Speaker 1: Coming to you from the dining room table at East
Speaker 1: Barbary Lane. Welcome to a special episode of Full Circle
Speaker 1: the podcast. I am your host, Charles Tyson Jr. And
Speaker 1: I am delighted to be sitting down with our guest today.
Speaker 1: He is a wonderful author of science fiction in the
Speaker 1: young adult milieu Escoor, and his new book is delightful.
Speaker 1: It is called The Brightness Between Us, and it is
Speaker 1: a sequel to what I feel is going to be
Speaker 1: an ongoing saga. Elliott Schefer is in the building. Hi, Elliott,
Speaker 1: how are you?
Speaker 2: Hi? I'm great, Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: Thanks for being had by us.
Speaker 2: That's a sophisticated set of grammar, right there, nailed it.
Speaker 1: So, Yes, So, your new baby is entitled The Brightness
Speaker 1: between Us, and it is a sequel. But first, why
Speaker 1: don't you tell us what's in store for us in
Speaker 1: the story overall and in this particular installment.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So, The Darkness Outside is a science fiction novel
Speaker 2: I wrote back in twenty twenty one. It is a romantic,
Speaker 2: gay science fiction story about It takes place four hundred
Speaker 2: years in the future, and the first astronaut to settle
Speaker 2: a moon outside of Saturn has gone missing. Her distress
Speaker 2: beacon went off and then no one has heard from her,
Speaker 2: and so the two remaining countries on Earth scramble rescue
Speaker 2: mission to go rescue her, and it's may have to
Speaker 2: put one astronaut from each of these warring countries on board.
Speaker 2: So these two boys are enemies of each other, sworn
Speaker 2: enemies of each other, but stimate they have to work
Speaker 2: together to do this rescue mission. But as they approach
Speaker 2: the moon of Saturn, they discover that the ship has
Speaker 2: been lying to them and that their mission is not
Speaker 2: at all what they were told, and that it's actually
Speaker 2: something much different. And so by the end of the book,
Speaker 2: these two boys have traveled across the Milky Way to
Speaker 2: settle a new planet, and they are the future of
Speaker 2: humanity because war is destroyed Earth, and at the end
Speaker 2: of the first novel they settle on this planet and
Speaker 2: begin a new life, to begin new civilization. So it's
Speaker 2: kind of like a literal version of it's Adam and Steve,
Speaker 2: not Adam and Eve. And then the brightness between us
Speaker 2: picks up sixteen years in the future and they are
Speaker 2: now thirty something dads, these two boys, and they have
Speaker 2: two sixteen year old kids, Owl and Yarrow, and they're
Speaker 2: trying to scramble together a life on this distant planet.
Speaker 2: But there's more than they like. We don't we haven't
Speaker 2: met any aliens or other creatures around, but there's plenty
Speaker 2: to be discovered on the other side of the mountains
Speaker 2: around their settlement about what's actually going on in this planet.
Speaker 1: I love it. Yeah, the book has a constant sense
Speaker 1: of wonder and discovery about it, and it's it's very cool.
Speaker 1: I dig it. One of the things that warmed my heart.
Speaker 1: I just love how the kids referred to their parents
Speaker 1: as dad and father. I was like, it's a nice
Speaker 1: way to to navigate that.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Originally I had them using their parents' first names
Speaker 2: because they're at their point of view characters, and they
Speaker 2: kept calling them Kodiak and Ambrose, and it just felt weird,
Speaker 2: you know, just like when kids first named their parents,
Speaker 2: Like it can sort of startle you, right, But yeah.
Speaker 1: Okay, what drew you to science fiction? Have you always
Speaker 1: been a fan?
Speaker 2: I've been a fan of science fiction, and yes, when
Speaker 2: I was a teenager, I loved two thousand and one
Speaker 2: and its follow up novels. I am a huge fan
Speaker 2: of Battlecar Galactica, the reboot that started in two thousand
Speaker 2: and four, And I think, you know, there's just something
Speaker 2: science fiction does, this crazy thing which it takes things
Speaker 2: that were concerned about like social social questions that we
Speaker 2: have about how we relate to each other in our
Speaker 2: contemporary world, and it puts them in a new context
Speaker 2: where you can kind of see them a new and
Speaker 2: reassess it. And I think that's always been a really
Speaker 2: powerful selling point of that genre, just like how Star
Speaker 2: Trek back in the nineteen sixties was a way to
Speaker 2: talk about race for a country that was unwilling to
Speaker 2: talk about race. They were doing it through this diverse
Speaker 2: crew that was meeting, like Captain Kirk kept falling in
Speaker 2: love with various aliens, you know, and so it was like,
Speaker 2: you're like, the first interracial kiss was on Star Trek.
Speaker 2: And I think there's a way in which it kind
Speaker 2: of can push forward and in a way that contemporary
Speaker 2: aratives not necessarily aren't equipped to do, can actually look
Speaker 2: and really examine what's going on. And I think for
Speaker 2: me reading these science fiction stories, I never even hoped
Speaker 2: to find an LGBTQ character in them, right, And that
Speaker 2: felt like a real kind of loss, like I would
Speaker 2: have loved to see myself in one of these stories.
Speaker 2: And so in the darkness outside us and the brightness
Speaker 2: between us, it's very much trying to like fill a
Speaker 2: hole that was there, not just around LGBT representation, but also,
Speaker 2: you know, sci fi kind of deservedly gets a reputation
Speaker 2: sometimes as being a little bit chilly, like it's kind
Speaker 2: of all about the ideas and not about characters and feeling.
Speaker 2: And I wanted to kind of also as much as
Speaker 2: I could, like just create characters and a romance that
Speaker 2: would really pull people in. And so there's a way
Speaker 2: in which these boys are each other's only the only
Speaker 2: other humans in each other's lives because they're trapped on
Speaker 2: a spaceship together, and so there's a way in which
Speaker 2: they discover that connection is the only way to survive.
