What happens when you don't follow your dreams right away? What if you pursue an entirely different path and then remember later on what you had wanted long ago? Ardi Alspach, children's editor at Sterling Publishing, shows us that it's never too late to get back into your field of dreams (sorry...couldn't help it!). She talks to us about her experience in not one, but two different publishing programs, how her experience in publicity has informed her work as an editor, and what it's like to play competitive pool. We also learn the heartwarming story of Ardi's house panther, Merlin. Don't worry...you can see screencaps of Merlin at hybridpubscout.com/episode-24-editor-ardi-alspach.

Plus! We chat with hour brand new summer intern (!!!) Amanda about what brought her to the frontier between traditional and indie publishing.

Yes, yes, yes, I You saw the dinosaurs. I did, yes, I

did play the dinosaur. Amazing. There was a dinosaur on a jet

ski. I thought that it was so incredible, so good. Only in

Portland,

Life finds a way.

I

it. Welcome to the hybrid pub Scout podcast with me. Emily

einerlander and me. Corrine kalasky, hello. We are mapping

the frontier between traditional and indie publishing, and today

we have a brand new intern, intern, intern. Corinne, I know.

I can't believe it. What happened? I don't know. Intern,

please introduce yourself to the public of hybrid pub Scout

listeners, hi public.

I'm Amanda and I'm an intern.

What sign are you? I'm a Sagittarius. Okay, this will

work. Yeah, I think Sagittarius earth sign. What do you fire,

fire, oh, fire, water, earth, oh, good elements, yeah,

Beyonce and Jay Z are Sagittarius and a Virgo. That's

right, you see how that worked out? Yeah, that worked. I mean,

I think that started out differently in my head.

Okay, well, thank you for for being interested in our podcast.

Yeah, so Amanda's gonna be

running some Facebook and Instagram stuff, and I'll

probably put her to work in other ways. And yeah, so so

you'll be seeing more her around. I'm excited. It'll be

fun. All right, so I have to fulfill a promise. We made a

promise to all of you, daddy swore an oath.

So we promised that if you wrote a review for us and gave us a

five star rating, I would read the review in an accent of your

choice. However, the person who left us the last review did not

choose an accent, which whoever you are. Thank you. Thank you so

much. But also, you can torture me more. It's true, she can

withstand a lot I can, I mean, not without yelling, but still,

yeah, all right, so I'm going to read this in an Irish accent,

okay? Because I was thinking about an Irish thing earlier.

Oh, what was it? It was a dark song. Long,

all right,

the name of this review is very informative by Panda girl, one

so many interesting tidbits about the publishing industry.

I This podcast is highly informative, fun and helpful. As

an unpublished writer with a goal to eventually publish,

learning about publishing from experienced publicist, authors

and more, is wonderful.

That's

ooh,

I feel I'm getting a unique and helpful perspective that's

difficult to otherwise achieve without tons of researching or

networking. As an added bonus, the hosts have great rapport and

are funny, honest and unafraid to dig beneath the surface.

Thank you. Panda. Girl one, girl one, yeah, we appreciate We do

appreciate it. Yeah. Does it just sound sarcastic when I say

I don't think so. I just wanted to reiterate, reinforce that,

yeah, exactly. That's the word I meant to use. Thank you both

work reinforce.

So we have a great interview with a New York editor today,

and so we're going to launch into that right now for you.

Today, we're chatting with Artie Alspach, a publicist at Sterling

in NYC.

Arti is a writer, children's book editor, amateur pool player

and fine artist living with her very own miniature house Panther

named Merlin, down on the Jersey Shore. You can follow her on

Twitter and Instagram at RDC. Elaine

Artie, thanks so much for taking the time to chat with us today.

Thanks. It's my pleasure. All right.

So I'm going to break the ice here talking about the thing

that I want to talk I want to talk to you.

So you have a new blog called genre diary, where you cover

thrillers, true crime and the like, and you've also

contributed a lot of blogs and reviews on these subjects. So

how did you get into that?

Well, sort of roundabout. I guess, I was working in

publicity for a science fiction fantasy publisher for a couple

of years, and when I left that job and began working for

Sterling, I wasn't working on genre at all. At the time, I was

still doing publicity, added in some marketing was working

mostly on children's books and a lot of Adult Nonfiction, but

science fiction fantasy has been my first love, and I wanted to

stay kind of involved with that world, so I reached out to one

of my contacts that I had made as a publicist, and just asked

politely if they had room for contribution. And they did, and

it was SF Signal was the first one that I contributed to,

and when they closed their doors, another one of my

contacts I made as a publicist note had noticed my writing on

there and asked if I wanted to contribute to their blog. And

that was the Barnes Noble science fiction fantasy blog,

which I still write for a couple of years now. So what true crime

podcast Are you listening to right now?

Currently, it's probably everyone's favorite. Who loves

this, which is my favorite murder,

but I'm eagerly awaiting for someone knows something to come

back that is one of my all time favorites. Same with missing and

murdered. It might not be as well known. It's a CBC podcast,

since it's kind of set up the same way someone knows something

is where it's investigative, and they follow one case throughout

its entirety.

And those have been really phenomenal in kind of reporting

on cases that are not as well known, or things that we kind of

overlook in true crime,

specifically missing and murdered indigenous Indigenous

women in Canada and the United States. So kind of an issue that

I didn't know much about until the podcast. So it's, it's been

interesting to learn about, and, you know, hopefully more of that

kind of thing will be

talked about, right? Yeah, there's, I didn't know about

that until I saw people posting about it on the Facebook. I

think it was like in the Gen Y podcast group, there was all

this stuff about it, and I it's just such an absurd amount of of

women going missing in those communities. And it's, it's, we

need to get to the bottom of that. The more people that that

know about it, I think the more likely it is that more of those

investigations will, you know, be featured in the news and that

sort of thing, right? Yeah, one of my other favorites is

criminal, and it's, I love it because it's not the headlining

stories, and it just really dives deep into one subject or

one type of crime, and a lot of it is light hearted. Some of it

isn't, but it's always, I always learn something from it, which I

like,

yeah, yeah. She's very, has a very soothing voice as well.

