Speaker 1: Welcome to teen Girl Talk, Teen Girl Talk. I'm ce
Speaker 1: Zy Coota, I'm friend Coda, and we are so excited
Speaker 1: to have author aj Whitney with us to talk about
Speaker 1: the second book in the Sovereign series, Elysium. I hope
Speaker 1: that I am pronouncing that correctly because I've only read it.
Speaker 1: Welcome Aja, Thanks for having me. Absolutely so we want
Speaker 1: to get right into it. Can you tell us a
Speaker 1: little bit I guess, like an elevator pitch about Sovereign
Speaker 1: that leads us to Elysium. And for anyone who missed
Speaker 1: our interview, was that last year or the.
Speaker 2: Year before that was almost exactly a year ago?
Speaker 1: Oh wow? Okay, so you can go back in our
Speaker 1: feed and we talked about Sovereign, but please just give
Speaker 1: us the high level upolutely.
Speaker 2: So Sovereign follows thirteen year old orphan number three hundred
Speaker 2: and thirty two, who was raised to be sacrificed. But
Speaker 2: when her village stops believing in their mysterious gods, does
Speaker 2: she finally have a real life or will the Sovereign
Speaker 2: take their revenge? And a little bit of a spoiler,
Speaker 2: they do in fact take their revenge.
Speaker 1: Yes, so you know it's I loved that one of
Speaker 1: the things with series because I love a good series,
Speaker 1: and in particular, I was happy that you did not
Speaker 1: like retread a lot in this one, like because I
Speaker 1: feel like sometimes they're like, let us go over these
Speaker 1: big chunks from the previous books, and I felt like
Speaker 1: you really trusted the reader. You're like, I I gets.
Speaker 2: So boring in a series, Like I remember when the
Speaker 2: Aragon books were coming out and I was like, oh
Speaker 2: my god, just stop telling me what already happened in
Speaker 2: the last year. I just read it.
Speaker 1: Yes, because the other part is like who picks up
Speaker 1: at the third book and is like, this is a
Speaker 1: good place to start. I'll just start here.
Speaker 2: That would be silly. I think you only do that
Speaker 2: by mistake.
Speaker 1: Probably, Yeah, And like there's a reason there's always a
Speaker 1: hold in the library on the first book that's like
Speaker 1: eighteen weeks long, and then you can definitely do the
Speaker 1: second book, but right, And I did.
Speaker 2: Try to like to kind of build that in a
Speaker 2: little bit to where you know the characters in those
Speaker 2: first couple of chapters they do kind of rehash some
Speaker 2: of the things that you know, the events that led
Speaker 2: up to where they are now. But I tried to
Speaker 2: build it in in such a way that maybe you
Speaker 2: didn't notice it was happening, or it wouldn't be that
Speaker 2: like eye rolling side moment where you just can't stand
Speaker 2: her read it anymore.
Speaker 1: No, I think you did a great job because, like again,
Speaker 1: and I don't know why, especially this winter, I've been
Speaker 1: doing a lot of series, and I feel like, especially
Speaker 1: when you're reading in succession, it is under like it.
Speaker 1: It's so much clearer when that's happening. So I had
Speaker 1: actually forgotten that the characters didn't have names for so long,
Speaker 1: because when you pick up in Elysium, they are fully
Speaker 1: formed people, and I know you know they're backstories. So
Speaker 1: can without spoilers, can you give us a little bit
Speaker 1: of like where we start in Elysium.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So in Elysium, we have a character who wakes
Speaker 2: up in an unknown place with technology she's not familiar with.
Speaker 2: She doesn't know what in the world is going on
Speaker 2: or how she got there, and she finds that the
Speaker 2: explanation for all of this is that she's now in
Speaker 2: an underground city where the scientists built this civilization hundreds
Speaker 2: of years ago to escape a massive nuclear war that
Speaker 2: destroyed the planet. But Unfortunately, we do still have this
Speaker 2: dual storyline, the same as we did in Sovereign, and
Speaker 2: unfortunately we find that the experience of the people left
Speaker 2: on the surface doesn't quite match up with the story
Speaker 2: that our main characters are being told below ground.
Speaker 1: I really felt that in this in Elysium, because I
Speaker 1: feel like in Sovereign it's so claustrophobic and like the
Speaker 1: communication is so closed, and Elysium everyone's getting a lot
Speaker 1: more information, but it's like, can we trust this information?
