One Two Three | Holly Furtick Book Club

Foreign.

Hello, everyone. Guys, it's a great night. It's book club night. We are going to be reading this book. It is called 1, 2, 3 by Laurie Frankel. Let's talk about this book because I absolutely loved this book. This a book about friendship. It's a book about fighting for justice. It's a book about people with disabilities. We've got some really amazing, lovable characters. I wrote down here are a few things that I really loved about this book. First of all, it's one of those books that's like real life, but there's a little bit of fiction in it, like, where you're like, that could never happen. But I'm loving this. So there's that. There's, like this David and Goliath kind of theme going on. And then you've got these teenage girls that are the main characters. All right, so what I love, part real life, part fiction, part David and Goliath. Teenage girls as the main characters, people with disabilities as the heroes. Who does not love a book where the people with somebody with a disability is the hero? I mean, that's amazing. I was listening to an interview that Laurie Frankel did because I always like to read up on the author and listen to them talk about the book so that I can pull out little interesting facts for you guys. Okay. Fun fact about this book that I did not catch. And if you caught it, you get an extra credit. A plus something. I don't know. But. All right. This book is called 1, 2, 3. And it's about three teenage girls who are actually sisters and they're triplets, right? And so they call each other 1, 2, and 3 based on their birth order. Right? So then the brilliance of this book is that Lori tells the book through the perspective of these three teenage girls, right? One, two, and three. And they each tell. They each have their own, like, chapter. And she tells it through the different chapters. But the mind blowing, brilliant thing that Lori actually pulls off every chapter, they're written in sequential order. It goes 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3, 1st, 2, 3. So we have the three sisters. One is Mab, and they all have different syllables. Monday is number two, and mirable is number three. So they each have a chapter. It goes Mab, Monday miracle. Mab, Monday miracle. And I just think that that is just so fun and so brilliant. The bad guys in this book, they were not fully bad. They weren't like villain villains. And I like a book like that that makes you sort of like, you kind of hate them, but then you kind of also sort of have a little bit of feeling or empathy for them. And I thought that was a really great way that she did that. Anybody love how this was a small town? Can you relate to it being in a small town? I love the town. I loved how the town was actually like a character in the book. And I think one of my favorite things that an author can do, where they take something that is not actually a person and they make it a character like the town. So I felt like the town was as much a part of the story as the characters. And I loved how you. You were piecing together, like, what is going on with this town? And what is. Why are these people like this? And how are they going to overcome this? I loved, like I said, how some of the characters were, like, they were the bad guys, but then they weren't. So you've got Nathan, and, you know, he's trying to right the wrong that he created. Nathan, you know, he's like. He's a villain in some ways. Like, he's pretending to drink the water, right? That's really sleazy. And they're, you know, they're looking for these papers, but. But at the same time, he really wants her to right the wrongs that they've done. Then you've got Apple. And, you know, I didn't know if I could really get on board with her reasoning for why she, you know, she was trying to, like, cover for her father's name. Guys, this book is so great, and we have got to bring Lori on. But first, I'm going to talk about my favorite part of the book, because I know you're going to agree with this. There were so many amazing moments. I mean, I have written down so many memorable scenes from the very first scene where the girl says she remembers being in the womb, to when they save Mirabel, saves River from the Kyles, and finding out, okay, the damn paperwork. That was amazing. And that was tricky in the audiobook, because the girls, you know, they have to. The guy says, we don't want them to find out about the damn paperwork. And they think that he's cussing, but. But really it's about the dam that they made. My favorite part, the girls get in the backhoe to try to break the dam, and they get in the backhoe. And you would think, because, you know, all their lives, Mab is the one that does everything right, because Monday is so, you know, in her own head about all the things that irritate her. And. And Mirabel is so limited, and they get in the Thing. And MAB just like is like, I don't know how to drive a backhoe. And they're like, we're not gonna be able to do this. This is really hard. And then Mirabel is like, oh, I know how to do it because I read the manual because it's yellow. And so she read the manual, and then they realized that Mirabel is the best one to drive it because she drives her wheelchair with the joystick. Guys, that was the part that sold me. That was the part where I was just like, yes, this is a book club book. Lori is on it. She's right here. She's about to come on. Hi, Lori. Hi.

It is so amazing listening to you all do this.

