Little Women Podcast: March Sisters Sweet Romance

Hello,

This episode was originally recorded for the Little Women podcast,

And I hope you enjoy it.

Usually it seems like the movies do way more the first half,

The Little Women half of the novel.

They don't center very much around the second half.

Actually it was its own book.

Good Wives was its own book.

It'd be interesting if they did a Little Women movie that was just like half an hour of the first and an hour and a half of the second part.

Because it always seems like they do three fourths as Little Women and then they rush through the Good Wives part.

So we don't get all the arcs and we don't get to really fall in love with the couples the way they're supposed to be.

So I think that would be interesting.

I'd like to see that adaptation.

That's a good point.

There's not a lot of growth you can do in a year,

But 30 plus.

Yeah.

Yeah,

I really wish I wish people would do either like a long mini series like a like a classic.

They should do a classic 80s centennial roots north and south multi-day event with Little Women.

And really dig into that second half because there is a lot of good stuff there.

The tomboy girl and the.

One of the things that I had to change that I could not really figure a way around and I tried so hard to bring in the Joe and Friedrich age gap.

But every time I would ask any expert in young adult romance,

They said they cautioned me against doing an age gap,

Especially for a book one of a series.

Age gap romances are are quite common trope in adult romance.

But for young adults,

That's one of the major no-nos.

So I couldn't do the age gap between them.

I'm not really sure how to describe what I did.

I tried to make them coming from like different parts of life,

Like different times of their life.

He is in college and she is in high school,

But they're only separated by like a year or two because he has skipped grades and he's very intelligent.

And I had to make them coming from different parts of life,

But the same parts of life.

He is in college,

But he is living with his parents and kind of at the same same part of life as she is,

But also has a more mature view of things.

He is super into this filmmaking thing,

Wants to do that.

But his dad,

Who is the studious professor type,

Is not really supportive of that.

And so he's trying to enter this movie contest to show his dad that this is a viable career.

It's not just a silly hobby.

And that's where he ends up meeting Joe and they end up having to work together because they both are having these technical difficulties and they can't make their own creations.

So they have to collaborate with each other.

And it's they both kind of know already who each other is from their portrayals on their individual channels.

But they end up learning more about who each other is.

And I really like him.

I think he is he's funny and sweet,

And he really kind of can get past some of her defenses and really see who she is instead of who she is portraying herself as.

There's a part in in mine where they're just again,

We're kind of totally spoiler alerting the book.

But if you read Little Women,

You pretty much have spoilers for all of my books in this series.

Anyway,

There's a part where they're starting to get together romantically and she's kind of having a conflict within herself because she has always portrayed herself as independent.

And I don't need a guy and dating in high school is just silly and stupid and I would never do it.

And here she is falling in love with him.

And he tells her,

You know,

It's okay to change your mind.

You don't have to stick to what you've been saying.

You can you can change and you can grow and you can change your mind basically.

It's like,

Don't care what he thinks Joe.

Yeah.

I see what you mean.

Yeah,

She's like,

I worried about this and they're all kind of like hoping that those two are going to end up together.

Yeah,

Lori and Amy I love the part near the very end where Lori and Amy are like kind of having a little party to themselves.

Yay,

They're getting together and and we like this guy and they're wishing that they could somehow like anonymously give him a bunch of money so they could travel the world and I think they really wanted them to get together.

Yeah,

I read somewhere and I don't know if this is true or not,

Or if this was misinformation.

When I try to Google it again I can't find this information but the age gap between Meg and john.

I thought he was younger than,

Than he was when I read this,

This article or whatever.

It was saying he's like 30 years old or something,

And if she's 17 when they meet.

That's an age gap and no one ever says anything about that,

But it's Joe and Friedrich,

They make the big deal of the age gap.

I don't know,

She was interested in people who are a lot older than she was.

I could see that I kind of had to break up the Friedrich,

There's a lot of Friedrich character and Rick and then there's also someone is bad.

Who is the actual immigrant.

The backstory was that his mom was an exchange student over in Germany and met him.

And then later,

He came over to America to be with her,

And they had Rick and his sister.

So there is a little bit about being a second generation immigrant in that,

But it's not a huge focus but it was kind of interesting.

I have a friend who is doing his master's in German studies and has been to Germany,

A couple times and lived there for like a year so I wrote to him and I'm like,

Help,

What would the German family be doing for Christmas and New Year's.

So he gave me some ideas and the Good Wives shaft,

I guess,

Not delving into Good Wives very much when you have an adaptation,

Which I do wish we could get that days on miniseries so that we can dive into Good Wives because there's a lot of good stuff in it.

