Episode 7: Young Adult Fiction

• Pop & Play, Season 3, Episode 3: Babysitters Club Meeting with Hannah and Maisie Holbert
• Pop & Play, Season 2, Episode 5: Choose Your Own Adventure

Haeny Yoon:

Welcome to Pop and Play, the award-winning podcast all about play and its many silly, serious, and powerful forms. I still get hung up when we say award-winning. Award-winning is a stretch, but we actually do have an award.

Nathan Holbert:

There's nothing more factual than the fact that we are an award-winning podcast.

Haeny Yoon:

That's true. I'm award-winner Haeny Yoon.

Nathan Holbert:

And I'm award-winner Nathan. We are two education researchers that decided that it would be a lot more fun to hang out and talk to other scholars, activists, artists, parents, children about how they engage with play in their lives. A lot more fun doing that than answering emails all day like we usually do.

Haeny Yoon:

In this season, we've been exploring what it means to play roles, whether in games, craft or theater. What is role playing all about?What compels us to try out new identities?

Nathan Holbert:

And rather than stay in fantasy land as we have for many of the episodes this season, today we're going to talk to a few brilliant scholars that have decided to play different roles in their own lives other than academia. Literally, or literarily or-

Haeny Yoon:

Oh my God.

Nathan Holbert:

Are those the same word? No.

Haeny Yoon:

Okay, so we're talking to three people this week who are academics who also happen to be young adult authors, actually published authors, not like the diaries that we make when we're going-

Nathan Holbert:

I'm a young adult.

Haeny Yoon:

Me too, same. And so we had the privilege of reading some of their work and engaging with it and thinking and reflecting back on our own mishappened middle school/high school, young adult dilemmas as well.

Nathan Holbert:

So first we have sisters and co-authors, Maritza and Maika Moulite. Maritza is a doctoral student at the University of Pennsylvania studying literacy and children's media and culture. And Maika is also a PhD student at Howard University studying media and representation. Their latest book is The Summer I Ate The Rich, which you can get now on Goodreads. And there are other books are One of the Good Ones and Dear Haiti, Love Alaine. Both feature Black characters across the diaspora with references and experiences from their own lives as Haitian Americans.

Haeny Yoon:

We also have Amy Noelle Parks, who is a professor of elementary education at Michigan State University. She focuses her work on math pedagogy, and instruction for pre-service teachers. She's also the author of several young adult books about, in her words, "smart girls falling for feminist boys in quirky midwestern settings" and likes using One Direction lyrics as an inspiration for entire novels. Shout out to the Midwest and also to Harry Styles. Her most recent book is Averil Offline, along with previous work and Nathan's favorite, The Quantum Weirdness of the Almost-Kiss. Tell us who you kissed in middle school. I'm just kidding.

Nathan Holbert:

Is there a particular young adult book that you're fond of?

Haeny Yoon:

I mean, obviously one could argue that my obsession with Taylor Swift as a young adult, interest in fantasy. But I will say, so I'm going to go back to, shout out to another episode from a previous season with Choose Your Own Adventure and when we did that. I think I confessed that when I was a young adult or middle school/high school-ish, I didn't read that much. So the books that I did read though are basically Choose Your Own Adventure, Sweet Valley Twins or Agatha Christie novels.

Nathan Holbert:

Sweet Valley Twins?

Haeny Yoon:

Oh, I did read some Babysitter's Club.

Nathan Holbert:

Well, hell yeah. The BSC?

Haeny Yoon:

Shout out to a previous episode as well.

Nathan Holbert:

Nice.

Haeny Yoon:

So basically that was my literary identity.

Nathan Holbert:

Literally.

Haeny Yoon:

Literally. I did read books in school because I was supposed to, but for fun, that's what I did. How about you? What did you read?

Nathan Holbert:

Yeah, a similar situation. I read quite a lot now and love to read, but I don't think that love of reading really started until probably high school. I did do a little bit of reading and dabbling in fantasy, stuff like The Hobbit, but as we talked about also in a previous episode, I was reading The Hardy Boys, that kind of thing, but I didn't really get into reading until later. One of the things that I think is fun about this episode is our authors that we're going to be talking with in a few moments, one of them, Amy Parks, describes her book as a kissing book, which is, I think, a wonderful genre of books, but do you recall some fun memories from when you were in high school?

Haeny Yoon:

Yeah.

Nathan Holbert:

But do you remember some of those memories?