Like, I feel okay while we're talking about all this terrible

stuff, you make me think it's all going to be fine for

sure. All right. Well, let's, let's, uh, let's jump into the

publishing related. Yeah, um, questions. Corinne, do you want

to kick those off? Yes, I do.

So now you completed both the Denver publishing course as well

as NYU. Can you tell us a little bit about your experience at

each one, and do you feel that they adequately prepared you for

a career in publishing?

Sure. So the Denver publishing Institute was something that I

did directly out of undergrad, okay, which was a long time ago,

and

it was pre Facebook. Facebook was not invented when I did

this. So it it was very print focused. So everything was about

print publishing on the book side and print publishing on the

magazine side. So there was nothing digital mentioned at

that point, and it was definitely valuable in helping

me

understand that books and publishing were were where I

wanted to

be, but I wasn't quite ready to commit to New York City at that

point. I had come from a very small town.

In South Carolina, and I went to a very small undergrad in South

Carolina, and so the idea of moving from basically the middle

of nowhere to New York City was just a little too daunting,

right? So

I ended up going to grad school instead. And kind of life

happens to go on one path, like, more things happen. So I was in

grad school, and then I ended up teaching

directly out of graduate school, and met my husband while I was

in graduate school,

and then six years later, it was like, Wait, what about this

publishing thing? Like, I want to do that still.

So I ended up,

I got to divorced and sold my house, and was like, I need to

figure this out. And I loved the Denver publishing Institute so

much, and felt that it was a valuable experience that I

thought it would help me, you know, kind of regain my footing

in right in that world so, but this time, I decided I wanted to

try one of the there's a few New York based publishing programs

like that. So I wanted to try it in New York, just so that it

would kind of force me, yep, go to New York and

like, is this as scary as I imagine? Is this a big, as big

of a deal as I think it is? Having never really like, I

traveled a lot as a teacher. I'd gone to many conferences and a

lot of large cities,

but New York was still an unknown one for me. So I went to

meet the NYU publishing Institute,

and it was similarly structured to the Denver so there was half

focused on books and half focused on magazines. And that

really does help you decide. If you don't know which of those

you're interested in, but you know you want to do something

related, it gives you a very in depth view of what those two

paths are like. It was definitely still solidly books.

After that program, I knew for sure that I wanted to stay in

books. Since my graduate program focused more on communication

and less on writing and literature,

I sort of veered into the

public speaking side of things. I'd been teaching public

speaking for six years at Clemson University. So that's

how I kind of fell into publicity and marketing. Is my

where my ultimately led, because my resume just pointed directly

to it. It just seemed brainer that that if I was going to

transition careers, that would be the best path to take.

So I did that. And I definitely think that the program helped

not only focus and helped me determined that books was still

the thing I wanted to do, but it gave me a lot of opportunity to

connect with other people in publishing. They were very

strong alumni network. There's still an alumni listserv that

I'm on where jobs are posted, roommate housing opportunities

are posted. It's very it's very good community. And I'm still in

touch with In fact, one of my roommates that I had for the

majority of when I lived in Manhattan was my roommate at

NYU. So it can be a really wonderful support network.

You're not alone. You come to the city, it's the big bad, you

know, New York City, but you're not alone. You instantly have

110 other people trying to do the same thing. So it may help

to make the adjustment to the big city from your kind of

phobia about it,

absolutely, absolutely. And you know, it's like, oh well, New

York has a lot to offer. It's not just, you know, the things

that you see on TV or in the news. It's, you know, wonderful,

diverse cultural place. And as someone who grew up in the

South, which is known for southern hospitality, right,

there's a stigma about New Yorkers being rude. And I want

to say for the record that that's not true. Yeah,

they're just always in a hurry say, but everyone has been

helpful. I've never really had a bad experience in New York.

It was a big adjustment going from small town southern America

to very large like, it's a whole it's a whole different world,

it's a whole different way of living. So having that support

network was really key in adjusting I got my first job

from a fellow NYU publishing person,

so that really helped me get my foot in the door. We were always

trading job links and ideas, and if someone got a job at a

company and knew of other openings, then it was helpful.

People to learn about them from friends

who could also recommend you to people. So it was really it

wasn't just about the classroom experience. It's more about the

broader network that you gain afterwards. So I definitely

recommend it, especially for people who don't already live in

New York. It's a really good way to

transition in. Have any other support system or any other way

of getting to New York, right? So right now, I'm curious too,

like this. So when did you take the NYU course? Because it was

quite a while after you did the Denver one, right? Yes, so I did

Denver three, and I did publishing Institute for NYU in

2012 Okay, so was there, like, a much bigger focus on digital in

the NYU? And I assume there probably had to have been, yeah,

yeah. Okay, social media. There's a huge component about

social media marketing books and what those are all about,

because there weren't ebooks in 2003

which seems like that wasn't that long ago, but no, I know,

yeah, yeah, since 2003 really,

everything is digital. Now, everything is online.

So it definitely helped, like, get a sense of what, where the

field is right now, in the moment that I'm trying to break

into it. So

now, with everyone with so many layoffs in the in the magazine,

even magazine, website world, I do you feel kind of relieved

that you went the book path? Or do you feel like you have better

job security? I have very good job security there, there's

always the print is dead, kind of going out. That's not the

case

in indie. Independent bookstores are stronger than they have

really ever been.