Thanks.

What are the things that I loved in your book and I thought it was very clever.

It has this moment when Teddy declares his love on the internet and all these Teddy and John shippers go crazy.

It is a perfect world the way to and Lori shippers act in real life.

And I think it shows how there is almost like a group pressure to ship Joe and Lori.

One of my friends pointed out that John Lori fans love the 2019 film because they think they have won because Joe wants Lori back in that version.

And that is not in the book.

Why is that in the film?

These shipping wars they have been going on since the 19th century.

When I started to do this research of on Louisa May Alcott and the real life Louris,

A lot of things started to make sense,

Especially why Joe dumps him.

What was the atmosphere in the 19th century in the book?

Larry threatens to hurt himself if Joe doesn't marry him.

It's really disturbing now for us.

And back then it was considered very romantic.

I find so disturbing that our culture still now romanticizes that type of behavior.

When I read those parts as a kid,

It went over my head.

I didn't get it.

But now,

Yeah,

It is disturbing.

It's not a healthy way of dealing with things or a very healthy thing to say.

It is disturbing.

Isn't that wasn't that I think it was your podcast and your research on her other books.

Doesn't she have other books that the guy reacts that way too?

Yeah,

In Rose in Bloom,

Charlie,

Who is sort of the Laurie archetype or bit similar to his character,

He sort of expects Rose to do everything that he wants.

And he sort of when when she rejects him,

He gets into this sort of maybe you could call it depression,

Sort of becomes alcoholic and he drinks and he spends his money and he doesn't take rejection very well.

It's not really a job for the female protagonist to raise him.

It's interesting that you said back in their time that was considered like a romantic reaction because now,

Yeah,

Like you said,

Just disturbing.

It is very disturbing.

It's very manipulative because you wouldn't want a person you cared about to hurt themselves.

So the melody in the in the Facebook group,

I think she pointed this out how in a lot of films these days,

You see guy being manipulative and threatening to hurt themselves with the female.

And then it's interesting how our culture romantic stuff like that.

I can understand if it was a thing for the Victorians.

He's smarter now.

Yeah,

I would hope that our,

Our views on mental health have done better now than back in the 1800s,

But maybe not.

It's interesting how people still like Joe and Laurie are perfect couples.

And if we would actually see him try to threatening Joe when he proposes maybe there would be a lot less Joe and Laura shippers.

Well,

And I think also we romanticize the whole wanting to change for someone and he's always like,

Oh,

Joe,

I would be exactly how you want me to be.

I would change for you.

I would be perfect.

And I think a lot of people think that that is a romantic gesture,

But you shouldn't have to change if someone really loves you.

I mean,

Yeah,

Change your bad habits or whatever,

Be more conscientious of certain things,

But you shouldn't change who you are for a relationship.

That's just asking for trouble down the road.

And that part always kind of bothered me too,

That he was just going to change for her and be what she wants.

And but,

You know,

He really wouldn't.

Yeah.

And I think Joe probably brought the worst things out of him and he from her.

Like,

I always think that scene where a lot is like,

Oh,

I want to move to Italy and he's like 15 years old and she's like,

No,

Just take one of your boats and sail there.

And then maybe it's like,

No,

Your grandfather is going to miss you.

We all have that one friend that you get in trouble with and I think Joe and Lori were that one friend you get carried away with.

You kind of need the Meg on the periphery to kind of bring it back to reality.

Yeah,

I didn't really like Meg that much when I was younger,

But now she's one of my favorite characters.

It's the same for me.

I didn't really think one way or another about her.

She was just the older sister that got married.

And the older I get,

The more I really like Meg and I like in Good Wives.

They have a couple of chapters about Meg and John being married and kids and parenting and John inviting his coworker home for dinner and not telling her and a little married kind of the concessions you make for each other and the compromising and having to think of the other person.

I think that's interesting and I think that I probably didn't really,

I didn't remember those parts when I was rereading it.

As a kid,

I probably just skimmed through or didn't make it that far because it's such a big book and you're a little kid reading.

Have you read any other Louisa May Alcott novels besides Little Woman?

I have read Little Men.

A long,

Long,

Long time ago,

I read Eight Cousins,

But I don't remember much about it.

I was a kid and the reason I wanted to read it,

There were two reasons.

One was because I myself had eight cousins and I thought that was awesome.

Also,

It was Louisa May Alcott.

So I know I've read that.

