Shownotes
This week, I sit down with Lainey Cameron, host of The Best of Women’s Fiction podcast, a show that highlights authors that Lainey respects, as well as interviews with best-selling and women fiction authors.
Each episode, Lainey and her guests share what inspired a favourite author’s book, as well as what advice they’d give to other writers.
Lainey is also the author of the award-winning novel, The Exit Strategy, which was inspired by a decade of being the only woman in the corporate boardroom. It’s been called a “rallying call for women to believe in themselves and join together” and tells the story of a Silicon Valley investor who first meets her husband’s mistress across the negotiating table.
If someone’s a great talent but a pain in the ass to work with, that’s going to be a problem.
For her first book, Lainey hired a voiceover professional to read the audio version, and she shares here how that process works.
Far from simply reading the words on a page, the artist needs to connect with the story and characters, to ensure the author’s vision remains, even when the end result can be something very different from what the author envisaged.
On Creating a Brand Through an Experiment
Lainey originally started podcasting as a video broadcaster using Streamyard for live interviews, and then decided to take that to an audio format.
To her pleasant surprise, the audio version of the show has overtake the video version, and is really taking off, helping her to connect more authors to a wider audience.
I wish I had had that kind of advice when starting out.
As the podcast has grown, Lainey is determined to continue giving a voice to lesser-known authors, and connecting them with the talent that can help them grow their audience.
The Importance of Vetting and Quality
As Lainey’s show has grown, so has the amount of cold pitches she’s receiving to have authors as guests on her show. While this can be a good thing when it comes to episode growth, it can also impact the amount of guests she has on, due to the extra research involved.
- A limited amount of time to read the books sent to her
- Minimal pre-release information or promo sheets
- A lack of peer reviews to ensure the book and author are right for her show
Since Lainey is very conscientious when it comes to who and what she shares with her audience, this extra awareness can cause problems that weren’t there before.
The Continuing Problem with the Tech Industry
Lainey’s background is in the tech start-up world, specifically in Silicon Valley. Being the only high-flying woman executive in the room would come with its own challenges, on top of the job any executive would need to do as part of their everyday life.
It is frustrating and tiring to be the only woman in the room, and to be the only senior woman on the team.
It often lead to Lainey needing to be twice as good as the men in the same position, and understand that the microscope was on her even more because of her gender.
How She Ended Up Hunting with Stoned Tribesmen in Tanzania
As digital nomads, both Lainey and her husband have traveled to numerous parts of the world, leading to a mix of scary and funny adventures.
One that sticks in Lainey’s mind is when they were on a safari tour in Africa, and ended up going hunting with a bunch of stoned teenage tribesmen in Tanzania. Now that’s not something we can all say we’ve done!
Join us for an entertaining chat about the writing world, the ongoing toxic masculinity in the tech world, and why being a digital nomad offers incredible life lessons if you can take the opportunity to grab them.
Connect with Lainey:
Contact me: danny@podcasterstories.com
My equipment:
- Electro-Voice RE320
- Motu M2 Audio Interface
- Denon DJ HP-1100 Over Ear Headphones
- Podcast Pro Boom Arm by Accu-Lite and O.C. White
Recommended resources:
This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:
Podtrac - https://analytics.podtrac.com/privacy-policy-gdrp
Transcripts
It's interesting because I think people who went to a
Speaker:certain types of universities and came out of a certain
Speaker:frat boy culture used to go into a, like the
Speaker:Capitol finance industry is of the world. They go to
Speaker:the wall street, Right? And you got kind of that
Speaker:real growth frat boy culture on wall street. And then
Speaker:something happened about 10, 15 years ago where those same
Speaker:people graduating were going into tech instead because it was
Speaker:viewed as being where the big money big upside was.
Speaker:And so it made it worse in my opinion, because
Speaker:a certain type of person who was gravitating towards a
Speaker:certain type of life where it was all about the
Speaker:money you can make out of it. And it kind
Speaker:of made it worse. You still are in the gaming
Speaker:industry as well.
Speaker:I got really ugly and its still is a really
Speaker:ugly in gaming.
Speaker:Hi and welcome to Podcaster Stories. Each episode will have
Speaker:a conversation with podcasters from across the globe and share
Speaker:their story. What motivates them by the start to the
Speaker:show are the crucial And More will also talk about
Speaker:their personal lives. And some of the things that have
Speaker:happened to have Midem, the person who you are today
Speaker:and now here's your host, Danny Brown. Hi, welcome to
Speaker:Podcaster Stories. The show that gets to meet the people
Speaker:behind the voices of the show is we have listened
Speaker:to you this week. I have Lainey Cameron who's host
Speaker:of the best of women's fiction podcast. A show that
Speaker:brings you interviews with the best of women's fiction offers.
Speaker:So Lainey, welcome to the show. I really appreciate it.
Speaker:And just to give the gal the lesson, it was
Speaker:a quick heads-up. This is our third attempt to, to
Speaker:get them to listen to me.
Speaker:So I really appreciate the fact that you've made the
Speaker:time today. So welcome to the shop. How about you
Speaker:introduce yourself and your podcast?
Speaker:Sure. Thanks so much for inviting me. Danny is such
Speaker:a thrill to have the chance to share it with
Speaker:you. And I love your podcast. It's so fun. Seeing
Speaker:the diversity of different types of people who put together
Speaker:Podcasts. So let me tell you a little bit about
Speaker:myself. My name is Lainey Cameron. I am a full
Speaker:time digital nomad, which means that I pick places and
Speaker:my husband and I pick places around the world to
Speaker:live and work. All we need is a really good
Speaker:Wi-Fi signal wherever we are. And obviously we can talk
Speaker:about the pandemics, put a little bit of a, what
Speaker:would you say? A little bit of a problem. And
Speaker:to that, we had to make some different choices for
Speaker:the last year, but we're looking forward to getting back
Speaker:to our nomadic lifestyle, hopefully starting around October and that's
Speaker:our cross fingers hope and I'm a full time author.
Speaker:I write women's fictions. So books that are mostly enjoyed
Speaker:by women with tend to be kind of a heartwarming
Speaker:or emotional or thrilling storylines. My first book, my debut
Speaker:novel came out last year. It's called the exit strategy
Speaker:and I just got to the news last night, but
Speaker:it was in its fifth award. So I'm kind of
Speaker:celebrating on that. It's doing pretty well for a first
Speaker:novel. And I have a podcast called, like you say
Speaker:the best of women's fiction, which came out of a
Speaker:place where I wanted to use my own platform because
Speaker:I am starting to have quite quite a following. I've
Speaker:got about 7,000 followers on Instagram and I wanted it
Speaker:to use my own platform to uplift other authors who
Speaker:perhaps didn't have the visibility that I had, perhaps didn't
Speaker:yet have the readership or the following.
Speaker:And so I created the podcast as way to highlight
Speaker:author's that I admire and respect. So I tried to
Speaker:pick people who I think are among the best in
Speaker:the genre. I get a lot of pitches that they
Speaker:actually have to turn down and then its getting a
Speaker:little challenging. At this point, I'm getting a lot of
Speaker:pitches funnily from publicists, which is not something that I
Speaker:was expecting when I started the podcast. But it's fun
Speaker:because there are really short interviews. We keep them to
Speaker:15 minutes max and I ask, what is the inspiration
Speaker:behind the book? What does that germ have an idea
Speaker:that started this novel that just came out generally were
Speaker:talking about books that just released. I like to do
Speaker:the interviews and release them kind of the weekend after
Speaker:the book releases. And the reason I do that is
Speaker:really nice.
Speaker:When if you hear an interview and you like a
Speaker:book, you can go buy it right away. And very
Speaker:often and writer, world, what we do is this thing
Speaker:called pre-release campaigns where you can go buy the book,
Speaker:but it's not coming out for another three, four or
Speaker:five months. And so when you go give your money
Speaker:to whoever your book seller or have preferences and then
Speaker:you have to wait to actually read it and maybe
Speaker:it's me. I mean, I'm an impatient person. So what
Speaker:I do with the podcast is I weight. Even if
Speaker:we prerecord it, I weight and I release it right
Speaker:after the book is available. So that if someone likes
Speaker:the story, they're inspired by the author and they can
Speaker:go download it and read it at that very day.
Speaker:And so that's what I like to do. I'm a
Speaker:little different than people who do things for in advance,
Speaker:but it works for me. And it's a lot of
Speaker:fun because I'm finding that people are coming to me
Speaker:now. It's kind of funny.
Speaker:I've actually seen some big time authors post recently, some
Speaker:really big, best sellers like New York times, best sellers.
Speaker:I just read this book and this book I love
Speaker:to, I just read it and I find it from
Speaker:Blaney's podcast and its cracking me up that know people
Speaker:are like repeating it back to me that they bought
Speaker:books and loved books because they heard them on the
Speaker:podcast.
