How Romance Authors Are Reshaping Love, Lust & Literature

Interview
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[00:00:00] Rich Bennett: Hey everyone. It's Rich Bennett. Can you believe it? This show is turning 10 this year. I am so grateful for each and every one of you who've tuned in, shared an episode, or even joined the conversation over the years. You are the reason that this podcast has grown into what it is today. Together, we shared laughs.

Tears and moments that truly matter. So I want to thank you for being part of this journey. Let's make the next 10 years even better. 

[00:00:34] Rich & Wendy: Coming to you from the Freedom Federal Credit Union Studios, Hartford County Living Presents, conversations with Rich Bennett.

Probably answer That's okay. No, no, no. It's fine. The truth is, 

[00:01:00] Cardyn Brooks: well, hello, I'm Cardin Brooks, um, book reviewer, uh, self-published author, traditionally published author and outreach director for the right Women book fest. She's back. Hi, 

[00:01:14] Kristie Wolf: I'm Kristy Wolf and I am an independently published author and I write Steamy Romantic Suspense.

[00:01:21] Rich Bennett: Oh, this is your second time on too, isn't it? This is 

[00:01:23] Kristie Wolf: my 

[00:01:23] Samantha Heil: second time on. 

[00:01:25] Rich Bennett: Ah, yeah. And she, the first time she didn't even come here, but she knew how to get here. 

[00:01:30] Samantha Heil: I was gonna tell her you called me. Oh no. I was definitely here. So was Aaron from Ohio? Yes. Uh, hi, I'm Samantha. Hi. I am the founder of the book there at Bel Air.

I'm also one half of, uh, the author Duo es Rosalyn and rewrite, uh, young Adult Contemporary Romance. But we are about to release our first adult romance next year. 

[00:01:56] Rich Bennett: Okay. Wait.

Well, 

[00:02:00] Samantha Heil: isn't 

[00:02:01] Cardyn Brooks: it 

[00:02:01] Rich Bennett: all about, 

[00:02:01] Cardyn Brooks: not that it's exciting. No, no. And I was just thinking in terms of your author journey. Yes, yes. Like when you start with usually the genre you're most comfortable with, familiar with and all that, and then you gain your confidence. Mm-hmm. And then you decide you want to branch out.

Mm-hmm. 

[00:02:16] Rich Bennett: So, see I was gonna say, 'cause there's a big difference from writing songs based on eighties music and everything. I mean books based on eighties music to doing. Wait, did you say Young Romance or Adult Romance? So the first 

[00:02:29] Samantha Heil: three, the first series is based on different songs from the nineties and 2000, so you had that correct?

Yeah. Mm-hmm. But the, uh, they followed sort of the same story arc, but at this point we can add more mature themes, and we've found also being indie published that that sells much better. The young adult isn't necessarily the way to go. If you are indie published, if you're traditionally published, young adult is Gradish.

I don't think you're gonna, you know, make too much money unless you're a Suzanne Collins or a JK Rowling, or you know, one of those people. 

Wow. 

[00:03:01] Samantha Heil: Um, but yeah, we have found when we do events and when we do all of the things that adult romance sells so much better. And since we already really found our, our groove and our chops doing the ya mm-hmm.

We've decided that we're going into, uh, adult for the next three. 

[00:03:19] Rich Bennett: For the next three bowl? Yes. The next three are planned. You've written how many? 

[00:03:22] Kristie Wolf: I've written three. And my fourth will come out in mid-September. 

[00:03:25] Rich Bennett: And that's the same, same genre, same chili pepper stuff, same chili pepper stuff? Yes. Three chili peppers.

[00:03:31] Kristie Wolf: Four. I what? Pushing four. Yeah. Yeah. Alright. Wait, so pushing four 

[00:03:36] Rich Bennett: and yours is gonna be how many chili peppers? 

[00:03:38] Samantha Heil: Probably two or three. Two or three. We didn't want to transition from young adult to five chili peppers, right? 'cause we thought for the people who are already bringing us that, that was probably not a great idea.

So we're gonna be low chili peppers, the first couple, but we've had some ideas for, you know, some higher chili pepper stuff later. 

[00:03:55] Rich Bennett: Speaking of higher chili pepper stuff. 'cause garden, what you write is Yes. It's like all, it's all the chili pepper scale. It's like ghost pepper shit. Yes, yes. 

[00:04:04] Cardyn Brooks: It's a bushel of chili peppers.

[00:04:07] Rich Bennett: Man, that is high. 

[00:04:08] Cardyn Brooks: It's, I write erotica. Um, what started my journey was. The erotic I was reading was, um, emotionally not deep at all. It was strangers, it was a lot of sex. It was tab A, slop B, and it was very mechanical. Okay. 

[00:04:28] Rich Bennett: Okay. 

[00:04:29] Cardyn Brooks: Go ahead. Very mechanical. Okay. Um, no. And so I wanted as much emotional intimacy as sexual explicitness.

Um, and it really wasn't there. And then for me, with being black, I also wanted fun romance. That was super sexy because when I started writing in the late nineties, early two thousands, it was a lot of, um. One note about how black people are. And so, oh, so my parents, I just wanted to write a, like, fun fiction about privileged black people.

Mm-hmm. 

[00:05:03] Cardyn Brooks: But for it to be fun, like, you know, it's not, if anything traumatic happens, it's gonna have a happily, uh, ever after and all that good stuff. So, and I was writing what I knew, which is both my parents are college educated, they're college sweethearts. Um, little sidebar. So my. My parents were in the same, uh, intro to French class.

My dad was getting an a and my mom was failing, so my dad liked her. So he offered to, um, tutor her. So I was like, well, he tutored her. 

[00:05:34] Samantha Heil: If that isn't a romance storyline, weand, 

[00:05:37] Cardyn Brooks: like, romance is so unrealistic. Why do you love? I'm like, um, excuse me. My parents are like the, um, you know, college sweetheart trope.

Yeah. Like, I'm a result of that. That's the trope. Wait minute, 

[00:05:48] Rich Bennett: lemme get this. Right. So you're reading, you're, you're, you're writing steamy sexual books about your parents? No. Oh, okay. No, I was gonna say, I, I, I, no, no, but what I'm saying is 

[00:06:02] Cardyn Brooks: that my. My parents' love story. Okay. Is why I'm drawn to romance. Okay.

As a genre, as a reader. 'cause I started as a reader. 

[00:06:11] Samantha Heil: He was really confused, was like, his face was legitimately confused. No, no, no. 

[00:06:16] Cardyn Brooks: Mm-hmm. 

[00:06:17] Rich Bennett: I was good. 

[00:06:18] Cardyn Brooks: No, no, no. Just didn't hit the ears. I'm sorry. I'm just, I'm glad, I'm glad you asked for clarification. Well, I'm glad you did it right about that because that's No, no, no, no.

But um, but they really, they really love each other and like each other. And I say to people all the time that, that's a direct path to why romance appeals to me as a reader and as an author. Because, you know, my parents, they're baby boomers, so they were young adults before the passage of the Civil Rights Act and all of that.

And yet, um, they and my grandparents. Savor joy. Mm-hmm. They like each other. They're friends. They get on each other's nerves. They go to neutral corners and all that. Right. But, but it's so, that's neutral, you know? And so that's the kind of, you know, you all have probably heard this before because sometimes critics of romance are like, it's so unrealistic, it's so blah, blah, blah.

But it's like, well, it's fantasy. But it's fantasy. Rooted in, 

[00:07:11] Kristie Wolf: it's rooted in real life. It's rooted in reality. Yes. Yes. 

[00:07:14] Samantha Heil: Tropes come from somewhere. Yes. There's a reason we have them. Yes. They've happened enough times. And I actually think it's harder to write tropes because you are in, uh, you know, you're in an thing.

Something that's already outlined for you. Yes. And so you have to make it fresh and exciting and different with something that's already there. Yes. Yes. Alright. 

[00:07:30] Rich Bennett: Explain what trope is. 

[00:07:32] Samantha Heil: So, a trope is basically a, um, a story. How do you put it? It's 

[00:07:40] Cardyn Brooks: like a recognizable theme or structure. Structure. That's a good right.

[00:07:44] Kristie Wolf: It is. Um. It's kind of the convention in the story maybe. Mm-hmm. Convention's good. Yeah. So, you know, for example, um, enemies to Lovers, you know, you have two people that hate each other mm-hmm. For whatever reason, and by the end of the book, there's a marriage proposal. They have fallen in love. Um, friends to lovers.

[00:08:01] Cardyn Brooks: Yeah. 

[00:08:01] Kristie Wolf: Um, 

[00:08:01] Cardyn Brooks: second chance. Yep. Secret baby. Secret baby 

[00:08:05] Kristie Wolf: Opposites attracts yes. 

[00:08:08] Cardyn Brooks: Workplace 

[00:08:09] Rich Bennett: Secret baby. 

[00:08:11] Cardyn Brooks: Yes. That's a big one. Yeah, that's a whole thing. That's a big one. It's a whole thing. Can 

[00:08:14] Rich Bennett: you, 

[00:08:14] Kristie Wolf: we're gonna let 

[00:08:15] Samantha Heil: you figure out what secret baby is. My favorite is called Black Cat Grand. Uh, black Cat Golden Retriever.

Oh yeah. That's my favorite one. Yeah. So you're talking two opposite personalities with usually the woman. I do love a man Black cat, though. They just don't have them very much. Right. Uh, a woman who's a little bit more standoffish, a little bit more introverted maybe, doesn't come off as, you know, bold as, uh, you know anybody else.