Oh, thank you. It's so nice to meet you.

It's so nice to meet you. I just. I can't even tell you the experience of. Of watching these comments scroll up and just listening to you have this conversation. I'm so thrilled that you do this every month.

It's really fun, and we have a really fun community of people who read every month and come back. And we love to chat, and we love chatting with the authors. And so I know you're very busy, and I'm just so thankful that you're on here with us tonight.

Me too. I'm so thankful. I'm so thankful we're doing this. This is really, really cool. That's awesome.

So you live in Seattle.

I do.

And I have to tell you, Lori, the reason I picked up this book is because I read your book before that. This is how it always is, which I thought was brilliant. I just. What I love in reading and in fiction is a story that causes me to put myself in someone else's shoes and gives me empathy. And you've done that not only once, but twice now. And I just. I love this is how it always is. So I saw that your book was coming out this summer. I immediately put it in my wish list. We went to the beach, and I had it on audible, and I just loved it. So thank you for writing stories that make us. Make us think and that make us think about what it would be like to be another person. Thank you.

Thank you for reading it and thank you for saying that. That is. That is always my fondest, fondest hope that it lets you live in and as somebody else for a little while. And also that you read the one and then want to read the next one. Yeah, that's obviously. That's perfect.

Stephanie Maddelman says you gave so many voiceless people Voices. And I think that's true. Okay, thank you for that. So tell me, like how do you even begin to think of and then pull off a story like this? Like, what made you say that's what I want to write my next book about?

Yeah, I mean, it's such a good question. And the real answer is very, very slowly. It took me like three and a half years to write this book and to pull this off, I read an in the New York Times in January 2016 about a town in West Virginia downstream from a chemical plant that had been polluting the water. And the lawyer who was suing them on behalf of the town who was suing the company for like 25 years and counting. And I just thought that is really, really remarkable. And the more I started looking into it, the more I found that the pollution is actually not that remarkable. But that tenacity of the people in this town and this lawyer, I couldn't stop thinking about them. And indeed, when you read the news articles, what they say is long term health effects, but they're news articles so they don't have the long term, they're just reporting on current events. And so I just started thinking about what does long term look like? What does this look like a generation on, what does this look like two decades later? Later? And that was the starting point and it went from there.

Okay, so you come up with your plot and your place and then what makes you go, oh, let me ride it through three teenage girls?

Yeah. Such a good question. And one that I think if I had known how hard it was going to be, I might have answered differently than I did. I am always interested in how people can grow up with lots of things in common. They have lots of the same genes, they grew up in the same house, they have the same parent, they have the same water, they have, you know, the same home and the same community. And yet they are wildly different people. And that way you can look at how a single thing will be interpreted really differently by different people. That seems really interesting to me. It also then was pretty clear to me that they were all going to want to talk because teenage girls were never going to say, oh well, you talk and I'll just end your violin. And they were gonna have to all narrate in their own voices because they are so different from one another and they, and they're very present and they're very ill behaved because they're teenage girls. They did not do what I told them to do. And then I had to follow their lead. There Was nothing I could do about it. I should have been prepared for that. But I think nothing prepares you for teenage girls.

That's really funny and also really scary because I have a 10 year old daughter.

Oh. Mine turned 13 a couple weeks ago. So I'm. So I'm. It's brand new. We'll see.

Right there. So what was like, what was the biggest challenge? And I said at the beginning, you did this thing where you wrote 1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3. And like, how did that. How did you. What were the challenges in staying true to that?

Yeah, and you're exactly right. That is exactly why this took me three and a half years to write. At first they all sounded like me and I used to be a teenage girl, but it's been 30 years. And it's not that I'm like a genius, but I've learned some things. I'm certainly smarter than I was when I was a teenage girl. And so I had to dial them all back. And then they all had to be really, really. Because they are so different from one another. They navigate the world so differently than one another. They had to sound different from one another. It was really important to me that you be able to be like that. You could open any page and read it and know who was talking because they sound so different. And it just took lots and lots and lots and lots of editing. And it was really structurally challenging because anytime. Because of what you're talking about, anytime I added a chapter, I had to add three. And anytime I took a chapter away, I had to take two other ones. And so I had to figure out how they could each tell their own story, but plus the overarching story while they all sound like themselves and talk to each other. It was not easy, but it was very gratifying. When I eventually got there, was there.

