Georgia Clark

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[00:00:00] Laura: Hi, Georgia. Welcome to what's your next podcast.

[00:00:02] Georgia Clark: Hi, I'm so happy to be here.

[00:00:04] Laura: So happy to have you here. And we're talking Christmas, a holiday book. So I am so excited. Tell us what you've been up to.

[00:00:13] Georgia Clark: Well, I've been enjoying the release of Most Wonderful, my new queer Christmas rom com, which is out now and getting so much love from so many readers from so many different places. It is amazing. I have been living in like a Christmas bubble, like a Christmas snow globe, for a few years now writing this book and it's very validating to a.

have the book finally out and b. be in the season. Like to actually have my interior Christmas world be reflected in the Season that we are now in.

[00:00:50] Laura: Yes, I love, we'll talk about the book in a few, but I love the fact that you write ensemble rom coms, which is not normally we don't see, we [00:01:00] typically see just one couple, we see the like the journey of the going, but in your books, you either have families or friends, or just characters that have loosely connected to each other.

And there is it feels like love, actually. And so I feel like this is like, Kind of like a love actually, this ensemble cast, and this case is a family. What's the process of writing? Because it's like, how do you keep all the different storyline together, and then make sense throughout the story to keep the story moving forward without like losing, like one person taking over the story or the other ones like, more louder and the other ones like more quieter and may not you do a really good job to keep you engaged on all the storylines.

[00:01:43] Georgia Clark: Thank you. That's lovely to say. And yes, the ensemble romance is not a super common genre. To your point, we mostly see romances with one couple, but it's a fun way to bring together a cast of characters with multiple love [00:02:00] stories, like a love actually, and to, bring those to life. I think the, when I'm putting together an ensemble romance, it's I'm thinking about, and you really are kind of braiding the stories together so that they do sort of feel even.

I, all of the, whenever you are doing an ensemble, every point of view character has to have an arc. They can't be a supporting character who is, essentially there is a foil to another character or to sort of help them on their journey with sort of little story of their own, all point of view characters have to have a full and complete change from the beginning of the end to the story.

So I, I'm making sure that I'm aware of what those journeys are going to be, what the changes they're going to go through, what their struggles are going to be, You know, it's always interesting when you are putting a story together and you're becoming aware of your characters, knowing where their comfort zone is, knowing where their comfort zone is not, [00:03:00] putting them in that place.

So we can see what happens when they are out of that comfort zone. And looking for that balance as you're putting things through. So if there is a scene that's really super sexy I'm not going to follow that up with another super sexy scene. If there's a kind of a quiet introspective, little humor kind of chapter, I'm probably going to want to see a little more action or a little more entertainment, some more jokes on the page, a little more of an active.

Chapter following that. It does feel very intuitive when I'm putting it together, like I'm sort of really feeling out what is the mood, where does the book want to go, what, how am I going to make sure that we're keeping certain things alive. I kind of sometimes think of it as like a juggler, like I've got all these balls in the air and it's like, oh, we haven't kind of heard from.

In this book in particular, we have the point of view characters are three siblings, three half siblings who shared the same famous mother and have different fathers. And they all come home for Christmas over [00:04:00] one, the month of December, essentially, they all kind of come home early for Christmas because they're at these crucial professional and personal crossroads.

And so I want to make sure, as I'm putting it together, have we not heard from Raffi in a while, the youngest brother? Have we, are we missing out on Bertie's storyline, who is the, amusing hot mess of a middle child? Has Liz's storyline not been mentioned in a while, the responsible eldest?

Have we lost our famous mother, Babs Belvedere, the linchpin of the family? And so just making sure that as a reader, you're never thinking, who's that? Wait, what's going on? I thought that he left, like, so that at all stage you feel like you're comfortable in the story and you know what's going on and the tone feels right.

But yeah, it's a balancing act.