I, you know, I'd never magazines. Was never really my

thing to start so I don't know if that there's any sense of

relief, it's more that things are always changing and

evolving. All industries have that,

and I feel like magazines and online journalism will kind of

find its feet again, and it may be a different form, but I feel

like it will always be there,

because when you think about podcasts, it kind of ties in

with the true crime podcast, a lot of investigative journalism

in print has gone away, and podcast is really where it's

being replaced, like we're getting a lot of that, you know,

online. So it's still, like the avenues are still there. It's

just a matter of figuring out where they are and how to kind

of transition from one thing to the other. That's a really good

tie in. Yeah,

all right. Want to move on. Yeah, let's do it. And now so

well, I can think you already answered this. Already did you

well? But did you know from an early age that you wanted to get

into publishing, or was that kind of something, that sort of

like, as you got more work experience, it was something

that you were like, Oh, this is, you know, the career I want to

pursue. I don't think I knew that it was a career. I didn't

know exactly

what it meant to make a book. I think as a young like, I spent a

lot of time in the library, and then me too, I get excited when

I hear about other people have spent a lot of time in library

as children. Yeah, I didn't have childcare after school, and kind

of transition between things too small to be unsupervised and

getting my driver's license, yeah, school, my thing, I would

just go to library and everything out there, and I was

already a bookish kid, like my mom read to me when I was a

baby. I learned to read early. I was always voracious about

reading, so going to the library just seemed like a natural place

to hang out as like a middle schooler, I've made friends with

all the librarians, so I ended up volunteering at the library

officially. And you know, that involves a lot of data entry and

shelving books. And when you're shelving a lot of books, you

start to notice things on the spines, like, who the publishers

are, and like, what does that mean, and how does that work?

And I think it was probably about the eighth grade that I

noticed that there were certain books that came from always came

from the same publisher, which was Tor for me, yeah,

and

it would be really cool to work there one day, but I didn't know

what I wanted to do. I didn't know what there was to do in

publishing beyond editing. I think that's another thing

that's valuable about the publishing institutes, is it

really opens it wide open to what all the possibilities are

like, you know, maybe you're not, you're a big reader, but

you're not necessarily a words person. You don't have to be an

editor to work in publishing. Like you can work on data if you

want. You can work on social media. You can work in sales,

publicity, marketing. You know, there's all sorts of ways to be

involved, beyond editorial. Mm.

Yeah. So I didn't really know until

I think college, that I that publishing was a viable option,

because everyone was asking as an English major, Oh, so you're

going to be a teacher? And I was like, No, right? Well, I'm not

going to be teacher. Well, you can do I'm like, no, no, yeah.

And

for those, those playing at home tour is a big sci fi fantasy

publishing company, so yeah, there's one wandering the halls

my senior year, and I saw a huge poster for the Denver publishing

Institute in my college hallway, and I was like, Yes, that's the

I ended up teaching anyway, and I don't regret that at all, but

it was just a long, a little bit longer, of a path. And I think a

lot of people take a lot of people that go to the Denver

publishing Institute or the NYU publishing Institute are coming

directly from college, yeah, but that is not, you know, anyone

can do it. I was in my 30s when I went to the NYU publishing

Institute, and I wasn't the only one. So a lot of, I think that's

very cool that you made that shift, instead of just kind of,

you know, accepting that the path you were on was the only

one. I know, a lot of people kind of just settle into that

instead of going, you know, I want to do this thing that I was

thinking about long ago,

that's, that's pretty cool. It is, yeah, yeah, it was. It was

sort of a it was a little insane. I probably should have

planned it a little bit better than I did, but,

but I made it. I got here, and I got hard and did all the things

I needed to do to figure it out. So,

good, yeah, good for you. I like that a lot. You don't have to,

you don't have to make a new fake ID and pretend that you're

like, 20 years old. God,

yeah, awkward, because my first job in publishing was an

internship, internship, and I was the only one that was not in

college, right? So it was that was a little strange. We made

good friends, good friends with my fellow internees, and we had

a good time. And I ended up getting a full time job at the

same company, which really, you know, helped get my foot in the

door. So yeah, it's really humbling to to be the intern,

like for me, I was an intern somewhere at 29 and then I found

out that the one of the women whose office I was working in

and interning for was 22 and

you awesome.

That job was younger than me, so yeah,

total humbling experience, but probably, you know, good, good

to have that smack and the ego every once in a while,

for sure.

All right, do you want to ask the next question? Um, well, we

got into a little bit the fact that you have had editorial and

marketing and publicity. Um, so for one thing, did we talk

about, like, how you kind of made that move from marketing

and publicity to editorial? Yeah, I can. I can dive into

that. Yeah.

So

my career changed. It actually happened about a year ago that I

decided that it really that editorial was kind of more where

I wanted to be. And I don't think that that was out of the

blue at all, because I had a Literature degree. I had done a

lot of copy editing.

I worked in the Writing Center at my undergraduate. I loved it.

It was my favorite job. I wish that I could have done that.

Like when I graduated, I was so sad because I had to leave that

job. I had the same experience, yeah, in college, forever and

ever and ever. Like, why can't I just be a writing tutor for the

rest of my life like it was really fulfilling.

Was it was? Yeah, so I think that the seeds of that are why I

ultimately ended up in editorial like marketing. Publicity was

great job. It was great to

network with authors and sort of be that connection between the

outside world and the internal world of publishing. So your

communication bridge, sharing, you know, what's new, what's

exciting out with potential readers and fans. So that's

that's really fun and fulfilling. And, you know, I

made a lot of friends through that, just, you know, especially

in the science fiction and fantasy community, it's a very

small community, so we all tend to know each other and know the

publicist and know the writers and know the reviewers. And so

it's a very small

world. And as much as I love that, as much as I loved.

Organizing events and sending authors on tour whenever I

could, and making someone's day by sending them the reader

advanced reader copy that they've been dying to get their

hands on. You know, that kind of thing, I think because I had

that drive so long ago to be more involved on the writing

level, like just to get

really deep into it. It's kind of a creative outlet for me. I

tend to do a lot of creative things on as hobbies, so it kind

of helps bring that more into my my day to day, where, you know,

I can

champion authors on the inside and use that marketing and

publicity skill that I had to help position books for the

marketing, publicity and sales department. So so all of that

still makes a lot of sense for what I do as an editor, but I'm

also now acquiring and getting really excited about new things,

and helping writers get their books out into the world,

helping them, developing them as writers, that sort of thing. And

it just, I find that just really fun and satisfying to do. It's

it definitely brings me back to the old days of the Writing

Center,

but on a much grander scale, and it's a really like, I feel that

I am where I'm supposed to be. Oh, that's great. That is a good

feeling. That's great. But, and you're, you said your hobbies

are artistic. You're a fine artist. You said, yeah, that was

kind of my other love. If I hadn't been an English major, I

would have been an art major like so I might start instead.

