My Crunchy Zen Era
Welcome to My Crunchy Zen Era — we're not exactly sure what it means, but we're figuring it out.
It started when I asked my friends: How do you create a life you love? Then it turned into a podcast full of a little fun, a little humor, and a whole lot of curiosity. Each week we dive into a fresh topic with a guest, exploring everything from everyday joys to life’s bigger questions. Whether we’re laughing, learning, or just letting things unfold, this show is your weekly dose of lighthearted inspiration.
Hosted by Nicole Swisher.
My Crunchy Zen Era
Government Watchlists, Creativity, and Cozy Mystery Novels with Ashley Weaver
Has her google history landed her on a government watchlist? Edgar-nominated author Ashley Weaver ponders the occupational hazards of being an author as she joins host, Nicole Swisher, this week as they discuss:
- The inspiration behind Ashley's Electra McDonnell book series.
- Unconventional female characters.
- The extensive career opportunities in the criminal underworld.
- Unique stories from World War II.
- Writing advice for aspiring authors and finding an agent.
- The art of creativity and the difficult task of starting.
- Cozy mystery novels.
- The Backstreet Boys and first concerts.
Whether you're an aspiring writer seeking practical advice, a mystery lover hunting for your next great read, or simply curious about how to orchestrate the next great heist, this conversation offers something to steal away with.
Subscribe now and join this exploration of what it means to live a happy life in an increasingly complicated world.
Host: Nicole Swisher
Guest: Ashley Weaver - ashleyweaver.com
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Well, Ashley, thanks for joining me. Thank you for having me. Yeah, so what's something crunchy or zen that you've done lately?
Speaker 2:I would have to say I really enjoy doing a nice relaxing bubble bath.
Speaker 1:Oh, that sounds great.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I find it kind of zen to do like Epsom salts. Or sometimes somebody gave me a really nice um like bath soap, I'd like a bath tea, and so I like to just like take a nice relaxing bath when I'm when I'm stressed, or sometimes just for fun yeah, are you?
Speaker 1:do you read or like listen to anything?
Speaker 2:yeah, I usually. I usually read.
Speaker 1:Well, welcome to my Crunchy Zen Era. This is a podcast about with a little bit of fun, a little humor and a whole lot of curiosity. I'm your host, nicoleisher, and this week my guest is Ashley Weaver. Hi Ashley, hi Ashley. So Ashley is a librarian and an author of two book series, the Amory Ames series and Electra McDonald, and her first novel in the Amory Ames series, murder at Brightwell, was nominated for an Edgar Award for first or for best first novel, and then her most recent book, one Final Turn, is the final book in the Electro McDonald series, which I love and which is why I reached out to have her on the podcast. So what is sorry? What did you say?
Speaker 2:yes, I was so excited to hear from you. Thank you for inviting me. I think this may be my first podcast.
Speaker 1:Oh, really Okay. Well this is great. It's my first remote podcast, so that's great. What is one memory that you wish you could relive, and why?
Speaker 2:This is a good question. I have a lot of really great memories. I think one that was really special to me was growing up, I always wanted to travel a lot and one of my like most you know desired destinations was Paris, and so the first time I went to Paris was really a great memory, and I remember actually had a friend whose husband was stationed in the military and so she was living in Germany at the time and she drove to Belgium to pick me and two other friends up at the airport and then we drove into Paris, and so I remember driving in at night and getting the first view of the Eiffel Tower when it was glittering, and I remember I screamed, and so that was just like a really fun. That's always a memory that sticks out.
Speaker 1:To me is that first glimpse of Paris and my first chance to travel internationally. I bet that coming in driving is just a different experience than yes, it was totally different.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was really exciting because we got to spend a couple days in Belgium and then you know she could drive us around the city and stuff, so we got to see quite a bit that's amazing.
Speaker 1:I feel like we should introduce your dogs.
Speaker 2:I know they're being so bad. I'm so sorry. They get really upset when I lock them out.
Speaker 1:I mean, they can join us.
Speaker 2:I have two dogs and she's being a little bit naughty in there, but that's Daisy. She can hear me that there's fun and excitement going on, but if I let them out they'll be all over the place. So they're, they're, locked up, but not but not completely absent yeah what kind of dogs are they they're uh, they're both mixed breeds, they're both rescues, so um. Those are the best kind um yeah, she's a good dog, but she's kind of jealous of my time that's understandable.
Speaker 1:You're her person, so I have a little grab bag um questions, which are random questions I put together a long time ago so I don't even remember what they are. Okay awesome. That keeps it really exciting it does. What is your favorite kind of cheese?
Speaker 2:My favorite kind of cheese.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:I'm a pretty basic cheese girl. I like a good cheddar. Oh, that sounds good. It's not too exciting and I'm from Wisconsin originally, so you'd think I would have like a wide variety of cheeses. That I do like a lot of cheeses, but like cheddar is my go to variety of cheeses that I do like a lot of cheeses, but like cheddars might go too, okay.
Speaker 1:So did you always know that you wanted to be an author or did you have like other ideas as a child?
Speaker 2:I had. I think I went through a lot of phases. I think I feel like every millennial girl wanted to be a marine biologist, or at least like a lot of us.
Speaker 2:So that was one of the things I wanted to be when I wanted to grow up. I wanted to be a librarian for a while, which I actually became, and so there was a few different things. But I remember writing my very first story, and I probably was I don't know maybe six or seven years old, and I remember writing this story down on some of my dad's computer printer paper, and I remember that being like my first realization that I could take a story from my own head and make it into a book, and so from that moment on, I think I always wanted to be a writer, so it started very early, for sure.