I should read it again because I don't remember much about it.

And I did read part of Joe's Boys while I was doing my research for this series.

But then I had to stop because I just had to start writing.

So I did read part of that and I want to go back to that after I have another series partly written out.

That sounds exciting.

Here's a question for you.

What are one thing or a couple things that you wish would make it into the adaptations?

Because I tried to put some more obscure things in that maybe the casual Little Women fan won't even realize is something that's adapted.

But people like you and my friend,

Melody and Ali from the Facebook group will recognize right away.

One of the things that I would definitely add is the way that Joe herself condemned sensational writing in the novel.

That always bothers me in the adaptations how she comes out someone who doesn't really care about her writings when they kind of portray herself as somebody who just writes trash like she calls it in the novel and she doesn't really like writing trash.

And I think that is a disservice to Joe's character and to Friedrich's character as well.

I would add that into all adaptations.

The last time I think they did that was the mini series.

There's a PBS mini series.

I think she talks about how she does it to pay the bills or something.

Yeah,

I think that she did pretty well in the modernization again,

But I think in that one,

Joe,

She didn't shout at Fritz because of the writing.

She really took all the advices that he gave to her.

She really liked that.

Then she got scared when they got very close.

That was a subtle difference,

But also in the normal Joe was just crazy about Friedrich.

And I would definitely add the scene of Laurie being in Austria composing that opera for Joe.

And all the things that comes to his mind about Joe are the most unflattering things.

Oh,

Yeah.

But it's so important scene because he thinks himself as this ultimate romantic hero.

And when Joe doesn't fit into his fantasy,

He creates this phantom woman who does look a bit like Amy.

And then he slowly realizes that Amy is a real deal.

And then he actually snaps out from those fantasies and decides to go to work for Amy.

Yeah,

I liked that part too.

He's trying to write Joe as the hero of his story.

And all he can think of is the negative things about her.

But Amy keeps coming to his mind or a character like Amy.

I liked that part in the book.

And it also shows how much he grows out of that idea that he is this sort of romantic hero when he's actually being quite abusive.

It would be nice to see that in a film.

One thing that I had fun adapting was in the Amy book I put in the art fair.

I kind of adapted that what that would look like in 2021.

Because that I thought showed a lot of Amy's character and how she was growing up.

And even before she goes off to Paris and really grows up and she and Laurie,

The best in each other.

That art fair,

Well,

I don't know what I called it the art fair.

I don't know what it is actually called in the original.

But it's where they all have their booths.

And she really showed how she was maturing and diplomatically handling situations.

And I always liked that part.

And so I wanted to to put that in there somewhere.

Very exciting.

I published this one a year ago.

It was November 2020.

I sort of reread it.

But I don't like rewrite rereading my own books because I always find things I want to fix.

That happens to everyone.

Yeah.

Yeah,

I think you could always revise and revise and revise and revise and come up with better word choices.

But at some point you just have to say,

This is my story.

It's been enough.

Put it out there.

Well,

I thought that was brilliant because that's the thing that I always get when I read Little Woman.

But even though Joe and Laurie are the same age,

He always had this feeling that he was somehow younger or more immature.

It takes some time for Laurie to get into that level.

And somebody left a comment on me.

I think it was on Instagram that if Joe and Laurie would have got together,

Laurie would have needed some major growing and wouldn't have worked because Joe never found Laurie attractive in the first place.

I like the couples that that Louisa May Alcott went with.

They're just so perfect for each other.

Yeah,

Me too.

Yeah,

I think it was a he thought he was in love with her because if he was in love with her,

He could have what he wanted,

Which was basically,

You know,

A partner and a family and to belong.

And I think he was he was young and confusing his feelings for wanting a family with being in love with her,

Whereas they were just really,

Really good friends.

But then Joe,

She kind of has this pretty clear idea what she wants to do when she's in her early 20s.

Laurie doesn't have no idea.

No.

Yeah,

I can't wait for you to read the rest of them.

I want to hear your opinions.

And don't be nervous.

If you don't like something,

That's totally fine.

I think you're going to like the way I did it.

I think I will.

I mean,

I love the book,

Laurie,

Because I can really relate to that because I was very much the same when I was younger.

But then I think nowadays I would like to rather be more like Fritz,

More mature and taking things a bit more seriously.

It's funny because I was never a Joe and Laurie fan or John Laurie shipper.

But when I was a kid,

My favorite characters were Beth and Laurie and I was low key shipping them.

But then I was always a big fan of Joe and Friedrich.

