Mega-Bestselling Author Kathryn Stockett on Finding Her Voice Again After ‘The Help’

The criticism from the help did shape how you started to approach this story and write the story. After many fault starts writing this story, I got fired. My publisher fired me because it had taken me so long. Because you were still operating out of fear? Yeah, there's something, I guess, scrappy inside of me that, you know, if you kick me when I'm down, I'm gonna come out of that a little bit wiser and a little bit braver. You still are gonna write the book even though you don't have a contract. I don't give up easily. I gotta say, I'm really stubborn. So when I got fired, it kind of put a fire under my ass to prove them wrong. This success of this book is gonna be the best revenge for the publisher that fired you. I can't even believe it. It was, it was fun to write. It was fun to write. It was, it was painful, it was fun. Hey everybody, thanks for stopping by the Oprah Podcast. A warm welcome to you all. I know millions of you read the help. Catherine Stockett's 2009 debut novel, which became a global phenomenon, selling over 15 million copies. Not many authors get to say that in their lifetime, not in three lifetimes. Back in 2011, the actress Octavia Spencer won an Oscar for her role in the hit film, The Help Based on the Book. And now Catherine Stockett's long awaited second novel, The Calamity Club, is finally here. And I know so many of you are going to devour this book. And it's already, I can tell you, run away bestseller. I knew that that was gonna happen. And I'm thrilled to be sitting on my front porch with the author, Catherine Stockett. I know you prefer everyone call you Kitty. So I will do the same. Kitty, welcome. So glad to be with you. So glad to be here. Let me just say, I fell in love with this coming of age story. And this is what I realized when I read this. I thought all of my favorite books are coming of age stories, beginning with Tony Morrison's The Blueest Eye, of course. Seely in the color purple. My Angelo's story is a coming of age story. I know why the Cagebirds sings. And of course, Tequila Mockingbird and Scout. There's something about a young girl's voice coming of age that speaks to me so deeply because I was a southern girl coming of age. And obviously, because you have done such an incredible job with this book, that also spoke to you. This is a story of a group of bold, unbreakable women who overcome hardships to reclaim their lives. The love between them was just, I was crying one minute and laughing really out loud to myself the next. And then cheering, I think it's both heartbreaking and it's also hilarious at the same time. So you've said, writing a second novel in the shadow of the help was daunting. You know, living life and raising my daughter as a divorced woman. But I think it took me so long because I told myself I would be cautious with this next book. I would write something short and simple and not draw the kinds of criticism that some people had for the help. And what I ended up with was a very vanilla, you know, banana flavored book version of this book. Because you were trying to write not to offend anybody. That's right. And I was trying to write something that had no heart in it. And what I finally had to admit myself after many years of failure was that you cannot write about Mississippi. And certainly not in the 1930s without talking about race, without talking about discrimination and the absurdities of some of the rules that were in existence, especially in a place like Mississippi. Yes, where I was born. Yes. And was very happy to get out of it at the time that I did. I understand. Yes, and you understand. Yes. I always said I was born at the right time. I was born in, I'm going to start talking like Mississippi. I was born in 1954 when Brown vs. Board of Education. And the luckiest thing that ever happened to me was that I left Mississippi before I ever spent a day in a segregated school. That I grown up in a segregated school with teachers who were teaching me that I was less than I would not have had the confidence or the agency or authority that I managed to have as a young girl moving to Milwaukee and never having to endure any of that. I think truly that made all the difference for me. And so what did you learn from the criticism of the help and what did you understand as the crux of that criticism? I'm of two minds about the help. I mean, on the one hand, I get it. I understand that the criticism, I understand that it put some people off that a white woman was writing a story that they perceived as a black woman's story. Story to tell. But the truth is, it was the story that I needed to write to answer a lot of the questions that I had about my childhood and about where I came from and about the things that I was taught. And I understand the criticism, but it was a story that just came out of me and I don't know how to quiet the voices in my head. We write what we write because we have to. Did the criticism cause you to approach this book differently or make different decisions? You said in the beginning you were writing cautiously and that it turned out to be something flattened and it didn't feel like it was coming from a real place. So were you conscious of the criticism from the help as you were writing calamity? Oh, absolutely. I mean, when I wrote the help, it was just me kind of pouring my heart out onto the page with no expectations of me and I didn't think anybody was going to read it. And I had 60 