What is Sleep? I’ve Never Heard of Her.

[00:00:00] Okay, my hand is literally trapped. He's like laying down on top of my hand. Good times. Welcome to The Incoherent Fangirl, where we have our first transatlantic interview today. This is so exciting! So cool. So if there's any issues with audio, it's because transatlantic, guys. Yeah, this is all the way from the south of Africa.

[00:00:30] Yes. South Africa to be exact. I was like, South Africa is the place! The south of Africa. South Africa in the south of Africa, right? Yeah. Oh, that was chaos. I am Mandy of District 12. I'm Karin from Havenwood Academy. Welcome back to the podcast.

[00:00:54] In our timeline, friends, it is March 6th. I'm still confused how it's already March. I know. I know. Very confusing. And in y'all's timeline, it is March 14th. Yay! Pie day! Oh my god, it's pie day! Go get a pie! Go get a pie right now. Or two. My god. You will be here when you come back. You can take us with you to get a pie. Yeah. I mean- That's true. Yeah. Just take us with you. But then I can't say this. Pause it and go get a pie.

[00:01:24] Pie. Welcome back. How was your pie? I hope it was delicious. I hope that I am also having pie right now. Yeah. Yeah. Because- Karen, Mandy, if you're listening to this, go get pie. Go get pie. It's pie day. You can talk yourself out of it. Door dash it if you have to. Do it. Pie now, immediately. Yes. Okay. Mandy, get Josh to bring you home pie. I can't do that. That's unfair!

[00:01:52] How dare you! I'm sorry. So rude. So rude. All right. This week in fangirling, Mandy, what'd you do? I did a whole lot that I can't talk about. So my stuff's gonna be pretty quick. I did get one of my nieces to start watching the Hunger Games with me for the first time.

[00:02:22] Um, her sister watched the first one and it's been out for like 15 years, but like spoiler alert, spoiler alert, spoiler alert, just in case. Um, Rue died and she was like, I'm not watching any more of this shit. Yeah. I'm done. I won't do it. Yeah. She's slowly coming around. It's been a few years. She's slowly coming around. So she may watch some of the later movies with us. But I mean, that's fair. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:02:50] I've had 20 years to unpack this trauma, 15 years, however long it's been out to unpack this trauma. Right. The one traumatizing thing about this experience with watching it with niece, niece is she didn't really care about PETA all that much. And I'm like, I'm sorry, but I don't, I don't, I don't relate to this at all. I was a PETA girly from like the second he showed up. The get go.

[00:03:17] Like one of the very first pins I pinned on Pinterest was a team PETA t-shirt. Like when it was new. Okay. You love PETA. PETA is everything. The goat. The goat. And in the movies, they gave him Josh Hutcherson's arms. I, women would fight wars over those arms. Okay. Facts. I will throw down right now. My God. Yes. So I was like, this is really strange kid, but okay.

[00:03:44] So we watch catching fire, which is the last one we've watched because they're on a overnight field trip for the next few days. She was like, I really hope Gail dies. And so I was like, are we coming around to PETA? Perhaps. He, spoiler alert, spoiler alert, spoiler alert, hit him with the, if it wasn't for the baby. And she was like, she kind of looked at me and I don't know if it was an interest or is he really trying to play this game with me right now?

[00:04:13] But either way, I think, however, she's probably going to be a Finnick O'Dare girly. I mean. Aren't we all? I mean. I mean. We're all Finnick girlies too. So yeah, I just, I love the Hunger Games. PETA is the goat. But like when Finnick answers the chat, like, I mean. Tune on that sugar cube. Like my God. My God.

[00:04:42] I want to reread the books now because it's been a minute since I read the books. But I watched the movies right around the election. Oh my God. Because I needed to feel something. But I think that they were either had just gone back to their dads or they were just kind of in their own vibes doing their own thing. Yeah. And so I was watching them by myself. But I'm like, I'm trying to watch them again. And it's like, as soon as one of them comes on, I am like fully hooked. Oh yeah. Yeah. I'm like, I can't stop watching them.

[00:05:11] It's one of those movies or movie series, I guess, that when it's on, like, no matter what I'm doing, I have to stop. Yeah. And I'm watching it. Like. Yeah. Same with like, like Crazy Rich Asians. Anytime that is playing anywhere, I, doesn't matter what I'm doing. I, sorry, I'm planted. Yeah. I still have to watch this. Sorry. Sorry. So that's been fun. I finished my beta read for Amber D. Lewis. I can't tell you anything about it.

[00:05:39] I did tell her, I was like, I'm so sorry. This has taken me so long. The president is who the president is. And I have doom scrolled my life away and I am late getting you this. And she was like, I'm late starting editing because he's the president. Yeah. And I've been doom scrolling. Yeah. So. I, I haven't. She was like relatable. I haven't started. So you're not even the last one. So good. It is so good. Yeah.

[00:06:08] You should start it. Cause it's, it's really. I don't want to say fun. It's fun. I want to reread the first one and then read the second one. Like I, this year, I don't know what it is about this year, but I've been more like if I'm reading a sequel and I haven't read the, the, the books previous, like recently I want to like reread. And I'm not normally like a rereader, but I think just. I'm going to say, are you going to reread this?

[00:06:35] I think the climate that we're in is very much like, I need to have less anxiety over what's going to happen. So like peppering in things that I already know how they're going to end is helping with that. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. I, I, I've, my problem is I've struggled if there's a screen in front of me. So if it's a Kindle screen or if it's my phone screen, I'm constantly waiting for Aaron

[00:07:03] Parnas's next breaking news. Love his sweet little baby angel face, but he, he gives me so, so much stress. Yeah. There's some major breaking news right now. Yeah. Aaron, please, please. Yeah. I can't take any more breaking news, but then I can't look away from it either. So I'm having to, I need to. Yeah. I guess break out the physical books and the audio books because. Yeah. That's why. I need the screen to be away from me.

[00:07:30] That's why I've, I've been on such like, I think most of the books that I've read this year have been on audio. Yeah. Simply because I can't focus on. Yeah. Yeah. Anything else. Um, okay. So I did my beta read. I finished or I read, I don't know if I'd started it last week. I read the last graduate by Naomi Novik, um, which is the next book in the Scolamance series. And I'm almost done with the golden enclaves, which is the third in the Scolamance by Naomi Novik.