And when I started to do this podcast and did more research,

I just became a more bigger Joe and Fritz fan.

I didn't thought that would be possible,

But it happened.

You do a lot of research.

I do.

I learned a lot from your podcast.

I love the part in your book when Rick was following internet exploding when Ted was making the love confession for Joanna.

And then Rick got jealous.

It was quite similar to the novel when Fritz thinks that Joe and Laurie are engaged and he only finds out that Amy and Laurie are married when he comes to Concord.

Do you always feel really bad for Fritz when Joe leaves from New York because he is poor and he is comparing himself to Laurie?

And it's sad because he's so madly in love with her.

It is interesting.

He thinks he's not getting enough for her,

Whereas he is exactly what she has needed and a partner in want.

Yeah,

I know that part in the book.

I'm always like,

No,

Don't walk away.

I think Fritz is the least selfish person in the novel,

Maybe after Brett.

He's going to Concord to tell Joe how he feels.

And then even if she wants to be with Laurie,

He sort of mentally prepared himself for that.

It's really,

Really sad,

Actually.

He is a really good person and a non selfish person.

He's raising his nephews and I don't know,

He's just a good guy.

I like him.

I really like that in your book when you have this sort of premise how Rick is very sort of uncertain about himself and compares himself to Betty.

We just talked about Meg and how we didn't really relate to her when we were kids.

But I think when I later read Little Woman as an adult,

I think that part about the Vanity Fair,

It really hit me like this experience that you have with wanting to fit into the in crowd.

And then almost like losing yourself in the process,

Trying to please other people.

You can see that in the 1994 film,

But not so much in the other adaptations,

But it's such a good,

Cream-stewed Meg's character.

And I can now see why I didn't relate to that when I was a child because I didn't have that kind of experience.

Yeah,

That whole part,

I just read it as a child,

Like,

Oh,

This is a fun thing she gets to go do.

And there's a party and you dress up and oh,

Some girl let her wear her outfit.

And to me,

It was like this great big Halloween costume party when I was a kid.

And then reading it as an adult,

It's like,

Ooh.

It kind of shows the loss of identity or sort of,

Yeah,

You know,

Meg really feels divided what's going on.

She doesn't really recognize herself.

She doesn't want to fit in with the girls,

But it doesn't.

So,

Yeah,

She's very conflicted internally at what's going on and how she's kind of letting herself be led by them and dressed up by them.

And part of her wants to.

And the other part of her is going,

Wait a minute,

This isn't me.

This isn't how I was brought up.

This isn't how I want to be portrayed.

But it's also kind of fun to be in the spotlight.

I mean,

There's nothing wrong with that.

I think it also shows how there was a lot of expectations for Meg that she would marry a rich man.

And then it kind of shows her shared values with John when she actually realizes that maybe this is not the life that I want for myself.

But that's also why she is very hurt when she hears about this rumor that she and Laurie are an item.

And I think Meg more so Laurie as sort of an annoying little brother,

Sometimes annoying little brother.

Yeah,

I chose this conflict within her.

But also how at the same time she did have a crush on John and he was very poor and she knew that her,

You know,

Her aunt and then these girls,

They would all expect her to marry someone else.

Yeah,

I also think that she,

What she,

One of the things she didn't like about those rumors were that the people telling the rumors kind of made it out to be like her mom was trying to set something up with the Lawrence's like,

Oh,

That's why they're being,

Being friends with them to marry off Meg.

I think Meg was kind of offended that people would think that about her mom because her parents,

Just like the real life Alcott's were very progressive in,

In that sense that they didn't want their girls to marry for the normal reasons that people were marrying at that time,

And they never would have been the kind of parents who did try to do that.

And then that's the rumor that's floating around that went totally contrary to how they viewed marriage and marriage for their kids.

I just thought about this with somebody.

When Laurie proposed Joe,

Joe knew that there were lots of expectations that she would marry him because they were friends and because he was rich.

Yeah,

There was a lot of different expectations,

And it was very interesting to me that they,

That the family,

The March family and the Alcott family were kind of some of the few that that didn't kind of follow those expectations and I almost kind of wonder,

Like now,

We're all about,

Yeah,

Marry for love,

Don't marry for convenience or money or whatever and I kind of wonder how that those ideas were received by the readers of those times.

Yeah,

Maybe just like we talked about that in the 19th century people were really expecting Joe to marry Laurie and one of the reasons was because he was rich,

And they didn't care that she wasn't in love with them.

Right.

That could be where that all started,

Where the shipping started was the conventions of the times maybe.