Speaker 1: Who is this information coming from? And I feel like
Speaker 1: both experiences, uh feel relatable to me, Like especially now
Speaker 1: where I feel like I have to be so careful
Speaker 1: about where I get information and fact check and et cetera.
Speaker 1: And then being a fish out of water situation, it's like, well,
Speaker 1: who can they fact check with? Like they're being told
Speaker 1: we are the experts, We're telling you what's best for you,
Speaker 1: and like, what are you gonna do?
Speaker 2: But and they're the adults too, the adults telling these
Speaker 2: kids this massive history. Yeah, and is it real or
Speaker 2: is it not real? And it's kind of for the
Speaker 2: reader to decide. Yeah, right up until the end where
Speaker 2: we start to get a little more information that hasn't
Speaker 2: been filtered mm hm.
Speaker 1: And even the sort of the comparison of like old
Speaker 1: world values versus modern values, and how there's like a
Speaker 1: benefit to both and also distractions to both. How was
Speaker 1: it building out this larger world versus like the smaller
Speaker 1: community in Sovereign.
Speaker 2: It was. It was pretty fun for me because I
Speaker 2: kind of just got to run with it and I
Speaker 2: had to decide.
Speaker 1: So.
Speaker 2: I mean, in Sovereign, the main story, it feels very
Speaker 2: like pioneer times, right, there's really no modern technology and
Speaker 2: it is very insular, like you've mentioned. And then when
Speaker 2: I wrote Elysium. First of all, when I wrote Sovereign,
Speaker 2: I had no idea where I was taking this story next.
Speaker 2: I had to come up with all the ideas and
Speaker 2: figure out what I actually want to do because I
Speaker 2: wasn't sure if it would get picked up as a
Speaker 2: series originally. But it was really fun. I got to decide,
Speaker 2: you know, how advanced I want this technology to be.
Speaker 2: Do I want it to be realistic like things that
Speaker 2: you know we actually have here in the twenty first century,
Speaker 2: or do I want it to be more advanced than that?
Speaker 2: And things that I just come up with. I did
Speaker 2: tons of research. I felt like the FBI agent who
Speaker 2: is assigned to watch my Google history probably is getting
Speaker 2: concerned because I'm having to google things about you know,
Speaker 2: like C four and you know, different ways to to
Speaker 2: use explosives. Oh you know there's a scene where she
Speaker 2: has to remove the screws from something from the backside,
Speaker 2: and I, okay, like how do we how does that happen?
Speaker 2: Like I have to make them brittle and I.
Speaker 1: So, yeah, I thought that was really like I would
Speaker 1: never think to do that. So like the making them
Speaker 1: see the forest basically like snaps the screws, very ingenuitive.
Speaker 2: And I got to as I wrote Elysium and then
Speaker 2: the third book is written and with the publisher already.
Speaker 2: But as both of those books, you know this this
Speaker 2: new society has, you know, they have like, you know,
Speaker 2: their own military, and so I'm like researching military ranks,
Speaker 2: so like huge documents that are like how to write
Speaker 2: a military report and you know, like trying to trying
Speaker 2: to keep track of all the ranks and the way
Speaker 2: platoons work and the weird knowledge that is now in
Speaker 2: my head.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean even the like I cannot keep military
Speaker 1: rank straight. So I was like, is a kernel more
Speaker 1: than a lieutenant, So I.
Speaker 2: Know, I like I honestly had to like keep going
Speaker 2: back and looking again to see like which one is which,
Speaker 2: and then like I'd give somebody a promotion, but I'd
Speaker 2: forget that they got the promotion and I had to
Speaker 2: figure it out all over again.
Speaker 1: And yeah, it's I mean, it's a lot to keep.
Speaker 1: And then in Elysium, when we like pop back into
Speaker 1: the above ground, uh yeah, the sort of the spiraling
Speaker 1: was so I guess escalation sort of the opposite of spiraling,
Speaker 1: but it felt like everything was like.
Speaker 2: Kind of both.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I I was stressed, I was worried. I was
Speaker 1: I was worried for Maggie. I I was worried, and
Speaker 1: you know, but the two worlds are not so different, right,
Speaker 1: Like they're dictated by these sort of like unbendable rules
Speaker 1: and like this sort of top down decisions and so again,
Speaker 1: not to give anything away, but I'm curious about the
Speaker 1: third book, like it do things get even bigger, because
Speaker 1: like I feel like this the villages of microcosm of
Speaker 1: what's happened in Elysium. And then yeah.