Haeny Yoon:

Okay, so I think the fun part about reading Amy's genre of middle school/high school crushes and young love and all of that is I think you can't help but go back to your own childhood and sometimes adolescence makes you cringe a little bit. And I know it makes me cringe.

Nathan Holbert:

Oh yeah, totally.

Haeny Yoon:

I have many pictures with me in braces and it's actually quite hilarious.

Nathan Holbert:

How long did you have braces?

Haeny Yoon:

I think two years.

Nathan Holbert:

Oh my God.

Haeny Yoon:

Did you have braces?

Nathan Holbert:

I had them for four years. My mom was an orthodontist assistant, and so I mean, they were like, "Well, we can't take them off. There's more to do." And so I just had them forever.

Haeny Yoon:

So it made me think about friendships. So I think of Holly Shupple. Shout out to Holly Shupple. Holly, please listen to this podcast.

Nathan Holbert:

Holly's probably a listener, I would imagine.

Haeny Yoon:

I hope so. I mean, me and Holly actually ended up going to the same undergrad and then also stayed there for grad school.

Nathan Holbert:

Wow.

Haeny Yoon:

So we actually reconnected several times throughout our adulthood.

Nathan Holbert:

That's crazy.

Haeny Yoon:

Yeah, so Holly Shupple was my neighbor. Holly and I, our neighborhood, we actually lived very close to our middle school, shout out to River Trails Junior High. So we lived two blocks away from our junior high, so she was my walking buddy, so we would walk to school. We would walk back to school and it would take us an hour to walk back to school because we would just mess around all the time while we're walking. We'd be the slowest walkers ever. And one of the things that we did too was the bus kids would always pass by. And I still remember, this guy Timmy, I'm pretty sure Timmy Monahan was his name.

Nathan Holbert:

Timmy, if you're listening.

Haeny Yoon:

Timmy, if you're listening, I don't know, I don't know what to do if you're listening, but I'm pretty sure he had a crush on me.

Nathan Holbert:

Oh yeah, he definitely... Timmy, if you're listening, give us a call-

Haeny Yoon:

Timmy, I know you had a crush on me.

Nathan Holbert:

Give us a hashtag.

Haeny Yoon:

You had a crush on me. Anyway, so every time he basically mobilized his whole bus to scream my name.

Nathan Holbert:

Oh, he had a huge crush.

Haeny Yoon:

Every single time the bus would pass by, they would just be like, "Haeny Yoon. Haeny Yoon." And they did that every day. I thought it was so annoying, but I also thought it was fun.

Nathan Holbert:

It is awesome.

Haeny Yoon:

So me and Holly would walk really slowly until the bus passed by.

Nathan Holbert:

You wanted to make sure you had your daily dose.

Haeny Yoon:

Just so we could hear the, Haeny Yoon." And so that was basically every day.

Nathan Holbert:

I love that.

Haeny Yoon:

That was our story and I just loved it.

Nathan Holbert:

I love that story. I love the privilege of youth to just walk slow and just take your time and do whatever you want. That's great.

Haeny Yoon:

Yep. How about you? So the reason why we're talking about these stories too, is that I read the other... Okay, so we have Inhale, Exhale books. One of the books was basically, it had very hard topics, but the whole idea of it was that relationships and interactions and friendships and the people that you spend time with and community shapes how your adolescence goes. It's all about friendship. So that's what I think about.

Nathan Holbert:

Yeah, that's one thing that'll be fun to talk to our guests about is the YA genre, the young adult, the genre has, as a feature, I think it's light in some ways because it's about kids, but you're at that age where there's some serious stuff you're starting to deal with, and so there's an intensity to them that I think is really compelling. But also a little... When I was reading Amy's book, The Quantum Weirdness of the Almost-Kiss, when I was reading this, there was times where I had tightness in my stomach because you could remember that intensity that you felt when you were young. That book in particular was about this love triangle of teens essentially.

Haeny Yoon:

She's so good at that. It's almost like she's a teen.

Nathan Holbert:

Well, when you did ask me to come up with a middle school story, I actually really struggled. It's much easier for me to come up with a high school story. For some reason, middle school is mostly vague recollections of feelings and themes. But I do remember I did have a crush in middle school. I had a crush on this girl, and-

Haeny Yoon:

Do you remember her name?

Nathan Holbert:

I think her name was Lauren. I don't remember her last name.

Haeny Yoon:

Shout out to Lauren.

Nathan Holbert:

Lauren, if you're listening.

Haeny Yoon:

Don't do anything.

Nathan Holbert:

I'm happily married. I hope you are doing well in your life. Here's the one very interesting thing I still remember about Lauren is that I think it was 7th grade, my health teacher was Lauren's mom.