Speaker 1:Would you say that was your first unpublished book, or did you have like another bigger one that you worked?
Speaker 2:on I did well. My first full-length novel I wrote my freshman year of high school and I grew up watching a lot of old movies and I liked the old gangster movies a lot and so I wrote sort of it was a gangster mystery romance set in prohibition era, chicago, and I would type a few pages every night on my little computer and print out. Print them out and bring them to school and my friends would sit around the lunch table and read them and give me feedback. So that was kind of my first taste of writing for readers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, were they like harsh critics, or were they generally just like cheerleaders?
Speaker 2:They were generally pretty. Yeah, they were generally pretty. You know I'm trying to think. If there was anyone who was like giving me, they were they in general they really liked it. I didn't have too much, you know, harsh feedback at that point. They were more friends who you know enjoyed reading and would would just want me to get more pages out yeah, those are the great friends to have in high school, I think yes, for sure yeah, so you have, like I said at the beginning, you've got two series, both mysteries.
Speaker 1:I've read the Electra McDonald ones. I'm saving, saving the other ones for a long flight that's coming up oh awesome yeah, so how would you describe, like the book genre that you write?
Speaker 2:uh, it kind of falls, I would say, sort of into the cozy mystery genre. My first series is set in 1930s England and it's a husband and wife solving mysteries in kind of an upper class setting. That was sort of my sort of inspired by Agatha Christie and the golden age of mystery. I've always loved her books and sort of that general time period, as I mentioned, growing up loving old movies, and so I found a lot of inspiration from that time period and so they fall sort of into the cozy mysteries. And then my Electra McDonald series takes place in World War II and is a safe cracker who is working for the British government to help, you know, do spy work and that sort of thing. So that's a little bit more someone I think one reader described them more as as sort of cozy thrillers because there's sort of a general mystery but it's, you know, it's more of like a caper in each book as opposed to a sort of limited set of suspects and, and you know, searching down the clues and that sort of thing.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I really. I really liked Electra because I like the anti-hero and she's a thief and then starts working for the government, but she to me she never fully gave up that other side of her and I like that. Thank you yeah she's.
Speaker 2:She's always got a little bit of her uh her criminal streak running through her. I think it'll probably always be there for her, but she's learned kind of how to, how to make it work to her advantage yeah, and so this is a weird comment, but my mom's side of my family, their last name is Ames.
Speaker 1:Oh so I'm like I'm excited, I'm like yeah that's great, it's perfect. Yeah, we had um the. In Minneapolis there was this legendary like corrupt mayor named Doc Ames oh, it's like this family lore.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's amazing. Doc Ames is such a great name too.
Speaker 1:That sounds like it really is a book character yeah, yeah, you can keep that in mind for the future yeah, maybe he'll be a relation yes, my grandma would love that. Um so how did you come up with the idea for the electro mcdonald series?
Speaker 2:I actually read a book called agent zigzag by ben mcintyre. I've been reading a lot of world war ii non-fiction, just kind of as a been reading a lot of World War II nonfiction, just kind of as a general interest. A lot of times as a reader I'll just get into phases and read a lot of different things. And this book was about a small-time criminal, kind of a petty crook, and I think he was even involved maybe in a few safe cracking operations. I don't think he was a safe cracker himself, but he was caught by the police and imprisoned on the Channel Islands in England, which was the only part of the UK that was occupied by the Germans. So when the Germans went to the Channel Islands they found him in prison and they said we'll let you out of prison if you'll be a spy for us. So he agreed, they took him back to Germany, taught him to be a spy and then parachuted him back into England and he immediately went to the authorities and said Germany thinks I'm spying for them Do you want me to spy for you? And became a double agent.
Speaker 2:And so the book is amazing. It just reads, you know, not for nonfiction, it reads just like a thriller novel. But I love the idea of someone who had all these sort of illicit skills that put him on the wrong side of the law and of society before the war and that was what exactly made him perfect for this job during the war. And so it kind of sparked an idea and I thought, well, what if, you know, I had sort of like a family of criminals and, you know, focused on a female main character who was part of this and how she kind of found out who she wanted to be and through the war and how she could use those skills for the war effort. So that's where the idea was born.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I feel like I learned a lot about World War II Just in London. I didn't know that much. How much time did you end up spending researching?
Speaker 2:I did quite a bit of research. I don't always do all my research prior to the novel, so a lot of times when I'm writing, if I know that I'm going to need to insert something, I'll use brackets so I can put, you know, like brackets, research here. And then, when I'm in the sort of research phase, I'll go back and search the document for brackets and then I can go back and find everything that needs to be filled in. Sometimes it'll be something simple like a street name that I'll have to spell out, or sometimes during the writing process, you know, I won't be feeling particularly creative one day and I'll think, okay, well, instead of writing today, I'll go and do fill out a couple areas of research and that sort of thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I just, and I did a lot of, as I said, world War II reading before just for fun, and so that sort of was a good bit of base knowledge too, but I learned a lot of a lot of really interesting things, as I yeah as well yeah, I wonder.
Speaker 1:I mean that makes sense that you had read more ahead of time, because I was like that could have taken a lot of time. Yeah, how do you research something like how do you crack a safe and get away with stuff as a thief?