And so I did a lot of drawing and painting growing up as a

kid. I do a lot of sewing now, just because it's a little

quicker than

hobbies, a little more instant, instant gratification. There. Do

you do that, like sassy needlepoint type stuff, where

you like say naughty things and embroidery wheels, mine are all

fandom related, so I have Lord of the Rings and

Harry Potter and Star Trek and

things like that. So sounds like you do a really good job of,

like, packaging all of your interests

like you're able to. I mean, I think it's a great thing for an

editor to know about marketing and publicity too, because so

many times they don't yeah. Just like, yeah, yeah,

yeah. It's something that I can kind of provide to my department

too, which is also fun, you know, they can come to me with

questions that maybe they don't feel comfortable going to the

other department for, or the other departments too busy, you

know, which they are always very busy.

You know, we can kind of talk about these things, and it's

easier to talk about these things during acquisitions, you

know, how are we positioning this? Who's the audience? Do we

really think sales is going to be able to

take a bite out of this and really go for it? Things so, so

definitely comes up for sure. Yeah,

all right, let's see. And what so you've worked on, I assume,

all kind of different types of books. And which ones do you

enjoy working on the most? And what have been some of your

favorites?

Um, I am currently working on mostly middle grade and young

adult. Okay, fiction,

that's what I love. I love fiction, but I've also worked on

nonfiction I have enjoyed, especially like picture books

about science and nature and that sort of thing. That's

another one of my many interests. So it's fun to share

that with kids, but I have to say that working on fiction for

younger readers has been, you know, it's I feel that I'm

making books for the younger me, possibly, like all the books

that I wanted to read when I was in middle school on up, like now

I can find those and find, you know, the other kids out there,

and get them excited about reading if I find something cool

and interesting, and I'm currently working on graphic

novels for middle grade, which is super fun. Yeah, delightful.

So,

yeah, that sounds really fun. Yeah, is there ever like an a

particular book that you worked on that was just like, amazing,

and you remember it forever,

probably one of the ones I'm working on now, and I'm not sure

that I can talk about it yet. Okay, well, I'm glad that it's

happening now,

but soon, very soon, we'll be out where we.

Discuss it so well, message us so we can post it on all of our

social media.

I will absolutely cool. All right,

let's see so more and more publishers have been

consolidating marketing and publicity departments, and even

though they're kind of two sides of the same coin? Do you ever

find it difficult to like balance each one?

That's a good question, because I've worked in both

environments. I've worked for Big Five where marketing is a

separate department from publicity, right? And then I've

looked at smaller publishers where marketing and publicity

are the same group,

and I think they both have their pros and they both have their

cons.

The pro of having them separated is you just you get a little bit

more focus and time spent on each piece. But I feel that a

con could potentially

be not quite being on the same page about what book is getting

what treatment. I don't know that that's always the I mean,

it just it's going to vary department to department.

So you know what, I take what I say with a grain of salt.

But the potential is there.

So that's the definite advantage of having it be in the same

department, is that you have one person overseeing the marketing

and the publicity for one specific title. And you know

that everything is kind of working together as it should,

but then the con would be

perhaps not enough resources, depending on the publisher, I'm

one person working on all of this. It's, it's a lot of work,

one person, so, yeah, it's definitely, there's, there's a

balance between the two.

I enjoyed both, to be honest. I mean, it was nice, because I'm a

very communicative person

across departments. I'm always bugging other departments for

information or just to find out, you know, hey, what are you

doing with this book? And is, you know, oh, my author is going

to go on tour for this thing. Can you make some graphics for

that, for social media for me? And is there anything that

you're doing that could tie into that, like that kind of thing.

So it's kind of on each individual person to, you know,

be as open about what you're doing and what they're doing and

just be really collaborative

in the same is true within the department. You know, if you're,

if you're the one person doing both, it's, you know, there's a

lot of talking to sales about what you're up to, and talking

within the department about what you're up to, and bouncing ideas

off of each other and that sort of thing. So,

yeah,

yeah, it definitely did.

So is there any topic in publishing that's been on your

mind lately that you want to talk about either an interesting

change or trend you're seeing or something that's got you hot

under the collar. Um, anything has me hot under the collar. But

trend wise, since I've always, I'm always going to bring it

back to science fiction or fantasy. I can't help it. That's

just my main interest, it's been so nice as a as a kid who loved

it and didn't see enough of it in the mainstream, how that

genre is just really becoming more and more popular among

readers.

We have, you know, the big blockbuster movies and shows to

thank for that. So I'm really happy that that's more

mainstream and that more people are reading, reading that

I think that, especially for a younger audience, science

fiction and fantasy is a really great way to get kids excited

about reading. And honestly, I don't care what they're reading,

as long as they're reading. Yeah, right, for sure. Yeah. And

so graphic novels, that's that's a particular area that I'm

seeing trending, especially among younger readers. We've

always kind of had graphic novels and comic books for like,

teen and up, but now we're getting a lot more graphic

novels for

middle grade and even younger like working on, I'm working on

one now for ages six to nine. That's the one that I can't talk

about, but I will tell you all about it as soon as I get the

thumbs up

and it's just it's really exciting to see that this is an

interest that buyers are wanting and readers are wanting, and

people are talking about it. I just read about the other day

and Publishers Weekly about the new Babysitter's Club Little

Sister series, yeah, the graphic novel series, which is great.

You know

how a new young

girl?

Girls like girls aren't the traditional readers for graphic

novels and now some series coming out that really are

targeted towards them. That's great. Yeah. I don't know if you

know the answer to this question, but I remember when we

were in school, we weren't allowed to read like comic books

or graphic novels during like class, or anything like that,

except during special times. Do you think I don't know if you've

been to a conference and talk to any teachers or library school

librarians, but has that loosened up a little that you

know, don't I don't actually know. I do have a few librarian

and parent friends, and they have not mentioned that any of

their kids have had any restrictions, they seem excited,

just as excited as I am, and as the market seems to be for that,

because some of my friends have younger boy readers who who

aren't into reading that much. And I think that it's kind of a

universal feeling that we just want them to read, happy to be

reading, and if we can provide graphic novels and comic books

for their age, it's age appropriate that you know,

parents are excited to dive right into that get their kids

reading. So yeah. JT, my husband went to visit his nieces and

nephews and one of our nieces apparently announced to him that

graphic novels and comic books aren't real books. And so he was

like, well, your aunt Emily works in publishing, so let's

see what she has to say. That was like, tell Madison that yes

they are

yes, yes, they are educating the children.

