44. JAIMA FIXSEN: A mother's vengence & medical murders of the 1800s

What would you do if a heart with the same defect as your missing child's turned up in an exhibit? That's what we find out in "The Specimen" by Jaima Fixsen. This wild book is part mystery, part historical fiction, part rage, and it is fascinating. Check out this conversation to find out the real cases that inspired Jaima's latest novel.

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Transcript

00;00;05;21 - 00;00;40;15
Speaker 1
Hi and welcome to Literary Hype. I am Stephanie Cutter, literary hype woman. Off the conversation is a fun one because this book that this woman wrote is wild. It's called The Specimen. This is by James a fiction. And I don't even have the proper words. Like, I was telling a friend a little bit about the first 50 pages, and he was like, what So in short, it's about a kid who goes missing and his heart's with the same defect that he had turns up in a specimen collection from the doctor who was trying to treat him.

00;00;41;08 - 00;01;05;01
Speaker 1
But then so much more happens. So we have a lot to talk about with Gemma. So without any further ado, here is my conversation Welcome to Literary Hype. I am so excited to talk about your new book, The Specimen, because this is such a wild ride. So for anyone who has not already seen this book, tell us what it's about.

00;01;05;05 - 00;01;33;00
Speaker 2
It's a revenge story. It's about a mum in Edinburgh. She's young. She's on her own. Things aren't easy for her, and she's. The story starts for me when she's doing an anatomical collection. That was kind of like a cool thing to do back then. Edinburgh was a real leading center for anatomical research, so that's what people would do for excitement.

00;01;33;00 - 00;02;00;08
Speaker 2
So she's going to see this anatomical collection, and she has this moment seeing a heart on a jar. And she hears this thudding in her ears, and she just knows something isn't right. And she's looking at the label on this heart, and it has a mitral valve defect, which is the diagnosis given to her son shortly before he disappeared, over a year before So she says, where this heart comes from, no one's taking her seriously.

00;02;00;08 - 00;02;09;01
Speaker 2
So she decides she has to find out for herself, you know, is it her son's heart? How did it come to this collection? What happened to her son at.

00;02;09;01 - 00;02;26;17
Speaker 1
The beginning, like when she's first realizing her son is gone? And you're you're going through like the mother's thoughts how did you put yourself into that headspace? Like you are a mom? Did were there experiences that you had with your kids that helped you get into that? Or was it purely research? How did you get my headspace?

00;02;26;24 - 00;02;45;10
Speaker 2
I mean, I think most people, you know, with if they have children that they care about in their lives, we'll have that moment where they just turn around and their child isn't where they expect them to see. And I mean, even if it's just a couple of seconds, you have that moment of just panic. So definitely playing on that.

00;02;45;10 - 00;03;15;12
Speaker 2
But we did have an experience where our youngest twist lost for about 3 hours. It was you know, everything was fine. It was, you know, an innocent mix up. He ended up being with friends the whole time, and we just didn't know where he was. But, you know, the police were looking our neighbors were all searching you know, that we were this the worst day of my life.

00;03;15;25 - 00;03;41;06
Speaker 2
And I don't think you've realize how much it affects you until I mean, it was over six months later I was driving down the highway, taking my older daughter to her music lesson. And an Amber Alert came over the radio and I had to pull over. I was just sobbing because it just brought it all back. And and so I did pull on some of those feelings and that.

00;03;41;06 - 00;04;00;04
Speaker 2
But I mean, not to say like it was anything like you know, but a mother who would have a son go missing forever would feel like. But there is some portability to feelings and experiences. And I just kind of extrapolate from that.

00;04;00;13 - 00;04;10;27
Speaker 1
It was so well done. So I had to ask. I was like, there's got to be something in there with somebody ah, you've been through something like that where you have been through those feelings.

00;04;12;02 - 00;04;12;26
Speaker 2
Yeah. I mean.

00;04;14;20 - 00;04;20;21
Speaker 3
Yes, I was the girl who misplaced the child. I wasn't going that far.

