01]: It feels surreal and some, yeah, it doesn't feel real a lot of the time, but it's really amazing that now like people who I don't know are reading the book and not just like my friends and I'm getting to hear they're sliding into my DMs and saying very nice things and there's a lot of themes I think people can relate to in open era like there's a big mental health theme and like it's people are sharing [SPEAKER_01]: pieces of their elemental health journey, which is just really nice to hear.

4:13 [SPEAKER_01]: So it's amazing to for it to be out there and it's not mine anymore. [SPEAKER_01]: It's everybody else's. [SPEAKER_00]: Well, I'm honestly so glad that it is because this was one of those books that like I was like this can't be his debut as I was reading it was like this is so good and the moment that I started reading it, I knew that I wanted to include it for the book club because it was so good and like even on like a sentence level and a craft structure there was just this one point where Austin was literally just crossing the street and the way that he's in our monologue was like overlapping with his actions.

4:42 [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, oh my god, fuck I'd were just meant this is amazing like what is happening here? [SPEAKER_00]: Fuck this guy, this is so good. [SPEAKER_00]: I now have to stay up all night and read this book because of the pacing, the structure of it. [SPEAKER_00]: It felt very cinematic, but also like you said, the mental health representation really is like an internal monologue that takes place, but like it was like such a palpable feeling that existed in this book that like, I genuinely couldn't put it down.

5:06 [SPEAKER_00]: Like I think it took me probably like a week to read, like the first two chapters just to like get into it and like figuring out like, if I want to trade this for the book club, but I read the book. [SPEAKER_00]: You're like two days. [SPEAKER_00]: Do I like tennis? [SPEAKER_00]: Do I want to feel anxious right now?

5:18 [SPEAKER_00]: Because I do you want references. [SPEAKER_01]: I was told there would be No, actually, I was not told about the gumaractics at all and that was uh, did you just drop the book when you got there? [SPEAKER_00]: Well, I was, I was beside myself, actually. [SPEAKER_01]: Stop eating, but drop like to the ground, like just because you were shocked.

5:36 [SPEAKER_00]: I was laying in my bed, but I did set the boat out. [SPEAKER_00]: No, I just rolled fully out of the bed. [SPEAKER_00]: But I got sent this book. [SPEAKER_00]: They were like, if you wanted to consider this for the club, no one like primed me or prepped to me that like this was a really good fit.

5:49 [SPEAKER_00]: And so it was like great. [SPEAKER_01]: We could have given you more of a hard cell on this. [SPEAKER_00]: I know, like no one sold it to me that hard, but I would like in the sense of like, thematically to the podcast. [SPEAKER_00]: But I just loved the writing so much. [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, I have to have him on the podcast.

6:01 [SPEAKER_00]: I have to have this for a book club pick. [SPEAKER_00]: And then when I got to the, I was reading it on my Kindle. [SPEAKER_00]: And you started talking about comfort shows. [SPEAKER_00]: And Diego said his was finise and firm. [SPEAKER_00]: And I said, this mother fucker's comfort show is going to be Gilmour Girls.

6:14 [SPEAKER_00]: And I like, I was like, I put my Kindle down. [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, I don't even have to turn the page. [SPEAKER_00]: And I clicked the page and it was like Gilmour Girls [SPEAKER_01]: How did you know that it was gonna be that? [SPEAKER_01]: There's lots of comfort shows. [SPEAKER_01]: Obviously, Gilmar is the best comfort show.

6:25 [SPEAKER_00]: But I think that like, I just like something in me, new, because like as an anxious person, as an Austin myself, like that is what Gilmar Gross has been for me for so long. [SPEAKER_00]: And honestly, I don't know a lot of other comfort shows as someone who's comfort show is Gilmar Girls.

6:42 [SPEAKER_00]: So I was like, it has to be. [SPEAKER_00]: And then it was, I don't know. [SPEAKER_00]: If it would have been anything else, I would have, I'd have been disappointed. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, just stop reading. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like four years and you're like, yeah, I'm done. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm done.

6:53 [SPEAKER_00]: Never mind. [SPEAKER_00]: You're probably supposed to, I'm actually changing my mind. [SPEAKER_01]: Is it too late to change this part? [SPEAKER_00]: But we look at to the government of it all in a minute because I do want to do the part of this that most authors do not like, but our audience really enjoys.

7:05 [SPEAKER_00]: And that is talk about you. [SPEAKER_00]: So Gilmore Girls came out in October 2000. [SPEAKER_00]: It's turning 26 this year. [SPEAKER_00]: What were you writing in the year 2000? [SPEAKER_01]: Well, the hell was I writing back then? [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe I wasn't writing very much back then.

7:18 [SPEAKER_01]: I really started writing around high school. [SPEAKER_01]: And I remember when my first memories of actually writing something was we had an assignment in my theater class to write a episode of a show that we liked. [SPEAKER_01]: And I wrote a episode of Friends with a friend. [SPEAKER_01]: And I don't remember a whole lot about it, but the premise was Phoebe trades her acoustic guitar for an electric guitar and plays a child's birthday with the hardcore electric guitar and it doesn't go well.

7:51 [SPEAKER_01]: And my theater teacher was like, I really like this. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm gonna send it to NBC. [SPEAKER_01]: It's like, go for it. [SPEAKER_01]: We did not hear back. [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, I think there's good on writers there. [SPEAKER_01]: They're good on writers, I think they're like, [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and that's that's and I wrote little skits theater plays with my friends in high school and then that continued into college and I wrote short films and like feature length screen plays so I've been writing a lot of my life, but [SPEAKER_01]: To be perfectly honest, I never thought that I would actually write a full-on novel because that seemed like a mountain that I would not be able to climb.

8:34 [SPEAKER_01]: But when I had the idea for open era because of the mental health and the interiority, a book provides around that that seemed like the right avenue to take it down. [SPEAKER_00]: What was the switch from like going from screenplay short films to novel writing? [SPEAKER_00]: Was it really just like wanting to get into that inner monologue?

8:54 [SPEAKER_00]: I guess it's also the entry point is also really a lot easier. [SPEAKER_01]: Well and it's like with if you're writing a screenplay you have to get so many guesses in order to get it made and you do have to get a lot of guesses for books too but like once you get the yes it can go out into the world.

9:09 [SPEAKER_01]: So that's, you know, a cool part about it, and there's a learning curve between like writing screenplays and books, obviously, and I knew that like there was something that I had not done before, and I was terrified of getting it wrong. [SPEAKER_01]: So I signed up for an online course that was like for writers trying to finish their books.

9:26 [SPEAKER_01]: And I was paired up with [SPEAKER_01]: Some really talented writers were kind of reading behind me and giving me notes and also a very talented author who was the teacher of the course and she was like reading behind me too and getting me notes. [SPEAKER_01]: So that was extremely helpful and I think like the major difference between screenplays and books is that interior already like you literally you write the in the monologue of what's going on and someone's head that you don't have room for in the page for a screenplay and I think some screen writers try to do that and they're told to like no take that shit out.

9:57 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: So I had to learn how to put that shit in and like find the appropriate amount of it. [SPEAKER_01]: Again, thank you for the earlier comment about like how it felt cinematic because I think that having the background and writing screen plays, I was able to sort of help myself there.

10:14 [SPEAKER_01]: And to me, it does deeply feel cinematic and then I thought about it that way in crafting the story. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, knowing that you have that history of writing screen plays, thinking of the opening of this book, like it feels like the opening of a movie, like the way that like you can kind of just like hear the crowd and like see how like bright the lights would be as you go into the match that they're about to play.

10:38 [SPEAKER_00]: Match is right. [SPEAKER_00]: That's right. [SPEAKER_00]: That's right. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay. [SPEAKER_00]: Great. [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you so much. [SPEAKER_00]: I feel like his therapist sometimes [SPEAKER_01]: It's a complicated sport, it's like really, it's kind of scoring is complicated and like I knew going in that like most people reading this are not going to know much about tennis and like I try to hold your hand through it and keep it simple.

10:59 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and I like that there's a character who just like doesn't she doesn't get it she tries and I'm like that that's me that's I can I didn't I'm represented here yes I feel soon by the therapist yes, but I love that so much because it really does lend while like thinking about the pacing of your book and like especially towards the end I just feel like it just lends so well to like the [SPEAKER_00]: the craft to like have that history and like the dialogue really speaks to that because I was like why is this not a show?

11:27 [SPEAKER_00]: I know this book has not even come out yet, but why can't I watch this on my TV yet? [SPEAKER_00]: Because I think it would just adapt. [SPEAKER_00]: It's so well. [SPEAKER_00]: So fingers crossed for that. [SPEAKER_00]: It's so fine too. [SPEAKER_00]: So speaking to writing, the Gilmour is somehow live an entire day before they go to work or school.

11:43 [SPEAKER_00]: Everything they do seems like to take five hours, but like if they make it seem like it's like no [SPEAKER_00]: What does an average writing day look like for you? [SPEAKER_01]: 5.45 a.m. my alarm goes off deep gasp. [SPEAKER_01]: I snooze till 6 and then I pull myself out of bed and writing open era in a lot of my second book.

12:08 [SPEAKER_01]: I would go to a coffee shop in the morning and it opened at 6 a.m. and I'd spend like 90 minutes there just either editing or trying to get words on the page. [SPEAKER_01]: And then I start my nine to five, well, I'm from the hours of nine to five. [SPEAKER_01]: And as they are. [SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, so it's like basically, it's, that was a dramatic way of saying, I write in the mornings.

12:28 [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, I like it. [SPEAKER_01]: About 90 minutes in each day, and that's basically it. [SPEAKER_01]: Um, and I know there are probably a lot of faster writers out there than me, but like I I give it about 90 minutes to two hours every day. [SPEAKER_01]: And every day, I try to do it too. [SPEAKER_01]: And I know you're supposed to kind of like maybe take a break.

12:45 [SPEAKER_01]: But I really love waking up and having with that quiet time, where I can escape to my own world for a bit. [SPEAKER_01]: And that's how I start my day. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh my gosh, I love that commitment because I feel like you're nine to five can obviously drain you. [SPEAKER_00]: And so trying to do it in the evening, I imagine.

