Interview with Jessa Maxwell - THE GOLDEN SPOON

[00:11] Cindy: Welcome to the award-winning Thoughts from a Page podcast, a member of the Evergreen Podcasts Network hosted by me, Cindy Burnett, a voracious reader and book columnist who provides you with casual author conversations and book recommendation episodes, as well as insider information on all of the newest releases that I personally endorse and on the publishing industry in my Behind the Scenes series. With so many books coming out weekly, it can be hard to decide what to read, so I find the best ones and share them with you. For more book recommendations or to find my backlist of interviews, visit my website at thoughtsfromapage.com.

Have you read a book recently that really resonated with you and makes you want to read a book more like it? If so, submit a Read Alike Request to me through my Google Form located in today's Show Notes and tell me why you loved it, and I will suggest some similar reads on a future Tuesday episode.

If you are interested in reading some great books before they publish, I hope you will consider joining my Patreon group to access additional content, including early reads and pre-pub author chats and bonus episodes. For March we are reading Fifth Avenue Glamour Girl by Renee Rosen. For April, my selection is The Comeback Summer by writing duo Ali Brady. I just added Banyan Moon by Thao Thai for May, and The Bones of the Story by Carol Goodman for June. The link to join is in the Show Notes.

Today I am chatting with Jessa Maxwell about The Golden Spoon. Jessa lives in Jamestown, Rhode Island, with her husband, two cats and her three legged dog. The Golden Spoon is her first novel. I hope you enjoy our conversation.

And now for my Read Alike request segment. While every book is unique and stands alone, certain elements of books we really love stick with us. While lots of websites use algorithms to try and recommend similar books, I rarely find that these recommendations make sense because they do not focus on what it is I liked about a particular book. That is what I want to tap into the aspects of the book that appealed to the requester and to focus on finding those elements in other books. Today's request is from Deanna, who is at @she_reads_truth_365, and she selected The Local by Joey Hartstone, one of my favorite thrillers from last year. This one has been described as The Lincoln Lawyer in the land of Friday Night Lights, where a freewheeling patent attorney must take on his first murder trial when an out of town client is accused of killing a federal judge. Deanna liked the book because she enjoyed the legal courtroom experience, along with the humor and banter the main character had with other characters. My first recommendation is a series by Harlan Coben that stars Myron Bolitar and his sidekick Win. While the books are not legal thrillers, Myron is a sports agent, there is so much humor in these books, and the mysteries are always very engaging. The initial installment in the series is entitled Deal Breaker, and in it, Myron is poised on the edge of the big time. So is Christian's Deal, a rookie quarterback and Myron's prized client. But when Christian gets a phone call from a former girlfriend, a woman who everyone, including the police, believe is dead, the deal starts to go sour. So Myron must figure out how to save his client in his own business. Sadly, Coben focuses more now on standalones, but occasionally adds to this series, and I always pick them up when he does. I think they are great Read Alikes for The Local because the main characters really remind me of each other, as well as the fact that each of them, both Myron and James Euchre, are having to pivot a little bit, go outside their comfort zone. In addition, both the local and the Myron Bolitar series contain compelling and unique mysteries. My next recommendation is The Lincoln Lawyer and its follow ups by Michael Connolly. Mickie Haller is the Lincoln Lawyer, a criminal defense attorney who operates out of the back seat of his Lincoln Town Car. He travels between the far flung courthouses of Los Angeles to defend clients of every kind bikers, con artists, drunk drivers, drug dealers they're all on Mickey Haller's client list. For him, the law is rarely about guilt or innocence. It's about negotiation and manipulation. Sometimes it's even about justice, which is exactly what the focus was in The Local. I love this series, which at times overlaps with Connolly's other series starring Harry Bosch, the two are half-brothers. In addition, this series has been made into a movie and a limited run TV series, the second of which is really good. Both Mickey's personality and the legal focus make these great Read Alikes for the Local. The last recommendation for a Read Alike for the Local is another series, the Elvis Cole Books by Robert Craze. Elvis is one of My all-time favorite fictional characters and is sharply humorous, much like James Euchre in The Local. In The Monkey's Raincoat, the first novel in the series, Elvis is hired by a woman to track down her missing husband, who abducted their son. A quiet and seemingly submissive wife. Ellen can't even write a check without him. All she wants to do is get him and her son back, no questions asked. Elvis Cole is the king of banter and witty expressions, so this one lines up really well with one of the aspects of The Local that Deanna really enjoyed. I recently read a fabulous new mystery that comes out in July called A Bitter Past by Bruce Borgos, and the main character in it reminded me a lot of James Euchre. A Bitter Past is set in Nevada, where Porter Beck is a small town sheriff, so the legal aspects aren't really present. But the story is so compelling, and Porter is just downright hilarious. Thanks, Deanna, for submitting a Read Alike Request and I hope you enjoy these recommendations.

