Best selling author and Bainbrie
Island resident Susan Wiggs
is out with her latest novel,
and I'm here to attest that I
can literally not put it down.
She's the author of over 50 nov,
and her newest work, Welcome to Beach Town,
has been called compulsively readable.
I agree. Like many of her novel,
this one was also inspired by rl
life events.
Welcome, Susan, to the show.
Thank you for having me. I'm so
excited to have a summer book o.
Oh my gosh, Seriously,
this is perfect for like,
it's like a vacation beach. Yes.
Oh, see, you already have your tagline.
I literally, I'm almost done.
So I don't want you to tell me the ending.
No spoilers, no spoilers today.
But for someone that hasn't head
of this book, what's it about?
It's a book that takes place on
California's best made-up surf beach.
And it starts out with a shockig
event because it's a Susan Wiggs book.
This very interesting character named
named Nikki gives a commencement
speech and she kind of drops a .
She goes off script from her prepared speech,
drops a bomb and becomes a
pariah in her beach town.
And So what follows is the sagaf
her fleeing from it and having o
come back and deal with things .
It's kind of the theme is you've
never really can outrun your pa.
You have to come back and settle
things in a highly entertaining.
I hope the book just out so and
I'm already getting feedback frm
readers and thank you for saying
compulsively readable it
is. I mean, I cannot put it dow.
My fiance is like what are you doing night.
I wish it was compulsively writ,
but it was a long slog for me
to write that book. It was.
My first book, though, after Pandemic,
and it was like a breath of fresh air.
I was so glad I got to have the
surf and the sand and the beachs
and that kind of vibe after beig
locked down for a couple of yea.
So it's very liberating to
be out with a book now.
Absolutely. And it kind of is
loosely based on a true story.
Can you can you touch on that? ,
not so much based,
but I accessed one of the precus
to the Murdock murders, which we
all been so obsessed with prior.
With that awful shooting that ws
just resolved a few months back,
there were some other tragedies
in that community,
and one of them involved a grouf
teenagers who went joy riding ia
speedboat at night under a brid.
And in, you know,
typical teenage fashion, tragedy ensued.
And so I kind of accessed that mindset,
that kind of reckless teen mind,
to create a really awful situation that
sort of blew the town apart again. And.
Hopefully they'll come back together,
but there's not going to be any
spoilers so we'll have to see.
No spoilers everybody.
OK And like you mentioned,
this is, you know, a beach read.
But meaning I guess that you
would consume it right away.
But there's also a lot of like
complex themes I guess througho.
Can you can you touch on that?
There are. It involves not.
It's really kind of Nikki's journey*.
You know, we meet her as a young
girl and it sort of follows her.
It's a coming of age story into the middle
of her life and the choices that she makes.
And one of the things that proby
was my favorite storyline and
I didn't plan it when I was,
you know, plotting out the book,
was that she kind of has this.
Interesting and unique relationp
with her father and who's just d
of this surfer dude, Single dad.
He raised her in an Airstream
trailer on the beach.
So the publisher was nice enough to put that,
you know, to reference that on the cover.
And I really enjoyed following their journey.
And there's also a tribute to my late,
great older brother who we losto
pancreatic cancer earlier this .
He was a really talented Plenair painter.
Plan air when they set up their easel
outdoors and paint what they se.
And so there's a,
there's a storyline in there about that.
And so I just,
I had a lot of affection for tht
amazing. And your process,
I mean, you said it's kind
of a long daunting processor.
It can be sometimes and I
even I don't want to you know
put you on blast right away.
But I even heard something about a freezer.
So can you walk us through
your process of writing
I had mentioned to Susie earlie.
When I write my first draft,
it's in longhand,
in handwriting, in a notebook,
which means there's no backup c.
And so if I haven't typed up myy
draft for a while and I've got maybe,
you know, 10, twenty 30,000 wor.
In a notebook,
I usually stick it in the freezr
because if the house burns down,
it's the last thing that will freeze.
So that's really smart. OK, I love that.
I don't know about smart, but it works.
Whatever works for you and you
can keep writing books like thi,
then keep doing your process
and you've obviously, you know,
written so many different books.
Do fans now reach out to you and say,
can you write about this?
I mean, do they give you any ids
or where do all these ideas?
All the time. Yes.
Yes, One of my favorite.
And I do get people who say I
have this great idea for a book.
So I'm going to give you the
idea and you write the book and
then we'll split the money 5050.
And so I just say, well,
I have a better idea.
You write your idea and keep all the money.
But I love the dialogue with with readers,
librarians, booksellers.
I love that because that's been
my jam for what, 50 some books?
My life.
This is my 36 year to be a published author.
Congratulations,
a baby writer way back in the d.
And where did that passion comem
that you wanted to get into wrig
A reading family? I'm sure,
because even before my conscious memory,
my mother has saved little scraps of paper.
I would scribble and and.
And dictate stories to her.
And so I was one of those.
But people come to writing from all ages.
You know, when they retire,
when they're in school,
it doesn't really matter.
But I think everybody's a storyteller.
But the ones who go home and
write it down are the ones
who write your summer read.
I love it. And you're a local author.
I mean that's just so cool to kw
somebody that you know, Seattle based.
And why did you want to do kindf
a beach read that would transpot
people maybe to this beach town?
Did you have any ideas with
them? Yeah, I did because the previous book,
it was called Sugar and salt in,
and it involved a lot of food.
There was a Baker, there was a,
there was a BBQ master,
and I think I probably gained
like £5 writing that book.
So I thought, well,
I had to write about an athlete,
you know, or something like tha.
So that was one.
And then the other thing was I heard.
That they wanted to publish
it in June of this year.
And I thought my favorite thingo
read at the beach is a beach re.
So off I went. I
love that. And I feel like who
doesn't just want to, you know,
lay at the beach and and read
something like that. And I mean,
I'm so excited to finish this b.
And now you've kind of told me t
the end could be something spic.
We don't know. Stay tuned.
Well, thank you so,
so much for coming in and talking to us.
We so appreciate it.