Ep. 320 It’s Really Hard to Change the Patriarchy with Sierra Greer
Sierra Greer is the novelist behind the new speculative fiction book Annie Bot, about what happens when an AI robot designed to be the perfect girlfriend learns to become human. We talk today about how this novel came to Sierra, why she chose to write under a pen name for this book, and how she was thinking about race and feminism throughout the novel.
The Stacks Book Club selection for May is No Name in the Street by James Baldwin. We will discuss the book on May 29th with Yahdon Israel.
LISTEN NOW
Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Google Podcasts | Overcast | Stitcher | Transcript
Everything we talk about on today’s episode can be found below in the show notes and on Bookshop.org and Amazon.
Annie Bot by Sierra Greer
Barbie (Greta Gerwig, 2023)
The Elements of Style by William Strunk and E. B. White
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
Nightwatching by Tracy Sierra
If I Had Your Face by Frances Cha
Galatea 2.2 by Richard Powers
To support The Stacks and find out more from this week’s sponsors, click here.
Connect with Sierra: Instagram | Twitter | Website
Connect with The Stacks: Instagram | Twitter | Shop | Patreon | Goodreads | Substack | Subscribe
To contribute to The Stacks, join The Stacks Pack, and get exclusive perks, check out our Patreon page. If you prefer to support the show with a one time contribution go to paypal.me/thestackspod.
The Stacks participates in affiliate programs. We receive a small commission when products are purchased through links on this website.
TRANSCRIPT
*Due to the nature of podcast advertising, these timestamps are not 100% accurate and will vary.
Traci Thomas 0:08
Welcome to The Stacks, a podcast about books and the people who read them. I'm your host Traci Thomas and today I am thrilled to welcome Sierra Greer to the show. Sierra's new book is called Annie Bot. And it is the story about a relationship between a human male and his AI-powered girlfriend robot. The book has been called by Esquire "a Frankenstein for the digital age." Today, Sierra and I talked about how she was exploring power dynamics, autonomy race, in feminism in this book, we also talk about her past life as an English teacher and so much more. There are no spoilers on today's episode. Don't forget the stacks book club pick for May is No name in the street by James Baldwin. We will be discussing that book on Wednesday, May 29. With Yahdon Israel. Everything we talked about on each episode of the Stacks can be found in the link in the show notes. Alright, now it's time for my conversation spoiler-free with Sierra.
All right, everybody. I'm super excited. Today, I am joined by Sierra Greer, who is the author of a speculative fiction novel that I read and devoured and just was so excited to read. It's called Annie Bot. Sierra, welcome to the Stacks.
Sierra Greer 2:11
Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. Thanks for inviting me.
Traci Thomas 2:14
I'm really happy to have you here. A friend of mine was like, you should maybe read this book, you might hate it, but I think you might like it. And I was like, okay, and about, I don't know, 30 pages. And I was like this was a perfect recommendation for me. So I was very happy to Jess for doing that. But let me ask you, we always sort of start here. And about 30 seconds or so can you just tell folks about the book?
Sierra Greer 2:39
Annie Bot is the story of a very advanced female robot who is custom designed to be the perfect girlfriend for her human boyfriend, Doug. And she she does whatever he wants, she dresses in the outfits, he picks out and cooks the meals for him and she can adjust his libido to hurt to suit his mood. So things are going along really well until he changed her changes her to an autodidactic mode. And at that point, she starts learning very quickly. And he likes when she becomes more human. But becoming human more human also means becoming a much more complicated person. So then they start having some conflicts. And that's I guess, the premise of the book.
Traci Thomas 3:24
And for folks listening at home, we're not going to spoil today. So you can you can listen to us. And then you can read the book, and I promise we won't ruin anything for you. So I love this idea, right that like if Doug, whatever Doug wants Doug gets, because that's the whole premise of these dolls. They're called Stellas. And Annie is a certain kind of doll and she's like, you know, the girlfriend on there's a doll that is the nanny doll. Then there's a doll that is like the housekeeper cook private chef doll. But Annie is specifically like a sexier dollar girlfriend doll. But once you turn the switch, she learns and Doug like whatever Doug likes Doug gets. So the idea that Doug likes that she's human is really what's motivating Annie, even though she doesn't necessarily understand that fully, either. Right?
Sierra Greer 4:21
Well, here's the dilemma her her programming is to please Doug. That's her number one objective. But if you're a human person, how can you always please somebody else? So that's really what causes the internal conflict for her. How can she keep pleasing this person when she has other interests in and might have some desires of her own? And she might even want to think about herself as the center of things. It's, it's really confusing for her.
Traci Thomas 4:50
I should back up a little bit. How did you come up with this idea? What made you think of this? Where what have you been doing that brought you to this story?
Sierra Greer 5:01
I noodle around with ideas a lot. And I actually was writing a short story about a very different robot maid who was sort of traditional like we would expect, she was, you know, taking care of things. And at the end of that short story, she went in for a checkup and Annie showed up. And Annie had a moral consciousness that was really pivotal to understanding the short story. But she was such a surprise to me that there could be a robot who was this advanced in a moral way. And so what happened is I set the story aside for a month or two. And then I thought, what's going on with that story, actually, friend of mine said, you should really expand that story into a novel. And I knew I couldn't expand the story. But I realized I could follow Annie and see if she had a novel in her. So I followed her home, and she went home to Doug. And as soon as she stepped out of the shower, in the first chapter, there's just something really dynamic about her that completely fascinated me. And I thought I just, I have to follow this character and see what's going to happen in this relationship. And then the rest of the novel, just really organically grew out of the relationship between them. And like, scene by scene, I just discovered the story with the characters, I didn't have a plot, I didn't have an outline beforehand, I just followed the characters, which is a fabulous way to write when it works. I was really happy that it did. So that's how I got the idea.