Right. And then you have the man who's kind of like the happy-go-lucky golden retriever. And so you watch those personalities kind of meet and that's a trope. 

[00:08:46] Cardyn Brooks: Grumpy sunshine. 

[00:08:47] Samantha Heil: Yes. 

[00:08:49] Cardyn Brooks: Oh mean, I'm learning all kinds of terminology 

[00:08:50] Kristie Wolf: here. That, and within these tropes, there's a conflict, you know, enemies to lovers.

There's obviously a conflict secret, baby. When someone shows up at your doorstep with a 5-year-old and says, this is your kid. That's a big conflict. 

[00:09:02] Rich & Wendy: Um, friends to 

[00:09:03] Kristie Wolf: lovers. There's a, there's a conflict. There's always the risk that things are gonna go wrong. And so that's where, that's what kind of drives your story and that's what readers recognize.

[00:09:12] Rich Bennett: Okay. 

[00:09:13] Samantha Heil: Yeah. Romance is known for tropes. Yes. Some people hate them because they think that they're too formulaic. Um, but I love them because I think that they give you structure to work within, and now you have to prove that you can work within that kind of outline, and you can make it fresh and you can make it really interesting without, you know, having to bend the rules.

Because these are the rules that romance readers expect. Romance readers expect tropes, they expect a happy ending. Mm-hmm. Um, and if you're not doing that, you're not romance. Right. 

[00:09:42] Cardyn Brooks: You can be a love story. Mm-hmm. Right. But romance has certain expectations in that delivery of the, at least happily together now at the end.

Mm-hmm. At least that 

[00:09:53] Rich Bennett: I, so the romance readers, are they also looking for like the sequels. 

[00:09:59] Cardyn Brooks: They love a good series. They love a series. Sure, yeah. They love a series. Yeah. 

[00:10:02] Kristie Wolf: Because you fall in love with the characters. And so I, I'm working on a series right now. Um, two of my three books. A new one? No, the same one.

Oh, okay. So two of my three books, my Project Viper series, book one was Too Dangerous to Love. Book two is Two Lethal to Love, and two Guarded to Love comes out in September. It's about, it's a military series. And so there's four guys on my team and they'll each get their own happily ever after. They'll each get their own book.

Um, they're called Interconnected Standalones. So there's no cliffhangers. The end of every book, those two characters are happy. There's a proposal. It is all wrapped up nice and tight with a bow. But then the next book, we go on to another guy in the team and we get his love story. So all those characters that you have fallen in love with, you get to meet them in all the other books.

[00:10:47] Rich Bennett: Alright, so your series is only gonna be three books, right? It's gonna be four. It's gonna be four. I have four Super 

[00:10:51] Kristie Wolf: soldiers. Okay. 

[00:10:53] Rich Bennett: So what are you gonna do after then? After the fourth one? 

[00:10:56] Kristie Wolf: Well, I'm writing a prequel. 

[00:10:58] Rich Bennett: Okay, 

[00:10:59] Kristie Wolf: so we're gonna backtrack to the oranges. Oh, there's an origin story. Basically the oranges of the story.

Um, I have a book out called Knife to the Heart, that's my small town and my hero has three friends and they'll each get their own story. So I'm gonna backtrack to that too once I finish up the Project Viper series. You like watching Marvel movies? I do. I love my Marvel movies. Yeah. My project. You said project.

I do it. My project Viper series is, um, is just like Bucky Barnes Winter Soldier. He has that sexy bionic arm and my characters have bionic limbs. I love it that she deadly 

[00:11:30] Rich Bennett: lasers. You know, I have not seen that one yet. 

[00:11:33] Kristie Wolf: You, you haven't seen anything with Bucky Barnes and Marvel? I don't think so. Winter Soldier?

Yeah. He's my favorite. He's so tragic and wounded and he just really needs a hug. 

Interesting. 

[00:11:45] Kristie Wolf: And I volunteer as tribute to hug him.

[00:11:51] Rich Bennett: Don't. Dart. Alright, so we, God, you, you. 

[00:11:59] Samantha Heil: It's okay. You're gonna be your, you're going, 

[00:12:01] Rich Bennett: your books are going to your new books? Yes. Are gonna be a series as well? Yes. So our 

[00:12:05] Samantha Heil: new series is Small Town Romance. And so in that mine will also be Interconnected Standalones. Mm-hmm. Okay. But we have three brothers, so you'll get to see, um, the First Brother go through his story, get his happily ever after.

But, uh, the thing that I think a lot of readers love about interconnected standalones is that you get to see the other characters pop up. Mm-hmm. As you read, you get to know the town. Mm-hmm. You get to know the side characters. Mm-hmm. You get to know it's charming. Mm-hmm. By the time you're done with the series, you feel like you could live there.

You feel like it's really cozy and nostalgic and I think that's what people really love about it. Um, you know. You, you add some, some drama of course. Right. But then you can add some humor and some heart and these things that really bring people into the romance genre. 'cause they're looking for joy. Yes.

They're looking for a place to, you know, be able to escape for a little bit because Right. Not everything is always joyful, of course. Right. So these books provide them a space where they can go to find their joy, find their happy, and, um, be able to just, you know, enjoy life for a little bit. 

[00:13:05] Rich Bennett: Well, if it wasn't for books like, like those, there wouldn't be a Hallmark channel.

Of course not. 'cause that laid the foundation for it. Right. That laid the 

[00:13:14] Cardyn Brooks: foundation for it, where it kept like gaining momentum. Because now before the Hallmark Channel, they would seasonally have some movies that way. Yeah. And then they recognize the tv, how much they were the ratings. And you know, if the ratings are high, that means that the advertising fees are high.

Mm-hmm. And it's, it's a business like yes, it's art and creative, but the. The accountants are like, oh look right, when we show this kind of content, these are the viewership numbers you get and this is the, the advertising revenue you generate. Mm-hmm. And so with 

[00:13:47] Kristie Wolf: Hallmark movies, you know, people make fun of them because they're so predictable, right?

Like you can say at exactly what minute of that movie that something is going to happen, but 

[00:13:55] Rich Bennett: it keeps you hooked. But it ke 

[00:13:57] Kristie Wolf: and people keep coming back because people like what they're familiar with Uhhuh and what they're comfortable with. Just like, um, just like Harlo wind romances. Yes. I started reading those when I was 12 years old, which was a long, long time ago.

Um, but that formula is the same. They don't deviate and it's satisfying. It's satisfying. I call 

[00:14:15] Cardyn Brooks: it brain candy. Yeah, that's a good one. Anybody that eats candy, like I'm a C Chocoholic, same. Me too. I want my chocolate bar, whatever brand it is. Like I want that experience of that chocolate bar to be the same.

And it's almost a little bit for anybody that's old enough to remember the new Coke thing where your Coke. Like people love coke. And my mom, at the time that it happened, she said when they said they were bringing a new Coke, I didn't know they were getting rid of the old Coke. Yeah, it hurt them. It did.

But then it, then they swung the other way and they were back. And so imagine if you watched a 

[00:14:51] Kristie Wolf: Hallmark movie and the heroin died at the end. 

[00:14:54] Cardyn Brooks: Oh no. 

[00:14:55] Kristie Wolf: Right. Never gonna happen. Right. And you'll get 

[00:14:58] Cardyn Brooks: slaughtered on social media, all the medias. Oh yeah, absolutely. My wife 

[00:15:01] Rich Bennett: could be watching know, watching a movie on Hallmark.

And I'll sit down and ask her, what are you watching? And then I can't get up. 'cause it does, it just, it draws you 

[00:15:12] Cardyn Brooks: with, it hits all those, whatever those satisfactions, it's dopamine are. Yeah, 

[00:15:18] Kristie Wolf: it's a dopamine. And I, I read this a few years ago, um, people, you know, you have a bad day, right? So what do you do?

You come home and you sit and you watch the TV and you watch other people. Live and navigate and are tortured by problems and you watch that whole movie because it gives you hope that you can figure out your own stuff too. That everything is gonna be okay. It was okay for them on tv. They had a satisfying ending, even if it is wasn't a romance.

The bad guy was caught the, they saved the ranch, whatever. And it internally gives people hope that their lives will work out too. 

[00:15:55] Samantha Heil: I think something that people don't realize when they think about romance is that it's a billions of dollar industry. Oh yeah. It's huge For all the other genres, it's, it's the, it's the number one selling industry.

And not only that, it's becoming so normalized that when people say, oh, romance is just blah, blah, blah, there's women who are now standing up saying Absolutely not. Like you can have a billion dollar porn industry, but we can't have, you know, romance books. Mm-hmm. That might have some sex in it. So it's really becoming, I think, more normalized, um, because now even when you go to like book clubs and stuff, you find other women who read the same stuff that you do.

Yeah. 

[00:16:28] Samantha Heil: And it is a very female dominated. You know, female dominated field. But I do feel like even men are coming into it because if you go on social media, if you go wherever, there are men who are reading it as well. Um, so I think it's becoming, you know, not only is it the number one, but it's becoming sort of a, a staple, you know, this is not just, you know, oh, you read romance, you know, it's not literary fiction.

Right. Um, Abby Himenez won Book of the year last year. Yes. That's huge. Yes. I mean, huge. Her name is Abby Himenez. She's like a very large, um, yeah, romance and, and she's the first one who won. I wanna say it was Good Read's book of the year. It was, that sounds right. Huge. It's either, it's either Good Read's or Book of the Month, and I can't remember which, but it's one of them and she won it and everyone was like, oh, it's a, this is the first romance author who's won this award.