I mean, so much of our visual media is coming from graphic

novels and comic books these days, and you can't miss it

anywhere you look there, there it is. So, yeah, all right.

Well, I think Chris is a very important question. So this is

not publishing related at all, but I am very interested. So you

are a competitive pool player, is that right? Yeah,

competitive, but it's amateur. So, but it's amateur. Okay, so,

like, how did you get into that? Like, tell us about the world of

competitive pool I'm super interested in this. Sounds like

a Discovery Channel, yeah, waiting to happen.

It's well, I It's a friend of mine who works at Macmillan, who

she has been playing pool for a very long time. I'm not sure

exactly how she got into it, either, but she had been

captaining a team for a long time, and it was all ladies,

yep, and she was looking for a lower ranked person. And I

played full as a kid. Weirdly, my dad had gotten us a pool

table secondhand, so that was something I know not, not in

every kid thing at all. And then I played a lot in college, and

just kind of, but it was just, you know, one thing to do, not

really thing I thought about that much. So I'm not, I wasn't

particularly good. I just knew I liked it. And so we had talked

about that, and she kept asking me to join her full team. I was

like, No, I haven't played. I'm just, I'm not sure that I'm very

good. And she's like, that's perfect. I need some

maybe I'll try it. So I tried it, and now it's been almost two

years now. Okay, yeah, really fun. Um, I play in APA, which is

the organization that kind of governs our teams,

because amateur pool, I don't remember. Yeah,

so and I play on a nine ball team,

and so we're, we're playing with only nine balls, and we shoot

them in numerical order. And it's,

it's hard, but it's, that's, it's the challenge. And I like

that challenge, and it makes playing eight ball so much

easier. You're

only worried about solids or stripes, so you have to do them

in order. Wow,

the ball. Balls are assigned points, and your rank is kind of

your handicap, so I only need X amount of points to win. My

opponent might need a lot more or a lot less depending on their

rank. So

yeah, do you all wear matching jackets? No, but I suggested

this.

Oh, awesome. Let's be, you know, like the pink ladies from

Greece, like we need, we need our own t shirt or something.

Yeah, absolutely, yeah. So I'm gonna get on that. Yeah,

endorsements, yeah.

Yeah.

Okay, so I also have another question about that. Is now

publishing related. Can you tell us a little bit about your cat,

who you described as a miniature house Panther? Yes, his name is

Merlin. He's very large, and he's all black, okay, when he's

prowling around the house. He kind of looks like a little baby

Panther, uh huh, and I picked him up off the street. He

actually adopted me. I did not know I was coming home late one

night, and I was in a hurry to get back to my apartment. This

was in Washington Heights, in Manhattan, and which is a

neighborhood very far north, and people know where it is.

And this little black cat came running up to me, just also in a

hurry, like, clearly,

I was just like, Oh no, I have to stop now and pet this cat. So

he's just, you know, having a grand old time. And I'm looking

around like, there's no people around, and he doesn't have a

collar, and he's very dirty and obviously hasn't been eating

properly, yep. So I didn't think there were any humans attached

to him, or if they were, they weren't taking very good care of

him. So I was like, You know what? I think I'm gonna pick him

up. Oh,

and he didn't protest. He just was like, very cool about it.

Like, okay, this is what we're doing. I just took him home. I'm

in my apartment, and, like, an hour later, he was sleeping so

hard on my couch, I guess he's adopted me, I guess so it's

actually right over

here.

Oh, we're gonna play the cat, yeah,

oh, wow.

What a sweet Yeah. How old is he? He's two, two, wow, oh, wow.

Okay, so when I picked him up, he was five months old and he

weighed seven pounds, so he's already

a full size cat. Size. Nobody was a kitten when I picked him

up. Sure, not interested in getting a kitten right

at all. Yeah. So he was so I took him to the vet just to get

him checked out and get all the shots and get him fixed and

everything. And the vet was like, oh, did you know he's only

five months old? I was

like, No,

shocking. It's like, oh, well, now I have this enormous kitten,

and he just got bigger and bigger and bigger, um, and now

he weighs 15 pounds. So, oh yeah, yay. That's really cool,

for sure. Yeah, that's awesome. So we always ask, what are you

reading right now?

I Well, I'm sort of in between. I'm reading a book that I'm

reviewing. I'm always worried about talking about books I'm

reviewing before I review them. So I'm going to skip that one,

okay? And I will tell you about

so I just finished reading the clockmakers daughter by Kate

Morton. Oh yeah. How was that? Oh so good. I got an audio book,

actually, because I got a long commute into Manhattan and so,

you know, and reading on the train is a little hard for me. I

don't know why I'm gonna get distracted, so I love to sink

into what I'm listening to. And the audiobook was just perfect

for that.

It's narrated by

her name, I think it's Joanna froggett. She was in Downton

Abbey. Oh, okay, who's the lady's maid in Downton Abbey?

And she does such a good job of all the different voices, like,

she'll do an American accent every now and then. And you

would have no idea it was hers, like, she's just, she's amazing.

And it's, it's a very involved story with a lot of mystery and

twists and turns, and it spans a couple of different generations

of the same of this mystery. So you kind of get different

threads happening, and then you have to see how over time, they

connect. It's, it's like each character that narrates starts

to overlap with the other. I love that. Yeah. So it's a very

layered and very interesting, but it all centers around

this one house

that was owned by an artist in 1800s and so you and you find

out more about him and about his life. And there's, there's a

murder that happens at one point, and I'm

afraid to tell more, because I don't want to give it away. But,

like, I still kind of get goosebumps thinking about how

how immersive it was, and how you're just right there in it.

