Peng Shepherd (All This and More)

Brett Benner: 0:47

Can you believe we're halfway through July?

Jason Blitman: 0:48

halfway through July, I was gonna say I'm embarrassed that we're both wearing the same colored t shirt. We, like, look exactly the same.

Brett Benner: 0:55

We look like some kind of gay version of we're enlisting to the army. We're both in various shades of olive green.

Jason Blitman: 1:00

Yeah. Or, you know, I'm the one that, I'm playing the younger version of you in the movie. No, no, no, no.

Brett Benner: 1:13

Ah, My hip might say that. True.

Jason Blitman: 1:16

Your hip might say that's true. I'm sorry. I'm

Brett Benner: 1:18

Oh no, it's all, it's all fine. It's all good. It's all good.

Jason Blitman: 1:22

to Gay's Reading.

Brett Benner: 1:24

Hey, hey,

Jason Blitman: 1:25

We have books that are coming out

Brett Benner: 1:26

we do have books that are coming out today. I have a couple here. Um,

Jason Blitman: 1:31

we don't have books that are coming out today, but authors

Brett Benner: 1:34

we tell everyone our new book is coming out?

Jason Blitman: 1:37

Hit it!

Brett Benner: 1:38

so, um, Smother Moss by Elisa Allering is coming out today, which I don't have. You haven't read this yet. Have you?

Jason Blitman: 1:46

No, but I'm really excited too. It looks so good.

Brett Benner: 1:49

Yeah, it looks really interesting set in 1980s Appalachia. Um, for our fantasy and kind of, uh, fantasy adjacent people, The Lost Story by Meg Schafer, that comes out today. Um, and looks really, really, really interesting that they say for fans of C. S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia. That would definitely be me. Um, for the, Thriller fans for the summer, Steven Graham Jones. I was a teenage slasher comes out. He's got huge fans, like huge fans.

Jason Blitman: 2:21

When you said I was a teenage slu I was like, what are you about to say?

Brett Benner: 2:26

And, uh, the other thing that comes out today looks, which looks so fascinating is Banal Nightmare by Halle Butler. But look at that cover. I know they can't see it. It's the freakiest, most frightening cover of two women's heads that almost look at morphine into one.

Jason Blitman: 2:42

you can go to our bookshop. org page to buy any of these books and see that cover in the meantime. So you can see what Brett was talking about. If you like what you're hearing, share us with your friends, follow us on social media,@gaysreading. Wherever you listen to your podcast, please feel free to give us a five star review or subscribe so that more people can hear about what the gays are reading. Something that we have to talk about today is there have been a lot of celebrity deaths recently, but, the one that really made me sad and the one I wanted to talk about is Shelley Duvall. Because when I was a kid, I was a big fan of fairytale theater. Shelley Duvall's Fairytale Theater, for those of you who are unfamiliar, it was, basically these short episodes of fairytale adaptations, and they were, they felt very theatrical, and they all had celebrities playing all of these characters, and it was such Uh, an impactful TV show for me as a kid, and I think it really,

Brett Benner: 3:44

YouTube now, too, a lot of them.

Jason Blitman: 3:45

I'm sure

Brett Benner: 3:46

At the very least, you can see an introduction where she comes out. Hi, I'm Shelley Duvall.

Jason Blitman: 3:50

Hello, I'm Shelley Duvall. Hello, I'm Shelley Duvall. Yes. So anyway, thank you, Shelley Duvall, for being informative in my, uh, storytelling appreciation.

Brett Benner: 4:01

I did take a moment where I thought he's going to say it's Shannon Doherty.

Jason Blitman: 4:04

No, but what was so weird is literally the day before Franklin talked about Shannon Doherty, which was so like,

Brett Benner: 4:12

In what context,

Jason Blitman: 4:13

something about witches. I can't remember. There was like something related. Yeah, no, but there was like something that reminded him of charmed. And then he said something, something, something, Shannon Doherty, something, something he would remember. I don't remember what it is. He's listening to this episode right now and be like, this is what I said, Jason. On today's episode, we have the lovely Peng Shepherd, talking to us about her brand new book, All This and More, which is a really fun adult choose your own adventure book, Peng Shepard was born and raised in Phoenix, Arizona and has lived in Beijing, Kuala Lumpur, London, New York, and Mexico City. Cartographers, became a national bestseller, was named a Best Book of 2022 by the Washington Post, and received a 2020 fellowship from the National Endowment of the Arts. Her debut, The Book of M, won the 2019 Newcombe Institute for Literary Arts Award for Debut Speculative Fiction, and was chosen as a Best Book of the Year by Amazon, Elle, Refinery29, and The Verge, as well as a Best Book of the Summer by Today Show and NPR's On Point.

Brett Benner: 5:22

Excellent.

Jason Blitman: 5:23

I'm Jason,

Brett Benner: 5:24

I'm Brett. Gaze

Jason Blitman: 5:27

this not choose your own adventure episode of Gaze reading.

5:37

You can't go wrong with a good old fashioned

Brett Benner: 5:49

Look at you in your professional studio. Oh

Peng Shepherd: 5:51

Is it? No, this is just a curtain. This is my my window of my apartment and it it makes me so backlit that no one can see me talk. So it looks like I'm in a studio,

Jason Blitman: 5:59

No, but even your microphone setup? Very

Brett Benner: 6:02

thing.

Peng Shepherd: 6:03

Oh, I, yeah, it's, so much better than hunching over your laptop trying to,

Brett Benner: 6:07

I want you to start singing now.

Peng Shepherd: 6:09

See? Oh,

Jason Blitman: 6:09

know you look like a recording

Peng Shepherd: 6:10

want that.

Brett Benner: 6:11

You do.

Peng Shepherd: 6:12

I am. I am. The. I should never sing. No.

Jason Blitman: 6:16

Okay I think a lot of people sing even though maybe they shouldn't,

Peng Shepherd: 6:19

true. That's true. At least I just know not to.