Speaker 2: So there's definitely I mean there's this both societies have
Speaker 2: this very authoritarian kind of rule to them, right where
Speaker 2: I make the rules. I tell you what to do,
Speaker 2: I tell you what to think, what to believe, and
Speaker 2: how to react, and you are going to do it
Speaker 2: because I say so.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and ask getting questions, yeah.
Speaker 2: I mean questions are like they and they tell her
Speaker 2: you can ask all the questions you want, but they
Speaker 2: answer them in such a way that doesn't invite more,
Speaker 2: you know, and they make her think she's totally satisfied
Speaker 2: with all these answers, but she doesn't have the whole story, right,
Speaker 2: And and so in the first book you really have,
Speaker 2: you know, the above ground village, and then of course
Speaker 2: the gray Haired Woman's story that is I almost said
Speaker 2: what the gray Haired Woman's story is? That will ruin
Speaker 2: it for anybody who.
Speaker 1: Hasn't read it.
Speaker 2: Two villages, you know, and you're figuring out how those
Speaker 2: are connected. And then in Elysium you find you know,
Speaker 2: the underground world in the surface world, and they don't
Speaker 2: really meet up much in this story, right. And then
Speaker 2: in the third book is where those worlds start to
Speaker 2: collide and we try to bring everything together. And I
Speaker 2: really try in that third book to bring things full circle.
Speaker 2: And I know, once you finished Sovereign, you had a
Speaker 2: ton of questions and Elysium mind answered some of them.
Speaker 1: I mean, honestly, the questions just change because I'm like, right, okay,
Speaker 1: but wait, this is not the information I thought that
Speaker 1: I knew. Yes, and like even like seeing sort of
Speaker 1: like the collective action and the sort of quiet descent
Speaker 1: of the above ground world in this book was amazing
Speaker 1: because I read a lot of nonfiction and I find
Speaker 1: that there are through through threads of how like change
Speaker 1: is done through collective action, and like I was so
Speaker 1: it felt like it was mostly the women in the
Speaker 1: above ground.
Speaker 2: Village, but like it might be a feminist.
Speaker 1: The fact that they like mobilized so quickly and they
Speaker 1: were so unwilling to just cave. I have to say,
Speaker 1: like I really I was rooting for them so much.
Speaker 1: I mean I would be a monster, not too right,
Speaker 1: but like they were. It was very It was so inspiring.
Speaker 1: Like was there a real life equivalent or like a
Speaker 1: person you know that you had in mind when you
Speaker 1: were modeling those characters.
Speaker 2: I don't think so. Man, that's such a good question.
Speaker 2: I feel like it really just came from this very
Speaker 2: like I don't want to sit down and shut up
Speaker 2: and just do what you tell me side of myself.
Speaker 2: And in some ways it became a little bit of
Speaker 2: a I oh no, sometimes I get this brain pug
Speaker 2: and I can't think of words, which is a curse
Speaker 2: for a writer, right, Yeah, it's it sort of mirrors
Speaker 2: my personal journey of you know, exploring spirituality and religion.
Speaker 2: And I was raised at a very strict religious upbringing
Speaker 2: and very authoritarian religious upbringing, and I've kind of gone
Speaker 2: on this journey of deconstruction as an adult and figuring
Speaker 2: out what I really believe and what I only believed
Speaker 2: because somebody told me to believe it. And I feel
Speaker 2: like the whole series in a lot of ways sort
Speaker 2: of parallels that journey. Yeah, And so it's very much
Speaker 2: just sort of this journey of me coming from women
Speaker 2: need to sit down and shut up to I have
Speaker 2: more power and more agency than I ever thought, and
Speaker 2: I'm gonna find a positive way to use it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, disenfranchisement is you know, like the number
Speaker 1: one authoritarian.
Speaker 2: Tool, right, so, like exactly, Yes, even.
Speaker 1: The fact that the wives were like, you know, quietly
Speaker 1: undermining their husbands and like finding ways to send signals
Speaker 1: like and you know.
Speaker 2: When your wife of fifty years goes, oh my gosh,
Speaker 2: he's evil. Now, yeah, something's gotta give.