Any part where you were like, I can't do this?

Yes, all the time.

What makes you. Is there a person that reads like, is like a friend or sister? Somebody who's like, no, no, no, this is good. Keep going?

Yeah, my husband does that for me. He reads it in lots of stages. He probably reads this book half a dozen times before, before it comes out. And even better than that, he talks to me about it because we have this ongoing conversation for three years where I'm asking him about people I have made up and we. As if they are real people because they have become real to us. And I don't know how people do that without live in help. I really need my husband to do that for Me, because he's here.

Oh, that's amazing. It is.

He's amazing. He's very good at it, too.

My husband also lives in the books that I read because I always tell him about them. And I think he feels like he has read these books because he's like, now, which one is tonight? That's, that's. That's really great. I. I can't imagine just reading something that you've written over and over and over again and not. Do you not get tired of it? Or like, does it all start to look the same? Do you. Do you have to take long breaks from it?

So it changes so much over the course of things and hopefully it mostly gets better. And so that sort of comforting. You read it over again. And I do get. I do sort of. I mean, I think like, like any work it gets, there are days when you are tired of it. There are days when you would rather do something else. But. But it's my job, so. So I kind of, you know, push on through it. By the end, I like, when I'm doing copy edits, when I'm doing proofreading, I can recite it, which is no good for proofreading, but. But up until then, it's really changing every time I look at it. And so, and so that. That sort of keeps it exciting. And I, you know, I'm always trying to see new things in it to figure out where it can be pushed. So until I get down to the kind of nitty gritty of commas, it's growing the whole time.

That's amazing. So you lived with these characters for three years?

Yes.

Who did you miss the most when the book was published?

When you have it in book form? I mean, it's such a great question. It's funny watching everybody love Monday. I also love Monday. Monday is my favorite one. But I think I miss Mirabel the most. And that's a really interesting. I don't think anyone has asked me that question, and I think that that's different. I think that the Monday was my favorite one to write, but Mirabella's the one who I think of. You know, I haven't read the book in. I guess it left my hands about a year ago and I haven't read it since because I would want to keep making changes to it. And, you know, I do think of them because they, you know, they are. I mean, I get to know them so well. They feel like daughters to me. They lived in my head for so, so long, and so now I miss them. Like, I would. Anybody who I became close with. And then left.

Right. I feel like, Mav, you maybe miss the least because she, like, went off.

Yeah.

And you don't necessarily have to worry about her. And Monday is just funny. She's just such a. Yeah. Such a strong character that you might. I would imagine, like, I could imagine how Monday would react to a certain situation or a meal that I made or whatever. But. But Mirabel just had this presence, and just. Her presence was always there, and you could feel that throughout the book. And the way. I know I already said this, but the way that you made her the hero of the book was just so brilliant and touching, and I just thought that was. You know, when you're reading a book and you just don't see. See something coming.

Yes.

And I just. I didn't. I wasn't in that. I was so into the book that I was just letting it happen. I wasn't necessarily going like, oh, this can happen. This is going to happen. And so when that happened, I just was like, oh, wow, that was so great.

That is. That is my fondest hope. I'm thrilled to hear it. And I think you're absolutely right. Maribel is the one that you worry about going forward. And whereas I. I do think you have hope that Mab will go off and see the world. And I miss her, too, and I love her, too. But it's true, I worry about her less. She weighs less on my heart.

So how'd you come up with the title?

My editor came up with this title. I have written four books, and I have titled zero Books early on. And sometimes, I mean, sometimes we go all the way, you know, very far into the publishing process before we land on a title or. Or end up changing a title that we've. We've been with for a really long time. But this one, my. My editor, who's really, really wonderful very early on, said, I, I, this is what we're going to call this book. And. And she was absolutely right about that.

It's a great title.

It's a great title.

It's. It's great. And it's great how it all comes together as you're. As you're piecing the story together. But you set it up right in front of you in the beginning, but then you pull it off, too.

Yeah.

So that's interesting to me that you don't necessarily need a title for your story, it's just your story. Do you have working titles?