Traci Thomas 6:25
You're the kind of author or at least with this book, that I never believe you people who tell me you just follow a character. I'm like, I don't believe it. i There's got to be more. Tell me this. You have this character, Annie and a totally different short story. And you're like, I'm gonna follow her home. What does that actually look like to you? Do you just start writing your thoughts about her? Like, what is how do you develop a character? Like, what are you following? Because obviously, it's all made up. So you're, you're doing something to generate?
Sierra Greer 6:58
Well, the seed of her had shown up in the first short story, and I probably had a couple of months there, where she was just sort of just sitting in the background without me really thinking, honestly, when I, when I write, and I'm, I'm in this robot character's head, I'm seeing what she's seeing and hearing what she's hearing and smell it while she can't smell. You know, I'm sort of experiencing life along with her. And there's always sort of a logic to what's what people are saying, if you put them in dialogues, they're actually usually having some kind of conflict with each other, even if even if they're just sounding like it's really inane. And there's an underlying tension. That's just hard to explain it without really spoiling the story. But because he controls her from the get go, there's just this tension of like, does she really want to do what she's doing? That's really the question for much of the novel. Does she really want to do this? Well, she has to do this. So what does that mean about what she wants? Right? So I'm not sure that's fully answering your question, except I'm so completely in the scenes with people that it just, it just unfolds. And then of course, I revise it, I get a draft. And then it takes, you know, 10 more revisions to actually make it all make sense. But that's how I can get a first draft down.
Traci Thomas 8:13
I'm maybe like digging in too deep on this, but I'm just so curious about it, which is like, you take Annie? And do you give her like, do you like I guess do you give yourself four different boyfriends that she could potentially have? And kind of like write a scene for each of them? Or do you just go like, okay, her boyfriend is gonna be this guy named Doug, and then kind of just see what happens. Like, how do you find you just set it?
Sierra Greer 8:38
That's it? No, I mean, he's, he's there. He's on the bed. It's like, what's going to happen? And I write that scene. And then, you know, then it's like, what happens the next morning? Oh, well, this is what happens. There's another little episode of friction. And then oh, well, she doesn't like how that makes her feel. So how is she going to try to make it up to him? I see. So she's motivated, try to please Him. And then a guest comes to visit. And he brings a different element to the dynamics between the two of them and it? And actually, it's, it's kind of I don't know how obvious it is, but because there's a guest who comes to visit them in the first chapter. And the guest does not know about Annie. He asks a lot of quick questions about Annie, like, how long have you owned her? What are her? You know, basically, what are her specs does she eat? How does she pick out her clothes? And, and because Doug and Annie are explaining that to the guest. They're also explaining all of that to the reader. So I wondered if it was contrived. And yet, it really kind of worked for what was happening. And I was like, oh, I'll just follow this. And because, you know, because this character kept asking questions like, Can she eat, I'd have to say, Oh, well, let's see, I guess No, she can't really eat. So I had to figure that out. Right in the scene on the fly. And then of course, I can go back in and revise things to change it once. I know what the rest of the story is. Yeah. But it's really fun. Are you a writer?
Traci Thomas 9:57
I'm not. I'm a reader. And so I'm always really fascinated by you know, I've been doing the show for six years now. And I talk to so many different authors about how they write. And everyone's really different, which I love. And it's just, it's so funny to me, as a person who write, I only consumed the finished thing. I never read a draft, I never see an edit, I just see the thing that you all decide is the thing. And it's so funny that someone could tell me I outline every single day, and I can love that book. And then someone like you could tell me, I just, I don't know, I like there's only one with her. And I could like that book, and like, the way that the thing is made. From a reader perspective, I don't really care if it's good. I don't care how you do it, like, zero judgment. It's all just like, an intense curiosity, which is really what actually got me to start the show is I was like, I just want to ask writers like how they do it.
Sierra Greer 10:53
Can I just riff a bit on what you're saying? Because it's really important for people to understand that every writer does it their own way. Yeah, they find their own way. Because I think sometimes new writers think that there's a path, there's like, oh, I have to have an outline, or I have to write 1000 words a day, or, you know, there's some system that's going to help it all work. And the truth is, you each person has to find their own thing that works for them. And what works for one novel might not work for the next novel to I just have to kind of stick with it and see what works for you.
Traci Thomas 11:25
If doing it the way that you did it for this book. Is that how you normally do it? Or do you like what's your trick? If you get stuck? If you were to get stuck in this story? What then do you do?