[00:08:00] And I can't tell you anything other than the gut punch perfection that would have been the end of book two. Had I not spoiled it for myself? Knows. No, like I, I don't even know how to put it into words, how much I messed myself up because I would have lived for the pain of the ending of the second book.

[00:08:25] So like I spared myself a lot of pain, but also like, I didn't get to like fully immerse in it either because I knew it was going to happen. Anyways, it was good. And then I read playing flirty by Shamise Patel, um, more on that later. And I think, and I've been editing my book, so that's really all I've done. I saw, I got, I got emails being like, Mandy accepted these changes.

[00:08:52] And I'm like, why is she editing in the Google doc? So what's weird is I moved it to a word doc so that, because the Google doc like really bogs down. It's really, really slow. So I moved it to a word doc and it'll like, let me accept, or if it's just like a note that's not like a correction, it'll tell me to delete it. So don't get offended if it says deleted. It does not mean ignored. No, I don't even.

[00:09:19] It's weird that it's telling you from a word doc. Yeah. I was like, this is random. I thought she was, I thought you were going to be editing in Scrivener. So I was like, I am. Yeah. I have like the, Josh got me the secondary screen. Right. So I have it up and then I'll make the updates in Scrivener and then I'll accept it. So I know it's done. Okay. Okay. But I have to tell you there's 500 something left. There's a lot going on.

[00:09:49] So you're going to get a lot of emails. In, in, in my defense, I did stop partway through of like. Capitalization. Capitalization stuff. So. I did an auto. But yeah, I think. Yeah. And some of it was also like, do we know how commas work? Yeah. I don't know that we do. I don't know. And then some of them were, oh, it's, it's Jolly. It's the love of my life. Yeah.

[00:10:17] There, there are, I put in track changes. So anything that I like thought needed to be edited was like, you can just hit accept and it'll change it. And then any comments I put as comments. So like, you could just read that and like, okay, I'm moving on. Like, and I don't think, I don't think that pops up for, like, if you do anything with the comments, I don't think it pops up for me or. I don't know. I've only gotten to a couple and they, they were like highlighted. Yeah.

[00:10:47] And that's the ones that it says delete. I don't know. Because I can like address it. I don't, I don't think that I see those. I think I just see the changes because. Then you should see all except. Many accepted 500 times. Oh my gosh. I'm not an editor guys. I was just, I was like, she did a great job. I was just like, this reads funny to me.

[00:11:14] I don't know what to do with it, but maybe look at it again. Just look at this. Okay. Just look over here. Look over here. I need that. So anyways, yeah. Editing the living and the dead. Writing ideas that I have pop into my head for book two, but nothing. I haven't written any scenes yet. It's just been, oh, this happens. What if this happened? So. I love it. Yeah. I love it. What did you do this week?

[00:11:42] I read quite a few things and I have zero notes. So it's going to go really well right now. It's going to go on vibes. It's all vibes. So yeah, we'll see how it goes. I read Bride by Allie Hazelwood, which we've got. Oh, that's a good one. It's good. It's so good. And I'm so excited that there's a sequel, but you've got, she's a vampire and he's a werewolf

[00:12:04] and they have to enter into a marriage of convenience because they're trying to make an alliance between the two groups. And it's an Allie Hazelwood book and, you know, stuff happens and, and there's nodding. Nodding. I love, I love the way that like the female main character. And again, I don't know the, the character's names. I cannot remember for the life of me. I can't either.

[00:12:34] But like the way that the female main character finds out about nodding is so funny to me. It's just like, oh, okay. Maybe we were not compatible in that way. Whoops. Which is, it's so funny. And they're, yeah, it's Allie Hazelwood. Like 10 out of 10. Love that. I also read Nod and Love by Allie Hazelwood, which is very different. Oh, I love that one.

[00:13:03] It's, it's very good. It's very different vibes from like her other books, but it's still like, it's a still like stem. And there, there's just a lot more like mental health aspect to it. And it's a little bit like darker, not darker. Because when I say darker, I think of like dark themes. Dark Roman. And it's not really dark themes. No. It's just, it's, it's, it's less calm. It's the, in, than Rom, like it's more Rom than calm. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:13:29] And again, I have no notes, but it's Allie Hazelwood. So it's great. I remember loving that main character, the male main character. And not in love. Yeah. So we've got the female main character works for a company and she's developing a patent. And the male main character is a different company that like buys out business loans.

[00:13:53] And they bought out the loan for her company and they're coming in to evaluate if everything, like the, the owner of her company has followed as broken any, like, I guess, rules or something. And if she's broken anything, then they basically get to just take the company from her. Yeah. And so the female main character. And follow the patents with it. And everything with that.

[00:14:19] And so the female main character is like pissed at the male main character because she thinks like they're just, they're vultures and they're just coming in and trying to steal things. But then the male main character, the male main character and his company is basically his group of college friends. And they built this company specifically so they could go after, eventually go after this company because of backstory that we find out later in the book. And he actually has a very good reason.

[00:14:47] And he is very much, I love the, the way that he is just like, I would give it everything up. Everything I've worked for years and years to get to this point. And I would throw that all away for you. And I'm like, we love that. We love it. It's so, so. And the mouth on him. I remember thinking the mouth on that man. Facts. Facts. I am. Okay. Next up. I am not Jessica Chen by Anne Liang.

[00:15:16] You have Jenna Chen who is, she is like doing her best to kind of meet expectations. She, you know, it works really hard. She's daughter of immigrants. I am very familiar with this life. Her cousin, Jessica Chen, however, is like the perfect child, right? She is super smart. She's top of the class. Everybody loves her. Blah, blah, blah. All of this.

[00:15:41] One night on a whim, Jenna makes a wish on a, on a shooting star and she wishes that she could be Jessica. The next morning she wakes up as Jessica. Now, Jessica, she has no idea where the real Jessica Chen actually is. And Jenna, who, her body and her, her life is kind of slowly starting to disappear. And people are slowly starting to forget about her as if she never existed.

[00:16:10] So Jenna, as Jessica, first she's like really excited about it. She's like, oh, I actually get to live like this perfect, like things are so different as Jessica. And I'm really enjoying being like everybody looks up to me. And, and then she starts slowly realizing one, that like her life as Jenna is slowly disappearing. And two, perfection is really hard to maintain. Yeah. So she starts seeing her cousin in a different light.