00;04;21;07 - 00;04;27;26
Speaker 1
It's like I even got left at a store when I was a kid. Like, it happens. It does happen.

00;04;27;26 - 00;04;28;23
Speaker 2
I got pretty much.

00;04;31;20 - 00;04;32;24
Speaker 3
Everyone loaded up in.

00;04;32;24 - 00;04;34;20
Speaker 2
The van and I got left behind.

00;04;35;13 - 00;04;43;21
Speaker 1
Especially pre. So holidays where you could just be like, Mom, where you at? Yeah, no, it's. Oh, no, it's so much easier to keep track of children.

00;04;44;08 - 00;04;44;22
Speaker 3
But when.

00;04;45;05 - 00;04;50;09
Speaker 2
And I'm obsessive about it, like, I track my kids, I find my friends.

00;04;50;13 - 00;04;50;29
Speaker 3
All the time.

00;04;52;18 - 00;05;22;06
Speaker 1
But one thing with Isabel while she's going through this because this is 1800 Scotland, so she can't just call her kid. But there's also this theme that kind of goes through the whole book of she's not being fully believed about what's going on, which historically. Yeah, just hysterical woman so can I talk a little bit about approaching the story through that lens of a female telling this story and like having to really push through to be believed on anything that's going on?

00;05;22;17 - 00;05;30;28
Speaker 2
A lot of us have experience that women in particular, although like certainly not exclusively women like even in this experience, where.

00;05;32;12 - 00;05;32;22
Speaker 3
You know.

00;05;33;09 - 00;05;54;28
Speaker 2
I look for my son, it wasn't where I wanted to be. I like cut my husband right away. I was like, Edward isn't in the yard, like, we need to call the police. And he was like, we don't need to call the police yet. I was like, No, we need to call the police. And we did because we didn't know where he was for a few hours and you know, like, I did get there first.

00;05;54;28 - 00;06;08;12
Speaker 2
And so sometimes I wonder, is there something about motherhood that makes you more like quick to, like, press the red button? Maybe.

00;06;10;12 - 00;06;35;16
Speaker 2
But I just think we see it in so many ways, you know, I really thought a lot about that case at the Yale Medical Center, about the fertility clinic. So it was this nurse at this fertility clinic that was stealing patients fentanyl. So they were undergoing this horrible, painful treatment you know. And, you know, they weren't getting any any pain relief at all.

00;06;35;16 - 00;07;10;09
Speaker 2
And so when they would complain to staff, like, you know, like, I need this medication isn't working, people just I was like, well, no, you've been given whatever fentanyl, but they were just being given saline and, you know, they just didn't believe them. You know, I've I've read a lot about 19th century medicine. And when anesthesia was discovered and women started wanting ether or chloroform to relieve labor pains, and there was a lot of resistance to that, you know, people talking about how it was God's will that women should suffer during childbirth.

00;07;11;05 - 00;07;43;10
Speaker 2
But, you know, there wasn't the same level of antagonism towards men who wanted surgery. So when they were, you know, having their legs cut off from an industrial accident or from a war conflict or, you know, no one really had ideas about like God or what's right and proper about surgical anesthesia. But, you know, if it's women's pain, somehow that doesn't matter or that matters less.

00;07;43;27 - 00;07;57;07
Speaker 1
So talk a little bit about your research for this book, because there is a lot of detail, both historically and medically throughout this book. So what was it like for you to piece all of this history together to write this book?

00;07;57;23 - 00;08;24;08
Speaker 2
Well, I've kind of lived in this sandbox for a little while because I've written other books that feature 19th century medicine, although from a different point of view, I write with my friend Regina's Audrey Blake, and we have two books, The Girl in the Shadow and the Surgeon's Daughter about 19th century medicine are based set around 19th century medicine.

00;08;24;08 - 00;09;08;09
Speaker 2
So I you know, I'm more familiar with that history than, like, some other things, but I'm probably just more familiar with it because I'm kind of obsessed about it. So when this story idea came to me, there was a lot I knew about it already. Like, I knew Edinburgh was a center of chemical study. I knew that there were murders happening there, you know, to provide specimens for for study and research but I did get to delve a lot deeper finding out, you know, the history of police forces, because this is just when police forces are kind of starting to become a thing.

