Guilt-free Pleasures and Chasing Your Dreams with Romance Novelist Alyssa Jarrett

Let’s talk about sex, baby! Or, talk about how reading and writing about sex is a guilt-free, shame-free political act. That’s right, in this conversation with the fabulous debut romance novelist Alyssa Jarrett we go on a wild ride about feminism, authenticity, identity, privilege, pursuing our creativity in the face of nay-sayers, and… werewolf erotica. (She doesn’t write werewolf erotica, but we both celebrate those who do!)

Fuck “guilty pleasures.” This episode is a battle cry for liking what we like, not yucking anyone’s yum, and going all in on our dreams. It’s an absolute treat, and you’ll leave with some great resources for finding exactly the level of spiciness you want in your fiction as well as (I hope) encouragement for centering the things that bring you joy.

You can listen on Apple, YouTube, Spotify, or anywhere else you listen to podcasts. (And please leave a review when you do!)

Read Alyssa’s thoughts on the romance genre on Substack

Follow Alyssa on Instagram 

Order her book – Love Apptually (in print or digital)

Or visit her website. 

Read the transcript below (with the caveat that the timestamps don’t match up, and there are a fair number of edits to the audio that are not reflected in the transcript).

Resources, References, and Links:

Bukowski. Charles Bukowski was an American poet who, if we’re being gracious about it (like the Poetry Foundation is), “satirized” violence and sexuality in his work. “Charles Bukowski”

Dan Savage. Writing since the early 1990s, Dan Savage is the LGBTQ+ advocate and love/sex advice guru behind the “Savage Love” advice column and podcast.

Alyssa’s post about the spiciness scale. Most Writers Don’t Read Smut.

Romance.io and the steam rating system.

Gail Carriger. Honestly one of my favorite non-erotic authors in addition to her gay werewolf San Andreas Shifters series (that she publishes under G. L. Carriger and are 5/5 on the steam rating scale). Most of her novels generally fall under the “glimpses and kisses” rating but occasionally reach “open door” rating. She’s wonderful, and has also written a book about the Heroine’s Journey and the bullshit that is cultural dismissal of the romance genre.

MM or M/M Romance. Books with two men at the center of the romantic plot – such as the San Andreas Shifters series or A Rake of One’s Own, the award-winning fifth book in A.J. Lancaster’s Lord of Stariel series (which I loved).

Emily Henry – Bestselling author of Beach Read and many others who straddles the lines between romance and women’s fiction. 3/5 on the Romance.io steam rating system.

Abby Jimenez – Bestselling romance author of Part of Your World.  3/5 on the Romance.io steam rating system.

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. The 2010s reboot of the 1980s cartoon, which is just so very wonderful.

Alyssa’s favorite emo bands. She’s especially fond of AFI, All Time Low, Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance, Mayday Parade, Thirty Seconds to Mars, and Set It Off.

Study about women and guilty pleasures – When media company Vudu surveyed 2,000 Americans on what they rank as their top “guilty pleasures,” among the most popular responses were all activities that are typically associated with women: reality TV, romance movies, daytime TV, and “cheesy” music.

Sarah J. Maas – Bestselling fantasy romance author of the A Court of Thorns and Roses (ACOTAR) series and the reason behind the recent romantasy boom.

Ruby Dixon – Bestselling sci-fi romance author of the Ice Planet Barbarians series. 4/5 on the Romance.io steam rating system.

Tessa Bailey – Bestselling rom-com author of It Happened One Summer, dubbed the “Michelangelo of dirty talk” by Entertainment Weekly. 4/5 on the Romance.io steam rating system.

Katee Robert – Bestselling erotic romance author of the Dark Olympus series. 5/5 on the Romance.io steam rating system.

Kristen Tate at the Blue Garret – Book editor for indie authors and publishers, including Alyssa Jarrett.

Book about sucking at stuff. Karen Rinaldi – It’s Great to Suck at Something: The Unexpected Joy of Wiping Out and What It Can Teach Us About Patience, Resilience and the Stuff That Really Matter. (This title really explains itself).

Transcript

Cate Blouke (00:00)

How did you embark on this glorious journey of becoming a romance author?

Alyssa Jarrett (00:07)

Yeah, I feel like, you know, when you look back on your life and you go, oh yeah, all that tracks. I’ve actually had several moments of that where, you know, and I talk about this on my substack stack as well. Like I think my first sort of foray into the genre was with my mother who used to get her nails done at a aesthetician’s house. So we would actually go over to this woman’s house and there would be soap operas playing on the television in the background.

Cate Blouke (00:13)

Uh huh.

Alyssa Jarrett (00:36)

And so I’m pretty young, I’m sitting on the floor, like, you know, amusing myself and I’m watching the Bold and the Beautiful and sort of getting engrossed in the love triangles and the relationship drama. And so I would read her Soap Opera Digests and I would steal her Redbook magazines for the sex tips. And way before, way before I was of age to be thinking about those sorts of things.

Cate Blouke (01:02)

Right?

Alyssa Jarrett (01:05)

And so, and then I started realizing like pretty much all of the content I consume, I am primarily interested in for romance, for relationship dynamics. I’m very uninterested in most media if it doesn’t have some kind of romantic element to it. And I’ve always been sort of, especially boy crazy for as long as I can remember. So it’s always been super tough of mine. So I’m not surprised that’s led me here. I am, you know, it’s…

It’s always interesting to see how long it takes for someone to arrive at that conclusion, which seems very obvious in hindsight.

Cate Blouke (01:41)

Right, well, I mean, was it obvious in terms of like, I’m going to write this, right? So what I’m hearing is like, you’ve been in love with the romance genre. Yeah, I’ve been in love with love. Yes, been in love with love forever. Amen to that. But what was the journey to like, I’m gonna write this. Like, I love consuming this. I’m gonna make some of this shit for myself.

Alyssa Jarrett (01:49)

love, yeah, with love forever.

Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I like a lot of writers, you know, I was writing from a very young age. I did like the Young Authors Fair in kindergarten. I was, you know…

Cate Blouke (02:12)

Oh, okay. I don’t know if that’s like everybody. I’m just gonna interject. You just said like, oh, well, I did the Young Authors Fair in kindergarten. I love that. That’s amazing.