Speaker:That's awesome. And I, as the tape to a series,
Speaker:it's, it's a fiction writers. It's not a non-fiction what
Speaker:was the choice? Maier? What is the thinking behind it?
Speaker:Was it because you were a fiction writer yourself with
Speaker:your book? Or why are you not interested in Fiction?
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Because I love non-fiction books, but it was because that's
Speaker:the space I'm in. I am writing women's fiction. And
Speaker:so I felt like I had a very good handle
Speaker:on that space. I know a lot of the authors
Speaker:I've met many of them through the volunteer work that
Speaker:I do is work with an association called women's fiction
Speaker:writers association. So for me it was like, I know
Speaker:that space really well. I feel like I'm a quick
Speaker:to choose great authors. I love the non-fiction space and
Speaker:I love list listening to non fiction authors on club
Speaker:hosts these days. It's very fun to hear them talk
Speaker:about their books. I love nonfiction in audio books. I
Speaker:will actually, when the author and the rate's their own
Speaker:book, I find that fabulous when it's non-fiction I actually
Speaker:find in Fiction, it's better. If you get a professional
Speaker:narrator who is really able to perform It, it's more
Speaker:like acting when its a fiction novel fiction novel.
Speaker:That's a, what do you call that? When two words
Speaker:to me in the same thing, let's say I'm a
Speaker:writer and you're not suppose to ever say fiction novel
Speaker:because a novel by definition it's fiction. But Hey, whatever.
Speaker:So yeah, I love nonfiction, but I decided to focus
Speaker:the podcast on Fiction just because that's the space that
Speaker:I'm really familiar with. And gosh, the book world is
Speaker:so big to start with, right? You've got thousands of
Speaker:titles coming out every month that you kind of have
Speaker:to choose the focus of some type of otherwise. It
Speaker:will be really overwhelmed.
Speaker:And you had mentioned there obviously it's, it's great were
Speaker:in some club hosts at the moment that has the
Speaker:offer's is doing the reading. And it's interesting. You mention,
Speaker:you should just always, or you should get a professional
Speaker:voiceover, a personal the guests to do the, the, the,
Speaker:the, the, the fictional stuff. Cause it kind of reminds
Speaker:me of that. I saw a, like a documentary on,
Speaker:on Disney plus the boat at the animation process and
Speaker:actors that are doing the, the voice is for the
Speaker:animated characters who are doing and why should you, you
Speaker:could get anybody to give the voices. But if you
Speaker:bring in some one that does voiceover, what can it
Speaker:be like Mark Hamill as a well known for his
Speaker:voiceover work for all of the Batman cartoons or stuff
Speaker:like that, but bring it to someone in like sick.
Speaker:It just has a more nuanced than the norm when
Speaker:something needs to be emphasized or whatever the guests, and
Speaker:it makes it more enjoyable for the list that, and
Speaker:it helps the reader.
Speaker:He would have been reading the books otherwise.
Speaker:Yes. Especially because I believe the process when they're recording
Speaker:animation, as they're doing the Voice and then they're doing
Speaker:the animation to match, right? So like there, there are
Speaker:tweaking it, I believe as they go these days, the
Speaker:way they do it, I'm not, I'm not an expert,
Speaker:but I think that matters because that means that the
Speaker:voice needs to portray the character completely. And then the
Speaker:animation needs to match that as opposed to the other
Speaker:way, runs that they are trying to match a cartoon
Speaker:that already exist. And so it's a very similar when
Speaker:you are in the writing a book, I actually just
Speaker:went through this process for the first time with my
Speaker:own debut novel M it just came at it now,
Speaker:actually in April. And I heard he hired the narrator.
Speaker:She's called Susan Marlo. She's done a, a 150 books
Speaker:and the process of creating that, it's fascinating. The first
Speaker:thing they do is they read your book end to
Speaker:end.
Speaker:And then they actually come back to you with a
Speaker:few questions. And then the next part is the, well
Speaker:first, before all of that, they do additions. So I
Speaker:actually listened to 50 different auditions for, from 50 different
Speaker:voice talent. And I picked this, this narrator because I
Speaker:really like the way he was portraying my two characters
Speaker:differently to each other. And also she came really recommended
Speaker:from another author friend who says she was approached. He
Speaker:was really easy to work with, which matters, right? If
Speaker:someone's great talent, but they are a pain in the
Speaker:ass to work with. That's going to be a problem.
Speaker:And so I picked her for both of those reasons
Speaker:and he was so fun to hear how it works.
Speaker:So if this was all new to me, they do
Speaker:a 15 minutes. At least this was the way it
Speaker:worked with her. I think it's pretty standard. They do
Speaker:a 15 minute section of the book.
Speaker:So you choose which voices you want to hear. So
Speaker:in my case, I have two main characters in the
Speaker:book. The first one is a really powerful Woman venture
Speaker:capitalist. And the second one is a CEO. Who's also
Speaker:a single mom and it's very dramatic in the opening
Speaker:scenes. The powerful CEO has just discovered her husband is
Speaker:cheating. And she's about to walk in to this meeting
Speaker:where she was going to sign a deal. She is
Speaker:investing in accompany that she's brought her whole career on.
Speaker:And it on the opening page, she realizes that the
Speaker:woman who owns this company is her husband's mistress. And
Speaker:so what really mattered to me is that the narrator
Speaker:got that these were two very different characters and portrayed
Speaker:them very differently so that you were never confused that
Speaker:my CEO, mom, Carly, with a big case of imposter
Speaker:syndrome versus my powerful venture capitalist, they couldn't have the
Speaker:reader be confused about who thinking, and who's had written
Speaker:at any point in time, but also I really wanted
Speaker:the tension to get across because the book has a
Speaker:page Turner.
Speaker:Many people have told me that Reviews kind of the,
Speaker:the number one thing that turns up and Reviews as
Speaker:people say its a page Turner we'll, you can mess
Speaker:with that in an audio format, if you weren't careful,
Speaker:if you didn't get it right. So I wanted that
Speaker:same kind of tension. And so I picked a narrator
Speaker:who also does suspense novels. So she does thrillers in
Speaker:suspense as well as women's Fiction. And I think that
Speaker:helps with her and kind of getting that tension into
Speaker:it. And then the fun thing is you don't hear
Speaker:it again until the whole thing has done. So they
Speaker:don't give it to you in sections. They really want
Speaker:to do the whole book. It is performing. It's acting
Speaker:that they're they're doing here. And so she did the
Speaker:entire book and then I got 12 hours of audio
Speaker:to listen to. And you go back with what are
Speaker:called pickups, which is basically any little things that need
Speaker:change.
Speaker:So like a small word, you know, she said all
Speaker:of it instead of on or a pronunciation of something
Speaker:like a place that's a real place that's pronounced drop,
Speaker:pronounced strong. And so you go back with that and
Speaker:then you fix those. And she really was a pro
Speaker:because I think in a book of 12 hours of
Speaker:audio, we only had to fix like, I think it
Speaker:was like 10 or 15 things in total, which has
Speaker:almost nothing, nothing. If you think about it, it's, it's
Speaker:almost nothing. And the funnest part of the whole process
Speaker:for me as a writer and this is my first
Speaker:book in my debut novel was you don't actually get
Speaker:to hear your book read by somebody else. Like there's
Speaker:a common thing we say in the writer world, which
Speaker:is once you put your work into the world, it
Speaker:does not belong to you anymore.
Speaker:And if you think about this, every book you've ever
Speaker:read your reading through the lens of your own personal
Speaker:experience, right? So when I read any book, whether it's
Speaker:fiction nonfiction, especially if I get triggered by a book,
Speaker:that's not really a bit of the book it's about
Speaker:me and my personal history and something that happened that
Speaker:makes certain topics trigger me. It's the same reason you
Speaker:can't take negative reviews to personally because it just means
Speaker:you have to your, your work trigger triggered that person,
Speaker:which could be completely to do with their life experience
Speaker:and nothing to do with that book in particular. And
Speaker:so you, you kind of get used to this concept
Speaker:that, that people say, once you're work is in the
Speaker:world, you don't own it. It belongs to the reader,
Speaker:everybody's reading from their own lens, their own life. But
Speaker:here's the fun thing is you never actually see that
Speaker:in action, right?
Speaker:I don't get to watch over someone's shoulder while they
Speaker:read my book, right. It's happening apart. Right. I get
Speaker:to see the reviews at the end of the day
Speaker:and what their overall impression was. But I don't get
Speaker:to actually sit and hear someone else to read my
Speaker:work. And so 12 hours of hearing how someone else
Speaker:interpreted this, which was not a tall, the way I
Speaker:said the words, the intonation, the way the phrases were
Speaker:said, it was different. It was an entirely different. And
Speaker:yet it still worked. That was actually a really kind
Speaker:of prayed moment. Like, wow, I created the thing and
Speaker:here's someone else reading the thing. And even though it's
Speaker:not the way I imagined it, it still cool. And
Speaker:so that was a kind of a big Hi so
Speaker:far and my author career, or the first time I've
Speaker:got to listen to those 12 hours of audio.
