Violet Thistwatle - Emily K

===

[00:00:00]

Welcome to the What Your Next podcast. So excited to be back. And today we got Cozy Fall Fantasy, which is the perfect engine antidote., If you're looking to do a little bit of low stake fantasy and you wanna dip in your waters, but you're just not ready to take on like big, massive quest or big massive wars and magic systems, you just wanna get a little bit of magic, but not too much.

This purpose is for you. \ Emily Krempholtz wrote Violet Thistlewaite is not a villain anymore. This book is still lively fun. It's like imagine yourself, you lost a war, you lost your identity. You have been a villain in the war, and then you just get an escape.

Someone the her and the other story tells you. I'm gonna let you go. You just change your, do something different and you decide, you know what? I'm just gonna move to a small town, open a flower shop, and just live my cozy life as possible, and then suddenly finds herself with her. Grumpy landlord who's an alchemist, who they have to share a greenhouse [00:01:00] and it's just cozy and fun and gardening, and oops, they have some quest they need to do, but it's not like this major PTSD quest that they have to go through.

It is fun. It is cozy, it is joyful. It is the cottage core. I think I did an episode of Cottage core recommendations. Does this kinda like the full cottage core of the fantasy world? So good. In addition, Emily, share some Cozy Fall recommendations to you. What to read. So this is a perfect fall vibes if you wanted to do a little bit dip into your toes for cozy fantasies. This is the perfect episode for you. Let's get to the show.

Laura Yamin: Hi, Emily. Welcome to the What to Read Next Podcast.

Emily Krempholtz: Hi Laura. Thanks for having me. I.

Laura Yamin: So happy to have you here. So tell us a little bit about yourself.

Emily Krempholtz: So I am an author. I live in Denver, Colorado, and my debut Cozy Fantasy Romance violet, THISTLEWAITE is not a villain anymore, is out in November. And it tells the story [00:02:00] of a powerful plant witch named Violet, this eight, who has spent her entire life working for an evil sorcerer. But after his defeat, she decides to turn over a new leaf and open a flower shop in a small town and try her hand at being a good person for once.

But it's a little bit trickier than she thinks. She kind of butts heads with a, a grumpy alchemist who lives next door. And when a mysterious blight kind of pops up in her new town and her own kind of dark past comes knocking at her door, she has to really grapple with whether or not a former villain ever deserves a happily ever after.

Laura Yamin: And she does so to say, and I think in some ways it's like, it's such a, I was telling it was like a perfect comfort, perfect balm too. Today's world, it's cozy, it's fantasy. It still thinks about characters and how to change and growth of the character. But at the same time, understand their own power and how they can use it. And I think in some ways as a human being, we are, we have power that we can use to good or bad and is how we choose to do it. So it does have the, the moral stuff, but it's a [00:03:00] really cozy escape of plants and beautiful settings and just kinda like cute things you create and it's but it's not this like life or death fantasy.

It's more like actually, like what happens after a bad battle. What can happen and how do you actually overcome it?

Emily Krempholtz: Absolutely. I feel like that's always one of my favorite things about Cozy Fantasy is it takes, it is kind of that. Slice of life. It kinda zooms in on normal people and, and looks at like, all right, well what happens after the battles are won? What happens after somebody has had this big experience? Or what happens, you know, to, to all the people left behind, you know, who aren't a big part of this big giant story that's happening after, you know, the heroes have come and they've defeated this great evil, but what happens to the minions?

What happens to the towns folk? And, and I love that cozy fantasy gives me and so many other authors the opportunity to explore those things.

Laura Yamin: So Cozy Fantasy feels like a newer genre. It's probably has been around, but probably the low stakes, like low stakes [00:04:00] fantasy. But the cozy aspect of it, I feel like as a post pandemic boom, or we are seeing more, much more better marketed. Talk to us about the genre itself. Like what made you decide to write within this level?

