Best-selling Author Suzanne Brockmann, Jules Cassidy, P.I., and Kickstarter

Special Guest: Suzanne Brockmann

[00:00:00] 

Matt: Welcome everybody to write Out Loud the podcast about storytelling, writing, and all of those creative arts that we hold so dear. Today is special for two reasons. First, I'm thrilled of course to introduce my co-pilot and creativity, Christina, who's bright energy, a boundless and infectious enthusiasm , are about to elevate this podcast and bring it to a whole new level.

And second, we're joined by bestselling author Suzanne Brockmann, a writer whose work has inspired countless readers and authors, including us. She's here to share a brand new Kickstarter campaign that we are so excited to tell you about. So grab your favorite drink, get comfy. Let's jump in and join the conversation.

Hello, Suzanne?

Suz Brockmann: Hello, how are you guys?

Christina: are fantastic.

Matt: Yes,

Christina: you here.

Matt: absolutely. Excellent.

Suz Brockmann: Thank you so much for inviting me. I'm really happy to talk about this really interesting project that I'm doing right now.

Christina: Yeah,

Matt: Absolutely.

Christina: I have been wanting to get you on the podcast for a long time. I don't even [00:01:00] know if AI can go through all of our episodes sometime, Matt, and check how many times I have referenced Brockmann and deep point of view. And, anybody who wants to learn how to write deep point of view go to Suzanne Brockmann. Yeah, so I'm, I'm a fan.

Matt: Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, Suzanne, if you don't mind, just give us a quick rundown. Tell us a little bit about yourself. Just for those that might be listening who aren't as familiar with you. Tell us about yourself.

Suz Brockmann: Sure, yeah. I've been writing I've been writing romance novels since 1992, so it's been quite a few decades here of doing that. I found my kind of niche. In writing about writing military, uh, romantic suspense focused on a team of Navy seals. I've written two series that feature Navy Seals.

And the, the, the one that's still ongoing at this point is is the troubleshooter series. And, uh, and yeah, so I'm, I've been, I've been doing this for a while. More recently, I've I've started, [00:02:00] producing indie movies for the basically L-G-B-T-Q Rom-coms.

Matt: Nice.

Suz Brockmann: uh,

Matt: My favorite.

Suz Brockmann: been taking, I know, taking my, attention for, for the past seven or eight years or so. But but yeah, no, I just wrote another book in the troubleshooter series. It's called Jules Cassidy Pi, and and yeah, I'm doing something a little bit different

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: I've been, yeah. Oh, I

Christina: Yeah,

Suz Brockmann: go for it, Tina.

Christina: yeah. No, I was just gonna say, uh, you just announced it just a short time ago that you're doing a Kickstarter for this one. So I know that you've done Kickstarters for your other projects, but this is the first time you're doing one. For a book that you've written and in fact, this is connected to your series, the troubleshooters that you used to traditionally publish. So what, what went into that decision of going the Kickstarter way?

Suz Brockmann: Well, the world's a dumpster fire, and I,

Christina: Yes.

Suz Brockmann: do know that many of my readers I have [00:03:00] a, I have a pretty progressive base of readers and, I know a lot of them are staying away from big corporations that have kind of co-signed the fascism deal that's happening. And how, as a self-published author, how do you, how do you market a book in this, in this day and age, if you're trying to respect the reader's desire to

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: away from places like Amazon, which is, the big the big. So, so with my experience having, having produced indie movies and used Kickstarter as a crowdfunding 'cause, okay, so LGBT rom-coms, there is a definite audience for

Christina: Yes. Yes.

Suz Brockmann: and

Christina: Okay.

Suz Brockmann: For, for, for movies with, with gay characters that have happy endings,

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: movies that, that we produced, which were, were basically set in the post coming out world.