Haeny Yoon:

Oh, juicy.

Nathan Holbert:

Which is the absolute worst to have a crush on the health teacher's daughter.

Haeny Yoon:

Did the health teacher know that you had a crush on her?

Nathan Holbert:

I don't think so, but what was really annoying is I distinctly remember her saying things like, "Oh, you're so nice. I wish my daughter could like a guy like you." And I'm just like, "But she doesn't."

Haeny Yoon:

That's awesome.

Nathan Holbert:

That's my story. That's the only thing I can remember about childhood crushes.

Haeny Yoon:

That's awesome. Middle school crushes are so devastating and fun and exciting at the same time,

Nathan Holbert:

And they're also just, mentally, it's an absolute mess because you don't even understand what you're thinking or feeling and you don't know... It's just chaos.

Haeny Yoon:

Yeah, it really is. I think that's why we don't remember a lot of things from middle school perhaps.

Nathan Holbert:

Broke our brain?

Haeny Yoon:

The chaotic wild energy of middle school life is very hard. I think that's why we want to talk to our guests this week because I think their specialty is getting into the chaotic wild life of middle school/high schoolers. And I think one thing that young adult authors do really well is that they embrace that chaotic part of adolescence, but then also convey and show that adolescents also have real ideas and real feelings. I think sometimes we dismiss the actual thoughts and ideas that they have.

Nathan Holbert:

Right. It's chaos, but that doesn't mean it's not real and meaningful.

Haeny Yoon:

Right.

Nathan Holbert:

Yeah. Well, let's get them on here. Let's talk to them.

Haeny Yoon:

Sounds good. Okay. Very, very excited. I'm nervous right now because we have three amazing superstars with us today.

Nathan Holbert:

That's true.

Haeny Yoon:

Who are academics just like us, but also are young adult authors, so they're actually doing the most while we're just barely making it.

Nathan Holbert:

Yeah, we'll get into that, but I don't even know how this is possible.

Haeny Yoon:

Yeah, so we're going to try to find out. So we have Amy Parks, who's an associate professor at Michigan State University.

Amy Parks:

Hello.

Haeny Yoon:

And tell us your middle school crush's name.

Amy Parks:

My middle school crush's name. Oh, well, my first boyfriend was in 8th grade and his name was Charlie.

Haeny Yoon:

Charlie.

Nathan Holbert:

Aw, Charlie.

Haeny Yoon:

Very nice.

Amy Parks:

It was really a shock to receive that question, I'll say.

Haeny Yoon:

You know what? I just thought of that question off the top of my head.

Nathan Holbert:

That's perfect.

Amy Parks:

It woke me right up.

Haeny Yoon:

I also just forced Nathan to share his middle school crush and I could tell that it was a very disconcerting for him. We also have Maritza Moulite who's a PhD student at the University of Pennsylvania, and I actually got to meet her a couple months ago and she was amazing, and she casually mentioned to me that she is a young adult author, which I wrote in my notebook and contacted her right back. Maritza, do you want to say hi and tell us your middle school crush?

Maritza Moulite:

I can't think of anyone because I was just trying to survive in middle school. My crush was my back brace that I wore for my scoliosis.

Nathan Holbert:

Sounds like an excuse to not say the name of the crush, but that's fine. That's fine.

Maritza Moulite:

Darren, fine.

Nathan Holbert:

Darren, yes.

Haeny Yoon:

And then we have Maika Moulite who's a PhD student at Howard University.

Maika Moulite:

Yes. Hi there. Honestly, I didn't really have crushes on people growing up. It was one of the things that my sisters hated about me because they would always have, "This is my celebrity crush," and I'm like, "I guess." I really can't think of anyone.

Nathan Holbert:

Was it Darren?

Haeny Yoon:

Was it Darren?

Maika Moulite:

That's why. I can't besmirch the family name. Starting mass.

Haeny Yoon:

Yeah, exactly. Well, okay, so all of you are either academics right now or emerging scholars or scholars in the making, and so I feel like that's already a very, very time consuming part of your identity and part of your life, so tell us how you started this journey on young adult writing.

Amy Parks:

So I'll say I always loved to read young adult books. So for a long time, I mean, when I was a teacher, they were an escape for me and in my early academic career, they were an escape for me. And then, I mean, the honest truth is I had a crisis in my work after the 2016 election. I was like, "I've spent 25 years in education and this is what I've done?" And it made me feel like everything was super pointless and I found it really hard to do scholarship in the year after. I just was not seeing what that was doing in the world and I felt like, I don't know, I just needed to fully escape. And so I started writing. That's how that got going. So my work is very escapist, I would say.