[00:16:40] And so, uh, it's this whole kind of journey to get back to herself and get her cousin back. Um, at the same time, there is a childhood best friend who knows or has a suspicion that Jessica is not Jessica. And so there's a little bit of like a romance aspect to it. And it's very cute. And I really, I mean, it's Anne Liang. I adore her and her writing so much.

[00:17:09] So yeah. Did you know that that's like a lifelong insane fear of mine is like waking up in someone else's body? Like, why am I waking up as Simone Biles? I don't know. I don't know. What do you mean? Oh, that's so funny. Well, there's, there's like, there's a one scene where she has to like, do like a swimming contest or like a race or something.

[00:17:38] And Jenna, Jenna can't swim. But Jessica is like a pro like, muscle memory apparently kicks in and she like does great. And it's like, but yeah, like the fear that she felt. I was like, oh God. I remember Victoria Aveyard like threading something about that during the Olympics. Like this would be the perfect worst day ever for me to body jump between one of these gymnasts. And so that's where my, that's why my mind went to Simone Biles. It's like, oh, that's the most relatable fear I've ever heard.

[00:18:08] Terrifying. Terrifying. Terrifying.

[00:18:43] Terrifying. Terrifying. Terrifying. And the sacrifices become the CD, the sea God's wife. And so everybody's known since she was little, like, don't get attached to her because she's, she's leaving. She's going somewhere. She's going at some point. so the female main character's brother doesn't listen and falls in love with her and she falls in love with him because he's the only one who actually wait wait what the female main character's brother falls in love with her

[00:19:13] no the girl that's going to be sacrificed okay i thought the female main character was the girl that was going to be sacrificed no and this is not a book i want to know about the female so the girl that is going the girl who's going to be sacrificed is a girl in their

[00:19:34] village okay i i you missed that part in my mind yeah yeah i am so sorry so she so she falls in love with him because he's the only one who actually like spends any time with her because everybody else is like keep her at a distance because they know she's going to be sacrificed so why get attached to her and he's like no i like you're a person you know so they fall in love and so on the night that this girl is going to be this this would be easier if i had said names but i don't

[00:20:04] know names so that's the problem so the night that she's going she's like going out to the to the docks to be sacrificed and the female main character's brother secretly follows to like save her and of course the female main character was like no i'm gonna save my brother because i can't lose him so they're like hiding in the shadows and like a dragon who is like an emissary of the sea god

[00:20:28] comes to get the the girl and her brother jumps out and like stops he's like no and the female main character is like oh fuck he's gonna get like murdered and she's still gonna get sacrificed and so she's like no she runs out in in front of both of them and is like take me instead i volunteer here as tribute basically oh no so then she gets taken um to like the the not demon world but like

[00:20:57] the world it's under the water and where the gods are and there's a whole thing in play and basically the the sacrifice didn't work um and so therefore now they're trying to figure out how to the the sea god's memories are missing and so because of that because he is like not whole that's why

[00:21:21] the storms are happening so she has to go and figure out like how do i fix this so that i can save the mortal world and while she's doing this there's another person who i think he's like the head of some sort of military thing who is helping her and they fall in love duh oh no um but it's it's it's a

[00:21:44] retelling of i think a korean folklore tale um and it's it's beautiful and immersive and i really really lovely i i had a i had a good time okay the queen's resistance by rebecca ross is the sequel to the queen's rising is the first book which i talked about previously um and so i can't really like

[00:22:09] explain what happens in this book because it's a follow-up but basically first book is about them trying to overthrow the king and put the rightful queen back on the throne and so second book is the aftermath of that and how do you how do you go basically how do you go from doing what you want to do to actually putting it into practice right so like so like you want it's like democracy yeah

[00:22:36] you want her to be queen but how is she how is she being a queen now yeah how does how does how do how do you rule after the fact right so there's a lot of that there's also like secrets that are being brought to the surface that nobody really knew about there's still like a bromance which is gorgeous and beautiful it's rebecca ross it ends lovely um hilariously i listened to the end of this

[00:23:01] book at home because i had started at work and i finished i only had a little bit left to go at home and so i just had it on my phone with the sound up because i couldn't find my headphones and so i'm sitting in bed with my phone playing it but it ends and i'm over here like oh that was so she was like because like to her she didn't get two books worth of story thought it was an hour

[00:23:28] she was like no no but no she was like that's how it ends like that's such a cliffhanger and i'm like no like if you got the two books worth of stories you would understand this is a resolution like this is everything i could want but for her she was like that's a cliffhanger and i'm like no it's not i promise you it's not like they just they went through two books with the stuff i promise you it's not so that was really funny but it was yeah it's rebecca ross like fucking amazing what can

[00:23:56] you say excellent she who became the sun and he who drowned the world by shelley parker chand this is the radiant king duology radiant emperor duology so you have it's kind of it's pitched as mulan meets the song of achilles so you have it's it's it's pretty i like it um it you know for me and this is probably because i listened on audio and i was working at the time so i like pulled focus so

[00:24:26] i think if i had put full focus on it it would have been like easier for me to follow along but because i was like my focus was divided it was harder to keep track of all the characters um and that's my problem that's a me problem that's not like a problem of the author they did an excellent job um so you have a girl who is peasant girl broke as fuck her family is starving they literally are

[00:24:53] like digging in the ground trying to find like bugs because there's no food there's no nothing um one day her her brother and her dad uh go to like a fortune teller and the the fortune teller predicts this great like future for her brother he's he's got greatness inside him right that's his fate he has a great fate ahead of him for her they predict nothing she's just nothing and she is not a fan of this but

[00:25:22] what but like she's like this is just kind of like what do i do i'm a peasant what what do i do um so one day uh bandits come their dad dies he was not a good dad so we're not we're not upset about that but their dad is you know killed um and her brother basically just gives up on life and just oh she

[00:25:46] wakes up one day and he's just dead alongside him and so she decides well if he's not gonna you know except this greatness fate um i'm gonna take it myself so she dresses up as a man and from like birth her her brother was promised to the monastery like once he came of age they were gonna send him