[00:04:47] Laura: It's a balancing act and so most wonderful is sat in the Catskills and spending the month of December, but these three characters have big lives outside of the outside of their mother or trying to make a name for themselves outside of [00:05:00] her mother's shadow. We have Liz who is the showrunner of Sweet, which is a Sweet Valley High recreation.

We got Birdie, who is struggling but is a stand up comedian, and it's a hot mess right now. And then we got Rafi, who is, A hopeless romantic,

[00:05:20] Georgia Clark: Yes. Yes.

[00:05:21] Laura: who's looking, who's finding their own way in the world and coming together. What was the process of writing this novel, knowing that it's set in Christmas and trying to, I'm assuming it was, Maybe it was written part in Christmas time, but sometimes maybe not on the holiday, how do you get in that spirit of getting in that holiday spirit, same time, understand that, Christmas has a high stakes, especially with family the drama.

And so it's not the most wonderful time of the year. And sometimes it's and this is where we start this. No, it's not the most wonderful time of the year. And then we're like, Oh, we got to, Oh shit. We got to figure something [00:06:00] out here.

[00:06:01] Georgia Clark: Yeah, it's a funny time of the year because it is, on one hand, the most wonderful time of the year. There's so much joy and pleasure around Christmas. It's cozy. During this book it's a snowy Christmas. They're in this, like, fantastic big house. But It is a time of the year where, you know, if you're looking for love and you don't have love, it can be a lonely time of the year, there's, when we're sort of out of our usual day to day, it's a time to reflect and to ask some big questions, which all the characters are doing in the book.

And so the process of writing it was. Having to live in Christmas all the time, which I enjoy when I'm writing a book, it feels like I'm in a movie in my head with my characters, a very collaborative experience with them. And, but you are definitely living in a Christmas. A very specific world. I think particularly with romance, [00:07:00] what readers like is a pleasurable world to enter and a pleasurable setting and place and strong sense of place.

And so with this book, I was writing, my snowy Catskills Christmas story. In the height of summer, in a rainy spring, in in the fall. I started it in 2021 and we went into production at the end of 2023. So I was running it over two Christmases, but all of that time in between, of course.

But it's a really fun season.

It's, and it's very different to me because I grew up in Australia. I'm Australian. I live in New York now. I've been in New York for 15 years, but in Australia, Christmas isn't in, is in high summer because we're in the Southern hemisphere. So I grew up with Christmases that were hot and sunny and in Australia, Christmas day lunch is often Cold food, like a big seafood platter is really common.

You would have like a crisp white wine with lunch. You would have salads not [00:08:00] the like American tradition of a hot, a big hot meal kind of thing and hot drinks. You often would go for a swim at the beach at the end of the day. Like that's all very common. That's how I grew up. So when I moved to America, of course, we're aware of what An American Christmas, like we all grew up watching Home Alone and Christmas movies, Love Actually, but to actually experience it was really another thing altogether.

And when I met my wife and started spending Christmas with my in laws, they go all out for Christmas. Like they have the big tree, the presents, the house is decorated, they have lights up. And it was really fun because my family is much more okay. Like, There's a few Christmas decorations, but Australia in general is just a little more low key with stuff like that.

So it was really fun to, to have that experience and to sort of be in that world. But all of the Christmas stories that I was, watching and reading, a lot of them weren't really my [00:09:00] story. A story where the girl gets the girl, the boy gets the boy, queer stories, queer love stories. And so I wanted to, contribute A story that was both cozy and funny and all the things that we want out of a Christmas story, but that also reflects my reality.

And it's a little more edgy and a little more sexy and has, just feels kind of modern and of the moment. So, I was definitely not wanting to put something out that felt really cheesy or squeaky clean, this book is not that. And I feel like I did. Achieve that goal.

[00:09:36] Laura: You did achieve that goal. So I got a couple of questions that are related, but let's be related. So in this book, you mentioned Sweet Valley High for me, I grew up in Puerto Rico, also sunny Christmas time, very warm. But Sweet Valley High, I rock reading those books in the nineties and like, those were my.