Haeny Yoon:

So you just sat down and started writing these stories.

Amy Parks:

Pretty much.

Haeny Yoon:

As an escape. Oh, that's awesome. Do you have a background in writing?

Amy Parks:

I was a journalism undergraduate, so not in fiction, but certainly I've always been a writer one way or another.

Haeny Yoon:

Yeah. Maika, how about you? How did you get started on this journey?

Maika Moulite:

Yes, so Maritza and I, we recently graduated from undergrad and we are honestly feeling a little bit disillusioned with working. We were like, "This is what we're supposed to do for the rest of our lives until we die. Terrible. Bad deal." So we started to think, what is something that we might be able to do instead just for ourselves? And growing up, our parents were very strict and they didn't let us go to the library. I'm sorry, wrong. They didn't let us watch TV during the weekdays and they-

Nathan Holbert:

Flip it.

Maika Moulite:

They made us go to the library every weekend. So we grew up reading as our form of entertainment, and then Maritza and I were just like, "Why don't we try to write a book?" Because there were things that we wanted to see written that just weren't written, and we started on this journey of writing together. And the first book that we wrote together, it was so strange how the character seemed to just appear to us. We both had a clear sense of who she was, even though we had never written together in this way, and we decided to just go down that path. And I'm really glad about it because writing can be so solitary and there's something to be said about writing with a writing partner and when the writing partner is your sister, we have just moments of shorthand and also bullying.

Maritza Moulite:

A lot of bullying.

Haeny Yoon:

I mean, what does it look like to write together? Because I was thinking about that. I was telling Maritza that I'm halfway into One of the Good Ones, so I could almost imagine how that collaborative writing might look because each chapter is from a different perspective or flips, jumps back and forth in time, or there's a certain different point of view of the character and things like that. So what is it like? Is it like you're in Google Docs and you furiously erase each other's words and do it like that? Or are you thinking, is it like a pass the torch sort of thing?

Nathan Holbert:

Is this what it looks like when you co-author a paper, you're furiously erasing the words of your co-author?

Haeny Yoon:

I'm just kidding, don't do that. I'm just wondering what that looks like.

Maritza Moulite:

So for us, we start with an idea or character or a vibe or something, and then we sort out in our own minds what we're envisioning for the story, and then we'll sit down and talk to each other. If we're in the same place, that's great, but if we're not, then we'll just get on FaceTime or something and talk through where we are and then we'll break off again and do some research, get really distracted in the research because it's procrastinating.

Haeny Yoon:

We know how that sounds, we know what that looks like.

Maika Moulite:

It's part of the journey.

Maritza Moulite:

Do that as much as we can, and then we come together again and come up with an outline. Even though we have very similar sensibilities, we don't actually share a brain, so we have to know what's going to happen in the story while still leaving room for whatever inspiration to strike. And then we typically write pretty chronologically, but we're not tied to any particular character or chapter. I could start one and she'll finish, and then we just always go back and read through what the other person has written, do any type of edits. That's when we're, not furiously erasing, but we do some adjusting if you will. And then we do that basically through the entire story. So it ends up having both of our voices ends up being one.

Nathan Holbert:

Blended together?

Haeny Yoon:

And Maritza, I'm assuming that you entry into it also started, as Maika suggests, with some disillusionment as to what was going to happen next or that's it?

Maritza Moulite:

Yeah, we actually started, it was grad school time and we were just trying to figure out what can we do and what do we want to do? It's been a huge part of our lives for such a long time and just trying to do something that we've loved forever and make those types of stories that we would've wanted to read growing up. We just decided what happens if we do this? And then it worked out.

Maika Moulite:

And we've written separately, but working together makes us stay the course.

Haeny Yoon:

I mean, I love that because I think what we've been talking a lot about the last few seasons of Pop and Play is just we don't have to actually just be one thing, that we could be a lot of different things. And I think we say that a lot, it's a lot harder and takes a lot of risk to actually jump in and be like, "I'm just going to do the other thing that I also wanted to do and try out." And my research is in young children, and so I feel like they do it so easily. They do it all the time. They swap out roles, they go back and forth. They don't feel like they have to necessarily be in this one category. And I think that for a long time I was that person who was like, "I have to stay in my lane and do this one thing and be just this person."

Maritza Moulite:

I was actually going to ask how that reception to the idea of being able to do different things and stray away from one particular brand has been in academia. Just casually asking for no reason at all.