Welcome, Jessa. How are you today?

[05:34] Jessa: I am doing great. I am just sitting here in my little home office trying to get some writing done this morning and just getting ready for my book to come out.

[05:47] Cindy: You must be getting so excited. I cannot tell you how much I loved The Golden Spoon and I can't wait for others to read it.

[05:54] Jessa: Thank you. Yeah, it's very exciting. A little nerve wracking. Yeah. Having my first novel come out, it's going to be very interesting to see what people think of it.

[06:04] Cindy: I'm sure they're going to love it. So, before we dive into questions, would you give me a quick synopsis of The Golden Spoon for those that haven't read it yet?

[06:13] Jessa: Sure. It is about a baking competition that takes place at a manor house called Grafton that is owned and run by the woman who descended of the original owner of the manor. Her name is Betsy Martin and she is kind of baking prodigy, like America's grandmother is her kind of name that they call her. And she hosts this competition there. Every year they bring in six different contestants to see who can win The Golden Spoon. And this time she's joined by Archie Morris, who is a brash kind of different person than she is. And for ratings, they need to add someone to it and he kind of shakes things up a bit and things go kind of south from there.

[07:08] Cindy: I loved the pitch for it. Only Murders in the Building meets the Great British Bake Off.

[07:13] Jessa: Yeah. Basically, it's a murder at a baking competition. It's the one line description.

[07:20] Cindy: How did you come up with the idea for this one?

[07:22] Jessa: Yeah, sure. So I had been wanting to write a mystery for a long time and it was, you know, mid pandemic. I had other things I was supposed to be doing, but I had this kind of nagging feeling inside that I needed to do this or I would never do it. And I had a bunch of different I still have so many ideas for mysteries and I had thought about a couple of different ones and I really wanted to do something. I love reading, like, Lucy Foley's books and these kind of locked room fun. Agatha Christie-style mysteries. And I had this I was talking to my mom on the phone, I think, and I was going for a walk, feeling very sorry for myself that I hadn't written a novel yet. And I thought about this, like, what it would be like to have, like, a baking competition, have a murder. It just popped into my head, honestly. And then I was like, no. And then I thought about it some more and I was like, no, that's actually kind of perfect because you have all these different kinds of people that are in one small space, which I think is so much fun. And I love that they can be different ages, different, you know, backgrounds, and then you can have these really distinct voices, which is something I really enjoyed doing in the book. Yeah, I just started writing it. I wrote it very quickly. I wrote it in three months and then I submitted it. So that was a very wonderful first novel experience. And the second one has been a lot harder, I have to say.

[08:42] Cindy: People often say that, that the sophomore outing is much more difficult than the first one, so you're not alone. But what kind of research did you have to do? Like, I was so curious about your research. Did you watch just tons upon tons of baking shows to see how they operated? Is that something you'd already done?

[08:58] Jessa: That's something I'd already I love the British Bake Off in particular. It's such a cool construct. I love the different people. You get so annoyed with certain people and so kind of enamored with certain people, and you feel like you have a sense for who they are, but then do you really? There's always that kind of question underneath it all. So I had done it when I was drawing. I was an illustrator for a living, so I would watch the British Bake Off on a computer behind where I was drawing a lot of the time just to kind of fill in the time and the noise behind me. And so I had these things in my head already. I didn't know anything about television production, and I honestly didn't research that much of it, but I did research just the names for various equipment and things. And then when I did talk to some of different people about optioning the book, everything seemed to be like, I did it the right way, which is kind of a miracle. So just my own research was all just, like, fun research.