Sierra Greer 11:35
Oh, yeah, well, I did get stuck in this story. There's a point about halfway through where Kenny finds herself in a spot that looks like it could actually be an ending right there. And I had to think about really the rest of the world in order to understand what her options were. So I sat back, and I did a lot of mental world building. And then I realized what would be the worst thing possible for her emotionally. And I decided, even though I didn't want that to happen, that's what needed to happen for the story to continue to grow the way it really needed to. So even though I was stuck, I was kind of stuck, because I didn't want to make her do what she needed to do. And I made that happen. And I can sort of tell from your expression that you maybe know what I'm talking about.
Traci Thomas 12:20
I know exactly what you're talking about. Yeah, it's Yeah, same scene, and I, oh, my skin is crawling.
Sierra Greer 12:28
When I get stuck, I sit back a little bit and usually have to do more world building around it to figure out a solution because it's there. The answer is in the novel. And if the answer is not in the novel already, then it might be time to abandon that novel and go work on something else. That's okay, too.
Traci Thomas 12:42
I love that. So you have multiple things going, you're the kind of writer who has kind of multiple projects at once, just to keep yourself fresh.
Sierra Greer 12:51
Usually, once I get into a novel, I see that all the way as far as it will go. So no, I wouldn't say I have a bunch of different things usually going on. It's usually one thing until it works or doesn't work. And then I started another thing, unless, unless I'm brainstorming between novels, because sometimes it takes a while to figure out the right thing to get going. And then I'll try something for a few days. And I'll try something else for a few days. And I'll try a third thing for next few days. I'll just kind of keep generating different ideas to see what works.
Traci Thomas 13:19
Usually we talked about this later in the episode, but since we're here now, how do you right? Where are you? How many hours a day? Are there snacks and beverages? Music? Outside inside set the scene?
Sierra Greer 13:30
Oh, my gosh, there should be all those snacks. A lot of chocolate involved, okay, everyday nonstop. I think that would help a lot. Okay, I just I, this is my full time job. Now, I used to be a high school English teacher. But I resigned 10 1214 years ago, in order to write full time. So I wake up and have breakfast. And sometimes I don't and I sit down and I write. And I I actually do aim to write for over 1000 words, I feel like if I can do that much. Whether it's good or bad. I've, I've got something down. And I also feel like I need to keep writing, even when I'm not in a long term project because it's almost like a pianist who practices piano if you keep practicing your fingers know how to keep typing, I guess. Right? So sometimes I just feel like a typist. But I still keep typing. And I'm talking about that because that's really what I'm into right now. If I'm revising something, like if I have an editor who's given me notes, and I have a deadline, then I get up and I write and I stop for meals, but I keep writing and sometimes I'll write till nine at night. Or and then I have to stop. And so sometimes I'm really doing it all day long for hours and hours and hours. But more more often I'll write I'll wake up and I'll write and have breakfast and lunch and stop around three to go take a walk.
Traci Thomas 14:54
Interesting. And then when you stop Do you ever go back or once you stop you're done for the Today,
Sierra Greer 15:00
I usually stop, I'm usually kind of trashed by then my brain, my brain is a little fried by then.
Traci Thomas 15:06
That's fair. That's fair. Um, okay, we'll go back to the book itself. I want to know about point of view or like perspective, because this book is third person, but it's tight on Annie. It's not any. But it's just about as close as you can be on Annie without being in her brain. Why did you make that choice? Did you ever consider putting it fully in her world or pulling back, so we got some of Doug and some of the other characters.
Sierra Greer 15:32
My gosh, I thought about writing it in first person. But that would have been too close at actually, it would have been hard to believe that we were releasing from Ai all the time. So I felt like it had to be third, just because it would have been too jarring to actually be in and his head. Right, then I was really just because though in the same way that I love, an unreliable narrator, I wanted her to essentially have that same quality, because she's a very innocent person who doesn't understand the complications of the world around her. And I wanted to capture that and have the dissonance between what she's seeing and what she's experiencing, and what the reader actually knows about the situation. So that's why I kept it so tight to Annie. And it was it was really satisfying to do.
Traci Thomas 16:18
It was so satisfying to read. I think, like, I think that to me, of all the things that work in the book, that's the thing that works, or that makes everything work. I feel like if we were in her head, it would be too like cutesy almost, you know, like, it'd be like a little too, like, Okay, I'm in a robot. But this keeps it real, but also gives you like, like you're saying like something, it gives your the readers brain some dissonance, right? Like, we're kind of like ooh, II, like as we're going through shame and humiliation, are sort of a pretty big part of this book. And I'm wondering what you were wanting to explore there, both the teaching of it, and also the learning of it.
Sierra Greer 17:10
Wow, I just feel like, I feel like shame is such a powerful emotion, that when you give it to a character, they have something really meaty to deal with. And Doug himself is, he's a really complicated character, and underneath his loneliness, and his need to buy a Sex Robot in the first place. There's also this shame that he needs that shame that he cannot find a relationship with a human shame that he's lonely in the first place. Because he feels like as a strong man, he shouldn't be lonely. So he himself has a lot of that, that he can't articulate very well. And yet he gets this robot so that he can try to overcome his loneliness and his shame, but it doesn't work. How can you overcome your shame by getting the thing that you're ashamed of? Right? So he, he has all of that going on? And then curiously, humiliation is actually one of the things that kinds of turns him on with any, so he likes it when she's uncomfortable, or if she's in a position of feeling like she's made a mistake. So it's, it's just really part of their power dynamic. And what I want people to learn from that, gosh, I, it's not prescriptive at all. I don't feel like my book is trying to tell people to do something or learn something. I think if I tried to make a book that just opened up possibilities, so people could think about things without me having to give answers.