So you can really see how far we've come from. Right. Thinking romance was kind of a fluff genre and just not anything that's really worth reading. Um, to now she beat out every single, you know, literary fiction novel from last year 

[00:17:28] Cardyn Brooks: and traditional publishing is struggling. Mm-hmm. Because back in their heyday when they were the gatekeepers, the unchallenged gatekeepers, um, they could pay the literary, usually male author X amount of generous advance.

And his sales might never cover the advance, but they were making so much money elsewhere 'cause they had no other competition. But then with the rise of self-publishing, which when I. Self-published. My first book Seducing The Berks in 2004, still some people called it Vanity Publishing because self-publishing was considered, you weren't good enough to get a traditional publishing deal.

And the reason I went self-publishing is I kept getting great feedback. I would submit to editors and agents and they would read it and they would say, they read the whole thing in one sitting, that they had other people in the office read it. And then I would get a rejection because it would say, it would be this coded language that would say along the lines of, but is it going to appeal to your target reader?

And what I had to read between the lines was because I'm writing about privilege privileged black people, and the perception was that the majority of my readers would be black. And their understanding of black people's experiences that most black people aren't privileged and. And so it was this cascading thing of assumptions.

Mm-hmm. And I got that so many different versions of that. Then I was like, you know what, I'm just gonna self-publish and see what happens. And what happened is people that wanted to read erotica with more emotional intimacy really liked it. And it didn't matter about their age or their ethnicity or their social economic class.

And so I was, um, first runner up in the category of erotica sexuality, but I lost, wow. I lost out to this really great, um, academic book about the, kind of, the history of erotica from like Asian cultures. And he had done a lot of research. So I was annoyed. I was annoyed, but at least he deserved it. You said seducing the burs?

Yes. Because the family is the burs. Well, I figured that much. And so it's five. Siblings, so it's four brothers and their sister and erotica because it's so intense. They're, it's short stories. Um, I call them thematically linked. You can read each story and it, it provides a whole. Story arc, but then the connection, I just am not as talented and as patient as the people who write actual series where multiple books are connected.

I'm like, wow, my brain will explode. At first I thought it was like 

[00:20:10] Rich Bennett: a very hot family and somebody's coming in seducing the whole family. 

[00:20:15] Samantha Heil: Oh, no, those, those books exist. Those do, but that, 

[00:20:17] Cardyn Brooks: that's not what mine is. But seducing the books is individual that each, each sibling. Um, individual love story. Look at his face of who they come across.

[00:20:25] Samantha Heil: It's a lot 

[00:20:25] Cardyn Brooks: out 

[00:20:25] Samantha Heil: there. You, yeah. The Dark Romance. There's a whole world of things you don't know going on in the book. Community romantic. Yeah. And I feel like TikTok has really made so much of this explode. They're exposing all of our secrets. Mm-hmm. And now everybody knows the kinds of books. Like when you think of a book person, you don't think of, you know, a certain type of woman who maybe is owning their sexual experience.

Yes. You think of, you know, someone who's nerdy and really introverted. Yeah. And that's really not the case anymore. Um, they're really kind of exposing this whole world of women who are really into reading all kinds of really silly things. The book that I was just telling you about, literally, it's called Five Brothers by Penelope Douglas and Oh, polyamory.

It's exactly, oh, yeah. What you think it is. It's five brothers, 

[00:21:11] Cardyn Brooks: but that's way back from Maya. Was her name. Banks, it's, there's a long time polyamory. Um, it's not even polyamory, it's just sex. She, 

[00:21:21] Samantha Heil: and it has an HEA and she, it, it's not y Choose. Okay. She does choose. Oh, okay. I'm pretty sure. Oh, okay. Gotcha. So, but I mean, it's all with it.

'cause his face is right now is just HGA, he's completely after, happily ever after. Oh, okay. He's completely stunned right now, so I'm just trying to give him some I got you. No, I, 

[00:21:38] Rich Bennett: I'm sitting here thinking 'cause of, you know, the, the romance and the erotica books. Do you guys know if there are any. Male authors that write this stuff.

Yes. Yeah, there are. Yeah, because I'd be embarrassed to, I'd be afraid I might get something wrong and a woman called, they do I want. Oh my God. Okay. 

[00:21:55] Samantha Heil: Yeah, no, they often do. And I think for a lot of us, we want to read women authors. Yeah. Um, I don't go looking for men who write romance now. If I had heard something was really good, there are a few who can do it really well.

Yeah, Jeff Zenner is really good. He has a pulse on like the emotional, why 

[00:22:12] Rich Bennett: have I heard that name? 

[00:22:13] Samantha Heil: He's fan. He's a writer. Fantastic. Very. Yeah. He's really successful and he's writing both for teens and for adults and has done both really well. Yeah. So there are some guys out there who really can, you know, but they write from a male gaze still.

Mm-hmm. Yes. You still tell that there, there's a man writing about it, but he does it in such a way where, you know, as a woman, I don't feel like he's getting it wrong. Right, 

okay. 

[00:22:34] Samantha Heil: Yeah. There are definitely things where I've read it and been like, oh, you don't even know, like anatomy. I don't think so. It's definitely, I mean, read a book buddy before you gotta do your research.

Right, right. These days research. Yeah. Yeah. I don't even think that's good enough anymore. I really think we need to start handing out like maps and you know, like things, because 

[00:22:56] Kristie Wolf: this could be a whole workshop. This, this could totally, I think totally you should, you should plan something. We have 

[00:23:01] Samantha Heil: learned the, I feel like, so I only started reading romance a couple of years ago and in my experience I've learned.

So some I didn't wanna know. Right. And like some, I'm like, oh, that's, that's what that is. Like. Oh, I feel like a lot of women are experiencing the same thing with this boom. Mm-hmm. Um, of romance novels and just reading in general. I feel like reading is really making a comeback. Um, yeah. You know, with being of the assault 

[00:23:24] Cardyn Brooks: on literacy and Yeah.

Libraries and book bands and 

[00:23:28] Samantha Heil: Yeah. And I feel like people, people wanna read. It's joyful. It, you know, it, it brings people happiness. So there's, and there's a little bit of something for everyone. There 

[00:23:36] Cardyn Brooks: is. Mm-hmm. There really is. Um, and to go with your TikTok thing as well, of broadening horizons, because there is a memoir out by a young woman, like 40 ish, where she shares about her sexual journey as a single no kids person.

In a world that, for women that can be really challenging for how people perceive you. And then she went to. Paris and I'm mostly here to enjoy myself. That's not exactly the title, but it's something like that. And I'm sorry I can't remember her name at all right now, but I feel like the boom of TikTok and expanding literary horizons, I feel like that created an environment for her nonfiction memoir to be received more.

[00:24:26] Kristie Wolf: Mm-hmm. 

[00:24:27] Samantha Heil: Yeah, positively. It's a great time for something like that right now. And, 

[00:24:30] Kristie Wolf: and I feel like TikTok has made, um, really brought dark romance into the mainstream. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And you know, women aren't embarrassed to say, well, yeah, I love a book where three masked men are chasing women 

[00:24:45] Samantha Heil: through the woods.

[00:24:46] Cardyn Brooks: Yes. Yes. 

[00:24:48] Samantha Heil: I told you there's something for everyone. Again, his face. I just need to, 

[00:24:52] Rich Bennett: I've 

[00:24:52] Samantha Heil: just been waiting for 

[00:24:52] Rich Bennett: Christie to open it all.

I mean, I, 

[00:24:58] Kristie Wolf: um, but you know, like Sam said, I mean there is, there is something for everybody and I, I didn't know I was a Dark Romance fan until I. Got on TikTok, and I only got on TikTok when I started publishing. And, and now I'm, I'm totally hooked and I read things that question my morality. Um, but I'm not the only one doing it.

There's lots of us out there. And at the end of the day, it is, 

[00:25:18] Rich Bennett: you're putting on a mask chasing men. It's no, it's the other way. No, it's other way around. Yeah. So men are chasing you through the woods. 

[00:25:24] Samantha Heil: Yes. Yes. There's a whole, again, there's, and you, you, we haven't even gotten into like a disclosures, content.

Warnings. Oh, yes. Pages and pages of trigger warnings. And there's not, and you know this, I could go on a whole different episode on tangent about this, but there's not even that in teen books. We don't give trigger warnings. We don't give age recommendations. There's nothing for teen books. But for dark romance, you get pages and pages of trigger warnings.

No, we hand these books about whatever, what Yeah. Mm-hmm. Not 

[00:25:49] Kristie Wolf: just a trigger warning in the beginning. No, there's nothing. Well, no. The beginning and the, the beginning has pages of, pages of triggers. Warnings. Yes. For dark romance. For dark romance, but for teen 

[00:25:57] Samantha Heil: books, there is none of that. Mm-hmm. Some of the teen books out there, not I know, I know.

I've been reading them and they're getting some of the elementary school books out there. No, not elementary. They're getting more and more open too, which really infuriates me because we're not putting any, anything. The American Library Association thinks that we shouldn't label things because it adds to more book banning, which I think is the exact opposite.

I actually think, because we're not labeling, these parents are going in there angry. Yes. And 

[00:26:24] Cardyn Brooks: they're Yes. And they're getting Yep. Shocked and horrified and afraid. Right. Look what 

[00:26:29] Rich Bennett: happened to the record industry when they made it. Mm-hmm. That you had to put the explicit language on the records record sales took off.