Speaker:And I was going to ask you that because you
Speaker:had mentioned,
Speaker:You only have to do about 15 change is 15
Speaker:minutes or 15. What is it called? Back's pick up,
Speaker:pick up, pick up. So you don't need to do
Speaker:it for 15 pick-ups. So obviously you've got this after
Speaker:the day after a green and the first time that
Speaker:you are going to send over, you think in the
Speaker:back and till it was finally finished with, it must
Speaker:have been cleaned in all of us to start with
Speaker:thinking in my group, I'm going to have a son
Speaker:who is, you have any edits on it, you know,
Speaker:pick up the taskforce. So listen to it back then.
Speaker:You mentioned it, officer, the voiceover artists at a great
Speaker:job and internet in some of the stuff that you
Speaker:hadn't maybe intended, intended to be intonated that way, or
Speaker:was it like almost like an out of body experience
Speaker:and, and less than a back and thinking, this is
Speaker:a really good book and not even thinking it was
Speaker:your book that was being read at the time,
Speaker:Because there were a couple of moments that it makes
Speaker:me sound it a little, like a humble bragging, but
Speaker:there were a couple of moments where I was like,
Speaker:huh, that really worked like in a way that I
Speaker:hadn't like to me, it was like, okay, like I
Speaker:thought it worked, but it was okay. And then when
Speaker:I heard her read it and she was putting all
Speaker:of the emphasis into It, which is possibly what every
Speaker:reader is doing in their head. I was like, Oh,
Speaker:that actually works better than I thought it did. Like,
Speaker:like I think we are our harshest critics of our
Speaker:own work. We were talking earlier, before, earlier, before we
Speaker:started it at the editing, Right? When you have to
Speaker:edit it to Podcast and how much work goes into
Speaker:that. And it's very similar by the way, with audio,
Speaker:for, for an audio book, the, what the narrator charges
Speaker:U is pear finished. Our, the acronym is P S
Speaker:H, which says that they're charging you an hourly rate,
Speaker:but not for their hours of work for the finished
Speaker:our of Audio.
Speaker:And I actually just interviewed My, my audio and the
Speaker:Raider actually on my, on my own podcast. I invited
Speaker:her last week. I said, come and talk to me.
Speaker:I'm going to interview you about the art of being
Speaker:an audio narrator. How did you get into it? What
Speaker:are the highs and the lows what's difficult, what's easy.
Speaker:And she was sharing that for each hour of finished
Speaker:work. She has probably read the book five to six
Speaker:times for that hour. So for each of our finished
Speaker:work, so the first time she reads it and then
Speaker:she's actually narrating it, then she's editing it than she
Speaker:is. She's editing it multiple times. And so she said
Speaker:at least five times, she's read that same hour of
Speaker:the book before she gets to a finished it.
Speaker:Wow. That's, that's crazy. I know when I'm doing it
Speaker:at it and it takes about two and a half
Speaker:times the amount of the finished product. So as the
Speaker:show is 30 minutes long, I'm editing for about two
Speaker:hours, maybe. I dunno. So I couldn't imagine him written
Speaker:a book five or six times to get to the
Speaker:one on the one record and know that's, that's incredible.
Speaker:Well, it, that episode that we were all looking forward
Speaker:to listen in to that one.
Speaker:My one is at the exit strategy is now in
Speaker:April. I just came out or it's just getting out
Speaker:there and this week actually got it
Speaker:Or something, I will look out for that. No, we
Speaker:had mentioned that this start and you're sure, I think
Speaker:primarily that at the beginning of this year, but actually
Speaker:started out as a video Podcast. So what's the transition
Speaker:to Audio have been like for you?
Speaker:And it's, you know, the first thing I'll say is
Speaker:it's been a surprise, how many people just love the
Speaker:podcast format? And like you said, I started on video.
Speaker:And the reason I did that was I was trying
Speaker:to leverage, like I said, my following. And so I
Speaker:thought the most, the best way to do that is
Speaker:to do on Instagram TV. So I did it as
Speaker:videos that I released on Instagram TV. And then just
Speaker:at the beginning of this year, I thought, you know,
Speaker:it wouldn't be that much more work to also make
Speaker:it into a podcast. I checked out anchor FM, and
Speaker:I discovered that you could take your video. I record
Speaker:the videos on Streamyard. You could take the video and
Speaker:upload it to anchor FM and it will strip the
Speaker:audio. And then I would add like a header at
Speaker:the beginning, I would add some music, but it wasn't
Speaker:like a whole separate thing.
Speaker:It could be, you know, maybe 40% more work to
Speaker:also do it as a podcast, as opposed to, you
Speaker:know, for a hundred percent more work. And so I
Speaker:did it as an experiment at the beginning, the first
Speaker:for podcasts that are released. And I thought, well, let's
Speaker:see if anyone's even interested in this format. And it
Speaker:shocked me how excited everybody got it. But the fact
Speaker:that it was now a podcast and all these people
Speaker:who are like, Oh, I always wanted to watch the
Speaker:video, but I can never find time. And now I
Speaker:can listen to it while I'm doing my house work
Speaker:or when I'm taking my kids to, you know, their
Speaker:stuff, soccer practice. If you still get to go to
Speaker:these days or why not? Well, I'm taking my kids
Speaker:somewhere in the car. And so it was fascinating to
Speaker:me, the excitement level that came over that, and also
Speaker:how much I started getting pitched and how many more
Speaker:people wanted to go be on the show, know that
Speaker:it was a Podcast.
Speaker:And so its growing and encourages people to, to check
Speaker:it out. And it's a really short 15 minute episodes
Speaker:each, but, and we've done a couple of special episodes.
Speaker:One was with my narrator, which was a little bit
Speaker:longer. It was 30 minutes cause I wanted it to
Speaker:do a full interview and I actually included pieces of
Speaker:the audio book as examples. So when she talks about
Speaker:how do you do different voices? I took a piece
Speaker:of the audio book for three minutes after it actually
Speaker:put it into the podcast that people could hear an
Speaker:example, which I thought it was kind of fun. So
Speaker:it made it more real to hear what she was
Speaker:talking about. And then I did a special episode, which
Speaker:was also 30 minutes long where I took all of
Speaker:the best advice from the first 30 odd authors who
Speaker:had been on the podcast and on the videos. And
Speaker:I created one, one podcast episode that was just advice
Speaker:for aspiring writers and its really cool.
Speaker:It was a lot of great stuff in there. If
Speaker:you're ever thinking about getting into the writing profession or
Speaker:even doing it as a hobby, that one's the one
Speaker:I would definitely not miss. I wish I'd had all
Speaker:of that advice when I started at all.
Speaker:And then that's a great thing that you mentioned it
Speaker:a little bit Podcasts. If you can put it basically
Speaker:in the background and do it, whatever you're doing it,
Speaker:you know, you can go up on the treadmill, you
Speaker:can go maybe not golfing, right. And I guess you
Speaker:could go off and do that out, but it, it
Speaker:makes it an easy buy in to anybody, but there's
Speaker:no technical, you know, binds or anything. It was really
Speaker:cool to hear to hear that it's just been picked
Speaker:up so well. And, and obviously your guests are all
Speaker:offers. Hence the name of the, the, the Podcast, the
Speaker:best of women's Fiction, a podcast. And you mentioned that
Speaker:you wanted to give a voice, you want to use
Speaker:your platforms to give a voice to offer is it
Speaker:may not have platform themselves. Is it a, like a,
Speaker:obviously that was one of the processes. What are your
Speaker:process for picking whose Lake to have on as guests
Speaker:or who we'd like to interview for the podcast?
Speaker:And in the beginning it was very easy for me
Speaker:because I would say I'm very well connected to the
Speaker:women's fiction writers community. I used to be the head
Speaker:of programs for WFW a women's fiction writers association, which
Speaker:is an association of about 1500 members, all of whom
Speaker:write women's fiction. And so in the beginning it was
Speaker:easy because I would know most of these authors either
Speaker:through WFW way or M I'm a host of a
Speaker:Facebook group where we have 10 author hosts called blue
Speaker:sky book chat. And so I would also hear about
Speaker:books through that and through our writers there as well.
Speaker:So we're in the beginning, it was easy because I
Speaker:was doing invite only like I was reaching out and
Speaker:inviting people. And it wasn't hard for me to think
Speaker:of who to invite 'cause I would just say that
Speaker:like for example, And Garvin, who is an author, I
Speaker:totally admire her third book is coming out in may.