rejections from agents to back that up. And when I sat down to write the second one instead of just me sitting in a room with the page alone, this time it was me in a room with all those readers and all those critics in that room. Yeah, staring me down. Yeah, with expectations, with expectations, what are you going to do now? Right. Yes, you said I'll probably get in some trouble for this one. A fate I'm drawn to above all the story embraces a woman's right to determine her own fate, which feels increasingly relevant these days. Why do you think you're drawn to getting in trouble? Oh, that's a great question. Who knows. I was just born this way. I feel like I've been in trouble most of my life for for something. Yeah. And I think it also has to do with the fact that I, you know, I have a sense of humor and I'm going to always search for the humor in some of the darkest moments. And I don't see how people get through life without looking for the humor. And it's, you know, sometimes it works for me. Sometimes it kind of I'm told I'm very hard to be married to. Is that what your ex-husband said? Yeah. So tell me this. You were saying the criticism from the help did shape how you started to approach this story and write the story where you finally able to let that go to shake that off and just delve into the lives of these women you've now written about in calamity. After many false starts writing this story, I got fired. My publisher fired me because it had taken me so long because I guess the material wasn't something they wanted. And that was the old version. That was the vanilla version. Yeah. And I really, I felt like I had let down myself. I felt like I'd let down my family. Yeah. And Chris. When I got fired, when I lost my contract, I really felt like I had failed everybody. And there's something, I guess, scrappy inside of me that, you know, if you kick me when I'm down, I'm going to come out of that a little bit wiser and a little bit braver. And once that happened, I was able to just sit down and write the whole book over from a very fresh perspective. So I want to talk about the story without giving too much away. I have to say, I've now given this book to so many of my friends who say, I wish it wouldn't end. I could not believe how many times I left. I could not believe these characters. Would you set up the characters in plot? Because as I was saying earlier, I am drawn to stories with coming of age Southern girls. And Meg is a character like we've never seen before. Well, thank you. I really like writing in the voice of a child because a child can see through the ball. Yes, can I say that? Yes, you can. And they're going to speak truth that sometimes an adult loses sight. of. So because of the plot of this story, sort of the punchline, so to speak, you know what it is. I also needed an adult narrator. So I was able to mix the two narrators, the 11-year-old girl and, you know, the 24-year-old kind of old-made, unmarried woman from, also from Mississippi. And I felt like that way I could give two perspectives of one story. And so I love this passage about Young Meg's life and the orphanage on page 127. You write, "Sometimes I feel old. Oh, this is what Meg is saying at 11-year-old. Sometimes I feel old, old in my skin and my bones. I remember when I turned nine at my mama's house. I could still feel a little eight left in me. But when I turned 10 in this place, there was not any nine left to spare. Now I'm afraid I might already have used up the rest of my 11 and most of my 12, too. So I just love that line. How do you come up with, I could still feel a little eight left in me? I don't know. Who knows? Where, where, you know, the muse speaks to you? How, how the words come? I don't know. I wish I did. Meg suffers abuse of the orphanage and she just scribes it this way. It's, it's like she's trying to whip the hope out of me. All the while, she's whisperin' dirty, filled the girl. Her 15-licks misgarnette sits down in the chair, panting. She only quits 'cause her arm gets tired. Were these scenes difficult for you to write? Not difficult, but that line, I wanted the reader to see firsthand that sometimes you can't whip the hope out of somebody. Genuine hope is powerful. Yeah. On page 136, you write this about how Meg feels. All this noise inside us and we can't make a sound. I felt like so many young girls, boys, people feel this way. Those 11 little words speak volumes for so many people in similar situations. So you were saying that for her, but saying it also for so many people. So many people that have been silenced, that don't have the chance to speak up. I guess it's why I write. Yeah. Yeah. I have a chance to say my piece. Our listeners tell us that the podcast is resonating with you and is serving as a bright spot in your day. That means a lot to me. So here's the thing. I would really appreciate it if you like and subscribe to the Oprah podcast on YouTube or wherever you podcast. It's just a quick tap of the subscribe button. And that way you won't miss an episode in your queue. You don't have to pay anything. I know subscribe usually means you're paying something, but this time it means you just are notified when there's something new. There are many more to come that we're excited about. So thank you for watching and listening. Time for a quick break when we come back readers share their favorite moments and what had them. Hello, hello, Ellen. That's next. This episode of the Oprah podcast is sponsored in part by Bolin Branch. There's a