Fantasy that's a cozy space. I understand like obviously the world has changed in the past five years and a lot of things have changed, but

Emily Krempholtz: Just a little.

Laura Yamin: just a little, just a tiny bit, it's, it actually hasn't been the past 5, 5, 5 years has accelerated, but it's been for some time. But I think this genre has gone, it's like, has grown tremendously.

It was only like a few books at the beginning and now it's like multiple books and multiple ways to look at it.

Emily Krempholtz: Absolutely. I think, you know, cozy fantasy and that kind of slice of life fantasy has been around for quite some time. You know, I always look at like, Howell's Moving Castle as a really good example of one that's, that's been around, Howells has been here. I don't, I don't even know when that book was published, but like, it's, it's been here, it's been around.

We only just started really calling it Cozy [00:05:00] Fantasy in, I think. 2020 with legends and Lattes by Travis Baldry. And he very famously, I know, has, has said like, he didn't write this as a cozy fantasy. He didn't write this to be called Cozy Fantasy. And yet it has kind of become like the, the sort of titular name we think of when, when we, somebody says Cozy fantasy.

I really got involved in reading it. I've always, you know. I've read a lot of books that I think would be called Cozy Fantasy if they were published today. I equate a lot of books like Violet to like books for people who grew up reading Ella Enchanted and like books for people who like, yes, like you, you, you love, like that magical whimsy and the romance and just kind of like, you know, the stakes that that.

Can sometimes flirt with being a little higher stakes, but generally are really focused on individuals and really focused on characters and their emotions and their own kind of internal journeys. And in a way, I think that cozy fantasy also has a lot in common with romance because of that. Because I think [00:06:00] that, you know, romance as a genre is often about, okay, you know, here's what's going on in, in just a couple of people's lives on a really micro level.

And so cozy kind of hits that nice in between like. Level between those two things, it kind of hits that really nice sweet spot where you're focusing on individuals, you're focusing on their emotional journeys, you're focusing on their lives. And they may or may not have huge world breaking stakes, probably not because they're normal people and not everybody's the chosen one.

So a lot of those things really drew me to writing Cozy Fantasy Plus like. I don't know. I, I love books. I love baking. I love tea. I love like going for little walks and like, you know, like I love, I love pets and animals and like all of those things have kind of become like sort of symbols of cozy fantasy in really nice ways.

You get the found family, you get your animal companions, you get. Copious descriptions of baked goods. You know, again, like I said, it's, it's for the, the Ella Enchanted girlies all grown up, but it's also for like the people who read Red Wall too. You know, like I [00:07:00] want, I want all those descriptions of the feasts and, and all of these like really just like nice kind of homey, comforting aspects of books.

Laura Yamin: It's perfect. I think it's just what we need. I think in some ways it's not as intimidating for someone who is starting to re fantasy and thinking like it has to be high stakes and it has to

Emily Krempholtz: Yeah.

Laura Yamin: the Lord of the Rings or the Hobbit. This high stake, this long, massive trilogy. These are more. Not palatable, but more easier to start and to get connected and to understand a little bit of low stakes. It's perfect for PTSD or at least like me, who cannot handle a lot of like triggers and a lot of bored, a lot of things. It's like this is a perfect companion where you're reading fantasy, but you're reading. The stakes are different, but they actually can reflect back to your life and to reflect to how you make decisions.

Like are you a villain or you're not a villain, and how do you have power? You don't have power? Or how do you manage the amount of power that you have? The, I realize it, she's like, she has a lot of magic. She has to exert [00:08:00] it, and it's like how to actually regulate your nervous system essentially,

Emily Krempholtz: absolutely. And there's, and there's so many different ways. Like, I mean, I, I love looking at magic as a metaphor for any sort of, you know, like mental health and for, for kind of like emotional regulation and for the experiences that we're going through in our lives too. And, and I think fantasy is. So well suited to be able to create those kinds of things because obviously, you know, magic fantasy kind of go together, but like it's, it's such a great way to say, okay, yeah, here, here's something I wanna explore.