00;09;08;15 - 00;09;37;09
Speaker 2
Actually, fire departments too, actually were started in Edinburgh by somebody Braidwood, I think, like right in this these years, which is kind of crazy to think about. But I did go to Edinburgh, which was incredible. I can it's a gorgeous city. I loved it so much and this is really creepy. But like most of the anatomical specimens I describe in the books are ones that I saw in Edinburgh.

00;09;37;09 - 00;09;45;08
Speaker 2
And they're not like contemporary specimens. They're specimens that people were studying in 1920s when I was writing this book.

00;09;45;23 - 00;09;49;29
Speaker 1
That's wild, but they're still around. Yeah, I still go see them.

00;09;50;23 - 00;09;52;01
Speaker 2
It's kind of bananas.

00;09;53;03 - 00;09;55;26
Speaker 1
I want to know how they figured out how to preserve these things and.

00;09;57;01 - 00;09;58;10
Speaker 2
A lot of alcohol.

00;10;00;08 - 00;10;22;07
Speaker 1
I mean, you do ever inside of like most of the whiskey goes in with a certain body part that I will not talk about because it's a spoiler and we try not to do spoilers too much. But anyway, so in your author's note, you do talk a little bit about the history that sparked this story. So talk a little bit about the actual case.

00;10;22;25 - 00;10;23;23
Speaker 3
That inspired this.

00;10;24;15 - 00;10;53;20
Speaker 2
Work here. Murders are pretty infamous. You know, they caused a public panic. They've had a real lasting impact on books and fiction as well. So like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the classic is based on the broken hair cases. I think there's definitely features of The Tell-Tale Heart that feature The Post story, the half hour broken hair arrest.

00;10;54;12 - 00;11;21;01
Speaker 2
So there are these two immigrant workers you know, that like they had pretty horrible lives, but they started to they started a new industry for themselves, very lucrative one instead of like they would just kill people, vulnerable people to sell their bodies to medical or to doctors for these anatomical schools, because the demand for bodies was just so big.

00;11;21;24 - 00;12;08;11
Speaker 2
Bodies are being shipped from as far away as Bristol, like in the barrel of brandy. You're going back to the liquor there and they were so expensive. So they were getting paid, you know, over £10 for a lot of these bodies that they were selling. They killed, we know of 16 people over a course of ten months. And it's just pretty terrifying that they were able to do that so quickly and so easily and and and the thing that chilled me about the case and made it such an interesting topic to write about was how complicit the doctor involved was and the medical establishment in closing ranks around him.

00;12;08;11 - 00;12;35;06
Speaker 2
Because Birkenhead were tried, one gave evidence for the crown. So he was promised immunity, but the other one was executed. But the doctor involved was never even called to testify. And this was in spite of one of his assistants, recognized one of the bodies that was brought to him. She was a sex worker, and he recognized her. But there was no inquiries, no questions asked.

00;12;36;17 - 00;13;08;07
Speaker 2
One of the victims was an intellectual. An individual with intellectual disabilities was a recognizable figure on the Edinburgh streets. And when the doctor got his body, he removed the feet, which were recognizable and kept the body for six months before using it in his lectures after his disappearance wasn't you know, a thing. So given those facts, I just can't believe that he was unknowing.

00;13;08;07 - 00;13;13;21
Speaker 2
And and I think that's to me, he's the real villain of the piece.

00;13;13;27 - 00;13;34;21
Speaker 1
So a lot of times in crime stories, in mysteries, the who is the mystery and you're trying to figure out who the who is. This woman is pretty clear early on who the who is. And you got to figure out all this other stuff that goes along with it. So what was it like for you as a writer to approach this in kind of a different way for the genre?

00;13;34;27 - 00;13;57;29
Speaker 2
It's that difference, right, between the whodunit and then there's kind of a whodunit and this one, you know, it's kind of a how, but it's also how do we prove it? And I think that's the story that was compelling to me because Isabel, as a as a woman, as someone who's economically disadvantaged, she doesn't have powerful friends in her corner.