moment. And if you've been running on empty for years, you know exactly what I'm talking about where sleep stops being a luxury and starts being the thing that holds everything else together between work appointments and honestly, just life. I was the last one on my own list, but as they say, you cannot pour from an empty cup. And it starts the night before. That's why I switched to Bolin Branch. My old sheets, peeling, slipping off and somehow always too warm. Now I feel the difference a second I get into bed, softer than anything I've owned breathable. And honestly, they've gotten even softer after washing. I added the comforter and waffle blanket too and now my bed actually feels like somewhere I want to be. Bolin Branch is certified organic cotton built for real rest and built to last. Upgrade your sleep with Bolin Branch. Get 15% off your first order plus free shipping at bolin branch dot com slash opropod with code opropod. That's Bolin Branch BOL and branch dot com slash opropod code opropod to unlock 15% off exclusion supply. Welcome back to the Oprah podcast. I'm talking with best selling author Catherine Stockett about her new novel La Calamity Club. Is it a hoot? It's both poignant and laugh out loud for real funny. I know you're going to love it. Great for this summer reading. Now back to the conversation. So you knew you had to, so if you were having Meg, you know you needed an adult to be a counterpart for what comes later on in the story. That all that crazy calamity stuff that happens, but where did she actually come from? When did you first hear her voice? Oh, probably from her own daughter just hearing that childhood voice and saying things to me that, you know, you wonder where did you come from? Yeah, where did that come from? Yeah. Yeah. And so how did she start to form and did she start to speak to you and did you write every day? I did. I wrote almost every day. Every day that I could. Yeah. So now you've been fired. You've lost your contract. Yeah. But you still are going to write the book even though you don't have a contract. I got to say I'm really stubborn. So when I when I got fired, it kind of put a fire under my ass to prove them wrong or something. It took me a minute to get out of, you know, this success of this book is going to be the best revenge for the publisher that fired you. Well. Yeah. It was fun to write. It was fun to write. It was. Yeah. It was painful. It was fun. Yeah. All right. We gave a few lucky readers the copy of the calamity club and Jamila is joining us now from North Carolina. Jamila, hi. Hello. So wonderful to meet you, Okra and Catherine. Jamila, I'm so excited to hear your take on this story. I love this story. I'm a Southern girl too. I'm from Mobile, Alabama and Catherine Mobile got a tiny shout out in the book. Yeah. And just really reflecting on this time and places I've been and visited because I grew up on the Gulf Coast. So all those, I luck see Jackson, New Orleans, Oxford. Very familiar to me. And it was a wonderful kind of flashback into time for me. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. A Southern, I mean, listen, I gave this to three of my Southern friends who were just over the moon. They couldn't even, I think there's everybody's going to love the book, but I will tell you that if you were a Southern woman, I think it resonates more deeply. I don't, I'm not sure why. Jamila, can you tell us why? I think it's because you know these stories. So my grandmother, she grew up cleaning white people's houses. Yeah. And so some of these stories were very aligned and Ophelia in the book. Yeah. Kind of remind me a little bit of my grandmother. So I think we have some, some ways we relate to it. Very real. Yeah. Me too. My grandmother grew up cleaning white people's houses in Mississippi. So I understand very much. Do you have a question for Kitty? I do. So tears weld up in my eyes at the end. I was so happy and excited for Charlie and Meg. But I must tell you, I honestly was like, what, what has happened next with the rest of them? What happened with Birdie and Jack? And do they have a future together? What about Rory and his second son in New Orleans? What about Garnet? Does she get retribution for what she did? What about Rory? Like again, like is he, what happens when he comes out? There's so many characters, right? Yeah. And were you worried? I was so worried that when Jack found out what Birdie was doing, he would then sort of think that she was some kind of soiled woman or something and wouldn't want to be around her if he found out that that that's what she was doing. I was very worried. Were you worried? Especially after the gift he had given her, which we won't go away. Yes. Right? I was like, this is going to be a terrible revelation for him. But what a way he handled it. Yeah. That way. I hope I'll enjoy that. What a way. And were you worried, too? Were you worried, too? Is your millet that the sheriff was going to come every night? Yes. Yes. I just could not imagine how, again, when they were going into town, too, for anything, to mill a letter to get food. And I was worried, like you, I was just hoping, can we make it to the next day? And every time, I couldn't believe they used to bed room. I couldn't believe they used to. I couldn't believe it either. And the whole, we just make it a few more days. And then when it got to that last day, Oprah, I breathed a sigh of relief. Like we made it. Yeah. We made it. We can shed it. No, but what about when the man's coming down the