Speaker:So I would just send her a quick message even
Speaker:on diorama and say, Hey On, so are you going
Speaker:to a new one coming? I want to be on
Speaker:the show. It was that simple. And then I had
Speaker:a standard email that I sent that explained how it
Speaker:works, that we X we recorded on Streamyard that what
Speaker:they need in order to do the recording. But it
Speaker:was the standard email that went every time and we
Speaker:just agree on a release weekend and then we could
Speaker:record at any time in advance. And then I got
Speaker:a bit more sophisticated recently where I'm using Calendly, where
Speaker:people can pick their own schedule so that I don't
Speaker:have to get into the scheduling back and forth, but
Speaker:what's actually become really hard. No is now that I'm
Speaker:getting pitched bye books and authors that I don't know,
Speaker:I'm having to do more research in order to decide
Speaker:whether or not to say yes and that's actually, I
Speaker:don't like that.
Speaker:I don't actually like being in the position of having
Speaker:to say no to somebody sometimes, but sometimes the book,
Speaker:you know, it doesn't have very many reviews yet. It's
Speaker:kind of hard to know and I'm not going to
Speaker:have time to read every single book. I read a
Speaker:lot of books. I do a lot of blur. So
Speaker:just to try and help me, my fellow authors from
Speaker:time to time, I do beta reading. So I will
Speaker:have seen the book even a year before it came
Speaker:out in an early form. But you know, it, it's
Speaker:not realistic at this point. Like someone just asked me
Speaker:if I can write them a blurb by the end
Speaker:of may. And I said, honestly, I have 15 books
Speaker:that have committed to rate and review by the end
Speaker:of may. I want to help you, but I'm not
Speaker:sure it can do it like time physically timewise. And
Speaker:so its becoming a bit more of a challenge because
Speaker:it used to be, if I wasn't sure about a
Speaker:book, I would just say, Hey, send me a copy
Speaker:and I'll read it and then I'll work on it,
Speaker:whether it fits.
Speaker:But now that it's just more than I can commit
Speaker:to. So I have to look at it like M
Speaker:are they referred by an authorized Myer? So if, if
Speaker:Camille pick up again, who I adore, he is a
Speaker:fabulous, best selling author says, this person should be on
Speaker:your podcast. I trust her instincts. She knows what she's
Speaker:talking about. And she is a book coach. She wouldn't
Speaker:send me a book that isn't worthy and isn't really
Speaker:among the best. And so that's easy. So sometimes I'm
Speaker:having to do it a little bit more GQ when
Speaker:people reach out to me, I actually had to write,
Speaker:go like, okay, who do we have a blurb from?
Speaker:What a blurb is. Right. And it is when your
Speaker:book is coming out, you reach out to other authors
Speaker:and you ask if they'll read up for you before
Speaker:it's in the world. And then they write, it's basically
Speaker:like an advanced review by an author. And that's what
Speaker:you see. Like when you see two sentences on the
Speaker:front of a book or you see it on Amazon
Speaker:where it has some quotes, right.
Speaker:As the book comes out, that's before readers even got
Speaker:access to it. So that's going to be other authors.
Speaker:There are given an early copy. And so I'll look
Speaker:if it has a good blurb, if it's, you know,
Speaker:it's easy, if it's an author, I know. And, and,
Speaker:and I admire, and they were already a bestseller that
Speaker:Susie, but like M I'll look at who is recommending
Speaker:them to me, I'll look at their blurbs if they've
Speaker:won any awards or prizes already before the book came
Speaker:out, that one's a little trickier. Cause it was not
Speaker:that many pre-publication awards. And sometimes I'll kind of say
Speaker:like, I just don't the current situation. I literally don't
Speaker:have any slots before September. Like I am booked every
Speaker:weekend through September. In fact, I've got a short season
Speaker:break in there, which I'm trying valiantly to hold for
Speaker:two weeks.
Speaker:So then I can take two weeks off. But other
Speaker:than that, like I'm booked through mid September right now.
Speaker:And so I've also gotten to the point where sometimes
Speaker:not saying like, listen to the book through September to
Speaker:check back with me on a few months. And then
Speaker:that way I know the book is going to be
Speaker:out in a few months. Maybe I can see a
Speaker:little bit more about it, then it's out there yet.
Speaker:And maybe that will give me a bit more information
Speaker:as well. So I am not very good at saying
Speaker:no, I hate saying no to a fellow authors. It
Speaker:makes me feel bad.
Speaker:Yeah. And then obviously, as you mentioned it, and it
Speaker:needs to fit in and review our show and, and
Speaker:you'd go, you know, with the gas team to highlight
Speaker:the guests and give them more because I can imagine
Speaker:if someone has already got a fairly, a large audience,
Speaker:so I've got a whole host, the award's behind them.
Speaker:That may be a less of a, an attractive guest
Speaker:for one of about a world. That was the title
Speaker:of a description that, and less of a, a, an
Speaker:attractive cast for you to talk to, maybe that are
Speaker:up and coming in, or maybe you just had one
Speaker:bucco or something or is that not the case?
Speaker:Oh, I love both. No, I, I love both. Author's
Speaker:like, so for example, I've had Carrie lens, Dale who
Speaker:was a big, best seller on I've had Barbara O'Neill
Speaker:who sold. Gosh, I think she sold 2 million copies
Speaker:through Lake union publishing. It's crazy. And the cool thing
Speaker:about these guesses. Yes. They'll come on and we'll talk
Speaker:about the inspiration for their, their latest book. But what
Speaker:I love asking authors who are multi, multi time, best
Speaker:sellers in a bit to talk to a Bentley Crosby
Speaker:in the coming week, she's in that category too, is
Speaker:how do they keep having inspiration? It's one thing to
Speaker:have inspiration for one novel are two or three, but
Speaker:when you get to talk to someone who's had a
Speaker:10 plus best-selling million copied books. Like I want to
Speaker:know how the heck they keep doing that because I
Speaker:want to do that like some day.
Speaker:And so I know a lot of my listeners are
Speaker:also writers and they're interested in like, where does the
Speaker:inspiration keep coming from? You know, Barbara and Neil is
Speaker:shared some fascinating things around how is she keeps newspaper
Speaker:clippings. And her husband was like C something in the
Speaker:news, like quirky or weird. Someone ran a way to
Speaker:the circus. And he was like snippet for her and
Speaker:send it to her for her file. And she just
Speaker:keeps like an inspiration file. So that as she's working
Speaker:on one novel, all this stuff is brewing in her
Speaker:inspiration file for the next one. And then the other
Speaker:thing I love to ask authors who are further down
Speaker:the path is what the advice is for writers who
Speaker:are just starting out, who are many years behind them
Speaker:are a few years behind them. That's a question I
Speaker:ask every guest and it is interesting how different the
Speaker:answers are from a new author whose first book is
Speaker:coming out and it's called a debut author, which is
Speaker:what I was last year versus someone who has had
Speaker:many books.
Speaker:And I think one of the things readers don't realize
Speaker:that even writers don't realize as a writer world is
Speaker:the author of the path is pretty up and down.
Speaker:It's a roller coaster, even when you are a best
Speaker:selling author. So this is a fabulous episode with
who I referenced earlier. He was one of my favorite
Speaker:Novelis and this is a fabulous episode where she shares
Speaker:the, now people know her as this best selling author,
Speaker:but she shares that her debut, when it came out
Speaker:was slammed in the Reviews. Like she wants it to
Speaker:crawl onto the bed and die level of bad. And
Speaker:she brings this up to say, you assume, when you
Speaker:look at her now, and she's this incredible best selling
Speaker:author, and she has a book coach, and she's really
Speaker:well known that that was like a seamless flawless path.
Speaker:And she was like, I almost gave up after book
Speaker:one. It was such a disaster for me. Like I
Speaker:felt personally offended that everybody was saying they added to
Speaker:it and it's not true, but everybody was saying that
Speaker:they hated it. It has, you know, very Reviews, but
Speaker:we take it personally when our work in the world
Speaker:and it was criticized. And so I loved talking to
Speaker:other sir Further in the path and, and encouraged folks
Speaker:that listen to Camille, his own words as she describes
Speaker:that she does, is it much better justice than I
Speaker:am, but I love when people share that the ups
Speaker:and downs of it, the way they keep going, like
Speaker:Barbra Neil share the idea that how do you find
Speaker:your voice? She has a very strong voice. One of
Speaker:the things people love about her books is when you,
Speaker:when you read her book, you know, it's Barbara and
Speaker:Neil book, and that's, what's called having a voice as
Speaker:an author.
Speaker:And if you think of it and the thing that
Speaker:you love to read or to listen to, right? The
Speaker:personality that makes that person on the radio, that person
Speaker:or their podcast, that's the same thing. It's a voice,
Speaker:right? And so she said, the way you find your
Speaker:voice is you listen to what people say about your
Speaker:work and what people compliment about it, and that's your
Speaker:Voice like, and then double-down on it. So take that
Speaker:thing and do it even more because that's you doubling
Speaker:down on your voice, your voice that people will appreciate
Speaker:it.