[10:03] Cindy: Did you go behind the scenes on any of those shows to figure out what happens when the viewers aren't there?

[10:09] Jessa: No, but how fun would that be? I didn't I did not go behind the scenes, but I'm absolutely open to doing that at some point. That would be amazing.

[10:19] Cindy: I think that would be so fun. I'm not a big baking show watcher. I have watched that Cupcake one, and I'm sitting here racking my brain for what the name of it? Is it's Cupcake Wars?. My daughter and I have watched that one off and on for years, but it's been a while because she's now in college, so that's really the only one I've watched. But it was so much fun reading your book and just determining what they were doing. And as things go wrong, this falls into the sugar. I was like, oh, this is so entertaining, for sure.

[10:44] Jessa: And it was really, I have to say, like, the hardest part of making the book was coming up with the rules for the show because within the confines of a novel, I had to have a limited amount of people I had to have a limited amount of days that it would take place over. And that was the hardest part for sure, of writing. It was like trying to figure out the rules of my own fictional cooking show.

[11:10] Cindy: And I liked the rules that you picked where it was supposed to be a kinder gentler, where they weren't screaming at the contestants and things like that.

[11:17] Jessa: I mean, that is definitely an homage to the Bake Off, which is very much that way. And I think it's, like, kind of the classy as one of those shows for sure.

[11:27] Cindy: Now I'm going to have to watch it.

[11:29] Jessa: It's so good. Yeah, it's so wonderful.

[11:31] Cindy: What about coming up with six distinct contestants? Did you pull from some of the people you saw on television? Did you just literally come up with your own? Was it hard to make sure they were all extremely distinct from each other?

[11:44] Jessa: It wasn't too hard. I really was conscious of that as I was writing them. They came to me very fully formed, honestly. Like, I really enjoyed writing them. I didn't know who would go home first when I started writing it. I wasn't sure who I would choose to kind of keep going, who would go home at any point. I wasn't sure who would be the murderer at that point of any of them. So that was kind of fun and also confusing at times to explore. But no, I didn't have too much trouble coming up with different ones. I loved some of them. I really enjoyed writing each of them, and I miss them now. And I'm writing my current book.

[12:26] Cindy: I always laugh when authors say they still think about their characters or wonder what they're doing. I wonder where they are now.

[12:34] Jessa: Yeah, I don't know about that for me, but I definitely miss writing certain particularly Purdue was my favorite character to write, so I definitely miss writing him.

[12:44] Cindy: Yeah, he was a hoot. I loved the format. So you talk about not knowing who was going to go home each day, not knowing who the murderers were going to be, but we also don't know who is it murdery? Is that the right word? We don't know who the murdered person is. We know at the beginning there is a murder, but we don't know until the end or close to the end who dies. So did you always structure it that way? Did you always know who that person was going to be? How did that work for you?

[13:09] Jessa: I did the first thing I wrote of the book was the first chapter of the book, which for me is not always the case. Like, I skip around when I'm writing. But that was very fully fleshed out from the very beginning, and I didn't change it at all, really, and I knew who was going to get murdered. And so then it was just kind of getting to that point, which was confusing. I had no idea. It took me probably until I was two thirds of the way through, and then I'd have to go back and rewrite certain things before I knew who the person would be.

[13:40] Cindy: Well, that was going to be my next question. Was there a fair amount of editing as you were writing? Even if you knew who was going to be killed, you still have to structure it where the reader doesn't know that. So you have to kind of make sure you're not dropping too many clues, but you're dropping enough clues that it kind of guide you along the way. So did that require a lot of work?

[13:57] Jessa: Yeah, I think, like, that is always confusing and trying to find trying to know, to figure out what to reveal and when. It's such a confusing thing when you're writing sometimes. I definitely struggle with that now. I think I was, I don't know, maybe weirdly confident because I hadn't done this before, but I didn't have as much trouble with that book as I am with my current book. But I did have to go back and tweak certain things to fit with what the outcome was going to be, but it never felt hard. I always think of book like writing. It's more of a process of sculpting, kind of where you have the basics there, and then you can go in and tweak it. I really enjoy that process, so never felt too bad.