00;13;59;07 - 00;14;26;16
Speaker 2
Like the vault, the real life victims in this circumstance. They didn't have anyone sticking up for them, and they had to you know, until there was a real hue and cry. And people were writing about, you know, the bodies being taken. Nobody did anything. And so it's that that struggle and that fight of, you know, how do we prove it?

00;14;26;28 - 00;14;47;19
Speaker 2
How do we get justice slash revenge? You know, one thing I thought about when I was thinking about how the story would work was the Count of Monte Cristo which is like classic revenge story that we know the whole time who Edmond Dantes is, is after. We just don't know how he's going to get though.

00;14;48;10 - 00;15;08;22
Speaker 1
There was one little detail that you talked about in this book that was just kind of wild, and that was the feeding vomit to dogs during and police investigations. So what other wild facts did you come across while you were figuring all the details out of this book that didn't make it in?

00;15;09;09 - 00;15;09;24
Speaker 2
Oh, my.

00;15;09;24 - 00;15;11;20
Speaker 3
Goodness. Look.

00;15;12;10 - 00;15;14;16
Speaker 2
I see things. Look, maybe that's.

00;15;14;16 - 00;15;14;28
Speaker 1
Why I was.

00;15;14;28 - 00;15;19;07
Speaker 2
So fascinated by medicine. And science at this time was it's just like.

00;15;19;25 - 00;15;20;22
Speaker 3
A total.

00;15;20;25 - 00;15;29;00
Speaker 2
Crapshoot. Like, are you going to go to a doctor and get like something that's going to help you or are they going to give you mercury?

00;15;29;06 - 00;15;29;21
Speaker 3
Like.

00;15;30;23 - 00;15;49;19
Speaker 2
You know, like they were starting to experiment with like blood transfusions so they would like just get blood from like if you are wealthy, they get blood from a service. Like there's no like blood machine or anything. They would try transfusing people with milk. Like, could you just imagine like an I.V..

00;15;49;19 - 00;15;55;02
Speaker 3
Pack of milk? Like, it's just it's just bonkers.

00;15;55;19 - 00;16;22;22
Speaker 2
Just so many crazy things. You know, I was kind of intrigued by the development of modern firefighting in Edinburgh this time. Oh, one thing that was crazy is so in the book, I try to avoid spoilers, but something big happens on Halloween or like All Hallows Eve or whatever they call it. Scott and that's actually when stuff went down in the real life case, which was kind of crazy to me.

00;16;23;04 - 00;16;34;07
Speaker 2
You don't have to go do a lot of digging in the past to find stuff that's just like, Oh boy. Like if I wrote this, no one would believe in this picture.

00;16;34;12 - 00;16;35;21
Speaker 1
Now that we live in the modern age.

00;16;36;24 - 00;17;02;02
Speaker 2
Maybe the best thing was So I told you how, you know, the story begins. Like what? That scene of that story was, and that's how this book came to me. Like, different books kind of began in different ways, but this one came from that imagining that scene of Isabel staring at that heart in the jar and as I was researching, I found out that that actually happened.

00;17;02;28 - 00;17;26;21
Speaker 2
Not like half in a jar, but there was a case in that period where some surviving family members went to an exhibit and saw a specimen that was clearly a deceased relative. They sued the doctor, you know, saying that they wanted it was a skull. In this case, they wanted the skull back so they could bury it with their relatives body.

00;17;27;06 - 00;17;46;16
Speaker 2
And they got it back. But then they went around and sold it to another collector. It was just bananas well, I had never even heard of that until well into the book. Like, I already had a first draft and stuff by then, but it was just so cool to be like, oh, you know, this thing that I imagined it did actually happen in the same place, in the same period.

00;17;46;22 - 00;18;06;00
Speaker 1
And we've talked a little bit about how this is set in Scotland. And one thing I noticed is selling books like Outlander lead very heavily onto the Scottish words. You are very sporadic with them. What was the decision like for you to decide, OK, I'm just going to touch on the Scottish words instead of lean full into the brogue?