Yeah,

It wasn't really very conventional love interest because he was a German immigrant.

And there was lots of discrimination for the German immigrants at the time,

Of course,

And then Louisa Mayakov was a Germanophile and Freddie was a Germanophile,

And then being poor and then being like in his late 30s,

Which is actually not very old from our modern standards.

It's funny.

It's another thing that changes when you read it as an adult.

It's like,

Wait,

He's not old at all.

I think he was so old when I was reading this as a teenager.

Yeah,

I was a bit older when I read Good Wife,

So maybe that's why the age difference didn't bother me.

But it was so strange when I got into like online little woman circles and it was so strange to me how everyone were like,

Oh,

He's so old.

And I'm like,

It says right here in the book that he was 30,

40.

But that's 17 year old me.

I really like this part in your book when Rick and Joanna,

They start to work together as a team.

And they work very well together.

And I just think because I just reread Little Men Again,

And it's almost like they go to business together because they start the school.

So they need to have this very open communication.

And I just talked about this with one of my friends that maybe,

You know,

From all the couples in Little Women,

They actually thought that they would have the best communication of all couples.

Yeah,

I can see that.

And maybe it is because we see so much of them in Little Men and Joe's Boys.

They do seem like a really good couple as lovers,

Friends,

Business partners.

They both are very honest,

I think,

With their feelings,

Especially with each other.

I think that helps.

They are.

They're just a good team.

I don't think people really understand how important it is that couples have in Little Men.

You can see how much they both value education.

And also that they have these sort of ideas,

Very similar ideas,

How to raise their children.

They don't want to use physical punishments.

It's really interesting.

And the same with Amy and Lori.

They like the same things.

And they like,

You know,

Amy and Lori are more of the,

Let's go out to a fancy party and let's fund some kind of a museum or whatever.

And they both like the fancy things in the museums and that kind of life.

And Joe and Friedrich,

Yeah,

Like you said,

They're both into literature and language and learning and,

Yeah,

Raising all those kids.

A lot of those boys either were orphans themselves or didn't have very good opportunities or had broken families.

And they took them in and kind of shaped their childhoods,

Really.

I really need to go in and finish reading Joe's Boys.

Now I want to read that instead of what I'm supposed to be reading.

There was one more thing I was thinking about.

Like you talk about the art fair in your book and then in Little Women and then also,

You know,

The night going to Vanity Fair.

I was just chatting with somebody that Joe doesn't really have that many,

Or maybe not at all,

Female friends in the actual novel.

But Meg and Amy do.

Joe doesn't.

That's true.

I never thought about that.

Her sisters,

But not really female friends outside of the family.

That's a good point.

My friend pointed this out that it's interesting how a lot of people seem to think that Joe is an ultimate feminist when there are lots of times in the novel when she doesn't seem to really like other women.

But then I think she's more of a feminist in Joe's Boys.

It's very gradual process that she grows,

Understanding the woman's struggle.

I kind of saw Amy Moore as a feminist because she wants to help female students and wants to make her female guests feel comfortable when they come to her picnic and so on.

First,

Laurie is Joe's best friend,

And then she falls in love with Friedrich and he becomes her best friend.

It's not necessarily a bad thing.

It's just interesting.

Yeah,

I guess she kind of pours herself into her school and her relationships with the kids and her family,

Which is interesting for the independent one.

Louisa Mayalkoff,

She had lots of sort of boyfriends,

Friends who were boys when she grew up.

And then there were all these young boys she likes to hang out with and then her falling in love with her older male friends.

I haven't really seen her having that many female friends either when she was younger.

But I think there were lots of women who she admired,

But I don't really see her.

I haven't really read anything about it.

She had very close female friends.

But maybe,

You know,

When you have these very close relationships with your sisters,

You don't really maybe you don't need female friends outside that.

Yeah,

Maybe.

I don't have any sisters.

I just have a brother.

So I don't know.

That's an interesting,

That's a really interesting observation by your friend.

Yeah,

And like Joe starts a school for boys and people are like,

Where she starts a school for boys if she's a feminist?

Right.

Well,

Joe always loved boys,

But then she always also,

She was always a very maternal character.

There's a couple girls who are in her school,

But it was almost kind of like a,

Okay,

They can come to you.

That's not,

Not really a conscious,

Oh,

Let's have boys and girls.

It was,

Yeah,

Boy focused.

And then I'll let these other girls come.

In Joe's boys,

They are expanding the campus and they have more female students there.

