Speaker 1: Hi, Kate, this is zero. How are you doing today?
Speaker 2: I'm doing well.
Speaker 1: How are you excited to share a conversation with you?
Because I cannot wait to start having conversations with other
people about this book, and I said, I won't do
it until I have a conversation with you.
Speaker 2: Excellent.
Speaker 1: This story is so amazing in the way of being
that conversation starter, because I think that we know a
lot of Rachel's and Allison's.
Speaker 2: I hope, so, I really really hope.
Speaker 3: So you know that that's one of the things when
you start writing, you think, Okay, I think this is universal.
I hope this is universal. I hope people will understand,
and you just cross your fingers.
Speaker 1: Well, you know what, I think what you what makes
it universal for you is the fact that you cover
so many different classes, the upper class, middle and everybody
else in between. To get into that area. How are
you so relatable with it?
Speaker 3: I mean, I think in my own life, I've had
I've just had experience with all of it. You know,
my my my family was, my relatives are all very
working class. My parents up working class. My father's a writer,
and he found some he found some success.
Speaker 2: And then you know, as as I.
Speaker 3: Got older, I sort of watched my own class change
and that felt, I mean, nothing to the level of Alison. Obviously,
I mean, her family is incredibly wealthy, but I did
feel that sort of that sort of shift of like, Okay, well,
I remember growing up in a tiny apartment in New Haven,
but I also remember living in a nice house in Maine,
and so I've had both experiences, and I wanted to
show both experiences.
Speaker 1: You know, you say that Allison comes from a lot
of money, But now I'm now I sit here and
I go, well, why was Rachel so embarrassed to call
her a friend? Why did she why did she feel
like she would be so uncool?
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's I mean, that's a funny thing, you know.
And I wonder what other manors will think about that
element of the story, because I always felt that way
growing up, that it was, particularly in Central Maine, there
was this real kind of I compare it to sort
of a Goldilocks thing. You couldn't you couldn't be too
poor and you couldn't be too rich.
Speaker 2: You had to sort of be just right in the middle.
Speaker 3: And so Rachel, you know, Rachel kind of was you know,
she I think She describes herself as sort of being
on the cusp of being too poor. And then there
are these kids who live in this neighborhood, neighborhood called
Allerton Heights, that that's kind of the cool neighborhood, and
that is where Alison lives. But she's sort of like
far and away just her family is. Her family is
so wealthy that it's hard for the other kids to
like her because I think jealousy takes.
Speaker 1: Over see, and that's another relatable right there, because I
think every town has this. I mean, I grew up
in Billings, Montana. We live south of the tracks. Uh oh.
And then those that lived up in Heights. You know,
it's like saying, I don't want to relate with you.
I have nothing to do with you people up there
in the heights.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And it becomes turfy really quickly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it sure does. It sure does. So Now one thing,
as that writer, I've got to ask you this question.
The book takes place eight years earlier. I'm one of
those people that believes that we are born to rewrite
our lives, and so as you were writing this story,
you had the power to rewrite those eight years.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, this is you know, I mean, this
is my I mean, my own experience. I would love
it if people thought that I was Allison's age, but
I am much older.
Speaker 2: But there's you know there.
Speaker 3: I had this kind of idea that I wanted to
put this story sort of in the in the two
different kind of presidential elections, So in the two thousand
and eight were the kind of Obama's being elected, and
then in twenty sixteen when Trump is being elected, and
sort of what it's like to be a young woman
in this gap, you know, where everything's changing.
Speaker 2: And so of course the story is.
Speaker 3: Not about that at all, but it is kind of
in the background the whole time that that sort of
these these things that when Rachel's thirteen she thought were
going to be givens. By the time she's twenty one,
she realizes, actually these things are feel like they're about
to be taken away, and that kind of clouds the
whole story.
Speaker 1: Aren't you giving us Chile markers on this map? Because
in our own personal lives it's moving too fast and
we need books like this and say, oh wait a second,
what was I doing during this time period?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Absolutely, I remember growing up, you know, I was. I
was Rachel's age during during the oj trial, and I
remember my dad saying to me something like, oh, you'll
remember this for the rest of your life.
Speaker 2: This will be a marker.
Speaker 3: And while that's kind of true, so much stuff has
happened since then that that's just like a tiny little
blip on the radar compared to, you know, everything that
happened now. I was in college during nine to eleven,
and so all of these different events that happen in
our young years. And I think particularly for people now,
it's just there's just too many. There's just too many.
You don't even know which ones are the defining ones anymore.
Speaker 1: You're very good with creating in identity, like for instance,
like we already know that it's too female protagonists, and
of course, inside my mind, I'm going, how are they
even getting along here? What's going on? Yeah, you know,
so it is. But I love the fact that you
know that you're straightforward with that, because people they know
who they are, they just don't know how to explain
how they are, and books like this really open up that,
you know that page.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's definitely true of Rachel. I think
Rachel sort of she knows she's an introvert, she knows
that it's not easy for her to make friends, and
I think she sees herself as being somebody who's not
very likable, and she doesn't necessarily know how to change that.
Whereas I think Alison is very proud of who she is,
it's just that nobody else seems to like that. And
so she's kind of in a position of thinking, Okay,
well I need to be myself. I'm going to be
myself well regardless of where not anyone else likes it.
Whereas Rachel's thinking, well, I want to change myself to
be whom everybody else likes, and that, you know, that
is kind of at the crux of why they can't
get along.