Speaker 1: Right, And you know, I'm trying not to say so hard. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like I wanted to talk about something that happens like
Speaker 1: halfway through the book, so I'm like, not gonna do that.
Speaker 1: I will say too, I think with Elysium, you know
Speaker 1: that obviously Elisium nights a thing like.
Speaker 2: Consider the Alysians.
Speaker 1: Consider themselves more modern. But even when I'm not sure
Speaker 1: if it's a he was considered a nurse's aid. But
Speaker 1: like says, oh, I started doing this job at like
Speaker 1: fourteen or something, and of like, oh, he's an elysiums
Speaker 1: there there is this thing of like, well, everyone has
Speaker 1: a purpose and everyone's gonna work and.
Speaker 2: Everyone serves the mission, right yeah, and you know that
Speaker 2: if you you don't test well or uh, you make
Speaker 2: a mistake, that's kind of it and you're immediately demoted
Speaker 2: and the stakes are so high.
Speaker 1: So but I I guess, like I have to say,
Speaker 1: I was surprised when you said that you didn't have
Speaker 1: this planned out, because I really it felt like you did.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, it reminded me of when I
Speaker 1: first watched Yellow Jackets and they said like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: we have all the seasons planned out, and I was like,
Speaker 1: that makes sense because you're like planting these things, you know.
Speaker 1: Uh huh. So how like were there other ways you
Speaker 1: thought you might take it before you sort of settled here?
Speaker 2: There were, and there are some things that I did. Like,
Speaker 2: So this book takes place over about the course of
Speaker 2: a year, and I really had thought, Okay, in the
Speaker 2: first book, our main character is thirteen, she turns fourteen
Speaker 2: in the second book. We just sort of quietly mentioned that,
Speaker 2: like it's not a big deal, but now she's fourteen. Yeah,
Speaker 2: but I had kind of thought, like some of her
Speaker 2: character development, I originally thought she should be older for
Speaker 2: some of these things. And of course I'm sure you're
Speaker 2: thinking like the person she turns into with the career
Speaker 2: path they set her on, Yeah, seems like a lot
Speaker 2: for a fourteen year old. Yeah, am I right? But
Speaker 2: it is a young adult novel, so yeah. So originally,
Speaker 2: like I had tried to do this time jump that
Speaker 2: I like covered in a series of like letters and
Speaker 2: journal entries, and I like it. It was great in
Speaker 2: the sense that it gave you, like some of the
Speaker 2: some of the deeper Elysian culture, so like some of
Speaker 2: the holidays that they celebrate in ways that they're different
Speaker 2: from above ground culture. But it was I didn't like
Speaker 2: it at all. Okay, and so I, you know, just
Speaker 2: brilliantly and just deleted all those chapters. I could have
Speaker 2: saved them as hidden war or something that would.
Speaker 1: Have been right.
Speaker 2: I didn't do that.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be like right.
Speaker 2: There's also so Rome character introduced in this book. I
Speaker 2: went back and forth for weeks, maybe even months, about
Speaker 2: where I wanted to go with his character. Was he
Speaker 2: gonna be a good guy? Was he going to be
Speaker 2: a bad guy? Was he going to be a double
Speaker 2: agent or a triple agent or what's like? Who is
Speaker 2: this person? And my poor husband had to listen and
Speaker 2: you talk about it like NonStop, trying to figure it
Speaker 2: out because I have to process verbally right, And I eventually,
Speaker 2: I eventually landed on what I wanted to do, but
Speaker 2: it took me forever, and I had written this whole
Speaker 2: outline of how I wanted Once I figured out where
Speaker 2: I wanted the story to go, right, I'd written the
Speaker 2: whole outline, and then I changed it for Rome's part
Speaker 2: of the story. Yeah, and then there'll be more surprises
Speaker 2: about his character in the next book, so be read
Speaker 2: out of that.
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, because right now.
Speaker 2: You still don't really know if yeah, a good guy
Speaker 2: or a bad guy. But I do, like and I
Speaker 2: had to know before I finished this book.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I had settled in one way of thinking,
Speaker 1: and then by the end of the book, I was like, well,
Speaker 1: now I'm not sure if that's.