Speaker:So it was really interesting. And I look, I really
Speaker:liked that advice because generally as human beings, we're always
Speaker:looking for the worst and we're always, if someone's speaking
Speaker:both of us, we take that a lot more seriously
Speaker:than our son was trying to put us compliments. And
Speaker:they know my wife always tells me that I'm really
Speaker:bad at accepting compliments. And, and I need to work
Speaker:on that. And, and I do, I want to bet
Speaker:that I think that is a Scottish thing really. And
Speaker:I think that's a fair, our, so we, we don't
Speaker:take off the ones to use a bit, but I
Speaker:love that at face. And especially as you mentioned as
Speaker:an offer our, our, our content creators, you know, that
Speaker:it's a podcast, a blog or whatever else, you're always
Speaker:gonna have people. It, it isn't public. So you have
Speaker:to have that kind of fixed skin to know that
Speaker:they're on a boat and what you put out, as
Speaker:opposed to you yourself. And that advice about pick up
Speaker:on the thing that they are praising you for it,
Speaker:because that's who is actually you.
Speaker:I love that advice. And, and I'm guessing that's what
Speaker:you are, you've taken into. You're, you know, you're, you're
Speaker:Corporate now. It has to do which we'll talk about
Speaker:it. So that actually moving in to the book world,
Speaker:et cetera, so I can get, and that's been a
Speaker:good primer for you. Okay.
Speaker:Yeah, it has, you know, this book is interesting. My
Speaker:own book that just came out and it was just
Speaker:talking to someone on an author, a podcast about author
Speaker:marketing, Dana K. She has a podcast about our culture
Speaker:breakout book. And it's all about how to market your
Speaker:book as an author. And one of the questions she
Speaker:was asking me was how did you who your audience
Speaker:was? And I said, honestly, I didn't because this book
Speaker:has a bit unique. Its two women who are putting
Speaker:in this dramatic situation, but ultimately it's a book about
Speaker:friendship and its a feminist book and it's uplifting, but
Speaker:there was no other book that was quite like that
Speaker:in the world. And so normally when you're bringing out
Speaker:your book, what you look for is something called cop's.
Speaker:That means comparable titles.
Speaker:And you say, okay, this book is really like that
Speaker:other book. So what I'll do the same things for
Speaker:marketing that the other person did because it works for
Speaker:them. And you also physical. Like you, you actually compare
Speaker:you say its just like Twilight. If you love Twilight,
Speaker:you will love this found pair novel to, and now
Speaker:obviously I couldn't do that. So what I did is
Speaker:when you were a book, goes out into the world,
Speaker:first, it becomes available for early Review from readers, not
Speaker:just from authors, but there was a service called net
Speaker:galley where you can put your book up on net
Speaker:galley and people can get it for free before it's
Speaker:released in exchange for writing an honest review about the
Speaker:book. And now you have to have a hard skin
Speaker:to go on and look at your neck, galley or
Speaker:Reviews before the book comes out of it.
Speaker:But I actually did go in and I read them
Speaker:from the lens, like you say of who enjoyed this
Speaker:book, who is this book for who read it and
Speaker:said, I love this to death. And those are the
Speaker:people I need to find more of because there was
Speaker:one of my readers and I found that women who
Speaker:are preciate female friendships, women who, our professional women, anyone
Speaker:whose worked in an office environment, anyone who likes kind
Speaker:of a little bit of tension, but it ultimately happy
Speaker:story. But interestingly, I find that like thriller Raiders who
Speaker:read only pure thrillers, we're not digging this book because
Speaker:it's not exactly that it's about friendship and its a
Speaker:bit more touchy feely by the end of the book
Speaker:than a pure thriller, right?
Speaker:Like the husband who portrayed them both, it does not
Speaker:die during the book. You would want him dead if
Speaker:it was the thriller and you would want them both
Speaker:to make them dead. And so it was just really
Speaker:helpful as a way you got to put on your
Speaker:arm or your emotional armor, but a way to say
Speaker:it, like who is this book for? Because I didn't
Speaker:have an easy way to tell that before it came
Speaker:out. And so I think that might be my startup
Speaker:background, but it's okay to just try something and see
Speaker:what happens and then learn and then go from there.
Speaker:No, you mentioned you start a background and obviously your
Speaker:book, the exit strategy is set in the tech world
Speaker:around a high flyer and executives have that world, which
Speaker:is your own story. You are a high-flying tech executive
Speaker:yourself. So how much of the book has pulled from
Speaker:your own life and the tech industry?
Speaker:This is one of my favorite questions I worked in
Speaker:Silicon Valley and for how it worked for a really
Speaker:big tech companies, I've worked for a multibillion-dollar almost hundred
Speaker:billion dollar, a tech company managing a billion dollar division's.
Speaker:And then I also worked for startups, Creating the whole
Speaker:company, getting the marketing team off the ground as a
Speaker:chief marketing officer. And I did that for 20 years.
Speaker:And then after 20 years I was pretty burned out.
Speaker:It is frustrating and tiring to be the only woman
Speaker:in the room and to be the only senior woman
Speaker:on the team, like after a while it starts to
Speaker:really wear you down. And so I decided to take
Speaker:six months, I just finished one. And normally you kind
Speaker:of roll straight into the next one. And the minute
Speaker:you leave, the head hunters are calling you and your
Speaker:working out where you're going next.
Speaker:And I decided to give myself six months to see
Speaker:if I had an ending to this book. I actually
Speaker:didn't know. I had a beginning at a very clear
Speaker:picture of how the book started with this wife and
Speaker:a mistress who are forced to work together, but I
Speaker:didn't know where it ended. And so I gave myself
Speaker:six months to, to right, the first draft. Now anyone
Speaker:who's close to the writing world knows we call it
Speaker:a shitty first draft for a reason. The first draft
Speaker:is just that I love the phrase that says you
Speaker:are just pummeling. So you're pouring sand and to the
Speaker:sandbox, that's the goal of a first draft is to
Speaker:give yourself something, to work with an editor it's in
Speaker:the real beauty of words and writing actually happens in
Speaker:revision, right? As you revise it many times before it
Speaker:comes out. But I gave myself six months. Cause I
Speaker:didn't even know if I had the end of the
Speaker:story.
Speaker:Right. Okay. And I didn't know if this was really
Speaker:going to be my gig and was I willing to
Speaker:step back? No, I'm a good paying job in tech.
Speaker:You know, writers don't make very much your money to
Speaker:do this instead. And what happened is I give it
Speaker:six months and after six months I found out, I
Speaker:didn't know the ending and I wanted to keep it
Speaker:going. They give the sh the book a chance to
Speaker:actually see the world. So then they get myself another
Speaker:six months on my husband and I realized, well, if
Speaker:I'm not earning any money while I'm riding, before it
Speaker:comes out, why are we still living in San Francisco?
Speaker:Why are we still paying rent at crazy San Francisco
Speaker:rental prices? And he's a tech guy. And he realized
Speaker:that he could do his job from anywhere. He does
Speaker:consulting and tech development for various companies. And so that
Speaker:was what drove us into becoming nomads.
Speaker:So we realized we could live and the most beautiful
Speaker:places in the world, as long as they have wifi
Speaker:for, you know, a 10th of the price of what
Speaker:it would cost us to be in San Francisco. And
Speaker:depends on your places. Like sometimes it's not a 10th,
Speaker:sometimes it's a half, but you know, we avoid expensive
Speaker:cities. Like we'd never spent significant time in London or
Speaker:Paris because that would kind of define the point. It
Speaker:would be like being in San Francisco, but we've lived
Speaker:in Cartagena, Colombia, which is fabulous. I thoroughly recommend it.
Speaker:We just, we had been in and out have many
Speaker:locations and Mexico right now in San Miguel de
where we actually have a house that we are going
Speaker:to rent part time and come to part time by
Speaker:October were hoping to be a new Orleans. We actually
Speaker:just preliminarily, but for ourselves and air BNB in October
Speaker:for the full month in new Orleans, if anyone's looking
Speaker:for a travel recommendation and obviously you can't make to
Speaker:concrete plans right now, cause we don't know what's going
Speaker:to happen with the world, but I'm kind of crossing
Speaker:my fingers.