Traci Thomas 18:46
I think my question was unclear. I didn't mean what were you trying to teach? Or have people learn from it? I met what was interesting to you about the idea of like Annie and Doug teaching and learning about shame. That's what I meant, oh, the character's teaching and learning, because there's an exchange of shame and humiliation throughout the book, as you're saying, like, it's like, they're like, the power dynamic in the relationship. It's like, oh, she learned this from him. And he teaches it back to her. And there's something really interesting about the exchange. Yeah,
Sierra Greer 19:19
I think you've just put it really well, yourself right there.
Traci Thomas 19:23
I don't like prescriptive things. I didn't want you to think that I was like, Are you trying to tell us? No, that's for the reader to decide. What did you feel like you, you as a writer and a storyteller can do with a non human woman that maybe wouldn't have been able to do if this was just about two humans in a relationship where the power dynamic was interesting.
Sierra Greer 19:46
Oh, it was absolutely essential that she was a robot because because she's a robot. We already have these assumptions about robots, that they're not human. We assume that they're like toasters and that they don't have feelings and that they're they don't have a soul, and that we don't have obligations to them as as sentient beings. So when the story starts that way, and Doug is controlling her, if you think of him, like controlling his toaster, it doesn't bother you. But as she becomes more and more human, like, that becomes a very gray area. And that's where it starts to become really interesting. I've talked to readers is, and we posed the question, at one point in the novel, do you start thinking she's human. And some readers thought she was human on page one. And some people thought she was human at the end of the first chapter. And some people thought she was human, when she started contemplating whether she deserved to be happy or not, which happens quite late in the book. So I know it's not the same for every reader. I know, people have different times. And because she's a robot, I could play around with this issue of control. That would have been really distasteful and hard to deal with if the both of the people were human from the get go. And yet we know there are relationships where somebody does feel very controlled by the other person. So in a way, even though she's a robot, she's an allegory for a woman who's in an abusive relationship.
Traci Thomas 21:16
Yeah. I mean, we also know there are periods in American history where people were controlled by other people, right? Like, it's like, it does feel distasteful to think of it now in this relationship. But it's like, we know that it's possible. We've seen it both historically. And we all probably know someone who's been in a relationship like that. Who are you writing to? Who's your audience? How were you thinking about audiences? You told this story?
Sierra Greer 21:43
I love this question. Because when I wrote this story, I didn't tell anybody I was writing it. I just sat on my couch. I didn't tell my family, I didn't tell anybody I was, I was assuming, honestly, that nobody would ever read this story except me. I was writing it for myself. And it was very far outside my comfort zone. I was just exploring this thing. I just thought, wow, this is too weird. No one's ever gonna want it. So really, while I was writing it, I had I had an audience of me. That was it. I was like, this is just for me. And then it turned out my agent thought it was a good idea. And then I was able to sell it. So it was good.
Traci Thomas 22:23
Did you have to change? How you were thinking about audience once you realized it was going to have an audience?
Sierra Greer 22:30
It did a little bit because I was concerned that there, were still going to be a lot of people that wouldn't like it. And I think there really are some dark moments in the novel. And I just was worried, you know, you always are worried that people won't like your novel. So and yet, I knew it was important to keep them in there, because I felt that I was dealing with some really important issues between men and women. So I just kept things in that I thought needed to be there. And then I got good advice from my editor and my agent for how to make it even stronger. So then I was aware of the I was definitely aware of the audience later. Here's one thing I really liked to read, fast, not read fast, I read slowly, I like to consume a book in a very quick way. Yeah, then it was really important to me to keep any baht short, just like a short number of pages. And there were times when my editor was encouraging me to expand to develop more around the character, especially later in the last third of the novel. And I really resisted that, because I wanted someone to be able to just read it in, you know, not not weeks, I wanted them to be able to read it in a matter of days. And but she, you know, she was right, she was saying, you can't read something so fast that you get to the end of it, and you don't have something to think about, there still has to be substance there. And there are these places when we don't really understand what Annie is thinking. And I was like, let's write a dialogue Can't you know, you actually have to take a beat here to just explain in a couple places what she's talking about. So that's a case where my sense of an audience definitely had to be informed by my editor to say there needs to be more here. It has to be richer. You can't just put these specs of something on the page. There has to be enough there.
Traci Thomas 24:19
So yeah, I love that. What's funny, what's funny is when you're like oh, there's darker parts people aren't gonna like that's the part I like the most I love the Daniele I feel like people don't write to my right don't write to me nearly enough. I love especially if in fiction because I read a lot of nonfiction. So if I'm going to read a novel, it's got to be it's got to have a little dark to it pretty much always and this book has plenty of that, which is what I think really hooked me. I was like, Ooh, this is like, Rose. Good girls.
Sierra Greer 24:50
That's interesting because I myself have a pretty low tolerance for like for cruelty in certainly in shows and I don't watch horror So there are a lot of dark things that I can't really do. But I know that there are people who appreciate it a lot more than I do. So that's why I was like, Well, I just have to be true to myself with this. And it's gonna resonate with some people or not, and they can choose so I'm really glad to know it worked for you.