Jason Blitman: 6:21

The worst thing that everyone has to do is of course the elevator pitch for the book. Do you have one? This is a good time to workshop it.

Peng Shepherd: 6:28

I do. Okay. Yeah. That's yeah. So I can do my elevator pitch and you can workshop it. So it all this and more, I'm going to start by saying it was the most complicated, but also the most fun book that I've written, I think so

Jason Blitman: 6:39

that doesn't surprise me.

Peng Shepherd: 6:41

yeah. For reasons that we'll get into but it so it's about a, it's about a woman named Marsh and she basically spent her whole life just playing it safe. And then, it turns out that when her world just implodes anyway, and she's, facing divorce and her career stagnated, her teenage daughter's kind of pulling away and she's gone about everything all wrong. She's missed out on romance, adventure, of fulfilling, you know, like anything that she had wanted to do, she, she didn't because she wasn't brave enough and she just wishes that if she could only go back. And do it all over again. She would just do much better. She would, seize every moment. And then she gets chosen to be on All This and More. And All This and More is a new game show that has somehow figured out how to send people back to very specific moments in their past so that they can make a different choice and then change, the course of their present lives. And so she, she can't believe her luck. She accepts. She dives right in. And. You know everything is great at first but of course nothing is that simple and so she even as her life is getting better and better she starts to worry that. The show's promises might be too good to be true because, even as her life is improving, something seems a little bit off.

Jason Blitman: 7:58

It clearly you said game show. I think it's this interesting marriage of game show and reality show. Because there is this there, it's almost yes, there are obstacles and there are quote unquote games to play. And there is, some sort of winning because of just the nature of did you win at life? Are you making the right choices? But clearly very much reality show because there's this voyeuristic component as well. Are you a reality show fan?

Peng Shepherd: 8:26

I have definitely become more of one since writing that. Yeah. So when I, we were, we were talking earlier about living in Mexico City and I did not have a TV when I was there. And so I didn't watch a lot of TV. But as I was writing first draft of this. I was like, I gotta see what's up, and so the, actually the reality show that I started with is the one where the two people get married, but the first moment that they see each other is at the altar when they have to say

Brett Benner: 8:49

It's a blind date.

Jason Blitman: 8:49

is it married at

Brett Benner: 8:50

Married at first

Peng Shepherd: 8:51

married at first sight, yeah. And what? What? I just, fascinating. Fascinating. Yeah. So I got hooked on that one because it's just wild,

Jason Blitman: 9:01

similarly, equally wild is love is blind.

Peng Shepherd: 9:05

Oh yes, I have seen that too, yeah. I think that unfortunately what sometimes happens with these shows is when you get into the later seasons, the people that are coming on, they know too much about it. And so they are I just don't think you're getting as authentic of an experience as a viewer and as a contestant or a participant, but it's especially for the earliest seasons of Married at First Sight and the earliest seasons of Love is Blind. I think they were really going in with. genuine hope and open mindedness and also terror.

Jason Blitman: 9:33

That first season of love is blind is so good. It's like genuinely good. Cause you're what you're getting this As you were saying real, genuine human connection, and you're seeing them in their, I think, most authentic form. Though, where the gaming the game comes in handy is something like Big Brother, which I have fallen in love with. Did you ever watch Big Brother? Is it a new thing? It's been on for like

Brett Benner: 9:58

No, no, no, no, no. For you. you. Please. I've watched Big Brother. The early ones. I used to be

Jason Blitman: 10:03

season, I think, in high school, and then it came back into my life a couple years ago, and I was like, this show, it is the most, it's just such an interesting sociological experiment, watching these people interact with each other, but also play a game. It is a social game. And I just, it's a, it's an interesting obsession. Thank God it only happens during the summer.

Brett Benner: 10:24

They're gonna I just saw today they're planning the 50th season of Survivor right now. That's nuts.

Jason Blitman: 10:30

in your galley note, speaking of all of these things, you say, I want all this and more to ask what it is to be happy and to examine what a choice really costs. do you Feel like you were able to examine that as the writer with this book?

Peng Shepherd: 10:43

I do. Yeah. And it was something part, the part of it that was the most interesting to me was when I started the book, I didn't really. I find the character as I write too, and so I was discovering Marsh as I went and, eventually she gains a husband who then becomes an ex husband and then, she gained a daughter. And so as I was building her, I think the really interesting part about choice is also when she's choosing things to change her own life, it's going to affect other people too. Like a whole nother can of worms, because she's on this show, she has the power to go back and change it so that, for example, she had always pursued a career and was a really, ambitious at her job and, but that will also. affect her daughter because in the real world, she had been at home for those early formative years or that, that could affect her relationship with her husband at the time because he was able to go off and do something while she was taking care of the house. And Marsh doesn't realize either that Everything she's doing is also changing things for other people. And so she starts rationalizing it as long as I'm making choices that are making their lives better, the people that I care about, that, it's not just me, but I'm making everyone's life better, then it's okay, right? But actually, nobody's asking those

Jason Blitman: 12:00

Hmm. Right. We're

Peng Shepherd: 12:01

Is, is that the, yeah it is better, but is that the better that they want? Or is it just the better that you want?

Jason Blitman: 12:06

It's so funny. We're sitting here talking about choices and making choices and choices, choices, choices. And something we have not yet talked about is the book is a choose your own

Brett Benner: 12:14

literally a book of choices that you make,

Jason Blitman: 12:17

You, you give power to the reader. Was that how you went into the book or did that, did you discover that along your writing process too, that you wanted it to be this choose your own adventure style journey? Yeah.