[00:26:11] to the monastery and they never did um so now she's like i'm gonna dress up man i'm gonna go in his place and i'm gonna take his great fate yeah and that's it's gonna be my fate now and so she ends up going to the monastery pretending to be a man and all of this and so it's the it's um like a fantasy retelling uh not fantasy is it fantasy i can't even remember at this point

[00:26:41] i think so um but basically um it's it's kind of like a alternate universe version of the rise of the ming empire the ming dynasty um and so um she goes to the monastery and pretends to be a boy and it becomes a monk and all of this and she has basically convinced herself like at this point she

[00:27:06] has given up who she used to be she is a boy she has this name and blah blah all of this and due to things that happen after the like the monastery gets burned down and she ends up going off into like the military and there's lots of battles and things like that and and her now now what she is

[00:27:28] like aspiring to is she's like there's this thing called the oh god what's it called the um i forget what they called it but there's there's something where uh like the emperor is supposed to have basically magic um and so whoever just demonstrates that they have magic they're the only ones who can become emperor and she develops this and so she's like well if i have it then i can become emperor

[00:27:57] i'm a boy now so therefore she is on this like path to her brother's great fate and she's convinced like because i have taken his fate i'm gonna have that greatness and she's gonna become the next emperor and it is badass and amazing um get it girl it's yeah it's fun there's um there's some and she's very

[00:28:22] much like i'm not getting attached to anybody because uh having feel caring about somebody is a weakness because then they can be used against you um but you know of course things happen and it's it's very queer and it's it's fun it's a fun time i enjoyed it i think i have it somewhere and then i read the courting of bristol keats by mary e pearson you have bristol who has just who is with

[00:28:50] her she has two sisters and their parents um are both dead and one day they get like this mysterious letter from an aunt that they've never heard of claiming that she has something of their dad's like to give them and it's like sketches from da vinci and they're like her her oldest sister has lost her

[00:29:15] job they're struggling to get by and so she's like at this point she's like okay maybe i'm gonna go check if this is like a scam or something or if it's real because if it is that's gonna be a shit ton of money like yeah sketches from da vinci like yeah and so she goes she there's like multiple they have like multiple different like sketches and they're just like you can pick one whichever one

[00:29:41] calls to you you can pick whichever one and and she's kind of skeptical but at this point she's like i i need to take care of she she's convinced that the reason her mom left and died um and her dad who went after her and was like despondent after her death was like she's convinced that all of that is her fault so she's like i have to do this in order to take care of my my sisters and so she ends up

[00:30:06] taking one bringing it back and uh realizes at some point that uh the people that she was dealing with are not exactly human and she comes home and tells her sister and her sister is freaking out she's like hold on a second i think you just interacted with fairies did you take anything from them did you make any promises did you broker any deals oh no what's gonna happen and

[00:30:33] oh no and so uh she enters into an agreement with uh buffet and has to go to the fae realm in order to they are wanting somebody who can close like portals between worlds and there's a portals that are open that are like inviting basically the dead in and therefore madness is happening yeah right and

[00:30:59] they're like well she is the daughter of these people and so she might be able she might be the one who can save us um because turns out her maybe one of her parents isn't quite human maybe possibly they are not exactly dead and so so she's like okay you have to help me find my dad

[00:31:23] because she's not convinced that somebody i guess told her that he wasn't dead even though like it was supposedly a hit and run and so she just believes that she's like he has to be alive so you have to help me find my dad and i will help you do what you want me to do and so it's a whole thing there's a grumpy captain person who is really mean to her and i mean you know things happen i can guess

[00:31:50] where that might go um yeah it's it's it's a fun time it's the first but i think it's a duology so there is a second book coming which is good because that ending was not made to be an ending and that was not it that was not an ending i mean it was an ending but it was i need they're not the one i wanted no it yeah and then of course i read playing flirty by shamise patel which we will

[00:32:20] well again it's you know anytime i'm in the office i can power through many many an audiobook yeah it's disassociate with life well did you have a fictional boyfriend among all of those

[00:32:41] books i really love william from playing flirty he is i mean i mean he's a nerd yeah he's a game developer like he's clearly so down bad for rose like from the very start it's adorable i love and also in the queen's resistance um our female main character has an adopted father who is just

[00:33:10] everything you could possibly want in a parent especially an adoptive parent where like he's like no you're my daughter like there's no distinguish there's no distinguishment between like you know whether you are of my blood or not like you are my daughter and uh he just like accept her immediately you know and and he has a son who is like yeah no that's my sister like the two of them

[00:33:39] oh it's just everything you could want like as an adoptee right you want to feel like you are a part of this family and you don't want because i i can i mean i'm not an adoptee but i can imagine that you can feel like really disconnected from your adoptive family and so to have somebody who is very like doesn't even blink bat an eye not my daughter you bitch right yeah um and so yeah i i that

[00:34:09] yeah so like fictional dad fictional father yeah they're very sweet and like to the point where it's like in in this world her biological father was like kind of a traitor to everybody and was like overlord of her adoptive father's like lands and was not very nice to the people so all of the people

[00:34:34] are not really welcoming of her because they think of her as her father's child um but he's her adoptive father is just kind of like that's my daughter i'm gonna go send you to handle household stuff because you're my daughter you can handle household stuff and she's like um he's like no no you'll be fine like doesn't realize doesn't realize like they don't actually think of her the same way that he does but he's like no you're like my daughter so obviously i'm gonna send you to do this stuff

[00:35:03] um which i mean is a little bit shitty for her in the instance but like also like so lovely that he thinks of her that way um so yeah i wish i remembered names it's okay uh what about you um i'm with william ashton too because my lord i'm here for a hot gandalf

[00:35:30] i'm here for a hot nerd moment love it yes love it love it love it love it um and then i would not be myself if i did not also say pita malarque because i am who i am and i'm not going to change no um and i've witnessed pita this week so pita is life yeah i always say aaron warner is my

[00:35:54] resident that's right he's my favorite but pita's the goat pita is georgie's the goat too he's just been hanging out i know it's just hanging in my lap he just side-eyed you so hard he's like what are you doing mother i love it that sound means we have an intruder alert