Speaker 3: True, and so like, and I like that the core
Speaker 3: set of characters, like they continuing through this journey, like
Speaker 3: all have their own paths but are still supporting one
Speaker 3: another so much like I friends groups, especially represented in
Speaker 3: books like this, like during times of strife, I think
Speaker 3: are so great because I think that that gets like
Speaker 3: the romance and sort of the anticipation around the romance
Speaker 3: I love, but also just you know, the.
Speaker 1: Checking in with the friend groups. We have some new
Speaker 1: friends of all and a.
Speaker 2: Teen drama which is necessary, right, Like their lives feel
Speaker 2: normal and settled for a good portion of this book,
Speaker 2: and well, yeah, if that's going to be a thing,
Speaker 2: you're gonna have some drama.
Speaker 1: Right Oh yeah, Like if you have the time an
Speaker 1: energy to have drama, especially around that age it's it's you.
Speaker 2: Can't be like safe and in school and have access
Speaker 2: to a swimming pool and never have any drama come on.
Speaker 1: All the technology, but.
Speaker 4: The teen drama chapters like this feels safe, this feels good.
Speaker 5: In Nobody's after anybody right now, and then you switch
Speaker 5: to the village right where everything goes terribly wrong because
Speaker 5: now they think the religion they abandoned is real after all.
Speaker 1: So yeah, and and seeing like what they're being told
Speaker 1: in Elysium versus the reality is chilling.
Speaker 2: Right, But the question is is it really reality?
Speaker 1: Oh gosh, yeah, your head.
Speaker 6: Sorry, yeah, because like the chapters from Maggie's point of view,
Speaker 6: like the whole time, I'm like.
Speaker 2: So, I'm really curious what you thought about Maggie's character
Speaker 2: arc in this story, because she goes from this very
Speaker 2: powerful woman, you know, she's strong, and she's in charge,
Speaker 2: and she's like the big bad leader, you know, she's
Speaker 2: the boss lady, and she becomes convinced that everything she
Speaker 2: knew was wrong, that she is the cause of all
Speaker 2: this terrible suffering. And of course, I mean you can
Speaker 2: imagine in a society like that, like it was gonna
Speaker 2: go wrong, yes, but just the way that she handled
Speaker 2: all of that. What were your thoughts on that?
Speaker 1: I mean, I really felt for her because you know,
Speaker 1: I can't blame her for feeling a little bit cursed
Speaker 1: after everything went so sideways, because her saying orphans are
Speaker 1: children and they are people and we should treat them
Speaker 1: thus does not seem like a hot take, right, so
Speaker 1: you think so when she first conveyed that and convinced
Speaker 1: everyone else, I was like, yes, the pendulum is correcting itself.
Speaker 1: And then in this book where everyone's like, look what
Speaker 1: you did, what a mess you made, I was like,
Speaker 1: that's not really fair.
Speaker 2: And for anybody who's considering reading this book, yes it
Speaker 2: gets violent, so be ready for that. I did have
Speaker 2: some beta readers, just close friends who work with teenagers
Speaker 2: and and so it helps to have another set of eyes.
Speaker 2: And one of them read it early and she was like,
Speaker 2: these chapters are so hard to read. It it hurts
Speaker 2: my heart. What are they doing to the children?
Speaker 1: Yes, and you know, even sort of like as a reader,
Speaker 1: when I became cognizant of the techniques that they the
Speaker 1: Council was using to kind of push their agenda forward,
Speaker 1: Like all of the behaviors felt sinister but that felt
Speaker 1: especially sinister because it was, you know, in the service
Speaker 1: of tearing families apart, and it was like wow, and
Speaker 1: while simultaneously trying to convince people this was in their
Speaker 1: best interests, like like convinced the citizens it was in
Speaker 1: their best address, and it was like, oh my goodness.
Speaker 2: They might have pushed too hard, too fast, you know.
Speaker 1: Yes, I think like the one line I remember in
Speaker 1: particular is when they were talking about the food shortage
Speaker 1: and it was like, but the member council, the council
Speaker 1: members just keep getting better. And I was like, because
Speaker 1: I mean, that feels like sort of a throw back
Speaker 1: to sovereign where there's like so much suspicion around food
Speaker 1: and food insecurity, and I was like, yeah, you can't
Speaker 1: be that brazen. People are not going to lay down
Speaker 1: for it.