Speaker:That enough of those will be vaccinated, including myself, that
Speaker:by October we'll be able to be a little bit
Speaker:more open and all of the fun things that happen
Speaker:in new Orleans during the year like jazz Fest quarter
Speaker:festival, it was another one of the big electronic music
Speaker:festival. There were four big festivals that happened over the
Speaker:year and they've all moved to October. So in a
Speaker:way, in one month you get like a year of
Speaker:new Orleans festivals, pretty much everything, but Mardi Gras is
Speaker:preliminarily booked for October. And so if it goes ahead,
Speaker:it's going to be a pretty fun, lovely meal. I
Speaker:love to visit. And the thing about being a digital
Speaker:nomad for us as we work full time, we're not
Speaker:traveling to be on vacation, right. Were both working a
Speaker:full time schedule. So even if none of those things
Speaker:happen.
Speaker:So as long as it's safe to be an, an,
Speaker:an Airbnb and walk around the streets, we'll still be
Speaker:able to walk around and buy Bengay and drink coffee.
Speaker:And I enjoy walking around in new Orleans, even if
Speaker:none of the festivals.
Speaker:Okay. And you'd mentioned it in your career, you are
Speaker:the only high flyer, a woman executive in your industry.
Speaker:And we've seen in recent years with the me too
Speaker:movement, especially for the tech industry, that can be a
Speaker:very sexist and toxic place you were in industry for
Speaker:awhile. And I was wondering with the reputation has a
Speaker:special in San Francisco. Did you encounter any of this
Speaker:toxicity in your own experiences?
Speaker:Oh yeah. I, I didn't thoroughly answer your question. I'm
Speaker:going to actually answer your question from before. And the
Speaker:answer to this, you have to ask, you know, how
Speaker:much of the book was from RE inspired by real
Speaker:life and how do they get to the story? And
Speaker:what happened is I had the inspiration was the wife
Speaker:and the mistress story. And then I asked myself, well,
Speaker:where am I going to set this? So if I
Speaker:have this waste on the way from this mistress are
Speaker:forced to work together, where am I going to set
Speaker:that story? And what's the scenario where they're forced to
Speaker:work together. And the obvious answer for me coming from
Speaker:having works in Silicon Valley for 20 years, I'll just
Speaker:set in Silicon Valley, I'll sit it in the world.
Speaker:I am used to where you got startups and you
Speaker:got venture capitalists and visiting and investing in those startups.
Speaker:So that was the easy choice, the sexism and its
Speaker:really funny because this book has been called a feminist
Speaker:Anthem, the sexism, I actually didn't set out to right
Speaker:into the book.
Speaker:I just said it. And what I was used two
Speaker:and wrote the story of what that world looks like.
Speaker:I wanted to show people what it felt like to
Speaker:be in that world to be the only woman in
Speaker:the boardroom and the sexism is just part of what
Speaker:I experience through my entire career. And so I actually
Speaker:wrote an author's note at the end because my own
Speaker:mother, interestingly after I didn't let her read it until
Speaker:it was final and it was actually done with copy
Speaker:edits and then I let her read it because my
Speaker:mother is super critical. She is the most critical person.
Speaker:I know she is an ex English lecturer to give
Speaker:you an idea. And I knew that she was going
Speaker:to pick it apart. And I wasn't, I wasn't mentally
Speaker:able to deal with that. I just knew that I
Speaker:wouldn't be able to have my own mother picked my
Speaker:work apart until it was like done.
Speaker:And I felt like it was as good as it
Speaker:could be. But when she read it, my mother says
Speaker:to me, so all of that stuff about the sexism
Speaker:and the, the main character or the head of the
Speaker:venture capital from who they ultimately have to work out
Speaker:how to take down together, like you made all that
Speaker:up that's Fiction. Right? And I actually had to explain
Speaker:to my own mother, but not a word of that
Speaker:was made up. In fact, the author's note says that
Speaker:I toned it down. I significantly toned down in the
Speaker:sexism in the book because I felt like for people
Speaker:who didn't live in that world, it wasn't going to
Speaker:be credible. And I actually mentioned in the, in the
Speaker:author's note that there was an example of something that
Speaker:I experienced frequently in Tech, which is meetings happening at
Speaker:strip strip clubs where the guy's we've been in a
Speaker:meeting all afternoon and they say, lets take this meeting
Speaker:to a strip club and your face with this horrible
Speaker:decision as a woman of like, you're either going to
Speaker:say, you know, no hell no.
Speaker:In which case you are that person and now you
Speaker:are like out of it because they're going to go
Speaker:anywhere. So now you're out of the meeting or you're
Speaker:going to go and have the most awkward business meeting
Speaker:and the history of reality where some woman is wiggling
Speaker:her tits and ass over you while you're trying to
Speaker:have a business conversation or you're going to make the
Speaker:joke of it and tried to be one of the
Speaker:guys, but not kind of, it's horrible. It's just a
Speaker:horrible, horrible situation because there is no good answer in
Speaker:that scenario other than don't do it. Don't suggest it's
Speaker:a stupid idea. But that was an example of something.
Speaker:I took her out of the book because I just
Speaker:thought people are not going to believe that actually happens.
Speaker:Even though it happened to me four or five times
Speaker:over at my career. Right.
Speaker:What do you think needs to change as someone has
Speaker:been in Australia at high level and seeing the experience
Speaker:you just mentioned there, for example, what needs to be
Speaker:done to encourage diversity in quality, especially on the tech
Speaker:industry, which is always come across as, you know, a
Speaker:Silicon Valley threat boys continue to act a where the
Speaker:product in the college.
Speaker:Yeah, there is a whole, there is a whole bro
Speaker:culture. There is a, if you just Google like bro
Speaker:Silicon Valley, there's a whole, all these terms around to
Speaker:it as well. And it's interesting because I think people
Speaker:who went to a certain types of universities and came
Speaker:out of a certain frat boy culture used to go
Speaker:into a, like the Capitol finance industry is of the
Speaker:world. They go to wall street, Right? And you got
Speaker:kind of that real bro frat boy culture on wall
Speaker:street. And then something happened about 10, 15 years ago
Speaker:where those same people graduating were going into tech instead
Speaker:because it was viewed as being where the big money
Speaker:big upside was. And so it made it worse in
Speaker:my opinion, because a certain type of person who was
Speaker:gravitating towards a certain type of life where it was
Speaker:all about the money you can make out of it.
Speaker:And it kind of made it worse. You saw that
Speaker:in the gaming industry as well. I got really ugly
Speaker:and its still is a really ugly in gaming. The
Speaker:simple answer to this. And if I knew like a
Speaker:silver bullet to make this happen easily, I would, I
Speaker:would tell you the simple answer is we need teams
Speaker:that look like the diversity of the world we live
Speaker:in. So we need a team when we have a
Speaker:team and that includes the senior team have a start-up
Speaker:you know, there should not be one woman on the
Speaker:board, right? We don't live in a world where out
Speaker:of a board of 10 people, one woman, so 10%
Speaker:of the world is not Women, right? 50% of the
Speaker:board should be a woman. And having one woman on
Speaker:a board actually puts a horrible burden on that one
Speaker:woman where she is not only speaking for herself, she's
Speaker:speaking for all of womankind and she's playing the role
Speaker:of being a vote, a woman on the board in
Speaker:addition to being herself and succeeding as herself.
Speaker:So it was like a double burden on that Woman
Speaker:and its the same thing. If you were the only
Speaker:black person on the board, if you're the only person
Speaker:of Indian descent, if you are the only transgender person
Speaker:on the board, like pick any category, if there's only
Speaker:one, you then have to play a double role of
Speaker:representing your group in addition to actually doing your job.
Speaker:So your having to do to kind of almost like
Speaker:twice the work and represent yourself differently as a woman,
Speaker:your, your having to, I talk about this a lot
Speaker:with other career woman, you're having to manage how you're
Speaker:perceived as a woman and how your emotions are perceived
Speaker:in addition to actually getting across your point that you
Speaker:want to make in the meetings. So, you know, or
Speaker:if a man finds that something has happened where, you
Speaker:know, the company does something terrible, right?
Speaker:Like we lie to on an application form, the guy
Speaker:gets to slam his fists on the desk and say,
Speaker:unacceptable. We do not do that in this company ever.
Speaker:And the whole team sits up, it takes a toll,
Speaker:pays attention and they go, he's angry. This is really
Speaker:bad. What we did if a woman does the same
Speaker:thing and slams her hand on the table and it
Speaker:says, this is unacceptable. Everybody goes, Whoa, she's kind of
Speaker:hysterical today. And you get perceived entirely differently and you're
Speaker:anger is perceived differently. Its not perceived as a productive
Speaker:thing. And so you're constantly managing how you express your
Speaker:emotions, which has not necessarily the way you would naturally
Speaker:express them. And again, that's a double burden. So you
Speaker:were like, you're representing womankind.