I do. I mean, I have titles. I just get outvoted you would think that that wouldn't happen, but it. But it definitely does. This one. I mean, because it is my fourth book and I have yet to title a book. I sort of knew going in that I wasn't going to be able to. To keep the title for a while. I was just calling it Bourne, which is the name of the town. But there are so many different ways to spell it that that makes it a difficult. Like a difficult title, you know, just practically speaking, like, it's hard to Google. It's hard to tell somebody about because. Because there are so many different spellings. For a while I was calling it Downriver, but there are a number of other books that have that title and so that didn't quite work or like Downstream. So I was just kind of flirting with. With those things when. No, I have this great idea and she's full of great ideas and that. I love that title. I love this title.

I love it, too. Do you have a way that you. That you like to write or a spot or a rhythm? Or are you. It's so interesting because we've talked. I've talked to a lot of authors, and you get the full gamut. You get authors who hand write their first draft. You get authors who, you know, just think about the book and let it happen. I don't know.

What's your process? I do the whole thing on my laptop. I don't handwrite anything. I don't even handwrite notes anymore because my first book, I had notes on the back of grocery lists. I had notes on napkins, I had notes on receipts, and they were all in my purse and they were in my wallet and they were in the car and they fell out and I could never find what I was looking for. So now even those notes, even those idle ideas I keep on the computer so that it's all in one document. I write in a program called Scrivener, which, if anybody is working on long form, is doing any writing yourself. I cannot recommend Scrivener highly enough. It keeps my brain all pointed in the same direction, which I super appreciate. And I can write anywhere as long as I have something to. As long as I have my computer with me. And so I often, like, I bring it in the car when I'm running carpool or I'm waiting for school to get out or, you know, things like sometimes I bring it. And when I used to spend hours sitting at the playground watching my kid on the monkey bars, I'd bring my computer with me and write. Then I Try to be able to write anywhere at any time, because life is really. Parenting in particular is not conducive to having, you know, to having, like, guaranteed minutes or hours. Tell yourself to do has. I mean, and my kid hasn't actually left the house in like a year and a half because she never. She never did go back to school last year. And so, you know, so I wrote in the bathroom and I wrote in the car and I wrote in the laundry room and that kind of thing. And that, that was good practice, I think, for. For being able to get it done.

That's amazing. Do you. I know the answer to this, but do you like to read yourself?

Yes, I like to read myself. I read all. I read constantly, in fact. Then this speaks to your previous question. I usually write with a book in my lap or like, I have the laptop in my lap and the book next to me on the sofa. So I read actually wall. I write in addition to. Well, I'm reading almost all the time.

Is that something you do, like when you need a break? When you're like, ah, my brain, you just pick up whatever and Is it typically novels?

Yes, almost always. Almost exclusively. Yeah. Unless I'm doing research for the book. It's. I'm almost always reading novels. And yeah, it's exactly like that. Because, you know, I think that what. What we often do is you're writing and you need a break, and so you tab over to Google and then 20 minutes later you're like, knee deep in cat videos. And this is not, you know, this is productive. So if instead of doing that, I just, you know, instead of doing the social media, instead of, you know, go following down the rabbit hole, I'm reading some, like, somebody else's novel. Then I. It serves to kind of remind me of what I am doing in addition to giving my brain a little bit of a break to reset so I can go back to whatever it was I was supposed to be writing.

That's amazing. All right, so let me ask you a couple questions about what you like to read. Do you have an author that you've read all of their books?

Oh, my gosh, yes. Tons of them. Lots. I mean, most. Lots, yes.

Who would you say is like, this is my favorite author?

Oh, gosh. I mean, that's so hard because I love so many authors, so I. My degree is in Shakespeare, so I do a lot of Shakespeare. I love Shakespeare. So that's like the easy answer. But as far as novels go, I mean, like, we could just have a little tour of My bookshelf here. So, I mean, people who. I've read all of their books. Can I do this? Can I tell you what books to read? Yeah. This book, Migrations. Charlotte McConaughey.

I just put that in my wish list this week. I read something about it. Okay.

And then this is her last. This one just came out. She has some. I want to say this is all of her books, but in fact, it isn't because she has. She's an Australian author, and she has a lot of books that she has written that she published in Australia that haven't come out here yet. But otherwise, I feel like, oh, no, I read all of them. Ruth Ozeki's new book is coming out in October, maybe. I think it's early October of this year. And I've read all of her books except for the one that hasn't come out yet. I don't know why I haven't read an advanced copy of it. I really definitely should. Mark Hayden is an author. I have read absolutely all of his books. David Mitchell. I've read all. I mean, every last one of his books. And there are lots of them. Oh, Kate Atkinson. Yes, Ken Atkinson. You know, and some of it is that I've read all of their books because on the first day the new one comes out, I go to the bookstore and buy them. And, you know, that way, you know that you don't miss any. But I feel like when I love an author, then, yeah, the first thing I do is go back and read everything they've read.