How do I explore this in a way that that feels different and that feels like a little more gentle? You know, if you're telling somebody, Hey, you're gonna go into this book and it's gonna trigger all your PTSD because a character's going through the same thing as you, you're probably a lot less likely to read it.

But if you're going into a book where somebody's going to, it's. Explore some of those things through magic and through a lot of kind of fantastical metaphors and fantastical kind of allegories, it feels a little easier and a little bit more palatable and it feels kind of it, it almost sneaks up on you [00:09:00] in a different way.

And I know that like when I read a fantasy where somebody's going through something that I've gone through and, and I get to the end of it and I'm like, that wasn't so bad. Okay, we're good.

Laura Yamin: Yeah, it's like the perfect exposure therapy in some ways because

Emily Krempholtz: It's.

Laura Yamin: you to the idea of like, here's what's going on. And like, I didn't realize I, I had, I've long diagnosed with PTSD, but I read the COR thos, not what it just came out. And that was experience of p, the affairs, PTSD, it. Oh, that's what it looks like.

And I was able to visualize that in therapy. And so fantasy allows me like, where in your book? I was like, oh, it's just like, how do you manage your emotions and how do you manage how you view yourself? Because you view yourself, you have. This identity and then realize like, I don't, that identity no longer fits me.

And then how do I view it now in this new identity that I don't know what it looks like and how different it is. And I'm in a new world. I'm in New town, new people and new experiences and [00:10:00] that's challenging. And it's allowing yourself to tap into your power and. Figure out like what it looks like.

And I think in some ways fantasy allows you to see those mirrors and explore them within your life and in others, and to make decisions hopefully for the better, which is what valid does,

Emily Krempholtz: and I think she, you know, she, she shook. The ways that that's, it's not always easy. Like I think we all, part of the thing that drew me to writing Violet is because I think like so many of us have had that fantasy when we're having like a rough day at work where it's like, I'm gonna leave all this behind.

I'm gonna, I'm gonna go to a new place where nobody knows me. I'm gonna open. For me, it's always a book shop Cafe combo is always the one I've wanted to open. But you have like your little like. Fantasy capitalism idea, and you're like, what do I want to do that is so different from the life that I'm living right now and how could I start over and be a completely new person?

But like, it's not that easy. Like we all have pasts and we all have these things that like, you know, combined to who have made us the person that we are right now and we can't, [00:11:00] as much as we would like sometimes just walk away from all of that.

Laura Yamin: Yeah, I had done the geographical cure so many times and all my baggage itches with me. remember the

Emily Krempholtz: How did that happen?

Laura Yamin: that? I was like, wait, I'm sorry. I still have all the issues all day. And I was like, and I'd done it multiple times. I've lived in New York for a long time and I moved to Chicago at some point, and then in Chicago, moved to Tampa and I was like. is going on? And I had to learn to like, oh my gosh, I had to be like violent and try to figure shit out,

Emily Krempholtz: yeah.

Laura Yamin: Like understanding, like it's just part of life. Like the baggage is with you and you kind of have to go back to the baggage and be like, okay, what do I keep? What do I do What?

Declutter, edit and figure out the identity, what it's gonna look like. Or letting go of the old identity too, letting that shed that light, but it's still so present because it was such a big part of your life.

Emily Krempholtz: Yeah, and any of that change needs to be done with so much intention.

Laura Yamin: Because otherwise it's [00:12:00] just gonna be like a hot mess, which is

Emily Krempholtz: Yep.

Laura Yamin: too.

Emily Krempholtz: And it's okay because you know what? Honestly, even if you're doing it with intention, sometimes there's a hot mess in there and that's also okay.

Laura Yamin: It's just life. Life is not, life is messy. Life is not like, like rigid and life is not like, this is how it's gonna always gonna be. It's like, it's just, you call it unfold. Just like Violet and Nathaniel Lang had to realize like, holy shit, we got something else bigger to deal with that brought this together.