Alyssa Jarrett (02:22)

To me, like on the publishing side, it’s like a massive cliche to be like, you know, oh, I’ve been a reader and writer my whole life. You’re like, yeah, get in the back of line. But yeah, I think for romance specifically, and we can kind of talk about this when we jump into sort of the stigma around the genre, but I started off writing.

erotic stories for boyfriends and as like Valentine’s Day gifts. You know, I felt like I had a knack for it. I have read a ton of erotica and erotic fan fiction and it’s always been an interest of mine. And in college, I sort of really started to give it the good try. And unfortunately I didn’t have…

an amazing experience as many genre writers do, unfortunately, in creative writing programs, but especially as a romance author or aspiring romance author at the time. And so that really led me off of this journey to get acclimated to the genre, to understand what I like and what kind of stories I wanna see more of in the world. And now I’ve really leaned hard into it.

first thing I say out of my mouth when I introduce myself like, hi I’m Alyssa, I write romance, and everything else is sort of ancillary to that.

Cate Blouke (03:50)

beautiful, right? And that speaks to sort of one of the reasons I wanted to talk to you, right, was this idea of taking the guilt out of guilty pleasure, really leaning into like, this is who I am, and I am not going to apologize to you about it. Like, I am a proud romance author. High five to that. Amen, sister. Right? What was your journey to like getting to that place? Like, when you started writing romance, were you like, fuck it, like, I’m gonna write this erotica. I don’t care. Whatever.

Alyssa Jarrett (04:05)

Yes. Yes.

Cate Blouke (04:19)

or was that more of a like evolving thing that occurred?

Alyssa Jarrett (04:20)

I’m sorry.

Well, I mean, I’ve always had a bit of a bombastic personality. I have been called a pot stirrer before, especially when I was in journalism school. And so having the quintessential hot take is kind of something that just kind of comes naturally to me. But for romance specifically, it wasn’t until I started being more forthcoming that I realized that not everyone agrees with me or not everybody sees the genre the way I do.

Cate Blouke (04:51)

Mm -hmm.

Alyssa Jarrett (04:54)

And so, you know, thinking back to my relationship in college, you know, that was my first eye opener into, you know, creative writing programs that primarily work with literary fiction writers, and especially with the young men that were in my classes, just not getting it or not liking it or not appreciating it. And, you know, they had so many things to say about.

Bukowski or all of these sort of literary geniuses and they didn’t really see the point to any of this. It all felt very silly and frivolous. And that’s when I sort of realized that reading romance, writing romance, it is all an extremely political act. And the more upfront and loud and proud I can be about it,

Cate Blouke (05:28)

Hehehe!

Alyssa Jarrett (05:51)

the less shame and embarrassment I feel and the less shame and embarrassment hopefully every other once person I interact with feels because there’s nothing wrong with, you know, wanting to see these stories, wanting to celebrate sexuality. And so I don’t know if I’m taking one for the team, but I figured.

For everyone who is not going to say in their first sentence that they write romance, I’ll be the one to do it and hopefully educate people about what the genre is truly about and why I feel, I just feel so supported and so celebrated in it. And it’s just one of the things that I love most in the world.

Cate Blouke (06:36)

Ugh, I love that so much. I just got all the like goosebumpy good feelings, right? Like you’re fighting the good fight. And one of the things I wanna sort of tease out there, there’s so many directions we could take this, but this idea that like things have to be like serious and angsty to be worthwhile. I definitely encountered that when I was in grad school. I have a fucking PhD in rhetoric. I like went all the way with the English Lit degrees and a…

Alyssa Jarrett (06:39)

laughs

Cate Blouke (07:02)

big piece of sort of recovering from that my post academia life is like this idea that things have to be serious to be worthwhile. And fuck that noise. Like fuck that noise out the window. Like, I want to live in a world where like we can value like love and connection and joy and fun and funny. Your book is funny. It is so funny.

Alyssa Jarrett (07:12)

Yup. Fuck that noise indeed. Yeah, yeah.

Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, I did.

Cate Blouke (07:33)

Yeah, and delight. Like, I just… Why can’t we do that, everybody? Like, with your Bukowski nonsense.

Alyssa Jarrett (07:38)

Yeah. And I think the market has definitely celebrated it in mass, right? We’re coming out of a pandemic. Everybody’s stuck at home. They’re reading more than they’ve ever done before. And nobody wants a sad story, right? No one wants to remind themselves of how utterly horrific and sad and tragic life truly can be. And so many of us…

are escaping into romance. And one of the things I often say to folks who aren’t familiar with the genre, one of the criticisms we often get as authors is, oh, romance is so predictable. It’s so formulaic, right? You always know what you’re gonna get. It always ends happily ever after. And I say precisely, right? I am so sick and tired of not knowing what I’m going to get when I read a book from getting a bait and switch that,

really puts me in the wrong head space that I wanted to be in. I want a world where good things happen to good people. I want to be in a world where love wins in the end. And that’s what you’re going to get in romance every single time. And so the fact that I find it liberating rather than restrictive is something that I will get on my soapbox every single time and shout from the rooftops. Like, this is a truly spiritual experience for people. And we need more of it.

Cate Blouke (09:06)

Oh my God, Alyssa, like I’ve read your writing. This is sort of our first like real hello encounter. And I didn’t know that we were like soul sister best friends. Like that’s what I’ve been saying for years is I just want to read like good, like good triumphing over evil and like people being nice to each other. And they just don’t want to read about terrible things happening to terrible people.

Alyssa Jarrett (09:10)

I’m sorry.

Mm -hmm.

Cate Blouke (09:31)

or terrible things happening to good people. Like I never made it through Game of Thrones for that reason. I was like, I can’t handle this. It’s way too stressful.

Alyssa Jarrett (09:34)

Mmmmm

Yeah, and to be fair, I love a lot of that kind of media. Succession is one of my favorite television shows of all time, and that is truly watching bad people do bad things. But the one thing that I love most about that show is the undercurrent of sexual tension between Roman and Gerri And so everything I ever watch, I just keep thinking, how can we make this more erotic?