So there's a lot of, of the, there's a lot of really great films that deal with coming out and with the drama around that, but, but my co-producers and I really wanted to [00:04:00] focus on, hey, it, there's more to life than after you. In fact, there's an entire life after

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: And so those are the films we were making and, and we needed. Because we, because those type of film films don't get support from big studios, we really felt like we needed to crowdfund and reach out to this kind of very vocal dedicated audience that likes L-G-B-T-Q Indie films. So we used Kickstarter for them and I've done four. Pro four different Kickstarter campaigns for four different,

Matt: Hm.

Suz Brockmann: project film projects. And know, starting back in, when was it, it was 2015, was my very first Kickstarter, and, and the platform has changed considerably. They've, it's become more uh, what is the word I want? Flexible and it is just easier to use all around.

So coming in with that, really knowing how to use the platform, really understanding how it works. It just seemed to be a really good fit for this book where I really just didn't wanna, like s. Give Amazon a lot of [00:05:00] money.

Christina: Yeah.

Matt: Yeah, for sure.

Suz Brockmann: and also really respect, I think this is, we're, we are in a place in our, in the history of our country, where a lot more people are becoming activists than have ever been before.

Christina: Yes.

Suz Brockmann: the first thing I wanna do is encourage that activism. And so, like, so here now be an activist and come over to Kickstarter and get this book. I, I, I can also, because of Kickstarter, takes a smaller. Percentage of, of everything of the money. I can price the ebook a little bit lower,

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: know, and everybody wants a, a good deal,

Matt: Yep.

Christina: Yep.

Matt: It's true.

Suz Brockmann: it's really, it really felt like a win-win to go with Kickstarter.

Matt: That's awesome. I mean, when you think about Kickstarter too, how difficult is it to come up with the different levels? I think about doing a Kickstarter campaign for myself, and I think about, things that I would launch through Kickstarter, but I think about the planning stages and the different levels of, if you chip in this much right, you're gonna get this mute, might get assigned.

Autographed photo of Sue's, [00:06:00] uh, or if you get this one, you might get, a, an advanced reader copy or something like that. But like how difficult was that, that process?

Suz Brockmann: Having, having had the experience of, of doing this for the movies where it's, it's a completely different animal, like with a, with a book.

Matt: I

Suz Brockmann: It's I mean I really kept it simple for this Kickstarter that I'm doing. You can get an ebook. Eight bucks.

Matt: sure.

Christina: Yep.

Suz Brockmann: And, and you have to, you have to also understand Kickstarter speak.

So, so you pledge, you don't buy a book, you pledge or you support or

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: uh, back and you and the book is your reward. So I'm the creator. You are the

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: And you, you pledge your support and when the Kickstarter closes you, your credit card gets charged. And then I, the Kickstarter creator then you your reward.

Matt: Sure.

Suz Brockmann: so, so these levels, these types of rewards with a, with a book, it's like ebook, paperback. Hardcover

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: basic. So, so that was, that was, basically where I started and then it, then it was like, okay, so, have [00:07:00] there we can do a Zoom and, two after bucks and join this group Zoom.

And here's, here's a couple of dates, you

Matt: Sure.

Suz Brockmann: 4th and December 20th for the people who are, who maybe need a little bit of a break from the holidays

Matt: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: the, into the bathroom by themselves and, and get away from everybody.

Matt: Nice.

Suz Brockmann: So, yeah, so, so I did that and and so then it's basically, it's the ebook with the Zoom.

It's the paperback with the Zoom. So I really, with a book, I really kept it simple and there Kickstarter now has an option to, to have rewards that are called add-ons. So, okay, so here I am with a self-published backlist of 23 books.

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: I thought, Hey, this is an idea. Since we're all trying to avoid giving money to the big corporations, and this is a, this is Kickstarter is a really great way to, if you think about it, self-published authors are like the ultimate mom and pop, business because here we are, we're writing our books and, it's our, that's our small business.

And with Kickstarter, it, it's, it's really. Uh, [00:08:00] the, the middleman is kind of gone. It's just, it's, it's Kickstarter. They take a, they take a pretty tiny percentage,

Matt: Sure.