[14:44] Cindy: I would wonder if you're in the throes of writing and it's also familiar to you when you show it to your editor, if he or she is like, oh, okay, I could guess it too quickly here, you need to fix this little part, or maybe we need a few more details. I didn't know if any of that happened or if you felt you could stay impartial enough that you were able to do that yourself.

[15:02] Jessa: I think I was able to do that myself mostly. I mean, of course, my editor was very helpful and when she looked at it several times, gave me different ideas and things that she thought I should add or tweak, but we really didn't do a ton of, like, super happy at it. I definitely think about it pretty objectively, I think, but I also think that was partly because I wrote it so fast and I didn't have time to really stew in it and like, go back and forth in my head too much, if that makes sense.

[15:34] Cindy: It does. And three months is a very fast time period, so also you're not going to forget what you did nine or ten months ago. You're kind of in the middle of it all there, and so it's not going to require you to go back as much. Probably three months is fast.

[15:47] Jessa: It was really yeah, fast. Which I was like, oh, I guess that's how long it takes me to write a book. This is clearly not true, so but I really yeah, I had just so much fun writing this book.

[15:58] Cindy: Oh, I bet you did. It's so much fun to read. And I just love all the different things that are happening, but I like the distinct characters and kind of learning a little bit more about each one of them and what's going to happen. I think Gerald might have been my favorite.

[16:11] Jessa: Yeah, Gerald's really fun too, and really funny. And I just is such a good character. I loved all of them. Honestly. It would be hard to have the book without any of them, I think. And that was the fun thing about using multiple perspectives that each person kind of brings their own skill set to the plot and you can play off of each other. I thought it was just such a fun way to kind of unspool a story, definitely.

[16:38] Cindy: Because each character reveals different things, and so you really have to be paying attention to make sure you don't miss something. And then in the next chapter, the next character is talking about something that just happened to the previous to that person from a different perspective sometimes. And I really liked that as well.

[16:52] Jessa: Yeah, I tried to look at it very visually. I like thinking about I think because I was an artist before I was a writer, I like looking at things, like, kind of cinematically and almost like each section was like a little mini episode in itself, which I worked well, I think, because it was the making of television program. I think that keeping it where one character I never went backwards in time, really. I mean, it did when I was having a flashback, but the story, like each character, their part would take place in the next section of time. And so it was always moving the story forward, each section. And I really thought that worked well for this book.

[17:32] Cindy: I definitely thought it worked well, too, because I think it might have been confusing with all of those characters and the window of time you had included if you were also then trying to go back and forth on the days. Lately, I've seen that a couple of times in it. I really have to think and pay attention. Okay, now, where does this fall in the whole timeline? And sometimes that's just too much for me.

[17:50] Jessa: Yeah, that can be a lot.

[17:51] Cindy: It can. What was the highlight of writing the book?

[17:54] Jessa: I think feeling like I could finish a novel. And honestly, I had so much fun during the process of writing it. It was so gratifying. I always write 1000 words a day while I'm writing, and I made sure I wrote 1000 words every day. And it was just such an exciting thing to feel it coming together and to see it take in shape and then to send it out and submit it and get so many great responses, it's very exciting. It's really the dream when you write a book that that's what happens with it. And I was very fortunate.

[18:26] Cindy: Well, I think it's constructed really well and I think it's such a unique theme. I mean, I think people love the type of shows that we've talked about. Both Only Murders in the Building, which I'm a huge fan of, and the baking shows. And so I think some kind of combination for people is perfect. I can't think of any other book out there like that.

[18:44] Jessa: Well, that's nice to hear. I mean, I really love those I love that show too. Only Murders especially. It's the first season that I thought was so great. I think there's like a kindness to that show that I really appreciate and I want my book to have. I love thrillers. I love really dark things. I don't think my book is super dark. I think of it as kind of a cross between a cozy and a thriller. Not like a cozy mystery, because I love the elements of thrillers and I don't think it's just like a formulaic mystery. But yeah, I think those shows are so great and I just am so glad that I was able to do that with this book and put so many like, kind of I like to add a little sweetness to it and I think that was perfect with the subject matter.