So I am really excited for listeners to pick up your book, to read it, to enjoy it, and to just have a fun, cozy time at this perfect time. So, so you're actually a book coach and a ghost writer and an author. So how, I assume you've always been writing

Emily Krempholtz: Hmm.

Laura Yamin: early reader. But talk to us about like what does it look like writing your own work, but also helping others to share their stories, whether they're ghost writing or helping them.

Plotting or coaching them to get other stories. What does it look like for you?

Emily Krempholtz: [00:13:00] It is honestly so rewarding. I have been writing my own stories for pretty much as long as I can remember. I was like that kid, like, you know, illustrating and writing my own little book. And on like printer paper with crayons and then like stapling 'em together and giving them to family members for, for birthdays and stuff.

And it, it has really just expanded from there. Like storytelling has always been very much something that is a part of me and something that I've always loved. And as I got older, you know, I had, I started to really have to think about like. How do I wanna do this? I know I wanna write books, but also like I have to, I have to pay the bills like I have to, I, I have to, I have to take part in, in society in like a normal way too.

And I eventually through a, a series of missteps, you know, ended up falling into doing some freelance writing doing some editing. I kind of like built on itself because I realized, you know, as much as I love writing my own stories, I also. Really have a lot of knowledge that I've accumulated over the years, and I have a lot of teaching experience in terms of how to [00:14:00] coach people through things.

And, and I, I came to realize how much I really like helping other people find the stories they're supposed to tell. So I started editing, you know, through some fiction and then I was doing some freelance editing. I, I. Fell into kind of working in a lot of memoirs and in a lot of like nonfiction fields, which I found really allowed me to still preserve a lot of my energy outside of work for working on my own fiction without burning that part of myself out.

And so that was really nice. But yeah, I, I've worked with. So many incredible people who have these amazing stories to tell. Especially like when it comes to memoirs. I have worked with people who have the most incredible life stories and you know, we, we look at, we look at a story in a book, and then we look at our lives and we think those are different stories.

Stories have a narrative. They have a beginning, a middle, and an end. And life isn't always like that. But the really cool thing about working with a lot of my clients and, and for, for memoirs is that. We were able to look at certain points of their life and certain realizations that they've had over time, and find those [00:15:00] narratives and find the ways that there is actually a narrative arc to a lot of parts of our lives if we learn how to look at that.

And so helping people find that has been incredibly rewarding just on that regard. I've gotten to know so many really cool people and learn some really cool stories along the way, but it's also made me such a better storyteller. It's also made me a lot more able to get to the heart of things and be able to look at a story from that like, you know.

10,000 foot vantage point and say, okay, I can see the shape of this and I can see what I'm trying to tell here. I can see what I'm trying to do with this. And that makes me a lot better at being able to kind of hone that and, and create that. So it's been, it's been a long journey and I'm so, I'm so grateful for the time that I have.

Spent and, and continue to spend working with my clients and helping them find their stories. Just because of what it's done for me as a writer, how, you know, I've been able to meet a lot of these people and, and help them find their stories. And honestly, there is like nothing like being with somebody when they have that aha moment.

And when you can see that light [00:16:00] bulb go off in their head and they're like, ah. I figured it out. I figured out what I wanna do. I figured out how I wanna tell this story and how I want this to work, and it's, it's beautiful and it's really, really inspiring.

Laura Yamin: Oh my gosh. I love this. I love the fact that you're like, you're able to build your body of work, and not just the actual work, but the like, the mastery of writing of master storytelling through nonfiction, through other people's stories. Because in some ways we borrow from the. Stories to make fiction, as for, we look for those inciting incidents to help us develop like what's the next, what's the next plot point?