Suz Brockmann: and Kickstarter, let me, lemme just also say, Kickstarter is not perfect. It's a big corporation too, and there's, there's trouble everywhere, but but they, but they do take a smaller amount.

So, so with these add-ons, I was able to, to put my entire back list up as. As add-ons for eBooks, $3 each.

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: and if you're looking for something, like in, that's a lot lower than the regular price for a lot of

Matt: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: And, and some of them, many of these books are 20 years old, but there's

Christina: Yep.

Suz Brockmann: stuff is there too. And so yeah, so I've had people come in, buy the new ebook, Jules Cassidy's ebook and and then. And then add on every single one of my back list.

Matt: Oh, that's great.

Suz Brockmann: cool is that?

Matt: Mm-hmm.

Christina: and.

Suz Brockmann: They win. Everybody's happy. And

Christina: let me tell you, someone who has read every single one of SU's back list, those are excellent books. There's not a bad one in a bunch, not a bad one [00:09:00] in the bunch. And from your first stuff that you did with a, I don't know who published you first, love Swept or. One of those early Harlequin, whatever those are all, that's, that's where I came in, with you on.

So I still, I, I have heart for those. So

Suz Brockmann: Yeah.

Christina: was, was a cool option.

Suz Brockmann: yeah. In all those love sweat books I have, the rights have been reverted to me, so I've reissued them and I I reissued them. They're all written and set in the 1990s,

Christina: Mm.

Suz Brockmann: they're, they're historical romance at this point, 'cause I'm sorry, any, you, no.

Nobody has a cell phone

Matt: Mm-hmm.

Suz Brockmann: and every, I mean, there. Pagers. Oh my God. And, payphones all, and people, know, Walkmans and, and

Christina: Yeah. Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: all this, all the, all the nineties stuff. And so as I was reissuing them, I was like, let's embrace this. These are all books that are

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: So I wrote little intros about the, about the fact that yeah, they're set in the nineties and, and, and enjoy [00:10:00] the escape from the noise of our world and

Christina: yeah.

Suz Brockmann: A

Christina: You made the choice to not change a word in the stories to them, but rather put a little, Hey, these were written, way back when. And that's the context is. You know exactly that. I love that. I love that.

Suz Brockmann: yeah,

Matt: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: yeah, I did. There are a couple of my books that I've reissued that I've annotated when and, and with with an ebook. It's really easy with an annotation. You just click on it and it pops up. And so it's, so

Matt: Nice.

Suz Brockmann: Like a a, a film with the director's commentary.

Christina: Yeah. Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: I am like some of my earlier stuff, the editors really dipped in and there were all these rules about, don't say penis and,

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: And, and also just like women who own, who had their. Condoms ready because they were sex positive. I mean, sex

Christina: Yeah,

Suz Brockmann: not a thing back then.

Christina: I,

Suz Brockmann: so I had to write, I had these, all this stuff about the women who like did like, just, it, just

Christina: yeah.

Suz Brockmann: [00:11:00] like, so I was able to in with annotations and say oh look, aren't we so happy? Things have changed, from the, from this situation where women had to. Pretend they didn't like sex

Matt: Yeah, for sure.

Christina: Oh, that's really, that's, that's brilliant. Sus I, I think that's really great. Rather than, not enjoying the context of what you had to put in there at that time, you were able to come on and leave it again. As original, but yet put in there and make everything like, let's give it a little laugh at how we were back, at that time

Suz Brockmann: yeah.

Christina: and, and what we had to put in there. But just to kind of continue with the Kickstarter something occurred to me when you started talking about, Kickstarter takes a smaller percentage, but you called it the middleman and it clicked with me with something else. Do you feel, and maybe this is something you can answer in the future maybe it's not real clear to you right now, but do you feel closer to your readers when doing something like this rather than, traditionally [00:12:00] publishing or even self-publishing?