Cate Blouke (10:03)

You

Okay, now I’m super curious, like, have you always been so sexually liberated? I mean, you were apparently reading Redbook from a young age.

Alyssa Jarrett (10:08)

you

Yeah, you know, I give my my give my parents a lot of credit, you know, they are they are politically conservative, but they are pro choice. And so they were sex positive, as anyone would probably label it when I was growing up. And so having conversations about puberty and sexual activity, you know, my mother taught, taught, you know, school for 30 years. And so, you know, having

a rational conversation around these sorts of things was something that I really, really appreciated. And very much so now that I’m older, that I never had the sexual repression that most people do have. And that’s, again, liberated me to be a lot more open about it, right? I was, in fact, you know…

This is an interesting tidbit about myself. I was sort of labeled often as a slut and a whore in high school. And I was a virgin. But because I had talked about sex and because I was open about my interests and open about talking about these sorts of things, you know, reading Dan Savage and all of the sexual advice columns and really knowing there is to know about, you know, this whole realm.

A lot of people were very resistant to that or had thought I was more experienced than I was. And so again, like looking back on it, I’m not surprised it led me in this direction because these are the conversations that are a lot of people are uncomfortable having. And every partner I’ve ever had has always said, wow, you’re just like so open to talk about these kinds of things. Like I feel really safe.

And that’s one of the biggest compliments I can get is when someone who knows me reaches out to me and divulges something very personal or very intimate about themselves because they know that I’m not gonna judge them. I’m gonna celebrate them and support them and want them to be their true authentic self. So that’s really why I do this.

Cate Blouke (12:02)

Hmm.

Oh, yeah. I’m just, I’m like stumped. Like my brain just melted in the like, yes of all of that is what just happened for me. Like, yeah. And I keep going back to this idea of like fighting the good fight, of like normalizing, of.

Alyssa Jarrett (12:32)

I’m sorry.

Yeah.

Cate Blouke (12:51)

being the voices that are like, hey, we can talk about this. It’s okay to talk about this. I love reading your substack stack for that reason. You just today published a post about enjoying smut. And I, so as someone who loves reading what I call fluffy fucking fiction, but not usually in the romance genre, and this is something.

a little bit about me, as someone who spent like most of my adult life single romance can like pull on the heartstrings for me of him just like I want mine.

Alyssa Jarrett (13:25)

Yeah?

Yeah, and I would say the same thing in relationships too, right? Like there’s this feeling of, you know, people are never going to be able to deliver that kind of high, I mean, there is high expectations, right? We want to preserve the best of humanity and romance and truly have people who learn and grow and become better people. And real life is messy and it’s not always going to work so linearly.

Um, but that’s okay. Right? Like that’s for me, it’s, you know, is my husband the perfect romance hero? Of course not. Right. But like, we’re not there for that. We’re not there for that. Um, but he’s supportive and he lets me, um, you know, celebrate myself in my fiction. And that’s all I can ask for. Right. It’s like, we’re imperfect creatures and you know, there we’re not always going to match up to the media that we watch. And that’s.

That’s for everybody, but that’s okay, right? It’s like, we just want to be able to have a good time and watch people get railed sometimes. It doesn’t have to be a complicated thing.

Cate Blouke (14:29)

rate.

right? Oh, there we go. That’s why I was like, I started a thought. And it was so as someone who doesn’t read a lot of romance, I super appreciated your like rating scale because I was unfamiliar with sort of like hear the different things. And I think I’d have to look at it. But like I’m usually in the in the like off out. What’s it called? The like there’s Yeah, okay. Yeah. So for our listeners who haven’t yet read your

Alyssa Jarrett (15:00)

Close, closed door. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, and again, you know, I’m in the Bookstagram community and on Booktok and everyone has different spice ratings. So you’re not always going to see consistency when you’re online. But I’m in the romance book subreddit quite a lot. And they all talk about

Cate Blouke (15:06)

post, like what are the like spiciness scales of romance novels?

Alyssa Jarrett (15:28)

the spice levels as a rating from romance .io. So romance .io is a popular resource for romance readers where you can go and you can check the spice levels or heat levels of anything you read. And so there’s five spice levels. And so they call them steam ratings. And so one is where we would be where it’s just, you know, you maybe get the Pride and Prejudice kiss at the end, but that’s it, right? It’s just glimpses and kisses, right?

Cate Blouke (15:56)

Right.

Alyssa Jarrett (15:57)

Some people refer to this as clean romance, however, I don’t prescribe to that because that unfortunately creates a stigma where every other part of romance is dirty. But yeah, so.

Cate Blouke (16:10)

Ugh, boo. Boo on that. Boo on that. And I also, I do, I feel like I should interject. I do like sexy scenes. I just, like, yeah. And you know what? This is about taking the guilt out of guilty pleasure. Have you read Gail Carriger at all? She has some San Francisco male werewolf erotica romance novels that I absolutely love. They’re great.

Alyssa Jarrett (16:25)

I have not. I have.

Oh, wonderful.

look up that immediately.

Cate Blouke (16:39)

So like, full disclosure, hello world, hello mom. I’m on the like M to M train. I think because that like is distant enough for me that it’s like fiction in a way that I can just sort of be like, oh, I love all of this. I love everything about this. And it doesn’t make me sad that I’m single. Right. Okay, so.

Alyssa Jarrett (16:42)

Yes. Woo!

Yes, exactly, exactly. Yeah, so one, we got glimpses and kisses. Two is what you were referring to, which is a closed door or fade to black where sex is implied, but you’re not going to see any of it. Oftentimes they’ll go to bed and then the next chapter they wake up the next day and you know, and it’s already done. And so that can be really popular for folks who are interested in romance, but don’t necessarily want the spiciness.

Three is open door. And so this is where you’re probably going to see most traditionally published rom -coms where sex happens on the page, but it’s euphemistic. That means that you’re not going to get any explicit terms for genitalia. And it’s going to be, you know, it’s more sensual, right? That’s the sort of the Emily Henry, you know, Abby Jimenez type of writing where it’s beautiful prose, but it’s not explicit.

Cate Blouke (17:38)

Mm -hmm.