Speaker 2: So and they shouldn't. They shouldn't have to.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, absolute, So Okay, I feel like we I like,
Speaker 1: I want to keep talking, but I also want people
Speaker 1: to read books and not be schoiled. So I feel
Speaker 1: like if we keep going, I'm gonna be like, Okay,
Speaker 1: we want to talk about this. Yeah, Frank, did you
Speaker 1: have any questions? Followed up et cetera.
Speaker 4: No, not really. I'm just we don't like, I think
Speaker 4: you're the first author we've had back for their second book.
Speaker 1: It's very exciting for us.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so it just like like when I just want
Speaker 4: to bring in my opinion about the Maggie chapters, and
Speaker 4: like when I got like when you got to the
Speaker 4: whole thing of just like oh, like they had like
Speaker 4: they've done these terrible things and like we're starting to
Speaker 4: recognize these orphans as children. Reminds me of my favorite book,
Speaker 4: Cold Mountain, about a Civil War soldier trying to walk
Speaker 4: home and he was fighting on the wrong side. At
Speaker 4: certain point, he stops with this group of traveling performers
Speaker 4: and he's there's you know, all different races there, and
Speaker 4: like one person says, like in his own foot, like
Speaker 4: a strange thing that one day the term slave will
Speaker 4: be strictly metaphorical. He's like, huh, he can't quite wrap
Speaker 4: his head around it. And that's that's what the village
Speaker 4: felt to me, except much more desperate.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like it's like.
Speaker 4: You know, because it's like we they they were living
Speaker 4: under such terror for so long that you know, it's
Speaker 4: like we're on the knife sedge and when somebody's like,
Speaker 4: oh yeah, when you know, Maggie's like, oh, orphans are people?
Speaker 4: Like this was all true. It's like it's so easy
Speaker 4: just to tip over. And like watching that happen in
Speaker 4: real time was so rough because I think I said
Speaker 4: on the last episode, I can't get over like that,
Speaker 4: you know, orphan three, like three three.
Speaker 2: Two, just like so many orphans.
Speaker 3: Yeah, just.
Speaker 4: You know, like sitting back and saying that happened to
Speaker 4: so many people and we just let it happen, and
Speaker 4: now that it's like we're going to start it all
Speaker 4: over again.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I did appreciate the past orphan Laura though, like
Speaker 1: getting some of the like a look into their predecessors.
Speaker 2: I guess, oh yes, the other Alysians that came, Yes,
Speaker 2: But I do.
Speaker 4: I do also think that like you mentioned Harper's age
Speaker 4: for her current job, and that once again just adds
Speaker 4: to more tragedy of the of these you know, two
Speaker 4: civilizations we were in, like and it's difficult once again
Speaker 4: to talk about her job out spoiling the book, right.
Speaker 1: You know, I would say it's an intense job for
Speaker 1: anyone of any age, never mind someone news you know four.
Speaker 2: Right, right, And it's it's in my mind it was
Speaker 2: a very concentrated effort at brainwashing this person and garnering
Speaker 2: unquestioning loyalty from her to make her so important so quickly,
Speaker 2: and it's going to backfire spectacularly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because it's not like she's not talented. Like every
Speaker 1: character has, you know, commented on it. It has been illustrated,
Speaker 1: but it's like made the perfect.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's like, if we can if we can
Speaker 2: build this loyalty and make her never ask any more questions,
Speaker 2: think of all the additional power we now hold because
Speaker 2: she is too dangerous to ask questions, right, Like, you
Speaker 2: want to wipe that out of her as quickly as possible. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it's gonna backfire.
Speaker 1: And everyone who sort of interacted with her in the
Speaker 1: first I would say, like quarter of the book was like, well,
Speaker 1: aren't you just so curious? Don't you ask such good questions?
Speaker 1: And I was like, initially I was really taken by that.
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, curiosity is so important, it's so good.
Speaker 1: And I was like, you don't actually care about curiosity?
Speaker 4: Well, just like towards the end, what I'm like, there
Speaker 4: was a part of me it's like, oh, she still
Speaker 4: has her humanity. That's going to change things.
Speaker 1: I mean, yes and no.
Speaker 2: There's like one point where I was like, whoa, You're like,
Speaker 2: who has this person become right toward the middle of
Speaker 2: the book.
Speaker 1: And like someone kind of like checks her on it,
Speaker 1: and she's like, I'm doing what i gotta do.