Escape like there were pretty much what I thought America look like what you know, college [00:10:00] and high school look like because it was very different. What was your experience, reading this books because you obviously have some knowledge because you do mention some of the characters and the.

And the relationship with the character. So I assumed you have read these books. What was your history with them? Like, what was like your origin story with them that made you remind it? Like, you know what, wouldn't it be nice to have a remake? Although I think there's, there might be a remake. I know Francine passed away.

So, recently, so which is like, major news in the Sweet Valley High fandom. But I, you did include part of the Todd Wilkins, storyline because it just upgrades. And there was a series of books that came afterwards where Francine wrote them and she threw a curve ball

Story.

What was your history with the

[00:10:46] Georgia Clark: Yeah. Yeah, so in Most Wonderful, my eldest character, Liz Belvedere, is a Hollywood showrunner and she has just had like her breakout success moment with a kind of a sexy reboot of Sweet [00:11:00] Valley High called Sweet. And the lead actor of the show, who plays both Elizabeth and Jessica Whiteville, the two blonde, beautiful twins who are the stars of the book.

If you've never heard of it, it is an 80s tween, sudsy, book series and starring and about two beautiful 16 year olds who were like the epitome of the American, ideals of beauty at the time. That has changed. And Liz has a hopelessly large crush on Violet Grace, the actress who plays both of the characters.

And is struggling to come up with a good idea, a good kind of concept for the second season of the show. She's got this writer's block because of this enormous crush. And the idea for that whole concept came out of this, kind of question about pleasure and fantasy that romance is like predicated on.

And if I wasn't a [00:12:00] queer rom com writer, Liz's, that, that job and that show would be my fantasy. I would love to be a showrunner of a sexy, like, funny, cool reboot of Sweet Valley High. I really enjoyed Riverdale. the kind of pretty bonkers remake of the Archie comics and kind of had that. I often have a companion show when I'm writing a book that's just sort of like on in the background or if I'm taking a break from writing I'll just like watch a little bit of it and that show was my kind of companion show for this book.

And so I really, it's just kind of like my, my, it bled into the pages because I grew up reading Sweet Valley High. I, as a tween there was a local secondhand bookstore in my town and you could buy books for 50 cents and you could also take them back and kind of exchange them. So it was sort of like a bookstore book exchange and I was just [00:13:00] constantly.

like a little like vulture vampire on that Sweet Valley High section. Like I was in there almost like every week for sure and just like reading through being able to buy and swap those books. I have such visceral memories of those covers like they definitely felt so edgy to me as a tween and I think they were sexier than my mother realized, like, and they weren't super sexy, they were honestly, they were very, like, sudsy, but there were some kind of moments where, the twins would do things that were just they were definitely edgier than, like, a babysitter's they were a little more risque, and they I think they were my first experience of fandom and of really becoming obsessive about a world and a series and needing to get the next one.

And it was before the internet. I mean, this is in the sort of like late [00:14:00] 80s, I would say. I was born in 1980. So, But I just that feeling of obsession and interest and just the way that it captured my imagination. I was also reading a lot of like, I read a lot of high fantasy I read like the Hobbit and all those kind of books but this was like it really just scratched an itch that was just so pleasurable and I really liked thinking about Yeah.

the way in which romance does deliver this pleasure to the reader. And you can still have lots of big ideas and characters who have had really complex histories and have been processing trauma. And, it can be beautiful on the line level. It can be, structurally complex, but what I am aiming to deliver in my books is a feeling of great pleasure.

They really do give me pleasure to write. Like it's so pleasurable to be in the world. So the sweet backstory is definitely drawing on my past and my experience. And then also sort of [00:15:00] reflecting my sort of interests and tastes at this stage of my life, kind of mashing it all together. So that's where that came from.