[00:36:22] oh i'm so excited i'm so excited i really didn't think that this would happen so i'm so stoked that we got to do this um we have shamise patel author of playing for alerty here with us i've got audio because my physical car hi friends karen here as we mentioned at the top of the podcast our interview this week was recorded across an ocean insert hamilton line here about being an ocean away

[00:36:50] and we kind of joked about how that may affect audio well while editing i found out that it apparently did in fact affect audio you'll hear a shift about halfway through the interview where shamise's audio starts kind of crackling i did my best with what i had but i am in no way a techno sound wizard person so it is what it is i hope it doesn't take away from your enjoyment of the interview

[00:37:20] because we had an amazing time with shamise who you will find and we do mention afterwards is the ultimate calming presence thank you so much for being here shamise and i'm so glad we were able to make this work i am so genuinely excited to be here yay all the way from south africa right that's where

[00:37:41] you are right it's 11 p.m on my side oh my god oh my gosh manny always says that if she could like she would be up all night and sleep during the day because she's like a night person a night owl so yeah we get the late night rearranging of schedules for sure yeah i'm both a morning person and a night owl which uh it's been a problem that's what i say too and i'm like she just doesn't sleep

[00:38:10] i'm like what is sleep i don't i've never heard of her who needs it not us oh i'm a nightmare in the morning nobody wants anything to do with me and i always say unless i'm on the way to disney world then i'm a morning person but if i'm not heading to disney i am a terror in the morning oh my goodness okay so the first thing we usually ask is can you give us like the elevator pitch for

[00:38:36] the book for anybody who hasn't heard about it yeah i've done this a few times and every time i panic a little bit it's like i don't know if you ever played a game for 30 seconds but i feel the same sort of pressure so it is playing flirty is a geeky steamy rivals rivals lovers rom-com about two gaming enthusiasts one board game and one video game and they end up having to team up become

[00:39:00] unlucky allies in an attempt to win a board game competition but they soon realize that the game they're playing isn't just on the board i love it so much i love how every chapter was like round one yeah round two instead of chapter it was like oh yes it just was it made it more immersive feeling which i really so bad that was like i was really hoping that the publisher would be okay with that

[00:39:27] change and they were happy so yay oh i love it it's perfect for this book so where did this story come from like where was the story born it's got a little bit of a sad origin story um it was born during covid during lockdown when i couldn't see any of my friends and family and i think i wrote rose having these game nights to sort of live vicariously through her where she could see her friends and have

[00:39:54] the best time with them so a lot of it was born in that time when i was looking for a creative outlet and aside from that i've i've always been a geek you know and um i don't think there's that many books adult books about geeks a lot of them tend to be ya um because once you age up you're expected to let go of all the fun things in life yeah i hate it i hate that mentality it's the worst like why don't

[00:40:23] you want to keep having fun i know i fair to yourself exactly i've really like from the moment we meet rose which is obviously the very first chapter i'm just like this she is me and i am her and it i felt so like validated like even down to like her being so short that they call her a hobbit

[00:40:47] i'm like i am also a small person people put things on the top of the fridge i also will not be able to reach that i oh i love that it was so much it the spreadsheet thing i'm like that is that is me like to a t um how much of yourself did you put into rose and and did you kind of i don't know i feel like for me if i was writing somebody who was so similar to myself i would i would feel like i was

[00:41:14] calling myself out a little bit as well like did you ever feel that way with especially with all of like the geeky and nerdy references as well so i i'm definitely a big fangirl but rose is like me times a million so there was that there was that divide that i could i could definitely tell the difference between what was me and what was her because i basically took something i liked and i just

[00:41:39] knew that she would obsess over it and she would make it part of her personality um so much more than i would and so there's definitely bits of me and rose but just enough to sort of plant a seed and then she grew on her own i love that oh i love her um someone else i love i love nema i need a book about her can we can we please have a shot at nema book i you're not the first person that has asked me for

[00:42:05] that so it's i mean it's i'm thinking about it oh good oh that would be so fun oh i know like a little connected multiverse of geeky game night it could all like be centered around game night as long as we come back to game night speaking of game night i know you say that you're a geek are you also a gamer and if so what's your favorite format your game all of that i am a gamer but i call myself

[00:42:31] like a casual cozy gamer because again i don't play it weekly i play whenever i get time i love both board games and video games i can't say i have a favorite between the two because they they're enjoyed for different reasons i play video games at night when i'm alone and i play board games when i've got friends over so it's it's two completely different entertainment options for me uh in terms of

[00:42:56] board games i'm a huge fan of 30 seconds which is a south african game i believe i also enjoy all the classics i'm not geeky enough to have really delved into much of the indie board games but i would like to and then in terms of video games i really enjoy all the cozy stuff like the sims stardew valley paleo um i don't know do you guys play any games i'm not not as much as i would like i think like

[00:43:24] i would love to be able to like sit down with something cozy like stardew valley and just escape a little bit but i think i'm i'm i don't know i don't know what it is i i don't really find myself gravitating towards games i'm usually more like books and reading oh i uh i survived covid because of the sims and animal crossing particularly as soon as the world shut down i was like i gotta

[00:43:50] download the sims like this is gonna help me survive and then i stress download the sims about once a year and then i just disappear into it for about 48 hours and resurface like a new person that has finally let go of certain traumas exactly oh my goodness and it's i don't even really care to for the gameplay i just want to build the house and design it perfectly and like like i built

[00:44:16] my house during covid and i like showed my nieces like look i made your room but i'm the same way once it gets to like an anxiety level it's like i just need the sims yeah it's just it's compartmentalizing it's it's awesome i i absolutely love the sims and have since i was a teenager i feel like i need to this is this is my sign i've never actually played the sims guys ever ever like not even oh my gosh

[00:44:42] so i feel like this is my middle school i feel like this is my sign to maybe try it for the first time with board games i don't know the name of it we've i've played several that i really liked um but there's one that our friend group played it's been years now but it was it was like one or two people would be like they'd get a card that they were red and then everybody else was blue and you like had to prove that you're you were blue even if you were red and it was like a spy game

[00:45:10] i could not for the life of me remember the name of it we always used to be like versions it's a very it's it's actually a very popular sort of group game um and there's a few versions of it i think the one is called mafia the one's called like werewolf so it's basically always two sides um like either cops and criminals but it's it's a lot of fun oh yeah it gets the whole crowd hyped