Speaker 2:well, actually I found a I want to say it was some sort of manual for a locksmith and so I found some good information there in an old locksmithing manual, but also there were there's several youtube videos on how to crack safes, and I think there's a lot of locksmiths now will like people will buy safes at auctions and stuff that are with with the keys lost or whatever, or combinations lost, and they won't know how to get into them, and so locksmiths, will you know, have a have a job opening those sometimes, and so there'll be some YouTube videos show you how to get into old safes if you, if you've come across one or if you've purchased one. So there's some good information available on YouTube as well. All, right.
Speaker 1:I mean, are you a researcher at heart? Like, does this just make you so excited to do that?
Speaker 2:yes, I think it goes hand in hand with being a librarian. I love research, I love um, and I'm just the sort of person I mean I'll be watching a movie and then you know it's a classic, like where's this actor from, I'll have to look up every movie they've been in. But also, just you know it's a classic, like where's this actor from, I'll have to look up every movie they've been in. But also, just you know, if there's like one little line of the plot that I want to know more about, I'll end up on, you know, wikipedia or something, just reading a bunch of information on how that element of the plot came together. So I just enjoy research for the sake of research. So that works out well with writing.
Speaker 1:Do you sometimes get really sidetracked when you're like I should be writing?
Speaker 2:definitely. Yeah, sometimes you know and especially that you know Wikipedia rabbit holes, those can lead you down a lot of uh you know, just click one other thing and pretty soon it's two o'clock in the morning and you find yourself reading something totally different than what you need to be reading. But what?
Speaker 1:what would you say is like the weirdest rabbit hole you went down during this book oh I, I don't know.
Speaker 2:That's a good question. I can't think of one off the top of my head.
Speaker 1:What about the weirdest question you've been asked to research as a librarian?
Speaker 2:I worked as a reference librarian for a while at the reference desk of a public library and I had someone call in one day and ask how they could donate a body to science. That was something you know. I was like I'm going to have to do a little bit of research on that and call you back. But you know there are apparently a lot of institutions and you know medical facilities and things that you can donate your body to. So I learned something new that day too.
Speaker 1:I did not. I didn't know that.
Speaker 2:That was interesting being a reference librarian, because people would call in and you'd never know when you picked up the phone what they were going to ask for.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that could give you a lot of ideas. Maybe so, when you sat down to write the first book, did you have an idea of how the whole series would end, or is that something that kind of came to you as you wrote?
Speaker 2:I did not have an idea. They say writers fall into either plotters who plot everything out, or pantsers who write by the seat of their pants. And I'm very much a pantser. I don't even know how the books will end when I start writing them, so in the individual books. So I just kind of I write actually sort of write my books out of order. I'll write chunks of different scenes, of things that I know I want to happen, and then I kind of piece them together and fill it in between. So I didn't have a far reaching plan of where I wanted everything to go. I just sort of put in the elements that I knew I thought would be interesting to pursue throughout the series and went from there.
Speaker 1:That's so interesting because I've always thought people just have outlines figured out and they know exactly what's going to happen here and here and here, and I yeah, I've never been able to get very far in writing and I think I get stuck in the plot yeah, there may be that may be.
Speaker 2:It's probably an easier way to do it. My brain I tried before to write an outline ahead of time and my brain just doesn't want to work that way, so I just roll with it, but are you a planner in your everyday life or is that similar?
Speaker 2:I'm a little bit more. I'm a little bit more of a planner in my everyday life. I do like to know, kind of you know, what's going to happen and what the steps are that I need to get done. But there's a little bit of panting in there and in everyday life as well, but I'm probably more of a planner in everyday life.
Speaker 1:I'm starting to come up with a theory, because you're the second person, second author, who has said that they're um a pantser but a planner everyday life.
Speaker 2:So oh yeah, maybe it's sort of uh, you know, looking for that little sense of adventure, yeah, and a less uh, you know, there's less consequences maybe when you're writing a book than in real life.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we'll have to take a poll, figure it out. Yeah, that's a good one. So I found one thing I really enjoyed about your books was just that I didn't know what was going to happen. I mean, I knew the. I figured out the romance part, which is fine because they ended up we'll just say she ended up with who I was hoping she would.
Speaker 1:But the plot was very unique and surprising to me and I was just curious how do you even come up with that and are like no one's going to figure this out or no one's done this before?
Speaker 2:I think that's sort of an element of that's part of my panting is that knowing that sometimes I feel like if I don't know who the culprit is, maybe who the villain is going to be or or exactly how it's going to work out as I'm writing, it maybe lends a little bit of that uncertainty to certain parts of the novel. Or the characters don't know at that moment how things are going to work out. Because I don't know how things are going to work out.
Speaker 1:So I think maybe that could contribute to that a little bit interesting how much editing do you end up doing before you send it to your publisher?
Speaker 2:Because I am a panther and a procrastinator.
Speaker 2:It's usually they get, they get. There's been a couple times I finished writing my draft, you know, at at 3am the day it's due and send it off so that draft draft, but like finish wrapping up. You know at at 3am the day it's due and send it off so that draft draft, but like finish wrapping up. You know it's not like very first draft but um, as you know, in perfect, perfect circumstances I'll have finished the whole book and then I'll have time to read over it a couple more times and make sure that, like I said, all my little clues are lining up and there's not a lot of loose ends and things that I never addressed or that kind of thing. So, but once you know there's several, once it goes to my editor she sends back notes on it, then I do another revision and then it goes back and goes to the copy editor and then it goes to the proofreader and so there's a lot of steps in the process to make sure that things line up well before it's published.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and so for your first series, how much did you have written by the time you went and got an agent and got into like the very traditional publishing route?