Peng Shepherd: 12:29

no, I so I started with the desire to write something with multiple paths in it. I just as a writer, I just love anything that plays with structure. So any kind of, like multiple timelines or jumping back and forth. So I knew that I wanted to do something with multiple paths, but I wanted it to be relevant to the story, or like real, it wanted it to mean something thematically. I didn't want it to just be this thing that I was asking readers to do. It had to. There had to be like a point to it. And so when I found Marsh and I realized that it's a book about the choices that she can make and how she could change her life. That's when it all started to come together because I thought. It is this book about what would you do if you were offered basically almost infinite possibilities? How would you know what's the right choice to make and how would you, when there's always another path, how do you know when to stop and just start living instead? And so I wanted the reader to be able to feel that as much as not just read it, but I wanted them to experience that kind of, that thrill, but also that danger of having the same options. And so that's where the idea of I'm gonna ask the reader. To help Marsh choose what to do came came

Brett Benner: 13:39

And then as you went in, just in a technical standpoint, I'm so curious, like I picture, I think of like a writer's room with a whiteboard and lines going down of each timeline, because it really is, you're doing alternate realities. So how did you then begin to separate, because you're writing something linear at first and suddenly you're branching out into all these different segments.

Peng Shepherd: 13:58

Yeah I don't know if you'll believe this. It is the truth. I did not have a map for the whole thing until like really late in the game. Because I realized that I was going to give this book to my editor and She was probably going to have a meltdown trying to make sure that everything like, and so I thought, okay, I've got to, I have to be able to prove to her and the production team that all of these paths do connect and they all make sense, no matter what you choose. And so at that point, I did do like a flow chart, but it was, it was very late in the game. I don't know. I was just all up here, like a, like just a chaos,

Brett Benner: 14:34

That is

Jason Blitman: 14:34

For our listeners, she's like chaotically making circles with her arm, hands

Peng Shepherd: 14:39

Yes, it's just all just, yeah.

Brett Benner: 14:41

Most of us can't remember what we had for breakfast and you had 17 million storylines going through your

Peng Shepherd: 14:46

I also cannot remember what I had for breakfast, but somehow that I don't know, you just get so deep into the world, and I remember even we'd be doing these things, because in the book, you have to make sure at every choice point that the page number is correct, and so we would get drafts back from the production team, and they would be asking us to check it. And I would be saying like no, but after, when Marsha's in Iceland. She doesn't go there. She goes here or something because I could just I've been like living it so long that I would be doing it without the book in front of me.

Jason Blitman: 15:17

Oh, wow. That's impressive.

Brett Benner: 15:19

That's incredible.

Jason Blitman: 15:20

I also just want to say for our listeners, cause I think I almost thought going into it and this doesn't give anything away, but I was anticipating as the author you were going to force the ending onto us. That it was gonna converge into wherever you wanted it to be as you, the author. And that isn't true. It is really in the hands of the reader. And you can have a completely different experience from your friend And Brett and I, again, we're not giving anything away, but we talked about some of the decisions we were making. And we have very similar personalities. And so we chose a lot of the similar things. But not all of our friends do. So it'll be really interesting. And I think that's such a, it's just fun and clever and different. And I think to your point, like playing with structure really neat and something we've never seen.

Brett Benner: 16:06

It would be, this is a fun book, absolutely for a book club to see where everybody ends up to have those people all discuss and why they ended up and the choices you make and you'll see. Who you especially when it comes down to personal relationships and who you would actually choose Okay, this we may cut this in terms of like for the main broadcast as a spoiler because do you have when you were writing? It in your mind. Is there someone you absolutely the ending you wanted for her?

Peng Shepherd: 16:32

Oh, that's such a hard. Well, Hmm.

Jason Blitman: 16:34

Without giving anything away,

Peng Shepherd: 16:36

Yeah, that's true. I could. I am so I feel like so I love all of the endings because I think that They're all really meaningful and there are different people who would legitimately choose each one. There's a very good reason to choose each of the endings, but there's one of them that I thought felt like most true for me, which I can say now

Jason Blitman: 16:58

I read all of the endings and I didn't. I didn't feel like you projected one, you didn't seem to favor one over the other in the reading. All of them made sense as an ending for the book. But

Peng Shepherd: 17:09

They were all like, oh, sorry.

Brett Benner: 17:11

ahead. No, go ahead. Go ahead.

Peng Shepherd: 17:12

Oh, I just, I was just gonna say they were all like. They were all like equally fun to write,

Jason Blitman: 17:17

Reading a book in general, you often might think to yourself, I wish they chose this other thing, right? I wish they did this other thing instead. And in this book, you like get to do all of it.

Brett Benner: 17:25

I know and I tried to be I tried to be smarter than you meaning I try to think oh I know what she's doing I'm gonna choose this and then it wouldn't do and I'd be like and I again Jason like what you were saying I had this Idea in my head that I thought She's gonna bring all this back to the way she wants it to end anyway And so that's how this is gonna be and so it's so cool knowing that it doesn't you know It absolutely

Jason Blitman: 17:43

But it was also, it was like stressful having the power in a cool, in an interesting way.

Brett Benner: 17:48

Yeah, because you make it, it's not impossible. You have to, I would sit there and think about it in a minute. Okay okay, sure,

Jason Blitman: 17:55

if you were cast on All This and More, would you want to? Would you want the chance to change your life?

Peng Shepherd: 18:02

Oh my gosh I mean it's so tempting, right? I think so have, I think at the beginning if he would ask me this when I was writing first draft, I would have said yes. And now that I've written the book, I think I would say yes. I mean, I would want, I would still want to say yes, because who wouldn't want, you know, to go back

Jason Blitman: 18:18

because we're curious creatures and we want to know.

Peng Shepherd: 18:21

yeah, and everyone has paths that they didn't take. But I think so what I've decided is that if I were going into the bubble, I would go in with a rule that I could not break. And I'm sure that I would break it immediately because we're all human. But my rule would be, if you go in, you can only change one thing. That's it. And then you have to leave. Because otherwise, it's just too addictive, right?

Jason Blitman: 18:46

It's like going to the casino and I will only bet with my winnings. And then you're there until three o'clock in the

Brett Benner: 18:52

but I would, I can maybe do that. If the caveat was I picked the moment I want to go back to, but it's not chosen for me. If I could say, this is where I want to go back to, and this will be the one thing I choose and everything could play out from there.