Amy Parks:

For no reason.

Nathan Holbert:

No reason at all.

Haeny Yoon:

That definitely sounds like an Amy question.

Nathan Holbert:

Amy.

Amy Parks:

Yeah. Well, the thing that first comes to mind is how for the first, certainly all through grad school when I was coming off being an elementary teacher and going into a PhD program, so I never felt smart enough around my colleagues. And so it was years before I even admitted I read books like this, much less that I wanted to write them. And I can actually remember Twilight came out and I heard a doc student at UGA, this is when I was a faculty member, talking about it in the kitchen, and I ran out of my office and I was like-

Haeny Yoon:

Tell me about Edward and Bella. What do you think?

Amy Parks:

The secret was out.

Nathan Holbert:

I love that.

Amy Parks:

But mostly people have been very lovely. Very recently, our library does this little induction ceremony where when faculty write books, they induct them into the library. They call out the titles.

Maika Moulite:

That's lovely.

Nathan Holbert:

Oh, I like that. I like that.

Amy Parks:

Science today and the social construction of race and Lia and Beckett's Abracadabra.

Haeny Yoon:

I love it.

Nathan Holbert:

Perfect.

Amy Parks:

But yeah, I think you just power through the embarrassment.

Haeny Yoon:

Yeah, that's awesome.

Nathan Holbert:

I like that. I mean, I think one of the things we, maybe assume isn't the right word, but just imagine is you do academics and then you have this other role, this other identity, you can try out and put on. Amy, you talked about 2016 and I think many of us had this experience of what the hell are we doing? You both, Maika and Maritza talked about this, "I don't want to live my life this way, I got to try something else." So it's interesting to think about flipping that. It's not necessarily a risk to go out and try this. It's, in some ways, a risk to try to just stay in that lane as Haeny said.

Maika Moulite:

Yeah, I think I'm so aware now, especially going through my PhD program, I'm a critical scholar, so I look at how power is embedded in everything and just so much of our livelihoods and our everyday lives, even outside of what we do for work, is focused on productivity. And sometimes it's just so important for us to remember who we are outside of those capitalist requirements. It's just what brings you joy. But I know especially in academic spaces, it happens all the time, but I'm like, "Just tell me you're one dimensional and go away."

Amy Parks:

And I'll say, I can't wait for your zombie book that I saw.

Haeny Yoon:

Oh yeah, I saw that too.

Amy Parks:

That is really in my lane. But if I had to guess, you might hear more snark when that comes out then your book now, which is so important. And I think academics see work like that and they're like, "Okay, it's children's literature," but also look, it's taking up these super big important issues in the world. But then when you're writing about love stories or zombies, then they're like, "What are you doing over there?"

Haeny Yoon:

That's such a good point, Amy, because I was thinking about the One of the Good Ones books, and I think that it really speaks very explicitly to the current social condition and it features adolescents in the midst of all of that and how they're navigating those circumstances. And I think that is so important and equally important is the big emotions that people have about love and Quantum Weirdness of the Almost-Kiss.

Maika Moulite:

Absolutely.

Haeny Yoon:

I just think all of those things need to be taken seriously. And I think that's the thing about play. We don't think that only the play that changes the climate is the right one. Your play in whatever other people might classify as frivolous can also be really deep and have a lot of import for people.

Maika Moulite:

And there's also something to be said about genres like romance or young adult that people view as, "Oh, this is geared towards women," or "This is geared towards young people," as being less worthy of care or investigation or that type of thing. And I'm pushing back against that. I'm like, "No."

Haeny Yoon:

Yeah, I think about how some people think of young adult fiction too, and the genre of it is a subpar literature and the work that a lot of people have been doing, especially all of you, on trying to reclaim what that actually means.

Nathan Holbert:

Yeah, but at the same time, and I'm fully on board with kissing books matter and we should care about them just as much as we care about books that are "serious" or taking on really important issues. But one thing I noticed, Amy, I read The Quantum Weirdness of the Almost-Kiss and thoroughly enjoyed it, but I was going to say that I saw your work in it. You could see this aspect of thinking about and communicating the fascination and beauty of mathematics and all that as well. And so it's still there. It's still blended. I guess what I'm trying to get at is sometimes people talk about identity as if it's you're in this identity, or you're in this role or you're in this one. And that's obviously bullshit. It's all of it all the time.

Amy Parks:

Yeah, no, I 100% agree. So we were talking earlier about how you can have these multiple identities, but also it's not actually multiple identities, that human beings are complicated and different contexts make different identities more or less salient. But how could there not be bleed through?