12:59 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, it wouldn't. [SPEAKER_01]: It would not work. [SPEAKER_01]: The evenings are for dinner with friends and dinner with friends are going to bed. [SPEAKER_00]: For me, of course. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, or all of those things in bed, dinner with friends in my [SPEAKER_00]: Just like honestly, it's the waking up early that gets me.

13:17 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not a morning person. [SPEAKER_00]: So like any time that I hear that someone has like a 5 a.m. 6 a.m. writing regime I'm like God bless you. [SPEAKER_01]: But I completely get that that was me until this is how I had to get shit done. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and then like it's I have adapted to it and I don't know how else I would do it [SPEAKER_00]: So going back a little bit and going back a little bit, I do mean in time.

13:39 [SPEAKER_00]: A lot of what we see from Murray in the early days is her and high school. [SPEAKER_00]: What was Edward like in high school? [SPEAKER_01]: I was at theater kid. [SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, I became a theater kid looking middle school. [SPEAKER_01]: My first musical play was Fiddler on the roof.

13:55 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh my gosh, they do in Gilmore girls. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, they do. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, isn't Kirk is Teviya. [SPEAKER_01]: Teviya. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, because the role was too big for one of the elementary schoolers Oh, yeah, and the kids are everybody else. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, amazing.

14:11 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so that was me basically, but I wasn't Teviya. [SPEAKER_01]: I was I don't even remember the name Fiedka and then I did Oliver and then I continued being a theater kid through high school and also into college. [SPEAKER_01]: I was an acting major [SPEAKER_00]: and really cool. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so I don't know, I don't know that I would be described as a very cool person in high school because of the theaterness of it all and I did go to one of the most celebrated football schools in the region.

14:40 [SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes like people say like even in the country it was very Fred and I lights. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh wow. [SPEAKER_01]: And we would all we would win all the time and I would only know that because I'd find out later not because I went to the games and get out there. [UNKNOWN]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, that's right.

14:55 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh my gosh, I love that. [SPEAKER_00]: That feels so aligned with the podcast though because like Terran, I we both used to work on Broadway. [SPEAKER_00]: So like we are we are theater girls to our core. [SPEAKER_00]: So we find that very cool. [SPEAKER_00]: So maybe we're cool at the time.

15:06 [SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, it was just earning it for later. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, this pod this moment. [SPEAKER_00]: We have deemed you cool. [SPEAKER_01]: There was a primitive in high school that was most likely to be famous, that I won, but it was between me and this guy named Hakim Nix, who I don't remember what team he played on, but he went on to win a Super Bowl.

15:31 [SPEAKER_01]: So I think that they got that's a primitive deeply wrong, but that was sort of like that. [SPEAKER_01]: I think that's a good illustration of like of like what my high school life was like it was like theater kid versus football kid. [SPEAKER_00]: I love that. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay. [SPEAKER_00]: Next novel.

15:47 [SPEAKER_00]: We, it's not wrong. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, maybe they want a super bowl, but are they a USA today by selling author? [SPEAKER_00]: I don't think so. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, audience at home, you decide which ones um, cooler. [SPEAKER_00]: talent aside like if you were you were quite talented person you were on the rise I have no doubt because that's kind of like my mission at this point is to get everyone to read this book because like it's so good like you're so talented and so I have no doubt that you will reach Super Bowl levels of fame and writing what's the Super Bowl of writing?

16:15 [SPEAKER_00]: This is not one. [SPEAKER_01]: This is probably in New York Times. [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe New York Times. [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe not being tagged in bad reviews. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I'm sure I can't, I'm sure I'll never avoid that. [SPEAKER_01]: Um, I think the more things you get the more you get tagged in better views.

16:30 [SPEAKER_01]: People are super kind to me right now. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, no, so maybe that's it. [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe that's it. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: We need to get our reviews sent directly to you. [SPEAKER_00]: And then you'll know you made it. [SPEAKER_00]: Great. [SPEAKER_01]: We've set some really good goals here.

16:41 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: The boundaries here are really good. [SPEAKER_00]: We've set for fame. [SPEAKER_00]: That's I love that though. [SPEAKER_00]: I love the I love a theater kit. [SPEAKER_00]: There's nothing. [SPEAKER_00]: I love more than someone who gets my five six seven eight beginnings here Speaking of teenage you what was comfort media for you at the time?

16:56 [SPEAKER_01]: the open era is a gay book and I am a gay man, but I wasn't that gay in a high school, I guess, despite me just telling a bunch of theater stories. [SPEAKER_01]: So I was watching like relatively like straightish media. [SPEAKER_01]: Um, like I was a big fan of 24 that show starring Keeper and Sutherland, which I can't really imagine a straighter show than that.

17:17 [SPEAKER_00]: Keith herself a win. [SPEAKER_00]: He comes up in the revival of Go More Girls for some reason. [SPEAKER_00]: He's invited to their wedding. [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know, Sam. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, he doesn't show up. [SPEAKER_01]: We didn't get that. [SPEAKER_01]: No, oh, we loved. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I was a big key for fan and just watching him do his counterterrorism things.

17:33 [SPEAKER_00]: That was like, I, but I, I don't know, like, that, that show. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like comforting. [UNKNOWN]: I had. [SPEAKER_01]: No, it was addictive though, because there's like one of the first very, very bingeable shows because it gets ends on a cliffhanger every single episode and then even seasons and in cliffhangers.

17:52 [SPEAKER_01]: So I don't know, I'm sure a piece of that storytelling is like baked into me somehow. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: We'll all end some chapters in a cliffhanger. [SPEAKER_01]: So I was watching 24. [SPEAKER_01]: I was a big arrested development fan. [SPEAKER_01]: There was a point and I don't know if this is middle school or high school, but what was airing directly before Gilmour Girls when it was on?

18:12 [SPEAKER_01]: And was it 7th Heaven? [SPEAKER_00]: I think that 7th Heaven came on after on ABC Family. [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, is that right? [SPEAKER_01]: I didn't have cable growing up, so I was watching that was like CW that I would have been watching WB but it came on V. So I don't know if something came on at seven because I would have a memory of Me watching a show and then Gilmore girls coming on and being like, oh, this is not for me and I have deep regrets there because later in life it became very much for me and I did not see the brilliance of it [SPEAKER_00]: They find you at the right time, though.

18:47 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it did, it really did. [SPEAKER_00]: But speaking to Rory and her high school days and your high school days, I want to know more about you and your book history. [SPEAKER_00]: And if you can kind of define your teens, 20s and 30s with a book that you feel like represents that age for you, given that we saw Rory in each of those decades of her life, our book or Rory.

19:10 [SPEAKER_01]: I'll let me go back even further than that because both of my grandparents and my mom's side were librarians and so come from a big, big book family and my grandfather, they both have their masters in library science and my grandfather went on to become the director of all libraries in Miami.

19:30 [SPEAKER_01]: for decades, he built the main library and many other branches in Miami, like he passed away a while ago now, but it's like a sick joke of life that like both him and my grandmother were not able to see this whole entire publishing process. [SPEAKER_01]: He had no idea I was going to go on the right of book, but now I think that it could be sitting in multiple of the libraries that he builds.

19:55 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh my gosh, I love that. [SPEAKER_01]: It's not so nice, like you've seen it. [SPEAKER_01]: But it's a beautiful legacy. [SPEAKER_01]: I dedicated the book to my grandparents. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so that's how books literature reading has been built into my family for a very long time. [SPEAKER_01]: My mom is a huge reader and was very adamant to make sure that her kids were reading all the time.

20:14 [SPEAKER_01]: and that often budd it up against what I wanted to be doing, which was watching 24th of or like being outside like playing and playing and like the woods and like I didn't really care about reading around like middle and maybe even high school. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't think that I wasn't Roy sitting in the cafeteria reading a book and like I'm almost deeply pissed about that.

20:36 [SPEAKER_01]: But like in middle or elementary school, I remember in third grade, I had a wonderful language arts teacher who really like tricked out her classroom to make it a warm cozy place for reading. [SPEAKER_01]: And I remember falling in love with a lot of books there. [SPEAKER_01]: My favorite, I think, was Shiloh, which is a book about a boy in his dog, a beagle.

20:58 [SPEAKER_01]: And like the villainous guy who lives down the street. [SPEAKER_01]: the first time I ever actually met an author and real life and like realize like oh there's like a person behind these books was when I met her at a book festival in Charlotte. [SPEAKER_01]: But it's later in life that I've kind of fallen back in love with reading and I remember reading Simon versus the Homeless Sapiens agenda which turned into love Simon the movie and I read that obviously later in life but that was like one of the books that I think like I wish that I had [SPEAKER_00]: What a good one.

21:33 [SPEAKER_00]: What a good pick. [SPEAKER_00]: Love Simon. [SPEAKER_00]: That's like a really good adaptation to I feel like. [SPEAKER_01]: It's good. [SPEAKER_01]: It's real good. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: So I have a little, if this or that, but the way that I framed it is open to it or closed off in the theme of the open era, are you open to it or closed off to completely spiraling because the person you're sort of interested in doesn't DM you back.

21:55 [SPEAKER_01]: open to it. [SPEAKER_01]: Like, unfortunately, well, no, I'm open to it as in, like, I experience it. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm actually closed off with, but it happens to it. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, for sure. [SPEAKER_01]: So I have to say, open to it because it's just happening.

22:08 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'm too anxious to be closed off to that. [SPEAKER_00]: Open to it, close off dating the owner of the diner you go to every day. [SPEAKER_01]: If he's cute, open to it. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay. [SPEAKER_00]: And if he's not totally closed off, dating your professional rival. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know what my professional rival would look like nowadays, but I think that could be fun.

22:27 [SPEAKER_01]: And I think it could be fun too. [SPEAKER_00]: I think it could be fun too. [SPEAKER_00]: I think having like a publishing rival that actually ends up being like a rivals to lovers, that's honestly true. [SPEAKER_01]: That's cool, sure. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: I also would love to pretend to like, we're still rivals to everyone else, but not be, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,

23:01 [SPEAKER_00]: Open Twitter closed off, dancing for 24 hours straight with your mom while your crush watches with his current partner. [SPEAKER_01]: So closed? [SPEAKER_01]: No. [SPEAKER_01]: No. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't also don't want dance for 24 hours. [SPEAKER_01]: I would've never signed up for that dance at the one they did.