They exploded. Yeah. Put it on the books. 

[00:26:43] Kristie Wolf: I, yeah. 

[00:26:43] Samantha Heil: I've been on this. I, I also think 

[00:26:45] Kristie Wolf: that the term young adult. Is deceiving. Yes. Yes. A better, like my, my husband and my son were, um, way into audiobooks before I was, I never listened to an audiobook until I started seriously writing, because I didn't have time to sit and read.

But my husband had an audible account for several years, and my daughter wanted a read. So she is like 10 at the time. Mm-hmm. 10, 11 years old. Yeah. And she was still at the age where she would let me lay down with her at night in bed, and she would put her new book on. Well, she wanted fantasy. And so my husband went on Audible and he Googled fantasy and young and adult, and she started listening to Star j Moss's.

Oh, Rowan of Glass series. 

[00:27:22] Cardyn Brooks: Oh, no. Now 

[00:27:23] Kristie Wolf: the first, you know, there's not much going on in the first two books or so, but as a romance writer, I know what's coming, right? Yes. Yes. You feel, and I'm laying there with her and I'm like. Wait a minute. So I went downstairs and I'm like, honey, he's like, it said young adults.

And I'm like, that is not what young adult means. Right? And he's like, well, they 

[00:27:40] Samantha Heil: need a better label that Yeah, they sure do. Because 

[00:27:42] Kristie Wolf: it has to do with the age of the characters, not like what the content of the book is. Oh, 

[00:27:46] Samantha Heil: right. Yeah. My entire thing has been 13 to 17 should be teen. We should be calling it teen and we should be putting trigger warnings on it.

Yes. Yes. 18 to 22 is a college age. It's a different type of story. It's a whole different sector. We should be calling that young adult or new adult or whatever they wanna call it. Yes, 

[00:28:01] Rich & Wendy: yes. 

[00:28:02] Samantha Heil: But teens should be clearly able, 'cause those, those books are in schools. Yes. And what happens is teachers and libraries are getting the fallout for that.

My poor librarian had a court authors of roses, uh, shelved for several years, all of them including silver flames for many years because she did not know what was in there. And so we would find kids back there in the corner reading and giggling. Yes. Because you can imagine Yes, yes. What's in some of these books.

Yes. Wow. And eventually she pulled them because she figured out what was in them, but it's just not there. 

[00:28:29] Rich Bennett: We, you never mentioned your, how many books have you written so far? I have written four books besides seducing the bs. 

[00:28:35] Cardyn Brooks: Oh. Uh, be, uh, three other books. Seducing the Burkes, um, when she's on top, that's about, um, you got my attention already.

It's of corporate women, uh, you know, when you're, when you're the boss. Mm-hmm. And, um, dodging s which was traditionally published and so was when she's on top dodging s is out of print right now. But I love that it was more and more experimental. It was firefighters and again, it was three siblings. Um, and it had, um, it had a little bit of a suspense element too.

Okay. I love that. Um, but yeah, I really write for myself first and then figure out the business of it later. 

[00:29:21] Rich Bennett: I think that would make it better 

[00:29:22] Cardyn Brooks: when you write for yourself first. Yeah. But I, but I, I understand that that's a. A privilege I have as a strategy because people who make the jump and their book sales are paying for the mortgage and the utilities.

Mm-hmm. And putting away for retirement, that's a different calculation. But I'm in a very privileged situation where I can actually write for myself first, because don't make the connection you made before. But I will say this about my parents. They're both artists. Mm-hmm. So I can't draw. They tried really hard and then they had, then they had to, they had to like, oh, she can't draw.

But they tried. And because my parents are all positive reinforcement, they're like, interesting. And I'm like, I can't draw. Why is that stick figure out. Exactly. But anyway, but what they've instilled in me creatively is do it for yourself first. Mm-hmm. And then if you're trying to make a business of it, figure out the business part actual after you do the art part for your heart kind of thing.

[00:30:22] Rich Bennett: And speaking of the business part. Yeah. Because, and I've talked to a ton of authors. Mm-hmm. And the biggest problem that it seems like a majority of 'em have is the marketing. Of course getting on podcast helps, but I think the, the events, yeah. Book fairs and the, even the book signings and all that is very important.

But you still see a lot of authors that don't do that. Why? 

[00:30:52] Samantha Heil: Yeah. So for Aaron and I, the reason we went indie was because I already had background in business. Mm-hmm. I had already been running, um, an e-commerce business, so I knew how to do everything already. And so if you're traditionally published, they expect you to do a certain amount of marketing anyways.

Right. And then they're also taking a cut. Right. Um, so for us it just didn't make any sense to go that route. Um, but for, for me, when I started publishing and really recognizing that there was an entire business behind it. Um, I had gone to, um, Cardin's event, the Women's Write Book Festival, and it was the first time I really felt in community with other writers and other Thank you for that.

You know? Thank you. And other authors. It, it's actually what inspired me to create my book there. 'cause I went in there and I was like, this is amazing. My community has nothing like this. I love that. I mean, they're at dad, they're in buoy. So it was, you know, a, a little bit of a hike for us. Yeah. Um, but we, our community didn't have anything like it.

And books are becoming, I mean, they're becoming huge. They're bringing people together. And so for me, um, as someone who's always worked in literacy in one form or another, I wanted to bring that to Bel Air. We didn't, we don't have a indie bookstore. We don't, you know, we don't have any of those things.

Yeah. Correct. Um, so I, and I wanted, my entire goal was to open an indie bookstore for a long time. Mm-hmm. I don't even know if that's the goal now, but for a long time it was. Um, and so I thought. I can do this, I can open a bookstore. Right. But I can do this. And so I started the book fair at Bel Air and last year was our first year.

And I was just blown away by how many people came out to support us. Have there 

[00:32:23] Cardyn Brooks: sold the most books? I don't know if she told you this. Yes. Yeah. That she sold the most books that she'd ever sold at an event. 

[00:32:29] Samantha Heil: Every author that was there said that, that, that belaire Wow. I sold a lot of books that day. Yeah.

Yeah. The Bel Air Community came out. They bought books. Not only did they come to visit, but they came to buy books. Right. Which is really the best way you can support an indie author is to pick one and buy a book or buy as many as your able, you know? Yes. Um, but they came in and everybody was like, oh my goodness.

You know, I'm out of we, I sold out. We have never in my, I've never in my life sold out. We sell a couple, 'cause again, we're teen. We don't always hit those audiences. We were out, we were sitting there just handing people flyers because we had no, we'd never get that many books for an event. Like, 

[00:33:03] Kristie Wolf: it astounds me that I'll go to, I do a lot of events.

Mm-hmm. I love them. You've always had there. I love it. It's my favorite thing to do as an author. Um, I, I used to go to huge technology trade shows and all the big conventions centers throughout the country, and I loved, I loved the energy. Yes. And I loved talking to people and pull, I just, I love the planning of it.

Mm-hmm. I loved everything about it. And so I had been outta that for quite some time. So this, this gives that back to me. Um, but it just amazes me that people who don't know me, they've never read a book of mine mm-hmm. Will buy all three of my books. Yeah. And I kind of feel like I should talk about it sometimes.

I'm like, wait, don't you just wanna try one and make sure you like me, but I don't, I'm like Absolutely are all three. Yeah. Um, and that. I mean, and, and that's wonderful. They're taking a chance on me. They love to read. Mm-hmm. But I, I am very aware that a lot of it comes from supporting Yeah. Supporting indie authors and, and giving us a chance, you know, that they as, as a, as a hardcore reader, they know the work that goes into it and they respect that and, and we so appreciate it.

Have you and Right. Women's was my first, aside from the coffee bar here in town. Right. Women's was my first, um, event too, that I ever did. 

[00:34:16] Cardyn Brooks: How long have you been doing that? One? We started, our first year was 2019. So let me tell a real quick story about how it started. So, Heather had started her women authors of Maryland Salon, where she wanted to have intimate meetings about once a month Okay.

Of, of mostly newer and indie authors. And she was doing that in Greenbelt because at the time I think she worked at the New Deal Cafe in, in like in Greenbelt. So. I went to the first meeting, I wanna say January or February of 2019. And in that she, she just casually says, you know, I think we need like a woman centered book event.

I'm gonna do some research and see if one exists, but if, if one doesn't, I think we should start one. So that's what she, she said in January, February. So then the next meeting, February or March, she just casually says, she's like, I couldn't find one. So, um, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna start one. And I got a venue at Marietta House Museum, their property, and, 'cause she had gotten married there right years earlier.

And she's like, um, and it's gonna be September, what? Whatever, the last weekend of September of 2019. So my little inner hermit, I don't talk to people, I like people, but I like will stay in the house. And I had already signed up saying I would support her. And I'm like, September of this year, I'm like, it's like March.

Wow. So, and then what? We got it done and then. Thank goodness we did, because then the next year was COVID, so we wouldn't have, if we had waited, we probably wouldn't have been able to launch. But because people had had a good experience the first year, they took a chance on us again when we're like, okay, we're gonna try to do this virtual thing with the second year.

Just book fast and. We did great. Yeah. People really, the community supported and then we were able to get some, we had a few people international because we were virtual. Nice. Um, which otherwise we wouldn't have been able to. And then, and then it kept our momentum going. And so every year we were bigger, at least participants and attendees.