Speaker:You are trying to do your job and you are
Speaker:managing your emotions are perceived on the meeting. Gosh, it's
Speaker:tiring. And I think it's tiring for any group that
Speaker:is not represented at an equal level or at a
Speaker:minimum at an equal level to what they represent in
Speaker:society. I mean, if you look at African-Americans, there are
Speaker:so few in Tech, it's ridiculous how often you will
Speaker:have an entire tech company of a a hundred person,
Speaker:a hundred people and not one African American on the
Speaker:entire team. And so like, you know, one would be
Speaker:one of the a hundred is 1%. It's 10% of
Speaker:the population than the us. So why is it not
Speaker:10% of the population that are companies like, and I
Speaker:know it's not easy to solve, but that's what we
Speaker:should be shooting for is for teams that look like
Speaker:the world we live in in terms of the diversity
Speaker:of them.
Speaker:And we're very, very far from that right now.
Speaker:It reminds me of panel. We saw which I can
Speaker:remember what it was, but it was like a South
Speaker:by Southwest or a social media world or something. And
Speaker:it was about the importance of gender equality when it
Speaker:comes to representation, pay, et cetera. And it was an
Speaker:all male panel. So it rightly got slate on social
Speaker:media where people decry and a panel about gender equality
Speaker:being in an all male one. I mean everyone was
Speaker:thinking, are you crazy? Well, why would you do this?
Speaker:There's a, there's a line in the book where the,
Speaker:the, the head of the venture capital from that Ren
Speaker:my main character works for it's called Simon Atherton and
Speaker:the book. And he's kind of that bro culture is
Speaker:very much, but he's a little older, right? He should
Speaker:know better for sure. You know, he's in his forties,
Speaker:he's got that whole bro culture thing. And there's a
Speaker:line in the book where he says, I am not
Speaker:sure that women have the balls to make good business
Speaker:decisions or, or maybe it's like, or maybe it's the
Speaker:same thing. Like it's a line in the book where
Speaker:he refers to balls. And I have a number of
Speaker:business meetings that I have been in over my career.
Speaker:I mean, like we're into the thousands we're having the
Speaker:balls is used as a way to say courage.
Speaker:Well, nobody stops and thinks about what does that mean
Speaker:to be other people in the room when you say
Speaker:it that way. And so I deliberately put that in
Speaker:the book and it's actually the way I wrote it
Speaker:in the book is almost word for what I had
Speaker:heard many times from someone who specifically it was in
Speaker:my head as someone who had worked with when I
Speaker:wrote that. And I'm just to say that, like I
Speaker:write under a pen name, like Lainey Kamran is my
Speaker:pen name. It's also how most people know me these
Speaker:days, but it was a little deliberate in the, I
Speaker:didn't want to end up one day. If I went
Speaker:back to my job in Silicon Valley, sitting across the
Speaker:interview table from a CEO where I'm supposed to be
Speaker:interviewing for their job as their best advisor, as their
Speaker:chief, chief strategist, a marketing officer. And they look at
Speaker:me across the table and go, so let me get
Speaker:this right, you right about people like me and your
Speaker:books.
Speaker:No you'd mentioned earlier that you and your husband are
Speaker:no digital nomads and what it can while travel in
Speaker:the world. And it sounds like you had some amazing
Speaker:adventures. All one that stood out for me when I
Speaker:read him and it was a certain, a hunting trip
Speaker:in Tanzania with Stoned Tribesmen. How did that come about?
Speaker:So funnily that was before he became digital nomads, M
Speaker:we actually took off. And this was part of what
Speaker:inspired us to do. The nomadic thing is back when
Speaker:we were both working in tech, I think about three
Speaker:years before we truly started becoming no meds, we took
Speaker:us six months sabbatical and my husband kept working the
Speaker:whole time for that six months. I actually took a
Speaker:sabbatical for my start-up because it was going to be
Speaker:too hard for me to do my kind of job
Speaker:remotely. And so we took six months and we did
Speaker:that differently. We actually moved around a lot. I think
Speaker:we covered like 20 plus countries in six months and
Speaker:we were working. So we were doing like two weeks
Speaker:at a time at that time. That's exactly how it
Speaker:adds up. It was like two weeks at a time
Speaker:for six months do end up with like 20 odd
Speaker:countries.
Speaker:And so one of the places we went to was
Speaker:Tanzania and we were on a Safari for two weeks.
Speaker:This was a time where we actually did have to
Speaker:stop working. Like you can't be honest with you in
Speaker:the middle of the Serengeti and assume you can get
Speaker:a wifi signal. So, but we weren't, even though you
Speaker:could look at it as a cell phone signal, I
Speaker:was amazed that the Safari driver's in the middle of
Speaker:the Serengeti had cell phone signal the entire time, they
Speaker:were all calling each other, asking where the animals were.
Speaker:And I saw some lions over here. Where are you
Speaker:worried? Oh my God, that guy has got some over
Speaker:here. I was amazed that they'd had cell phone signal
Speaker:out in the middle of Lake. Literally the planes have
Speaker:the Serengeti. There was nothing for a a hundred miles,
Speaker:but we had a cell phone signal. And what happened
Speaker:is we had our first off, what happened is we
Speaker:hired this local company to do our Safari.
Speaker:This is a good tip. If you're ever looking to
Speaker:go to a country that has a very expensive, so
Speaker:the fairies, so it's a very, it can be ridiculously
Speaker:expensive that it can be like 20 or $25,000 per
Speaker:person. Like they can be crazyville. But we also read
Speaker:all these forums online that said, if you book directly
Speaker:with a local company and you pay them directly, it'll
Speaker:be like 10 X cheaper than, than if you're going
Speaker:through a big international company. That's marketing marketing at marking
Speaker:up Up. So the first Skerry piece of that, his,
Speaker:we actually phoned this company that was recommended for the
Speaker:people on this travel for M and we wired them
Speaker:in the money. So we had no idea that when
Speaker:we arrived at the airport intense and you know, whether
Speaker:anyone was going to turn up, cause we were pretty
Speaker:dubious that like wiring money to this random accounted in
Speaker:Africa, and maybe someone is going to turn off the
Speaker:tickets on a Safari.
Speaker:And it was like, we are going to take the
Speaker:risk and we'll find out a worst case. We'll get
Speaker:to Tanzania. It won't be in the airport. No mobile
Speaker:com come get us and we'll come up with a
Speaker:plan. So we took the risk. They pick us up
Speaker:in this beautiful, well, not beautiful, but a big 10
Speaker:persons, a fairy truck and so forth like, Oh cool,
Speaker:we're gonna beat the rest of our Sperry. We'd go
Speaker:to the hotel the next morning we get up, we're
Speaker:ready to leave. And first off they laugh at us
Speaker:because they wanted to know where our bags were. And
Speaker:we were like, well, that little carry on suitcase, that's
Speaker:it that's our bag. And they couldn't believe we can.
Speaker:As far as with the carry on suitcase, we are
Speaker:traveling the world for six months. That's all we had.
Speaker:There was a carry on suitcase in a backpack with
Speaker:a laptop on it. Yeah. And they take us off.
Speaker:And as you know, and leaving, we say, so where
Speaker:are the rest of the people for this ten-person truck?
Speaker:And they Go, don't, you know, you booked a privat
Speaker:Safari for two weeks. So it was so cheap. We
Speaker:assumed that we would be people in the truck with
Speaker:us. But the cool thing that happened is because we
Speaker:were the only ones in the Safari for two weeks,
Speaker:our driver was this amazing guy. And then, well, who
Speaker:had done all these documentary's for the BBC. And you
Speaker:can only see so many animals before you were like,
Speaker:okay, that's very interesting more animals today. And he actually
Speaker:proposed that. We go and do this thing with the,
Speaker:the Tribesmen. He said the last tripe that is truly
Speaker:a Hunter gatherer, a nomadic tribe is in this area.
Speaker:I actually know them because I found this documentary about
Speaker:them through the BBC. Okay. And if we take them
Speaker:a bunch of pot, they will take you a Hunting
Speaker:for the day and think of it. But there, there
Speaker:are a true Hunter gatherer, a tribe. So they don't
Speaker:want electronics. They don't want money. They have no value
Speaker:and money, but they will take part because they are
Speaker:Stoned out of their minds. And so we go and
Speaker:they take us Hunting. But before the Hunting, there is
Speaker:like an hour ceremony where everybody is smoking and it
Speaker:goes on and on and on. And it was just
Speaker:a very unique experience. I'm sure I've got a Contact.
Speaker:Hi, because like, it was like we were sitting right
Speaker:there in the circle with them and they were smoking
Speaker:and smoking and smoking.
Speaker:And then after they're done smoking for an hour, they
Speaker:actually send off like the teenagers to go hunting. The
Speaker:guys who are like, ah, you can tell that's the
Speaker:tourist, take the teenagers. So like these teenage boys between
Speaker:like 18 and 17 take as a Hunting with Spears
Speaker:where they are tracking through the undergrowth, you know, you
Speaker:got to be quiet. Otherwise, if you crackle things, the
Speaker:animals here at As, and it was quite the experience
Speaker:going hunting with a bunch of stones, teenagers, M who
Speaker:also, and don't wear our clothes yet because they don't
Speaker:have much reason for clothes as a Hunter and gatherer
Speaker:in tribes either. So it's a bunch of Stoned naked.