Traci Thomas 25:14
It worked for me, I can't do horror. I can't do like scary, but I can do like fucked up. You know, like, I think we're there. Yeah. And I feel like you definitely nailed that. I also appreciate the the shortness of a book, because this is the kind of book that does need to be tight. I think if you start wandering too much, and it gets too big, you lose sort of like the driving pulls up the thing. So I think you did strike a good balance of like keeping it tight and giving us enough. How do you name your characters?
Sierra Greer 25:53
Ah, that's a good one. Annie, is named Annie because it's a very dear, wonderful, warm, kind name, I associated with just goodness and kindness and the girl next door. So I really wanted to hurt her to have a name that was like a regular person. So that's how Annie got her name. Doug, I wanted to have a single one syllable name that could just be said very quickly. And Doug, it sounds like you know, the past tense of Digg. So it's sort of like, it's sort of like a person who's like digging around in the mud. So it has those associations for me. But otherwise, I just sort of see who shows up. And then a couple times, I have to change people's names. roelens name changed a couple times, until I found roll into that was really good for him. Lucia is a great name. I had a friend when I was in grade school, whose name was Lucia and I just always loved that name. So I pulled that in.
Traci Thomas 27:00
What makes you change someone's name? Like it just didn't sit right with you.
Sierra Greer 27:04
and sometimes there are too many names that have the same, the start with the same letter I so I don't want that confusion, or they're all the same. They're all two syllables, or they're all one syllable. And I just want to change up that so things sound, more fitting, and different names fit different characters because of their backgrounds as well. So Doug's name. He's from Maine. He's from, like a small town up in Maine. And it just seems sort of like a regular guy, white guy named from up in Maine. Yeah, so that worked.
Traci Thomas 27:36
Speaking of white guys, I feel like you're doing some sort of interesting stuff in this book with race. I don't know that a lot of people pick up on it or are interested in it. But I was. And I'm curious how you were thinking about it? And if you were thinking about it, or if I just put stuff on you?
Sierra Greer 27:55
No, you did not put on that on me at all. I really wanted to include an element of race in the novel, I felt like it would have been naive and not true to the world. If the novel didn't have some different races represented in the novel, I really felt they needed to be there. And if you're talking about Danny's relationship to Gwynns, his first wife, is that what you're referring to do? We find out early on that any is based on Well, somewhat based on Doug's first wife, who was black, and they divorced with a very ugly divorce. And when he decided to make a robot, he decided to have Annie and based physically on her parents and grandparents to a degree, but he also lightened her skin, because that's what he wanted to do. And it's one of these things where I'm presenting a character who is racist, and inviting, I think, inviting judgment of Doug. And there's always a risk that I'm inviting judgment for myself as well. But I was willing to put that out there in the world, because I'd rather have the conversation than just pretend there's not racism at all. So that's what's going on for me with Doug and Roland is my, he's my character who gets to call him on it. And he doesn't really say too much to Doug directly, except that when the ex wife would hate this, to know this is true, but he also makes comments to me about how he's really doing a disservice to his first wife by by doing this by first by having a sexpot resemble her, and also by changing the color of her skin. I just feel that that's so disrespectful of Doug to do that. Even if his ex wife never knows it. It just feels intrinsically really, really ugly. But that's there. And the other thing I wanted to point out or or suggest is that sometimes people in the privacy of their own own homes will do something that they know is not acceptable in public. So this is not something he's told people he doesn't, he would probably avoid saying directly racist things in a in a social situation. And yet in the privacy of his own home where he wants something to work on with his, you know, his past relationship and his sexual appetites, he can play around with something that's, frankly racist. And he can do that. I've just said a lot about that. Do you want to add to that conversation?
Traci Thomas 30:31
I loved it. I love it. I think it's like, so again, like an icky thing that's in this book that I really appreciated. I also think, you know, Roland, who is his best friend who we meet in the first chapter, he's also black. And so, to me, that says another thing about Doug, right that his ex wife and his best friend are both black, and he's this white guy. And in the privacy of his own home, when push comes to shove, he could have made this doll look like anything. And he made her look like a white version of a black woman. Like, just, you know, so I, I just thought it said, so. Even from early on that piece of information. Let me know more about Doug, than I think a lot of other things that you eventually roll out, I was not surprised about Doug's behavior. Because of that, like little nugget, you sort of drop it early. And I don't know that a lot of people probably even think about it or pay attention to it. But because I'm black, I feel like I it's like, you know, Spidey sense.
Sierra Greer 31:36
Yeah, I'm happy to hear that. That's your reaction, because it felt really important to me to, to put that in. And the thing is, there were not opportunities later on in the novel to really delve into that more deeply. it and I didn't feel like I had the answers to authenticity myself to really explore race and in more complex, sophisticated way. But I did what I could, I felt like I did that as honestly as I could with the background that I have, and with what I've been able to research. So that's why it's there. It's really important to me that it's there. And I also think that you know, different readers will read that different way. Because any is in our minds, we imagine what she looks like. And just to say that she's she resembles a black woman, but she's a little bit lighter. That still gives you a huge range of what somebody looks like, right? Yeah, yeah, yes. And people can, if it's not important to them, they can ignore that. But if it matters to them, they can dwell on that more. And as you say, that actually informed a lot of a lot of his character to you, because you knew this. Yeah, no, he's a very flawed, he's a very flawed man. But I feel like he's really created by our, our society right now. I think there are a lot of people that recognize somebody like Doug, or, or no parts of themselves that are like, Doug, whether you're male or female, we have a lot of dog in us.