Peng Shepherd: 19:06

Mm

Jason Blitman: 19:06

What's it's what's scary is that it's the butterfly effect. Like even that one moment, if you really start to untangle it, you're like, Oh wait, but then that would happen. And then you're like, shit, I shouldn't do that.

Brett Benner: 19:16

Of course. I'm going to get the chocolate ice cream instead.

Jason Blitman: 19:20

That's the sort of decision you'd want to make. One of the things the show, all this and more says is that it's a new chance at perfect. What does perfect mean to you?

Peng Shepherd: 19:30

Oh well, so, I think that has also changed over the course of this book because we, Yeah. So it's what we're all striving for, even if we don't say it or we don't even realize it because it just everything in our society in our childhood is pushing you to be like better, but, have the best grades, be the best at your hobby, have the best body, be the best at relationships, be the best on Instagram. And so that I think that's what we all think we want. But. Over the course of writing this book, I have I've come to realize that I think perfect would actually be pretty horrible because it would be so boring, if something was actually perfect, it'd be so boring and there would just be nothing after that,

Jason Blitman: 20:09

It's the Stephen Sondheim lyric, if life were only moments, then you'd never know you had one, right? If everything was perfect and there was nothing imperfect, then you don't even know that what you're living in is perfect.

Peng Shepherd: 20:20

Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 20:21

So yeah. And like, why settle for good enough when you can have perfect? And it's good enough is maybe good enough?

Peng Shepherd: 20:28

Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 20:28

I don't know. And some things could be perfect, and you figure it out as you go. It'll test me out, thinking about the things that I would have changed.

Brett Benner: 20:37

Going down a rabbit hole after this conversation.

Peng Shepherd: 20:39

did you ever see yeah. Did you ever see what's the movie called? The best exotic Marigold hotel or something like that.

Jason Blitman: 20:46

but I've always wanted

Peng Shepherd: 20:48

okay. I'm going to, this is not a spoiler. It's just a cute line for it. Okay. There's a, so the premise of the movie is that all these old people see a. hotel, like a luxury hotel in India. And they're like, Oh, the UK is so expensive. Let's all just move there and live in paradise until we pass away. And they show up and it's not done. And everything's a mess. And they're trapped in this. It's almost like a fire festival kind of situation. The person who owns a hotel and who's building it. It's a young Dave Patel. And and he's, earnest and ambitious and honest. And so at one point there's a, one of the older women comes down to see him and it's just everything is wrong anyway, but also there's no hot water in my room. There's a water period and there's no electricity in the, and he's trying to calm her down. And he says something like like it's okay. This is actually great. All these things that are wrong. It's it's actually great. What do you mean it's actually great? And he goes, because we have a saying here, everything will be all right in the end. So if everything is not all right, it's not the end yet. And it's it's a little cheesy, but also I love it. Because it's true.

Brett Benner: 21:49

My version of that is go to bed earlier and it will be okay in the morning. Like I always, I've said that to my daughter a lot because I always feel like you look at things differently the next morning and usually it's like at the end of the day and if it's ugh and you're exhausted and things feel horrible and I'm like go to sleep, wake up, and then look at it with fresh eyes and sometimes that refreshes and you can look at it differently and some of those things will just be like okay whatever I was flipping out the day before.

Peng Shepherd: 22:13

Yeah. It's so true.

Jason Blitman: 22:14

It'll all be okay in the end. Okay, I'm gonna sleep a little better at night tonight.

Peng Shepherd: 22:19

Yeah. Yeah. Because if it's not okay, it's not yet the end. That's the best part of it, you know, I

Jason Blitman: 22:26

similar to my question about what perfect means to you, I'm curious to ask the same question about what it means to be real. Because the book also talks a lot about or not talks about, but addresses like, real life, reality show, being in your authentic self, making choices that are real for you, and are they real for other people and it also made me think about the story of Pinocchio, and being a real boy, and what does it mean to be real, and anyway, I fell down a rabbit hole of what it means to be real, and so I'm curious to know your thoughts on that.

Peng Shepherd: 22:59

So I think a lot of it has to do with if you have experienced and earned it yourself because there are a lot of there are a lot of stories where someone some kind of interloper slips in and steals the life of another person and it's We all automatically reject that and I think it's because they didn't earn all those things that they now have and so I feel it would be the same way with Marsh, for example, or any contestant went on the show, if you got to, go back and basically pay play like Tetris with your life and then, flash forward and you've got, It's just this amazing new present life it, I think a lot of us would say that's not real because you didn't earn it or something, or you didn't live through it and experience it. But. Then I think there are a lot of people who would also say, okay, so like maybe it's not real, but if you're happier, does that matter? What, what is more important, happiness or truth? And so that was a lot of what I was going back and forth between because the, I think in some cases it is better to live, if there's some kind of a fantasy that makes you happy and it's harmless, maybe it is better to just believe the fantasy. And then sometimes it's not.

Brett Benner: 24:04

which goes back to why reality shows are

Jason Blitman: 24:06

popular Yeah.

Brett Benner: 24:07

we put that, but the bachelor and the bachelorette, look at that, there's all those fantasies about love and all these things can be found in the escapism. Jason, you start.

Jason Blitman: 24:14

I was gonna say what you said about just earning it made me think too about like choices that you make can totally change your life to the point where you don't need to worry about money or access and just like privilege becomes the, it just happened. It just becomes right based on a choice that you make, suddenly you can be privileged. suddenly you don't have any ambition, right? Or you didn't need to work for anything. And so it in turn is not real where you landed.

Peng Shepherd: 24:45

Yeah. An extreme example is like trust fund kid that never, you know, but like, that's a stereotype for a reason. I think sometimes if you either. you know, If you were just given infinite choice like that or infinite resources early or without kind of expecting it or feeling like you've earned it yourself I think a lot of us would not know what to do with it. And then that's the kind of thing, if you're just so wealthy, for example, or so famous that you can't fail no matter what you do, like none of it is interesting anymore because whatever you do, it almost doesn't matter.