Speaker:Teenager's in the middle of the forest in Tanzania. It
Speaker:was an awesome for us on a unique experience. And
Speaker:here's what I'm both interesting and a little sad, but
Speaker:I think sad is judgemental here.
Speaker:You know, the government and Tanzania wants to force the
Speaker:kids to go to school. So in these hunts, this
Speaker:is the last have the hunting and gathering tribes. There
Speaker:were five miles from the closest school and the government
Speaker:wants to force the kids to go to school for
Speaker:good reason. The government wants the kids to have a
Speaker:chance in life to have a choice. But if you
Speaker:think about it, once this generation of kids goes to
Speaker:school, there are not going back to being a Hunter
Speaker:gatherers, right? Like why would you go to school C
Speaker:all the other kids with cell phones, C all the
Speaker:people with jobs in the hoses, and then choose to
Speaker:go back and hang out with a spear all day.
Speaker:Like it's probably not going to happen. And so what
Speaker:a manual, all our driver was explaining it is you
Speaker:probably won't see this in 10, 15 years any more,
Speaker:it's not going to exist anymore.
Speaker:It's an interesting quandary, as you say, I mean, how
Speaker:involved do we, as the developed world get, and is
Speaker:there a negative connotation to that involvement when you share
Speaker:an example like these kids?
Speaker:Yeah. But on the other hand, like, are you going
Speaker:to deny those kids a chance, everything that all of
Speaker:the other kids get? Like, it's a hard one, right?
Speaker:That's not a, not an easy answer either way.
Speaker:And I'd mentioned earlier that you are sure started at
Speaker:the beginning of the year and has adapted to becoming
Speaker:more of a video and audio sho. So what are
Speaker:your goals for the future of the podcast and what
Speaker:do you remain on both mediums or maybe concentrate on
Speaker:one of the other or something different?
Speaker:It's a, it's a great question. I think I might
Speaker:need to ask people how much they like the video
Speaker:is versus the audio, because it's rapidly getting to the
Speaker:point that I'm getting more listens on the audio, that
Speaker:views on the video. And so, you know, it's funny
Speaker:because when I started it, I thought I'll give the
Speaker:Podcast of tri for a few months. If it doesn't
Speaker:take off, I'll just go back to doing just the
Speaker:video. It was because it's extra work and no, I'm
Speaker:like, Oh, the Podcast is actually kicking off or even
Speaker:faster than the video is. So I don't know. Its
Speaker:really interesting. I mean I'm, I'm recording on Streamyard so
Speaker:we're doing the video at the same time. I could
Speaker:just do a shorter video that is just a trailer
Speaker:for the Podcast. I think I needed to ask the
Speaker:people who are watching and listening and see what they
Speaker:think. I think they're going to keep going with it.
Speaker:One of the things that is really interesting as an
Speaker:author is they say that you should try and bring
Speaker:out books fast. And the reason for that is people
Speaker:forget about you, right? You bring out your first book.
Speaker:My debut came out last year. It is still getting
Speaker:a lot of good PR because it's winning all these
Speaker:awards right now because of the words come out of
Speaker:the following year. But by the time of award season
Speaker:is over this year, it'll kind of right off into
Speaker:the sunset. It'll have, you know, a few sales, but
Speaker:it won't be a big buzz anymore. And so they
Speaker:say that you're supposed to bring out your next book
Speaker:and a year after your first one. Well, very few
Speaker:authors actually churn out a book a year. It's hard.
Speaker:Right? And you can, if you put yourself in that
Speaker:kind of schedule, it it's stressful as well. 'cause, it's
Speaker:a huge work to do revise a book. I made
Speaker:my first book to be five years and it must
Speaker:have been revised 15 times As, and rewritten 15 times
Speaker:by the time I came up.
Speaker:And so I'm working on the second one right now,
Speaker:I'm really excited about it. And maybe it'll be in
Speaker:2020 too. So it'll have been, you know, a year
Speaker:and a half, two years from the first one. The
Speaker:really cool thing for the podcast for me is I
Speaker:can stay in front of readers, an offer them value.
Speaker:That is not me coming out with a new book
Speaker:because readers read voraciously. They love lots of books, right?
Speaker:One of the biggest Fiction in the creative world is
Speaker:the concept of scarcity or that we're competing with each
Speaker:other. We are not competing with each other, right? My
Speaker:podcast is not compete with your podcast. People can listen
Speaker:to both. And the same thing in, in the writer
Speaker:world, my book does not compete with someone else's book.
Speaker:In fact is the opposite of that. If I recommend
Speaker:a book, someone who was looking for something to read
Speaker:is going to read both most likely.
Speaker:And so I love the idea that I'm going to
Speaker:have something that I can keep adding value to other
Speaker:writers and readers, even when I don't have a book
Speaker:coming out of myself. And it's a way for me
Speaker:to kind of stay in their awareness, even though I
Speaker:don't have a book right now and it takes a
Speaker:long time to bring up with a coat. And so
Speaker:for me it seems like a really positive way. And
Speaker:its taking a little bit of the pressure off of
Speaker:me to bring out another book fast, which is nice
Speaker:because it is very stressful trying to like go through
Speaker:that entire process of writing the book and revising it.
Speaker:And when is it ready? When is it actually ready
Speaker:to see the world? It's one of the biggest challenges
Speaker:was challenging.
Speaker:And, and for this new book, well y'all have to
Speaker:be used and a voice over artist again, to read
Speaker:it perhaps the same one as X a Strategy.
Speaker:It's a great question. My second book is a different
Speaker:age grip. My second, my main character and my second
Speaker:grip is in her twenties and she's actually a digital
Speaker:nomad. You know, all of Fiction is inspired from some
Speaker:version of real life. So my character in my second
Speaker:book is a digital nomad who is an adventure travel
Speaker:writer. So imagine those people that you see those amazing
Speaker:photos on Instagram, like hanging off the cliff by their
Speaker:fingernails. And they were like hiking in there. So she's
Speaker:that kind of a big adventure travels, sky diving, all
Speaker:kinds of stuff. But she has a dark past that
Speaker:she is afraid is going to catch up with her.
Speaker:She's living under a new identity. And so I think
Speaker:I would have to have my narrator audition for that
Speaker:and see if she's able to do it because a
Speaker:20 year old character, 26 year old is pretty different
Speaker:to a 30 or 40 year old character.
Speaker:And I know she said she was not a fan
Speaker:of doing like ingenue characters. So I'd need to let
Speaker:her have a go and see if it's something that
Speaker:she gets inspired by as well, because you want, you
Speaker:also want the narrator to be really excited about narrating
Speaker:that character and feel like they can give it all
Speaker:their best to you.
Speaker:Wow. That's awesome. So Lainey, I really enjoyed chatting with
Speaker:you today for our listeners. We want to check out
Speaker:your podcast, buy your book or perhaps connect with you
Speaker:online. What is the best place to do that?
Speaker:Yeah, I'm going to give you a two Webb addresses.
Speaker:So to buy my book, as in my author persona,
Speaker:that's going to be my website, which is Lainey cameron.com,
Speaker:L a N N E Y. Cameron C a M
Speaker:M E R S O n.com. Good Scottish name there.
Speaker:Actually, my grandmother's made a name is how I picked
Speaker:my pen name. And if you want to check out
Speaker:the Podcast, it has it's own website. It's Best of
Speaker:women's Fiction dot com and you can find the links
Speaker:right there on the best of women's Fiction dot com,
Speaker:both to the video versions and its on Apple. It's
Speaker:on Google podcasts. It's on Stitcher, it's on M Spotify
Speaker:and caret for them, but all of the legs are
Speaker:right there on the website.
Speaker:And are we sure have to leave the links to
Speaker:all of these in the show notes. So if you
Speaker:are listening to your favorite podcast app, make sure to
Speaker:check the show notes as usual. So thanks to Lainey.
Speaker:It's been a real pleasure to speak with you today.
Speaker:I really appreciate you coming on the show.
Speaker:Okay. Thanks Danny. This has been so fun. I really
Speaker:appreciate that. You have invaded me. Thank you so much.
Speaker:You've been listening to Podcaster Stories. If you enjoyed this
Speaker:week's episode, head on over to Podcaster Stories dot com,
Speaker:where you can catch up in the previous episodes as
Speaker:well as sign up to the three newsletter. You can
Speaker:also find a show on your favorite podcast app, Apple
Speaker:podcasts, Google podcasts, Spotify, Amazon music, Stitcher, and more until
Speaker:the next time take care, stay safe.
