Mindy: Welcome to Writer Writer Pants on Fire, where authors talk about things that never happened to people who don't exist. We also cover craft, the agent hunt, query trenches, publishing, industry, marketing and more. I'm your host, Mindy McGinnis. You can check out my books and social media at mindymcginnis dot com and make sure to visit the Writer Writer Pants on Fire blog for additional interviews, query critiques and more as well as full transcriptions of each podcast episode. at WriterWriterPants on Fire.com. And don’t forget to check out the Writer, Writer, Pants on Fire Facebook page. Give me feedback, suggest topics you’d like to hear discussed, and let me know if there is someone you’d love to see a a guest.

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Mindy: We're here with Robbie Couch, author of The Sky Blues, which released April six. The heartfelt and tender story that celebrates resilience blazing your own trail and the joys of discovering your truest self. So, you're a journalist as well, and your work primarily focuses on LGBTQ issues, progressive causes, which of course, ties into the novel as well. I feel like especially in YA literature we see a lot of coming out stories. Which is great and it's really awesome that we're seeing those, we don't see a lot of the post coming out stories and those lived experiences once you've made your statement and put yourself out there. So, if you could talk a little bit about that and how it ties into The Sky Blues, that would be great. 

Robbie: I think you put that really well, fortunately, we've had many more LGBTQ stories in general in the past few years, but I think even within that genre, I think the coming out story is a little bit over saturated within the genre. But I do kind of feel like there's so much more to the queer experience than just that coming up moment. And sometimes I think in the genre we can kind of get pigeonholed into that one moment. Also with a lot of coming out stories, there's this very big build up to the moment and then it can sometimes feel like rainbows and sunshine afterward and for a lot of LGBTQ people, that's really not the case. Coming out is a wonderful moment, but oftentimes it does come with unfortunately, some backlash. Family rejection and even just internal struggles of finding your way and being comfortable in your skin and navigating the world as an openly queer person, that comes with its own challenges. I wanted to capture the moment after a young queer person, in my story his name is Sky Baker, and you meet him right in Chapter One, a few months after his mom found out that he was gay. He's openly gay, but he's still in that awkward, contentious weird moment in his life where he's trying to be comfortable essentially with this new normal. 

Mindy: I really, really like that you are examining this in a realistic way because yes, it is awesome to be able to be yourself and, you know, make your announcement and be present as your true self. But no, not everyone is going to be accepting and loving and not necessarily just in novels but tv shows and movies, I just see so much celebration - which is great and is necessary - it needs to be there. It's too long in coming. But I don't always see a realistic presentation of fallout. So I wrote a book called HEROINE which is about the opioid crisis and my main character is a female athlete who becomes addicted to heroin and her best friend also was in the car accident with her and suffered through pain and recovery without becoming addicted to opioids. And at the end of the book her best friend is like fuck you, you know, she's like I did it, why couldn't you? What the hell is your problem? And I had a lot of people you know email me and be like, you know, thank you for not just making it - Yeah, it's okay. Because there were plenty of people that are like, you know, it's all right, Mickey. We still love you. We're going to help you through this, we're sorry this happened, it's not your fault, it's just what happened. And then one of the most important people in her life is like no you're weak, I'm done with you. It's important to show that.

Robbie: For sure. I think especially in the genre, there should be sort of a balance where of course we want young people to feel empowered to come out and we want to give them hope that there's a place for them in this world. So we don't want to paint it in this very dark light where it's this scary thing. But at the same time to your point, it often is very complicated and there are tough challenges that arise. And I think it's just as important to tell the stories of those people who face those challenges and then still come out thriving and doing well. And another theme of The Sky Blues, a big theme is found family. Our chosen family and Sky is able to, even though he faces some family rejection and there's certainly people in his life and in his town that do not respect him as a gay kid, there are many people who do. And I think that was something that I really wanted to make a part of the narrative and a part of that story because yeah, I think it's just as important to show those tough, challenging stories, but then also showing resiliency and showing young where people are overcoming those things and finding the pathway forward. 