23:14 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's like I don't. [SPEAKER_01]: Is there, can I donate somewhere instead? [SPEAKER_01]: Like, I don't, I don't need to be dancing for 24 hours. [SPEAKER_00]: I know, you probably could. [SPEAKER_00]: You probably could just sign a nice little chat tailor just to you. [SPEAKER_00]: Sure, sure.

23:24 [SPEAKER_01]: Like, can I hang, help, help the Kang something to prepare for it and let the Roy's dance? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, you can be low at Mrs. Kim, where she's making all this eggless, I sound sandwiched. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, yes. [SPEAKER_00]: Open your closed off, giving up your phone and socials for a prolonged period of time.

23:39 [SPEAKER_01]: Uh, now it would be tough. [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, like, like a day, I could probably do it, but I can't do it for longer than that. [SPEAKER_01]: I should. [SPEAKER_01]: We all should. [SPEAKER_01]: I think I have to say close to it. [SPEAKER_01]: And Austin is close to it, too. [SPEAKER_01]: Doesn't mean he doesn't give it a shot.

23:52 [SPEAKER_00]: One of my favorite lines in the book is when Robbie says, this is not a shocking decision at all. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, when he, like, gives him the phone and he's like, really like, struggling to get it out. [SPEAKER_00]: This is not a shocking decision at all. [SPEAKER_01]: And also Robby is like, this is not going to work.

24:07 [SPEAKER_01]: So what does our safe work going to be? [SPEAKER_00]: Like, this is like, immediately is like, how can we get through this? [SPEAKER_00]: Cause this is not going to happen. [SPEAKER_01]: This is going to be a fight. [SPEAKER_00]: So my last one, open to it or close to off is getting a dose of reality from your ex after you drop out of college.

24:23 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I'm open to, I hope that all of my friends would give me an honest dose of reality. [SPEAKER_00]: But your ex specifically. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm friends with some access. [SPEAKER_01]: So there are some that I would prefer it from than others. [SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, I think I'll remain open to it.

24:40 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, great. [SPEAKER_01]: And like your exes have like the biggest insight on you. [SPEAKER_01]: I think I think like over some other friends too, so like maybe they know you best of all. [SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes, or sometimes they laugh for a good reason. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, yeah, again, like there is someone.

24:57 [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, some I'd prefer to hear from over others. [SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely. [SPEAKER_01]: Let's clip this and tag all of them. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, oh my gosh. [SPEAKER_00]: I love drawing. [SPEAKER_01]: I keep saying all of them, like that's there's not a whole lot. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay, well, we can, we can tag them all.

25:10 [SPEAKER_00]: Just give me the names. [SPEAKER_00]: I'll tag them. [SPEAKER_00]: We can come lab with a cloud. [SPEAKER_01]: The keep ahead and find it's a cloud. [SPEAKER_00]: Which to be fair, this was quite nice. [SPEAKER_00]: You did one third by us. [SPEAKER_01]: That's true. [SPEAKER_01]: It's a good thing.

25:20 [SPEAKER_01]: It's a good thing. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: My gosh. [SPEAKER_00]: What a perfect social media clip we have just made. [SPEAKER_00]: But speaking of that, let's talk about Gilmour rolls. [SPEAKER_00]: In the open era, Austin's comfort show is Gilmour Rolls, which really did shock me.

25:35 [SPEAKER_00]: But at the same time, I deeply [SPEAKER_00]: So I want to know what your relationship with the show is, what your history is, how you started watching, and if it is your comfort show. [SPEAKER_01]: It certainly is my comfort show. [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I've seen it many times now in my memory is bad.

25:49 [SPEAKER_01]: So it might not appear that I know it as well as I do. [SPEAKER_01]: Um, because the trivia stuff I probably can't do. [SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, it became a comfort show. [SPEAKER_01]: There was like a resurgence of it. [SPEAKER_01]: Like it was a decade ago where people look at hitting Netflix and people are watching it.

26:03 [SPEAKER_01]: Um, and I was those people. [SPEAKER_01]: I like I fell in love with the characters. [SPEAKER_01]: I fell in love with the banter and [SPEAKER_01]: also just like the multiple seasons of world ready to be experienced and I like I quickly watched it all. [SPEAKER_01]: My parents fell in love with it too so I was telling everybody I knew to watch it and so yeah they would they would be there like evening like watch routine too and they say it's fun for all ages.

26:27 [SPEAKER_00]: You're like spreading the good word. [SPEAKER_01]: But yeah my sister loves it too a lot of my friends love it and yet but it was later in life that I discovered it I was not watching it while I was [SPEAKER_00]: So I do want to talk about the particular scene that you called out in the open era because he mentions to his love and trusty ego that can more girls is his favorite show, but later on he's watching it and he's watching the why did you drop out of jail scene?

26:51 [SPEAKER_01]: Why did you drop out of jail? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that's exactly how I heard it in. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, I even could have put it in like the the emphasized words and yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: How do you feel about that? [SPEAKER_00]: How do you feel about that scene? [SPEAKER_00]: How do you feel about just in that moment?

27:05 [SPEAKER_01]: It was, it seemed relevant to the open era when I was writing it because Austin literally drops out of college to be a protagonist player and he hasn't looked back, but there are times when his coach was like, was this a good idea or not? [SPEAKER_01]: Like, are you actually ready for this?

27:21 [SPEAKER_01]: So that there's similarities, thematically there, which is why I chose that particular scene and it's also like obviously a very famous scene. [SPEAKER_01]: Like we all remember the denim jacket and the [SPEAKER_00]: How do you feel about that situation? [SPEAKER_00]: Just, just, just, just, just, could be just, but of just returning in that way to kind of be the person who gives fory that dose of reality.

27:44 [SPEAKER_01]: Well, and he's a, I think he's a really good person to, to do that for her. [SPEAKER_01]: And like, Lorelei was like trying to do that, but also they were not speaking and like, just his super smart and can see Rory in a very special way. [SPEAKER_01]: And I know that's what you're kind of what you're asking with like the getting advice from your act situation, which is always like it could be difficult to hear, but like I guess my point that I responded with was like, he knows her almost best of all.

28:10 [SPEAKER_01]: And he was right. [SPEAKER_01]: Do you need to scream it outside of where are they? [SPEAKER_01]: I restaurant or something. [SPEAKER_00]: They're a bar, yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, bar. [SPEAKER_01]: But like the other thing too is that and we'll talk about why you're mad at me, but like these are like, I'm mad at you, I'm not mad at you.

28:27 [SPEAKER_01]: I just thought these are young people like they're in their early 20s and like sometimes earlier and like they're not going to make the best decisions or like treat each other in the best way and like also that's plot and that's conflict. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure there are more elegant ways that just could have said those things but I think Rory needed to hear it.

28:47 [SPEAKER_00]: She needed to hear it loudly. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I agree. [SPEAKER_00]: I love the messy bits. [SPEAKER_00]: The drama on Gilmour Girls is some of my favorites. [SPEAKER_00]: Like when they're yelling at each other in the streets, like I just, those are my favorite when they're yelling at Friday night dinner.

28:58 [SPEAKER_00]: Honestly when anyone's yelling, I, like, yeah, we love to yell. [SPEAKER_00]: We love yell. [SPEAKER_00]: Love a messy moment. [SPEAKER_00]: But speaking of a messy moment. [SPEAKER_00]: So I got a message from a mutual friend of ours backsporesm saying that she wanted to come on and live to beat you on the podcast and so I was like she was like you'll find out when you talk to Eddie and I was like I'm deeply confused like I don't know what what could it possibly be and then you shared with me what it was before we started [SPEAKER_00]: And I would like everyone to keep an open mind.

29:29 [SPEAKER_00]: Please send no open to it open to it. [SPEAKER_00]: This is the open era. [SPEAKER_00]: If you will, I'm this you need to be open and I'm going to let Eddie share on what he has to say. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Now, I'm like a little bit nervous. [SPEAKER_01]: It is now two. [SPEAKER_00]: Don't be nervous.

29:45 [SPEAKER_01]: And I'll be careful with my framing here because what a brilliant thing about Gilmour Girls is all three of the major men for Roy in there are good for her at different times and bad for her at different times in different ways. [SPEAKER_00]: No, I think that too. [SPEAKER_00]: I think that the guy that she was with at the time that she was with him is the right guy for her.

30:07 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: And sometimes they grow away from each other and like they grow out of that. [SPEAKER_01]: And they're also, again, they're young people and they're just figuring themselves out. [SPEAKER_01]: But I think what I appreciate most about [SPEAKER_01]: Dean, is how he tried to fit into Rory's life in a way that the other two guys, especially Jess, did not do, um Jess?

30:34 [SPEAKER_01]: He's trying to skip out of family dinners. [SPEAKER_01]: He just doesn't want to be in the star's hollow at all. [SPEAKER_01]: But Dean, like they would watch movies together, he'd a deeply loved Rory and wanted to be there for her and knew that, like in order to do that, he had to be friends with [SPEAKER_01]: her mother too.

30:51 [SPEAKER_01]: And I think that is undervalued when we talk about like what team we're all on. [SPEAKER_01]: And I wish that Jess could have approached that relationship with more love towards Rory in that way. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Like Jess is like extremely selfish. [SPEAKER_01]: and so is Logan.

31:08 [SPEAKER_01]: In a way that Dean never was, he was a great high school boyfriend for her and a great star's hollow boyfriend, and of course she goes out of him, and he makes some serious mistakes, serious mistakes that I'm not going to come on here and defend. [SPEAKER_01]: That's that's my hot take on Dean.

31:27 [SPEAKER_01]: It's an even is one. [SPEAKER_00]: No, I actually, okay, it's a thing. [SPEAKER_00]: I was expecting it to be a lot worse, [SPEAKER_00]: Dean that shows up to their relationship in terms of her relationship with her mother, he does that the best. [SPEAKER_00]: He knows how important Laura lies to her.