Jason Blitman: 25:16

Yeah. Yeah.

Brett Benner: 25:18

The nepo babies.

Peng Shepherd: 25:19

Yes. Okay. Thank you.

Jason Blitman: 25:20

Not even just Nepo babies,

Brett Benner: 25:22

No, I know.

Jason Blitman: 25:23

it's even people who like fall into, wealth or fall into fame. These people on these reality shows all

Peng Shepherd: 25:29

Or like winning the lottery,

Jason Blitman: 25:30

Yeah, exactly. This overnight sensation, overnight fame thing

Brett Benner: 25:35

Yeah. It's also the promise of what social media does now too. Like all these people who get on Instagram or TikTok, and they have thousands and millions of followers and they're not standing. Let's be honest, like the Kardashians never stood for anything. They were hot girls with a very savvy business minded mother, and they in turn have turned things into it. But hearing Kim Kardashian talk about she's, she worked so hard her whole life. And you released a porn tape and then from there, things expanded, but let's be real. So

Jason Blitman: 26:05

But it's also tricky because to what we were just talking about, like you said, business savvy mother, like clearly it was earned.

Brett Benner: 26:11

For her. Sure.

Jason Blitman: 26:12

Yeah. And so like, But, and so, like, and but, but then it's like the waking up and into that privilege. How do you, and yet it was earned, but it wasn't, so it's just, I don't know. It's complicated. It's very interesting.

Brett Benner: 26:25

they've, I will say they've made the most out of opportunities that were presented to them. Those short doors that they opened or that, all this and more for them, they, they chose that. And some of it was very smart, obviously, because they've been become very successful,

Peng Shepherd: 26:41

Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 26:42

know suddenly I'm like, what can I go back to and quickly change? But it's also really interesting. Cause in, in every version of the story, there are things that don't change because Inevitable. Is there something in your life that you would hope that to be the case for? That never changed? That in every version, no matter what you chose, X stayed the same?

Peng Shepherd: 27:05

Oh, would it be corny to say that I would hope that I was always a writer? I really would. Like I, yeah, I wanted to be a writer. Ever since I was like the tiniest there's this funny story about me from childhood, but it's true when so I used to, as soon as I learned how to write, I was, I would try to write stories for my mom, like my, you know, books. And so I wrote this one, I was like five or something. And I wrote this one about this spider who's, he's a spider and he's lonely and he wants friends, but he's a spider so everyone's afraid of him. And I, wrote it, illustrated it. It must have been all of five pages. And I took it to my mom and I showed it to her. And so she thought it would be really cute if she took it to her work and laminated it and then put a little spiral spine in it. And so she did that, brought it home, gave it to me as a present. And I thought I had been published. I thought it was a real book. And I swear ever since then be, I don't know, it was just something about getting to hold it and see it like that. And I just was like more, I just wanna do this all the time.

Brett Benner: 28:06

I

Jason Blitman: 28:06

What was it called?

Peng Shepherd: 28:08

It was called Webster'cause he's a Spy Webster guy.

Jason Blitman: 28:11

Oh my God.

Peng Shepherd: 28:13

the friendly spider

Brett Benner: 28:14

God, I'm surprised that you didn't call pickle Webster

Peng Shepherd: 28:17

Oh. Like Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 28:19

It's funny. My first thought I think was my husband and

Peng Shepherd: 28:21

Oh, I love

Jason Blitman: 28:23

that I wish he was, that he was always my husband in all of the versions of my life.

Brett Benner: 28:27

Oh my God, that's very romantic and sweet.

Peng Shepherd: 28:29

Now you have to follow that up. What are you gonna do?

Jason Blitman: 28:32

I know Brad. Good luck. What

Brett Benner: 28:33

I wouldn't change anything. No, but I was thinking this, it's like, it's an interesting theory because even if you could go back, it's not that you yourself changed necessarily, but your circumstances might, depending on what you pick. So it's how you as a person respond to your new circumstances. How it's like we were talking about earlier. It's like how people respond to the fact of fame. You hear so many actors talk about it's thrust upon them and suddenly they have no privacy. And suddenly you're dealing with all these things that you never anticipated. You just wanted to become, or sometimes it's by circumstance, you happen to be cast in something, you're an amazing actor and suddenly you can't go out of your house. It's just an interesting theory to think, even if you go back, even if you change something, what changes about you or what stays the same? I used to have a, years ago I had a therapist who said, I was having trouble in a relationship and she just said, you're going to have the same problem in your next relationship because the problem is with you. You understand that, right? And I was like, what do you mean? I'm perfect. But and so I think about that if you've been going back to change something, how much, it's based on circumstance. That's, it's fascinating in terms of what she faces.

Peng Shepherd: 29:37

What is it? What is that phrase? Wherever you go, there you are.

Brett Benner: 29:40

yeah,

Peng Shepherd: 29:41

Something. Yeah.

Brett Benner: 29:42

interesting.

Peng Shepherd: 29:43

Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 29:44

For better or for worse.

Peng Shepherd: 29:45

yes, for

Brett Benner: 29:46

said to me once, whatever you are today, you will be tomorrow even more which was horrifying to me In some elements. I was like, really? Okay. Some things were fine, but

Jason Blitman: 29:55

It's funny that you say that you, not funny, obviously, you're a writer who's now been published multiple times, but that you say that this was something since you were a little kid, because you also describe Marsh as a person who's been in love, with being a lawyer since she was very young, too. Goes on to say that she liked the idea of trying to find the truth at the heart of something, which sounds very much like a writer to me, too.

Peng Shepherd: 30:21

A little bit, yeah.

Jason Blitman: 30:22

Do you relate to that? Do you feel like that's something that you're doing, uncovering the truth at the heart of something?