Mindy: Absolutely. A realistic expectation for those who are going to be walking that path. Yes, absolutely. We're in prom season. So I work in high school and it is prom season. Last year we didn't have a problem at all because of Covid. This year we are having a masked prom. Prom of course, comes with all of the social expectations and body disparities. I went to high school in the 90s. I think especially for girls body positivity has changed a lot of things. I see girls wearing something that they are like, yeah, I'm rocking this, you know, and they don't feel... they don't feel any type of shame or anything like that. And it's such a relief. I remember in the 90s taking water pills, I would have rather peed in my dress, dripping urine as my body expelled everything just so that I looked as absolutely swim as possible. I mean, it's just ridiculous.

Robbie: Wow, that's awful. And I do think there absolutely is, of course, a double standard between genders in terms of expectation and what you look like and what you can wear and what you can't wear and how people are going to judge you. So, oh my God, I'm sorry. Hopefully we've made progress since the 90s. 

Mindy: It’s so much different now and I'm so, I'm so pleased and happy when I see my kids that are just content with themselves, not just content, but proud and muscular girls, too. Like built girls that are like yeah, I look good. I really like seeing that there's also this whole other experience of Prom for LGBTQ plus youth. Can you talk about that experience since we're in that season? 

Robbie: I think prom can be at least a wonderful, amazing, beautiful experience for high schoolers, but it's also this very traditional, conventional thing that I think can sometimes be dripping with heteronormativity in many ways. Sometimes for young queer people, it can feel very othering to be either gay or trans or bisexual and want to come to prom as your full self and be able to express yourself in whatever way that looks like. Sometimes that can be really challenging, especially if we're going to a school where there aren't a lot of openly LGBTQ students and teachers and it doesn't feel as inclusive. Something that's a secondary narrative in The Sky Blues and something that you're seeing at a lot of high schools across the country nowadays is like a queer prom or an LGBTQ prom or gay prom. It's a separate space, a separate event for LGBTQ students to really be able to come and be their authentic selves. As much as I wish that there didn't have to be that separate space and that we could have one big problem for everyone, I think it's really important that young queer people do feel safe and supported and can be celebrated doing the things that every other high schooler gets to do in their high school experience. Hopefully one day we won't have the need for those sorts of problems and they truly will be inclusive. We're not quite there yet in many schools. I do think it's gotten a lot better. My heart is always bursting when I hear about LGBTQ students who are crowned prom king or queen, even when I was in high school back in 2007, it's changed quite a bit since then. So it's very encouraging. But I think we have a little bit to go and it's important for those big quintessential high school moments to be inclusive for everyone. 

Mindy: Absolutely, the quintessential high school experience. That's exactly right. Everyone should be included in that. And I do think we're making strides.

Robbie: Another theme that is sort of touched on in the book too is oftentimes we're not aware of the messages that other people are being sent and absorbing from their communities. So, as a straight person, you might not necessarily see the sorts of homophobia that he faces, even if it's not blatant, even if it's just microaggressions or just the things people say or making off the cuff remarks. There's certainly people in my own high school that were LGBTQ that I didn't know. It's tough to think about going through that experience and wishing you were there for each other and kind of having the hindsight now as adults to wish you had that supportive network and could really encourage people to be their true selves. 

Mindy: You say too and you're so right, just about the microaggressions. When I was in high school, so in the 90s, if something was stupid or dumb or boring or if you didn't want to do it, you said it was gay That's what you did. You were like, that's gay. It was a negative connotation. I used it never meaning it in any way as to hurt or harm towards a gay person. That was just the word we used. That is not cool, you can't do that. I worked really hard to get out of my vocabulary as a derogatory term. Shen I think back now to the casualness of dropping that and probably most definitely in front of even my teammates - wer’e all telling them that's bad, that's not okay. 

Robbie: Even after I came out when I was in college, I would have folks accidentally say that's gay and then immediately tense up and say something to be effective - I don't mean it like that, I'm sorry. And I believe that. But the implicit message, like you said is that there's something wrong with it or abnormal or lame or stupid or whatever it may be, and especially if you're a young queer person that can really leave a mark on your self esteem. And it can also be sending you this message that there's not really a place for you in your hometown or if you do come out, you're going to be facing a lot of hostility, you're going to be othered and you're not going to be accepted in the same way. I mean, I think about it too as a white person, I remember being much younger in high school and we would throw around the word ghetto, right, well that's ghetto. And I didn't think twice about it. And it wasn't until I was much older that I realized all of the layers of using a term like that, especially as a white person. And I felt awful and I had to really challenge myself and think about using a word like that differently or not using it at all, really. There's all sorts of words like that, that as you get older, you have to push back and question and push for our culture to shift because they do send messages be they positive or negative and especially young people are hearing that in absorbing that.