31:46 [SPEAKER_00]: Like he comes to, you know, the movie nights and even like when they break up, Laura lies still has an affection for Dean. [SPEAKER_00]: We always say that like when Roy says he's my Dean, Roy thought that Roy lives gonna be okay with it because he's our Dean, you love Dean, and Laura's life was always kind of in our opinion, [SPEAKER_00]: how he treated her.

32:06 [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, did he yell at a lot? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, did he get mad a lot? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, he did. [SPEAKER_00]: But he's a teenager. [SPEAKER_01]: And he's a teenager and then here comes this cool guy. [SPEAKER_01]: Good looking Jess and he does dean get in his head about it and like lash out a little bit.

32:23 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, he does. [SPEAKER_01]: Because like she's the love of his life and he's like, oh, shit, I'm going to lose her. [SPEAKER_00]: And she's lying about it too. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: And that's what it means, perspective. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, of course, he's in his head.

32:34 [SPEAKER_00]: Of course, he's upset about this. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, of course, this like kid who is actively trying to, like insert himself into their relationship. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, he's not innocent about it. [SPEAKER_01]: He's going around. [SPEAKER_01]: He's toys with him. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, on purpose and worries like oh, he's fine.

32:49 [SPEAKER_00]: That's just that's who just is and you're like yeah Girl like when the tiska to task it when they do the basket But a basket and just bits on her basket. [SPEAKER_00]: She's like and she's like well that's the rules That's the rules and you took yeah, but I'm your boyfriend like let him take your basket and she's like no, but I have to I gotta go [SPEAKER_00]: And let's because she wants to like he is actively growing out of him and she wants to so she does what she wants I mean she can stress what she's still in a relationship with Dean which are our first episode of the podcast is actually titled Star Cross lovers and other reasons to hate Dean Forster But I will say we have softened on him significantly since that first episode and guess 22

33:37 [SPEAKER_00]: kind of like how all of us kind of reacted to a lot of or some of us, it's really his right reactions are bad, but it's always kind of justified. [SPEAKER_00]: At least in the early days that like yes, you can find justification for his anger, is his reaction understand? [SPEAKER_00]: It's not, but there's all you always understand that he's like kind of it is a breaking point several times a day, would just Marianne O.

33:58 [SPEAKER_00]: Until I will say until season three, when Jess is with Rory now, and Dean is like, I don't have to be calm around you anymore. [SPEAKER_00]: And he like kind of antagonizes him, but that quickly falls off. [SPEAKER_01]: So then he marries Lindsay, and then that, and then all deep because I can't, I'm not going to get on here and draw to defend that.

34:16 [SPEAKER_01]: Like he makes the series. [SPEAKER_01]: No. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that was, but that's the beautiful thing about a TV show. [SPEAKER_00]: You can kind of cherry pick. [SPEAKER_01]: season one dean. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and I think that you can kind of do that with any character where you're like, oh, these are all the reasons this person is awful.

34:30 [SPEAKER_00]: And I think it's a lot easier with Dean, because as he makes choices later on, they are quite bad. [SPEAKER_01]: So we'll see written to be that way. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and we've talked to, um, like writers from the show. [SPEAKER_00]: They were like, they were just trying to make a good high school boyfriend.

34:44 [SPEAKER_00]: And it's like, yeah, what I want Dean is my high school boyfriend. [SPEAKER_00]: Probably more so than Jess, if I'm being honest. [SPEAKER_00]: Jess would make me cry all the time all the time. [SPEAKER_01]: And like what he ever show up, like, does he like me? [SPEAKER_01]: Like, yeah.

34:56 [SPEAKER_00]: And like, meanwhile, Dean seems to like me more than I like him because he calls me in a while today. [SPEAKER_01]: Dean would build you a car. [SPEAKER_00]: Dean built a car. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, Dean remembers to get the Pete Dean brings the pizza to movie night. [SPEAKER_01]: Build her a, that's one of my favorite episodes where in like Richard gets all on his chest Now it and then they take it and they get the card checked out and it's like the two of them is standing there with the banter back and forth and they have like he's like Dean really steps up and he's like standing like head to head I love it so much.

35:27 [SPEAKER_01]: He built her a car. [SPEAKER_01]: What it wasn't just just did not build her a car Just doesn't show up to family dinner. [SPEAKER_01]: Logan bought her a broken, but like that's not the same [SPEAKER_00]: That's better. [SPEAKER_00]: You're okay. [SPEAKER_00]: As a 17-year-old build duo car, and you get the car, or you get like, a 17-year-old build duo car.

35:50 [SPEAKER_01]: Now I'm team Richard, I'm like, oh, no, we're going to agree. [SPEAKER_00]: We talk about that all the time that Laura was like, wait, no, he puts her a car. [SPEAKER_00]: I can say it's fine, and we're like, um, Laura like, let's let her choose this. [SPEAKER_01]: Let's go to what's her name.

36:06 [SPEAKER_00]: Dean's Dad helped him, but Dean's Dad works in Stereos, and like sounds it's down. [SPEAKER_00]: That's not the same thing. [SPEAKER_00]: That's not the same thing. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure the car sounds great, but like we need to check the engine. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, the music good, but the car's going to fall apart.

36:17 [SPEAKER_00]: It's going to fall off the wheels. [SPEAKER_00]: But meanwhile, Logan buys you a purse that's the same price as a new car. [SPEAKER_01]: So it's like it's not the same thing. [SPEAKER_01]: It's not. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to double down. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay, that's fine. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm team Logan, so I will take the bag.

36:31 [SPEAKER_01]: I'll take the bag. [SPEAKER_01]: Don't don't come here wrong, but like Dean spending Do it. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to fight you about this, but I will be taking the bag at the end. [SPEAKER_01]: But like Dean spends what like six months building a car and like Logan plops down his Amix and buys a bag.

36:48 [SPEAKER_00]: You do have to kind of work for a Bergen, you have to get to the list he waits for a month. [SPEAKER_00]: Exactly. [SPEAKER_00]: Now the effort that goes into it, you know, it's really like acts of service gift versus, you know, gift gift. [SPEAKER_00]: Sure. [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, I'm still taking the Bergen as Team Logan Girl.

37:05 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I can not drive in that car. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: We kind of disagree to agree. [SPEAKER_00]: It's really. [SPEAKER_00]: I guess so. [SPEAKER_00]: I think that we might agree here. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay. [SPEAKER_00]: So this was a lot Tamer than I thought it was going to be.

37:15 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Someone did recently ask me if there's ever been any one that came on and they were like, I'm firmly team dean. [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, oh my gosh, no, if they were, they wouldn't admit it. [SPEAKER_01]: but this one guy who might be coming around. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, this one guy who's he ran his career.

37:28 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: No, it was like a really sad like his book came out like three weeks ago. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm probably bad for him. [SPEAKER_00]: No, but I actually agree with a lot of that. [SPEAKER_00]: And my team dean, I'm not, but when we were rewatching season one, I was reading a lot of like YA novels, like Sarah Descent at the time.

37:46 [SPEAKER_00]: So he just like really felt like a YA hero. [SPEAKER_00]: Like he just felt like when he jumps on the bus to talk to her and then gets off at the next stop. [SPEAKER_00]: It's just like you're kind of like, that's nice. [SPEAKER_00]: That's cute. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, he likes her so much.

37:59 [SPEAKER_00]: he likes her so much and it's on points too much but like yes yes yeah that is my preferred relationship is you like me a lot more than I like you yeah so maybe that maybe I am team Dean cut that cut that cut that we can't don't tell anyone I said it clip it clip it so when it comes to the Gilmoura girls though which Gilmoura do you must line with Emily Roy or [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I think it's it's lower line.

38:30 [SPEAKER_01]: I think I'm too like I'm too old to identify with Rory and then Emily I don't really really to I love Emily, but like I don't relate to her in that way to anything in her life I'm sure I I love like a martini so like that bar car that comes out for for dinners like I can relate to that [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, you're like, I will be taking this.

38:55 [SPEAKER_00]: I will, I will, cocktail hour. [SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely. [SPEAKER_01]: I will attend. [SPEAKER_00]: Will I be quoting you? [SPEAKER_00]: Yes. [SPEAKER_00]: Do I have to send your life at all? [SPEAKER_00]: Not really. [SPEAKER_01]: No, no, no. [SPEAKER_00]: Why do you think it's a show that has become your comfort show?

39:06 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, what about it has resonated with you specifically about the show? [SPEAKER_01]: the scripts like the deeply flawed characters, the world of stars hollow is a wonderful place to escape to and like I don't know if those worlds really exist very much nowadays. [SPEAKER_01]: And the fact that like my memory is so bad that I can like watch it like the entire series and then pick up break for a month and it's like I'm watching it brand new again.

39:31 [SPEAKER_01]: There's enough content for me to like who forgot in a bit of it. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that's actually like my favorite kind of comfort show is like giving like enough a break that you're like, oh my gosh, I forgot about this spotlight and it's so exciting. [SPEAKER_00]: This new thing that I'm happy.

39:45 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, but this this one I feel like I just I can't be surprised by it ever again. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's it's your professional job to to know all of the things. [SPEAKER_00]: So why did you include Gilmore Girls as Austin's Comfort Show? [SPEAKER_00]: As we said, there's so many different kinds of comfort shows that I could have turned the page and seen, but it was Gilmore Girls.

40:05 [SPEAKER_00]: Was it because it was yours or was there a reason that it fit him? [SPEAKER_01]: There are some questions I'll get like this where I have a great answer and I'm like, if you're thematically, here's why. [SPEAKER_01]: But it's the truth is it like sometimes I'll get to a point where like, I knew Austin needed a comfort show, which it's very good to have that for a lot of people like living with anxiety for all the reasons we've talked about and I got to the point where I had to decide what show it is and because it's mine, I was like, let's see if this works for him.

40:37 [SPEAKER_01]: and then you just like put it in there and just audition it and see if it works and like it had never left. [SPEAKER_01]: Austin lost his father a few years before the open era starts and of course you have like Richard's presence in there but for the most part it's like kind of like there isn't a big father figure in the life so maybe like he's not having to think about that a lot while watching his comfort show so that could be another reason.