Speaker 2: And I think that's we all live a version of
Speaker 2: that story where you realize even with all your armor
Speaker 2: and you're saying, like I'm good, I'm fine on my own,
Speaker 2: I don't need anyone, screw my families, screw my friends, whatever.
Speaker 2: Like we all learn like you do need someone, it
Speaker 2: doesn't have to be your family that you were born
Speaker 2: with but you do we are we only exist in
Speaker 2: emotionally healthy ways if we're in a relationship with someone
Speaker 2: of any sort not romantic.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's that is one thing that you know. I
Speaker 1: also am a fan of science fiction, and you're right,
Speaker 1: it does tend to be a little cold and clinical
Speaker 1: and sterile at times, and that is an element in
Speaker 1: your work that I do appreciate, that sense of emotional
Speaker 1: awareness and intimacy, and you know, yeah, I think it
Speaker 1: is safe to say that that comes directly from you know,
Speaker 1: our queer sensibility and the longing for connection and belonging
Speaker 1: and togetherness and family, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we have to work, you know. We all had
Speaker 2: to survive and upbringing where we weren't necessarily able to
Speaker 2: be our authentic selves, or most of us did. So
Speaker 2: a lot of our adulthood is about, you know, keeping
Speaker 2: whatever armor is useful, but also removing whatever pieces we
Speaker 2: can to become vulnerable to each other and not you know,
Speaker 2: not always because I think you know, I certainly if
Speaker 2: you look at like the wreckage of all my relationship
Speaker 2: from my twenties, I just was not ready to like
Speaker 2: sort of say like, oh, I need you, I need help,
Speaker 2: you know, like those kind of things. I was like
Speaker 2: just always trying to like, no, I'm fine, Like you're emotional,
Speaker 2: but I'm not feeling anything right now. And that was
Speaker 2: all the result of growing up in the closet and
Speaker 2: feeling like I had to like be walled off from
Speaker 2: needing people, relying on them, or being my full self
Speaker 2: with them. And a lot of my work as an
Speaker 2: adult was figuring out how to become authentic again, Like
Speaker 2: I needed to do that early on in my life
Speaker 2: to survive, but I don't need to now, So it's
Speaker 2: a it's very much. Something I wanted to talk about
Speaker 2: in the book too, is to explore how we connect
Speaker 2: with other people. And it's like the hardest task of
Speaker 2: our lives, I think, to really get full connection. Like
Speaker 2: I think human relationships are simple on one end and
Speaker 2: really tricky when you look at it through another end,
Speaker 2: Like there's a lot to You're always learning about how
Speaker 2: to be a good partner.
Speaker 1: Whoever you're with, and there's never just one answer, and
Speaker 1: that one answer doesn't always stay the same.
Speaker 2: Answer yep, yep, absolutely.
Speaker 1: And you know then there's also that whole like you know,
Speaker 1: feeling of where the importance of love is. And you
Speaker 1: talked about like, you know, building the armor and breaking
Speaker 1: down the armor, and sometimes there's elements of like, you know, well,
Speaker 1: if they love me, then what does that say about them?
Speaker 2: And oh, yeah, I had that relationship too. Was that
Speaker 2: There's some quote I think it was Whatody Allen and said,
Speaker 2: I don't want to be a part of any club
Speaker 2: that would happen to.
Speaker 1: Me as a member. Yeah, exactly right.
Speaker 2: And definitely you know like some people like if someone
Speaker 2: loves them, then there must be something wrong with them, right,
Speaker 2: so they find a way to talk themselves out of
Speaker 2: that relationship. And that's a really self defeating mindset, it is.
Speaker 1: And when you said relationships in the twenties, a part
Speaker 1: of me just cringe because the entire ones, the mistakes
Speaker 1: we made. It's a wonder I'm still here.
Speaker 2: But when you don't even know what mistakes you're making,
Speaker 2: that's part of the problem. Like once you're conscious of
Speaker 2: you're trying not to make, but you're making all the
Speaker 2: subconscious ones, you know.
Speaker 1: So and how do we learn from our mistakes when
Speaker 1: we think we already know every damn thing. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: a wonder we make it out a lot. Well, actually
Speaker 1: we don't.
Speaker 2: Well yeah, well, and the darkness side is I don't
Speaker 2: want to reveal the plot to us, but it has
Speaker 2: half way through as a major thing happens where the
Speaker 2: boys mission is not the actual mission and they end
Speaker 2: up kind of like in a situation where they can
Speaker 2: restart their relationship with each other after thousands of years
Speaker 2: go back, and so they leave messages to their future
Speaker 2: selves about how to be good partners for each other.
Speaker 2: And that was partly about you know, when you think
Speaker 2: about some of those people before I was equipped to
Speaker 2: be a good relationship partner. You know, I looking back,
Speaker 2: I probably knowing what I knew now, it could that
Speaker 2: relationship could have worked out. You know, I've been with
Speaker 2: my husband now for fifteen years, so I'm not actively
Speaker 2: seeking any of that, but I think back on some
Speaker 2: of those and like, it was me. It wasn't him.
Speaker 2: It was me in some of those situations, and like,
Speaker 2: but the scar tissues there. There's often you can return
Speaker 2: to relationship, but sometimes the hurts go too deep and
Speaker 2: you just can't. And I was kind of thinking about,
Speaker 2: like what if you could have a redo And not
Speaker 2: to reveal too much, but the story of darkness outside
Speaker 2: is kind of exploring that, like, what, let's give it
Speaker 2: a second go and see how we can be better.