Mindy: Tying that into the small town theme, those cultural settings, I can say I'm very proud of the small town that I live in that it is of course, not 100% accepting, I'm sure, but we do have two trans students and they seem to do much better than I ever would have anticipated. I do think things are improving here in a rural, rural small town community, there's support and I see more support even from my generation for these students, I see staff being careful with their pronouns. God, it's so refreshing.

Robbie: That is so refreshing to hear. Yeah, that's amazing. You and I think probably have a lot in common. I'm from rural Michigan. So I grew up in a small town right outside of Flint, very working class, predominantly white conservative town. The book is not set in my same hometown, but I definitely let my own experiences growing up in the rural rust belt inform the world that Sky lives in. Yes, Sky is facing homophobia. Yes, he is certainly facing bigotry. But would this same conversation happened in the same way today than it would have back when I was in high school? Or would it look differently or would there be more acceptance? Sky learns throughout the book, there are so many people in his corner, in his small town, even though he didn't realize it. At first there's a trans character, there's a black character who is Sky’s good friend. And you see these journeys that other characters who are marginalized in their small town also take, you realize that although yes, there's certainly homophobia and transphobia and racism. I think sometimes you also find the most fiercest badass sort of allies in those communities that can really stand up for the little guy and that's especially cool and awesome to see. 

Mindy: I think two summers ago my local library had an LGBTQ book display. There was definitely a backlash. Some people were extremely upset. It was a very small group of people and I wouldn't even use the word group - handful - but a very loud minority. I was looking at the posts on Facebook and I was greatly relieved to see that besides the usual suspects, even older people were just like, you know what? Leave it alone doesn't matter. Let people be people.

Robbie: Oh my gosh, that's awesome to hear. And to your point about the very small minority sometimes being the loudest people in the room, five angry people can sometimes feel like 200 angry people if they're shouting, shouting into the void. That's so awesome. And I think that's why it's really important that when you in these small towns or really anywhere that when you have people speaking up being upset about LGBTQ stuff that you do have allies also speaking up and whether that's in digital spaces and going into the comments sections or showing up at school during a community meeting or whatever it looks like. I think it's really important that you have outspoken adult allies who aren’t just letting that sort of bigotry go without having some push back to it and saying no, that's not who we are and we're not going to allow that sort of thing.

And I think we are seeing more and more of that resilience in small town America where my parents live now. They live on the west coast of Michigan and it's a small town, I wouldn't necessarily say it's super conservative but it's a little bit more moderate. And at their high school a few months ago there was a little bit of controversy around the library at the high school wanting to put all the books that had any sort of LGBTQ theme or characters in a specific restricted area where they would need to get parent permission in order to check out the books. 

Although it was of course very discouraging to see that that was proposed. It was also really encouraging to see so many people in my parent’s town really stand up and go wait a minute, No, that's not how we do it. My parents’ pastor at church was one of the most vocal proponents of making sure these books were accessible to young queer kids. So it's really, really cool to see that progress happening on the ground in small town America and it's complicated right now. There's still a lot of traditional conventional ways of thinking that do come with homophobia and transphobia, but there's also a lot of forward thinking happening to you for small towns. 

Mindy: Yeah, there's more going on here than you think. I'll say that.

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Mindy: Now, to your point, I'm glad you've mentioned, a church was one of the largest proponents of the LGBTQ book display in my public library. 

Robbie: I'm not personally religious, but I think that queer people should be accepted every space that they want to be. And I think especially when you look at younger generations, you do see a lot of younger Christians are more, far more accepting and tolerant of LGBTQ people and that's great to see.

Mindy: Not a small town environment, but a friend of mine, a good friend of mine from college is a minister and she's a head minister at a very, very large church. She had some concerns when they were going back to in person services, they have very hardcore Trumpers and they have diehard liberals. The church was like, hey listen, we're going to church, you guys are gonna be nice to each other. The day after they resumed in person, of course with masks and distancing, she was like, it was fine. So there weren't any problems. It was good. And people gathered. They may not be having those conversations in that space, but they are present together. as long as you're seeing other people as humans and there with you, there's room for growth.