stairs, the man's coming down the stairs and she realizes what's going on in the house. What about that? And this is hard. Oh my gosh. I was sorry. What about that? Oh, just really, it was so much going on. I thought Mrs. Tarles, Mrs. Tarles, going to have a heart attack when she realizes what's going on in this house. Exactly. But you see so much maturation and all the women given the times. Yes. And I think there was a way she came to appreciate what needed to be done. Desperate times call for desperate measures. Absolutely. So I know you have a question. But tell me, did you have a favorite character? I think I look like you. Everyone loves Meg. But I really did like birdie. I identified with her having to be a heroine in so many ways. She never made it back home from what we saw. This is why I'd love to know what happens next. And so you kind of gave me the end to ask, are we thinking about a sequel? I really want to know what happens to some of these other characters, Catherine, because while we know Charlie and Meg are probably hopefully doing well together. What about Esmeralda? What about Garnet? What about Rory? What about Birdie and Jack? Let me just say, y'all are the best readers. Y'all are a writer's dream. I don't know if there's going to be a sequel. I kind of doubt it. I don't want to put too hard of a finish on, you know, a story, and I like to leave, you know, leave the reader wandering a little bit. But kitty, but kitty, you know, you can do what Elizabeth Stroud has done with all of, you know, she's such a great writer. Yeah, all the kids, which, yeah, and everybody in that town ended up having in some form or another their own story and were in other books. I mean, there is no reason, kitty, that you cannot continue this story with these characters moving on. I mean, literally, Bertie, what happens to Bertie and Jack and Bertie and Jack's family or all the other, or any of the other women? Don't you agree? Don't you agree, Jamila? I completely agree. I mean, even some of the offshoot parts like Lucille, what happens to her? What happens to the Hyruleburgs? Like, you have so many places you can take this character, and so my vote is for a sequel, but absolutely up to you. Thank you. Absolutely up to you. Thank you. Thanks for your enthusiasm, kitty. Okay, don't you want to pass it on to everybody? Don't you want to say everybody? Absolutely. I think everyone should read this. And while it seems daunting, right, with the number of pages, once you get going, it just moves, Catherine. It's, you can't put it down, or then you, like you said, Oprah, you want to put it down because you're almost scared. What's going to happen there? Yes, yes. It's a delight. So I hope everyone picks it up and gives it a read. It actually, I think, left me with less judgment of women's choices to do what they need to do until they can do what they actually want to do. Did you feel that too, Genoa? I did, that, you know, there's a character that has to leave her job because of men, right? And men taking opportunities. And just opposing that with what the ladies in the C-club had to do, right? I think it absolutely gives you that confidence in knowing, listen, everyone should read the story and take away from do what you have to do. And women have been doing it for years, and it's a reminder of how important it is to walk with conviction as women, to keep moving forward. To keep me moving forward. Jamila, thank you. Thank you. All right, spread the book. Go right around, right? The Calamity Club. And so are you one of those writers that has a schedule? If I don't write almost every day, I lose my momentum. I'm a big believer that the voices are always there. I have to clear my schedule, I have to clear my palette just to be able to hear them. And you know, it's kind of like just because you turn off the radio doesn't mean the music stop playing. So yeah, if I lose my thread and I lose my frequency. Because you got so much criticism, well, not so much, but you got criticism after the help with such a great success. So you get criticism for writing about black women because you were a white woman. Did you decide, okay, well, I'm only going to write about white women. I'm really tried. Yeah, I really tried. But you can't write about white women in the South without putting some black women in there. This is true, and especially in Mississippi. In Mississippi? 50/50. And so how did, were you worried about that bringing the black characters in? I'm still worried. Yeah. I'm still worried. It's a, I'm a southerner. I was born to worry. Yeah. And what are you worried about? Just the same things that happen with the help, you know, I am a white woman. And it's, you know, it's a story about white people and black people and the relationships that they have, the help was. And a little bit in this one too. When that criticism came, were you hurt by it? Were you, you say you were shocked by it? I was surprised. Surprised by it, yeah. Yeah. Did you feel that that criticism was valid? It was, you know, told from the perspective of only through the white eyes. And the white gaze. The white gaze. Exactly. And I'm a white woman. The screenplay was written by a white man, a good friend of mine. But at the same time, for a lot of people in America, it was a first step. It was, it was the first introduction to the complexities of the relationships between blacks and whites in the south. And do you feel differently now about who is allowed to tell what story? I don't try to overanalyze it