But it's still me and Heather, and I may have said this already, Heather does the work of like three people because she's creative and she's technical. Mm-hmm. So all our website, social media, graphics, whatnot, she does. But Heather has a full-time job. Shes married, she's a grandparent. She's, um, on-call caregiver for a particular family member.

And you're 

[00:36:46] Rich Bennett: listening to the conversations with Rich Bennett. We'll be right back.

[00:36:54] Terry Trouyet: Hey, Terry, Troy, a station coordinator here at 91 1 WHFC, inviting you to support us right now at w HFC nine one one.org. Your support keeps us playing your favorite tunes and bring you the latest campus news too. Donate right now. Be a part of our vibrant community, WHFC 9 1, 1 0.0 G. And thanks. 

[00:37:16] Cardyn Brooks: That's why this year is our grand finale because our team isn't like the event if it just for love for the participating authors and the attendees and the event.

We do it till we died. Right. But Heather might die at the end of the, like at the end of the year, like, because I just, we had a Zoom a couple months ago and Heather, I could tell she was exhausted. 

[00:37:39] Rich Bennett: Yeah. 

[00:37:40] Cardyn Brooks: And she said. What if this is our last year? And I said, let's go out with a bang. And she started crying because she didn't wanna tell me that she was so exhausted.

Yeah. And I was like, Heather, we did our best. We, we looked for court respons, blah, blah, blah. But we had a great partnership with the library. And so what you were saying earlier about people taking a chance on you, the other thing with the partnership with the library is we tell our participating authors and our attendees like, Hey, we know everybody has a book budget.

Mm-hmm. You know, based on what your numbers are. But most of the participating authors books are in the Prince George's County Memorial, uh, library system. And you can borrow it. So spend all your money on the books you can buy, and then you can also help an author by borrowing their book. 'cause if enough people borrow their book and request it, they get 10 requests.

They'll buy in. The library will buy another copy for the system because that, it's a numbers thing. So we tell people, there's so many. Non-money ways or freeways Yeah. That people can help. Authors that maybe you're not sure of, you just can't afford to buy their book, borrow it from the library, do an interstate.

'cause maybe you don't live in Prince George's County. But, um, a lot of times you can do an interstate library borrowing thing and your library system can borrow from theirs. But again, it gets the circulating and if you write a review, if you follow them, like there's so many things that don't cost money that if you're just willing to put forth the effort Yeah.

For an author that you had a good engagement with. Mm-hmm. Um, so that's the other thing. But the hearing you all's comments, you probably see I was tearing up because that's, that's the core of what we wanted for the right women book fest for authors to feel and community with each other. When we do stupid stuff, we try to share like, don't do this 'cause that was bad.

You know? Um, 'cause there are other mistakes you can make in lessons you can learn. But don't make the mistake we made like. We're learn from those mistakes. Yeah. You, but sometimes they're so costly and that's again, with that, the one that failed with the million lives. She just was too ambitious. At least from the outside looking in.

It seems like, like not, not a, not reasonable expectations for the size of her team. The venue, like the venue can crush you because I know what we are paying. Five figures low. Five figures at Buoy Comfort and, and Conference Center. Oh, in Buoy, Maryland. But we had looked at, oh sidebar, lemme backtrack. So Marietta was free.

Mm-hmm. Because it was, so we did four Years Free, which was great because it was considered a cultural event and Heather had gotten married there, so she already knew the staff and they had a relationship so that. You know, set yourself up for success because our first year we weren't even sure it's gonna be an annual thing.

We're like, well, we have this idea, let's see if it's gonna fly. And it did. And then Marietta worked with us through the pandemic and all that, and it, we kept our momentum. But if first year going out, you choose the Baltimore Convention Center. I can't imagine what just the fee for the convention center was.

There were a lot 

[00:40:52] Samantha Heil: of, a lot of issues. Christie and I were both tabling at. That book festival. Oh, I didn't know you, we were both there. Yeah. At the convention center. Oh yeah. So this, uh, just about a month ago, there was a very large convention down in Baltimore that made national news because, um, the event organizer basically promised over, over, promised, and way under delivered Yes.

Is how to put that. And I will say just from having been inside all of the hoopla, that it was very messy and a lot of people are very hurt. And I think as an event organizer, the last thing you want to do is piss off your authors. That's just really like the baseline. 

[00:41:33] Rich Bennett: Well, and it could hurt other people like you.

You're trying to put together an event. Yes, it has. 

[00:41:38] Samantha Heil: And people are now sort of, uh, you know, I, I have had people reach out, um, because that particular person was supposed to be, um, tabling at my event and I actually had to let them go because, um, no, yeah, just isn't, isn't gonna work. 'cause I had people reach out and say, I'm uncomfortable.

Don't wanna be in the room. So, you know, it ended up being a much bigger thing. I mean, it got all the way to the guard and covered it all the way in the uk. I mean, wow. It was huge. Mm-hmm. And so not only, you know, does it kind of give a bad name to people who are running book events legitimately and really putting so much effort into it.

But there really was a level of dishonesty that I've never seen in the book community. Um, and so for us, you know. I don't think we're ever gonna see any money back, but I think that we are definitely, um, lessons learned. Yeah. And, um, you know, a lot, lots of lessons learned. So 

[00:42:31] Rich Bennett: you have one coming up 'cause the la the first one you do is at Bel Air Armory.

[00:42:36] Samantha Heil: Yes. So this year, this year is also gonna be at Bel Army. Oh, it's okay. Yes. We're signed on for August 23rd from 10 to two book fair at Bel Air. We're free. Come on over and check us out. Um, it is August 23rd this year, but, and you get the inside scoop. Um, I am expanding next year, so I will be at Hartford Community College at A-P-G-F-C-U.

I will be in the arena. In the arena. Wow. Such congratulations. So we will be, um, tripling. The authors next year. Wow. Yeah. Yep. We're going from, um, this year we have just a little bit over 40 because it's, we have a lot of table sharing going on. Right. Yeah. Um, so there's not that many tables, but next year it'll probably be up to one 10.

So we definitely need, need community to come on out and support us. We had 1300 people in the door last year. It is wild. Um, I was, um, amazed, uh, looking at, like, just looking out over the armory at one point. Mm-hmm. It was just people. Um, and it was just such a cool experience to see the community come out and be so supportive and, you know, really put their money where their mouth is.

They really did. They showed up and they bought books. Yes, they did. And we were just. I mean, we were all so amazed. So that's outstanding. It was, it was amazing. It was a really cool feeling. It was really just cool to know that people care about literacy. Yes. And people care that people are reading. And reading is important.

Yes. And because we hear so much how, you know, the reading scores and they're horrible. They're horrible in this country. They just are, um, part of, they do that again. What's the date of that again? What's that? What's the date of that one? So that's August 8th next year. That's a Saturday 26th, 2026. This year is August 23rd.

This year is August 23rd at the Bel Air Armory. And, um, yeah, I mean, it's, it's wild. It's been a wild experience. We've, uh, we've really blown up over the past. I have a waiting list of over 50, still over 50 authors. Um, but Bravo to 

[00:44:28] Cardyn Brooks: you because that speaks to what you, what you have created. 

[00:44:33] Samantha Heil: It's, it's been really cool.

And I just feel really lucky to have so many people in the community that are so supportive. I have a wonderful book club. They, they show up anytime I ask them to do anything. I mean, they're just wonderful humans. Yes. Put it on your calendar. I, 

[00:44:46] Rich Bennett: I love because I couldn't make it last year. Okay. Something came up, I forgot what it was.

Um. But I love going to these things. Maybe you still 

[00:44:55] Samantha Heil: owe Erin an a OL cd, I think from our last interview, and I think she was, she didn't get it? No, she didn't get it. I sent it to her. Did you? Oh, look at your face. No, you, he, he promised, he promised my co-author an A OL cd. Like a, you know, a, a very old one.

Yeah. Um, little bit of nostalgia because our book series is based in the early two thousands. I love it. And so we were joking about a OL and she was waiting for you and your a l cd. I'm still 

[00:45:23] Rich Bennett: waiting for an email back from a OL. Oh, okay. For the cd. 

[00:45:30] Cardyn Brooks: That's a OL sound, the hilarious whatever it is. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Oh yeah. I can't even 

[00:45:35] Samantha Heil: remember. Well, we hope everybody can come out and hang out with us this year. And Pardon has an event too, if you wanna tell us the date and 

[00:45:40] Cardyn Brooks: Oh, sure. So the Wright women, uh, book fest, our grand finale year, we are Saturday, July 19th. That day is the table author tabling will have about a 120 authors, um, mostly, um, fiction, nonfiction and adult.

But this year we're gonna have a separate children's room that has about 10 authors, uh, drag queen story time, uh, crafts. And, uh, we are so fortunate because this year, Kim c Lee, who's a very successful, uh, indie children's author, is in charge of that because, uh, Heather and I children's. That's not our area of expertise, right?

And so we felt like in past years it's floundered because that's not our area of expertise. And Kim agreed with us and she was willing to, uh, to volunteer to, to make that better for everybody. So, um, we're just really excited. So that's the first day from 12 noon to 5:00 PM at the Buoy Comfort Inn Conference Center in Buoy, Maryland.

And then a little bit in response to the failure of that, um, uh, book event at, um, the Baltimore Convention Center, we decided to go conservative for day two. We were originally gonna be at Buoy Comfort Inn and Conference Center on day two as well, but we reached out to the library and. Saving almost $5,000.