Speaker 2: Come on, And I was like, yeah, you gotta do
Speaker 2: what you gotta do. What you gotta do to survive. Man,
Speaker 2: Like it's you or me, and that's yeah, yeah, and
Speaker 2: that's her. Her journey across the three books is really
Speaker 2: kind of fun for me, just because in the first book,
Speaker 2: you know, she starts she doesn't even have a name,
Speaker 2: she has no identity. She was raised to never grow up.
Speaker 2: She doesn't know who she is or who she's supposed
Speaker 2: to be. And in the second book, she starts she
Speaker 2: has this opportunity to actually have an identity, to be somebody,
Speaker 2: and she gets to decide who that is, but she
Speaker 2: doesn't realize she's being manipulated into a very specific identity. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and then in the last book, we're gonna see her
Speaker 2: kind of come around from figuring out who she wants
Speaker 2: to be to knowing who she is, and you'll see
Speaker 2: a little bit of a there's gonna be a combination
Speaker 2: of sovereign Harper and Elysium Harper, Okay, that come together
Speaker 2: to make that fully formed human that she decides she
Speaker 2: actually wants to be.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I feel like even if you're preteen team
Speaker 1: not in total peril with a huge life change.
Speaker 2: That is what being a teenager is is trying to
Speaker 2: figure out who who you actually are, who you want
Speaker 2: to be, and whether it's the person people are trying
Speaker 2: to make you be or not. You know, do I
Speaker 2: want to be this person you're telling me to be,
Speaker 2: or do I want something different for myself? Yeah, that's
Speaker 2: like the whole the whole teen experience, I feel.
Speaker 1: Like, and trying on different personalities, like maybe not to
Speaker 1: that extreme, but like you know, like a.
Speaker 2: Little bit yeah, I mean that's a teenager zoo, right,
Speaker 2: You try on a little bit of this, a little
Speaker 2: bit of that, and you're experimenting to see what works
Speaker 2: in it feels right who you really are inside. And
Speaker 2: we see a lot of that in Harber and her friends.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, and even just the like wearing hair up or
Speaker 1: I don't know if the corsets were mentioned in the
Speaker 1: first book, but I was like that sounds truly dreadful,
Speaker 1: and I would also she.
Speaker 2: She wears her first corset for the barn dance. Yes, okay, yes,
Speaker 2: and now she's like cool, I can breathe.
Speaker 1: Yes, he had a T shirt. Yes, please, a huge
Speaker 1: sort of upswing versus like being so corseted. But right, well,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for joining us. Can you let
Speaker 1: everyone know where to find you, where to find the book? Yes?
Speaker 2: So the best place to find all the information you
Speaker 2: could ever hope for about me is my website, aj
Speaker 2: Whitney books dot com. I have a great newsletter on there.
Speaker 2: I send out emails once a week on Wednesdays, exclusive lore,
Speaker 2: things you're not gonna see written down anywhere else. So
Speaker 2: I send out like hidden chapters. I send out well,
Speaker 2: let's see last month, I sent out like a lost
Speaker 2: audio transcript. And good luck figuring out where all of
Speaker 2: these fit. By the way, before you before you get
Speaker 2: to read the entire series, because I really mix it up.
Speaker 2: The secret Lore coming out next week on Wednesday is
Speaker 2: the first two chapters of Elysium, so you get a
Speaker 2: little sneak peek. If you haven't read Sovereign, don't do it.
Speaker 2: Don't don't, don't read Sovereign. Don't read the first two
Speaker 2: chapters of Alysia. It'll mess you up. You won't understand.
Speaker 2: But I send out lots of fun things there, so
Speaker 2: that's always fun. And then I'm on You have two tiktoks.
Speaker 2: The main one is AJ Underscore the Writer. I'm on Instagram,
Speaker 2: I'm on threads, Facebook, but all those links are on
Speaker 2: the website, which is hopefully easy to remember. Ajwhitney books
Speaker 2: dot com.
Speaker 1: Okay, perfect, We will put it in the show notes.
Speaker 1: Thank you again so much for coming and speaking Elysium
Speaker 1: and more Sovereign with us.
Speaker 2: Thank you for having me back.
Speaker 1: Absolutely and we are looking forward to the third one.
Speaker 1: Like I said, I love a series, so uh until
Speaker 1: next week, I am Suzie Coda, my friend Team Code