Peng Shepherd: 30:28

Oh, definitely. I think that's, I think that's why we all write, because we we feel something that either we understand or we don't understand. And the whole process of writing a book is just being like, Hey, I feel this thing. Do you also feel it? Do you feel it like this? Is it, is it the same for you too? And I, yeah, I just, I think a lot of fiction is that.

Jason Blitman: 30:49

We read a lot of books. I'm not convinced that every author goes on that same journey,

Brett Benner: 30:55

yeah, I don't know either.

Jason Blitman: 30:56

but I appreciate that. It's like a part of why we do this podcast is because we not even just talking about the books, but just like getting to the root of humans. Because at the end of the day, we're just people engaging with each other and creative ways.

Peng Shepherd: 31:11

Yeah, and we're all just so weird in our own way, Everybody's just so weird.

Jason Blitman: 31:16

Yes.

Brett Benner: 31:17

So the book covers you're covering a lot of locales in Are, I'm so curious, are you a traveler? I've

Peng Shepherd: 31:24

I, yes, I love to travel. And I actually ended up, the locations that we visit in All This and More, I have been to them. I didn't go there knowing that I was going to put them in the book, but it was usually a case of like when I went to Iceland, I just fell in love with it and I thought it was beautiful. I don't know. It's just so beautiful and so strange. I've never seen such strange landscape in a good way. It's just it just looks so different. It looks like the end of the world, like everywhere you go. There's actually this there's a beach there where the, all of the sand is just jet black. And then the cliffs behind it are jet black. And then the water that's rolling in is this icy blue, white water, because it's

Jason Blitman: 32:03

Whoa.

Peng Shepherd: 32:04

Oh, beautiful. I'm going to sound grim. I don't mean it in a grim way. But I, when I went there and it was a really windy day and it was so the wind was so loud that you couldn't hear anyone else talking and there weren't a lot of other people on the beach anyway, but you could just hear nothing, not even your own footsteps. And I was walking in this, Jet black sand and I just remember thinking like I bet this is what it looks like when you die Because it's just so like it was so beautiful But so unlike anything that seemed like it could be on earth and I just thought I thought I hope when I die Like this is where I wake up. It's just so different.

Jason Blitman: 32:38

That's so interesting. I somewhat similarly, or at least what that made me think of, is I've floated in the Dead Sea before,

Peng Shepherd: 32:47

Oh

Jason Blitman: 32:48

and It just, people tell you about the salt content, and you'll float, and, you know, you sort of assume you know what that means and what that will feel like. But you really don't, and you have this experience, or it is very uncommon for an adult to have an experience of wonder for the first time that you don't experience as a young person. And so when I was there as an adult and experiencing this thing and watching all the people around me experiencing this thing of wonder as well, it just was this weird, magical, and you're also like at the lowest point of the world, like it was, guess it didn't. In the moment feel like maybe what it feels like when you die, but upon reflection, maybe it also felt that way.

Peng Shepherd: 33:33

yeah. No, I can imagine how. Yeah I would love to go do that too. Yeah, it's so fascinating. Yeah.

Brett Benner: 33:40

Where have you,

Jason Blitman: 33:40

you have to go in backwards and then

Peng Shepherd: 33:43

Oh, and then lay

Jason Blitman: 33:44

yeah, you like sit down into it and just like lifts you up. Fascinating.

Brett Benner: 33:48

can't you go for why can't you go forward?

Jason Blitman: 33:51

Because of the salt content it literally makes you float. And

Brett Benner: 33:55

it kind Picks you up.

Jason Blitman: 33:56

yeah, You can fall over, fall forward and you like, can't get it in your eyes or cause it would just, It's tremendously painful they tell you it's really bad if you have even minor cuts and things. So yeah, the idea is you go in backwards and you sit down into it and it's really what it feels like. It's so weird.

Brett Benner: 34:14

That's crazy. Now, is there someplace you haven't been yet that you really want to go?

Peng Shepherd: 34:18

Oh I would really like to go to Uzbekistan and I'm gonna go next year I think.

Jason Blitman: 34:23

Oh,

Peng Shepherd: 34:24

Yeah. Um, I just think it's, it's so cool. So beautiful. The photos of I don't know, it's just like they have all these like gorgeous buildings and like really old like temples and ruins and the I grew up in Phoenix, which is a desert, but it's just a very different looking desert to deserts outside the U. S. So it's yeah,

Jason Blitman: 34:45

think I've ever heard anyone say that Uzbekistan is the place they want to travel to. So this is, I'm excited. I can't wait for you to report back.

Peng Shepherd: 34:52

Yes, I will. Yeah. Yeah. I'm very excited.

Jason Blitman: 34:55

To obviously keep talking about your book and not to, talk about all of the ways it stressed me out, but it also just got me thinking about, it's not a whole book about choices, but obviously it also is. And I feel like it's something that we do on a daily basis, make choices, everything from hitting the alarm clock one more time to the socks that you put on to every, every single thing we do throughout the day is a choice. And so it made me think about like the things you can't undo and the fear of the unknown that makes you just hesitant to even make a decision and make a choice. Do you find that to be true? Have you found, are you a leap and the net will come kind of person with, or, which is my, something I always say for myself. It's let's just do it. Leap and the net will come. We'll figure it out. Or are you a little more cautious?

Peng Shepherd: 35:49

No, I think I'm definitely like just jump now, but I don't think that's the right decision sometimes either. So I've definitely leapt too early and then Oh there's not a net and then it's like a mess. And that was one of the really interesting things about writing Marsh, because she's totally the opposite of me. And so it was, fun to be in a different set of shoes where the, the character's reaction is exactly the opposite of mine.

Jason Blitman: 36:12

Other than like, egg on your face, foot in your mouth, weird, a lot of weird turns of phrase, what is the worst that can happen if you make a wrong choice? I guess depending on how big the decision

Brett Benner: 36:23

You could die.