Traci Thomas 33:02
Well, I think. So. I think that's the part of the book that really works for me is like, I read Doug. And I understand how Doug could like, have a black best friend and like, know, people, and have had an ex wife and all of these things. Like I can see him and also be like, Doug is a monster, like I like, but I understand how other people wouldn't like it's like, we all know a dog. And I think that that's really, like, difficult to do, especially in a short novel, where it's like, this person is our villain. But yeah, also, he is attractive and likable. We're told by a lot of people in the book, but also we're seeing him do things that are Eric, across the board. Yeah, yes. And it's like, to me, that is so many of the straight white men that come either to like our larger cultural, you know, celebrity, or a bit are also people that you work with, or you know, where it's like, Oh, your boss is so great. Oh, he's so awesome. And you're like, yeah, he says crazy things when we're not in meetings are like, yeah, he's having an affair on his wife or whatever. But it's like, we're told that this is a good guy. But then we get to see him do things where we're like, that's not what good people do. But it keeps you really, it kept me really engaged in the book, because I believed, I believed that he was a person that I could have known that I could know. And I think like that kind of gets to a bigger question about world building and like creating this story, which is so tight to the real world, except this one thing, which is that you're gonna have a Sex Robot, or a nanny, which I would personally love. But I'm wondering like, how How did you decide how far or how close to keep it to our world?
Sierra Greer 35:07
I, I really just was thinking about going forward only a little bit in time. And then. And then I didn't worry about inconsistencies. I really wanted to explore the idea of this robot. And I thought, Well, I'm just gonna jump in on that. And I imagined there has to be other technology around it. Like there have to be self driving cars and things like that, too. But I didn't, I just didn't bring them in. I just, that wasn't interesting to me. So I just didn't go there. And if we can just go back to Doug for just one. Yeah, of course we can. If you're saying that he's someone we recognize. And I feel like we can recognize this character. I hope that the NOS novel also conveys that there's hope for these characters, they, they have a chance to change. What do you think about that?
Traci Thomas 36:01
I don't know. I don't, I don't think that the novel doesn't say that there could be hope for these characters. But I view these characters especially dug in an enrollment to an extent in the world which we are in. And knowing that Doug is not an individual, but part of a bigger system. I think it's, I think it would be really hard for Doug to change. I imagine that at the end of the book. We're not getting Doug is not excited about the end of the book. Like that we're not getting we're not getting an evolved. Doug, I think that Doug is Doug, and maybe he can change or he can feel that he's changed. But I don't know, when push comes to shove, if Doug has done enough, work on himself, to like, be able to handle things that are not in his control that he's not in charge of. I mean, that's Doug's problem from the beginning. And I don't know that Doug changes. And I think that's because Doug is a white guy. And he's been taught that he's supposed to be in charge. So I don't know that there's not hope for some of the characters. But I don't know that, given the fact that we're in this world with a little bonus, that but they are changing.
Sierra Greer 37:20
Oh, you have a very legitimate response for the novel there. You absolutely do. And I think there are a lot of people who would agree with you. And I do think he just as any represents modern feminism, I do think that he represents the patriarchy. So if you, you know, there, it's gonna be really hard to change the patriarchy as a whole system. So yeah, I can see how you might think that he's hard to change.
Traci Thomas 37:47
When you say that she represents modern feminism. What are you defining as modern feminism? Is that like modern feminism, like Barbie, the movie or is that like, or are you thinking of it as like a more rigorous feminism?
Sierra Greer 38:02
Oh, wow. I guess I'm thinking of her in terms of like a humanist feminist. Like, she's a person who deserves autonomy, she deserves control of her own body. She deserves respect. She deserves to not be secondary to the men in her life. She deserves political rights. I guess that's where I'm going with it. Does that make sense?
Traci Thomas 38:31
yeah, I just wasn't sure. I feel like people use the term modern feminism to mean like, sometimes, like a pejorative against feminism, sometimes, like a certain kind of, you know, so I just wasn't sure how you had envisioned her as a feminist like as representation of feminism. Is there anything that's not in this book that you wish could have been?
Sierra Greer 38:55
What? What Kitchen Sink Did I leave out?
Oh, it's so tight. You know, it's so compact, but there's so much there. Like, there's so many things I care about that are in this novel. And if you try to put too much in, you lose the power of what's there. Do you remember Strunk and White's book about Elements of Style one of the rules is omit needless words, which is the shortest way you can possibly say don't put any extra words in there omit needless words. And you can apply the same principle to a to a sentence into a paragraph into a chapter into a novel and to make any work. I don't think I was consciously leaving things out. But I know that everything that stayed was something that had to be there. So no, I wouldn't at this Wouldn't there's nothing I would add to that novel.
Traci Thomas 40:02
Yeah, that answer. Yeah. Sometimes people have things like there's a scene we had to cut. And sometimes people are like, No, I liked what I did. And it just didn't have anything.