very much. All I can say is that as a writer, I don't really have control over what I write. I write with my heart. The voices come out of me. Some people say you obviously have control over what you write, but you're saying you don't have control in terms of what your heart wants to speak to. That's what I hear you say. That's true. Yeah. Yeah. That's true. And I've wondered sometimes if, maybe the issue wasn't that I wrote the help, it was that it became such a success. Maybe that was the problem. It's hard to think about telling an artist, no, no, that's not allowed. You can't create that. Yes. That's crossing the line. Yes. Yes. But again, because what will we be if artists aren't allowed to express what's inside them? And some say that the role of art should make you a little uncomfortable. I see both sides. Okay. Let's talk about the Calamity Club. I think readers will feel transported back to the South in the 1930s from the slang, to the language, to the clothing. How did you craft that? I had to do a lot of research. I had to do interviews. I looked at a lot of Udora Welty's photographs and read her stories and to really immerse myself in the time. And I think I thought most of it right. I really wanted the reader to feel like the air of the time and feel just feel like, know what it felt like to be a woman in 1930 in Mississippi. Where did all of these women come from? I mean, it's a cast of characters in this story. How did this story come to you? Kitty? All I can say is that my characters kind of tell me what they're going to do. I go into writing a story, knowing maybe about 10 percent of what's going to happen. So what did you know of Calamity Club? Where did that name come from? Well, Mark Twain uses it and I thought it was just a great word of the time. Calamity. Calamity is a calamity. And you know, the C Club has a little special meaning to me as well. And you know, if you read the book, you'll stumble across that. But I don't know where we get these ideas. All these voices in my head. Do they come one at a time? Do they come as a group? I don't know if they just show up and they tell me what they're going to do. And sometimes they say that they're going to do this and I say, no, you're not. I don't want to write that. And then what did they do? They go do it anyway. Okay. So Meg came to you because of your daughter. Yes. Yeah. Okay. Birdie came from where? I think birdie came from me. Okay. Someone who speaks her mind and often gets in trouble for it. Okay. Charlie, Meg's mother is in prison declared unfit and sterilized against her will. In your research, you discovered in the 30s, so many women were often diagnosed as the word time, the word that you used in the book, feeble-minded or promiscuous. And what else did you learn about women in that period? So much. Tough time to be a woman. I don't think there's been enough written about this subject. But in the 1920s and the 1930s, the eugenics movement was just starting to heat up. And the idea was that by sterilizing certain people, they could cleanse the population of what they called undesirables. And these were people that might have epilepsy, that might have autism, people that they perceived as having a lower intelligence. They thought by sterilizing them, they could stop the procreation of these types of people. And the one that really stood out to me was that in Mississippi, a woman could be sterilized for being promiscuous. And that one stopped me in my tracks. I mean, I guess the idea was that if you're promiscuous, well, then you must be stupid. And if you're stupid, then because it's hereditary, you're going to have all these children that then the state of Mississippi and so many states adopted these laws would have to then take care of. As you're saying that, I'm thinking glad I got a Mississippi when I did. It's time for a break. Up next, Catherine Kitty talks about the power of hope and learning from our mistakes. More on that when we come back. This summer, serve up the cook out classics, craft mayo and dressing, toss green salads with delicious ranch dressing or zesty Italian, serve smooth, cravably creamy potato salads with mayo. We all know it's not a cook out without craft. Thanks for joining me on the Oprah podcast nearly 17 years after her mega hit novel The Help. You're going to love, love, love reading Catherine Stockett's new book The Calamity Club. Let's get back to our conversation. Fei is zooming in from Ohio. And I hear this idea of Fei, how many times did you laugh out loud? Could you even count too many to count? That's what I say about this book. It will have you howling with yourself really. And I hear this This idea of chosen family resonated for you. Absolutely. There's a line in the book that completely stopped me when I read it. It perfectly embodies the theme of Found Family and it reads, "This slap together band of misfits made me feel for the first time that I truly belonged. How the hell I wondered did I ever get so lucky." Katherine, what inspired you to explore the theme of Found Family in this story and what do you want readers to feel when they close this book? For somebody like Bertie in the book, that's what she's looking for, a group of people where she feels like she fits in and so many of us are looking for that. And I think that's a reasonable thing to ask for in life. And she finds it with a group of misfits and it surprises her as for what I want the reader to take away. I want the reader to feel motivated to protect women's rights. We can't