[00:45:34] oh yeah we'll be screaming matches i'm true blue meanwhile you're holding the red card they can't see it oh i love it um did you have a favorite part of this book that you really like enjoyed writing or coming up with me i i really just enjoyed the back and forth between rose and william i had so much fun playing around with ibansa i'm just trying to think of the i don't know

[00:46:04] what i thought was the quickest little comebacks that they could have um for each other side i had so much fun with their dialogue oh yes their banter is incredible top-notch banter i'm obsessed with it i'm glad it came across that way i want to talk about the cover because there are so many geeky easter eggs we've got a well-known hat we've got a wizard plushie we've got a nintendo a dice like

[00:46:31] i can't even how involved were you in like the cover design um it was so wonderful they asked me for references for things that i think should be on the cover and then they sent me a couple sketches and they had it spot on it was perfect they they came up with the sort of an autograph on the floor and you can't really see that well on the book special but the little tiles spell out grow

[00:46:59] no i love it's right there oh my god it's hard to see so cute they were they really did give so much attention to detail and i adored it's so cute the moment i saw this i was like i i need to have that like i feel like it's it's a romance and it's nerdy like i don't know what else i could ask for quite honestly right it's so perfect like i want to go to a convention and like ask everybody like

[00:47:28] have you read this have you read this right like everybody will love it yes like you're right there's not enough like geeky adult books yeah and so this is really good i don't think it's just to read fantasy which we did but you can also enjoy a contemporary romance from the time for sure a hundred percent so this is your i think this is your uh romance debut right you also write fantasy

[00:47:57] though as well so i mean fantasy and romance are the beat of my heart right and so what is it like transition not transitioning because i'm sure you're going to continue writing fantasy as well but what is it like jumping between two genres do you have to come at it different in different ways i do um especially because the fantasy i've ever seen in third person multi-pegling

[00:48:22] because obviously the world's big this big cost and the romance is completely from those points of view in first person so it is all friends just in different genre different we stand up i do take a little bit of time between the two if um and it's come back on one because there was nothing over that in editing playing fantasy and editing the fun my fantasy trilogy and i had to take

[00:48:49] a beat between the two to just really sort of get rid of cassian lucas and ockland and the king and you know murder and trying to try and try and get my mind back into the sweet and soft love that ross and william have for each other but that being said it is it's like a kind of tendency to write a romance after fantasy as much as i love fantasy

[00:49:18] it is it's challenging in a different way i'm not saying that writing romance is easy but it's the same thing you get when you read a fantasy and then you read a contemporary romance it's it's like it's just much lighter so i quite like that i get to balance too yeah i bet i mean you're exactly right like when you say like it's the same way when you're reading it it's sometimes you just need that break because fantasy is so big

[00:49:46] and so much and so much world building and so in depth and a contemporary romance you don't have to build the world we know you're not in the same way right we know what a job is like you know we know what somebody who's got a grumpy brother is like you know we know what game nights are like so but then it's still a craft though even with it being a it's got some challenges yeah

[00:50:12] so what is your writing process like we have the most chaotic writing process it is i wish it wasn't i wish it wasn't but i i also have a kid she's six years old at the moment so when i was writing these books which again overlaps in little but it was done for the toddler that was kind of always around me so i did it in little snippets

[00:50:39] on my phone whenever there was like 10 minutes i needed to jot down an idea so everything came out in bits and i edited it i didn't focus when editing so i edited between i would say 10 p.m and midnight because that was basically the time that the house went to bed and i could focus so it was it was chaotic this week was written everywhere it could be written there was no time

[00:51:07] it was like a candle and find a playlist and set the mood it was you've got time that is the mood you're gonna write i love when we ask that question and the first thing out of an author's mouth is it's chaos because that just it just it's how i write as well it's super chaotic and it's validating to know that other people are the same way like successful authors are the same way as me so thank you

[00:51:34] just all over the place with it oh this is george bailey he uh we call him our show dog he wanted to come say hi he was down here begging so it's like okay okay i guess you can come up here it's fine sorry i pulled up he distracted me carrying me saying about what was being chaotic i i

[00:51:59] dare i say authors are some of the most chaotic people in the world i think so which is so cruel when you're supposed to have a perfect end result but yeah chaos right it's just it's like you i i feel like most most authors that we talk to just have all these ideas in their mind and and having to like parse that out and find the story in that chaos is just it lends itself to a chaotic process right

[00:52:28] yeah it does and i i don't like pausing the 90s script to sort of go back and be like you know did i say i did i say that lady at the store's name was karen was the lady and mandy you know what just let me tell you now come back after the end of the process and so like i've had people's names change and icons changing but and gosh when i edit it though i have to that's when the

[00:52:55] rose in me comes out i'm like i can't raise my spreadsheet yes bring up the spreadsheet and really start breaking down each chapter but that first draft is just complete one-in-one and i never want to release dog if i can edit while writing that first draft it's so hard because i'm so like i'm i i want everything to be perfect the first time right if i don't do it right the first time then what's the point but that's not productive no it's not

[00:53:25] productive at all it's it's just just it's discouraging because you look at it you're like well if it's not perfect what's the point but like no that's part of the process like you gotta let yourself live through it yeah so write it out and you'll find that i mean i actually changed the beginning of playing flitzy three times for finding the one that really felt right to me but i think time can be written so i mean imagine i got stuck on that first chapter

[00:53:53] oh my gosh yeah that's true then where would you be we wouldn't have this book no and i loved it i'm obsessed with william yes i mean i can't help it though i love it i love a nerd i do love a nerd i am a nerd and i love a nerd yeah it's such a false he's so smooth my god right i'm obsessed so smooth like he just but then you also know he's like i don't even feel like it's a spoiler you know from

[00:54:23] the moment you like open the book he is man is he's gone full send for her down bad for real i i'm too biased because i wrote him but i i had i don't really mean it has been one of my favorite characters to write and uh i know people that i was like this point to be here i was shy to be inside his

[00:54:44] mind so oh i get that i totally okay so now is actually the perfect time since we're gonna say william we we have a couple questions that are like mandatory questions that we always ask one of them being we have a uh a segment on the podcast in which we we call fictional boyfriend of the week where we pick a fictional character that we love it doesn't necessarily have to be a boyfriend