41:02 [SPEAKER_01]: And Austin is he loves a banter. [SPEAKER_01]: He loves like [SPEAKER_01]: And I think that for all the reasons I love Gilmore Girls to just that those tight jokes and back and forth he relates to and bring some comfort. [SPEAKER_00]: I actually felt like it was a really good fit for a tennis player for their comfort show to be Gilmore Girls, because it's like really just like a ping pong match back and forth.

41:28 [SPEAKER_00]: The tennis match, if you will, I don't know, I said ping pong when I was talking about tennis, which is table tennis. [SPEAKER_00]: Sure. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, and there's ping pong and table tennis in the book too, so not far off. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, so I feel like that is like perfectly match that like the banter between the characters feels very, you know, like a nice relaxing tennis match to sit back and watch or to sit and have on in the background.

41:51 [SPEAKER_01]: It's also so different from his like world. [SPEAKER_01]: Like he didn't grow up on the East Coast and in a small town and like it's the Kilmer Girls could not be further away from [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I love it. [SPEAKER_00]: So going into the open era, I truly loved this book so much. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I know that I've said that, but like, I think it's one of my, like, on my top, like, 10, you know, you're messing with your top 10 books of the year.

42:17 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, it's definitely setting up there right now because, like, it's such a surprise to me that, like, when you go to debut, you never know what you're going to get. [SPEAKER_00]: You've never sampled this work before. [SPEAKER_00]: You've never, like, I've never encountered you before.

42:28 [SPEAKER_00]: And so when I went into this, like, I just immediately fell in love with, like, [SPEAKER_00]: The style of writing that you had, the story you were telling, the pacing, it just, there were so many times why I put it down because like turns a phrase that you had or ways that you structured, paragraphs are just sentences themselves.

42:42 [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, this is so, so good. [SPEAKER_00]: And like, before I had even finished it, I was like, what is he doing now? [SPEAKER_00]: I hope that that man is working right now because I need to read another book from him because I love this so much. [SPEAKER_00]: So that being said, how do you pitch this book to new readers?

43:01 [SPEAKER_01]: When I was pitching it to agents, when I actually literally had to pitch it, like cold to people, I said that it was similar to Carrie Soto is back and read Whiten Royal Blue and for fans of challengers who wish that was gayer was like an actual quote in my query letter. [SPEAKER_00]: That's such a good cell.

43:21 [SPEAKER_01]: And it really, like, that's, it is what it is because of Carrie Soto, like, Carrie's deeply about the tennis. [SPEAKER_01]: And then we're bread, white, and roll blue is like a two relative, not relatively. [SPEAKER_01]: Very public figures falling in love. [SPEAKER_01]: And then, um, challengers is tennis.

43:37 [SPEAKER_01]: And we, and we all wanted it to be like that. [SPEAKER_01]: But we in Zendaya, and we do, we do love challengers. [SPEAKER_01]: And then like I equip all the time on social like pitch it as epic and gay tennis, which is also exactly what it is. [SPEAKER_01]: And then I, it's a sports romance that's interested in a few other things too.

43:55 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm interested in telling a mental health. [SPEAKER_01]: story and a story about a guy who's recently turned pro and is like fish out of water and like the most it's the biggest competition he's ever experienced in his whole life and all of these things are happening around it and they all deeply affect each other.

44:15 [SPEAKER_00]: How would you pitch this book to a Gilmore Girls fan? [SPEAKER_00]: What do you think a Gilmore Girls fan would love about it? [SPEAKER_01]: I think that it follows younger people, Austin is 20 years old. [SPEAKER_01]: So if you liked Rory's dating antics, at that age, you're gonna see this here too.

44:31 [SPEAKER_01]: But kind of set in the modern age, not kind of it is that in the modern age, with being left on red and like DMs and in their relationship is a bit more public because they start to get shipped on social media. [SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, if you, if you like the romance in Gilmore girls, if you like the incestant banter, if you like deeply complicated and flawed, but lovable characters, like you'll find it almost every single Gilmore character, the open era is for you.

45:02 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I also think there's a lot of pressure for excellence that comes internally from the main character. [SPEAKER_00]: Almost the people around him are like chill. [SPEAKER_01]: You're absolutely right. [SPEAKER_01]: Like you're right. [SPEAKER_01]: It is internal. [SPEAKER_01]: It's like he wants to win a grand slam and that's the only thing he wants.

45:18 [SPEAKER_01]: He doesn't want to talk about his sexuality even though he's open about it, but he doesn't want the focus to be on that. [SPEAKER_01]: He wants to be the best tennis player he possibly can. [SPEAKER_01]: and everyone else you write is like, you don't have to be, it's fine. [SPEAKER_00]: You know, we're cool with me like he actually.

45:32 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: So it's like a very like, it's very lower line that sense in his like internal pressure for excellence is very, very like more, he holds himself to a very high standard in Austin. [SPEAKER_00]: There's that line where Lora lies wanting worried a kind of like lighten up, and she says, who cares if I'm pretty if I feel my finals.

45:50 [SPEAKER_00]: And that feels like really aligned with Austin. [SPEAKER_00]: That like he's going to like work himself into a panic attack to try and be excellent. [SPEAKER_00]: So I felt like those two characters like super aligned in that way that like they're kind of the young adult story. [SPEAKER_00]: Not this is young adult, but he is 20.

46:05 [SPEAKER_00]: So he is a younger. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, he's a younger person. [SPEAKER_00]: But I feel like they really, they really aligned in that sort of, like, elite realm. [SPEAKER_00]: Whereas worries in academia, and he is in the US open. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, Austin is at the Yale of tennis. [SPEAKER_00]: Some might say the Harvard of tennis, depending on who you're asked.

46:22 [SPEAKER_00]: Some might say that. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: What was the first idea that you had for this book? [SPEAKER_00]: And then what did you immediately do with that idea when you had it? [SPEAKER_01]: It started with the question of what would it be like to be the first openly gay, male tennis player to compete in a grand slam.

46:35 [SPEAKER_01]: That's the kind of essential question of this book. [SPEAKER_01]: It hasn't happened yet in real life. [SPEAKER_01]: And when I found that out, when I started to fall in love with tennis, I was like, well, why? [SPEAKER_01]: Why? [SPEAKER_01]: And also like we've seen it in almost every other major sport.

46:49 [SPEAKER_01]: What is it about tennis? [SPEAKER_01]: So I think that like my initial like pitch even to myself when I was kind of wrestling with that question was like this is it's like call me by your name meets the US open. [SPEAKER_00]: Lots of peaches. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's like... Oh, and like there's the honey doce, which is the signature.

47:08 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: You open, so he might have a time with a honey doom Allen. [SPEAKER_01]: Clip it. [SPEAKER_01]: Clip it. [SPEAKER_01]: That's the clip. [SPEAKER_01]: So, again, that was sort of like the impulse for the story. [SPEAKER_00]: No, I love that. [SPEAKER_00]: What did you, like, what was the first part of the story that you approached?

47:27 [SPEAKER_01]: I like to write chronologically. [SPEAKER_01]: I can't imagine writing any other way because in my minds and other people are probably much smarter than me and they can write different pieces. [SPEAKER_01]: But I like to write in order because one scene should deeply affect the next and the next and the next and they should all build.

47:45 [SPEAKER_01]: And like I like to be then like lip hangers and chapters and like it's hard to do that if you're writing out of order. [SPEAKER_01]: So I did the initial start of the book used to be when Austin won his final qualifying match and he officially qualifies for the US Open. [SPEAKER_01]: I didn't always start with the Flash Forward and my brilliant teacher of that course I was talking about, I submitted my first two chapters and I was like, I was like, [SPEAKER_00]: I like this.

48:12 [SPEAKER_01]: I think this is solid. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure there's work to do, but I think we're in a good place. [SPEAKER_01]: She was like, no, you were not starting in the right place. [SPEAKER_01]: It was a huge ego check. [SPEAKER_01]: It was exactly what I needed and she was like, you're not starting in the right place.

48:24 [SPEAKER_01]: Come back with something else. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't care about how it starts right now. [SPEAKER_00]: Interesting. [SPEAKER_01]: So I wrote the flash forward chapter, which is how it starts and it's [SPEAKER_01]: Austin and Diego in the tunnel right before they walk out into the Arthur F. Stadium, which is the largest tennis stadium in the world.

48:43 [SPEAKER_01]: And through interiority, you find out that something has gone down between these two guys. [SPEAKER_01]: And they're about to play huge match against each other. [SPEAKER_01]: And there is a scuffle during the coin toss and the photos at the net. [SPEAKER_01]: and you find out at like the very last few lines at the chapter that they have like they've kissed and something has happened between the two but then something has gone horribly wrong and then we go back about 10 days and figure out what the hell happens.

49:10 [SPEAKER_01]: That I think is a more compelling start that to your point I think is a bit more cinematic too and it hooks a reader. [SPEAKER_01]: I think in a way that you have to try a little bit harder [SPEAKER_01]: in 2026 because we're competing against so much other pieces of media and that's how I landed with chapter one.

49:30 [SPEAKER_00]: I truly loved. [SPEAKER_00]: It was one of those things like I read chapter one and I was like, yep, I love this book. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I'm like this book is going to completely like, and gross me because I just was like, who are these guys? [SPEAKER_00]: What happened between what? [SPEAKER_01]: What happened?

49:43 [SPEAKER_00]: What? [SPEAKER_00]: Why am I mad at one of them? [SPEAKER_00]: Which one of them am I mad at? [SPEAKER_00]: I need to shout out. [SPEAKER_00]: But again, it really did feel like this was like so perfectly suited. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I can see the adaptation. [SPEAKER_00]: I can see like the beginning of [SPEAKER_00]: the movie, the show, whatever this turns into because it has to.

49:58 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I cannot rest until I get to see this on screen. [SPEAKER_00]: But I think that what trips up a lot of books is like, there really is that interiority that is really hard to explain in a way that's not just straight-up exposition. [SPEAKER_00]: But like, you can see this play out so clearly without any, almost like with no words happening between the two of them, that like, to start the movie of this.

50:18 [SPEAKER_00]: And it just starting off a book like that feels like, okay, now we're off to the races. [SPEAKER_00]: The match has begun, if you will. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, I don't know why suddenly I was British for that. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, it's rumbled in now, so that it makes sense. [SPEAKER_00]: It's, yeah, thank you for, for writing back to me.