afford to lose any more ground than we already have. Well, I love that. Well, you know what I love in the very beginning of the story. When we go to the orphanage for the first time, well, there's so many things I've appreciated about this book. Well, first of all, it's said in the south and I'm from the south and Meg is southern and she's 11 and she's barky and bright and all those things and she's at the orphanage. And when you walk into the orphanage, one of the pivotal locations in the story, the sign out front reads, "Welcome to the Lafayette County, orphan asylum for girls found in 1927. We do not accept colors, Indians, Jews, Mexicans, oriental types, twins, anyone who has or has had leprosy, consumption, missing limbs or hairlip. No boys, no sick children or anyone of a retarded nature. No girls over the age of 12, no women in the family way. We do not deliver babies here. May the Lord bless you all." That's that's quite the tone. Aren't you struck by that, Faye? Absolutely. I remember bookmarking that part of it and going back to that. That tells you everything you want to know about the prejudices of the time, of the prejudices of the time. So I want to know, did you find signs like this for real in your research? Well, no, but I did know that these absurdities existed and I made a choice. I said, "I can try to stretch that point out for 600 pages or on the very first page. I can stick it in a sign on the wall." And let the reader know what they're in for. Yeah. I think that set the tone. We know what we're in for. We're going to walk into a world of prejudices here and I think Meg handled them all so beautifully. Thank you, Faye. How many people are you passing the book on to? I mean, I couldn't wait to pass the book on to as many people as I could. So many. I'll be recommending this to everyone. It will be my top book of the year. Yeah. I think so. I think so. Thank you. Thank you. I also read the Calamity Club. Heather? Hi there. Hi, how are you? Hi, hi, hi. Did you read it all in one sitting or did you keep coming back to it, laughing out loud? I almost did. I was actually on a flight to San Francisco. So I read it the entire flight there, the entire flight back and just consumed it as quickly as possible. Yeah. Did you laugh out loud? It's definitely a book where you're laughing. You're crying. You're feeling such mixed emotions. You're feeling hopeful. It's beautiful. Beautiful. I mean, there was definitely a moment for me when I read the line, what if we fail? And the quick response was what if we succeed? And I think that for me really resonated because it's really easy to focus on all the things that can go wrong rather than trusting in what will go right. And in my own life, I've had a lot of detours that have changed the course of the path that I thought my life would take and reading this book definitely felt like validation of, and I think that's really something that women, especially, we need to focus on to trust that journey and through that really learning how confident and brave and strong we really are if we just trust ourselves rather than, you know, what we may see in front of us. Well, they're all in that house, trusting each other. That was some crazy. That was a calamitous time in that house. Do you have a question for Katie? I do. I do. Catherine, my question for you is, many of these characters faced really big decisions and crossroads. What would your advice be for young women and to encourage them to trust in themselves rather than waiting for the universe to give them this perfect sign that everything's going to be okay? You know, I think a lot of women are afraid to make a mistake and it's a good question because I think that that's one of the reasons why it took me 17 years to write a second book. You know, we tend to overcompensate, we overthink it when the truth is sometimes just making a decision is just as good as making the, you know, perfectly exact right decision. Part of this is because, you know, women haven't had the rights that we do and the rights that we deserve for that long and so we're afraid to make mistakes. We might lose it and I just want to tell women that it's okay to make a mistake. That's how we learn. That's how we learn, Heather. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for reading all of those pages. Aren't you glad you did though? Aren't you glad you did? I just love this book. So glad. So glad. I love this moment in the book where I won't tell you what has happened, but I just love this sentence where Meg says, "Nobody needs to remind me to count my blessings. I could count to 100, but what I've done in just the last two hours." And oh, it is just all so spectacular. Wow. Yeah, what does this say about Meg? She's still full of wonder and that she has hope. She doesn't lose hope through the whole book and hope is so powerful. Yeah. Was the idea to bring all of these women together who were sort of outcasts and the outsiders and to show that together they could build something that was really powerful even though that something would not be what most people would consider, you know, a great business. But it was a profitable one. Yes, it was a profitable one. Yes, we're all stronger when we come together. I couldn't believe they were going to do it. I started to get so nervous, you know, I didn't want anything to go wrong with them and I started, I started getting nervous. I actually put the book down. I thought, are they, is she actually going to go through with it when they left the