Haeny Yoon:

Yeah. Where do you get your ideas, I'm wondering? I mean, I feel like that feels like a rhetorical question because I can look at it and I'm like, "I know where they got their ideas." But what inspires you? Do you walk into the fields... Here's what I'm imagining, do you Alice in Wonderland it where you're like, "Oh, I'm just going to walk through these streets and I'm going to find an idea somewhere." Tell us where you get your ideas from.

Maritza Moulite:

Sometimes it'll be the character and it will be someone like Alaine who just is so confident and snarky and sarcastic and confident and strong-willed and all of these things. And we think, "What type of shenanigans would she get into?" And then other times it's thinking about what's happening in the world, what has happened historically and answering the what if from there. And then for The Summer I Ate the Rich, that was inspired by this wanting to do a zombie book but bring in a history that a lot of people don't know about around zombies. And we're Haitian American, we have that duality. It's not duality, but we have that as part of our identities.

So we thought about what it would be like to have a girl who is zombie in the Haitian sense of the word which was formed during slavery where the enslaved people were just absolutely terrified of being further enslaved even after death. And then that was the zombie. And then people come to Haiti, they see the idea and the different ceremonies, and then it has evolved into the brain eating, dragging your feet, moaning zombie that we know now. So combining these different-

Amy Parks:

That's fascinating.

Maritza Moulite:

Yeah, combining these different ideas of a zombie and someone who is out for revenge and wants to start some class warfare.

Nathan Holbert:

Nice.

Amy Parks:

That's so great.

Haeny Yoon:

How about you, Amy? How do you get your ideas?

Amy Parks:

In some ways really similarly. I think to sustain a book, you can't have just one idea. So I have a middle grade coming out in February called Averil Offline, and I would say it was this combination of two things. One is when I was little, I really loved the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler-

Haeny Yoon:

Classic.

Amy Parks:

...where these kids run away and live in the museum in New York. And as a kid in the Midwest, I just found everything about that setting so exotic, as well as their independence and the adventure. So I wanted to write a story like that where two kids today ran away to a college campus because that's what I know. And then I teach these undergraduates, and I was actually teaching a children's literature class, and one of my undergraduates phone rang and she said, "Can you talk to my mom?" And I was like, "Okay." And I picked it up and the mom had been calling because she thought the daughter wasn't in class because we met in the library that day instead of our building, and she was tracking her-

Haeny Yoon:

Oh my God.

Amy Parks:

...on that Life360 thing and was like, "You are not in the building you are supposed to be."

Nathan Holbert:

Get your butt to class.

Amy Parks:

That's the first time I heard about Life360. And I was like, "You-

Nathan Holbert:

Yeah, but she was in the library. I mean...

Amy Parks:

"You have to explain this to me." And then I was like, "Oh, that's going in a book." And so I just started trying to put those two things together until I had the story.

Nathan Holbert:

That's cool.

Haeny Yoon:

Oh my God, Nathan, don't do that to your kids.

Amy Parks:

No, everyone needs to stop that right now.

Haeny Yoon:

I know, seriously. That's so terrifying.

Nathan Holbert:

Yeah, that's crazy.

Maika Moulite:

Oh my gosh.

Haeny Yoon:

Yeah, exactly. Do you both remember when you decided to make those Google Docs or running lists public? Because it's one thing when writing is a hobby. Then it's another thing when it actually becomes-

Nathan Holbert:

Put it out there.

Haeny Yoon:

...something that other people get to read.

Maika Moulite:

I don't know. Speaking candidly, I feel like if you write something and you get it published, it's because you want people to engage with it. And sometimes people will be like, "Oh, I don't really care what people think." And it's like, "If that was the case, then it would be a diary entry. You would not share it." It's the act of sharing that makes it so fulfilling, even if people get it or don't get it. But I think for Maritza and I, we knew that from all of the books that we read growing up, there were certain books about Black girls, Haitian girls, that were just missing. And this was really much like, we want to write this story first, for ourselves, but then we know that it will resonate with people, even if you aren't a Black Haitian girl.

There's a literacy scholar, I'm always shouting her out, Dr. Rudine Sims Bishop and she talks about books being mirrors, windows and sliding glass doors, and how it's an opportunity for you to see yourself reflected. If it's not your exact experience, you can engage by looking through the window and then hopefully you can open the sliding glass door, and that's where the engagement happens. And so for us, we knew that what we were writing would ultimately, if it got picked up, would be published. We wanted it to be published, and that's something that we carry with us. But sometimes you just do stuff for yourself and then it's like, yeah.