We're day two for workshops and some panels, uh, discussions. We're gonna be at the South Buoy library. That's awesome. A branch, uh, which is only a few miles away from the hotel. And, uh, not, not too hard to get to. But yeah, we just made, we're like, you know what? The tabling day is the most important day.

Mm-hmm. And the second day we want, it has substance, but it's not worth that financial risk in this environment. Because originally when we signed the contract, it was even before last year's election. 

Oh. 

[00:47:38] Cardyn Brooks: So yeah. So, um, and then the library's already our partner, so, uh, just kudos to libraries and librarians.

Yes. Who just, when I reached out to them and I just said, this is, and they of course they had heard, they had heard about the failure. Yeah. The failed. And they were like, we totally understand. Uh, you can have, uh, there's a second floor on the South buoy branch library. That's a big, uh, meeting room, a conference room, and a smaller room.

But between those three rooms, we can do all the things we want to do on that second day. And they're like, come on. So we, we had to make some adjustments. Adjustments because it's a Sunday and they're only open from one to five. So that compressed our day and we're gonna do some things virtually and connect in that way, but very quickly it will like a 48 hour turnaround.

The library's like, we've got you. 

[00:48:26] Samantha Heil: Wow. That's amazing. Now are you gonna have 

[00:48:28] Rich Bennett: workshops and panel discovery? No, I 

[00:48:30] Samantha Heil: am completely, and I feel like I will probably stay completely a vendor event. I think that's smart. You'll like, that's, I love panels, you know, as an, as a writer, as a, but as an event planner, I don't see those being very profitable and they're never very well attended.

Mm-hmm. They are for writers and they are for people who really want to dig into their craft. And so if that's your com, your audience, that's your target audience. Those are great. Yeah. Um, but you're bringing in those people probably at a fee of some sort. Mm-hmm. And they're coming in to learn. Right.

Right. And so for me, mine is really to center the authors. Yeah. The authors are the stars, they are the people who you are coming to see the audience is the community. Mm-hmm. And for the community. They're not really coming to us to learn about author's craft or, you know, whatever, writing, whatever. And so all of the ones that I've been to, you know, panels and discussions and all of that are great.

Um, but I haven't seen them be very well attended, you know, as, as Cardin said. Yeah. So, so is, 

[00:49:28] Rich Bennett: uh, so the panels aren't, like, they're not where the authors sitting up there with a host and then the people attending can ask about their characters and everything. They are, but they are. Yeah. Sometimes 

[00:49:39] Samantha Heil: you have just a few people sitting in the audience there.

Yeah. Yeah. And, 

[00:49:42] Kristie Wolf: and it depends how the event is structured. Mm-hmm. Right. Um, and how the event organizer wants to structure it. Right. And so. It depends what you're looking for. It is. Um, there's an event in Massachusetts that I went to last year called Fall in Love, new England, and I'm trekking it all the way back up to Massachusetts again this year.

Um, and it was one of my favorite events. It was a two day event. This year, it's a three day event. Oh, wow. And Wow. Um, all day, all day panels. Yeah. And then in the evening is the book signing, and then there's a big lunch, there's a big dinner in the ballroom, um, that their readers and the authors attend.

And as an author, it was fabulous for me Right. Because I spoke on two panels and I spoke about my books. 

[00:50:24] Rich & Wendy: Yeah. 

[00:50:24] Kristie Wolf: Now we're all there in the same hotel for the weekend. We're, I had, there were 40, 50 readers and authors in the room listening to us speak. Right. But there weren't, there was nothing else going on.

Yeah. Right, right. And so authors didn't have to leave their tables to go speak on a panel. Mm-hmm. Readers didn't have to leave the signing. 

[00:50:39] Rich & Wendy: Mm-hmm. Oh, okay. Um, 

[00:50:40] Kristie Wolf: and so once. People heard about me talking about my books. Yeah. They, nobody knew me. Right. I'm not even from that area. Um, they came to my table and they were like, oh, we heard you speak.

Oh. And there was everything from like, you know. Author Accounting. Yeah. To, um, you know, characterization. And then I did this really fun thing called speed dating, where we had to make, um, trading cards like baseball cards. You're don't tell my husband. It was the girls weekend Happens at the book fair.

Stays at the book fair. Um, so we made trading cards of our characters and there were 10 tables of 10 readers each, so. 50 readers and, and authors in the room. Yes. Yes. Actually, they had to kick the authors out because it was a first come, first serve for readers and five authors. And we had 10 minutes at each table and, and we sold those readers on our characters.

So we hands out the trading cards love. And I was like, so this is him and this is her. And then I sold so many books that way. Um, but I also was able to make like good reader connections because I was sitting next to them in workshops. I was sitting at the lunch, I was hanging out at the bar with 'em.

Mm-hmm. And so, you know, we're all, say the name of the event again, please. I, it's called Fall in Love, new England. Okay. So it really just depends how the event is structured. Um, and it's structured well, I guess a, an event make sense win, right. Because 

[00:51:56] Cardyn Brooks: Yeah. I, and that's what we learned the hard way in 2023.

Uh, our first day we had. Tabling. But then we had, um, some panels. Now our panels were well attended, but for us coordinating it was a nightmare. Right. And that's why then Heather was like, I think we should do two separate days. Mm-hmm. In the first day. Exactly. It is just tabling no. Makes panel discussion.

Yeah. Because you don't, 

[00:52:19] Rich Bennett: like you said, you don't wanna pull the authors away. You know what? You would have to make a choice. Yes. Right. Yeah. Yeah, that makes, that makes perfect sense. Yeah. 

[00:52:26] Samantha Heil: Yeah. And so for now I'm doing strictly vendor event, but in the future, you know, that could change if it goes 

[00:52:34] Rich Bennett: more than two days or more than a day.

Yeah, yeah, for 

[00:52:35] Samantha Heil: sure. But I've definitely learned, you know, how to split the authors and how to kind of get the, you know, community involved. Mm-hmm. I've got different people coming in, like the children's section. I really leaned into the children's section and that's sort of, it's funny because I have no experience in children's whatsoever.

Um, but I found that community wants something for their kids to do. Yeah. Kids, kids can't be sitting at home doing nothing. And what better way to spend a day than to bring them to a book fair. So we had faith painting, we had an art table, we had Pete the Cat running around. We're gonna have all those things again this year.

Um, hopefully some new fun little things going on too. And, um, you ought 

[00:53:11] Rich Bennett: bring Bluey and see if Bluey can catch the cat. 

[00:53:15] Samantha Heil: Yeah, I don't think that's bluey. I also don't, like, bluey was first a TV show, so I really tried to get like a literary character, like a beloved, like book character. And so when I went to get, you know, my, my character, uh, the, the list of them wasn't really all that impressive because they were all TV shows when that eventually became books.

Yeah. I wanted, well you could 

[00:53:36] Rich Bennett: always get Clifford the Big Red Dog. Yeah, that's a good idea. Chase the cat. Yeah. 

[00:53:40] Samantha Heil: Clifford could chase the 

[00:53:41] Rich Bennett: cat. Clifford's a big dog. He would chase every, I don't think he'd 

[00:53:44] Samantha Heil: fit in the Armory, is that either. My daughter loves Clifford too. That's such a good idea too. I didn't even think of that.

And it's funny because, so I paid for the Pete the Cat costume because I was gonna get somebody to rent, but it was half the price for me to just buy the Pete the cat costume. Yeah. So it's always somebody I know, right. In the Pete, the cat costume. And I think it's becoming like kind of a, a matter of pride now.

Like I 

[00:54:06] Rich Bennett: was Pete. Love that. I ain. Never heard of Pete the Cat until you told me. Really? Yeah. 

[00:54:10] Samantha Heil: Oh. We love Pete. The cat is from like the seventies and old gonna say I around for a long Yeah. Long time. Like the guy who wrote him is very like, 'cause he, he's groovy. Like Pete, the cat is super groovy. Yes. You know, he's into like peace and love and Sure.

You don't mean Felix 

[00:54:23] Rich Bennett: the cat. No. Pete. No Pete the cat. You're looking at me. You don't remember Felix. Was it Felix the 

[00:54:28] Kristie Wolf: cat from No, that was Sebastian the cat. Oh, 

[00:54:33] Rich Bennett: Sebastian. Felix, the cat I thought was from like the seventies. Like 

[00:54:38] Samantha Heil: I, he was the guy who was just black and white. Right? Yeah. Felix was. Okay. So that's a different cat, but, well, obviously, because his name's not Pete, but Pete, he's groovy.

[00:54:48] Kristie Wolf: I didn't watch a lot of TV shows when I was a little kid and my mom made me watch Elvis movies. 

[00:54:52] Rich Bennett: I 

[00:54:52] Samantha Heil: don't 

[00:54:53] Kristie Wolf: know. 

[00:54:54] Samantha Heil: I love that 

[00:54:54] Rich Bennett: so much. I can't remember Felix. That was like a regular cartoon, jealous cartoon show on TV though. 

[00:55:00] Samantha Heil: Yeah. I don't know. Sometimes it's hard to know which one came first, but I think about like this old beloved book characters that really like, you know, that was a book series for a long time before it.

Maybe because like Pizza's TV show now you can find 'em on tv. Um, but some of like Clifford the Berenstein Bears mm-hmm. The, you know mm-hmm. I don't know, whatever. Um, and those classics kids don't read. My daughter's reading Junie b Jones right now, God. Which let me tell you, as an adult reading it, I have some feelings about Junie b Jones because.