Suz Brockmann: Tina and I have a long history

Christina: Yes.

Suz Brockmann: and so she's really aware of back in the day I used to do something called the virtual signing

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: Yeah, where I'd go, where I'd use PayPal and, and and allow people who couldn't come to an in-person signing to get a, a signed copy of the book.

So I

Matt: Okay.

Suz Brockmann: I would sign. I basically move like a thousand books into my home

Christina: Yes.

Suz Brockmann: them all individually. You could get a signature only or personalized. And so it, it was, that was done through through the internet

Matt: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: and so I've always had that sense of kind of closeness and connection to, to to my readers and, this is, this just feels like a continuation of that.

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: I have to tell you, I've got 709 backers so far on this project. So, you

Matt: That's awesome.

Suz Brockmann: and I go through and I've gone through the list of everybody who backs the project. I sent them a message saying thank you. And I recognize a lot of names and

Christina: Oh yeah.

Suz Brockmann: [00:13:00] is.

And when I do recognize the name, I often give it a little extra shout out. Like, Hey, nice to see you here. Boy, we go way back. And so,

Matt: That's

Suz Brockmann: so it does. Because, I mean, and some of the, with Kickstarter you don't have to necessarily put your last names, but the people who do I, I recognize them.

And the other thing I wanted to mention about the Kickstarter, that's been really kind of, Interesting in a, in a very interesting, kind of scary way, is that so many of the people who are backing this project are first time Kickstarter users. In fact, I

Christina: Wow.

Suz Brockmann: before we got onto this podcast, I kind of went in there to look at like, out of the last 12 people to today who have backed the project, 10 of them are first time Kickstarter users.

Matt: geez.

Christina: Wow.

Suz Brockmann: okay. So this shows me that well. something that I learned from the earlier Kickstarters that I did is that readers don't necessarily, necessarily into movies. We, we know

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: right? As

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: and people who are connected to book people. And so, so this is, this Kickstarter, since it's [00:14:00] focused on a book, is bringing a lot of people who have never tried Kickstarter before, never used it, and and so it's, so there's. There, there's a certain amount of, shall we say, human error

Matt: Sure.

Suz Brockmann: and and which is normal. And oh my God, how cool is it that people, and some of them, some of my readers are getting up there in, in age and yet they're, they are willing to like boldly go.

Matt: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: And that's really cool.

Matt: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: so

Christina: it really is.

Suz Brockmann: is, is in my messages back to people when I see, and Kickstarter tells me first time backer that if, if somebody is new, I

Matt: Hm.

Suz Brockmann: get a little like message about that. And and so I'm able to say to people, okay, you're, you're new. Here's, here's the lingo that we use on Kickstarter.

'cause it really helps to understand, to speak the same language

Matt: Sure.

Suz Brockmann: Kickstarter. 'cause Kickstarter is telling you all this, like, fill out your backer survey. What does that

Matt: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: So, so yeah. One of the things that that I have been making sure people understand is [00:15:00] that with. This is, this backing a book on Kickstarter is different than pre-order. It's a lot like pre-ordering a book because the book is gonna come out on a set date, in this case with Jules Cassidy Pi. It's December 11th. And with a pre-order, a reader will just click that one, click and, and forget about it until, oh look, the book pops up into their e-reader. But with Kickstarter, need the, the backer, the person who is buying the book to fill out something called a backer survey so that I can get the information I need, like their email address

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: send them the book, which I'm

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: With a, with a, uh, service called Book Funnel.

Have you, are you guys

Matt: Yep.

Suz Brockmann: Phil?

Christina: yes,

Matt: Yep.

Suz Brockmann: awesome.

Matt: That's great.

Christina: in our, yeah. For those in our audience that may not have, can you just give us a little brief on what it does?