But in our lives, the inciting incident can change, like a little moment can change everything, big moments can change. Everything like, it just depends. But trying to look prior to your life, it's a daunting process. It's like, how does it all make sense? How does it make me the essence of me in this stage of my life?

And how did it actually. Make it together and do I have a character act? Or don't have a character act at that stage of your life. And I think it's like fun to watch it, it's kinda [00:17:00] like a therapist in some ways with what you're doing, essentially. Like, okay,

Emily Krempholtz: I will never, I, my sister's a therapist and I will never, ever say that in front of her, but there, no, and, and, and therapists, you know, it, I, I, there are a lot of huge differences, but there is also that aspect of being there to guide someone as they draw those conclusions and as they connect those dots in a way that is.

So satisfying, and it's exactly what as writers we do for our characters. You know, we're making up these people in our heads, but we're essentially trying to guide them to their own kind of mental breakthroughs and to their own kind of emotional, you know, journeys and, and help them find peace and help them, you know, find fulfillment in ways that that feels remarkably similar.

Laura Yamin: And characters sometimes don't act the way you want to act them. And that's the other part. It's like you can't control people and you can't even control your characters. 'cause characters can talk to you and be like, no, we're not doing that. We're not that. I know John 500 these, so I've heard plenty of times they're like, yeah, I wanna this way.

And then the character [00:18:00] treated me somewhere else. That was my. Part of my journey just to walk them through and maybe observe what the action looks like. And so sometimes it's just taking a step back and observing and like, oh, like this is where you wanna go.

Emily Krempholtz: And it's cool because once you, once you have honed your ability and once you've, you've done enough work with your characters so that they feel like real people, you can start to listen to those things. If you're writing a scene and you're like, why am I having such trouble writing this? You can take a step back and be like, okay, well maybe when I wrote this outline, this character was the type of person who would, who would take these actions, who would do this thing.

But now that I've gotten to know them, now that I'm, you know, 50,000 words into this manuscript, I've, I've come to know them on a different level and part of my brain, you know, that you can call it the character taking on a life of their own. You can call it knowing yourself and knowing your own intentions, but there's something in you that's telling you, hey.

This isn't working and learning to like listen to that part of your instinct and learning to like understand how to listen to that and how to pivot and change course when a character does not wanna [00:19:00] cooperate and listen to what they're trying to tell you, what your own brain is trying to tell you about.

You know, this story that you're trying to tell is a really powerful tool to hone in yourself. It's a really powerful skill to have in your pocket.

Laura Yamin: Nice. So I love this. So let's talk about some book recommendations. Talk to us some of the books you recommend our listeners to pick up after reading Violet.

Emily Krempholtz: Okay, so I am have been very much we were talking a little bit about this before we were recording. I've been on a big, cozy fantasy reading kick. This stuff is, you know, it now is the time. Recently I read this Princess Kills Monsters by Ry Herman, which is like a fairytale retelling of a lesser known grims fairytale called the 12 Huntsman.

It is hilarious. It start, the book literally starts out by telling you the, the story as it's known and then being like, yeah, this is not quite right. It's, it's very different from this, but it's, it is like, it is queer. It is hilarious. It is. So it flips so many [00:20:00] fairytales on, its on their head in such a fun way.

I laughed out loud so many times when I was reading this. I would like turn over in bed and like poke my partner and be like, can I just read you this line? Until finally it was like, he was like, no, I'm just gonna read the book. Stop reading these to me. But it's so much fun. I loved it. It was, yeah, a really good time.

Laura Yamin: I love this re recommendation. I'm like the cover's beautiful. And it's also like,

Emily Krempholtz: It was gorgeous.

Laura Yamin: like a fun time to do,

Emily Krempholtz: it's very like, irreverent, but at the same time, like I feel like you really, you get to know the characters on a, on a really great level. And, and I don't know, I just think the writing is, is spectacular and laugh out loud and just the story is really, really well crafted.

Laura Yamin: I'm

For my TBR, so.