00;18;06;14 - 00;18;12;02
Speaker 2
Oh yeah. I didn't want to reinforce the broken one. I'm not Scottish, so.

00;18;12;14 - 00;18;12;21
Speaker 3
Like.

00;18;13;04 - 00;18;47;17
Speaker 2
I would just feel like a total poser. I'd probably get it wrong. Like, I think it takes a lot of skill to get that right. And the other thing is Sourcebooks by Publisher is, you know, an American publishing house. So any time you're writing in the past, I feel like you are kind of transposing it into modern lexicon, but in a way that supports the illusion of it being in the past, whether Scotland, whether it's London, no matter when I'm writing, I'm not trying to recreate that language.

00;18;47;17 - 00;19;14;11
Speaker 2
I'm just trying to create the illusion to the reader of what that language would be. So I would try not to use anachronistic words. So if a word didn't exist in 18, 20 days, I wouldn't use it. And then I would just kind of put in a sprinkling of it. So the same way, if I was writing a character whose first language is French, like I'm not writing in French.

00;19;14;11 - 00;19;22;03
Speaker 2
So, but, you know, there's a few things you can do drop in there and there to give that French flavor.

00;19;22;08 - 00;19;34;02
Speaker 1
On social media. You posted about this book when you got your copies in and said that it was an extra special unboxing for you, even though you've unboxed other books of your own. What made this one so special to you?

00;19;34;05 - 00;19;58;15
Speaker 2
This one I think was different because it did come to me kind of in that that experience of a scene instead of like sitting down with a notebook and and having an idea and kind of working them through this one kind of came as an experience rather than as a decision and the characters spoke to me quite easily.

00;19;58;15 - 00;20;03;20
Speaker 2
And so it's kind of a terrifying thing. It's like, Will I will ever have another book like.

00;20;04;22 - 00;20;05;20
Speaker 3
This specimen.

00;20;05;20 - 00;20;34;26
Speaker 2
Again? Like this one does feel feel special to me. And maybe it's because some of the themes are quite close to my heart about you know, motherhood and found family and spotlight and the need to protect vulnerable people. Like I do care really deeply about those things. You know, the whole story began in a very emotional way. So I do feel very emotional about this one.

00;20;35;05 - 00;20;43;10
Speaker 1
You've mentioned that you write as Audrey Blake with a friend. How does your process compare for writing with someone versus writing alone?

00;20;43;17 - 00;21;07;17
Speaker 2
This is probably not what you're going for, but it's very different technically because solo writing, I use completely different software. So I use Scrivener, which lets you do certain things so much more easily. Like you can't use Scrivener for collaborative writing. It's not like Google Docs or Microsoft Word, where I can live on the cloud in one drive and two people can use it at the same time.

00;21;07;25 - 00;21;44;12
Speaker 2
For Scrivener, only one person can be in the document of the time. So it's just a no go for any type of co-writing project. But Scrivener has like incredible capabilities for outlining and tracking all your information and like, you're kind of story. Bible all exists in this same really easily accessible document. So I my theory is that the reason we have so many books with split timelines now is because authors are using Scrivener software, which gives you so much more capability for that.

00;21;44;26 - 00;22;06;03
Speaker 2
And I have written this book, timeline book not and this is like hell. It is like trying to keep track of everything in Google Docs is like an exercise is insanity. So like even just like logistically there's there's key differences in the tools that you can use.

00;22;06;15 - 00;22;11;18
Speaker 1
And I was curious how when you're writing with someone how you approach who does what parts of the book.

00;22;11;27 - 00;22;35;02
Speaker 2
Mm hmm. Yeah. Regina and I look at it like it's not our first rodeo. We've done a few books, so I think we're pretty good at knowing each other's strengths. So we have very complementary skill sets. So, you know, when we talk about a story and how it's taking shape we kind of just sort of like, yeah, I feel like I like a connection to the scene.