Suz Brockmann: Yeah, it's a website or a service that allows authors to basically send readers eBooks in a very simple format. As a reader, you [00:16:00] would you just basically give an author your, your email address and and you, you will have then. Like I can send a copy of, of Jules Cassidy Pi to that email address, and then the reader just logs in with the email address.

They'll get, can either create a password or they can, just do the sign in through email thing. That's pretty common these days. And then, and then they're on the book funnel site and, and the, the ebook is right there ready for them to download. Now book funnel ha is really cool because they will help you download the book to the e-reader of your choice.

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: are a Kindle user, it's, it just instructions are right there. Easy to follow. Same thing for Nook and Cobo and, and you can even read the ebook right on the book, final site. So it's a really, it's a very cool service that I became aware of when I did I think it was, was romancing the vote, one of the, uh, fundraisers for democracy

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: of romance RI writers did.

And, I, I gave away several hundred copies of eBooks, and basically it was push [00:17:00] a button and bloop,

Matt: Off the go.

Suz Brockmann: there. There you go. So it's really easy. It's easy for an author to use. It's equally easy, maybe even easier for our reader to use. It's a great service.

Matt: Yeah, that's really awesome. , I have a couple questions about it, just Kickstarter in general, I think, was there a, with all the backers that you had, was, did any of the interaction. Shape the story or shape the campaign or like have any kind of impact on that? Or was that all pretty much decided and you're interacting with them and kind of as you described, like thanking them for, joining and helping the newbies to get acclimated and all that.

But like, was there any sort of like impact that they had on the, either the story or the campaign itself?

Suz Brockmann: Not, not for this

Matt: Mm-hmm.

Suz Brockmann: I have to tell you that for some of my film Kickstarters in the past, I've, I've done things like like given, created a re a reward again, Kickstarter speak,

Matt: You Sure.

Suz Brockmann: Of of be a beta reader for my next book.

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: so in, in the things I've written in the past, I've actually had people like. Sign [00:18:00] up and donate money to the film project. And their reward is to get an early, early copy and give me feedback.

Matt: Okay.

Suz Brockmann: and, uh, but, but with this case, with Jules Cassidy Pi, the book was, the book was written,

Matt: Okay,

Suz Brockmann: It's, it's pretty much ready to go. I'm, I'm doing the final page proofs and, proofreading, just trying to catch those last typos. And but, but yeah, not, not for this one

Matt: sure.

Suz Brockmann: been any, uh, any of that.

Matt: Okay. And then the second question is if you've, if you're talking to an author that is on the fence about using Kickstarter or crowdfunding, is there any words of wisdom or any, like, what would you tell them if they're just like, ah, I don't know.

Suz Brockmann: I think it's, I, I think it's the future. I think more, I think more and more authors are gonna do it. And and when I was, as I've been working on this project, as I was setting it up and as I, as I, over the past several days, it's been about 10, 10 days now that the Kickstarter's been live, the campaign has been live.

And I've, I've noticed [00:19:00] that the majority of of books. And authors who are doing campaigns on Kickstarter right now are romantic and science fiction and I think, I think that, that, that genre in particular tends to lead the way.

Matt: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Suz Brockmann: But I, I really do think that more and more authors are gonna do this because I mean, we're, we're in this kind of weird world where where. You don't need that big of an audience to, to, to earn a living. It used to be, I mean, the, a royalty, back in the day when writing the writing books, I would get, there was a time when I first started, in fact, the Harlequin books, my, my royalty for each book didn't, wouldn't cover the price of a stamp.

Matt: Oh gosh. Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: And so, and there'd be like, people would be like, why don't you send postcards to, to people to let them know you have a new book? And I'm like, well, what's the point?

Matt: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: And so yeah, no mailing, no

Matt: Nope.

Suz Brockmann: Yes. But, uh, but yeah

Matt: yeah, that's [00:20:00] awesome.

Christina: I would like to delve into just a little bit again, no spoilers but I've gotten a little sneak peek at Jill's Cassidy Pi, but I know you haven't been in the troubleshooter series since. I think we said eight years maybe. 20.