It doesn't hold up. I'll tell you in 20, in the year of our Lord 2025, that book does not hold up. 'cause I'm reading it and I'm like, this is not, it's like, it's not politically correct. It's not worded at all like nice. Like it's, 

[00:55:41] Rich Bennett: I'm the same way. Because if Dr. Seuss, when I got them Green Eggs, come to find out it was mold.

So yeah, he was all raw that that Green eggs and egg. I've never heard that. 

[00:55:53] Samantha Heil: Never heard that. That's mold. Is that what it is? For real? Mold's green. Well, yeah, but how do you know the eggs were moldy? Were you there? 

[00:56:01] Rich Bennett: In the book. I don't think it never, well, you gotta mess with me too. Listen. You started at, so Sam, 

[00:56:07] Kristie Wolf: here's a thought.

I think, think that, I thought you 

[00:56:09] Rich Bennett: said Susan for Rich. 

[00:56:10] Kristie Wolf: No, not Santa, not Sam. Me. Trust me Santa, this is not a question you're gonna wanna answer. Oh God. There we go. So I'm thinking that we have Felix the cat for the kids, but for the most, no. Can we get like an updated version of the Hardy Boys? Maybe like Sam Dean from Stranger Things?

Let not tell you. No, no, no. Supernatural. 

[00:56:30] Samantha Heil: So last year I had cutouts of the Bat Boys, or they're from a court of Thorn and Roses. Yeah, they were up, they were shirtless. You could go take your picture with them. And were adding a special guest this year. Yeah. Mr. Zaden Ryerson from Fourth Wing is gonna be out and about.

Uh, he, you'll find him at the book fair. You can Nice a person, not a cutout. I wish. Oh, okay. Um, no, I'm, it's a cut. I'm still excited. It's still good. I promise. We'll put a little background. You come take a picture however you want. Please be silly. Be funny. I think people were scared to like. Act silly with them.

They were just like, and then I saw some people like, you know, tiptoeing up, like, I'm gonna take a silly picture with them now. Like, please take all, that's what they're there for. Yeah. That's what point. Take silly pictures. I could 

[00:57:08] Rich Bennett: see somebody throwing their leg up into his arms. Yes. That's what 

[00:57:11] Samantha Heil: basically they were hugging them and like, just silly.

I have 

[00:57:14] Kristie Wolf: my own, I have a full, full-size banner that is about five feet tall of my shirtless super soldier, which be at table, a short guy. Okay. I know. I cheaped out on the banner. I didn't get the big one. I put him on a stand. So he's like that tall. Yeah, right. I was gonna say, she's gonna put him on a stand now.

Um, mines six foot. He's, he's, yeah. Yeah. So come to my table and meet my super soldier. Take a picture with him. 

[00:57:36] Rich Bennett: And I don't think you want Felix the cat for the kids. 

[00:57:38] Kristie Wolf: No, no, no. So you 

[00:57:40] Rich Bennett: sent Felix the cat for the kids. 

[00:57:42] Kristie Wolf: So, um, I have stickers. They're not that inappropriate, like they say. Good girl for the bad boy.

Yeah. And my other sticker says, I like books. Like I like men Hard. 

[00:57:53] Cardyn Brooks: And now did you special order those or did you find them already? My designer 

[00:57:58] Kristie Wolf: made them. Okay, nice. And they're cute. They have my logo on the bottom. I love it. And, um, I, when there's events with kids, I have to, I don't put them on my table anymore.

Yeah. Because little kids come over and they say, oh, a sticker can I have one got high. I also stopped putting chocolate on my table too, because little kids come over and they start looking at my book covers. Yeah. And I mean. It's a shirtless guy. Like you see that at the beach, but some of the little boys get all funny and they're like, oh, I know what kind of book that is.

And like, girlfriend, your mother. It's 

[00:58:24] Samantha Heil: definitely something I have to address this year because when we were at a million lives, I had never, I'm very hard to rattle, right? I read romance, I read all kinds of romance. Like I, I'm walking through a million lives and the art, the character art that people had out, I was scandalized.

I was like, what? I mean. I, so they're 

[00:58:43] Cardyn Brooks: going for shock value maybe. I really 

[00:58:44] Samantha Heil: think it was, we're talking multiple people in all kinds of compromising positions and all of, and, and some of it are like, okay, so one was looked like a Yeti. He's like a big, like white, oh, you know, like, like a, the beast or like the bumble from, uh, root off the red nose.

Right. Okay. So the guy looks like, but he wasn't his hair. He was like smooth. A smooth big Yeti. Yeah. And I'm looking at my friend and I said, what is that? And she said, that's Jack Frost.

Because I guess it had something to do Yes. With the book. And Jack Frost was in a very compromising position, and I just was, I never thought that I would have to put in instructions. Like, I'm sorry, this is a family friendly event. Right. You gotta put this away. Yes. And please, like, your discreet covers should be on like, yes, Christy's covers are fine.

That's about as, about as much as we can do, I think at the book fair, at Bel Air. So, um, yeah, we're keeping it clean. Anything 

[00:59:36] Kristie Wolf: wrong with abs. No, no. Abs are on display. Yeah, we're 

[00:59:39] Samantha Heil: good with abs, but you just 

[00:59:40] Rich Bennett: can't bring the toy pepper, chili peppers. 

[00:59:43] Samantha Heil: No. And she can't bring her character art. 

[00:59:46] Kristie Wolf: I don't 

[00:59:47] Samantha Heil: have 

[00:59:47] Kristie Wolf: character art yet.

[00:59:49] Samantha Heil: I think maybe someday. You might. Oh, I will. Yeah. Uh, people, readers love character. They do. That's great. They do like great. Keep it behind the, you know, behind the table. Yes. And then show them when they, they buy the book you want. The, I'm working with, um, 

[00:59:59] Kristie Wolf: a company now who's doing special editions, box special editions, and she's gonna do character art as well, so I'm cool.

Super excited to see that. That's fantastic. Yeah. 

[01:00:08] Cardyn Brooks: What are you all's thoughts about, uh, all these special editions with the. Um, the, uh, the sprayed edges and the, I think it's a industry mean, it's so beautiful. It's 

[01:00:18] Samantha Heil: the, so the book industry has been losing money on paperbacks and hardbacks for years now. I mean, they've just become almost obsolete because of audio books and eBooks and all of that.

Really? People don't wanna read physical books. Yeah. So in the past couple of years, there's been this resurgence of hardbacks, but they're making them, I mean, they're stunning. We have a woman in the community, her name is Amber, and she works at, um, bookish signs and more, and she does. Some stunning work. I mean, she not only sprays, but she does like the 3D printing of like, I'm talking like art.

Yeah. There works there 

[01:00:49] Cardyn Brooks: works of art. Yes. Like you almost don't wanna open them. Mm-hmm. Because they just, they're so beautiful. They're so beautiful. They're troph. Yes. And there are plenty 

[01:00:56] Kristie Wolf: of readers out there who will read the ebook and then if they like it mm-hmm. They will go by their trophy to keep on themselves.

Even my plain old paperbacks. 

[01:01:03] Rich & Wendy: Mm-hmm. 

[01:01:03] Kristie Wolf: I have readers that come to events and say, I read your ebook, and I would like a signed copy from my shelf. Yeah. They're not gonna, they're not gonna read the book again probably. Right, right. And they're gonna put it on their shelf, on their signed copy shelf. Yes. Um, and Kayla, um, Kelly Deman, um, she has sprayed some edges for me.

She's done mine too. Um mm-hmm. And she does, she does beautiful work. And you know, I take 'em with me to events. Usually I sell, I usually sell one or two. Yeah. I'm almost out. Kayla, I'm gonna be calling you. 

[01:01:28] Rich Bennett: It's funny because I think of my son, who's 32, and my daughter who's 23, and even all their friends, they like the physical book.

Mm-hmm. 

[01:01:40] Rich Bennett: And they won't get rid of them. No, they keep 'em and, and they'll read them again because I got my daughter an e-reader before she didn't like it. 

[01:01:48] Samantha Heil: It's a, I think if you grew up on physical books and you're trying to skip to an e-reader, but I didn't appreciate audiobooks and eBooks until I had no time to sit down with the physical books.

Yes. Mm-hmm. And now. Well, and now all I do is I, I do them in separate. So have you ever read the book Atomic Habits or heard about the book Atomic Habits? Yes. Okay. So this man talks about like habit stacking. Right. And so you're doing something else, but while you're doing that thing, you're gonna, you know, do something else in form a habit.

Right? Right. So I habit stacked reading, that was how I became like more of a prolific reader. And so I will have, uh, you know, an air AirPod in mm-hmm. Whatever you call mm-hmm. Whatever you call them in my ear. And, you know, I'm folding laundry, I'm doing dishes. Mm-hmm. I am, uh, whatever, you know, and, but I'm listening to my book.

Mm-hmm. My e-reader is sitting on my bed. My physical book is either in my purse or, you know, somewhere else in the house. And so depending on where I'm at, 

[01:02:40] Cardyn Brooks: right. 

[01:02:40] Samantha Heil: That, you know, time is what I'm reading and how I'm reading. Um, but for a long time I was strictly ebook and audio. 'cause I, and like during the newborn phase with my daughter, I didn't have a hand for a book, so.

Right. You gotta. Find other ways to do that. It, well, I can, 

[01:02:53] Rich Bennett: there's certain books I can listen to. Mm-hmm. Like novels. I can, yeah. If, if it's a good person that's doing the voice. Yeah. Some self-help books, I can, but most of your self-help books, you need that physical. 

