Thank You for Listening(110)

But it was my choice to walk away.

What if it hadn’t been?

What if “no” had been said for me?

What if the main character I’d been seeking had been kicked unceremoniously out of the pursuit of her dream, against her will, and that was why she was narrating?

I’d already written a book about choosing to walk away from an old dream and toward a new one.

This time, I wanted to write a book about accepting the absence of that choice. Nothing to overcome, nothing to be corrected . . . just something to accept.

It occurred to me, then, that I had explored this territory once before, albeit nascently.

Before My Oxford Year, I had been working on a YA novel about a seventeen-year-old girl growing up in Los Angeles, the daughter of a celebrity publicist. A pretty girl, a not-terribly-ambitious girl, a girl for whom doors opened simply because she was pretty and fame-adjacent. And one day, this girl skipped school and went skydiving with her friend and almost died. But she didn’t. She survived, with half her face.

Her journey was accepting that while she may at first feel like an ugly duckling, she was actually a Swan.

So, I finally had my main character and, to borrow a line from her, I had her “why.”

Finally, I was ready to write.

But first . . .

I had to promote My Oxford Year.

And attend to my day job of recording other people’s books.

And then I got a job offer at an audio-based tech start-up I couldn’t refuse.

And then, after building the company to a place where I was able to step back, I finally, finally, sat down to write three chapters and a synopsis.

And then I flew to New York and met with my agent to discuss the pages.

And that meeting was on March 2, 2020.

The fact that this book about accepting all the things we can’t change was written during the turmoil and upheaval of 2020/2021 seems fitting.

It was ten years in the making.

It was my pandemic baby.

It was my refuge from the madness.

Just when I would begin to think there was no empathy or laughter or romance left in the world, I’d open my computer and there were Swan and Nick, waiting for me to get cracking. Empathizing. Laughing. Romancing.

And it became autobiographical in a sense far deeper than occupation or history or family. It became the embodiment of all the hope for the future I wanted to have, but often found I couldn’t muster. Just like my main characters. Into them, I wrote my fears as well as the antidote to those fears: the urging to take the risk. To trust in the outcome, an outcome that, whatever it may be, would at least be the result of action instead of inaction. That seemed worth writing about in these times. It seemed, as Sewanee observes at the end about Nick’s voice, something to believe in.

Which, I suppose, is the very essence of Romance novels.





Reading Group Guide


Throughout the story, Sewanee works toward accepting and embracing all that life has given, and taken away, from her. What do you think the turning point was for her to actually accept the way her life had changed? How do you think the future will fare for her now that she’s no longer living in grief for her old self?

There’s a lot of discussion about happily ever afters. Romance has them, but so do mysteries and thrillers (the bad guy is caught by the good guy). Why do you think they are important to so much of fiction?

Sewanee and Nick both have huge fans. Do you follow any audiobook narrators or podcasts? Why do you think people can connect so much to just a voice? Furthermore, how do you think this might change if audiobooks are synthetically narrated by AI in the future?

Are you an audiobook listener? Do you think it’s a different experience than reading?

What did you think about June’s last letter? Do you think Sewanee and Nick were meant to be or do you think they were lucky to find each other?

Speaking of meant to be, do you find that Adaku’s perception of life—that everything happens for a reason—is true? Or is Sewanee’s belief that everything just happens more accurate?

We see many different sides of Hollywood in this book—from Sewanee, Adaku, and Blah Blah. Did any of their stories challenge your conception of Hollywood?

Sewanee loves her best friend and is genuinely happy for Adaku’s success, but there is an admitted undercurrent of jealousy. If you feel “less than” someone else, do you think your admiration for them is truly honest, or is it only masking envy, resentment, and jealousy?

Sewanee and Nick fall for each other in two very different ways. Do you think it’s possible to fall in love with a person without ever seeing them or meeting face to face?

If Brock hadn’t turned out to be Nick, and Sewanee had found herself in a love triangle, who do you think she would have chosen? Who would you have chosen?

Marilyn and Stu found each other later in life, but Marilyn assures Sewanee that she and Henry “had a good life together,” that as difficult as he could be, “life is never one thing.” Do you think it’s possible to have an “unhappy” ending with someone and still find the life you shared to have been meaningful?





Praise for Thank You for Listening


“Mix Julia Whelan’s storytelling ability and smart banter with a cynical romance audiobook narrator who won’t trust a happily ever after and what do you get? Pure magic.”