Speaker 2:For my first series I had the book finished. Actually, I had a friend who was my writing buddy and we would write in the evenings or on weekends and cheer each other on and send each other chapters back and forth to critique, and so we had finished our books and she had said that I mean, I kind of thought that we were, you know, yay, we finished our books and that was fun. And she said no, now we're going to try to get agents. And so then we had to go about research, uh, researching that project process and see what needed to be done, you know, writing a query letter and researching the agents you're sending it to and all that kind of thing.
Speaker 2:So I had the first book written, uh, when I sent it off to an agent but with the idea that it would be a series in mind, and actually the first book I had left with a cliffhanger a little bit. Um, when you read the book, the very last scene was not part of the book but my uh lady who did become my agent, said readers like closure, so you can leave a little bit of uncertainty as to where you want to go in the series, but you don't want to leave too much left hanging, and so then I ended up writing that last scene and she was right and it worked out perfectly. So I started with that one, and then, I believe, they offered me a two book deal, and then they came back a little bit later and said they would take two more books, and then I ended up doing three more after that.
Speaker 1:That's cool. Was hooked, I think.
Speaker 2:I think that, uh, the my agent was the was the third agent I sent it to. I think I sent it. Uh, I sent it to one who said it wasn't right for their editorial con contacts and then I didn't hear back from one, and I think she was the third one I sent it to.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:And I found yeah, it was fun, I found her by. There was a series that I really enjoyed. That was a mystery series that I felt had a similar vibe I think it was set in Victorian England but it was a strong female protagonist and sort of an undertone of romance and she's solving mysteries and sort of an unconventional character and so I looked up who the agent for that series was and and that's who I ended up signing with. So that's something I always tell authors is look for a series that you feel like is similar to yours, or a series that you really enjoy, and see who represents that, Because that's a good way to find an agent who may be interested in what you're writing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's really good advice. I like the unconventional female characters. I haven't heard it like that. Um, do you, when you create your characters, um do you create them like at all, based on people you know, or how do you come up with their character?
Speaker 2:I don't, um, I don't usually base them on people. Uh, for one thing, I said you know, people have asked me this before and I say well, in writing mysteries it's kind of dangerous because either you know they could end up being the victim or or the murderer, especially the way I write, not knowing till the end who's gonna fit the bill. To be the culprit. But my cousin, actually my cousin's husband. I was just visiting my cousin and he said he wanted me to write a villain in one of my stories with his name. But I won't say, in case I ever do. And then he said but I want at the end the detective can catch him. But I want the detective to say how clever his plot was, so that he almost got away with it so maybe one day.
Speaker 2:Maybe one day I will have a character based on what I know, but mostly I just sort of just sort of let them develop on their own as I'm writing the scenes and see kind of how their little personalities come out. And I've heard I always heard authors say things about like characters doing things on their own and I was like, well, that seems kind of strange because you're the one writing it. But there really are things that have happened that I was not even planning to to put down on, you know, to type out, and they just all of a sudden, you know, kind of happened in my mind, I guess, as I was writing. But it's kind of fun to see what ends up unfolding, especially when I'm not writing from an outline. It can always be a surprise.
Speaker 1:Do you find that like the more you write those characters, the more it's just kind of like, it's just naturally you think like them when you're writing them, or do you have to definitely.
Speaker 2:um, like I mentioned, uh, amory Ames, the first, the heroine in my first series, is a society woman and she's kind of elegant and likes fancy clothes and but she's, you know, smart and sophisticated.
Speaker 2:And so when I switched to Ellie Electra McDonald, who's the heroine of the second series, she's a little bit more, uh, rough and tumble, I guess, like she's grown up sort of probably lower middle class and and she's, she doesn't really care about clothes and she's, you know, ready for an adventure. And she grew up with her older boy cousins, kind of like brothers, and so she's, you know, used to sort of being with the being one of the boys. And so when I first switched over to writing from one series to the next, occasionally I would catch myself writing something and I would say that sounds like something Amory would say, not something Ellie would say, and so I'd have to rewrite it. But the further I got into the series series, the more I felt like I was kind of just writing from her perspective, and so the shift became easier then do you have to keep track of, I guess, the consistency in the books, um, I don't know.
Speaker 1:I think of like the show bible for a show running, but like, if you've been writing something for so long, do you ever have to go back and be like, oh, was this like Electra or was this Amory?
Speaker 2:yes, definitely. Well, I don't know so much between the two of them, but within the, within the series, sometimes, especially things like eye color, or I'll have to go back and you know, double check and make sure that I'm not switching somebody. And then finally, like the last couple books, I finally made just one document of all the names of all the characters throughout my two series, because sometimes I'll be like I can't remember if I've ever used the name Mary before or something you know to where I don't want to just keep recycling the same name. So I finally made that document so I can search names to make sure I'm not repeating them. But I definitely I probably could benefit from having something like that with a little bit of you know, information about each character and what they look like and everything, but I'm not always organized enough for that yeah, people are gonna be like what's up with Mary?
Speaker 1:yeah, she really likes people named Mary do you have a favorite character that you've written?