Sierra Greer 40:11
I had an earlier version of the novel that omitted about 48 hours worth of travel, I'll call it travel, I see, which is not a spoiler. But I had not included the chapters of travel. And my agent suggested that I put them in. And they ended up being a couple of my favorite scenes in their their relationship that's explored. Yeah, well, two people are traveling together is really, really special. So that's what where I thought something didn't need to be there. And he said, Oh, put this in. And it ended up adding a lot to the novel. I know that sometimes sometimes I'm not, I'm not always the best judge, I have to have someone else say, Oh, well, you should put this in.
Traci Thomas 40:51
This is why writers need editors. I am a big fan of editors. A big, big fan, though. Sometimes I'm like, this editor failed. And I feel like you can tell that to not in your case. So for folks who don't know, Sera, Greer is a pseudonym. Can you tell us first of all, how you picked that name? And second of all, why you write under a pseudonym?
Sierra Greer 41:14
Oh, yeah, I picked Sierra because it's beautiful. It's a great strong name. And Greer, because it's the last name of my grandmother's grandmother. So it's a family name. And I'm writing under a pseudonym for for anti bot because in another before this, I was writing young adult novels. And I have an audience of, of people, you know, sometimes young adult readers struggle from, you know, kids from their childhood to adults. So sometimes that happens, but sometimes it doesn't go the other way. And I just didn't want any chance of confusion, or distraction, by having this novel, antibody come on out under the name of a of a young adult writer. So I picked a different name, and I'm really happy with it.
Traci Thomas 42:04
Great.
Sierra Greer 42:05
Yeah.
Traci Thomas 42:06
Do you? Did you get like, or I guess not. Did you get? What was it like being able to write about sex freely as you're writing for adults? Because I know in the white space, that can be very contentious.
Sierra Greer 42:23
Yeah, this would not fly this is for young adult readers. It's not. And it, it's, I think, one of the reasons why I was so uncomfortable, because I've been really happy writing for young adults and children. I just, I really respect my young readers, and love exploring ideas for certain age groups. So having characters really all about the sex was a big departure. But I just went with it as like, you know, we all have multiple sides to ourselves. Yeah. And it's fine to just go ahead and explore and see what happens when, when we're looking at this too.
Traci Thomas 43:04
So Annie, loves to read. And Emily, she love to read, she loves to read a lot of books that I know and love. And I'm curious how Annie's taste in books aligns with your taste in books, former English teacher.
Sierra Greer 43:18
Um, it's pretty close. I like the books that anyways, I'll be honest, I like most of the books that Doug reads too. It was really important to me that Annie had was a reader because I feel like reading is such an important escape for people and an opportunity to read and explore the world. And she's really, when she sort of discovers the books in her life, she's at a place where she desperately needs to have an outlet and a way to connect. And even if you don't always think of it, when you're reading books, you're actually connecting to other people. You're connecting to the writers who wrote them in the first place, and you're connecting to other people who are reading them. And you feel like you're part of a community, even if the conversation is with someone who's not even alive anymore. So I think she really, really needed that. And I liked I liked celebrating that. I love it that one of her favorite things is her library card. Yes. And I was talking talking to a librarian who said one of her favorite moments in the novel was that, you know, Annie really likes her library card. And I was like, Yeah, let's have a little shout out here for libraries and books.
Traci Thomas 44:24
So I loved I loved it so much. Brett Bennett, Emily St. John Mandel. I was so excited. Yeah. How did you know you wanted to be a writer? When did you know?
Sierra Greer 44:33
Ah, well, I was writing short stories, all the way back in seventh grade, seventh and eighth grade. And then I went to college and I took a writing class while I was there, and I really, really liked it. So I decided I would try writing and and so I did. I just have been writing ever since. And as people know, writing doesn't always work out for you. So I spent a lot of time right Anything that I wasn't publishing, and then I went off to become a teacher. And one of the we were talking about the American dream. And I was asking my students, because we were studying American literature and their various American dreams all the way through American literature. So I had to my students, what's your, what's your dream, your American dream? And they turned it around to me. And I said, What's your, what's your dream? And I thought, I want to be a better teacher. And I also thought, I also want to be a writer. And I was like, why am I? Why am I putting my dream on the backburner? And I was reading every summer, you know, I was reading on weekends when I could get a chance. But as you know, when you're a teacher, that you that consumes all of your time. But then my family went on a sabbatical, and we had a half a year living away. And that's when I started writing my first young adult novel. And I was like, Okay, this is it. This is just what I'm going to do. So that's when I kind of had a break. But I've been doing it all the way along. Yeah. Do you miss teaching? Sometimes, I think it'd be really hard for me to go back. Now. I think the pandemic really changed what's happening in the classroom. It'd be very hard for me to sustain the energy that it that it takes to be a teacher, it's just a different kind of energy than the energy you need to be a writer.
Traci Thomas 46:21
What was your favorite book to teach?
Sierra Greer 46:23
I think it was Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck. It's never really short. It's really short. It's written in a very clear, simple style. It has only a handful of characters. And the power dynamics between all of them are really intense. And it takes place in the 1930s sort of in the dustbowl time, and it's brutal. The ending is absolutely brutal. It'll kill you, it'll kill you. That's, that's my spoiler for you on of my students, my students really got into it. And then they could really understand the characters and the dynamics and what it said about injustice in our society back then. And now. So I think that was one of my favorites.