Peng Shepherd: 36:24

I think the worst, I think the worst outcome would be if it ends up hurting someone else. So I would think like relationships, if you're either getting into one you shouldn't be in, or you're like leaving one that you actually shouldn't leave. You just but. If you stayed, it could be better, but you leave instead, or you get into a relationship and it becomes serious and you probably shouldn't have been with that person. Or if they're, and then if you break up and there are kids involved, the kids get hurt too.

Jason Blitman: 36:51

I think you're right. It's about relationships and also just like other, how do these decisions affect other people too, right? It's, cause then it becomes selfish if you're making choices and not thinking about how it affects everything else.

Peng Shepherd: 37:04

Yeah, and even sometimes it is the right choice and you do have to hurt someone else. But if I like think back on my own life, the I don't often regret having made a choice even if it made something harder for me or I like lost an opportunity because of it because that is just me. I'm you know, I'm a Yeah, like a leap and see if there's a net there but the things that I do regret are if it hurt someone else and when there was just no way to not hurt someone,

Jason Blitman: 37:30

but right to your, what you also just said, about sometimes even if you do hurt someone, it is the right decision to make, but it is about considering other people too. It's not, it's it's thinking through the process, right? It's not always just like leaping. It's like step, leap.

Peng Shepherd: 37:46

yes, yeah.

Jason Blitman: 37:47

my god. So another quote from the book is that change is never easy, but is always worth it. Do you agree with that?

Peng Shepherd: 37:54

Maybe because I am a leap and then check if there's a net there. I tend to think that change is going to be better because it, it feels like progress, but I guess it is not, sometimes newer is better, but sometimes newer is just different. And that's, I think as we all get older, we are, I am learning the difference too. The older and wiser I get, I'm starting to realize that sometimes newer is just different. It's not better, but it's, I, that's really a lifelong lesson that you're learning, I think.

Brett Benner: 38:23

Sure.

Jason Blitman: 38:24

Sometimes I go to a Go ahead Brett.

Brett Benner: 38:26

no, I was going to say, and sometimes, and also as you get older, speaking as the senior of the group, you begin to your options begin to narrow. In all capacities, like I mean you have children and that changes something and so your choices have to be a little more thoughtful and specific because it does have a bigger effect in some ways,

Peng Shepherd: 38:45

Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 38:45

I was just gonna say, even though I'm a leap in the net will come kind of person, I still will order the same thing at a restaurant that I know I like because I don't want to take the risk on that other thing.'cause what if I don't like it? It costs

Peng Shepherd: 38:56

Yeah, food's important too. He's you got to really enjoy that meal,

Jason Blitman: 38:59

Yes, exactly. No matter what it is, I'm like, oh, why didn't I order that thing?

Brett Benner: 39:04

Sometimes it's as hard as like picking a different color shirt than what you normally go for choose.

Peng Shepherd: 39:09

thing where I like find it in a style I like and then I buy all the colors So like every silhouette is exactly the same. I just have it

Brett Benner: 39:16

yes, yes,

Peng Shepherd: 39:18

That's me. That's me

Brett Benner: 39:20

but that's very thoughtful. That's, that's thoughtful and thought out and there's no, there's not a risk

Peng Shepherd: 39:25

there's no yeah, and I hate shopping. I hate shopping And so it just makes it, make shopping 50, like one fifth of the time, because I just have to find one shirt, and then I just buy, every

Brett Benner: 39:35

Are you the same way in regards to food? Could you eat the same? Like my husband, when I met him, when we first met, like every night he would have contadina pasta with pesto. Every morning he has granola with yogurt. There's no variance. And he's fine with that. Where I would be like, can't you have a pancake, and he could, but like his default always the same. you like that at all? Are you

Peng Shepherd: 39:56

sorta, yeah I think sometimes I get into these, I don't know what, I would, I get like hyper fixated on a couple meals, and I'll just eat that for, I don't know, a week, a month, and then I switch to something else, and go really hard on that for a week or a month it's probably like related to Stress or busyness is probably what it is.

Jason Blitman: 40:13

Wait, when's your birthday?

Peng Shepherd: 40:14

April 12th.

Jason Blitman: 40:15

Oh my god, I knew it. Mine is April 6th. And I was like, I wonder if this is an Aries thing. And sure enough, it is. Cause everything you're talking about, I'm like, this is me.

Peng Shepherd: 40:25

yeah. Okay. Do you do the thing where you listen to the same song on repeat? like 500?

Jason Blitman: 40:31

and then

Brett Benner: 40:32

You guys, what is your song right now? What is the most current overplayed song for both of you?

Peng Shepherd: 40:37

Oh I, so right now, because I'm writing, it's usually like an instrumental thing that I've just got looping endlessly. What have I been looping? I don't know. At one point I was looping stuff from the Inception soundtrack or from the Social Network soundtrack actually, which is that what it's called? The Social Network movie? Yeah. Because they're like a little creepy and mysterious, but a little caper,

Brett Benner: 40:58

and it can sit in the back of your head and just

Peng Shepherd: 41:00

Yeah. And, keep you in the zone. Yeah.

Brett Benner: 41:03

and you, Jason,

Jason Blitman: 41:03

I don't know what mine is most recently. I feel like I maybe haven't been listening to a lot of music, it's been a lot of podcasts, but last year was like my year of what else can I do from Encanto,

Peng Shepherd: 41:16

Oh,

Jason Blitman: 41:16

which is so lame, but I just find some of these lyrics very moving, and that's, I just it was inspiring to me, so I like needed to listen to it

Brett Benner: 41:25

I love that you're embracing like your 15 year old girl right there with it. I love that. I

Jason Blitman: 41:30

I would not change it for a second.

Brett Benner: 41:33

No, I love it. I love it Let it go

Jason Blitman: 41:37

Wait, what? I need to, I'm going to Google the lyric in a second so I can explain to you why I feel very profound about it. But something we haven't talked about yet that, Again, as we're talking about decisions, and maybe, I don't know, fellow Aries, if you feel this way but I get, I don't like it when people ask for my advice, I give it to them, and then they don't take it, because I'm just like, what did I give you my advice for?