Speaker 1: Please do not move. There's more with Kate Russo coming
up next. The name of the book is Until Allison.
We're back with author Kate Russo. The book creates emotion
and and and so I always wonder, you know, what
what did you feel before we get the angst, the jealousy,
the doubt. I mean, because I mean there's I mean,
it creates an emotion, which to me is making that
connection with readers.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think for me, it was about sort of
exploring my own haunting to a certain extent, you know,
looking back on my own time in junior high and
in college, and and that sort of moment where you
have a memory and you just cringe and you think.
Speaker 2: Oh God, why did I do that? Or that was
such a horrible thing that I said.
Speaker 3: And again, I'm hoping, I'm very much hoping that this
is a universal experience, and I wanted to put that
in in Rachel. So whilst you know, it seems unlikely
that she would know or have anything to do with
Allison's death, she can't help but feel like it's her fault.
And then the and then the novel sort of goes
back into thinking about you know, why she why she
feels that way.
Speaker 2: It's a real meditation on your own haunting.
Speaker 1: See, I can relate with that because I mean, I mean,
Rachel does feel that guilt when when she finds out
about Alison. And I think that there are people, you know,
as we grow up beyond high school and college and things,
we lose friends and we wonder if I would have
kept in contact with them, would that have happened? Oh
my god?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Am I part of the of the problem here.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and it's actually an enormously selfish it is, you know,
like in some ways you think, oh, I'm being a
martyr here by blaming myself for this, but actually no,
you're just centering yourself. And I think Rachel I like
to hope that she eventually figured that out, that you
know that this, at the end of the day wasn't
about her, but she's determined that.
Speaker 1: It is the one of the pieces or the glue
of this story. And listeners need to understand this is
that you really do. You're standing in the corner of
walk and don't walk when you say that you've either
been bullied or you are the bully that is right
in the center of making a decision.
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, And I think I think we've all been both,
and I think that we all need to admit that
we've been both. And also that person in the middle
that did nothing and that more often than not was me,
And that is why I'm haunted about my own youth.
But I do feel that people, Yeah, it's the moment
we begin to understand that we have bullied somebody is
when we can begin to understand why people bully. And
I think when we other bullies that way, it's really
difficult to understand where cruelty comes from.
Speaker 1: The ending of the book. No, no spoiler here, but
how were you able to bring it together to create
a major league summertime big surprise, I surprise myself.
Speaker 3: I think that I think that was part of it. Yeah,
I think that was part of it. I knew, I
knew kind of what I wanted to do. There were
lots of different This young boy, Ethan who's in the book,
there are lots of different versions of him, and it
took me a long time to settle on version of
him that I wanted him to be. The other book,
so Rachel's has two boyfriends in this book, Ethan in
her junior high years and Cam and her college years.
And I knew Cam and her college years from day one.
He was crystal clear to me. But Ethan really really
took some work, and he had lots of different iterations,
and when I finally figured out who I wanted him
to be, it just opened everything up.
Speaker 1: Wow, you spoke about your father being a writer as well.
What is that like for you? Because I mean, what
are you doing with his writing? And the reason why
I bring that up is because I've been a daily
writer for thirty two years and I'm at that yeah,
where I go, what am I going to do with
this writing?
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a big discussion that we have, actually, I mean,
as I start to build my own archive, you know,
I've got stax and stacks and stacks of edited pages
and I'm only on book two and about that, my dad.
Speaker 2: Must be I've lost count to be honest.
Speaker 3: I mean, there's like nine novels and then and then
some nonfiction and a couple of years ago, I think
I helped him sort of organize this archive.
Speaker 2: And there's so much stuff and.
Speaker 3: You know, we've got it in storage unit at the moment,
and it's kind of like what do you do with it?
And it is it's it's a it's a big conversation
of legacy and how, you know, how useful is any
of it really?
Speaker 2: You know, what do you keep and what do you
throw away?
Speaker 3: Because again, your ego plays into it, and you you know,
and I think my dad's probably one of the one
of the.
Speaker 2: Least egotistical people in the world. You probably would have
chucked at all.
Speaker 3: So it's you know, it is it's a really interesting conversation.
What you what you do with all of this stuff?
Speaker 1: Do you believe in the theory of dear future reader?
In other words, yes, you're writing this book. Wow, until
Alison for today? But what about what about fifteen twenty
years from today?
Speaker 2: I always feel that way.
Speaker 3: I think I'm really I think I'm really retrospective in
that way. I always think, now, I don't you know,
readers today will read it, But I always think about
what people are going to think, you know, thirty years
down the road, because you want something to resonate, you know.
And I tend to edit that way too. So if
I'm working on the book and I think will this matter.
Speaker 2: In thirty years?
Speaker 3: Will this resonate in thirty years? I tend to remove
it if I don't think it will ye.
Speaker 1: Yeah, wow Yeah. Where can people go to find out
more about you and everything you're doing? Because you just
said this is your second book, Yes, so.
Speaker 3: Probably the best place is katearussou dot com. The page
might look confusing it to be I'm an artist and
a writer, so it's a page for both of those things.
So you can look at my artwork and find out
about my books there and the Penguin Random House page.
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
Speaker 3: They've got a page for both my book's SuperHost as
well and Instagram. My account is Russo Kate Love.
Speaker 1: Please come back to this show anytime in the future.
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Will you be brilliant today? Okay miss Kate.
Speaker 2: Oh, thank you so much, thank you.