Alyssa Jarrett (17:56)

And then when you get into the fourth level, that’s explicit open door. So that’s the level that I write at where sex happens on the page at least twice and it’s explicitly described. So you’re going to get all the words and all the positions. And so…

Cate Blouke (18:14)

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Alyssa Jarrett (18:19)

And then when you get into the fifth and final level, that’s what we call explicit and plentiful. And that means that you get a lot of explicit scenes. And this is where your traditional erotica or erotic romance comes in, where things are just a lot more, it’s mostly about the sexual relationship rather than any sort of undercurrent of plot. And so that’s sort of the range. And what I love is that you can try things out and you can dip in and out however you’d like.

Just get a taste for what works for you. And there are some writers that I will read lower spice levels because I love the way they write. And then there are some where I know exactly what I’m getting and I’m loving every minute of it.

Cate Blouke (18:58)

Mm -hmm.

Yeah, yeah, I think like I I’m more in the like I don’t tend to gravitate towards the high spice Just because I end up being really horny with nowhere to go like really like that’s what it is So I’m probably like a level three a lot of the time But I’m not gonna I’m not gonna close the door on a level four if it’s well written, you know, like I’m here for it

Alyssa Jarrett (19:30)

Yeah, yeah and there are creators out there like Steamy Lit that do book boxes where you can get some spicy romance with a sex toy as part of your subscription so you know you don’t have to go without.

Cate Blouke (19:38)

Oh, hey, there you go. Right. Um, okay, so… Oh, gosh.

Alyssa Jarrett (19:51)

I know, that’s a segue, man.

Cate Blouke (19:54)

Yeah, yeah, where do we go from from that? Um, well, I guess like, how long has it been since you’ve been introducing yourself as I am Alyssa Jarrett I’m a romance novelist.

Alyssa Jarrett (20:09)

Yeah, so I quit my VP of marketing job at a tech startup in 2022. So it’s been two years now. I was struggling with some pretty severe mental health issues. And it just, I wasn’t in the environment that it was going to be really conducive to healing. And so I decided to take some time off, took a sabbatical. I put that in air quotes because that turned into self -employment pretty quickly.

And then that’s when I really started to go gung ho. So at that point, I had already written one novel and I was part way through the second. So I knew I had the ability to do this. And so I took some time over the course of, you know, these past two years and completed a four book series of rom -coms. And…

Cate Blouke (20:59)

Wait, so hold on, hold on, hold on. So your first book’s about to come out, but all of them are done.

Alyssa Jarrett (21:03)

All of them are drafted, I will say. Yes, all of them are drafted. Yes, I do have some significant work on a couple, you know, just to make sure that, you know, they’re publication ready. But yeah, I was extremely lucky that I had the flexibility to really have the vision to create the series and then write it straight through. And some things got shifted around that first novel is actually gonna be the last one I publish. But overall, it’s just been really nice to put, you know,

Cate Blouke (21:05)

Okay, well still.

Alyssa Jarrett (21:33)

flipped my identity around where I was a marketer first and a writer second. Now I am a writer first and a marketer second, even though the marketing is certainly what pays the bills at this point. I think the shift really changed when I decided that this wasn’t a hobby, that this was a business, that this was my career.

Cate Blouke (21:53)

Hmm. Yeah. I can relate really hard to that right now. So I’m now as of today, we’re recording on the day that the podcast launched, right? Like now I’m a podcaster as well as a writer, right? And a life coach. And I have some marketing that’s still paying the bills, right? But it’s similarly in the last year, I’ve been going through that transition as well. And it really is like an identity sort of choice and decision and shift.

Alyssa Jarrett (22:07)

WHA –

Cate Blouke (22:23)

that I’d love to hear more about what that looked like and felt like for you and what that opened up for you.

Alyssa Jarrett (22:29)

Yeah, and I think we’ve talked about this of why we were connected to, of what it means to be creatively integrated, right? And so there are kind of two sides of this camp, right? There are authors out there that believe in compartmentalization, right? Where my creative work is completely separate from my day job, from my family life, from my home situation that, you know, I keep it, the divisions are clear and they are stuck, right?

And that works for some people. And sometimes you may be in a career, like if you’re in finance or politics or you teach underage children, where that is necessary to keep those divisions pretty clear. However, I am very fortunate enough to believe in creative integration, where I bring my whole self to work, so to speak, and I’m not hiding or diminishing any aspect of my personality or my identity. And so that means that,

I am both a marketer and I am an author and I am a wife and I have three cats. And so all of this is important to me. And it’s important that my readers and the people around me know that that’s all a part of my life. And I think when I was working in tech, I was weighted too heavily in like…

my identity climbing the corporate ladder. I use the phrase I girl bossed too close to the sun. And when that no longer exists, then you have an identity crisis. And you think, well, what now? Where do I go from here? And so now I’m about making sure that I’m not, you know, I’m not keeping myself from enjoying all facets of myself.

Cate Blouke (24:05)

Yeah.

Oh, I love that so much. I’m not keeping myself from enjoying all facets of myself. Fuck yeah. Like, fuck yeah. Yeah, I, when I was leaving academia, it was a huge identity crisis of like, who am I without, without being this job? Right? And one of the things, one of the many things that

Alyssa Jarrett (24:25)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Cate Blouke (24:45)

I’m really trying to do on this podcast and in my writing is saying like, let’s all be our awesome selves all the time, right? That we’re not just the one box or the one job or the one label, right? That we bring a lot of really cool shit to the table. And I believe that like fulfillment and joy is found in being able to show up as our whole selves.

Alyssa Jarrett (24:57)

Yeah.

Yeah. And I will be the first to say that that’s a massive privilege to be able to do this, right? Like I am self -employed. I don’t have anybody to, you know, to tell me what to do. I have a lucrative marketing career and my husband has the same in finance. We have the financial means to live the way we’d like. I am also child free by choice. And so I don’t have to worry about protecting the privacy of other people.

Cate Blouke (25:14)

Yeah. Yeah.

Alyssa Jarrett (25:39)

Um, and so I get to be as forthcoming and open about what I do. Um, because I, I am relatively protected. I am also cis. I am white. I am straight. I am the insert all of the additives that have given me a lot of privilege in life. Um, and so, you know, when I have, I read a lot of tech, uh, nonfiction and management guides when I was in Silicon Valley and it’s.