Suz Brockmann: was the last book.

Christina: What made you decide to revisit them? Uh, why now after such a break and how was it getting back to them?

Suz Brockmann: Well, I started writing this

Christina: I.

Suz Brockmann: two or three days after the election in last year, yeah. It's funny, the election in 2016, like made me want to not write. And this time around, uh, I just felt like, oh my God, I have so much to say. And just felt like it was really important to to bring Jules back and to kind of show what happens to, to him [00:21:00] as an FBI agent and what.

In this administration or

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: similar administration, there is a sense of, of vagueness about the present day in the, the series. But yeah, so it just, it was weird. It was like. I suddenly I had to write again and I, I spent, it took me 11 months to write this book.

I, I've got long, I've got long COVID and so everything is harder and takes longer and when I flare it's, uh, it's brutal. And I had to really re uh, organize the, my method of writing to, to overcome the brain fog that comes sometimes with this.

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: but, but I really, I really wanted to tell the story and it's basically. Jules's first assignment as he is the new head of, uh, troubleshooters Los Angeles office. And there's a secondary, a, a, a secondary plot in the book. It's pretty hefty one. And I felt that this was a great place to tell this story, which [00:22:00] is 17-year-old Jules in high school.

Basically, his first mystery that he solves. It's basically the story of why he becomes an FBI agent in the first place. And those, the interm meshing of those two stories really, uh, really for me as, as the writer. And I gotta tell you though, because it had been so long. I spent the entire year rereading the troubleshooter series. I

Christina: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: read it completely through about twice some of the books , the books that were heavy with Jules and Sam. 'cause Sam Statt plays a big part. Navy Seal , former. Seal Sam plays a big part in this new book too. So books like hot Target, hot Pursuit All Through the Night gone Too Far where

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: Sam and Jules play Large.

Parts, I've read them many, many times. One of, one of the things with long COVID is one of my, one of my particular symptoms is insomnia.

Matt: Hmm.

Christina: Oh,

Suz Brockmann: and I decided sometime this past year that instead of doom scrolling, I would simply read the troubleshooter series. So.[00:23:00] 

Matt: Nice.

Suz Brockmann: So there I was at four o'clock in the morning.

I'm like, reading is so much better than doom scrolling, I just gotta

Christina: yeah.

Matt: Yes.

Suz Brockmann: And and to have those, their voices in my head repeatedly through while I was writing this book. Uh, yeah, so that was, I think that was a benefit, 'cause zoom scrolling

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: not, not a healthy thing to be doing, people.

Matt: Especially these days.

Christina: Yeah, well, I gotta say as a fan uh, I, I did get an early copy. Sue sent it to me and as a fan it really did bring me back to those days. I can see myself after this going back to those books and rereading them and enjoying them. And actually I absolutely loved the young. Jules story it actually, again, it made me think back to those troubleshooter books where you had the World War II plots.

Now this certainly isn't a World War II plot, and it's not historical in the sense [00:24:00] other than Jules the 17, it made me, remember the connections. Between each subplot and how beautifully that you do that, where I don't see that in other people's work. So that, I, I was really excited.

So having said that, will there be more in the troubleshooters, series? Is there going to be more? Yes.

Suz Brockmann: Well, well

Christina: Tell us more.

Suz Brockmann: when you read the book you'll see that there's things I'm setting up. There are a couple of characters who are moving into the troubleshooters universe. I mean, Jules is there he is in Los Angeles. And a lot of people are leaving government service these days,

Matt: Mm-hmm.

Suz Brockmann: and that

Christina: Yes.

Suz Brockmann: in the military. And,

Christina: Mm-hmm.