Speaker 1: Nice and you know, going to dig into that little
Speaker 1: bit more in a moment, but but yeah, I was
Speaker 1: just thinking, like, you know, there are a lot of
Speaker 1: stories that are quote unquote universal, but I'm sitting here
Speaker 1: thinking there's just some stories that can only be told
Speaker 1: from a queer sensibility and a queer point of view,
Speaker 1: you know, because not everyone really has that shorthand and
Speaker 1: and that approach to relationships and the emotional intelligence that
Speaker 1: can come through it. And it's interesting when other people
Speaker 1: try to tell our stories and it just doesn't feel right.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: The legacy of science fiction too, where we have these
Speaker 2: astronauts who don't have emotional needs like they are Like
Speaker 2: our own Space program was we just drafted our first
Speaker 2: astronauts for all Air Force pilots that were just swapped
Speaker 2: over to become astronauts instead, and really they were taught
Speaker 2: to like be unemotional, to like drive out emotional needs,
Speaker 2: and it was thought that that's what made the perfect astronaut.
Speaker 2: But now like we have a very different approach to it,
Speaker 2: and you realize like they're trapped in this environment, in
Speaker 2: close quarters and high tension environments with other people, and like,
Speaker 2: having emotional intelligence is crucial. It's not like that's something
Speaker 2: that we have to avoid emotions. It's instead it's about
Speaker 2: being expressive and being in touch with what you're feeling
Speaker 2: and also what other people are feeling around you. And
Speaker 2: I think it's it's kind of time science fiction caught
Speaker 2: up to the fact that, like, it's not like emotions
Speaker 2: are secondary to survival. They are crucial to surviving.
Speaker 1: Right, because otherwise, you know, we could just have an
Speaker 1: entire story about robots.
Speaker 2: Yeah, or robotic people, which some of the sci fi
Speaker 2: classics they are like their characters, but they're not really
Speaker 2: like they're just you know, sort of automatons going through
Speaker 2: this storyline exactly.
Speaker 1: So something very exciting your Your first book, The Darkness
Speaker 1: Outside Us, is in development to be a feature film. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's one exciting thing. And the other exciting thing is
Speaker 1: it's in development with Elliott Page's production company, Page Boy Productions,
Speaker 1: which that's so many cool things wrapped them inside of
Speaker 1: each other.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I was delighted when I got that call, because
Speaker 2: you know, Page Boy Productions is doing really exciting stuffy.
Speaker 2: They're looking to make commercial, broadly accessible movies that are
Speaker 2: from and about marginalized people and getting as many people
Speaker 2: on the team who are you know, trans gay by
Speaker 2: and just really shaking up who's making movies and who
Speaker 2: movies are about. And so it's been really exciting to
Speaker 2: work with them. And then we do I can't get
Speaker 2: it going to the detail because I've been announced, but
Speaker 2: there's a major studio that's stepped up in a big
Speaker 2: way to fund it. So that's you know, I sort
Speaker 2: of feel like Charlie Brown with the football round film stuff.
Speaker 2: I'm sure I'll run towards it and Lucy will find
Speaker 2: a way to like pull the football away. But right
Speaker 2: now it looks really promising that we will actually have
Speaker 2: a movie of darkness Outside is sooner rather than later,
Speaker 2: so that would be super exciting.
Speaker 1: I love that. Have you gotten a chance to have
Speaker 1: direct conversations with Elliott?
Speaker 2: So I've been talking to the head of Page Boy Productions,
Speaker 2: Matt Jordan Smith, and he's been my main, my main
Speaker 2: go to I'm going to be in la next month,
Speaker 2: so it's possible that I'll be eating with Elliott, But
Speaker 2: so far we haven't had a chance to have a conversation.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure what a group of Elliott's is called.
Speaker 2: It's probably some collective noun for it, but we do
Speaker 2: spell it differently. I'm one L and Elliott is two ls, so.
Speaker 1: In my head it's elle Ocean.
Speaker 2: But I like it. Yeah, that's good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I love I love that. I love that mission
Speaker 1: statement of the production company. And you're definitely fits right
Speaker 1: in there. Especially in this time of I get so
Speaker 1: tired of hearing about hearing people say why do we
Speaker 1: need to care about the sexuality of the characters, Why
Speaker 1: do we need to know? Why do we need to care?
Speaker 1: Why does sexuality have to be put put on display
Speaker 1: as it were, to which I usually then just post
Speaker 1: screenshots of their fase, you know, kissing like Batman and
Speaker 1: Catwoman and things like that. It's like you're not thinking
Speaker 1: about it, but trust me, it's always there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like straight is a sexuality. It's not like that
Speaker 2: is a an empty space that isn't a sexuality. It
Speaker 2: is a different one.
Speaker 1: You know, I mean, judging from stories of a lot
Speaker 1: of women, I know maybe you know, but but no,
Speaker 1: that's wonderful. Yeah, talk to me, Yeah, talk to me
Speaker 1: a little about your feelings on that, because you know
Speaker 1: representation is crucial.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well so I was. You know, I don't love
Speaker 2: the phrase like the character just happens to be gay
Speaker 2: or buyer trans I think it's not.
Speaker 1: That's so dismissive.
Speaker 2: No one just happens to be their sexuality, right, like
Speaker 2: it influences who you are and how your life is.
Speaker 2: But at the same time, I definitely there's a place
Speaker 2: for books that are about being LGBTQ. But Darkness Outside
Speaker 2: As and Brightness between Us isn't about that as much
Speaker 2: as it's just part of these characters' lives and who
Speaker 2: they are. And I think we need both kinds of stories,
Speaker 2: one where it's about that identity in other words, that
Speaker 2: is less central. And I actually, with the screenwriter for
Speaker 2: Darkness Outside As, we did a co project where we
Speaker 2: read this book on the making of two thousand and one,
Speaker 2: sort of thinking about other sci fi movies and what
Speaker 2: we could learn from it. And I was reading that
Speaker 2: book and Arthur C. Clark, who wrote the novel two
Speaker 2: thousand and one, was gay and live with a man
Speaker 2: in Sri Lanka.
Speaker 1: I don't think I knew that.