50:33 [SPEAKER_00]: Just to find it, got it. [SPEAKER_00]: I got you. [SPEAKER_00]: So one of the things that I selfishly wanted to ask you was, how do you approach drafting versus editing? [SPEAKER_00]: Because like this book is just so well written. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, how did you do that? [SPEAKER_00]: Explain this.

50:47 [SPEAKER_00]: Explain how you do this. [SPEAKER_00]: Explain this book. [SPEAKER_00]: I, I held up the book. [SPEAKER_00]: I realized this is a naughty omedium. [SPEAKER_01]: I wrote it. [SPEAKER_01]: I do this thing where I do this thing that you're, I think not really supposed to do is like, I go back and edit myself like the very next day after I write a chapter.

51:07 [SPEAKER_01]: Like I start the writing session with going back and reminding myself like what just happened and inevitably I will like tinker with some things. [SPEAKER_01]: So I ultimately, and I kind of did that with my second book too, and I think that ultimately results in a cleaner draft. [SPEAKER_01]: And of course, with open era, I had folks coming in and reading behind me.

51:29 [SPEAKER_01]: So I was getting like real-time feedback and making adjustments on the fly. [SPEAKER_01]: But I didn't really change that much from first draft to what you just held out that no one can see. [SPEAKER_01]: when Penguin random house has published it and when I first met with my editor she had a few adjustments that she wanted to make like she wanted to see another date between Austin and Diego almost who's like it'd be cool if we do like a if we get another New York date in there and so of course I send them to New Jersey instead and they ride go for it.

52:00 [SPEAKER_00]: Let's give New York life. [SPEAKER_00]: Just count me. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: No, no, I'm not subscribing to that. [SPEAKER_01]: Don't come for me, New Jersey. [SPEAKER_01]: It's a wonderful, wonderful state. [SPEAKER_01]: They do cracks in New Jersey jokes in the book, but that's fiction.

52:13 [SPEAKER_01]: I can't be canceled for two things in one another. [SPEAKER_00]: You can't be canceled by Gamble Girls fans and all of New Jersey. [SPEAKER_00]: That would just be heartbreaking. [SPEAKER_01]: Exactly. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so there was like in real time editing happening to open your as I was writing it.

52:25 [SPEAKER_01]: And I don't necessarily recommend that like I think that there it's nice to just kind of like dump all of your brain and then go back and clean it up. [SPEAKER_01]: But that was what how that was my process for open era. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think it's like it's the detail sort of they get filled in more after the first draft is done because you can see the full story and you can kind of like tune the characters a little bit more in their reactions to things.

52:45 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so I don't know that it was like the cleanest of like editing processes because they really tell you just like, please don't have it yourself. [SPEAKER_01]: Just write it right tell yourself the story first. [SPEAKER_01]: I didn't do that. [SPEAKER_00]: Well, whoever told you it's wrong, they don't count because we make the rules, okay?

52:59 [SPEAKER_00]: Because you make the rules and like what you have done here is fantastic. [SPEAKER_00]: So like, that's the new rule, you know? [SPEAKER_00]: Like, that's what you do and that's how you end up with a fantastic book. [SPEAKER_00]: So like, you get to make your own rules because that ended up quite well.

53:11 [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I've heard of authors who every time they go in to write a new scene, they read the entire book. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, they read everything that's been written. [SPEAKER_00]: So it's like I think that it's really very individual but just do it all the time. [SPEAKER_01]: Especially like if you what if it's a long book?

53:26 [SPEAKER_00]: I know that they said that sometimes like it takes like two hours before they can even start writing and I'm like at that point I'd be out there and then dump it the day I work two hours. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah exactly like I don't want to do it anymore um like that wasn't even a very good book like you know.

53:40 [SPEAKER_01]: It didn't like just didn't finish. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, Dean of my own job, but no, I think that what you've done here is like simply remarkable and I love it. [SPEAKER_00]: So let's talk about anxiety now. [SPEAKER_00]: Now I've given you some compliments to prime up to this yours mine, Austin's.

53:58 [SPEAKER_00]: How did you approach the anxiety representation? [SPEAKER_00]: Because it's... [SPEAKER_00]: Kind of painful at times. [SPEAKER_00]: There were times where I was like spiraling alongside Austin because I have felt that exact same anxiety. [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, there's not a doubt in my mind that Edith Schmidt is an anxious man because there's no way that someone who had never experienced anxiety like this could possibly write this.

54:21 [SPEAKER_00]: So first of all, apologies for anxiety. [SPEAKER_00]: But same. [SPEAKER_01]: Apologies like David's to Austin. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, but it's it's really it's so well done. [SPEAKER_00]: It's done really well. [SPEAKER_00]: Like you said for 2026. [SPEAKER_00]: Like it speaks really closely to how people feel anxiety the way that everyone does today.

54:39 [SPEAKER_00]: What was your approach for that? [SPEAKER_01]: I gave a lot of Austin myself. [SPEAKER_01]: A lot he has some stranger anxiety symptoms that I lifted deeply from me. [SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, I think that and I also am not a big journaler and this was sort of a way for me to put my thoughts onto the page through fiction.

54:59 [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, it is fiction, but unfortunately Austin did inherit some of my anxiety traits. [SPEAKER_01]: And so in that sense, like I wasn't thinking that much about like the representation because I knew that it was real and I could just put it, I could just give it to Austin. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, you're like fact check.

55:20 [SPEAKER_00]: This is happening. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, but like I work for a mental health nonprofit and like I've spent a lot of many years now being a mental health advocate. [SPEAKER_01]: So I did feel a responsibility for the representation there. [SPEAKER_01]: And I didn't want to be wrong about it.

55:38 [SPEAKER_01]: I didn't want to be offensive about it, but mostly I wanted to show how messy and nuanced mental health journeys are. [SPEAKER_01]: I didn't want to show you a perfect person because, like, if I was writing like a, just like a straight-up like advocacy book, I'd talk about how great therapy is.

55:55 [SPEAKER_01]: But instead, like, Austin doesn't want to go to it. [SPEAKER_01]: He is extremely reluctant. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think that's pretty relatable because we all think that we don't. [SPEAKER_01]: need, and it takes a beat to be a therapy to let it sink in and see how wonderful it can be. [SPEAKER_01]: It's difficult, but it can be wonderful.

56:15 [SPEAKER_01]: Those are all of the things happening in my head, whether I was conscious of it or not. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know, but... [SPEAKER_01]: It wound up in there and it's a huge, huge theme of the book in his mental health effects every element of his life, the competition surely, and also his crush on this new friend turned maybe something more.

56:37 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I I actually like that there's no real resolution. [SPEAKER_00]: It's not like suddenly he's like healed. [SPEAKER_00]: I have no more anxiety that it's like clearly like a work in progress, but also if it's like the catalyst for him meeting his crush. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's the yeah, it's the meet you kind of.

56:52 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: The anxiety is the meet queue, but it's also the problem and I think that sometimes when it comes to like like weaving in advocacy into books I think that things like this work better sometimes than being like you should go to therapy But it's like this person didn't want to go to therapy But then they had to because they had a kind of mental break on a world stage and see like how this is working for them and like the hesitancy that they felt and Maybe you can find someone like this [SPEAKER_00]: to help you.

57:22 [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe get off your phone. [SPEAKER_00]: But that's what I loved so much about it is it felt like I was kind of like living alongside feelings that I had felt. [SPEAKER_00]: Sometimes I was like, I don't want to feel this feeling. [SPEAKER_00]: So I'm going to keep reading, so I'm going to put this down.

57:34 [SPEAKER_00]: Because specifically when he's like spiraling over a text, I was like, I haven't been here in a second, but I am going to keep reading because I would like to leave this because I know that you are a very talented writer and the only way to relieve this feeling is to just keep reading and I'll get rid of it and I did.

57:51 [SPEAKER_00]: because something had happened and I just I think so many people were relate to that. [SPEAKER_00]: I think so many people were feeling anxiety in this. [SPEAKER_00]: I know I did and really relate to just that story. [SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's something that I really like about this in terms of when you approach a novel that has the kind of the concept that he's the first openly gay man.

58:10 [SPEAKER_00]: to play in the U.S. open, but it also has a lot of mental health representation. [SPEAKER_00]: I think sometimes people are going to put those together. [SPEAKER_00]: But like that's what he's anxious about. [SPEAKER_00]: But I love that that's not what it is. [SPEAKER_00]: That he's very confident in himself.

58:21 [SPEAKER_00]: He knows exactly who he is. [SPEAKER_00]: He knows who he loves. [SPEAKER_00]: And it's just more so about the way that it isn't packing him because he wants to play tennis. [SPEAKER_00]: Like he doesn't want to focus on that. [SPEAKER_00]: He wants to be known as a good tennis player. [SPEAKER_00]: And Diego.

58:33 [SPEAKER_00]: kind of shows him some other ways that he could think about it or Robby as well. [SPEAKER_00]: But I just love that that is just like so they're parallel stories that are happening, but it's not anxiety that is a result of his sexuality. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I mean he has a mental health condition, like in the many of us do many of us suffer from and he was Medicaid.

58:53 [SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, and there are other things that like I certainly think the media attention like is not good for that mental health condition. [SPEAKER_01]: and he's making active choices to like not try to get better. [SPEAKER_01]: But the idea is that he's gay, he has anxiety disorder, there are things that he's just simply has and is.

59:15 [SPEAKER_01]: And he deeply does not want to be defined by sexuality despite what the world wants to do. [SPEAKER_00]: But he's like, you said he's extremely, he knows what he is. [SPEAKER_01]: He's out, he came out in high school. [SPEAKER_01]: It was no big deal, and suddenly it has become a big deal.

59:26 [SPEAKER_01]: And he's like grappling with being a posture boy. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: There's a bunch of women who have already come out. [SPEAKER_01]: Like, why do you care about me? [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Can I tell you that it's interesting that describing this book is like the first openly gay man in to play the U.S. Open.

59:41 [SPEAKER_00]: I told my sister-law about it and she's like, oh, is it a memoir? [SPEAKER_00]: I said, no, it's a romance novel. [SPEAKER_00]: It's never happened before. [SPEAKER_01]: There is, I met this woman and she who puts together events and then I met her one time and I was telling her about the book and then I saw her again at another event and she went to introduce me.