Suz Brockmann: I really see, this book, it's different from the other troubleshooters books because it's really not, it's a mystery with, with comedy and dramedy and and with romantic [00:25:00] elements. And the,

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: The, our two main characters are Jules and Sam. And that's, they're. Fast friends and

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: that their relationship, it's a, so it's a, in a way it's a bro novel, but,

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: but the, the, it it's the secondary characters who have the romantic

Christina: Mm-hmm.

Suz Brockmann: the romantic elements into the book. And I just the, the, what I imagine is a world where Jules gets to work with a whole lot of different. Members of the troubleshooters team and as, as well as maybe a Navy Seal two, who is gonna retire at this point. so it does allow me to continue the series that way.

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: I also realized the book ends the, the. I mean, I, it's not really a spoiler. The book ends,

Christina: Yes.

Suz Brockmann: although with this one, I gotta tell you, I was writing it and sometime this pa I thought, I'm gonna finish it this summer.

And I'm, I'm at like, I'm at like, 125,000 words, which Tina, that's a

Matt: a lot.

Suz Brockmann: That's big. That's long even for me. And

Christina: [00:26:00] Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: this book will never end. I am just gonna keep writing it forever. And it's just gonna, it's just, well, because the book's gotta be as long as the book is, 

Christina: yes, exactly.

Suz Brockmann: And so the book does end, thank goodness. And and it has occurred to me that I can even return to the Young Jules storyline because it ends rather early in the school year. There's a lot of months to go before graduation. And and I really found those characters, they were.

Particularly delightful to spend time with for me, the

Christina: Oh.

Suz Brockmann: I really hope

Christina: the reader? Yes, for the reader. It was, I, I thoroughly enjoyed that. And in fact, I was a huge fan of Veronica Mars.

Matt: Hmm. Mm-hmm.

Christina: part in particular I love, the teenagers with purpose, with ideas, with comradery, caring, friendships, the care that they have with one another. So I, I personally was like, I. I hope we don't see the last of these guys, so, yeah. Good.

Suz Brockmann: [00:27:00] one of the beauty of of being a self-published author and throwing all the rules and publishing out the window and just doing what I want. Like, I could write it, I could have the next book in the series take place completely in that ya

Christina: Yeah. Yeah.

Matt: Sure.

Suz Brockmann: Why not? I, you

Christina: Why not?

Suz Brockmann: gonna, who's gonna yell at me?

Matt: Yeah, exactly.

Christina: Yeah. Certainly not your readers. Your reader is gonna be like. Bring it on. Bring it on.

Suz Brockmann: Thank you.

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: I hope so.

Matt: That's awesome.

Christina: I wanna say two things you've gotta come back on, please to talk about more writing stuff, some of the stuff that I've mentioned in the podcast before, like deep point of view.

Matt: Mm-hmm.

Christina: as I said, I think you're one of the best ones to do that. Even in this book writing in deep point of view allows the reader just to forget everything around and really become enfolded within the book. So I'd love to have you back on, uh, for a discussion on that. Uh, but I wanna save time for you to tell us. [00:28:00] We are going to have all the links and

Matt: Mm-hmm.

Christina: but tell us the dates for the Kickstarter so people don't miss out on it. And just, you know where to find you and what you're working on next.

Suz Brockmann: Yeah. Okay, so the kick, it's basically if you go to Kickstarter, kickstarter.com and you, you search for Jules Cassidy, he'll pop right up and wave at you. You'll find it right away. 'cause the campaign is called Jules Cassidy Pi, which is the title of the book. And yeah, it's only available through Kickstarter. At this point I do intend to release it on the, the regular old booksellers in early 2026. But but with this Kickstarter, which ends on, December 8th, you, a reader can get, will have the ebook in their hand. I hope, I, I promise, by December 11th, which is my son's birthday. So

Matt: Nice.

Suz Brockmann: that with, uh, with giving everybody a little Jules Cassidy present. So yeah, I, Kickstarter does have this thing now where you [00:29:00] can ex, you can keep it going for a little bit. So if, if somebody is listening to this and it's relatively close to December 8th, you could pop over and see if it's open to late comers that's a new feature.