Speaker 2: I know I didn't either until I read this and
Speaker 2: I realized, like the characters in two thousand and one
Speaker 2: to two men on a voyage, and they're not really
Speaker 2: you know someone one of them has their wife back home,
Speaker 2: but it's not really their sexuality is and part of
Speaker 2: their characterization. And I see this kind of artful dodge
Speaker 2: that Arthur cy Clark did in the sixties when you
Speaker 2: wrote two thousand and one to sort of neither make
Speaker 2: them gay but also like not have their straight sexuality
Speaker 2: a big part of their characters. But as a result,
Speaker 2: it sort of feels like there's like a little missing
Speaker 2: piece somewhere in that story of this human connection. And
Speaker 2: so you know, I would love to think of the
Speaker 2: sort of gay version of two thousand and one. And
Speaker 2: in a way, Darkness Outside is kind of is you know,
Speaker 2: this front tense experience of being locked into a spaceship,
Speaker 2: like you can't leave right there is no like I'm
Speaker 2: out of here, we're done, Like you're like then you're
Speaker 2: in the vacuum space and it's not good for you. Yeah,
Speaker 2: they really have to figure out their relationship and their
Speaker 2: and their love. And I have two different the main characters,
Speaker 2: like one of them is very kind of progressive and
Speaker 2: really sort of comes from a country where they speak
Speaker 2: they don't even use, you know, labels for people's sexuality
Speaker 2: or sexual identities. It's all just much more fluid. And
Speaker 2: the other one is from a much more repressive, patriarchal
Speaker 2: old school society and he's more buttoned down. And so
Speaker 2: just to give us sort of different ways of looking
Speaker 2: at how we approach our own sexualities through these two characters,
Speaker 2: to see, you know, we all have varying relationships and
Speaker 2: of comfort with our own who we are as people.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's that's an interesting dichotomy with people because
Speaker 1: we have those of us that are like, why do
Speaker 1: we need labels? Why do we need to make things
Speaker 1: a thing? Why can't we just be? And then other
Speaker 1: people like, but if there's no order, then then how
Speaker 1: do I know how to be?
Speaker 2: M h. Yeah, Well it's I find I have both
Speaker 2: feelings at the same time, you know, like I don't
Speaker 2: want to have to self identify or to to think
Speaker 2: of the label for other people. But it's also a
Speaker 2: really quick shorthand that's useful in a lot of circumstances
Speaker 2: to be able to say, like, here's who I am,
Speaker 2: and here's here's my descriptors. It is it can catch
Speaker 2: people up really quickly, whereas it takes more work if
Speaker 2: you're going to avoid labels to really get across your identity.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and now that I said that, I am thinking
Speaker 1: about like the new generation and it does get a
Speaker 1: little chaotic. It's like, you know, I have to learn
Speaker 1: a whole new language, and it's like I am always
Speaker 1: going to be respectful of my people, but you know,
Speaker 1: certain things like do I really have to say Zen's are?
Speaker 1: Can I just say your name?
Speaker 2: Yeah? That one is it's hard for just the brain
Speaker 2: to process it. But I do appreciate, you know, the
Speaker 2: ways in which sort of these very specific identities like
Speaker 2: sort of allow people to to quickly identify even if
Speaker 2: they're their sexuality or their sexual identity is really complicated. Right.
Speaker 2: I think it's useful and it's it's good to have
Speaker 2: a broader set of terms, but it does mean, you know,
Speaker 2: there will always be a term that I'm not familiar with, right,
Speaker 2: So I just hope for patients and grace from people
Speaker 2: that are teaching me about how they identify when it
Speaker 2: when I don't yet know what they're what their.
Speaker 1: Adjectives mean, right, and then you have people that are like,
Speaker 1: my gender is a warm summer night, and it's like, no,
Speaker 1: we're not doing that. I'm sorry, log.
Speaker 2: Off, but well, I think I think there's like two
Speaker 2: sides of you want gender to be really like sort
Speaker 2: of taken seriously, and sometimes it can feel like it's not.
Speaker 2: It's being taken not seriously, but at the same time,
Speaker 2: like it's great to be playful or on gender too, right,
Speaker 2: like have you know like that we can have it
Speaker 2: doesn't have to be a serious concept all the time, right,
Speaker 2: Like we can we can kind of screw it up
Speaker 2: and be fluid and gender queer.
Speaker 1: And I think pro hopefully, Yeah, definitely. And of course,
Speaker 1: and to backtrack real quick, I was thinking about two
Speaker 1: thousand and one and the queer sensibility behind it that
Speaker 1: I didn't realize was there. Hall is kind of a
Speaker 1: shady queen.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, you're all seeing eye of hell.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, now that I think about it, yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I rewatched it and they're they're very handsome
Speaker 2: astronauts too that on that voyage. I mean, Kubrick the
Speaker 2: director wasn't wasn't gay from anything I can tell or buy,
Speaker 2: but there definitely wasn't interest in casting very beautiful people
Speaker 2: for those roles.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you know two thousand and one is a
Speaker 1: visually striking world. Oh anyway, speaking of how so AI
Speaker 1: is a very present component of your work in these stories.
Speaker 1: So how much of that concept do you put what
Speaker 1: you want to see? And how much like where we are?
Speaker 1: Because the whole concept of AI for me is very fraught.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it is for a lot of us.
Speaker 2: I you know, writing Darkness Outside as I wrote it
Speaker 2: in twenty nineteen, and at that time a I was
Speaker 2: being mentioned. But I was a little leery of having
Speaker 2: even saying that the phrase artificial intelligence in the book
Speaker 2: because I was worried it's going to be like a
Speaker 2: fad that we wouldn't be talking about it. And then
Speaker 2: obviously now we're really talking about it a lot more.