And I just don't think I can recommend it enough, especially

the audio version, because you're just just in it, and

there's nothing to distract you from just being pulled right in.

So, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. That's great. That's awesome. Yeah. Corinne, what am

I reading? Well, let's see. I'm still reading the Jen Kirkman

book. I can barely take care of myself.

And then I'm also reading, I just got this out of the

library, this book called prophets pray. That is about the

FLDS church, Warren Jeffs. I'm so, I'm, like, beginning to kind

of, because I check out a lot of books, I'm really, like, I'm not

a huge True Crime person, but I'm really into cults. So almost

all the books that I check out from the library are about cult

so I feel like they're going to start, like, flagging my card or

something. Is like, Who is this weirdo? But he's checking out.

It's still, like, exclusively books. I mean, what would the

risk would be? You would be a cult leader, yeah? Like someone

in a cult, right, right? Like, checking out, yeah, I don't

Yeah,

necessarily,

so, but yeah, so I'm reading those two things that which are

like good counterpoints, because Jen Kirkman is like a comedian,

and that book is super, like light and breezy and fun. And

then obviously the other ones, like an investigation into this

deep dark, like, you know, just terrible underworld of terrible

things. So it's kind of a good counterbalance, like they both

sort of balance each other out. So we have the light in the

dark, marvelous will. So anyway, that's what I'm proud of you.

Yeah, thanks.

What about you? I finished Pachinko on Friday, and it's

devastating and wonderful, and I recommend it. It is a

commitment. It's like 479 pages and four generations of a Korean

family living in Japan, World War Two and up through the 1980s

and, um, so, yeah, that was a great one. I just got, um, we

went to pals yesterday, and finally, like, cleaned out a

bunch of our books. Well, we thought it was a bunch, but

we're like, Oh, we got this big old box full of books, and this

lady was literally in line in front of us with a dolly with

three banker boxes full of books, a doll, wow, yeah. But we

got 39 bucks, all right? And I was like, Okay, I'll be right

back.

And so we cut

the next, the last book in the

Broken Earth trilogy by NK Jemisin. And so my husband is

one book behind me. And so I'm like, Oh, I have to, I have to

start reading the stone sky immediately, or he's gonna catch

up and win.

No, can't have it. That one's that one's next.

I'm probably gonna start it tonight. Very excited.

That's that's been making my year.

I don't know why I don't go faster. I think it's because of

the every at the end of everyone. I'm just so

emotionally exhausted that I need a break.

Some books, especially the good ones, will do that to you, for

sure. Yeah, I just, like, ugly cried for 15 minutes after the

end of the first one.

Wow, paced around the house. That happens a lot to me, though

I have a lot of feelings.

All right. Well, is there anything else you wanted to we

know, we know that your Can you give us our your Twitter handle

one more time, and anything else that you want to plug Sure? Yes,

I'm on Twitter at artist Elaine, so a, r, d, y, C, E, E, L, A, I,

N, E, and I've just started genre diary, which is a brand

new Ruby website. It's still in its early stages, so it's taken

me a little while to get things up there, but it's

genrediary.com,

Artie, thank you so much for being on Thank you. We learned a

lot. Thank you so much for having me. This was a lot of

fun. So, Amanda, what brings you here?

Well, I'm really interested in learning more about publishing,

the publishing industry,

technology. You know, social media. Social media marketing is

really exciting. So I can't wait to work on your Instagram

account, and, you know, the website and all that stuff. It's

gonna be really fun. And I'm just really passionate and

excited. And so we're excited too. It's gonna be the best

summer ever. It is, yeah? So they say that's true, the best

summer ever. It really is, yeah, yep,

no, right.

Do you have questions for Amanda Corinne,

let me think of some good ones.

Let's see what is like of all the books that you had to read

in high school, what was your least favorite?

Favorite,

and why? Ooh, my least favorite, yeah,

yeah. I don't know. I like blocked, I don't remember

anything like ninth grade. Yeah, that's okay. Those are the two I

remember. So a lot of grades, I don't really know. I don't know

I liked a lot of books, but none of them, but none of the ones

you were actually, I was actually assigned, yeah, exactly

yeah.

The one, the one good thing that I got out of high school, that I

loved was I actually started a literary magazine. Oh, my god,

yeah. So when I was a junior, like, helped me through a lot of

my, like, emotional stuff that I was dealing with, and I had

this, this teacher who is amazing, and she we're still in

touch now, and she kind of was like, hey, you know, do you want

to get started on something so that you, like, a club? And, you

know, I She's told us that she ran a literary magazine at a

previous school, and she kind of, like, helped us get started.

But, like, I was kind of the institute, like, I was like,

that sounds really cool. Let's do it. And so yeah, we started a

magazine with, like, no funding, and we kind of just did all the

fundraising by ourselves, and, like, all the students submitted

work and made it happen. So how many

volumes, issues, like, two. So I did two throughout my career

there, but that the literary magazine actually continued on

after I left, like, for another I think, I think it's actually

might still be going, um, yeah, I might still be going.

Previously, they hadn't had a literary magazine for like 10

years at South and then they just, I think they still have

one. Were you Editor in Chief? I was editor in chief. It was

called figure of speech.

That's amazing. Yeah, yeah.

No, I was editor in chief. It was great. I got to, like, pick

the font in the magazine and, like, pick the layout. Do you

remember what font it was? I don't remember. I wish I did.

Wasn't Comic Sans was no, heck no. Or Papyrus,

papyrus was it wing tings?

Now that would have been some Samuel struggle.

You have to decipher it, right? Well, it was, was really fun.

That's awesome. No, tell us more about that. Like, what did you

write? We had, well, I wrote a lot of

poetry, and I still write poetry, and I took some

photographs too for it, and, like, I don't know, I just like,

yeah, poetry, short fiction, flash fiction, kind of stuff.