'cause

Matt: Hmm.

Suz Brockmann: I can tell you from somebody who's done Kickstarters in the past, there's always somebody who emails you

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: after it ends and says, here's, here's a, a lot of money come, can I have the thing? And I'm like, ah.

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: yeah, so that's a little bit different with Kickstarter.

So, so it's not as dire, but I'm

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: people do.

Do go there. You can find me too at my website. There's there's an excerpt up from the book my, suzanne Brockmann.com. And, uh, it's right on the homepage. The link to the Kickstarter is on the homepage as well as a link to a Jills Cassidy PI page that shows the cover art and the and, uh, a link to the excerpt. And , yeah. I mean, we did a photo shoot for the cover art. A few weeks after I started writing the book, 'cause I was out in California and and I knew I wanted to bring the famous running couple back. Do you remember Tina,

Christina: yes,

Suz Brockmann: those

Christina: [00:30:00] yes, yes,

Suz Brockmann: some, like this,

Christina: yes.

Suz Brockmann: people

Christina: Yes.

Suz Brockmann: little tiny silhouette figures running and who are they? And we could

Christina: Yes.

Suz Brockmann: they were. And I can tell you right now that right now it's Jason and Ed.

Christina: Yeah.

Matt: Ah.

Suz Brockmann: They're my cover models, my son and my husband, Jason's very tall. Ed's not quite as tall and I needed, tall Sam and Jules is not as Jules is height challenged.

And and I made them run across the road. We had there, there was a day that the sky was just gorgeous and and Jason's husband, Matt and I, uh, were, had our, I, iPhones with our excellent cameras and just made Ed and Jason run across the street repeatedly.

Christina: That's

Matt: That's awesome. Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: and it was the cover it, we, we got it,

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: that I wanted.

And yeah, so,

Christina: And we will have all of

Matt: Mm-hmm.

Christina: Links on our, uh, webpage. So if you can't, you don't have a pen. write down Suz's info, we will have it including the Kickstarter on our page as well.

Suz Brockmann: thank you so much. That's

Matt: [00:31:00] Yes, 100%.

Suz Brockmann: question?

Christina: The last question is uh, what are you working on next?

Or, are you waiting until after the Kickstarter to start something or have you already started?

Suz Brockmann: I haven't started. I'm kind of letting the ideas kind of st. Really, Tina, oh my God. I finished writing this book like a month ago. That's the, like, that's the beauty of self-publishing

Christina: Yeah.

Yes.

Suz Brockmann: I had, if, going with a legacy publisher, it would be 20, 27 before this book came out.

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: so with self-publishing, I finished the book, I've been revising it like. Really dedicatedly, getting that revision, getting the revisions done, having beta readers. But but so yeah, so this, this one's been my full focus with the Kickstarter and but, so I'm just kind of letting the next book Stew.

And,

Christina: Yeah. Good.

Suz Brockmann: I could, it could be a novella, it could be a

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: it

Matt: Sure.

Suz Brockmann: the rules are it.

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: Let's see what I start next, but

Christina: Yeah.

Suz Brockmann: soon. And and it's gonna feature Jules's Cassidy.

Christina: Awesome.

Matt: Awesome.

Christina: I can't wait. [00:32:00] Well, thank

Matt: Awesome, awesome.

Christina: on.

Suz Brockmann: you for having me.

Matt: Yeah, what a conversation. We can't thank you enough for joining us and giving us a really great look at the Kickstarter campaign at Jules Cassidy Pi and the world of crowdfunding, which is up until now, unexplored on this little podcast. It's pretty cool. If today's episode inspired you, make sure to check out the Kickstarter Show some love for this incredible project because it is absolutely worth it.

And Christina, as always, thank you for lighting up the microphone with your energy and enthusiasm and love. And to everybody listening, , keep your stories coming, keep showing up for your creativity and keep writing out loud. We'll see you next time.

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