Speaker 2: That was not a worry I needed to have. But
Speaker 2: I think at this point, because of our diet of
Speaker 2: other science fiction stories, we're very ready to have the
Speaker 2: kind of evil AI interpretation. And I definitely play with
Speaker 2: it in the Darkness Outside as there's the ship's operating
Speaker 2: system they call it OS is shady and it's their
Speaker 2: true mission is kept a secret. From them by the ship.
Speaker 2: But once they know the true mission and they are
Speaker 2: heading off to settle this new planet, the AI becomes
Speaker 2: an ally and it becomes when they land, it becomes
Speaker 2: kind of the third parent for their kids. It's just
Speaker 2: like sort of gentle gardener of this new civilization. And
Speaker 2: I kind of liked playing with our expectations around it
Speaker 2: that it doesn't have to be Skynet and Terminator. That
Speaker 2: there is a way in which AI might be as
Speaker 2: it gets more and more complicated, might be emotionally complicated too,
Speaker 2: and capable of good things and bad things. And we've
Speaker 2: kind of see that in our every day there's you know,
Speaker 2: a lot of us are worried about the influence that'll
Speaker 2: have on this information, and you know, students plagiarizing essays
Speaker 2: from chat GPT. But at the same time, it's, yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean, it'd be hard to resist. But at the
Speaker 2: same time, it's you can see all the small ways
Speaker 2: in which is facilitating everyday life and useful, useful ways.
Speaker 2: So I think it can be both at the same time. Right,
Speaker 2: we have to kind of be able to hold both
Speaker 2: those in our head. It might be force a good.
Speaker 1: Imbad exactly, and you know, I am all about the
Speaker 1: advancement of science and technology. In fact, I'm low key
Speaker 1: obsessed with it. And you know, part of me is
Speaker 1: very excited with the way that AI is integrating itself
Speaker 1: into our real life. And then part of me is like,
Speaker 1: you know, the people that are creating these things, I
Speaker 1: know they read the same books and saw the same
Speaker 1: movies that I did. So it's like, why are we
Speaker 1: trying to like do certain things to prove that we
Speaker 1: can when we already have a not good example of
Speaker 1: what could happen. You know, it's like, why are we
Speaker 1: doing this to ourselves? And why do we have that
Speaker 1: impulse to do that to ourselves?
Speaker 2: Yeah, when it's this a mad scientist approach where because
Speaker 2: you can do it, you should do it, which you
Speaker 2: trust that someone else will step in the way if
Speaker 2: it's going to do wrong, that it's not your responsibility
Speaker 2: as the creator of these things. And I think we're
Speaker 2: realizing that governments have been slow to get a handle
Speaker 2: on how to put guardrails on AI, and in a
Speaker 2: lot of ways it might be might be too late.
Speaker 1: Yeah, That's why whenever I ask chat GPT to write
Speaker 1: something for me, I always make sure to say please
Speaker 1: and thank you.
Speaker 2: Because you want to survive the robot apocalypse.
Speaker 1: I'm one of the good ones. Please thank you.
Speaker 2: That's right. I was just learning today that people give
Speaker 2: names to their rumpus, and I've never named my robot vacuum.
Speaker 2: So I think I'm worried that I'll be killed during
Speaker 2: the robot uprising. Son, I'm gonna name it really quick
Speaker 2: so that it keeps me alive.
Speaker 1: Oh, now you have manners, uh huh, now that it's useful.
Speaker 1: I love it. I love it.
Speaker 2: I love it.
Speaker 1: So what do you do? You see the brightness between
Speaker 1: us being part two of an ongoing saga, I think.
Speaker 2: So I'm a little leery around sequels in general, because
Speaker 2: for every good sequel, there's probably four or five really
Speaker 2: terrible sequels out there. And you know, I actually got
Speaker 2: in trouble yesterday for naming Greece Too is a terrible sequel,
Speaker 2: which apparently a lot of people really love Greece Too.
Speaker 1: That is so controversial.
Speaker 2: Apparently. But like, let's say, Speed to right. So Speed
Speaker 2: was an amazing movie, and they were like, let's just
Speaker 2: make the bus and cruise ship and do it all
Speaker 2: over again, and it just didn't work. And I think
Speaker 2: when a sequels doesn't have its own thing it needs
Speaker 2: to say what it's just like a follow up without
Speaker 2: really a lot of thought behind it, it can be
Speaker 2: kind of terrible. So I was I dragged my feet
Speaker 2: about writing any follow up to Darkness Outside Is until
Speaker 2: I realized I had more to say and a story
Speaker 2: that could stand on its own, and so that's when
Speaker 2: I wrote it. And so I think I am interested.
Speaker 2: I think this world has more stories in it to
Speaker 2: tell that I would like to tell. But I'm waiting
Speaker 2: to find a storyline that can stand on its own
Speaker 2: and not just rely on the other two for three.
Speaker 2: So if that, if, and hopefully when that comes to me,
Speaker 2: then I'll work on it. But I don't want to
Speaker 2: make a speed to or agrees to. The model for
Speaker 2: me of like a perfect sequel was Aliens after that,
Speaker 2: because Alien had this amazing creature, an amazing lead, the
Speaker 2: Sigourney Reaver, and it was basically a slasher movie, just
Speaker 2: in a spaceship ye And then Aliens kept the Aliens
Speaker 2: kept the main character, but the tone of the movie changed.