[19:29] Cindy: I think so too. I definitely don't think it's a cozy. I mean, I've seen people saying that a little bit. I mean, I worked at a mystery bookstore and I know what the cozys look like and there's just kind of one after another with all the pun titles and everything, and this doesn't remind me of that at all. So I think it's just a really great mystery. It's just not super dark, which for me works well. Like, I don't like super dark and I don't like all of these really unlikable characters. And of course they're all human, but your people are regular. They're not just dastardly the entire time. I mean, they're just living their lives, doing their thing, and obviously some are worse than others, but that's normal versus sometimes I read these books and I'm like, okay, who are all of these people? I have never encountered so many awful people in one place. It's just not very realistic. And I felt like yours was more in line with just regular, everyday people.

[20:16] Jessa: I really yeah, I appreciate that. Thank you. I prefer that kind of character also. And I think that people are all kind of doing their best and they go off track sometimes, and I think that's more in line with how I view the world instead of I don't think there are too many just ultra-villains out there. I think people don't start out that way generally. Of course, they do exist, but I'm not interested in writing from their perspectives.

[20:46] Cindy: Necessarily, and I'm not interested in reading their perspective. So that's great. We're a good fit, and there's no woman who's unreliable because she's doing drugs or drinking. I mean, I just feel like I'm done with all of that.

[20:57] Jessa: There are a lot of tropes that are played out over and over again, and they do get a little tedious, I think.

[21:03] Cindy: So that, I think, is what appealed to me so much about your book. It's just a regular mystery with a unique format and a unique storyline, and that's what I think readers are looking for, or at least this reader is looking for.

[21:15] Jessa: I hope so.

[21:18] Cindy: I'll do my best to make sure that they know about it.

[21:20] Jessa: Thank you.

[21:21] Cindy: Well, the thing that I love about your book, in addition to the interior, is the exterior. Like, the second I saw your cover, which was many months ago, I was like, I don't even care what that book is about. I have to read it. I mean, you have the best cover, and the title is pretty spectacular, too. Did you just love it when you saw it?

[21:39] Jessa: It's amazing. It was the second cover that I was given, and I want to make sure I say his name correctly. I think it's James Iacobelli. And it is absolutely beautiful. It was just such a beautiful design. He did such a good job with it, the way it was printed. Do you have a finished copy?

[21:58] Cindy: I don't have a finished copy. I need to get one.

[22:01] Jessa: It's just stunning. They're so shiny, and it has the embossing, and it's just this gorgeous piece of art. I really am so fortunate with the design of it. I think they did such a fantastic job.

[22:13] Cindy: Oh, I love the covers that he does, as well as his partner, Olga Grlic. I have interviewed her for my behind the scenes series. Actually, it was before it was behind the Scenes. It was just as a cover designer. And I love the work they do. And they have a great Instagram account @bookcoversbyOJ. And so with the two of them together, so you can see and I see yours there now. I somehow had missed that. Well, they do a spectacular job.

[22:35] Jessa: Yeah, I've seen other covers of his, too. I can't remember what one I saw recently, and I was like, wow, he is just so good at it. Yeah, it's such a stunning cover. I'm so lucky.

[22:45] Cindy: It really is. And then the title, obviously, I know what the title signifies, the award, but is that the title you started with, or did you all work to come up with that? How did that happen?

[22:54] Jessa: No, I came up with that title while I was working on the book. I think probably I was about a third of the way into it when I came up with it, and I wanted it to kind of it's the award. But it also kind of alludes to people who are born with privilege and people who are born without privilege, which I think the book also discusses.

[23:15] Cindy: Definitely without any spoilers.

[23:18] Jessa: To me, that's like a very important thing, too. I think it's like I love having a diverse cast of characters across the board. And I think having people coming from different backgrounds, different socioeconomic backgrounds, is really important to me also, because I think a lot of books you read, it's like five rich 20 year olds. And I just think it's fun to see people coming from different places. I grew up without that much money, so it's very nice to write about normal people.

[23:44] Cindy: Exactly. Again, like we were talking kind of reflecting back the actual world. And I think that was fabulous. And I was thinking about that again today when I was reviewing your book because I read it months and months ago. And I was thinking you did a really good job of covering all sorts of bases in terms of diversity for the cast.