1:00:01 [SPEAKER_01]: to someone she's like, and he's the first openly gay male tennis player. [SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, Oh, no, no, no, no, no, hi, I please don't watch me play tennis. [SPEAKER_00]: Please, we, we have a promise promise. [SPEAKER_00]: But she was like, Oh, my gosh, that's so cool. [SPEAKER_00]: Is it a memoir?

1:00:15 [SPEAKER_00]: I was like, no, this is a romance. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: My more reading. [SPEAKER_00]: I want it. [SPEAKER_00]: But speaking of the tennis like that's kind of like the question is tennis because I tried really hard to follow it in the book How do you do?

1:00:29 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm his therapist for sure. [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, I've stayed tennis when I was younger So I know like there's a lot of 15s There's here are some 15s. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, this pouring is I was I was more so concerned with the tennis skirts which are quite cute So I didn't I don't grow a lot of I know Venus and Serena [SPEAKER_01]: I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I can I

1:01:14 [SPEAKER_01]: and I was also looking for outlets to work on my own mental health in a great way to do that is to work on your physical health and get outside, get exercise, touch grass, meet new people. [SPEAKER_01]: That year I caught myself really falling in love with the competition of it all and the actual game of tennis.

1:01:28 [SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, I like watching this, I think I might like playing it too, so I got a coach, I joined clinics, I hit with strangers and parks, and which sounds weird. [SPEAKER_00]: No, I think that's fine. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, no, yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: It sounds a bit sexual. [SPEAKER_01]: That's what I was just talking about.

1:01:45 [SPEAKER_01]: Strangers and parks. [SPEAKER_01]: So, no, that's fine. [SPEAKER_01]: Go off and do whatever you want. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, go off at strangers. [SPEAKER_00]: And hit balls with strangers. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so it became like a kind of session of mine, this sport in a way that sports were never really in my life at all.

1:02:03 [SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, I couldn't get it out of my head, it's the tennis of it all. [SPEAKER_01]: And then when I found out there were no openly gay male tennis players competing, like in a professional level, really. [SPEAKER_01]: I was like, I think that I can combine my new love for tennis, my love for queer love stories and mental health advocacy into one book.

1:02:22 [SPEAKER_01]: And I felt uniquely qualified for the first two and I had to learn a lot about tennis. [SPEAKER_01]: So I did read a bunch of memoirs. [SPEAKER_01]: memoir people don't come for me either. [SPEAKER_01]: I love memoirs. [SPEAKER_01]: You're like, we love memoirs. [SPEAKER_00]: So my best friends are memoirs.

1:02:36 [SPEAKER_00]: Exactly. [SPEAKER_00]: I actually think tennis is like really like such a perfect backdrop for the story because of the back and forth between the two of them because of the back and forth in the banter. [SPEAKER_00]: It's also one of those sports that like maybe this is just me because like I don't know a ton of people who play tennis but like you could fudge it and I'd be like that's for sure right.

1:02:57 [SPEAKER_00]: Like like whatever yes. [SPEAKER_00]: like you if you didn't get it perfectly right if you excluded something I'd be like well that's that's what Edward Schmidt's attendance is and that's what I believe tennis to be but the thing that I really love about because I'd only ever won red one other queer sports romance before this.

1:03:14 [SPEAKER_00]: And I think the thing that I like about them being on the same team or like in the same sport and not being like women's tennis and men's tennis is that it feels like the closest that I felt to it was kind of an alley he's a wood book where it's like you have like two scientists who are like working in opposite directions, but they both deeply love the work that they're doing.

1:03:36 [SPEAKER_00]: and they deeply appreciate the other person's passion for it in a way that doesn't get achieved and like heterosexual romances that are sports related even if they're both playing the sport or one of them is playing the sport because you don't have that like interior passion and compassion for the sport and just like the overall love that exists for it is so different from like even just being in men's versus women's sports.

1:04:03 [SPEAKER_00]: but if there is just one person who is like the sports romance and it's like with the like manager or the coach or whoever like whatever the sports romance is I think that when it's a queer romance and they get to be on the same team or rivals I think it just deepens the connection between the two of them because like I think that like I said Ali Hizzlewood because that was like the closest that I felt like it's like two scientists who are fighting for the same thing that have different [SPEAKER_00]: goals, but they both deeply appreciate the other person's love for it.

1:04:31 [SPEAKER_00]: And so like that that's what that was like the closest that I could like find to it. [SPEAKER_00]: But I think that's why I loved that they were playing a game that like was so individual that it wasn't they were on separate teams like that were fighting against each other. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like they had to stand across the court and look at each other and [SPEAKER_00]: know the work and the commitment that went into getting to this place in their lives.

1:04:52 [SPEAKER_00]: While the last 10 days is also ringing in their mind. [SPEAKER_00]: So I felt like tennis was like the perfect backdrop for it in that regard. [SPEAKER_01]: There's a lot of things about tennis that I think are interesting to the story. [SPEAKER_01]: Like, you being a theater fan too is kind of like just like two people on stage.

1:05:08 [SPEAKER_01]: And that's not met. [SPEAKER_01]: It's not a cast. [SPEAKER_01]: It's just like a two-hander. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: And there's like a set of stage theatrical element to it. [SPEAKER_00]: I get to have a drink while I watch them. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: There's like passion for something.

1:05:22 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Well, there's like in-between sets, I guess. [SPEAKER_01]: There's multiple animations then. [SPEAKER_01]: but just the solo sport of it all. [SPEAKER_01]: I think it's interesting for like the mental health aspect of it. [SPEAKER_01]: Or it's just you out there. [SPEAKER_01]: It's you against the world and also like it's an interesting metaphor for just being queer and you're in that coming out.

1:05:43 [SPEAKER_01]: It's like sometimes you just feel like you're the [SPEAKER_01]: there's no one to support around you. [SPEAKER_01]: It's just you out there. [SPEAKER_01]: So I think there are a few parallels there, but ultimately it's like it's just really interesting for like a sports romance like related to rivals and they're not extremely rivals.

1:06:03 [SPEAKER_01]: Like they're there is we call it that because that's the word that we have, but like the angle is world number two, Austin is 239. [SPEAKER_01]: There is a world apart, but they're essentially they go ahead to head to the US open and they [SPEAKER_01]: and they both want the same thing and they both can't have it.

1:06:20 [SPEAKER_01]: And that's something they have to direct and with on top of what other, whatever else they, they might become, with their flirting towards. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, while you're talking, you know, trying to figure out a word for Diego and Austin, and like, because like, Diego is like, top of his game, like, one of the best in the world, and Austin is like trying to get there.

1:06:40 [SPEAKER_00]: And I was like, I can't think of something other than rivals, because it's like, I don't know, are you rivals with the number 200 ranked number 200? [SPEAKER_01]: My sister has been my biggest rival in this. [SPEAKER_01]: She's like, they're not rivals. [SPEAKER_01]: They're not. [SPEAKER_01]: like, they're like, they're not the same.

1:06:57 [SPEAKER_01]: But like, and they are in the aren't like, they're going head to head. [SPEAKER_00]: They're there on the same floor. [SPEAKER_00]: And win, yes. [SPEAKER_01]: And like, they're on the same world stage and they are both protest players. [SPEAKER_01]: But like, there is, there's a world between them.

1:07:11 [SPEAKER_01]: And let's, let's see who wins. [SPEAKER_00]: Let's see who wins. [SPEAKER_00]: That's the real question there. [SPEAKER_00]: Is your sister like, did she inspire Charlie at all? [SPEAKER_00]: And they're really a per relationship with Austin. [SPEAKER_01]: My sister and her name is Kia and my best friend, Erin, kind of split the role of Charlotte a bit.

1:07:29 [SPEAKER_01]: I also, like, in a former life, I worked as a creative director at a PR agency. [SPEAKER_01]: So, like, I know the PR things I was able to give Charlotte some of those things as well. [SPEAKER_01]: But my sister, she read an earlier draft of it. [SPEAKER_01]: And she was like, she was like, she loved it.

1:07:46 [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, Kia. [SPEAKER_01]: I get that, like, I might be Charlotte, but I would never send you eggplant emojis. [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm like fair and also good, but Aaron might. [SPEAKER_01]: So, like, yeah, it's, um, it's uh, at this performance, the character of Charlotte will be played by two people.

1:08:08 [SPEAKER_00]: Okay, I love that. [SPEAKER_00]: I love a nice split role. [SPEAKER_00]: That's great. [SPEAKER_00]: But I was just wondering because like the way that you were talking about your sister I was like that feels so Charlotte. [SPEAKER_00]: It's like they're not rivals. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, Austin might think they're rivals.

1:08:20 [SPEAKER_00]: But Diego is like I don't know. [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know. [SPEAKER_00]: Who's that kid is there [SPEAKER_01]: They're exactly. [SPEAKER_00]: A big relationship in this book especially as it relates to tenants is Austin and his mentor, Robbie. [SPEAKER_00]: Did you have someone who is really important to you during this writing journey that maybe influenced Robbie or that you were happy to have a Robbie in your life?

1:08:40 [SPEAKER_01]: Robbie is one of my favorite characters. [SPEAKER_01]: I love them all, but he's one of my favorite characters. [SPEAKER_01]: Like a relationship between Austin and Robbie. [SPEAKER_01]: And for those listening at home, Robbie is Austin's coach. [SPEAKER_01]: Also, Austin's dad's best friend who, you know, he lost his dad a few years before the open era.

1:08:58 [SPEAKER_01]: So they're both mourning the loss of [SPEAKER_01]: a man and then very different ways, because he had different roles in their lives, obviously. [SPEAKER_01]: But it is like a very special bond that they have, and Robbie feels an immense pressure to keep Austin safe, which is sometimes at odds with training the best tennis player you possibly can.

1:09:19 [SPEAKER_01]: So they're not set up for success in the open era. [SPEAKER_01]: But they have, I think, a really beautiful relationship, it's very bantery, it's like, it's beyond the point of like, father and son because they joke about like more like dating stuff sometimes and like it's a funny little relationship.