Speaker 2:that's a good question. I really I feel a little bit like that's like having to pick your favorite child, so I don't. I like Amory and Electra in different ways. I feel like they sort of have similar, even though they're very, very different women. They have similar qualities that I just sort of admire. In general, they're, you know, smart and capable and clever and they want, you know, even though Anne-Marie is looking for criminals and Elektra is a criminal, they both sort of have this innate sense of right and wrong and just justice and injustice, and so they want to see that, you know, the good people succeed and the bad people don't, and so I feel like those are kind of similar qualities in both of them that I admire and I like how they sort of show themselves in different ways and the two very different women.
Speaker 1:I like that, yeah, any strong female characters I'm like I need more. So you said earlier that, like for your first book, you kind of had a writing buddy, writing partner. Um, do you still do that, or is it very much like a alone process now?
Speaker 2:I do add that same writing buddy. She still reads all my books. Uh, sometimes it's her, just her and my sister, usually the ones who ended up end up reading before I. You know my roughest of rough drafts, and so, um, yep, she's still one of the people that I read with. I have a couple friends who or who read my books, but I have a couple friends who like to write as well, and so sometimes we'll do, uh, you know, we'll say I'm gonna write now for an hour, let's see how many words we get done, or that kind of thing. So we kind of keep each other on task and, yeah, not such a lonely process then. But I do do a lot of writing very late at night, and so then I just sort of get in my zone and you know, I usually put on a background, a background tv show of some sort to watch or to listen to a little bit, you know, in the background as I'm writing.
Speaker 1:So Do you have a go-to TV show?
Speaker 2:For a while I was really, especially during one book. I watched like several seasons of Project Runway so I was really excited to see it's just come back because I had watched. It was a good show for writing because you don't have to pay a whole lot of attention throughout the. You know, it's kind of a thing you can kind of look up and down at and then at the end you have the little reward of getting to watch the runway show where they show off all the clothes they made, and so that was sort of like you know, now now pay attention and write during this other episode and then you can stop and focus on the runway show when it gets to it. So that saw me through one book at least nice.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I feel like everybody has kind of those background shows of like just like having it on um.
Speaker 2:I like Gilmore Girls, just like oh yeah, my sister's a big Gilmore Girls fan too.
Speaker 1:I've seen so many times that I'm like I can tune it out and tune back in and I haven't, I haven't missed anything yeah, you know exactly what's what's happening. So how do you like create a space where you're creative?
Speaker 2:I feel like, well, to a certain extent, I know that I have to be creative, and so it's sort of like one of those things where you know, okay, well, I just have to sit down and do this, and so it's not. I found, especially as the more books you write, the less it oh, I feel so inspired to sit down and write. You know 2000 words today, and it's more like, okay, I have to sit down and write 2000 words today, and so I just try to. You know, caffeine is one of my go-tos. That's something that helps a lot.
Speaker 2:I'll just sit and I'm actually I do a lot of writing in my bed and I'll just bring my laptop in there and sometimes like a cup of coffee or tea, and I'll put my fun little background shows on and just get to work. So I do find that creativity Usually. Sometimes it's a matter of not being inspired to start, but being inspired once you start being inspired once you start, and so you know, I may not feel like sitting down to write at this moment, but once I sit down and start getting the words on the page, then I find myself getting excited about what I'm writing and looking forward to, you know, fleshing out the scene and and figuring out what's gonna happen. So I find that that sort of it's a matter of, you know, getting myself over that hump of, of that initial motivation, and then I can really start to feel creative.
Speaker 1:I feel like starting is just like it's like a wall sometimes yes, it's the truth.
Speaker 2:Of so many things, just getting started is the hardest part yeah, it doesn't matter.
Speaker 1:It doesn't matter what um and so like. Have you ever run into writer's block when you're like, oh my gosh, I cannot have writer's block? When you're like, oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:I cannot have writer's block.
Speaker 2:Right now I don't have too much problem with writer's block, I would say, and I think one of the reasons maybe is because I write out of order. So if I'm finding that I'm stuck on a scene or, you know, nothing's happening, this isn't working out, you know the way I want it to, or I can't seem to fit the clues in here, then I'll skip to another part of the book and work on that, and so sometimes it may be as simple as well. You know, this is going to require research in this part, and I need, you know, to look up how to blow open a safe with nitroglycerin, and I don't know how to do that, and you know this kind of stuff. And so then I'll say, well, let me skip to a romance scene or something that's easy to write and is sometimes, you know, a little more fluffy and fun, and so then I'll work on a different part of the book instead. So that's usually how I overcome if. If I'm feeling blocked in a certain area, I'll just kind of skip to a different place.
Speaker 1:I'm feeling like your google history could be concerning to like the government.
Speaker 2:Oh, yes, definitely, I've thought about that before. I said I'm probably on some sort of watch list after this series.
Speaker 1:What would you say is like your favorite part of the writing and publishing process, if it's after too?
Speaker 2:I feel like as a librarian it's just always comes down to seeing the book on the shelf After you know, when it's published especially my first book, you know to see it on the library shelf next to all these people whose books I'd put away for years, and it was just really rewarding. So I always say it kind of is amazing how it's, how it's almost like magic, how you take a doc, they take a document on your computer and then turn it into like a beautiful book with a pretty cover and you know, and it all comes together to create this sort of it's all in my head but then it comes together to create this outside thing that that can be in other people's heads. So I think that's pretty cool that's I.