Speaker 2: It became more like a war movie instead of a
Speaker 2: slasher movie. It was like Platoon or something but with
Speaker 2: the Aliens, and I thought that was so clever because
Speaker 2: it was a follow up. It felt like a sequel,
Speaker 2: but it didn't follow the beats the original alien because
Speaker 2: it was the whole tone was different. And I think
Speaker 2: that's that for me, is like a gold star about
Speaker 2: what a sequel could do. And it's something I kept
Speaker 2: in mind with the brains between us.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like the first movie was a horror film, the
Speaker 1: second movie was science fiction, and then it expands right
Speaker 1: there and from there, and I think that's tone is
Speaker 1: very important. I'm a huge fan of the trilogy, especially
Speaker 1: the second installment in a trilogy, because typically in the
Speaker 1: second installment of a trilogy a there's not a happy ending,
Speaker 1: which is always interesting to me. And also you drop
Speaker 1: right into the action, you know, because we've got all
Speaker 1: the world building and all the character exposition and everything
Speaker 1: from the first film, so now we just jump you
Speaker 1: right in the middle of the action and we just
Speaker 1: story story, story, story story. That's usually like, uh, Empire
Speaker 1: strikes back, Matrix reloaded, Like that's that's.
Speaker 2: Usually your Matrix reloaded fan. That's also a controversial one.
Speaker 2: That's not a purist that want to just rolled. Its
Speaker 2: just the first movie. Oh, interesting, like two Towers? Is
Speaker 2: that one?
Speaker 1: Two Towers exactly? Yeah, fire yep.
Speaker 2: Follow up. Yeah. I do like the feeling of not
Speaker 2: having to do the work of getting to know the characters,
Speaker 2: because that is there is a lot of work we
Speaker 2: writers ask of readers is to spend the time putting
Speaker 2: the pieces together to figure out who someone is in
Speaker 2: the book. And sequels are great because you already know
Speaker 2: they're all friends by now, so you know exactly who
Speaker 2: everyone is.
Speaker 1: But see the other side of that, though, is then
Speaker 1: that puts so much pressure on the third installment because
Speaker 1: now you've got to wrap this whole thing up in
Speaker 1: a satisfying way, and that doesn't happen as often as
Speaker 1: i'd like. Case in points the third Matrix film, well, yeah, I.
Speaker 2: Mean the very few people are fighting for that one unfortunate.
Speaker 2: But then like Return of the King, that was an
Speaker 2: amazing right, and that was the one that won the
Speaker 2: Academy Award for the Lord of the Rings. Yeah. I
Speaker 2: think for me, the tricky one is the second one,
Speaker 2: as on the writer side of things, because often those
Speaker 2: are just treading water. Like the first book had the
Speaker 2: amazing beginning and set up the premise the last one
Speaker 2: is going to finish everything, and the second one is
Speaker 2: like more stuff happens, you know, it's just like the
Speaker 2: middle stuff. And so I think it's it's hard to
Speaker 2: make those interesting on their own, right.
Speaker 1: But at least with your approach with these books, you
Speaker 1: don't have that pressure on yourself because you're not thinking
Speaker 1: of it in terms of a trilogy. You're thinking of
Speaker 1: like a satisfying story in this installment, and it is
Speaker 1: what it is for this moment. So that's that's good
Speaker 1: for you at least.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm not sure how how far this
Speaker 2: will go. It'll stop once I feel like we've told
Speaker 2: of all the stories that needed to be told in
Speaker 2: this universe, but I'm not sure when that'll we so
Speaker 2: I guess we'll just find it out as we go.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, part of me doesn't know what
Speaker 1: to root for, but like, you know, you might get
Speaker 1: to the point where when the film is a huge
Speaker 1: success and then they start backing the big money truck
Speaker 1: up to your house and now you're like, okay.
Speaker 2: Right, right, Well part of it is, you know, you
Speaker 2: see what happened with something like Game of Thrones, where
Speaker 2: the TV series got out ahead of the books, and
Speaker 2: so it was, you know, it seemed like there was
Speaker 2: infinite amounts of material for them to adapt, and then
Speaker 2: all of a sudden they were the schedule was getting
Speaker 2: ahead of Georgia R. R. Martin's, so part of it, you know,
Speaker 2: writing the sequels does mean that I would be able
Speaker 2: to set the terms of where this storyline would go.
Speaker 2: Whereas if I kind of if the movie did take
Speaker 2: off like k Not Come, would they would if I,
Speaker 2: if I weren't in the follow ups, they would be
Speaker 2: harding a screenwriter to write it. So if I want
Speaker 2: to tell the story, I better get in there, get.
Speaker 1: Working exactly, because I've seen too many examples of properties
Speaker 1: where they want the money, they want the capital TV,
Speaker 1: they want the cash cow of the next part of
Speaker 1: the of the story, and the original screenwriter or the
Speaker 1: original writer isn't involved usually because you know, they don't
Speaker 1: freaking want to. You know, this is not what I
Speaker 1: want to do with my work, and.
Speaker 2: It's not good. Yeah, one TV series you see off
Speaker 2: from the showrunner who's kind of the head writer, is
Speaker 2: there for a season or two and then moves on
Speaker 2: to other projects, and the series takes a nose dive.
Speaker 2: Once there, their voice is out of the room.
Speaker 1: Yep. Like right now, there's all this conversation, and I
Speaker 1: mean mostly on the internet in discussion groups, but like,
Speaker 1: do you remember Lovecraft Country that was on HBO. Lovecraft
Speaker 1: Country was a novel which essentially was like a bunch
Speaker 1: of short stories stitched together with one overarching plotline, and
Speaker 1: they made this brilliant series on HBO and like the
Speaker 1: show had its own like had an accompanying syllabus because
Speaker 1: there was so much, so many references with books and poetry,
Speaker 1: and it was just stunningly perfect. And when the series ended,
Speaker 1: like it there was just the one, the one season,
Speaker 1: and people are like, we want season two, we want
Speaker 1: season two. But my whole thing is there was only
Speaker 1: one book. They did the series on the book. So
Speaker 1: if they do a season two, now they have to
Speaker 1: start making up new shit without the author. I don't
Speaker 1: want to see that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, who knows, maybe they'll come up with something that's
Speaker 2: out Lovecraft's love Craft, but it's hard to imagine.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, it's like you don't know what to root
Speaker 1: for it. It's like, I'm not done loving this show,
Speaker 1: but no, I don't want you to mess it up.