1:09:35 [SPEAKER_01]: But I think above all else, like Robbie is so extremely supportive and has so much love for Austin in a found family's sort of way because he's not, he's not blood. [SPEAKER_01]: I grew up with a wonderful family who is blood and loves me to death and is so supportive of this book. [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm sure pieces of them worked their way into Robbie there.

1:10:02 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, he's one of my favorite hair just to he actually has some of like the best one liners when it comes to Austin and like the way that he like so deeply knows him but is like kind of sometimes holding back a little just to see like what his reaction is going to be there's like one part towards the end which I won't spoil but there was like a moment where I had to like kind of set it down because like you realize just how deeply Robbie [SPEAKER_00]: loves Austin and will do anything for Austin even if it means something that neither of them really wants.

1:10:34 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: And I just it was that was like probably one of my favorite relationships in the story was getting every time Robbie was on the page. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm like what you got to say now? [SPEAKER_00]: What do you have to say? [SPEAKER_01]: That is like it's really like I knew the plot points and I knew like where the story was going but it was always difficult to finally make it to those moments and have to write these more complicated sadder scenes that like looking back kind of feel inevitable.

1:11:01 [SPEAKER_01]: But yeah that was a that was a sadder scene to write. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah it really got me. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm on a sur crying at that park so I was like [SPEAKER_00]: I love him, but to be a relationship, let's touch on the romance before we go, because this is of course. [SPEAKER_00]: That's what you're all listening for.

1:11:17 [SPEAKER_00]: Yes, that's what you're here for. [SPEAKER_00]: Diego Cruz, who is his love interest, Austin's love interest. [SPEAKER_00]: Why was he the best pick for love interest for Austin, for our darling anxious Austin? [SPEAKER_01]: They're different in a lot of ways. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think they both look up to each other in different ways.

1:11:36 [SPEAKER_01]: Austin is world 239. [SPEAKER_01]: He's just entering his professional career. [SPEAKER_01]: Diego has been there for a while and he has extreme confidence that you see on the court off the court, he has brand deals, Rolex Nike, like he is like the golden boy of tennis, although he's never won a grand slam before.

1:11:55 [SPEAKER_01]: So, like everyone knows Diego Cruz, no one knows Austin, and Diego Cruz is also extremely attractive, and so like this is a recipe for a crush from Austin. [SPEAKER_01]: Diego is from what we understand a straight man. [SPEAKER_01]: to. [SPEAKER_01]: So Austin is like kind of unsure what why Diego is so interested in him when when they have their little meet cute and he shows up that evening with an intendo switch in hand at Austin's hotel room.

1:12:25 [SPEAKER_01]: He's like to see why don't you eat my friend that on how many friends? [SPEAKER_01]: So sure great but also man is hot. [SPEAKER_01]: And on the Diego side, he appears confident. [SPEAKER_01]: But I think we learn as most people who appear confident that's really are, there's stuff below the surface and sometimes those are fronts.

1:12:43 [SPEAKER_01]: I think that Diego is curious about, and looks up to Austin's confidence in his own sexuality, because early on, like one of Austin's interviews, goes viral where he's talking extremely confidently about a sexuality and kind of shutting the interviewer [SPEAKER_01]: I think Diego is impressed by that, in a way that maybe Diego can't be as open about his own sexuality, he's curious about Austin and that way.

1:13:09 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I think what you were saying about their confidence matches like really makes them like a good like I guess rival pair is nice because like they both are settled in different things that the other person is because like you said awesome is very confident in his sexuality, whereas Diego like has been to the open before he's like very experienced and tennis and confident in his abilities even if he gets nervous for the match so I think that having those and then flipping them over and seeing the other person.

1:13:38 [SPEAKER_00]: Has that anxiety and how they can help each other and how that hurts each other as they continue on in the open I think that they're I just love them when you were talking about Diego. [SPEAKER_00]: I was like he is handsome And he is the number two in the world and I love him and he helps face like a flame on your card Why fin use and for for Diego?

1:14:01 [SPEAKER_01]: That was one where I knew that he also needed a comfort show, and I wasn't, Austin, I could give Gilmore girls to, because I know that like younger folks are watching that show now, but I wasn't, I don't know what else like, Diego is 23, so I needed a show that like a 23 year old would like that also he grew up with too.

1:14:24 [SPEAKER_01]: So, I, I, um, sourced the answer from one of my younger friends and lifted it from his comfort show. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, my God. [SPEAKER_01]: Um, yeah, there were a few times where, like, I was deeply concerned about not coming off as like cringe writing 20 and 20, three year olds. [SPEAKER_01]: So I, um, I got some, you know, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some, some other readers.

1:14:50 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: Also, there is this at one of the author events, there is like a Q&A and this woman raised her hand and she was like [SPEAKER_01]: Okay, so listen, I have two boys and they're Austin and Diego's age, and I was reading as like, wow, like, you've, like, this author, like, it really, like, captured their voices.

1:15:10 [SPEAKER_01]: But now I'm here and like, I see your, you're not their age, and I was like, okay, all right, okay. [SPEAKER_00]: And you're like, I look very young. [SPEAKER_01]: I was like, she really got me. [SPEAKER_01]: She's like, oh no, I know I mean it as a compliment and I'm like, I'm not hearing it is that.

1:15:26 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: You're like, I am making a Botox Wimitumaro. [SPEAKER_01]: We did, I had some fun. [SPEAKER_01]: It was all I was on. [SPEAKER_00]: I love that. [SPEAKER_00]: I agree. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I think that like you really captured that age. [SPEAKER_00]: And of course, I never was on a stage that big.

1:15:42 [SPEAKER_00]: But like having that much pressure, like in a pressure cooker at that age, I probably would have broke. [SPEAKER_00]: I probably would have had a panic attack and fainted. [SPEAKER_00]: And hopefully a very, very attractive tennis player would have come to my aid. [SPEAKER_00]: That's how it happens.

1:15:58 [SPEAKER_00]: You know, one can only manifest good things for themselves like that. [SPEAKER_00]: I would have a panic attack to meet a hot man. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to do a wake up and just immediately have another one. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, exactly. [SPEAKER_00]: So the last thing is, if there is something that you could offer to our listeners who, if they have not yet read it, what is something you could tell them that's not a spoiler, but when they get to it, they'll be like, oh, yes, that.

1:16:20 [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, so just like you can smile at yourself because I like primed you for it. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: My answer is espresso martini. [SPEAKER_00]: Hmm, okay, very good. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, is that a good? [SPEAKER_00]: It's a good one because if you have read it, which I have, I do know.

1:16:35 [SPEAKER_00]: But if you have not yet read it, you'll have to get there. [SPEAKER_00]: You'll have to have that little tease. [SPEAKER_01]: And the name changes, like, like the meaning changes throughout. [SPEAKER_01]: So like you might have that moment to yourself multiple times. [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.

1:16:47 [SPEAKER_00]: Have your own little moment, especially like you should read this book. [SPEAKER_00]: You should you should go find out what espresso martini is because as I was reading this book, I only wanted to read your next book. [SPEAKER_00]: Like I wanted to buy it immediately and as you have been talking, speaking of teasing, you have said working on my second book multiple times and I held back because now it's the time because I want to I want to know what is next, what what is happening [SPEAKER_01]: the open era, I think I mentioned tennis once in it, and let's see if that lasts.

1:17:22 [SPEAKER_00]: What a relief. [SPEAKER_01]: But what I can probably ask, like, put the flash cards away. [SPEAKER_01]: But what I can promise is another queer epic summer adventure. [SPEAKER_00]: Ooh, okay, love. [SPEAKER_00]: Will we have another book next summer? [SPEAKER_00]: We say greedily after we've only had this month.

1:17:39 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I think the plan is for it to come out in relatively a year from now, yeah. [SPEAKER_00]: Okay, amazing. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm really excited. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, honestly, it's just like when you find an author that like you just immediately love them, there's absolutely nothing worse than discovering that they only have one book.

1:17:57 [SPEAKER_00]: I think now I have to wait every single year. [SPEAKER_01]: Unfortunately, yeah, I only have I only have one book. [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I'm kind of sad I didn't find you like three years from now when you have the back cut off, but I would have found you. [SPEAKER_00]: Now I will desperately follow your career.

1:18:12 [SPEAKER_00]: I'll be a group of yours as you continue on because I'm such a huge fan. [SPEAKER_00]: But the last question I have for you is a question they ask all authors and that is what is a book organization that you have for Go More Girls fans. [SPEAKER_01]: I raise you a small town charming love story about Hades, the former god of the underworld, who falls in love with a very handsome florist.

1:18:40 [SPEAKER_01]: It is a queer romance called dearly departed. [SPEAKER_01]: by Chippons. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah. [SPEAKER_01]: And I think that the the setting of the small townness of it all, I think might appeal to Gilmar Girl fans and also it's a wonderful wonderful romance that also touches on themes of grief.

1:19:03 [SPEAKER_01]: It's quite nuanced. [SPEAKER_01]: So it comes highly recommended for me. [SPEAKER_00]: I love that. [SPEAKER_00]: I've seen it around the cover of it is simply stunning and it is. [SPEAKER_00]: What a wonderful guy. [SPEAKER_00]: So love that. [SPEAKER_00]: I've been kind of saving it for like a fall-ish time because it's.

1:19:19 [SPEAKER_01]: It's a great summer read, but there's also like, I don't know, like there's some fantastical elements to it that could be a good fall read too. [SPEAKER_00]: There's something about like immediately like Katie's I'm like, ooh October. [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, actors. [SPEAKER_00]: Yes. [SPEAKER_00]: I'm a storm, leave the bustling, but I think that's a great recommendation.

1:19:36 [SPEAKER_00]: And I think that everyone should get the open era, dearly departed and wait patiently for your next book of announcement along with me. [SPEAKER_00]: but Eddie, thank you so much for chatting today. [SPEAKER_00]: This was absolutely wonderful and we all promised to approach everything you do with an open heart knowing that you're team dean.

1:19:53 [SPEAKER_01]: No, not team dean, not team dean, but he understands he understands we that you have an understanding heart for Dean. [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I understand Dean, see you in one Dean. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not. [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not. [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for your justification [UNKNOWN]: You