Speaker 1:Honestly, it's kind of funny because I found your book, because I was just wandering around my library looking for a mystery book and I think it was like sitting out and I thought the cover looked it was so beautiful and like so different that I was like oh, I'm just gonna check this out. And then I was like oh, that doesn't usually happen yeah, oh amazing, I love that yeah, how did? Were you part of designing the cover, or was that something someone else did?
Speaker 2:that's something they. They have some uh cover artists through the publisher and they've always done an amazing job. Every time I get one of the books I'm more excited than the last, so there's been several times when they've sent me the email. You know, here's the proof of your cover and I'll just gasp because they're so pretty and perfect, so I've really been fortunate with my cover designers. They've done an awesome job.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, they're really, really. I mean, they caught my eye, so, um. So with your first series you'd written the first book and so you were looking for the agent, got the publisher, but with the second series you're.
Speaker 2:You actually already had a publisher and they wanted more right yes, they said they were interested in seeing what if I was interested in starting a second series.
Speaker 1:And so when they approached you about that.
Speaker 2:Had you already read the Agent Zigzag book or were you like I have to come up with a new idea? I think I had actually already read the Agent Zigzag book because I remember when they asked me I kind of had this idea floating around in my head a little bit already. I was like, oh, that was an idea that I was interested in exploring and I thought that it would make a fun series because of you know all the different she gets a little. There's a little bit of criminals from different walks of life that they know and they're they're different criminal contacts that they pull in to do different aspects of the job, and so I thought that would be a fun sort of world to explore. So that was it was. It was high on my list.
Speaker 1:Nice, I actually.
Speaker 2:I think you should like bring back your gangster idea to do something, because I love gangster stories the tail end of prohibition, um, because it's the early 30s but they're, they sort of get involved with a with an underworld character, and so that was sort of my homage to those early days of my, uh, of my gangster series, because I do sort of have a soft spot for those 1920s, 1920s, you know, bootleggers and things. I always thought that was such an interesting time in american history for sure I yeah, I think that I think it's.
Speaker 1:I've always been fascinated by like the mob and any like criminal. I feel like if I wasn't so like paranoid about getting caught, I'd I'd be a criminal. It'd be fun. Instead, I became a lawyer.
Speaker 2:Oh well, it's adjacent, you know, to crime. The world of crime, yeah.
Speaker 1:The courtrooms at least. Yeah, I'm not even that kind of lawyer. Oh well, still the law. I sit at a computer. Yeah is. My grandparents lived on the Mississippi River and their house looked like right out at the river and across from them was a tunnel that the gangsters, the mob, built, and they would smuggle stuff there, and so the FBI would come and sit in their living room and watch the monsters oh, that's amazing. Yeah. So I'm like I feel like I had that like story and I'm just like it's so fascinating.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that would make a good story too. And then you know, have the FBI sitting in your living room and watching out.
Speaker 1:Well, feel free to use that.
Speaker 2:You've got some good fodder for stories in your family history for sure yeah, yeah, I do actually.
Speaker 1:Wow, I never really thought about that, but I don't know. My grandma has written a bunch of books, so she's, she's definitely, oh, awesome yeah yeah, um. So do you have a new project in process?
Speaker 2:I don't. At the moment. I don't't have anything definite. There's a few ideas I'm sort of swirling around. I recently last year switched. I worked in public libraries for 19 years and I took a job as an elementary and middle school librarian at a school, so I've kind of made a day job switch and so I'm sort of this will be my second year. We actually go back to meetings and stuff tomorrow. Today's my last day of summer vacation, which was awesome. I hadn't had summer vacation since I was a kid probably. So it's pretty nice having the summer off. But now that I'm kind of settling into this, I feel like it's going to leave me a little more brain space for turning out something new.
Speaker 1:How is that different than working in a public library, like what would you say is like the biggest difference other than the kids, I suppose?
Speaker 2:I think one of the biggest differences for me on the day-to-day basis was in my previous job. I worked kind of behind the scenes. I had an office in the back where I would catalog books and do the kind of behind the scenes things. And here I'm, people facing all day and I wasn't sure how I felt about if I was going to be drained by that. But actually I've really I really enjoyed it last year and the kids are a lot of fun and kind of makes the day go by really fast. So I I've, I've been happy with the, with the switch. I miss, I love my old job and all the people I worked with, but I I just this opportunity came up and I was like, well, maybe it's time for me to spread my wings and try something new. So I took a risk and so far it's been good.
Speaker 1:Is there anything that you find surprising about being a librarian? Because, I mean, you've been a librarian for quite a while, so is it? Is it? I feel like people see librarians a lot, but I'm like what do they actually do? This made me my question.
Speaker 2:Yeah, there's a lot of different and I've actually done a lot of different jobs within the library. I started working at a library after school when I was 14.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow.
Speaker 2:So it's actually the same year that my freshman year of high school when I wrote my first book. So my writing career and my librarian career have always sort of gone hand in hand. I say but so I did the sort of circulation stuff where you're working the front desk and checking out books and checking in books and that kind of thing.
Speaker 2:And then I did more of the technical services with my previous job, where that was behind the scenes, where I was, you know, processing books. I'd order books, catalog them, put all the labels on and that kind of stuff and get them ready to put out, or I, you know, repair damaged books, that kind of stuff and get them ready to put out, or I, you know, repair damaged books, that kind of thing. And then I mentioned working at the reference desk.
Speaker 2:I did that for a while so that was, you know, answering people's questions and helping them with their research and that kind of thing. Yeah, so there's been a lot of different. There's a lot of actually kind of different avenues of librarianship you can pursue.