house and they went to look for her son and then there's Bertie left in that house. She's not going to do it. And then she did. She did it. Yeah. And every night I was waiting on the sheriff to come. Every night I thought the sheriff was coming. Oh, you're such a good reader. Oh, I thought the sheriff was going every night and I thought, at first I thought the guy standing outside, he had to be the sheriff, but if he was the sheriff, he wouldn't have been able to just stand outside and watch. He would have brought everybody in and they would have arrested them. So I couldn't figure out who that guy was until the end. I still didn't know that that's who it was. Thank you. I did not. Yeah. But every night I was so worried for them every night. You won't give away the plot about halfway through the book. There is a draw-dropping secret reveal. So when you started writing, did you know what the key moments would be? Are they plot? Did you plot them out? No. No. I was just so long for the ride. You were long for the ride. It really makes me crazy when writers say this. Oh, no. I really believe the characters are driving the boat. They're driving the story. They're telling me what they want to do. When did you love the most? The characters you love the most. Oh, I like Flossy. I really enjoyed writing her because it felt like she was so vulnerable. Yeah, she was. And a little pathetic and so honest. At least that's how I tried to write her. And I hope that's the way that she came across. She did? Yeah, so that was your favorite. Well, Meg was definitely my favorite, of course. And so you quote Emily Dickinson and her famous poem, where Meg says, "Hope is the thing with feathers that purchases in the soul and sings the tone without the words and never stops at all." What do you want readers to actually-- or did you want readers to know anything about hope when you were writing this book? Oh, it is so powerful. I wanted to give Meg kind of a theme song that she could hear in her head the darkest nights in the orphanage. And so I put that poem in her armor to bring out when she needed it. It's time for one last break, y'all. When we return, Catherine Stockett explains why she feels it's her duty as a writer and a human being to imagine what it's like to stand in another person's shoes. Come on back for that. As Father's Day do more with dad and spend less with low prices guaranteed at the home depot. Get him fired up with a new grill and accessories. Like the next grilled five burner for just $299, so you can spend more time together, while he becomes a cook. comes the grill master he was always meant to be. Or build memories with savings on top brand power tools so you can tackle projects side-by-side. Give more and do more together this Father's Day with help from the Home Depot. Exclusive to Plycy Home Depot.com/Prysmatch for details. We're back with best-selling author, Catherine Stockett. If you know somebody who loves to read a rip-roaring tale and wants a great book for this summer about spirited women, share this episode with them now back to the conversation. In the author's note, you say that as a writer and as a human being I believe it is my duty to imagine, I think you say this in the beginning of the book, you say, as a writer and as a human being, I believe it's my duty to imagine what it feels like to stand in another person's shoes, to stay sane. I put those imaginings on paper, the calamity club is the result. How did writing these women's stories keep you sane? Actually, you drove your little insane, I'm sure. Well, as for the end note, I have to say I think they should teach it in school that as a human being, it is so important to imagine what it feels like to have someone else's problems. But I think it's also vital to imagine what it feels like to have someone else's successes. It's what gives us hope. There's just some voices inside of me that got to get out and when I write books, they come out. I feel like I've been redeemed and I've been released, that song. Did you feel that this was a releasing when you completed these 800 pages? I was very relieved when I finished the book, yes, after so many years. Well, we aren't going to give it away what happens to these characters at the end, but I will say I was in a puddle really, listen, did you always know you wanted to resolve the story this way? It's a little bit, I wanted to write a slightly different ending, maybe one that wasn't quite as it turns out, but hey, I'm okay with ending, I've made peace with it. You made peace with it? Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you. Thank you. Kitty's Stockett, Catherine Stockett, she likes to be called Kitty. Thank you for this beautiful breathtaking. It's just really. Thank you. It is an honor to be here. Thank you. I hope you all read the calamity club, I'm telling you it is one of the great reads and particularly for summer. I think you're going to just fall in love with the characters like I did. So good for the summer to share with your friends and you can buy it instantly now. Right now, I just love the way this happens. If you scan the QR code on your screen, you can get the book. Happy reading. So here's the thing. It's just a quick tap of the subscribe button and that way you won't miss an episode in your queue. I know subscribe usually means you're paying something but this time it means you just are notified when there's something new. There are many more to come that we're excited about so thank you for watching and listening.