[00:15:08] Laura: I appreciate I think I found for me to rely high was formative I read them now and I think I consider a result I'm like I should do a recap of like, reading those books again and like understanding how different and how. problematic. Some of the areas were,

[00:15:24] Georgia Clark: Oh, yeah, sure.

[00:15:24] Laura: at the same time, how much pleasure and how much it like it gave me a place to escape.

And I think in some ways the bridge to romance was so easy because I had this like background of like these telenovela, this like, It's just, this sense of like soapy, like gossips very quick and easy. And like, that is just a fun escape. That's just like fun and it sparkles and it's frothy and it's just, this is what I like.

I, there's nothing wrong with liking rom coms. There's nothing wrong with liking to have pleasure. There's nothing guilty about it. [00:16:00] And now in my forties, I appreciate. what it did for me. And I appreciate that it offered me a space for me to, despite the trauma, it offered me a space to be like a breathing room of some sort.

And I think that's what I love about romance. The love of our romance is like, at the end of the day, it's going to be a happy ever after or happy for now. Things are gonna get resolved. It's all gonna be okay. You should be fine. Yes, the angst. Yes, the journey. Yes, the specifics. That's part of the journey.

That's part of life. But like, it can be it's gonna be okay, no matter what. And I think that's what I love about your books is like, it's just like edgy, like queer, like just looking at it from the like, what's the sensibilities of 2024? But still have the magic of the books that I grew up with, the pleasurable part of it.

[00:16:53] Georgia Clark: Yeah. Yeah. That's a great compliment. And thank you for saying that. I agree. No, no guilty pleasures. No,

[00:16:59] Laura: Yeah.[00:17:00]

[00:17:00] Georgia Clark: we don't need to be guilty about pleasure at all. That's the last thing we should be feeling guilty about, especially as women.

[00:17:06] Laura: Yes. So, so let's talk about some book recommendations. Do you have any books to recommend our listeners to pick up?

[00:17:12] Georgia Clark: I do. Yeah. So right now I'm reading All Falls by Miranda July, the it book of the moment over the summer, which is. I've just started and I'm already hooked. No one does it like Miranda July. This year, I really love The Prospects by Katie Hoffman, which was a queer romance, sports romance, that came out earlier in the year and is the first romance published by a major publisher That was written by a queer trans man centering a queer trans man.

And I'm not really a, I'm not a sports person myself. Like I don't really play sports. I like to watch the tennis, but but you don't need to know anything about minor league baseball, which is the sort of subgenre that it takes place in to enjoy the book. I'm also reading Fang Fiction right now [00:18:00] by Kate Salmon London, which is so fun and is a vamp, a twist on a vampire story.

I really loved In the Literary Fiction World this year, Whoever You Are, Honey by Olivia Gatwood. Olivia is a poet and I always love reading literary fiction by poets because it is just so beautiful on the line level and it is, the descriptions are always so surprising and unique and it feels incredibly fresh and this book is takes place and sort of explores that intersection between friendship like a female experience and artificial intelligence, which is really interesting and was I would really recommend that for a kind of under the radar read.

I really loved the Poetry Collection Instructions for Travelling West by Joyce Sullivan, which again, like, I love poetry, so beautiful on the line level really raw and just gorgeous writing feels very personal [00:19:00] and vulnerable especially about a female experience. So I really recommend that.

Yeah, there, there are a few things on my list. I have on top of my TBR as soon as I'm I'm working on a new book right now and I sometimes have to have, like, boundaries about what comes in and, in that stage because it's, is the pairing by Casey McQuiston, their new spicy rom com that came out this summer.

As soon as I'm out of a draft, I will read that because otherwise Casey's work will send me into a tailspin of like, oh, what am I even doing here? Casey's doing it so much better. So that's stuff on my TBR. And of course I read Emily Henry's new book over the summer. And we'll always read everything Emily writes.

[00:19:41] Laura: Yes, those are great recommendations. And I have to tell you the pairing is like the perfect European safe, which he took a year trip. So it's just reliving the Euro trip, you

[00:19:52] Georgia Clark: Yeah, yeah.