Speaker 2: At the same time, though, I think, you know, I'm
Speaker 2: really interested in not being too heavy in the room
Speaker 2: if when they adapt, if they adopt, get to the
Speaker 2: point where they we're getting ready to make the movie,
Speaker 2: because I think I've said my piece for four hundred pages.
Speaker 2: I've I've said everything I want to say about the
Speaker 2: characters in the storyline, and I'm kind of interested in
Speaker 2: someone else's take and what they what they want to modify,
Speaker 2: and what they would do. And I don't want to
Speaker 2: get in a way of that. I'm afraid that, you know,
Speaker 2: it's the writer I would it's like, no, you shouldn't
Speaker 2: be wearing a yellow shirt, be a green shirt, like right, right, right,
Speaker 2: just become insufferable to them. So I would much rather
Speaker 2: have a lighter hand help where I can, and then
Speaker 2: someday sit in a movie theater and the lights go
Speaker 2: down and I get to just see what they did
Speaker 2: with something that was once just a word doc on
Speaker 2: my computer.
Speaker 1: I love it. Yeah, And that's interesting when, like you know,
Speaker 1: when an author lets go of the rains and it
Speaker 1: ends up being different than their vision and they're experiencing
Speaker 1: it for the first time with the rest of us like,
Speaker 1: what must that feel like? Like, do you recognize your
Speaker 1: baby at all?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Right, hopefully you do. But then if they make
Speaker 2: a muck of it and it's a trible movie, at
Speaker 2: least I can just say, like, I didn't do it right,
Speaker 2: I did it, you know. But there's a ways in
Speaker 2: which you know movies are different, you know, because I
Speaker 2: can get a lot of tension and story out in
Speaker 2: the internal narration in a novel. In a movie can't
Speaker 2: really do that, So they have to sort of prove
Speaker 2: through the visual medium what characters are about and what
Speaker 2: they're thinking. And that's a very different art form than
Speaker 2: what it's a novelist I have access to. So I
Speaker 2: think I'll leave it to the experts to figure out
Speaker 2: how to translate what at times can be a more
Speaker 2: internal story in the novel into something that is works
Speaker 2: well for cinema.
Speaker 1: Do you like I mean, right now, I know the
Speaker 1: answer because you're in the middle of getting your work
Speaker 1: into a film. But do you like film adaptations better
Speaker 1: than series adaptations? What do you think about those two?
Speaker 2: I don't know. I think there's so many films that
Speaker 2: I've loved in TV series that I've loved. It's hard
Speaker 2: to hard to know. I think it's just keeps changing
Speaker 2: so much. Which are getting the best productions and the
Speaker 2: best directors, Like it's used to be that like film
Speaker 2: is considered a cut above, but that's those days are
Speaker 2: long gone and you have some of the best digital
Speaker 2: entertainment is on TV now, So I think it's I
Speaker 2: can see a version of like where a whole season
Speaker 2: would be the darkness outside is in the whole season
Speaker 2: would be the brightness between us. But I think with
Speaker 2: the movie you have like the total clarity, like we
Speaker 2: know exactly where it's going to end, because the screenplay
Speaker 2: has already gotten there, and it's just a really neat
Speaker 2: arc where it's a TV series ends up a little
Speaker 2: more open ended and I think has more room to play,
Speaker 2: but it can be a little less tight than a
Speaker 2: movie can be. So I'm certainly open to both. But
Speaker 2: right now we're thinking of it as a movie, right.
Speaker 1: Like there is that like it can become a big,
Speaker 1: sprawling thing if you let it go over the course
Speaker 1: of the season. But at the same time, it can
Speaker 1: be like you said, like you can delve more into
Speaker 1: the internal struggles and the personal journeys of the individual characters.
Speaker 1: Like the example that's in my head the total random
Speaker 1: comparison is Dear White People. Like there was the movie
Speaker 1: and it told the story beginning, middle end, but then
Speaker 1: they redid it for the series, and that was interesting
Speaker 1: in that each episode was told from the point of
Speaker 1: view of a different character, so they still, over the
Speaker 1: course of the series of the first season anyway, told
Speaker 1: the exact same story that the movie did, but you
Speaker 1: got so much more out of it because you got
Speaker 1: to see it from this complete three sixty point of
Speaker 1: view because you're seeing it from all of the different characters.
Speaker 1: And that's one of the things I love about expanding
Speaker 1: properties into series that you can go as deep as
Speaker 1: you want, but then it really depends upon how seriously
Speaker 1: you take the work, because it can easily go go astray,
Speaker 1: like American Gods, for instance, Oh my god, they the
Speaker 1: minutia that they paid attention to. And because I was
Speaker 1: so excited to see American Gods turn into a series
Speaker 1: because I love that book. I have never been so
Speaker 1: bored by a story that I loved. You know, it's
Speaker 1: like we're five episodes in and we're only like twenty
Speaker 1: pages into this book. I don't understand, you know. So, yeah,
Speaker 1: there is a two sides to that coin. So who
Speaker 1: would you say are your biggest literary influences.
Speaker 2: Well, for these books, I think Arthur C. Clark is
Speaker 2: a big one. I do love like storytelling wise, I
Speaker 2: think Susanne Collins did an absolutely amazing job in the
Speaker 2: Hunger Games trilogy, and I think as a model of
Speaker 2: getting a tense thriller kind of story with a high
Speaker 2: concept world like She's she really mastered the way to
Speaker 2: do it. My favorite book of all time is a
Speaker 2: book called Howard's End by Iam Forster, which you know,
Speaker 2: I was set in nineteen oh eight London, but he
Speaker 2: was you know, Forster was a gay man. It wasn't
Speaker 2: revealed until he died in nineteen seventy and he had
Speaker 2: this gay novel, Morris, that was only published then. But
Speaker 2: Howard's End, yeah, it was this like straight characters but
Speaker 2: written by gay man with a gay sensibility. And as
Speaker 2: a gay teenager, I saw the movie and then read
Speaker 2: the book and felt like kind of seen by it
Speaker 2: and that I understood him, and I felt a kindred
Speaker 2: spirit in Iam Forster, and so that book has always
Speaker 2: held a really close place in my heart and I
Speaker 2: reread it pretty regularly. It's like my comfort read. It's
Speaker 2: a really great book.