That whole white feminism of you know, just bring your whole self to work

Cate Blouke (26:11)

Right.

Alyssa Jarrett (26:12)

Um, it’s only going to work if you were in an environment that celebrates vulnerability and celebrates authenticity. Um, and I was told in my past career that I did not have executive presence, right? That I didn’t necessarily have a stoic enough personality, um, to show up in the way that the C -suite wanted me to show up. Um, and to some extent they are right, right? I would always side.

with the underdog, with the employee, with the union, with, you know, insert whatever labor rights group you want to talk to. That’s where I feel my true alliances. And so now that I write romance, I don’t have to pretend to be somebody that I’m not or try to appease anybody who thinks differently than me.

Cate Blouke (27:06)

Yeah, what was that choice like to to say like I don’t I mean what I heard there I feel like I heard there was just like I don’t want executive presence if that’s what that means right like I would rather be doing something else with my life. What was that choice or process like for you?

Alyssa Jarrett (27:16)

Yeah.

I think it was humbling in the sense that, you know, when you’re an executive, I had just thought of it as a natural progression of my career. What I quickly realized was that everybody around me in that room, that’s where they truly wanted to be, right? They didn’t necessarily have hobbies or like things they liked to do on the side, right? They’re in back -to -back meetings for 12 to 14 hours a day and they live and breathe this stuff. And I realized that’s…

massively unfair of me to not give all of this to this position because I don’t care as much as everybody else in this room. But what I do care a hell of a lot about is this world that I’m in now of romance. And we all deserve to be in the room that we truly want to be in. So that way, we can fall in love with learning again.

Cate Blouke (28:01)

you

Alyssa Jarrett (28:21)

And I learned that belatedly. It wasn’t until I quit that I realized like, do I keep up on marketing trends and the conversations everybody’s having? Sure, right? I keep up with the tech industry and understand what’s going on there. But I get to truly be a novice and an amateur and I get to learn and soak up everything like a sponge now that I’m pursuing publishing.

And that is, that’s just so refreshing. I just feel so much more rejuvenated every day. Um, because I get to think about the things that, um, that matter to me.

Cate Blouke (28:58)

Yes!

Has that, I mean, was like claiming that for yourself, like making that decision of like, I don’t care about this. I want to do the thing that I care about. Like, what has that been like? Was that hard? Was that scary? Was that easy for you?

Alyssa Jarrett (29:18)

It was definitely scary. And there’s so, so there was, there was kind of a conversations I was having with therapists, with executive coaches, with my husband, with my friends about making this jump, right? And, you know, there was, there was a lot of hesitation and I had to sit back and really evaluate that I am in such a position of privilege. If I don’t have the bravery to do this now, I never will.

And for everybody who can’t, I owe it to them to do it, right? To show them that it is possible, there’s nothing massively special or unique about me, other than I have the means and the drive to do so. And so it was interesting, I had a conversation with my brother around the time I took this marketing executive position and he said, I’m so proud of you, but I don’t want you to forget what your eight year old self wanted, which was to be a…

Cate Blouke (29:54)

Mmm.

Alyssa Jarrett (30:17)

to be an author. I know.

Cate Blouke (30:21)

Good job, brother –

What a good job, brother moment.

Alyssa Jarrett (30:27)

about that because he’s completely right. He knows me backwards and forwards and and that’s what you gotta remind yourself. What did your eight -year -old self want for you? I did not want to be a startup executive. She wanted to tell stories and so I’m telling stories now.

Cate Blouke (30:48)

Yes. Fuck yes. What else did she want?

Alyssa Jarrett (30:48)

you

laughs

Cate Blouke (30:55)

Like what other things are you like bringing forward? I mean, I think in my, so like I turned, what am I? I’m 41 now. And I think in the last couple of years is when I’ve really been like leaning into just reclaiming the shit from my childhood that made me happy. Like I watched all of My Little Pony, Friendship is Magic to get through my dissertation. Like, and I’m, I,

Alyssa Jarrett (31:10)

Yeah!

Love it.

Cate Blouke (31:20)

I have a relation, well not a relationship, but like I have a relationship with glitter now. It makes me really happy. And I’m just like, fuck it. Like I like glitter. I am a 41 year old woman who likes glitter and that’s okay. I’m also in my leopard print era where like I’m just gonna wear something that has leopard print at all times. Cause like, and then when I think back and like we can trace these things back or at least I can. Like when I was a kid, I was really into big cats. I was really into horses. Like.

Alyssa Jarrett (31:27)

Yeah.

Yeah.

Oh, same. Yeah, I would say it was funny those first few weeks of my sabbatical, what I chose to do, right, to sort of get back to center and nurture my inner child. I did a lot of puzzles. I rewatched the entire original Gossip Girl series. I listened to all of my favorite emo bands.

Cate Blouke (31:50)

Yeah.

Alyssa Jarrett (32:14)

Um, and so I would say, yeah, lean into your nostalgia. Um, because somehow some way I got distracted by other priorities, um, that didn’t truly make me happy. Um, and now I say, fuck it. Like just, just live how you want. And I think when we talk about guilty pleasures, it’s amazing, um, that the only thing that we describe as a guilty pleasure is something that women and girls do for the most part.

There have been studies about this, about how people think about the media that they consume. And when it comes to guilty pleasures, that’s what you label as rom -coms, reality shows, pop music, you know, anything that’s feminine coded. And so I obviously take great issue with this because you don’t…

And my husband does not talk about the horror schlock that he watches on Shudder as his guilty pleasure, right? Or the fact that, you know, Valentine’s Day is called the Hallmark holiday, but we sell just as much chocolate on Halloween. And so what are we really trying to say here? Is it that the things that mostly women and girls like are to be ridiculed and to be deemed as lesser than? No.

Cate Blouke (33:14)

Right?

Alyssa Jarrett (33:36)

Fuck that.

Cate Blouke (33:37)

that makes me think about you were just at a writer’s retreat and we’re saying that most writers, writers, quote unquote writers at the quote, you know, the like writerly write write retreat don’t read romance novels.