Haeny Yoon:

Yeah, I mean, that's what we say all the time in terms of play. We think it's a distraction and we think it's a divergence, but we think those divergences are almost necessary to come back to an idea or it actually mobilizes, strengthens something that you were really stuck on.

Amy Parks:

I think that's really important. I agree about sharing your work, and I love having things published and having people talk to me about what I wrote. At the same time, there's definitely a cost to turning something that was play-

Maika Moulite:

Absolutely.

Amy Parks:

...into a job. And it's real in all kinds of ways. What I write now and what you write, I'm sure is a negotiation, right?

Maika Moulite:

Oh yes.

Amy Parks:

You're thinking about what it is going to sell and what is my agent going to like, and what is my editor going to like? And the story isn't yours anymore, at least not entirely. And so I've been playing with this idea in my head of, because this does all take a lot of time, and is there space in my life for something else that isn't also a job? Because this is still playful for me, but it's not playful in the same way it used to be. And I think that's something I'm struggling with right now. I don't have an answer.

Maritza Moulite:

I was shaking my head so much that now my head hurts because-

Nathan Holbert:

Headphone's are falling off.

Maritza Moulite:

Yes, nodding. Yes, I agree to all of that. I feel like my hobby now is thinking about what my new hobby will be since the old hobby is something that you have to think about in all these different ways now. And I just want to be able to do something and not think about if I'm doing it well. And that is something that I think about a lot now because it's fun and amazing, but it's also there is that negotiation. And something else-

Amy Parks:

Especially when... Sorry.

Maritza Moulite:

No, go ahead, go ahead.

Amy Parks:

Especially when you're an academic too and you're getting reviews on your journal articles and teaching evaluations and feedback from your professors, I'm sure. I just had a week a couple of weeks ago where I was like, "I really need three days where no one tells me what they think about me."

Nathan Holbert:

I could use one of those weeks too.

Amy Parks:

That's great. So it's hard.

Nathan Holbert:

That's so funny.

Maika Moulite:

I honestly feel like that's part of the reason why, I mean, it also might be because I'm doing too much, but I like to do more than one thing. I don't know if you ever watch, Everybody Hates Chris and the mom is always like, "I don't need this. My man has two jobs."

Haeny Yoon:

What's his name again? Shout out to Abbott Elementary. I forgot his name.

Maika Moulite:

But sometimes it's just that when the academic space is becoming intense, as we know as it can be, I can pivot to my writing for myself and if that becomes too much, then I do work with a think tank. So I just am able to move into different spaces because I don't want, like Amy was saying, anybody to just keep giving me all of their opinions about me and I have nowhere else to just be.

Nathan Holbert:

That's what play is all about too though, is to have that space where you can go and you can just be you or you can tinker and sometimes you work hard at whatever the play is, and it's for yourself though, and not necessarily for someone else. So it's so important to have those spaces. Not to be always offering the contrary opinion, but also being able to do a job that you find some enjoyment and love in is pretty great too. My daughter literally this morning, she asked me what I had to do today. I was like, "Well, I have a lot of meetings, but they're fun meetings and they're going to be playful." And she's like, "You play at your work." I was like, "Girl."

Amy Parks:

I love that.

Nathan Holbert:

It's my job.

Amy Parks:

How old is she?

Haeny Yoon:

That's so great. I mean, I feel like we could go on and on for a really long time.

Nathan Holbert:

This was fun.

Haeny Yoon:

Thank you so much for talking to us about your work. And I think one of the reasons why we wanted to talk to you all in particular was we just really admire the ways that you're Blurring the boundaries between your work as an academic and also your work as a young adult author and just not necessarily living separate lives, but living them together. And I think that's a really powerful example for a lot of people across the stages of their academic career.

Maika Moulite:

Absolutely.

Haeny Yoon:

So we like to do one last thing before we let our guests go, and it's called What's Poppin. And it doesn't have to be related to young adults at all. It could be like, what's poppin, RuPaul's Drag Race, I don't know. That's also not sponsored, but we'd love for RuPaul to sponsor us.

Nathan Holbert:

RuPaul, give us a call.

Haeny Yoon:

Call us Ru. So just tell us something right now in pop culture, whether it's media, books, toys, games, whatever, anything really, that you feel like is poppin right now that other people should really check out.

Maritza Moulite:

I was the most excited about this section, so I have several things. Song of Achilles.

Amy Parks:

I love it.