[00:55:11] um i've had a fictional granny mandy's had a fictional son like just a fictional character that we really love that week um do you have any characters that you're like this person is perfect everybody needs to know who they are any comfort characters oh goodness there are so many yes so let me try and figure out what that's like get the mood right this is where you're like have i ever

[00:55:37] read a book have i ever watched a movie what are like in my head i'm like there are five million of them but yeah what media i don't know i don't know any pop culture anything in terms of reading i would i would definitely say that um the romances tends to appeal to me most because i i can't find myself rereading fantasy as much as i love love reading them the first time

[00:56:03] because of that heaviness i don't tend to go back so i'll finish the series and i'll just be done forever and i'll love it in my heart and never does it again uh so romances are things that i does a little bit more often and quite recently i really enjoyed erin connor's unromance i mason is just he is so sweet i can definitely definitely see myself just having a wonderful yap with him

[00:56:31] just yeah coffee yes and just feel safe and obviously not necessarily sexy stuff because that's that's where it's business but um yeah he's definitely he's definitely probably quite quickly yeah we're at i think it's always a cozy show something to watch it's it's the lord of the rings i just hear the intro music i just feel very emotional

[00:57:02] i'm with you yeah i love i love that i started making my nieces watch them uh i think during covid actually because they were with us during like the major lockdown and i'm like i hadn't really watched it since high school but i watched it all the time then and i'm quoting it before they say it and my husband is like you are such a nerd and i'm like it's lord of the rings man what do you

[00:57:28] mean it's like we're supposed to be able to recite this exactly it's mad it's really learning yes are you surprised it was a whole cultural phenomenon like a whole cultural movement at the time like what do you mean you can't quote this verbatim from start to finish

[00:57:47] i don't relate to you all right another um question that we like to ask is we know that we love your book we are going to recommend it we're going to tell everybody that they need to read it but when you're not writing what are you reading what are some of your favorite books um any books

[00:58:10] that you recommend i think i don't know how i didn't find it any sooner i was almost mad while reading it instead of just enjoying the book i was completely angry like nobody's recommended it to me

[00:58:39] i almost love when that happens when you're like when when the not necessarily like the hype has died down but it's like when you discover something after everybody else and you're like i'm mad that i didn't have this before but also like i get to experience it on my own now instead of as everybody else is it is very special the same thing happens to me with the google's guide to murder

[00:59:04] i just oh gosh i enjoyed that so much and i was i was shocked by how much i enjoyed it because i don't i don't always go way too far away from romance and fantasy so when i picked that up it was i think it was just because they just don't get a book i was like sure okay i need something to listen to and i was hooked i listened to every free second i had i was obsessed i love that can i tell you that

[00:59:32] is exactly how i was with playing flirty like i finished it in a day because i was like i cannot stop i have to know like i cannot wait any longer to get like i need i need it's a rock we know there's an a ga okay right i need to get there i need to get here that is and i'm like please don't break up please don't break up that's the yeah it's they were

[00:59:56] like they were just so perfectly adorable together and it's like and you know the third act's coming and you're like oh no oh no but then you're like they're gonna come together it's it's it's torture in the best way yes yes 100 that's right it's breaking up it's honestly it needs to be done

[01:00:19] now well it was everything was done perfectly i i so enjoyed this so much um so what comes next what are you working on right now is there anything you can tell us i think so um so you mentioned that you love the multiverse game night is in book two in series planned for 2036

[01:00:44] and it would be sure and email i asked all sort of fun cause i didn't pitch that in lincoln a very very shy genius in this circle and what i can tell you i think is that he is and we shy so he doesn't do that well in real life he can't fly very well online oh my god i'm so excited

[01:01:13] so we'll get to get into the top of the video games oh my god i can't wait this is everything i know oh my god i love it well this is also a very good time to let you know that now that you have been on the podcast you're actually legally obligated to come back for all future book releases um like so so sorry not sorry not really sorry not sorry

[01:01:41] consider this my signature to say yes perfect well everybody um playing flirty is out now so you can go into a bookstore and pick up this freaking adorable book it's so good um thank you so much shemise for making this happen we're so glad we were able to talk to you so much fun so much so much thank you and we're so excited we're so

[01:02:10] excited for everybody to hopefully like all the there's plenty of nerds out there adult nerds who need adult romance in their life so they need that representation to be seen and see themselves in these characters truly truly everybody go pick up a copy now because it is available just walk into your favorite bookstore grab it off the shelf yes thank you again i love it i promise we will talk to you soon i'm sure thank you

[01:02:41] my hand is oh my gosh i love her i love her oh and being willing to talk to us all the way from south africa at 11 o'clock at night at 11 o'clock like like so sweet i adore her i love this book seriously y'all that's such a calming like presence where i just want to like be around her right like i feel like

[01:03:05] peaceful i i just i feel like i like turned down all the lights lit a couple candles put on like some essential put out like uh essential oils and just was like yeah chill and relax and that's that's what her her presence does i love her aura yes yes oh vibe i'm so glad we were able to make that work

[01:03:30] yay all right let's do some announcements yay i'm so excited i've been excited to read this book for a while um too because we've had it for a while they did super early which was great had it for a while and i read her first book and i really loved it and i like the moment i saw this cover i knew i needed to have it as well um so next week y'all we're talking to jennifer chen author of hangry hearts like

[01:03:55] i'm sorry it's so cute i'm gonna have to order chinese food this weekend i'm yeah i'm going to go to dim sum and bring the book and just sit and read because we're gonna get hangry yeah that we did this to ourselves about all this food i mean the book is hangry hearts exactly like yeah it's on brand i feel like maybe next week bring it around we should have some food we should have some food while

[01:04:20] we record because yes that's it's it's uh mukbang asmr that's what we'll call the episode perfect you're just gonna have to listen to us smacking all right well wait wait we have another announcement we have another announcement we're gonna be together oh yeah i was like we all west okay you guys need to understand that when

[01:04:48] mandy says something she will follow through okay for a while after a little bit of a disaster of y'all fest for us personally that was a rough man it was it was it was a little rough mandy was like i don't know that i will make the effort to go back unless tahira mafi is there and so the moment that y'all west