Alyssa Jarrett (33:49)

Yeah.

Correct, or you know, if they read them, they certainly aren’t writing them. And so I loved all of my peers, my fellow attendees, that writing retreat was truly an illuminating experience. And it was so interesting to see all of our different backgrounds. I don’t have an MFA. I don’t have any awards or accolades. I… Yeah, thank you. I appreciate that. But I…

Cate Blouke (34:15)

Yet.

I

Alyssa Jarrett (34:20)

yeah, it’s so funny that you get out of your bubble where I’m living, breathing romance all the time and all of these trends and everything that’s hot in the space. And then there’s so many books I’ve never heard of in my life, right? Would never pick up in a store, right? And that to me is amazing because that means that there are so many niches in the world that people…

can align themselves with. So if you haven’t found your thing yet, it’s out there somewhere, right? You just gotta do a little digging and find what works for you. And there are a lot of people now that have found their way to romance through other ways, like, you know, the romantasies with Sarah J. Maas or, you know, more on the, you know, upmarket women’s fiction side with Emily Henry, right? There’s these gateways that people find themselves to the genre. And I think that’s so magical.

Cate Blouke (35:15)

I also think it’s magical. I mean, I think that’s one of the beautiful things about the like magic of technology and the era that we live in and the sort of self -publishing option that is available is that it’s, I mean, I’d love to hear more from you about this because you are much more familiar with the publishing industry than I am. But I just feel like in the last decade, we’re getting…

so many more, I don’t know, like interesting and fun and yummy things available that just weren’t an option when, you know, the standard publishing industry was the gatekeeper.

Alyssa Jarrett (35:53)

Yeah.

Mm -hmm. Yeah, well and and traditional publishing, although slow to move, is coming around, right? And I’m seeing this every day. Ruby Dixon is in Target, right? Ice Planet barbarians, blue -skinned aliens with barbs on their dicks is in Target. And I…

Cate Blouke (36:19)

I was like, I mean, I was like, I don’t know who this person is, but it seems like I should.

Alyssa Jarrett (36:24)

You should. It’s such a binge -worthy series. It’s fantastic. And same thing with, you know, Tessa Bailey, Katie Robert, right? The explicit and spicy and sexy and fun is making its way to readers like never before. In fact, one of the agents at the retreat was scouting a erotic romance author, a dark romance author that had…

a kink in her book that went viral and now you know she’s you’re gonna probably be hearing her name very soon and so it’s it’s fascinating to me that you know you and this is this is more prevalent in romance than other genres but we can self -publish the truly raunchy crazy stuff and if it hits audiences publishing will come around right they are

taking readers money. And so it really just depends on making sure that you find your readers, build a platform, be true to yourself, truly write what you adore and enjoy because if you’re having fun your readers are gonna have fun too.

Cate Blouke (37:36)

Yeah, I was just about to say, so like, what does it mean to be true to yourself as a writer?

Alyssa Jarrett (37:41)

Yeah, for me, it’s being comfortable and accepting of critical feedback, right? And so my book is available for early readers to receive ARCs or advanced reader copies. And not all of those reviews have been stellar and that’s totally fine. I hold a lot of gratitude for those readers. And so if you are, if you’re not a…

if you don’t wanna read about Silicon Valley or you don’t really care much about satire or you don’t really care too much for unlikable female characters at times, it may not be your cup of tea and that’s okay, right? I have to be comfortable with that and say that I am one reader closer to finding the people who are really gonna enjoy what I write. And so, but I wouldn’t have…

come to that conclusion had I not been on this journey to find out what kind of writer I am, what kind of stories I want to tell. And the first thing I do before I write is I think about the theme and I kind of outline that. What am I trying to say? Because romance can mean something at the end of the day. And what is my point of view on that topic, right? It’s not always love conquers all, although that’s –

always going to be the case. But what is the all part, right? What are we actually talking about when we when we write a love story? And for me, that’s a way for me to parody the industry I know best and, you know, incorporate a lot of the things that I saw when I was, you know, working my way up the corporate ladder. And I find it really cathartic, actually, to put those in my books now.

Cate Blouke (39:33)

I bet, I bet, yeah, I mean, I have been enjoying reading your satire about Silicon Valley and as someone who has marketing background experience, like it is relatable and funny to me. And I wanna circle back a little bit, like, I mean, okay, I love that, like, yes, absolutely, like romance can have a point.

Right? We have a per – like anything that we’re producing, we have a perspective and it’s about something. Um, but I, and I want to circle back to that moment where, like, how have you gotten to that place of like willing to accept critical feedback? Like, what has that been like of, of saying, you know, I’m going to do this thing that I love and it is delightful to me and it’s okay if you don’t like it.

Alyssa Jarrett (40:02)

Mm -hmm.

Yeah, it’s not easy. I’m gonna say that putting yourself out there, whether it’s a podcast or a book or whatever hobby people may have, it’s scary to put yourself out there and create something for public consumption,

Cate Blouke (40:43)

you manage that like on the internal like behind that like that that’s what I’m really curious And then wondering like what that looks like, if you’re willing to share about it and just like, like, how do people are mean? And it’s scary to put things on the internet because people can be real mean on the internet.

Alyssa Jarrett (40:54)

Yeah!

People can be real mean and I have my real last name out there, right? I’m not hiding behind a pen name. I am not particularly difficult to find, you know, so to speak. And it is, I, you know, I received my first critical review one week into making my book available for early readers. And you know what? I tell myself like, wow, that person read my book really fast.

Cate Blouke (41:06)

Yeah, same.

Alyssa Jarrett (41:32)

Um so they may not have liked it, they may not have liked it, but they man they really powered through it. Um so I gotta give them props for that. Um I have a little pity party right? I, I feel my feelings right? I was in therapy to accept what I can’t control. Um I have you know I have pretty severe anxiety at times.

Cate Blouke (41:32)

Yeah, they’re fast reader!

Alyssa Jarrett (41:57)

And for me, it’s like coming back to the truth. And my therapist and I, we don’t always talk about that. What’s the truth? And the truth is I would do this if nobody read it. I would do this if it didn’t go anywhere. I would do this if it didn’t make any money, right? I do this because I love it. And for the people who are on board with that, like that makes it all worth it. So it’s just being really, really clear about your why.