[23:59] Jessa: Yeah. And I hope it's rings authentic because I definitely didn't do it just to tick boxes. I wanted to have a cast that you would see on the Bake Off or that you would see on a regular baking show or any sort of one of these cooking shows because the casts are usually so diverse in those shows.

[24:19] Cindy: Exactly. No, I think that makes sense. You're just reflecting what you would see on television. Well, you're going to be going on book tour. Will that information be somewhere where people can find it?

[24:29] Jessa: Yes, you can find my book tour information on @jessicamaxwellauthor, which is my Instagram, and it's also on Twitter. @maxwelljessa is the Twitter handle.

[24:41] Cindy: Good. Well, that'll be so exciting to head out and meet people and get to talk to readers.

[24:46] Jessa: Yeah, so fun. I'm going to the poison pen in Scottsdale, Arizona and Murder by the Book in Houston, Texas.

[24:55] Cindy: Oh, that's where I used to work.

[24:56] Jessa: Really? Oh, it's so cool. Yeah. I've never been to either of these places. That'll be really great. I hop in a book party at the Mysterious Bookshop in New York, which will be really fun.

[25:08] Cindy: I've only been to that store once. My daughter goes to school in New York City. And so in the fall I said, we really have to get down there. So we went down. It was really fun to see it.

[25:17] Jessa: Yeah, it's great. I love these kind of genre bookstores are so fun.

[25:21] Cindy: Definitely. Well, there's been some chatter about a potential Hulu series from your book. Can we talk a little bit about that?

[25:28] Jessa: Yeah, I mean, there's not too much to discuss yet. It's very slow in television, as people probably realize. But I am very lucky that Eileen Brash McKenna bought the rights right. Away. I had, like, an auction for the rights to the book very early on and she is kind of famous writer, director, producer. She had just had a show come out called Your Place or Mine? With Ashton Kutcher and Reese Witherspoon. And she adapted The Devil Wears Prada. So she's very experienced and well respected and we'll see what she does with it. But I feel like it's in very good hands. She's shown me the first episode or the written episode that's been really interesting to read. It's been amazing just to read something. It's like reading fan fiction almost because it's your characters, but it's not the same thing that you wrote. So it's this very surreal experience. But she's very good at what she does and it's been really fun to watch her do that.

[26:33] Cindy: Well, I can't wait till it makes its way to the screen and I get to watch it.

[26:37] Jessa: Yes, I cannot wait either. I hope that happens at some point.

[26:41] Cindy: Exactly. Well, what have you read recently that you really liked?

[26:45] Jessa: I have been reading Kayla Olson's book called The Reunion, which is really fun and cute and I just love it. And she's just like a lovely person. It's also got a little bit of a reality TV bent to it. I'm about to start this book called The Good Ones by Polly Stewart, and that's coming out in the summer. She's a friend of mine I met at Bouchercon this year, and that's kind of a thriller. And I'm also reading Bonfire of the Vanities right now.

[27:15] Cindy: I have never read that. I'm pretty sure I've seen the movie. Wasn't it a movie?

[27:20] Jessa: I don't know if I'd seen the movie, actually, but it's so good. He uses ellipses constantly, that which drives me absolutely bananas. But it's a really good book. It's amazing writing.

[27:32] Cindy: I've always heard it's very good.

[27:34] Jessa: Yeah, it's phenomenal.

[27:35] Cindy: Well, Jess, thank you so much for joining me today and the Thoughts From a Page podcast. I really enjoyed chatting with you about The Golden Spoon.

[27:42] Jessa: It was really nice to be here and I hope everyone enjoys it.

[27:48] Cindy: Thank you so much for listening to my podcast. If you like this episode, and I hope you did, please follow me on Instagram at @thoughtsfromapage, consider joining my Patreon group to access bonus content and support the podcast, tell all of your friends about the show, and rate it or subscribe to it wherever you listen to your podcasts, I would really appreciate it. The book discussed in this episode can be purchased at my Bookshop.org storefront, and the link is in the show notes. I hope you'll tune in next time.