[01:05:14] announced that she was doing one of the keynotes i screenshot it and sent it to mandy and within 10 minutes she had booked a flight to la for that weekend i was like i will be there i was like listen if i if this is what i have to do to make you come visit me and it's not even visiting me i mean it's visiting you too but like but like i wouldn't have gone if you weren't like i wouldn't

[01:05:44] have been like because my husband can't go he's got other stuff so it's just me i don't know that i would have flown to la solo just to go to y'all west but since you're gonna be there i'll be there heather will be there with us heather's gonna be there uh we are also going to star wars after dark at disneyland that same weekend it actually worked out really well because we had extra tickets for

[01:06:08] star wars um so which is the day after y'all west so we're making a weekend of it it that's the most impulsive thing i had i think i have ever done because normally i am a like i have to plan it out i have to you know look into this and consider that and i was like nope nope i'm done yep i'm booked it's i had miles my flight cost me 11 it's happening i love it i'm gonna i i didn't even

[01:06:38] do this on purpose but i'm wearing my air armor sweatshirt i'm gonna be able to show her my tattoo it's gonna be great i'm so so excited like literally i said it as a joke i was like i'm just saying this is a good reason for you to come visit and then uh next thing i know i'm sending you a screech she's like all right i'm coming i'm like oh okay be ready and just for the record it for anybody

[01:07:05] who's listening i am picking her up from lax i know ever been to lax or had to pick someone up from lax you know this is an act of true love lax i've only ever gone to pick somebody up from lax once and that was beth and i vowed i would never ever do it again see which is so why i guess it's because i'm

[01:07:32] spoiled because atlanta the atlanta airport is my home base okay it's huge it's chaotic and i'm like if you can master the atlanta airport you can master anything and so picking someone up from the atlanta airport is nothing yeah so but then atlanta traffic and la traffic are not the same no la traffic is so much worse so much worse i once had somebody tell me they flew into lax when they

[01:07:58] landed they ordered their uber and the uber had was like at like the beginning of like the line to get into pickup for lax and they were like on the other side and it took them an hour for the uber that was already there to get from one end to the other because of how bad it is i think i need to take the transportation to the rental car place and let you pick me up there because the traffic there

[01:08:22] last time i was in la was not bad at all i i don't know i've only ever been there once heather is like i'll handle it i'm like okay as long as i don't have to drive i hate hate driving in la i cannot express how much i hate driving in la it is my least favorite thing in the world i hate it so much

[01:08:46] so anytime somebody else can drive when i am in la i am here for it yeah you're like fine i was like heather is a southern california native she has done uh she travels a lot the pro uh she's she's handling all that but i will be in the car so we'll be both of you we're gonna be together at y'all west and disneyland the first time we ever met in person was at disneyland

[01:09:16] yeah so oh we're going full circle so cute i love i know i told my after because of course like i'm talking to my husband as i'm booking the flight right because like we have pets in a home to coordinate um because you know obviously he's going to be doing some traveling too so we got to coordinate who's going to be here with them which we will have a house sitter but after i had booked it i was like i woke up this morning and i didn't know that i was going to disneyland

[01:09:47] so like everything anything is possible because this morning i wasn't going to disneyland and now i am i love that i'm obsessed i know that makes me we're talking about like i don't i don't want to jinx it but wow yeah because i'm going to see you and go to y'all west and disneyland and then a month later i'm going to see hozier and then i'm going on a disney cruise and then i'm going to romania

[01:10:14] wow what a year what a year let me knock on wood what a year i love that for you i'm obsessed that makes me so happy i'm so excited yolo for real though i mean do you realize that this dude has been standing here this whole time he's just standing there looking out the window meanwhile mine is over here just sweet boy don't mind my pajama pants patreon exclusive

[01:10:41] it looks like we match because they're the same color but his are sheep and mine is bluey but it doesn't matter it's still adorable very adorable all right let's get into a spiel all right friends if you enjoyed this episode please like follow and subscribe wherever you are listening to us follow us on social media we are at the incoherent fangirl on all the things visit our website the incoherent fangirl.com where you can also stream our episodes as well as read our blog subscribe to

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[01:12:33] karen 10 or mandy 10 for 10 off but unfortunately if you spell karen wrong we are going to sacrifice you to a bad gandalf at a convention yes and you're gonna get zero percent off so yeah yeah exactly that i pulled that one right out of my butt i was wondering what you were gonna do

[01:12:57] with it it's like where am i going with this all right and next up you're gonna head over and visit our friend amber d lewis at amber d lewis.com add 10 of everything to your cart and use code fangirl 10 to get 10 off of your 10 of everything which means you've gotten one of everything for free yeah it's perfect math that's how it works and then last but not least we're gonna go support the show husband um so you can follow at searchers believe on everything that is the paranormal investigation

[01:13:26] group um if you go to searchers believe.com slash shop and use code fangirl 10 there you will get 10 off of merch designed by moi um then we also have the searchers podcast formerly the paranormal mind um i think he's it sounds like he's downstairs editing right now every every few minutes i get a a hint of some voices down there so he may be editing that um so it will be live soon um so

[01:13:53] you can follow at i think it's at searchers podcast i set it up i should know that it's been like a week um but anyways go look for the searchers podcast anywhere you love your podcasts um you can also subscribe to their patreon um and then last but not least we have stream beacon tv which is a new streaming platform for paranormal true crime and horror content funnily enough we talk about

[01:14:19] on the searchers podcast how careful southern people are when saying the word horror and i'm i specifically talk about how i can't make eye contact with you when i say it anymore i never i can never look at her when she says it because then she'll start laughing because if we say it quickly in our accent it's gonna be whore and people are like what kind of platform is it i mean i'm here for it

[01:14:48] um so if you go to stream beacon tv.com and subscribe you can use code fangirl10 and get 10 off of your subscription you can support the show husband we've got some very exciting things coming down the platform down the pipeline platform oh yeah to the platform down the pipeline that's that's that's the one that's the one oh lord that was coherent fangirl it sure was

[01:15:16] thanks for listening we love you bye we are sponsored by our friends at here comes the nerd pins stickers magnets and more here comes the nerd has happy art for all fandom loving hearts new customers can use coupon code fangirl during checkout for 20 off their first order at here comes the nerd dot com coupon applies to ready to ship items only