And there's this really interesting scene where Joe sees these male students sort of flirting with the female students or being a bit inappropriate and then Joe gets mad.

And you can kind of see this connection between her relationship with Lori.

Yeah,

I'm looking forward to reading it.

I also thought it was kind of funny in Little Men how Lori would swoop in and be the fun uncle.

Like,

He has matured and we saw him mature,

But at heart he's still just the,

Let's do something silly.

In the entire book series,

I think in every single one book,

I've seen my Lori's like,

Thank you Joe for being my,

Being the person who raised me,

I would have been lost without you.

Yeah,

I always liked those parts that are kind of sweet.

But you can see how Joe really always had that maternal side of her.

But then Louis and Al got married as a nurse and she was a very maternal person.

So of course,

Joe is like that as well.

In your version,

Joe sees herself as somebody who has rather unusual interests,

But then she also compares herself to her sisters who are more conventional.

There was a little bit of that dynamic.

And I wonder,

I can't even,

I can't really think of in the original if she really cared.

I don't think she really cared and compared herself.

But yeah,

In mine I did do a little bit of the comparison of the sisters and because I think that's pretty normal to compare yourself to your sisters.

Then of course,

Joe feels that her sisters get things easier because they are more feminine and conventional.

And it's understandable because during that time period,

When you were more feminine,

Or just being this sort of tomboy,

You know,

You might get things easier.

Or people would have different reactions towards you.

Yeah,

You saying that reminded me,

She makes a comment about Amy.

Amy never has to struggle.

Yeah,

And it's like,

Maybe that's just your perspective,

Joe.

Yes,

I do remember that now.

She does compare herself with Amy sometimes.

I think the Fannity Fair chapter Joe was like,

I would never go into this type of bolting.

She is herself above that.

Maybe she's also afraid that she will be dropped if she goes there.

I don't really read lots of young adult novels.

Turn Joe and Fredrick's love story into this genre.

Well,

I knew I wanted to write a young adult sweet romance series so I just kind of had to take things and make them fit.

I liked the idea of kind of the creatives bouncing ideas off of each other and kind of working together even if they don't think they want to work together in the beginning.

I guess it kind of goes back to,

I saw them as as good partners like we talked about the original,

They just had to figure out that they,

They would be good partners for each other.

And I think they do come to respect each other and work well together,

But I do like their little banters in the beginning when they're not quite sure of the other person.

In the original book,

They have lots of fears that they are going to be rejected by the other person.

Fredrick feels that he's not good enough for Joe and then Joe fears that she's not lovable enough for him.

Enduring dynamics that they have.

Well,

You had that in your book as well.

Yeah.

There was a fear of rejection.

I think that's pretty universal over genres and times.

Like who hasn't felt fear of rejection at some point?

So tell me Jen,

Where we can find your books.

Well,

They're on Amazon.

The ebook version and the paperback versions.

You can just look up March Sister Sweet Romance or Jen Brady.

Or you can check out my website.

It's authorjenbrady.

Com and there's info in there too.

Awesome.

And I'm very excited to hear what you think about the rest of the book.

So you'll have to let me know when you're done.

I am very excited to read them.

I just want to say I really do enjoy all your podcasts and all the information that I have learned about Little Women from you.

I was really glad to find your group.

And I think Melody actually,

Yeah,

Melody had written to me.

I think it was the first one had come out.

My first book.

And she does Goodreads and I had never done Goodreads before.

And she messaged me saying,

Oh,

I really like your book,

But it doesn't have the page number on it.

And the page is the page count.

And I guess on Goodreads,

Something happens with you can do a challenge where you read so many pages.

So I went in and figured out how to put that on the Goodreads site so people could get credit for their pages.

And we kind of struck up a conversation and she's like,

Oh,

You have to join this group.

It's so good.

So that's how I found out about your podcast.

That is so amazing.

Melody ran the Little Women Book Club on Facebook and she's super nice.

But I am no longer on Facebook.

But if you are,

It's a good group.

Well,

That's a perfect time to wrap up because my husband just came home.

I will contact you again when I have read the rest of the books in Marchister.

Marchister Sweet Romance Saga.

OK,

I hope you really like them.

I really want to make more episodes about Meg and Beth as well.

And it's so nice that you have covered all the four sisters in your novels.

They will be nice topics for us to chat about.

Well,

It's the next book,

So.

Yeah,

I look forward to read it.

Well,

Thanks for having me on.

It was great to have you here.

That was the chat between me and Jen.

Take care and make good choices.

Bye.