Robbie: Absolutely. And I think it's a more pressing thing now more than ever. And it will probably become even more of a pressing issue as we go on. And we have this sort of division in digital spaces where it's so easy to just be surrounded by people who agree with you 100% of the time on 100% of the issues. I'm a very proud, progressive person and I have very, very low tolerance for any sort of bigotry, homophobia, racism. At the same time, I think in general, it's not a good thing when we push ourselves into these echo chambers and aren't interacting and connecting in the real world. And it's great that we have spaces where we can still come together as people and even if we don't agree on everything, we can still connect. 

And that's really I think how you move hearts and minds, right? Befriending someone who is different than you. Or maybe you haven't thought about an issue in a particular way because you haven't known anyone who was trans or who was gay. And if you meet that person and actually just have a normal conversation with them, they're not this scary boogeyman that you might see on FoxNews, but they're actually a real person with real experiences and you might be able to connect about baseball or apple pie or whatever you want to talk about. I hope that moving forward, even if we do continue in the direction of everything going mobile and technology just taking over, we still can find a way to have those spaces to have genuine connection, whether it is somehow online or in the real world because I think that’s how you have progress, how you can change hearts and minds.

Mindy: Having that person physically in front of you, flesh and blood, changes things. When I was in college was when AOL first came out with instant messenger and I had someone from high school that I was still in contact with. I was in college and some of my friends were younger, so they were still at home. I was in college and we would get on like group chats and talk in the evening or whatever. And I had a friend from high school that basically had some beefs with me, really like, kind of went off on me over AIM and said some really hurtful things. And one of my dude friends said, it's a lot easier to say mean things over this chat box. She would never say that to your face. And he said, I'm not sure that this whole AIM thing is a good idea. I think it makes it a lot easier to be mean to each other. 25 years later, I'm like, Oh, how right you are.

Robbie: Oh my gosh, yes. And I've had so many interactions with people that are just so telling. Before I wrote this book, I worked in progressive media, I worked at HuffPost and UpWorthy. And so I had a lot of bylines on issues that were somewhat controversial and I would often get very trolly people reach out to me, or say something really mean spirited in my replies and most of the time I would ignore it. But there was a few times that I would reach out and very gently kindly ask why they said that? Starting a conversation in a productive way and 99 percent of the time with those people, as soon as you engage them in a sincere way, they immediately kind of back down and they don't have that rigidness and they will either apologize or say they didn't mean it, or they didn't think about it in that way. But I think when you're just firing off things online, especially if you're anonymous in doing so right, if you don't have a profile picture, you kind of feel protected by the anonymity of the internet, people say absolutely horrible egregious things to complete strangers. And I think especially if you're a woman or LGBTQ or a racial minority, you get it even worse, of course. Your friend was definitely onto something by predicting the future of media in that way. But I think we're becoming more and more aware of that and I hope that whatever it looks like moving forward, we’ll be able to carve out a way that we can just be a little bit kinder to one another. 

Mindy: You are so right about even if someone attacks you first, approaching them as a human being and them not knowing quite what to do with that. I write dialogue for a living, I can do a zippy come back and I can bury you. It's pointless. We’re both screaming at each other. We're literally looking at a box and getting angry. I had RT’d something about people should be able to go to the bathroom wherever they feel they want to go to the bathroom from a friend, and somebody came in on it and I don't even know where they came from, attacking and angry. And this person's last name was McGinnis. They were from Pennsylvania and they were from an area in Pennsylvania - because they do a lot of geology - that some of my family is from. And I was like, can you like.. this bathroom stuff aside... do you happen to know when your family landed in this area? Because I think there's a possibility that we're related. He hit back something like, I'm not related to some stupid liberal, like you. And I'm like, well, actually, I think you might be. If you are, this is really bad because we're both McGinnis’s and McGinnis’s are never wrong. So this is gonna be a long fight. And he's like, I don't know, I'll ask my dad what his dad's name was. I'll get back to you. And I'm like, okay, cool, have a good day. And he's like, you too!