Just like, because, you know, that's really interesting, like,

the line between prose and poetry, like, where does that

even stand sometimes,

especially with, like, the longer, longer form poetry,

that's, like, kind of in the format of prose. Like, it's,

like, paragraph form, it's, it's always kind of been hard for me

to define, like, what I like to write, but much of it comes from

like, a point of, like, emotion and not a lot of plot. So I

guess I would kind of define that more as poetry. Well, I

mean, you can write whatever you want because exactly, it's all

made up. Yeah, it's all made up anyway, yeah. But no, the

magazine was amazing because, you know, we got submissions

from students at school who previously hadn't had any

outlets for, like, their creativity through the school,

it was usually like we had yearbook, we had drama, we had

sports, and that's pretty much so a lot of things for

extroverts. So extroverts, yeah, but we, you know, we accepted,

we accepted photography, we accepted poetry, we accepted,

like, short stories, we accepted essays, like non fiction stuff.

So it's kind of like a mixed bag. And the difference between

our first edition and our second edition, like, while I was in

it, because I was in it for two years, was, like, amazing, wow.

So you learned a lot, and just that, that I learned a lot, wow.

And doing all the fundraising stuff was really fun too. Like,

figuring out how to because the school didn't fund us at all the

first year and then the second year, they kind of helped a bit.

But like, we had to do bake sales. We had to do, yeah, we

did bake sales. We did car washes, you know, all the kind

of like standard. And then we also would do, like, we did ads

in the back of the magazine, like, we contacted local

businesses and, like, people's parents and stuff. And like,

would cold call them and like, get them to put ads in the

magazine, so that they would, like, raise money and real

magazine, like a real magazine. And most of the money went to

the printing and we, I went to, actually, I went to Albany with

Alexa, the advisor, the club advisor. We drove to Albany and

saw the printing press? Oh, my God, it was so cool. It was so

so cool. Did you see the printing press printing your

magazine? No, I wish that would be like a once in a lifetime.

Yeah. But anyway,

that was a great experience, and that's actually what really

solidified, like my love for writing, and like wanting to get

into writing, and man, also like the marketing behind it, and

like all the design, like, you know, on the back of the scenes,

or behind the scenes. What kind of software did you guys get?

Because in design, we got a yearbook kid to do it. Yeah,

they're good at that. They are because yearbook kids, yep, we I

was pre InDesign when I was in like.

Like,

we use page maker and I just sit there and cry. Oh no, it was the

worst. I know any designers out there are probably screaming

right now, because you know how terrible PageMaker is. Count

your lucky stars that you never had to use page make. Oh so,

like, I also worked on a newsletter for we hadn't we had

an aquarium at our school. Oh my gosh, that's so crazy. Yeah, it

was, like, a really expensive, like, it was partnered with

Noah. It was what, I'm from Southern California. It was

really cool. And we were near like,

and so we had some pretty intense stuff going on. So I was

in charge of the newsletter for that. And the printer we used

only took page maker, so InDesign was starting, but like,

they wouldn't use it. Oh, okay, they didn't, okay, yeah, it was

one of those, like, it was just, it was just, there's the one

printer, the one main one, and they will only use this

outdated, yeah. Oh my gosh. I hope they've gotten better.

Well, they have to, I mean, they have to gone, yeah,

everyone hates it. You'd hope they don't still try to use it.

Oh my god. Can you imagine they're just handing out CD ROMs

here. Put this on your

computer. Take this floppiness.

So when did you go straight into college after high school? I

did, yeah, I actually went to University of Oregon for two

years. Oh, cool, because it was in Eugene. And, you know, my

parents were like, oh, we'll pay for the dorms for a year if you

go, if you go there. And I was like, okay, whatever. So I went

there. I went to U of O, they paid for the dorms for the dorms

for a year, and then I, after that year, I moved back in with

them, and then I was at the U of O still, but I kind of didn't

really want to be there, because I had been in Eugene my entire

life. And I was like, I'm kind of ready to get out of here,

like, and that's the time you're supposed to do it, yeah. And I'm

like, you know, it's been two years, so it's perfect time to

transfer. So I did. I transferred up to Portland,

state, yeah, and doing English or so, yeah, well, actually, I

was originally an English major at U of O, but then I

transferred to sociology. So I do, I mostly do, like, social

science stuff and, yeah, like sociology, women's studies and

so at Portland, state now I, my major is liberal studies, all

right, but minor in writing, cool. So mostly, and more,

mostly around, like the writing side of things, and then also,

like, the social, sociology side, and, yeah, cultural stuff.

And I don't know, a lot of books, or, like, a lot about,

like, you know, books and things and reading, I try to read as

much as i You're gonna learn. I'm gonna learn a lot. Oh, I'm

so excited. I'm gonna learn a lot this summer. Is like, I'm

gonna read so much this summer, I shall read. I shall. I shall.

Speaking of which, yes, I'm gonna start with you. Karine,

you're really chomping at, I sure am. What are you reading?

Okay, well, first of all, I just checked out for his dark from

the library, which is by Nicole Kraus. Oh, who did history of

love? Yeah, great house. She's great. She is, she is, you know,

used to be Jonathan Safran for his better half. She was, always

the best half of that company. She was. And then then he left,

then

declared his love for Natalie Portman. And Natalie Portman was

like, Oh, that's not what I meant. Oh, okay. His wife was

like, Okay, well, then you can't have this Yes, which seems fair.

So anyway, but I just started it, so I'm only, like 20 pages

in, but so far, I like it a lot. And then also, I saw just today

that at the Multnomah County Library, my copy of bad blood is

ready for me to pick up. So I'm very excited about that. Also,

you carry you.

Just kidding.

Kind of Yeah. I

know he does seem like a smug prick, but he did. It's a good

book, really good. Yeah, you told me it was Yeah, so I'm

excited to read about that. So yeah, that's what I got right

now. So everyone loves an anti hero,

yeah? Indeed loves to hoot, loves to hate Are you reading

anything right now? Man, I am. I'm reading a nonfiction book. I

forgot the author's name, but it's called unfuck your

intimacy. Oh, that's Dr. Faith Harper. Faith Harper, that's a

microcosm book. Yes, it is. Yeah, I went to microcosm and

picked it up. I love microcosm. Joe Biel actually came to speak

to my class, to the same one, and so I've been and I did a lot

of, like, I did a research project on microcosm, so I'm,

like, really interested in them. And then I randomly was at the

doctor yesterday, and I realized that microcosm was right there

across the street, so I went there, and I just picked it up.

