Eh, could you talk a bit about the role geography plays in this? We start in Camden, Maine on the extreme eastern end of America, and, and then we travel west.

Yeah.

So in October of 2023, or...

Well, let me walk back a little bit.

In 2023, I realized that I was 40-something and living in a s- a suburb of Washington, DC in a neighborhood with an HOA, and it was literal hell.

And I wondered, "What, what am I doing here? I don't like being here.

[laughs] I don't like being surrounded by, by this, this cookie cutter neighborhood where everybody was white," and it just felt strange.

Yeah.

Was that just a string you wanted to pull along the way? I

have friends who are older, friends who survived the HIV and AIDS crisis of the 80s and 90s.

And it's so funny to me how language evolves.

We see reports now in the news of like, oh, certain percentage of LG or of Gen Z identifies as LGBTQ plus and it's higher than it's ever been.

And so that's proof that there's a gay agenda that people are forcing.

But here's the thing.

That's not it at all.

you have relationships that you look to when you were writing about Rodney and Don

Why do you think so many people have connected with it?

Well, I have a Two answers for that.

First, timing.

This book, the day it came out was March 17th, 2020.

Do you know what else happened that week around the world? That's when COVID exploded around the world.

In the United States where I'm from, that's when the lockdowns began.

March 17th, 2020.

Did you always know you were going to do a second book?

You paint the room quite well in the way of bringing the emotions and, and the atmosphere that's around everything that's taking place.

place.That's important for me.

I, I want, I want my books to feel very cinematic.

I want you to feel, when you are in the pages with these characters, I want you to feel like you are there.

When you close the book for the last time, I want you to feel a sense of loss, uh, like to feel almost bereft because even though these characters are fictional, I want them to feel real.

Even if they're set in a fantastical setting with different crazy things happening, I still want them to feel like they could leap off the page, and that where they are, the, the reader can feel and smell and taste and touch and f- everything that is there.

That's important to me 'cause I know how, how a book can feel like a sensory experience-

Yeah