00;22;35;02 - 00;22;47;11
Speaker 2
And, you know, this one, I think would be a good one for you. Do you feel a connection to that? So we kind of go by what we feel about it. And, you know, we've got a good assessment of each other's.

00;22;48;25 - 00;22;49;15
Speaker 3
Strengths.

00;22;50;16 - 00;23;18;16
Speaker 2
For the specimen. As I was getting up to the point where Thomas Isabel Stein goes missing, I was really procrastinating and dragging my feet because that was just going to be so hard to write. And I do find that, you know, those really tough scenes sometimes getting into them can be hard. But, you know, it's like that procrastinate thing.

00;23;18;16 - 00;23;28;12
Speaker 2
If you just start, then it's like, OK, it'll be fine and you know, it's fine. And I'm happy with how those things went. But I was avoiding it for a while.

00;23;28;22 - 00;23;36;24
Speaker 1
Procrastination. I live there so familiar.

00;23;37;03 - 00;23;56;09
Speaker 2
My most recent manuscript was due to be submitted September 1st, and I sent it at like 11:57 p.m. but you know, like it was just busy. I just wanted to get that last read through and like you just always want that last read through.

00;23;56;28 - 00;24;02;11
Speaker 1
Your day job. Is being an occupational therapist. How is that informed how you approach writing?

00;24;02;25 - 00;24;26;21
Speaker 2
I think it makes me well, I mean, I do procrastinate more than I should, but it also is good because it does put some limits on me. Like I can only procrastinate for so long. So I do have to manage my time better and actually I feel like one of the best things about my day job is that it's very playful.

00;24;26;21 - 00;24;49;24
Speaker 2
I work in a community pediatric setting so being playful at work makes it enriching for the rest of my life. And I feel like that helps me be playful. As I approach my writing, I feel like really just helps that creative muscle, right? You know, if you're playing, there's no wrong way to play. There's no you can't fail at play.

00;24;50;05 - 00;25;05;19
Speaker 2
So, you know, if I write a scene and then I have to scrap the whole thing, but approaching it from that play perspective, of, you know, that's OK. Like it's OK to try again. It just feels the stakes are lower.

00;25;05;26 - 00;25;28;01
Speaker 1
And in stocking your Instagram before this interview, to get to know you a little bit, I noticed that you semi recently went to the Green Gables four where Elon Musk says As a fellow redhead, do you feel like your personality is just that you read in of Green Gables and that became your personality is yeah.

00;25;28;03 - 00;25;28;23
Speaker 2
I kind of.

00;25;31;04 - 00;25;37;08
Speaker 1
I read like a modern take on and of Green Gables and of Manhattan and I was like oh my God, do I have my own personality or is it just.

00;25;37;08 - 00;25;37;24
Speaker 3
An.

00;25;38;28 - 00;26;12;26
Speaker 2
You know, like I feel the ginger, right? Like it. Yeah. I think it's definitely a thing like, you know, we all wear that that hat or that shadow. Like I actually reread out of Green Gables this year. It had been a long time since I'd had a read of that, and I enjoyed it so much. And, you know, a lot of books from that period don't age that well and you know, but this one did, and I just loved it so much.

00;26;13;05 - 00;26;25;10
Speaker 2
But yeah, especially being a writer, it's like yeah, I don't know, it feels a little bit uncomfortably close to ABC and being Canadian.

00;26;25;25 - 00;26;26;11
Speaker 3
Oops.

00;26;28;26 - 00;26;32;00
Speaker 1
I was like, I would totally break a chalkboard over its head.

00;26;32;22 - 00;26;37;10
Speaker 3
Yeah, oops. Oops.

00;26;37;20 - 00;26;44;10
Speaker 2
Oh, I would bake a cake and put something the wrong thing in it. Definitely. I've done that more than once.

00;26;44;23 - 00;26;55;13
Speaker 1
You've gone and got a lot of other adventures. What has been your favorite of these trips that you've taken? And some of them looked like you had your kids lost, like, I mean, family trips that were especially special.