And you like to read actual books?

I do both. I prefer to read than to listen just because I am a visual learner myself, so that's what works best for me. I. I like to listen in the car, but I live in a city, so I. I don't spend that much time in the car. And, and, and so then I get into the book and then I have to leave it. And then I come home and. And I'm cooking and I'm, like, not paying attention and that kind of thing. Whereas if I'm reading, I'm. I'm reading. I like to read from the library on my iPad, but because I can look up words I don't know, which is great. But I really like to read books. I mean, I like. There's nothing better that's chunky and it smells nice, and I can write in the margins and really, really love a book.

Everybody is saying, show us more of your bookshelf. They're loving this. My mom, Anybody writing this down.

Okay. I mean, I could do this all night long. It's really. It's. The funny thing about these events that are live like this is that I'm sitting next to my bookshelf. I could do this all night. Hilary Mantel is an author about whom I cannot say enough. And this is the third in a trilogy, the Wolf Hall Trilogy. Now, I haven't actually. This is an interesting example. I haven't read all of hers because she has so many books. So I'm kind of slowly working my way through all of them. But the Wolf hall books are amazing. It's like 2,000 pages worth of. Worth of wonder and fabulousness. And this book. This book is like a top three reading experience for me. I cannot say enough good things about this.

That's the top three?

Yeah. I mean, not necessarily.

It's called the Mirror and the Light.

Yeah. But in order to really get it, you have to read the first two. This is historical fiction. It's Henry viii, Thomas Cromwell. It's. It's hardcore. It's so good.

Is there a book or an author that made you fall in love with reading, with literature?

Oh, yes. Beverly Cleary. I read all of the Beezus and Ramona books. I read them over and over and over again. I read them until my parents were like, get out of the house. We cannot read this book anymore. Yeah.

I love Beverly Cleary. I read Ramona the Pest to each one of my kids the year before they went to kindergarten. And so I think I've read the Ramona series. I read it as a child, and I read it twice with. Once with my boys and then once with my daughter. I'm a huge fan of Beverly Cleary.

Yes. Oh, me too. I mean, she is so inspirational, you know, just like the life that she lived and all of the books that she put into the hands of, you know, kids who needed books and really, that, you know, writing. These really, really strong girls. She changed my life.

That's so amazing. Hey, thank you so much for.

Thank you so much.

I could talk to you about books all night long. And that's like, truly all of the amazing people that are in this book club, that's what we like to do.

We like to talk about books.

So I just.

I.

And I always love to ask authors what they like to read because. Because I've never met a fiction writer who doesn't love fiction, and it's just amazing. And. And your books are special. Your books are really special. They. They really. You're. You're. You're using story to. To help us think. And so thank you for that.

Thank you for that. I really love how you put that and I appreciate it the most. And oh, my gosh, I'm happy to talk about books all the day long anytime. As you can see. I do this all day.

I love it. Thank you so much, Lori. I really appreciate you being on with us tonight.

Thank you. Thank you for having me and thank you for doing this. I think it's really remarkable.

Thanks, Lori. Bye. Well, guys, that was amazing. I hope that you enjoyed that conversation as much as I did. I absolutely love fiction. I can't believe that I get to meet so many amazing authors. And Laurie was delightful. I know that you would agree. Hey, if you liked the book or if you didn't read the book, you want to pick it up. This is a book. One more time. One, two, three. By Laurie Frankel. And if you liked this video, if you liked this interview, make sure that you like it, that you comment. Tell me an author that you want me to read and have on. And make sure that you can subscribe, that you subscribe so that you can find out when we're posting more content just like this. And hey, if you want to officially be a part of the book club, go to hollyfurdick.com all I'm going to do is send you an email once a month, let you know what book we're reading and when we're meeting so that you can join us live on Instagram for all of our amazing conversations, the amazing books that we get to read. I love you. I'll see you next time.

Sa.