Interview with Jennifer E. Smith + Mid-Month Check in!

Our Book Of The Month Author!

I’m so excited to share with you another AMAZING author interview with the ever lovely Jennifer E. Smith! Jennifer is the author of this month’s Ashley Brooke Book Club selection, Field Notes on Love!

But have no fear, if you haven’t finished the book or scooped up a copy yet we made sure there are no spoilers in this one. So feel free to read without anxiety! 😉

Just like me, I know you will really enjoy this interview with Jennifer! It’s so much fun to get a peek inside her process.

Lightning Round Q&A:

What are you reading right now?

JENNIFER: Normal People by Sally Rooney, which is fantastic. I’m also listening to Daisy Jones and the Six, and it’s probably one of the best audiobooks I’ve ever heard. The performances are incredible. 

What was your last Amazon purchase?

JENNIFER: A globe for my nephew’s birthday present. Trying to make a world traveler out of him!

What’s your Starbucks order?

JENNIFER: Just a cup of tea.

What is your guilty pleasure?

JENNIFER: Would it be too general to say TV? I’m not a huge believer in guilty pleasures – I think it’s okay to like what you like – but I definitely watch too much TV!

Who is your favorite celebrity or fictional character?

JENNIFER: Hermione Granger

What is your current online obsession (website, Instagram account, etc.)

JENNIFER: Humans of New York

What is next in your Netflix queue?

JENNIFER: At the moment: Knock Down The House, Schitt’s Creek, Queer Eye, Derry Girls

Where did the idea for this story come from?

JENNIFER: There was a story that went viral a few years ago about a guy who bought a round-the-world plane ticket for him and his girlfriend, and when she broke up with him, he had to find someone with the same name to take the ticket. I remember six or seven different people sent the article to me and said it sounded like one of my books, which made me laugh at the time. But it’s such a fun idea for a story. And since I’d already written a book set on an airplane (The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight), I thought a cross-country train trip would be the next best thing.

Have you ever taken a train trip?

JENNIFER: Yes, I’ve always loved trains. There’s something so soothing about them, and it’s such a beautiful way to see so many different landscapes. While writing the book, I did part of the journey that Mae and Hugo take – from Denver to San Francisco overnight, and then down the coast to LA – and it was incredible, especially the first leg, when you go through the mountains. But some of my favorite train trips have been abroad: the bullet train from Tokyo to Kyoto, the journey from London up to Edinburgh, traveling through the French countryside or up the Italian coast. It’s such a wonderful way to see the world!

The backstory on Hugo and his siblings was so interesting to us, we loved the tie in to modern day parenting and parents who blog about their kids. Would you ever consider a story about another one of Hugo’s siblings?

JENNIFER: I’d love to write more about the sextuplets! They were so much fun – especially their text exchanges – and I only wish I could’ve spent more time with them in this book. I think Poppy would probably be the most interesting one to explore more. Or maybe Alfie.  (We all know who he would vote for, anyway!)

Field Notes on Love hits all the right notes and the ending is hopefully ambiguous…was this story ever going in a different direction? Were there any big plot points that were edited out?

JENNIFER: I always joke that my books conclude with an ellipsis instead of a period or an exclamation point. I like to end things on a hopeful note, but at the same time these characters are young and life is long, and I always want to leave some of it up to readers as well.  I don’t usually know what’s going to happen when I sit down to write a book. So much of the process is feeling my way through the story. In this case, not much got edited out along the way. But I did have a sense of where I wanted these characters to end up, both emotionally and geographically. And I just wrote my way toward that. 

Where is your favorite place to write?!

JENNIFER: I’m lucky to be friends with a lot of other authors, so it can be fun to write with them – in coffee shops, restaurants, offices, and even on writing retreats (where we often do as much chatting as writing!). But the place I most often work is just my desk at home in New York City, which gets lots of sunshine in the afternoons, and looks out over a beautiful park, and where my all-time favorite writing buddy – my little beagle – snoozes at my feet.