[01:03:06] Samantha Heil: Yeah. See, I'm the opposite. I love nonfiction on audio.

Mm-hmm. And I actually like, because I'm in and out of the car. Yeah. And I feel like you can pick up self-help again. No problem. I don't have to be reminded of story. I don't have to be prompted. It's just, you know, here's the next part of this. Certain areas of that. Yeah. 

[01:03:22] Kristie Wolf: So I can't remember where Rich's studio is, but I can put down a book and pick it up two months later and know exactly where we left off.

[01:03:29] Samantha Heil: I can't do that. I'm like that too. I need to be, 

[01:03:32] Cardyn Brooks: but I will say this too, for, um, like a long, uh, car ride, Mindy Kaling any, because she does her own audio books. Mm-hmm. And she's just, so her delivery. I guess because it's her material. Yeah. I mean that, it makes, uh, that's one of my favorite genres. So important makes, yeah.

Memoirs 

[01:03:51] Samantha Heil: read by the author or one of my favorite genres. Leslie Jones. Oh, Leslie Jones is so good. Did you do I can't drive unless, because I'm, I know 

[01:03:58] Rich Bennett: I'm gonna write, wait, Leslie Jones, I used be Saturday. Yes. Yes. She has a great memoir. Yes. It's, it's so you know who else this was? I get that. Stunning 

[01:04:06] Samantha Heil: was Viola Davis wrote in, I mean, out of this world.

I was, I had a trouble driving during it because I was like, choked up. Yeah. And I mean, her story is amazing. Wow. Yeah, it's amazing. So that's another thing I love on audio is hearing the actual author and 

[01:04:21] Kristie Wolf: PSA for all the Dark Romance girlies out there. If you haven't read the Butcher and Blackbird books yet Oh, so good.

Listen to them. Oh, trust me, ladies, that Irish 

[01:04:31] Samantha Heil: accent 

[01:04:32] Kristie Wolf: is to 

[01:04:33] Samantha Heil: die for. They are very good. And she sings in the second one. What I thought was so cool, like this whole full cast audio thing, that's like becoming a really popular It is so cool. It feels like you're experiencing a movie. Yeah. But they're in your ears.

Mm-hmm. It's so cool. You hear the background, it's, yeah, they make like all kinds of noises, like all kinds of, all kinds of noises.

[01:04:58] Rich Bennett: Alright lady. Something very important. Yeah. And I'm gonna, I'm gonna start with you car. Tell everybody your website and how they can get your books. 

[01:05:05] Cardyn Brooks: Oh, okay. Fantastic. So I'm still on theon and I apologize for people for reasons. I understand why the people who've cut that off. So I support, I really ask people to borrow my book from the library and read it and review it.

I love sales. That's great. Mm-hmm. Um, but that's not for everybody's budget or inclination and I just real people to read. And if they. Would do a review on Good Reads or whatever their favorite review site is. Mm-hmm. That's actually what works for me the most. And I think I more have that attitude just because of the doing the Bitchy Quill podcast with Heather Brooks and our finale year of the Right Women Book Fest.

Um, so, and I forgot to mention, mention earlier that, uh, day one, Saturday, July 19th is ticketed. I think it's about $29 plus whatever the event bright fee is. So maybe around $34 total. And then I. I hope Heather will forgive me, but I'm 99% sure that with each adult ticket, a kid can come for free. And if I'm wrong about that, just say, I heard it on the podcast, Cardin said it, and we'll let you in.

But yeah. What did you say the name of the podcast, our podcast is called The Bitchy Quill. The Bitchy Quill. Yes. We talk about bookish stuff, but we talk about kind of life from a feminist perspective. Um, I just love the title. Yeah, we, we, you sold me already. Thank you. Well, we worked with it. We're like, because we wanna make it clear that it's a little edgy.

We're not using profanity or that it's not edgy in that way, but we're talking about mature topics. Um, mostly somehow connected to the bookish world and publishing and whatnot. But we, our first, I think our first episode was towards the end of October where we were just encouraging people to like. Uh, read the online PDF searchable, PDF of project 2025.

We weren't telling people what to think. We were just saying it's almost a thousand pages. But the searchable PDF people could look at, like if you have school age kids, look at what they wanna do for education. If you have an elderly person mm-hmm. Or your elderly, and just see if it's in alignment with what you want to do or what you want the government to do.

So that's why we started at the end of October to just encourage people to Yeah. So, but we're like, I was like, okay, well we want people to know, like, we 

[01:07:29] Rich Bennett: got an attitude. If you start a podcast, Christy, just remember, can't be called Red Hot Chili Pepper. 'cause I think that's your trademark. 

[01:07:38] Cardyn Brooks: Okay. Oh, and the other thing I wanted say about day two is free for the, um, day two Sunday, uh, July 20th at the South Buoy Library.

That's free. Awesome. 

[01:07:47] Rich Bennett: How did people get your books? Yes, and the toy peppers. 

[01:07:52] Samantha Heil: You're very into these toy peppers. I think he, I never heard, I've never seen the toy Peppers toy. I'm 

[01:07:59] Kristie Wolf: gonna buy some toy peppers and put my logo on them. Think you should. I think you should. And I'm gonna put Rich's picture on them.

Yeah, no, my God knows. 

[01:08:05] Rich Bennett: Especially if they take a battery.

[01:08:10] Kristie Wolf: You 

[01:08:10] Rich Bennett: alright, Sam? Did we almost choke? You 

[01:08:14] Samantha Heil: almost lost 

[01:08:15] Rich Bennett: my squatter. There's no filter on this podcast. No, I see that. But Christie started all that so, 

[01:08:25] Kristie Wolf: so my books are available at my website, christie wolf.com. That's Christie with a k. R-I-S-T-I-E and Wolf, just like the animal, WOLF. Um, my books are available on Amazon.

I'm on Kindle and Kindle Unlimited for all the e-readers out there. And they're also available, I'm most major retailer platforms, um, like Barnes and noble.com, and they are available in person. So if you go to my website or follow me on Instagram or Facebook or TikTok and you're local, um, there are lots of options throughout the summer to come and meet me in person.

And I wanna meet you too. Um, I'll be at the book fair at Bel Air on August 23rd. I'll be at the Wright Woman's book Fest on July 13th, 

[01:09:07] Rich Bennett: 19th night, July 19th. 

[01:09:10] Kristie Wolf: Um, make sure 

[01:09:10] Rich Bennett: you get good directions. Yes. No, I, I was there last year. I was like, she, yeah, she knows apparently that, 

[01:09:16] Kristie Wolf: maybe not, that's why I always leave a half hour early and Yeah.

And so I'll be at about town, I'll be at, um, first Fridays. I'll be at this first Friday this year, um, of the first Friday in Bel Air of this year, on June, whatever, the June 6th maybe again, um, and other places. So look for me and come and say hi. Nice. It 

[01:09:35] Rich Bennett: would've been perfect timing if, when we were talking about the toy chili chili pepper, if somebody's phone just started vibrating.

Right. 

[01:09:44] Samantha Heil: We were good and made sure our phones were not on before we started. Yes. So. Put my, 

[01:09:50] Kristie Wolf: I may have trouble getting here, but once I'm here I know what to 

[01:09:53] Rich Bennett: do. Yeah. Oh God. Yeah. We know. 

[01:09:57] Samantha Heil: On that note, you can find my books, uh, it's www dot ES rosalyn, R-O-S-A-L-Y-N n.com. Those are my books that I write with my best friend, Erin.

Mm-hmm. And, um, we have a. Uh, teen series, um, called Mix Tape. That's based in the early two thousands, um, where you get to follow this young girl through her, um, kind of self discovery journey over, um, let's see, how many years is it? Four eight. I think it's eight years total. Or maybe it's six. I don't know.

But you get to follow her throughout her journey and get to kind of watch her. It's, it's pretty cool. Um, and then the book fair at Bel Air is on August 23rd from 10 to two. Completely free. Lots of things to do. So many great authors. Please find us on Instagram and Facebook at book fair at Bel Air to see all of the authors, all of the cool things we're doing.

Um, and definitely come visit us. 

[01:10:51] Rich Bennett: You're forgetting something. 

[01:10:52] Samantha Heil: What am I forgetting? 

[01:10:53] Rich Bennett: Don't you have a podcast? 

[01:10:55] Samantha Heil: I do have a podcast, but it's like completely unrelated. It's all right. My podcast is called Creating Joyful Readers, in which I talk to secondary literacy educators about how to create, um, happy kids who loves books.

How is that unrelated? Uh, because it's like for teachers, like I'm talking directly to high school English teachers in the podcast about 

[01:11:16] Rich Bennett: writing, right. And 

[01:11:17] Samantha Heil: books. Yeah. Right. It's a separate business. I don't even think of them as the same thing. It's 

[01:11:21] Rich Bennett: more related to this than freaking chili peppers. I don't think so.

Don't think so. Ladies, thank you so much. Thank you for having us. Thank 

[01:11:32] Cardyn Brooks: you for making this possible because it's you all's connection that facilitated this. So just thank you to all, absolutely. Happy to have you. Well, 

[01:11:38] Rich Bennett: Christie, well, you, you both know, so I'm letting you know too. The door's always open.

Thank you for listening to the conversations with Rich Bennett. I hope you enjoyed today's episode and learn something from it as I did. If you'd like to hear more conversations like this. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode. And if you have a moment, I'd love it if you could leave a review.

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