00;26;56;00 - 00;27;22;10
Speaker 2
Well, Edinburgh was fantastic for this book and it just enriched the book in so many unpredictable ways. It wasn't just seeing the specimens, it wasn't just, you know, like flocking. OK, how long does it take to run from here to there and, you know, but like feeling how hilly the city is, but like flying a kite there with my son and my niece, you know, like that made it into the book.

00;27;22;10 - 00;27;42;08
Speaker 2
And I would have never have thought of that if we hadn't packed the kite along to Edinburgh. So Ireland, I love Ireland. I'll be there at Christmas researching a project I'm starting right now. I love the mountains. That's probably my favorite place to go is just, you know, a few hours away.

00;27;42;23 - 00;27;47;08
Speaker 1
Well, hinted at your next project. Is there anything you can say about what's coming next for you?

00;27;47;20 - 00;28;15;02
Speaker 2
So this is my next next project. So my next project, the one that I just submitted, is actually set in Canada. I've never gotten to do that before, so I'm quite excited about that. A it's a thriller, but it's more of a classic whodunit instead of I have done it and it's set actually in Alberta, which is where I live in the mountains kind of the cabin in the Woods vibe.

00;28;15;14 - 00;28;16;18
Speaker 2
No title on that yet.

00;28;18;19 - 00;28;46;18
Speaker 2
Ireland, again, it's going to be more of a whodunit, and I want to be going back to kind of the Gothic pubs of Specimen. My protagonist will be a nun and I think I'm going to set it in about the 1930s and kind of the big thing that I have on my mood board right now is this Caravaggio painting of an angel.

00;28;46;28 - 00;28;50;09
Speaker 2
And it's just all about that light and dark. Oh, the.

00;28;50;09 - 00;28;54;17
Speaker 1
Last question we always ask, because this is literary hype. What books are you hyped about right now?

00;28;54;23 - 00;29;22;01
Speaker 2
OK, well, like my standard favorite that I feel like is like a book that nobody's heard of that I just think, Oh, you have to treat yourself to. This one is called A Company of Swans by Eva Ibbotson, and I love it. You've ever seen I love fairy tale retelling, so that was awesome. But the books that I've most recently read that I'm hyped about are This Girl's A Killer by MSE.

00;29;22;01 - 00;30;04;26
Speaker 2
Well, it's really it's great. It's Dexter I just finished the advance copy last week and super funny female serial killer. Like, just great vibes and then the cow gamma food detectives, it's Japanese but translated into English is just super, super sweet. It's a father and daughter run this little hole in the wall restaurant in Kyoto and they have a detective agency, but it's a food detective agency.

00;30;04;26 - 00;30;24;19
Speaker 2
So all they're looking for is like people come in and they're like, I have this this ramen when I was a kid and I would love to have it again, but I don't know the recipe until they find the recipe, but it's just like the things they find out about themselves and people. And now it's just really beautiful and sweet.

00;30;26;17 - 00;30;57;03
Speaker 2
And then I just finished last night oh, the day he never came home by video. It's a domestic thriller. Kind of love those. And this one I loved particularly because he did such a good job of like two partners in an intimate, intimate relationship. Like how they can have the same experiences but still, like, have a totally different take on what actually happened.

00;30;57;03 - 00;30;58;24
Speaker 2
Like, I just thought that was so well done.

00;30;59;11 - 00;31;03;28
Speaker 1
Well, thanks so much for taking time to talk to literary hype about your new book, The Specimen.

00;31;04;21 - 00;31;06;22
Speaker 2
It was a pleasure, Stephanie. Thank you for having me.

00;31;09;09 - 00;31;24;04
Speaker 1
Thanks again to Jamie for hanging out with me to talk about her book, The Specimen. If you'd like to get a hold of this because it is bonkers and you need to read it if you'd like to get a hold of Jamie's books, both as herself and as Audrey Blake, the links to do so are in the show notes for you.

00;31;24;12 - 00;31;34;05
Speaker 1
If you enjoyed this conversation, don't forget to subscribe to the Literary Hype podcast. Give us some stars and share it with friends. Thanks so much for listening to the Literary Hype podcast.