Yeah, yeah. Have a little store. They do a little store. It's

adorable. I got lost in there for like, an hour. I love it,

yeah, it's, it's.

Yeah. I mean, it's very small, it is, but there's a lot of

books. I mean, I didn't get lost, lost, but, you know, I was

reading all the titles of the books very meticulously for an

hour. I guess that's like, a better way of putting it. It's a

House of Leaves situation, exactly. It's bigger on the

inside.

Yeah, it really is, though, you just keep turning corners, and

they're, you know, yeah, no, she's got a lot of good books.

Do you follow her on Instagram? I don't, but I should, you

should she posts a lot of good mental health memes? Yeah? Oh

yes. Love a mental health meme. Yeah. They're great. I like

screenshot a lot of them. Oh my gosh, yes. Love it. She's great.

She's really funny. She's one of those people. Like, if I emailed

her about something once, because something she posted

really resonated with me, and she emailed me back within a few

hours. That's amazing. Message authors, email authors, tell

them that you like what they're saying. Totally. Like, do it

especially like now, yeah, yeah. Anything else, no. Book wise,

that's all I'm reading. One is enough. It's okay, yeah, in

fact, like, it's probably better,

yeah, it's better than the zero I was reading for most of 2018

true or, like, the the four you were quote, unquote reading, I

was reading, yeah,

you're like, I can't read anything else because I have to

get back to me. Yeah, yeah. Was that part of it? That was, yeah,

that probably was part of it, yeah, yeah. Corrine went through

a very dry spell of not reading until we shamed her into reading

again. And that worked, because I'm a recovering Catholic, and

shame is something that does not go away. It doesn't so yeah, and

it's like that, and being a woman on top of everything,

yeah, that is a lot of shame. Yep, sure is, but crin but I

persevered, and now I'm reading not one but two books at the

same time. Oh, congratulations to me.

I believe in you.

Thank you so much.

You What are you reading right now? I am quote unquote reading

like five books at the moment, right that's a quote unquote so

the one that I can speak to and actually got through more of and

is less embarrassing is is, believe me, by Eddie Izzard. And

I know I've complained about celebrity memoirs on here

before, sure, but I went on a road trip with my husband, and

he does not like thrillers, and he does not like crime, and he

does not like a lot of the things I like. And so I was

trying to find something that we would both enjoy. And on our

last road trip we took, we listened to Eddie Izzard CDs,

CDs the whole time. Yeah, that's how long ago we took a road

trip.

And so I was like, Eddie Izzard has a memoir. Let's listen to

Eddie Izzard's memoir. So the first few chapters were, you

know, very sad, because his mom died when she when he was four.

Oh, gosh, yeah.

But it also had that whole thing where I would have stopped

listening to it if my husband hadn't been having a wonderful

time. Because it was like I was a child and I played cricket and

I went, I was in the street, blah blah blah. But he, he does

so many asides

which, it's kind of his thing, you know, it's like, what is

this about? Yeah. And then, did you know Winston Churchill,

blah, blah, blah blah, yeah. So there's a lot of that that's

like, and he goes anyway, and he keeps saying, like, end a

footnote

and a very long footnote,

end of a necessary footnote. So it's fun. I just got to get him

in a situation where we're like, together for a long period of

time in a car again. Yeah, yeah. So we can

listen, yeah, exactly. That's good, yeah. So we listen to

that. I like audio books a lot. Do you like audio books? I do,

but I don't listen to them very much. Audible. You don't have, I

don't have audible. Get libro FM. Okay, yeah, we'll talk about

that later, but I've talked about that a lot on this

podcast, definitely. Let's talk about it. Heck yes,

yeah. So I'm also just reading. There's, like, a bunch of things

I want to read to be our pile, yep, overflowing. Sure, sure.

I'm reading a bunch of weird, like magic books that I'm

embarrassed to talk about.

One of them is by this, like, 1960s chaos magician dude named

Peter Carroll. Is called lieberknoll and psychonaut.

Well, they're two different books, libre null and

psychoanalyt, and it's like the Bible of chaos magic or

whatever. And it's just all this weird esoteric stuff

that makes it's like gibberish. But you know, it's one of those

things where someone was like, you have to read this if you're,

like, interested in the occult. And like, Oh yeah, yeah.

Crazy. And

it's like, there's one where it's like, this is the ritual of

the blah, blah, blah, and you do this, and then it's blood, and I

have been cautioned against telling you anymore, and then it

just the section ends. Oh my gosh. All right.

This is, this is black magic, this is red magic.

This is polka dot green magic. This is Rainbow magic,

all right, so you can find us at hybrid pub, scout.com please

sign up for our mailing list. I did just release our one lead

magnet as a for everyone podcast, so I have to figure out

something

new. Well, whatever, it's fine. I'll make JT read more. Smut,

yeah. And so find us on Facebook, hybrid pub Scout,

Twitter, hybrid pub Scout,

Instagram, hybrid pods,

hybrid pub, Scout pod, because our first account, yeah,

deleted, I don't know, yeah, yeah. And keep an eye on

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over. Yeah, be be aware. So follow us there and am I missing

anything? Give us a five star rating. Please. Just five stars

if you don't want to give us five stars, why did you get this

far in the podcast, right? Yeah, but it'll be extra fun for you

if you leave a review and tell me what accent to read it in.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, what could go wrong, what, not indeed, just

don't, you know,

just don't,

don't, don't, select some

just be tasteful. Yeah, yes.

Anyway, Karina, have anything else to say? I don't think so.

All right, been a pleasure.

It's been a pleasure. It's been very fun. I'm really happy to be

back here because it's been a few weeks it has so, yeah, it's

just like getting reacquainted with an old friend who is

actually a current friend. So that's, you know, many friends,

yeah, yeah. Anyway, all right, to say i

Well, thanks for

listening and thanks for giving a rip about books. You

you.