And I think everything comes with practice, right? I’m going to get these, you know, negative reviews because it’s inevitable. And I honestly, I thought of that as a badge of honor. Like, I got one, I got one, I lived, right? I’m here, I survived. And that’s fantastic, right? It’s okay. You’re…

Cate Blouke (42:48)

Ah, it.

Yeah, yeah, it didn’t kill you.

Alyssa Jarrett (42:54)

didn’t kill me. My brain perceives all threats as equally scary, right? Because like caveman days, right? Everything is, every mean comment is a saber -tooth tiger. But I have to remind myself that I am chronically online and not everybody else is, right? Nobody is going to give as much of a shit about whatever is bothering you as you will.

Cate Blouke (43:06)

Mm -hmm.

Yeah, yeah, totally. I also have done a lot of therapy and struggled with anxiety, right? And that is a similar, like I use the actual tool of like, I am afraid of this. And the truth is, I was doing that this morning, right? You know, and it’s so helpful. It’s so helpful to sort of have that sort of muscle built of coming back to the truth is I would do this anyway.

Alyssa Jarrett (43:29)

Mmhmm.

Cate Blouke (43:44)

Like I would do this if it didn’t make me money, I would do this. And I think especially around creativity, to me that’s like how we stay sane, right? Is that like, yes, it will be amazing when this, that or the other thing like makes us money. But at the end of the day, like I’m doing this because I want to do it. And when I can come from that place,

Alyssa Jarrett (44:08)

Mm -hmm.

Cate Blouke (44:13)

I get to enjoy the doing.

Alyssa Jarrett (44:15)

Yeah, and no one can take that away from you.

Cate Blouke (44:18)

Right. Right. Like, haters gonna hate, but like, if I enjoy the process of making the thing…

Alyssa Jarrett (44:21)

Hahaha!

Mm -hmm.

Cate Blouke (44:28)

and get to like notice that while I’m doing it, right? Like I get to be on this conversation, be having a great time on this conversation. Nobody can take that away from me, regardless of how many people listen to us talk about this or

Oh, I love it. I love it. What do you love most about your book?

Alyssa Jarrett (44:50)

Oh my goodness. I mean, for me they’re just, they’re so fun. like they are truly just a blast. I’m having, I know it’s going to sound arrogant as shit when it comes out of my mouth, but there are sometimes I will read my sentences over and I will say, I’ll say, damn, that was a good one. Or I will make myself laugh. And I forgot I wrote it.

Cate Blouke (45:17)

just like pause us here. Like, why is that arrogant? Like, fuck that. I like, because so I just recorded a fuck ton of my old blog posts to launch with the podcast. And like, I had similar moments of I was like, you know what, like, this is really good. And like, what if we lived in a world where like, it was okay for us to be like, to just own that to be like, Oh, I made something really good. Like,

Alyssa Jarrett (45:32)

Yeah. Yeah, and I think most authors are told, you know, oh, your first draft is going to be trash. It’s rubbish. It’s garbage. It’s right. And no one ever talks about but but hopefully your final draft is like really, really awesome. And like fills you with pride. And like, is the story that you want it all along? Right? That.

to me is magical and not, we don’t talk enough about the journey, right? My first drafts are kind of trash and then they get better, right? And I love that. So yes, I’m all here for it. I don’t know if you did this in high school, but when we read the Scarlet Letter, we all had to like do an, we had to make a letter for one of our negative qualities. Yes, we.

Cate Blouke (46:27)

No, no, I did not have to do that in high school. Oh my God, that’s bananas.

Alyssa Jarrett (46:31)

Yeah, maybe my high school was unique in that regard, but a lot of people would take what I would call easy negative qualities. They would be like, I for indecisive, right? Or P for procrastinator. And that’s all safe, right? Who hasn’t procrastinated on something? And I went guns blazing and did A for arrogance.

Cate Blouke (46:59)

Okay.

Alyssa Jarrett (47:00)

which does not make you a lot of friends in high school. I will let you know that right now. But I was very sure of myself, right? And I truly felt that, yeah, you know, in some regard, in some manner, I am just better at something than somebody else. And that’s okay, right? Just like there are a lot of people who are a hell of a lot better at me than other things. And so, yes, if that makes me arrogant, you know what? Fair.

Cate Blouke (47:03)

No.

Mm.

Alyssa Jarrett (47:30)

That’s a fair assessment.

Cate Blouke (47:31)

Okay, so yeah, so I’m coming from the perspective of having just like raging deep -rooted insecurity at all times very much in high school, right? So this idea of like, no, I want to claim some arrogance for myself. Like I want to own that.

so circling back to that sort of like making visible the creative process, right? How long from like, I’m gonna start this book project to today. Like how long has that been?

Alyssa Jarrett (47:57)

Mm -hmm. Oh man. It has been a minute.

I got started in 2014. That was with the first draft of my first novel. I technically I drafted that novel in three years, but that’s on and off. I took many a hiatus. I got married. I realized I can’t plan a wedding and write a book at the same time. So there were just things that got put on the back burner for a while.

But I would say I, it was around 2020 where I threw my hands up in the air and said, I can’t do this anymore. I can’t edit this anymore. I don’t know what I’m missing. I’ve done all that I can do and I need help. And that’s when I hired my now editor, Kristen Tate at the Blue Garrett and boy, she rocked my world in the best way possible.

And this is kind of silly to say because I was a marketer and a journalist and I’ve been writing my whole life, but writing fiction is different. It’s a different muscle and you’re not going to be really great at it from the get -go and you get way better and you get faster. You get a process that works for you. My fastest novel was my third. It took me 13 weeks to draft. And I was utterly obsessed with that story. It’s actually going to be the second one in the series that comes out this fall.

a rock climbing romance. So I’m super stoked for that. But yeah, it’s not always going to be that way. My fourth novel took me a longer period of time to get out, but now I have a repeatable process, something that works. And it took me a very long time. So that’s like, what, 2014? So that’s a decade to get here, to realize like I finally kind of sort of know what I’m doing now. And that’s…

Cate Blouke (49:42)

Yeah.