Emily Krempholtz: My next one is definitely a witches guide to Magical in Keeping by Sangu Manana. And I loved this book. I loved her first book too. The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches. I loved this one even more. It was heartwarming and cozy and sweet and romantic. [00:21:00] The cast of side characters are amazing.

It's about a witch who has essentially lost a lot of her powers. But she runs this inn with her aunt. And, and it kind of tells the story of a lot of the people who live in this inn. And her trying to get her powers back essentially. And there are, it's got, it's got like all the trademarks of the cozy fantasy.

There is a talking Animal companion. There is a, a zombie chicken, which is like, it is, it is so, it, it's just very well put together and. Amidst all of the cozy and the funny and the shenanigans. It's also got like a really strong emotional thread that like made me cry and just feels very strong and very, very powerful and very true.

So definitely would recommend this book.

Laura Yamin: I'm adding this one to my TBR 'cause I love the first book so much and I was like, I was, I've been waiting for this book. And one of the things I wanna tell the listeners is that I do have an interview with Singu from. With her date, her previous book, and so we'll air after this interview so you get to [00:22:00] hear some of her recommendations.

But this is like another a must read to read, if you like Cozy. This is just as you said, it's even better than the first book, which is the first book was Top Notch, so

Emily Krempholtz: Oh.

Laura Yamin: it's

Emily Krempholtz: I'm gonna go back and have to listen to her interview with you too and see what her, her recommendations are.

Laura Yamin: yeah. Awesome. Do you have any other recommendations or.

Emily Krempholtz: Oh, I do. So my next one is The River has Roots. This one is by Amal El Moar, and it is very like Fally fantasy. It has the feeling of a very old fairytale. This author is one of the authors who wrote, this is How You Lose the Time War which is. Also just a really spectacularly, beautifully written book.

This book, though I swear, the River has roots, had moments where the writing made me gasp out loud. It is just stunning. It is so well written. The story follows two sisters who basically live on, on the cusp of the Faye world. They live in the human world, but they, they have a lot of interactions with that because of, you know, the, [00:23:00] they, these kind of magical trees that their family kind of cultivates and it follows.

I, I don't even feel like I can talk about the story. Just read this book. It's so good. It's very short, it's very skinny, but like it packs a punch. I read it on like a single airplane ride on my Kindle. And I got home and I went out and bought a copy of the book. 'cause I was like, I need this on my shelf.

And it is just so well written.

Laura Yamin: It is always a great feeling to read the book on the Kindle and be like, oh no, it needs to be a trophy. We

Emily Krempholtz: Yes.

Laura Yamin: now.

Emily Krempholtz: Yes. And that is one, I don't, I don't typically reread a lot of books. That is a book that I will probably reread at some point. It's just, it's, I feel like I missed so much. And there's a lot there. Yeah,

Laura Yamin: Gosh, I love their first book, so I'm excited for this one. I didn't realize there's a bug that

Emily Krempholtz: new. It's new and it's their first, it's their first like solo book too, I think. Yeah.

Laura Yamin: exciting. Oh my gosh. I love these recommendations. Emily, tell us where can find you online?

Emily Krempholtz: So I am all over social media. You can find me on Instagram at [00:24:00] m bakes books. I'll talk a lot about Violet. I do a bunch of ridiculous. Skits and memes and whatever. You can also find me on TikTok at Writers of Rohan. Same thing there. I do a little bit more teaching content on TikTok. I talk a lot of, a little bit about like the craft of writing and, and how writers can kind of emulate a lot of that thing.

And yeah, you can also find emilykrempholtz.com and you can find Violet Thistle weight wherever books are sold.

Laura Yamin: Awesome. Thank you, Emily for being in the shower.

Emily Krempholtz: Yeah. Thank you so much for having me. This was great.

Laura Yamin: Awesome. If you enjoyed this podcast, consider it rate, review or subscribe. Thank you so much for listening. Happy reading. Bye.