Speaker 1:I like the damaged books thing. I I once tried to return a book that our puppy had just ripped apart I was like maybe they won't notice, they definitely did it happened for sure yeah, I think one time they somebody returned a book to me that their that their child had had chewed on.
Speaker 2:So that was something new. But babies will do that, yeah babies and puppies yeah, yeah, you'd be surprised.
Speaker 2:You see, I think one of the one of the going back to your question the things most surprising about librarianship is the library's hardly ever quiet. You know, a lot of people think, and a lot of people think that librarians get to sit and read all day, which, you know, I wish, I wish, I wish I could sit and read all day. But, um yeah, libraries are hardly ever a quiet place. There's always something going on and some kind of ruckus happening.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so, um, I'm not sure if you have any free time, but if you do, how do you spend it?
Speaker 2:well, unsurprisingly, I do a lot of reading, that's, you know, my probably my favorite pastime and I I do a lot of reading.
Speaker 2:That's, you know, my probably my favorite pastime and I like to travel a lot. I mentioned my, my trip to Paris, so that was a great memory. But I tried, and you know, fit in trips whenever I can. I'm excited now because during the summers will provide me some more opportunity to be off and travel. Actually, my cousin, our friend, and I just went, just got back. Last week we went to Las Vegas to see the Backstreet Boys in the Sphere.
Speaker 1:Oh, no, are you serious?
Speaker 2:It was so amazing. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1:My sister's going to be so jealous. She and her friends still go. Millennium was my first concert.
Speaker 2:Oh wow, amazing. Yeah it was, it was really fun. It was really like a special, you know nostalgic moment.
Speaker 1:Yeah, are they all there still?
Speaker 2:Yep, they're all there. Yeah, they did, I think, like a six week residency at the Sphere doing shows Friday, saturdays and Sundays, and then I think they added a week. So that's amazing and they were, you know, selling out. So hopefully I'm like, hopefully they'll come back again, you know, in a year or two, and maybe I'll get to go again. It was really fun.
Speaker 1:I feel like the songs that you grew up with, like I think we're probably about the same age. I'm like a 90s kid and I'll just be doing something random, like I was journaling the other day and I just had this song pop in my head and it was like the Britney Spears song, like Dear Diary which is like, yeah, and I knew all the lyrics and I was like this is a problem yeah, yeah, that's yeah.
Speaker 1:And they and I mean they sang all like all the old favorite songs, so of course everyone's like screaming the lyrics and dancing around together and it was really fun you figured a lot of things, but you never forget those lyrics, yeah for sure, so do you have a recommendation on like a cozy mystery or thriller series? I do.
Speaker 2:I have a lot of favorites. I always enjoy Deanna Rayburn's book. She has a couple of series that are really good, and I belong to a group called Sleuths in Time authors and we're all mystery writers who write in different eras of history, and so the other writers in that group. They're different. Some of them are set in England, some are set in America and they're throughout different periods of history. But I always recommend their books to anyone who's looking for kind of the similar cozy vibe and usually with a female protagonist who's smart and savvy and good at solving mysteries.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:So that's Alyssa Maxwell, Nancy Harriman Colleen, Cambridge. Oh, I hope I'm going to be able to remember everybody now that I'm on the spot.
Speaker 1:You can always email it to me.
Speaker 2:Jessica Ellicott. Okay, and the other one is Clara McKenna. Cool, I got them all right.
Speaker 1:Lots of recommendations.
Speaker 2:I like that yes, so that's several, if people are interested in reading, you know, historical female-led series like that okay.
Speaker 1:And then do you have any advice for a young woman who is aspiring to be an author?
Speaker 2:I always find that the best writing advice that I've seen is is from Stephen King, and he said if you want to be a writer, you have to do two things you have to read a lot and you have to write a lot. Yeah, because writing, reading you learn the kinds of things you are interested in in writing and the things you're interested in, the sort of style you're interested in. You learn through reading what you would love to write. And then, as for writing a lot, I always I think a lot of people get the idea that they have to sit down and create this amazing novel, you know, as soon as they sit down at the computer, and I've written so many things.
Speaker 2:Sometimes I write things just for fun. I have no intention of publishing them, but if I get an idea of just a fun scene I might like to write, or an idea for just a little snippet of a story. I have a document that I just opened up on my computer, just called ideas on original. But I just opened my ideas document and write it down just because it's good to work on your. You know the craft of writing, even if it's not something that you think that is going to be, you know, the next great American novel. Sometimes you just write for writing sake and and practice as much as you can.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean I don't don't. I mean maybe someday I would write a book, I don't know, but I do that a lot.
Speaker 2:I have a lot of just unfinished things on my computer that I'm like I'm okay if it's only ever me, um because I know it and I had an idea and it's there well, now you've got you know, you've got that whole prohibition era thing going on you could have the FBI agent and maybe, like there's a young woman in the family who falls in love, or maybe.
Speaker 1:I never say never. So what are you obsessing over lately?
Speaker 2:I. The most recent thing I was obsessing over was I was watching because of Backstreet Boys mainly. Um, I was watching. It's on Netflix. It's a show called Building the Band. Okay, and it's hosted by AJ McClain. He's my favorite. He's your favorite too, oh, my gosh.