Alyssa Jarrett (49:49)

I feel like everybody’s like that. Everybody takes way too fucking long on their first book, like outrageously long because they don’t know what they’re doing and they’re scared. And then we finally get over that hurdle somehow and the rest of them, I’m not saying they aren’t hard, but they’re definitely not as hard because you finally get some experience underneath you.

Cate Blouke (49:55)

Right.

Yeah, and I feel like, you know, and that’s true for writing books. And all of the things that we want to learn to do, right? All of the things that we want to get better at, that we want to be good at. Like, we just have to suck at it for a while and like muck around and not know how to do it. And that’s hard.

Alyssa Jarrett (50:23)

Yeah!

Yeah. And I do encourage when, if you do make that shift into sort of monetizing your hobbies, go get another hobby that you can suck at. So I love to bake. I am not a particularly great baker, but it’s fun to try and, you know, to eat my mistakes. It’s fun. Or I’m starting to do personal training and get a little bit into weightlifting. And I’m not great at that either.

Cate Blouke (50:44)

Mmm.

Alyssa Jarrett (51:02)

But it’s good for me and I feel accomplished when I get to lift just a teeny bit more weight than I did the other day. And so yeah, like you’re not, I don’t anticipate anybody should monetize all their hobbies, but go find one that you can suck at while you’re getting better at the one that you really care about.

Cate Blouke (51:21)

Yeah, there’s a book, it’s good to suck at something that’s like all about like she’s like learned to surf in her 40s and, you know, was bad at it for a very long time, right? And there’s this idea of just giving, like for me, there’s been a lot of like giving myself permission, right? I have needed the like permission to be bad at things and to do them anyway, as a recovering perfectionist.

Alyssa Jarrett (51:32)

Love it.

Oh yeah, I hear ya.

Cate Blouke (51:49)

Yeah, yeah, so I appreciate you sharing that it’s been 10 years, right? It’s important to hear that. For me, and I assume for folks who are listening, that just, you know, it takes time.

Alyssa Jarrett (52:04)

yeah. And there is always going to be some kind of imposter syndrome around this, right?

Is this first book going to be perfect? Of course not, right? But it’s a learning experience. And now I know a hell of a lot more about publishing myself and all of the work that comes with it that I’m going to roll that into every other book I make. And that’s worth it just for that.

Cate Blouke (52:31)

Alyssa, this has been such a lovely conversation. Is there anything, is there anything we didn’t cover that you want to make sure we touch on before we wrap this up?

Alyssa Jarrett (52:34)

Yes!

I think, you know, I, the one thing that I haven’t said that I do think is important from like just a, from a moral standpoint is, you know, fuck capitalism for stealing our creativity, right? If you’re listening to me and saying,

Must be nice, right? Must be nice to be able to quit your job and have enough savings to write books and, you know, to live your passions. I hear you, right? I was definitely one of those people. And I am so angry that this industry in particular is favoring the privileged and the wealthy. Because there are so many people that have a fascinating story to tell. And you may have.

right, a very, very, very difficult day job, right? Or you may have a maxed out schedule. You may have multiple children. You may have, you know, people in your life that you’re taking care of and you may not be able to put as much time as you’d like into your passion. And I want that for you, right? Somehow, some way, I do want that for you. And so…

It is possible. I am not saying it is easy, but I’m rooting for you. And however you can find that joy in your life, prioritize it. It may not be, it could be five minutes a day. It could be on your lunch break. It could be early in the morning, at night, on the weekends. However you can swing it. Get your partner involved if you have one to let you have your you time

because this is what keeps me from sinking into a very dark depression. And if I didn’t have this, I don’t think I’d have much of anything. And I want that for everybody that’s listening to this. Like, that’s all I can ask.

Cate Blouke (54:37)

What beautiful icing on this yummy, wonderful cake. I’m just like, all the snaps, all the amens. That’s a beautiful high note to end on. Like, yes to that. Yes to carving out time for yourself. Yes to claiming your joy, regardless of circumstance and an acknowledgement of same over here, cis, white, privileged background.

I have the savings to be able to cut back on my marketing work, to be doing these projects, to be pursuing what really lights me up. And I want that for anyone who’s listening too. And I really think it starts with honoring that part of us that just really wants that thing. And carving out just a little bit of space for that thing is how it starts.

Alyssa Jarrett (55:32)

And even if it takes a decade, right? Like the decade was gonna pass anyway. So you might as well.

Cate Blouke (55:38)

Yeah, ugh, so good. All right, Alyssa, where do people find you?

Alyssa Jarrett (55:44)

Well, I am at author Alyssa Jarrett. I’m on Instagram, threads and TikTok. I also have a substack -stack newsletter called Grumpy Plus Sunshine, where I share all of my romance rants and raves and recommendations. And so you can find me there. My debut novel is called Love Apptually. It’s a Silicon Valley rom -com with a lot of…

Laugh Out Loud satire and you can check that out on my website alissaJarrett .com slash love dash actually. It is going to be available on Amazon Kindle Unlimited and paperback wherever books are sold on May 21st. So I really appreciate this opportunity Cate

I’m just so excited for all of the work that you’ve been doing and I read your newsletter religiously. So this podcast is gonna be like right up there at the top of my queue every single time. So this has been such a joy. And yeah, if I could give any last like words of wisdom at all, it’s like, if you feel guilty at all about what makes you happy or what your pleasures are,

Fuck it, right? Like you’ve got one life and I don’t care if it’s monster smut, you do you, right? Just do whatever floats your boat and I am gonna be rooting for you every step of the way. And I wanna read that monster smut by the way, please send it to me. I am…

Cate Blouke (57:15)

Hahahaha

Amazing. I don’t but like I want you to send it to Alyssa. I think that’s great. I will not yuck your yum. I will pass it along to somebody who’s gonna find it yummy. That’s what that’s what it’s about, right? Everything is yummy to somebody.

Alyssa Jarrett (57:32)

Yes, I’m here for that. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. I am I’m I’m it is it is and go find the people who agree with you. And you’ll you’ll have make best friends for life. Right. It’s that’s it’s just such a joy to be able to not have to not have to hold back anymore.

Cate Blouke (57:59)

Indeed.