Robbie: Oh my gosh. I'm certainly not completely innocent. But people I think sometimes go into those conversations so charged up and fired up. And as soon as you say something nice or try to connect with them on something other than whatever hot topic you're discussing, there's like this immediate, almost relief. I think sometimes we've seen people like, okay, like you’re a person. I'm a person. Yes, we disagree, but we can still have a conversation. I say that also knowing that I'm also someone who doesn't think we should be compromising when it comes to human rights and accepting people and totally, if someone is not wanting to have those conversations, if they're trans or from a marginalized community and they have to deal with someone who is spouting bigotry in their face, I'm never going to tell that person no have the conversation with them. People should absolutely have the ability to shut that down to not engage. They're being harassed, they should report it, block the person, whatever. But if there are spaces where you think there is room to have a discussion, totally go for it because that's the only way we're going to build bridges. No

Mindy: No one should ever be in a conversation that makes them feel badly about themselves insulted or even if it's just making you angry, like I make myself sound good over here, but I've had days when I'm like, I'll have it written down and it's like here it comes, going to go nuclear on your face. And then it's like I'm just going to delete this and go outside. 

Robbie: Oh my gosh, yeah, I do that too. I have done that so many times. A few years ago when I was much more active, I would write out these oh my gosh, several paragraph responses to something problematic that someone said and just writing it out, I felt was kind of cathartic. And then I would get to the end and be like actually I don't even need to send this now because I got out of my system. And maybe I will reply with something a little bit more tame or less combative, or maybe I won't reply at all. 

I totally hear you on that and I think it's a good practice. I spend way too much time on Twitter and it's such a immediate platform where you know, you're engaging with people constantly and you're writing quick replies and responses and sometimes if you’re emotional - for better or worse-  you can quickly respond to something when, if you just took a couple minutes to think about it, maybe go for a walk to separate yourself from it for just a minute and then return to it with fresh perspective or fresh eyes. Sometimes you can articulate your perspectives better and maybe not come across as intense. I certainly need to practice what I'm preaching right now. I've done it too. 

Mindy: I've really, here in my forties, come to ascribe to that idea of your feelings, becoming thoughts and those thoughts becoming actions and interrupting that process when it's negative, recognizing that cycle and be like - no, you don't have to eat a whole row of double stuffed Oreos today.

Robbie: Replace double stuff Oreos with a big pot of fettuccine pasta and that's me. I think that's a good point though. I was actually just having this conversation with someone about improving mental health and that was something that I noted. The older I've gotten, the more I've realized how important it is to be aware of my thoughts and be aware of my feelings. And if I'm kind of falling into a darker period, and a lot of times it's associated with self doubt or insecurity or just not feeling good about myself in some way, I can sense those thoughts starting to spiral. And if I can have sort of like my own little toolkit to be able to do something that I know can disrupt that spiral. Whether it could be something as simple as calling my mom and having a good conversation with a family member, just having those tools at my disposal to kind of recenter me and make me aware of what I'm feeling and why I'm feeling that way can work wonders, I think, when it comes to mental health. 

Mindy: That's what I do for a living is I spin narratives. And so my anxiety just looks like me doing that with the worst possible outcomes. Put myself in bed in the middle of the afternoon, because I got completely wrapped up in it. 

Robbie: And then when you can kind of find some space between those thoughts and where you are now, it can sometimes feel so irrational looking back and it's like, why did I feel that way? Like, of course, of course that was an irrational course, it makes sense. But in the moment, that's where your thought is, and it can be so difficult to get out of that funk or to get out of that way of thinking. 

Mindy: Last thing, why don't you let listeners know where they can find the book, The Sky Blues, but also where they can find you online.

Robbie: I am, as I mentioned earlier on Twitter, probably way too much. So you can find me on Twitter at Robbie underscore Couch. Last name is just like a sofa. And I'm also on Instagram. So @Robbiecouch and if you're interested in buying  The Sky Blues, you can see the link in my bio. It'll take you to the Simon and Schuster landing page where you can get it through whatever bookseller you want to get.

Mindy: Writer Writer Pants on Fire is produced by Mindy McGinnis. Music by Jack Korbel. Don't forget to check out the blog for additional interviews, writing advice and publication tips at Writer Writer Pants on Fire dot com. If the blog or podcast have been helpful to you or if you just enjoy listening, please consider donating. Visit Writer Writer Pants on Fire dot com and click “support the blog and podcast” in the sidebar.