Speaker 2:Okay, aj, we're definitely the same age, yeah so, um, it's, it's kind of you one of those reality shows where they have to. They're like all in like little cubes and listening to each other sing, and then they have to decide if they want them in their band and then they have to make connections and build a band together. And then I haven't finished the series yet. I have like three episodes left, but I've really been enjoying that I'm definitely going to watch that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's really fun. I mean it's, you know, kind of silly, cheesy, reality show type stuff. But I always enjoy a singing competition show and it's kind of fun to see. You know, when you have a group there's also like the singing and there's also all kinds of interpersonal conflict, which is always makes for good. You know, reality TV, great TV, yeah yeah, I've been obsessing over.
Speaker 1:I waited a long time and then I finally ordered unbound merino. It's like travel clothes. I'm wearing the um, oh, uh-huh and I kept hearing about it on one of my favorite podcasts and I'm going to Scotland, and so I was like I obviously need travel clothing so I finally ordered it and I've been wearing it like for a week straight and it's so comfortable and I'm like oh, perfect yeah so highly recommend.
Speaker 2:Love it um that's awesome and I know I'm hoping to get to Scotland next year that's on my yeah a couple friends and I, like we were a couple years ago. We were like, okay, we're gonna shoot for 2026, so hopefully, fingers crossed okay well, okay, so I'm not gonna get this right.
Speaker 1:I'll send it to you after, if you want it. Um oh, yeah there's this photographer in Scotland, I think, based in Edinburgh. I found her on Instagram and she does main character photo shoots for women. I think maybe you've seen that it looks so cool it's kind of like like outlander type yeah, yes, and I I submitted, but I didn't get it because there was like a wait list but maybe you could submit.
Speaker 1:Early enough because I phoned it out too late but I was like I really want to dress up in a gown with a sword and go to a castle.
Speaker 2:Oh, that's amazing. Yeah, definitely send it to me.
Speaker 1:I was so disappointed. I was like my mom and I are going, so I was like wouldn't it be amazing if the two of us had swords and gowns and we're gallivanting around edinburgh?
Speaker 2:that'd be so cool, yeah, well, maybe next time next time.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna recommend today a youtube channel called nourish move, love and she's out of Minnesota and, um, I've been doing she's like a weightlifting like beginner. I think she's more than beginner but I'm a beginner. So, yeah, I really like her and she does like 10 minutes. She's always like 10 minutes is better than no minutes, so I feel very motivated by 10 minutes. Yeah, that's really encouraging, because sometimes I look at stuff I'm like, oh, I have to like build up.
Speaker 2:So far to do that. But to say, yes, no minutes. So I feel very motivated by 10 minutes. Yeah, that's really encouraging, because sometimes I look at stuff I'm like, oh, I have to like build up so far to do that, but to say, yes, you know, just, you have to start somewhere. Like we said, starting is the hardest part. It is yeah, so I'm like 10 minutes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I can do that. Some are five. I even do five. That's awesome, yeah.
Speaker 2:I don't know if I have any recommendations off the top of my head and and I'll probably think of 25 once I.
Speaker 1:You brought some great book recommendations, which I always need, so we will share those for sure. I'll link to them. What are you looking forward to this week?
Speaker 2:I'm looking forward. I'm actually looking forward to starting back to school.
Speaker 1:Is it?
Speaker 2:tomorrow. It's just meetings this week, but it is tomorrow. Yes, we're starting back just sort of, you know, administrative stuff and kind of getting back into the swing of things. But I'm looking forward. I'm looking forward to the new year and getting to see. I was kind of surprised. I was like, oh, I really miss a lot of the kids and I ran into a couple of them around town over the summer and it was fun to see them and they were excited to see me, which was so cute and so, um's some sweeper. You know they were. I was at a restaurant with I was actually with my book club and they ran up a couple of them ran up to the table. So I'm looking forward to kind of getting back into the swing of things and getting the school year going.
Speaker 1:I feel like that elementary age is just like they still. They get excited to see like teachers and staff outside of school. They're like, oh my gosh, you're awesome yeah, and then a little.
Speaker 2:I probably you know. Once you hit high school, I imagine, yeah, they grow out of it. Avoid you in the store if they see you.
Speaker 1:Yeah well, this week I'm really excited because I'm finally getting my haircut. I've rescheduled it like two or three times so feels good to get it checked off the list right yeah, so, ashley, where can people find you and find your book specifically?
Speaker 2:um, you can find me on. I'm on facebook and instagram, I'm on x, but I'm not. I'm not always. It's kind of like I check into x once in a while, but, um, I I'm trying to remember. I think I'm at Ashley Weaver. Author.
Speaker 1:I'll link to you. Don't worry, I got it okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that's where you can find me and you find my books um wherever books are sold, as they say.
Speaker 1:Yeah and everyone should definitely follow Ashley. Read her books. I'm I'm a fan.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much I'm telling everyone about this.
Speaker 1:I'm like I started the podcast just to meet people I want to meet.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, that's a really fun idea though. I bet you know if you get to meet a lot of interesting people if you're doing a podcast, fun uh well, thanks for being here and everyone.
Speaker 1:Thank you for listening. Please subscribe to my youtube channel and follow the show wherever you listen to podcasts. I'll see you next week. Thanks for listening to my crunchy zen era. Please subscribe and leave a review wherever you listen to your podcasts. This podcast is produced by me, nicole swisher and my good friends summer hardcup and liz colder. Editing is by drew harrison Media and recording is done by Lagos Creative in Nashville, tennessee. Thanks for hanging out. We'll be back next week.