Speaker 1: You seem to like period pieces, like yeah, I think so.
Speaker 2: I like learning about somewhere else. In general, I like
Speaker 2: to feel like I've gone far away from where I am.
Speaker 1: It's like you're influenced by stories set in a fixed
Speaker 1: point in the past, and then you write about things
Speaker 1: that take place far into the future. It's interesting.
Speaker 2: Either, you know, sort of like having a good exploration
Speaker 2: where I'm running from humping in the President who knows?
Speaker 2: I love hmm explore episode two.
Speaker 1: Here's a question. Do you have a soundtrack when you
Speaker 1: when you write or do you write in complete silence?
Speaker 2: No? I usually have music going. Yeah, I tend to
Speaker 2: write to sort of vapid pop. That's like a good
Speaker 2: match for me because it's got energy but the lyrics
Speaker 2: that don't require too much attention. And so I definitely
Speaker 2: like wrote a whole album to you know, Kelly Clarkson
Speaker 2: another one too. I don't know.
Speaker 1: Interesting, I never.
Speaker 2: Never wrote to Katie Perry, but I do like like
Speaker 2: an album that I know and love that I can
Speaker 2: put in the background and feel the energies. But it's
Speaker 2: not like new music that I'm actively processing, Like that's
Speaker 2: the perfect writing music for me.
Speaker 1: Okay, all right, I love that.
Speaker 2: I love it. I love it.
Speaker 1: I love it. So what do you what is your
Speaker 1: your hope for your your career? Like, say, where do
Speaker 1: you see yourself? Pie in the Sky in in five years?
Speaker 1: The movie's been out, it's a huge success.
Speaker 2: I like this. I like this, future sounds great.
Speaker 1: Like what do you what's on your your dream board?
Speaker 2: Oh well, I'm toying around with the idea of a
Speaker 2: novel for an adult novel, not erotico, just a novel
Speaker 2: that's audience as adults. But I was asked on a panel,
Speaker 2: you know, what's the time period that you'd be interested
Speaker 2: in writing about that you've never written about? And I
Speaker 2: realized I'd always thought about, like what would what would
Speaker 2: I have done if I were born in the Middle
Speaker 2: Ages as a gay man, Like what would I I'm
Speaker 2: with myself when there is no stone wall, you know,
Speaker 2: there's no like gay awakening. And I realized I would
Speaker 2: probably have become a monk. I don't believe in God,
Speaker 2: but the idea of living on like in some monastery
Speaker 2: with a bunch of other guys and brewing beer and
Speaker 2: illuminating manuscripts and doing astronomy and stuff, singing chants, and
Speaker 2: it sounds great. So I'm imagining a novel about a
Speaker 2: monastery in the twelfth century where it turns out not
Speaker 2: one or two, but all the monks are gay. It's
Speaker 2: like a gay monastery. So I'm not sure where to
Speaker 2: go with it story wise, but I think that's probably
Speaker 2: the next project for me down the pike.
Speaker 1: Be honest, Fabulous Monastery ever.
Speaker 2: That's right, that's a good title. I mean, you'd want
Speaker 2: to crack an open, right, unless the Ebulous Monastery ever?
Speaker 1: I mean, hey, well, Elliott Schrefer, thank you so much
Speaker 1: for sitting and chatting with me. I'm so glad that
Speaker 1: I got to talk to you about your wonderful work,
Speaker 1: and I look forward to being able to sit in
Speaker 1: the theater and watch the film based on your work,
Speaker 1: because you've got a unique point of view that I
Speaker 1: think people need to need to check out, need to
Speaker 1: be exposed to.
Speaker 2: Well thanks, yeah, yeah, I would love that experience too,
Speaker 2: So maybe we'll be communing across from two different cinemas
Speaker 2: thinking about that. But this has really been a great conversation.
Speaker 2: Charles and I really appreciate your having me on and
Speaker 2: I've really really enjoyed it.
Speaker 1: Thank you. What's your favorite way to get people to
Speaker 1: buy the book?
Speaker 2: I love you know. It should be in most independent bookstores,
Speaker 2: your local small bookshop, so please check it out there
Speaker 2: if you do want to buy it. I've signed the
Speaker 2: copies in three different bookstores, Books of Wonder, Red Balloon Bookshop,
Speaker 2: and Blue Willow Bookshop, so you can order from any
Speaker 2: of those and they'll send you a signed copy, or
Speaker 2: you can get it from your general chain store too.
Speaker 2: That's all fine, fabulous.
Speaker 1: So the book is The Brightness Between Us by Elliott Schreefer,
Speaker 1: and I implore everyone that is within the sound of
Speaker 1: our voice to get yourself a copy and immerse yourself
Speaker 1: in this wonderful world that he has created. Elliots, thank
Speaker 1: you so much, and I hope that this is not
Speaker 1: the last time we talked to each other.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that sounds great. Let's do it again.
Speaker 1: Yes, take care now.
Speaker 2: Thanks.
Speaker 1: Full Circle is a Never Skured Productions podcast hosted by
Speaker 1: Charles Tyson Junior and Martha Madrigal, produced and edited by
Speaker 1: Never Scured Executive Produced by Charles Tyson Junior and Martha madrigal.
Speaker 1: Our theme in music is by the jingle aries. All names, pictures, music, audio,
Speaker 1: and video clips are registered trademarks and or copyrights of
Speaker 1: their respective copyright holder.
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