Maritza Moulite:

I finally finished Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller. It took me a million years and it's 10 years old, but I see why it's so popular and amazing. I am currently reading, We Are Never Meeting in Real Life. Hilarious essays by Samantha Irby. Just so funny. Just started up Wheel of Time, Season 2. I'm trying to get Maika to get back on it. Just finished Loki and The Marvels is amazing.

Nathan Holbert:

Yes, so good.

Maritza Moulite:

Yeah, so many things and I could go on and on about that.

Haeny Yoon:

My God, Nathan just finished up Loki too.

Nathan Holbert:

I did, but I would much rather spend the time talking about how much I enjoyed The Marvels. I took my two kids to that and we were just like, "This is the best." We had so much fun.

Maritza Moulite:

I love it. Yeah, shout out to Ms. Marvel.

Haeny Yoon:

I don't really know anything about this. The last movie I saw was the Taylor Swift Era's Tour.

Nathan Holbert:

That's cool too.

Maritza Moulite:

That's very good.

Nathan Holbert:

There's room enough.

Maika Moulite:

Speaking of tour films, that's my pop culture moment.

Haeny Yoon:

Oh, Beyonce?

Maika Moulite:

I'm going to be running across the film tonight. I went to the concert twice and I'm going to see the film tonight.

Nathan Holbert:

Oh, wow.

Maika Moulite:

I was going to wait for my sisters and they were lollygagging way too much, so my friend was like, "We're not waiting for them. Let's go."

Haeny Yoon:

That's awesome.

Maika Moulite:

So excited for that.

Haeny Yoon:

That's awesome. So you've actually been though to the real Renaissance concert two times and now you're going to go see the movie?

Maika Moulite:

I did.

Nathan Holbert:

Unbelievable.

Maika Moulite:

Yeah, the DC show wasn't giving me the energy, so I had to go back home to Miami and I was like, "That's what I needed."

Haeny Yoon:

Oh my gosh. That's amazing.

Nathan Holbert:

That's cool.

Haeny Yoon:

I love that.

Nathan Holbert:

Amy?

Amy Parks:

I think I'm going to do an inhale and an exhale.

Nathan Holbert:

Oh, nice.

Amy Parks:

If I understand the terms properly. So I think my exhale is The Inheritance Games by Jennifer Lynn Barnes. It's a series where the premise is so brilliant. This orphan girl gets a message saying she is now the sole heir to a billionaire's fortune if she goes to live in his mansion with his four hot grandsons.

Maika Moulite:

Amazing.

Amy Parks:

The whole book is catnip. I don't know. It's 350 pages and you read it in three minutes. I think it is eventually going to be a TV show, so you could hold out for that.

Haeny Yoon:

Oh, nice.

Maika Moulite:

What's the book called? This is right up my alley.

Amy Parks:

The Inheritance Games.

Maika Moulite:

Oh, okay, thank you.

Amy Parks:

And then the podcast, it's called 5-4, and the tagline is Why the Supreme Court sucks, and it's three lawyers unpacking cases, both current and past. And I just find it righteous anger and they're hilarious. And it's just this cathartic place where I feel like I am not an insane person. Someone else is as mad as I am, but also lots of things about the law that I did not know.

Maika Moulite:

Love that.

Haeny Yoon:

That sounds amazing.

Amy Parks:

It is. It's really good.

Nathan Holbert:

Thank you so much, guys. This was really fantastic. I'm excited to check out all these books and recommendations and I really enjoyed engaging with your work. It's been a ton of fun and super fun to talk to you all as well.

Maika Moulite:

Thank you. This was awesome.

Amy Parks:

Thanks for having us. It was so fun.

Haeny Yoon:

Thank you.

Maika Moulite:

Bye.

Nathan Holbert:

Bye.

Haeny Yoon:

Pop and Play is produced by Haeny Yoon, Nathan Holbert, Lalitha Vasudevan, Billy Collins and Joe Rinaferri at Teachers College Columbia University with the Digital Futures Institute. This episode was edited by Billy Collins and Kyle Arlington.

Nathan Holbert:

For a transcript and to learn more, visit tc.edu/poppandplay. Our music is selections from Leaf Eaters by Pottington Bear used here under a creative Commons Attribution non-commercial license. Blake Danzig provided our social media and outreach support. Follow at popandplaypod on Instagram and TikTok for more of what's poppin like the Trashies with Juana Litterat. Thank you to Meyer Clark and Abu Abdulbaghi for support with our website and additional materials. And thanks to you for listening.