Peng Shepherd: 41:59

yes. Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 42:00

But there is, because All This and More, the TV show, is live, there's also a live stream. And there is something about people with an outside perspective that can see things in a different way. So one, I think this is a PSA, trust your friends because they have an outside perspective. But two, How do you feel about that?

Peng Shepherd: 42:24

Oh, I mean, it's, yeah I, I definitely any big decision, and this is part of my trying not to leap before I have step, and so I have, like a small crew of, it's like my best friend, my mom, my partner, and I try to run everything by them and like really, because they know me best, but they are knowing me from the outside. And so I think that they really do. They have stopped me from jumping, towards something that I shouldn't jump for, they like pull me back from the edge, but yeah I, not always, but I think very often sometimes they can just see things better than you can because they're, they're coming at it without the emotion. They're just looking at. I'd say, yeah, it's, I don't listen to them every time

Jason Blitman: 43:06

but valuing, valuing. Yeah. Okay. So the lyric that moves me every time is what could I do if I just grew what I was feeling in the moment? What could I do if I just knew it didn't need to be perfect? It just needed to be and they'd let me be. And I find that very moving, right? Like it doesn't need to be something perfect. It's just I will just be, it'll just be what it is and that'll be that. And it'll be perfect because I made it right. And that I think as a concept. That's like the nugget of the whole song. And I was like, ah, this means a lot to me right now.

Peng Shepherd: 43:42

Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 43:43

not that I need to justify myself, Brett.

Brett Benner: 43:46

You do not at all you do not at all absolutely not

Jason Blitman: 43:50

Anyway you talked about writing. Can you talk at all about what, even in a secrety way about what you're working on?

Peng Shepherd: 43:57

Oh, I can't. Yes. This will actually, this will be great. I can workshop it again because I haven't, I've like barely I'm only part way through the first draft and I've like basically not talked about it at all. So it's it's a lot darker than all this and more. It's a lot darker and it's how do I describe it? It's about body doubles. Who are like they're secretly hired to impersonate like a very rich famous person. And the story is about how just as their lives become increasingly intertwined in really dangerous ways, how everything starts to unravel. Yeah, I, yeah,

Jason Blitman: 44:33

I feel like you're like leaning into this big questions about the universe thing.

Peng Shepherd: 44:40

My first book, The Book of M, was also a lot about, it was about what's the relationship between identity and memory. And if you're losing one, can you keep the other? Or a little bit about like love and memory too. If you're losing one, can you keep the other? And I think, I don't, I just find body doubles so fascinating, especially if you're doing more than just like mere impersonation. If you're really trying to convince somebody that you are that person, like what happens to your own self, the better you get at that. And what is it? What does it mean for your original that you're mimicking if you become like even more convincing than they are? Like who, who are all of you really anymore at that point?

Jason Blitman: 45:14

And then the camp version of this is the drag queens who impersonate and become the characters that

Peng Shepherd: 45:20

they're so good. They're so good.

Jason Blitman: 45:23

I know they're really some of these people really embody the, entertainers that they are impersonating.

Peng Shepherd: 45:29

Yeah, they really do.

Jason Blitman: 45:30

That sounds

Brett Benner: 45:31

That sounds really amazing.

Jason Blitman: 45:33

and different and I'm excited for it. Eventually. No pressure. Yeah.

Peng Shepherd: 45:36

Yes. Yeah. No, I'm. No it's like going slow, but because it's it feels like really delicate in subtle because it's all about just. You know the relationships between these guys, but it's it's so much fun.

Jason Blitman: 45:47

Yeah. Oh, cool. I know it, it reading your work feels like you have fun writing

Peng Shepherd: 45:55

Oh, I'm glad I really do. So I'm glad that comes through. Yeah

Jason Blitman: 45:59

all back to Webster. Was that his name?

Peng Shepherd: 46:02

Webster. Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 46:03

It all goes back to Webster. Thank you for sharing that story with us.

Peng Shepherd: 46:07

Yeah, of course.

Jason Blitman: 46:08

still have it?

Peng Shepherd: 46:09

I do actually it's somewhere in this apartment. I do. Yeah.

Jason Blitman: 46:12

Oh if you find it, I'd love to see a picture of the cover. It'd be, we could share it on social media if that

Brett Benner: 46:18

I also love the moment too. Like I love. As a parent, she, it, it's almost like it's all come to fruition, and she saw that and you sharing that with her. I said, that's gotta be so special now to be like, you've, it's like you've done so well. It's just a great thing.

Peng Shepherd: 46:34

And it somehow came up and I told that story and it was in Phoenix and she cried in the front row because she's like, I didn't know you remembered. I'll be like, of course I remembered. That was such an important book to me. It was like, it was my first book. So

Jason Blitman: 46:48

that's so cute.

Brett Benner: 46:50

that's so sweet. It

Peng Shepherd: 46:52

Yeah. She's a great mom. She's

Brett Benner: 46:54

She's, she sounds like it. And

Jason Blitman: 46:55

Shout out to mom.

Brett Benner: 46:57

Shout out to your mom. That's amazing.

Jason Blitman: 46:58

We love it. This has been so

Brett Benner: 47:01

Just delightful.

Peng Shepherd: 47:02

Yeah. I had such a great time.

Brett Benner: 47:04

You've reached this point in the show, you've chosen to turn to page 479, and you're at the end of the episode.

Jason Blitman: 47:12

So funny. Peng, thank you so much for being here. Everyone go check out all this and more. You could find it in our bookshop. org page or wherever you get your books. And we'll see you next week for another book that comes Grossman talking to us about his book, The Bright Sword.

Brett Benner: 47:35

Fantastic.

Jason Blitman: 47:36

I don't know why I rolled my R, but it sounded like something that someone in

Brett Benner: 47:39

It was very fancy. It was very

Jason Blitman: 47:41

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Bye.

47:44

Van Foss and Michael over P. A. The actual words are for the year of the Ox and the ox arrow! Van Foss is really havin a good year. He's like a real rapper.