[00:19:53] Laura: except that this is more sexier,

[00:19:55] Georgia Clark: Right, I was traveling with my

[00:19:56] Laura: around.

[00:19:57] Georgia Clark: toddler, so it was less of a sex [00:20:00] fest but it's still a really fun trip.

[00:20:03] Laura: Yes. So, and I have to say, fanfiction, I just finished it like 10 minutes ago, and it's such a romp, and it's just fun, and vampires are meant to be back, and this is a take on a vampire who does not fall in love with a teenager.

[00:20:19] Georgia Clark: Yeah,

[00:20:20] Laura: Which is like,

[00:20:21] Georgia Clark: all for it. Kate is such a wonderful writer And such a bubbly, wonderful human. So excited to continue my journey into her world.

[00:20:31] Laura: So talk to us about your sub stack and your writing classes. So just do a plug in for those.

[00:20:37] Georgia Clark: Yeah, sure. I put out a monthly author newsletter called Heartbeat, which covers my personal life and writing tips and book news, a little secret peek into a writer's life. It comes out at the end of every month and is called Heartbeat on Substack. And yes, I teach writing. I have two groups. A storyteller group and a writer's group.

The [00:21:00] writer's group is for writers who are working on romance novels and, or women's fiction with romantic elements who are working towards getting a book deal. And so for novelists who are working on like a long form project. whose aim is getting an agent, getting a book deal, either traditionally published, or if they're self publishing.

I also have self publishing students as well, but it's that sort of working towards something, in the sort of 70, 000 plus zone. And we meet monthly virtually in a Zoom room and we workshop. I have special industry guests such as agents and acquiring editors. I speak frankly about the publishing process myself.

There's not a lot of writers who have writers groups who are also publishing in today's market. So that's, I really like being that sort of supportive figure for the writers who are wanting to publishing in today's market. And then I also have a storyteller group, which is for [00:22:00] writers who are working on stories for a live storytelling shows or personal essay.

So more of that 1200 word, like a short form. Writing and I, because I have a live storytelling show called Generation Women, which is a monthly show here in New York City at Joe's Pub, the iconic Joe's Pub, part of the public theater. And every month we invite a woman or non binary performer in their 20s, and 70s plus to tell an original story on a theme.

The show has been going for seven years. It's really inspiring and uplifting. We program a lot of like hopeful stories that highlight. Resilience and the power of grit and determination. Second act, third acts, and that are looking to create intergenerational connection between the decades. And so, if you want to come and we, every show is live streamed.

And we also have shows in New Jersey and Seattle and Montreal and Sydney and Melbourne. You can find all of those through our website, generationwomen. us, as well as the [00:23:00] Storyteller Group, my Writer's Group classes, as well as a Romance Workshop that I teach a few times a year, which is a four month engagement, Monday, generally Monday nights.

And that is like a, a masterclass in, in the romance novel specifically. And that's also, you can sign up for writer's group or romance workshop, or just get more information about those things on my website, georgiaclark. com. And I also have a lot of book coaching students and story coaching students.

So I do work quite a bit as a teacher in the writing space, as well as doing books and newsletters and everything else that I'm doing. I didn't even like, I'm like. I'm like how does she have the time? I really don't know. So

[00:23:40] Laura: Oh my gosh. Georgia, tell us where we can find you online. Tell us about your website, your socials, and all the fun places where we can stalk you.

[00:23:47] Georgia Clark: yeah, you can stop me on Instagram. I'm at Georgia Lou Clark, L O U Clark, and as well as my website, georgiaclark. com, generationwomen. us, generationwomens also on Insta, and my [00:24:00] newsletter on, this is Heartbeat on Substack.

[00:24:02] Laura: Thank you, Georgia, for being on the show.

[00:24:04] Georgia Clark: Thanks for having me!