Traci Thomas 47:08
What's the word you can never spell correctly on the first try?
Sierra Greer 47:14
Oh, like necessary. That's one I have to look at every time. And then there's Syzygy, which is when you know, the Earth and the Moon all lined up? Yeah. I have to look that up every single time. I don't think I've ever even heard that word. Oh, yeah. That's a good one. Yeah. A couple right there.
Traci Thomas 47:33
This is I think I know the answer to this. But I have to ask, because one of my favorite parts of every book is the acknowledgments and yours are extremely short, is that just because you're in a pseudonym, and you do full acknowledgments with your real name?
Sierra Greer 47:46
I, it's definitely it was partly influenced by being a pseudonym, but it's also because I just wanted to keep it short. I am really thankful to my editors, and my agent and my family. That's those are the ones I'm most most thankful to. So I just kept it to that. Okay, well, maybe you haven't picked up on this yet. But I'm a very sort of, I'm a simple, I picked up versa.
Traci Thomas 48:12
Yeah, picking up what you're putting down? But, you know, I write these questions before I meet you. And I'm always because I'm always mining the acknowledgments for like gossip, and like relationships. And like, you know, sometimes I'll see like, I just read a book recently, and the author lives in my hometown. And they acknowledged two people, one that I went to high school with, and I was like, This is amazing. So I'm always in the acknowledgments looking for hints and clues, you know, sometimes someone will think like, a soda water or like, you know, a song that they love, and I'm like, Ooh, what's there?
Sierra Greer 48:48
I'm sorry, I'm given up nothing there. And you're just you're just gonna have to work for it somehow.
Traci Thomas 48:54
That's okay. It's okay. I thought I found out about of Mice and Men. And that wasn't an acknowledgment. So you know, I can still ask questions, but I like to, I like to know, for this books been out in the world for a little bit, who's the coolest person who's expressed interest in this book?
Sierra Greer 49:11
Well, having a Book of the Month Club, people pick it up. That was pretty big. Having Jimmy Fallon flag it for his book club was pretty big. I was named in the first in the sweet 16. Last to allow us to trace this year whose novel nightwatching actually went all the way to the Wow. And hers. Now, her novel was the one where she went and talked to Jimmy Fallon in person just this last week. So those have been pretty good. Yeah, those are cool. Really nice interest.
Traci Thomas 49:43
I love that. For people who love Annie Bot. What are some other books you might recommend to them that are in conversation with what you're doing?
Sierra Greer 49:53
There's a novel by Francis Cha, called if I had your face, which is takes place in Korea. And it's fiction, but it feels like science fiction or the future, because people are having facial surgeries and changing their appearances all the time, because they want to look beautiful, and they want to look beautiful. So they could work in tea houses, to serve the guests that come to Japan or Korea or other. And it's just really it's just a really fascinating novel that ends up being about friendships between some women that need friendship really badly. So I would say that's in conversation with my novel, I just really liked it. When I was writing this book, it was hard to find other books that were like it, you know, that I can compare it to. There's a book called Galatea, two are Galatea 2.0. And that also is about it's about the discovering of AI and a relationship between the man who is reading literature to this AI consciousness to try to help it become more informed, and AI consciousness itself. So it's sort of a throwback to an earlier time have an have an AI. Yeah. But it's hard for me to find books that are about AI robots that are comparable to Annie, because she's so human. So I think you're almost better off looking for the comparisons in relationships that are human human relationships.
Traci Thomas 51:28
Yes. Okay, last question. If you could have one person dead or alive, read this book, who would you want it to be?
Sierra Greer 51:34
I think my father, I think I'd have my father read it. He always encouraged me so much. And he would be delighted by this book, I think it would make him just really happy for me that, that it's out in the world. And I think he would be happy to see the fruition really, of all my years of working on something to try to be able to do this. I think it would mean a lot to him. So I would love it if my father could read this book. I love that helped. That's not too corny.
Traci Thomas 52:06
No. It's great. As I said, I've been doing this for a long time I've gotten answers that right, run the gamut. And I always love the way people answer that question. I think it's just really, really pure. Well, CR it's been great talking with you. I adored the book and I'm so excited that we had a chance to talk about it. And for folks at home, you get Anubhav wherever you get your books. It is a as we mentioned, a short, sort of icky ride and I hope everyone is ready for it strap in. Thank you so much for being here, Sierra.
Sierra Greer 52:37
Thank you, Traci. This has been great.
Traci Thomas 52:40
And everyone else we will see you in the stacks.
Alright y'all, that does it for us today. Thank you so much for listening. And thank you again to Sierra Greer for joining the show. I'd also like to say a huge thank you to Eliza Rosenberry for helping to make this conversation possible. Remember The Stacks book club pick for May is No name in the street by James Baldwin, which we will discuss on Wednesday May 29th with Yahdon Israel. If you love this show and you want inside access to it head to patreon.com/thestacks to join the stacks pack and check out my substack at Tracithomas.substack.com Make sure you're subscribed to the stacks wherever you listen to your podcasts and if you're listening through Apple podcasts or Spotify, you can leave us a rating and a review. For more from the stacks follow us on social media at the stacks pod on Instagram threads and tick tock and at the sacks pod underscore on Twitter. And you can check out our website thestackspodcast.com. This episode of The Stacks was edited by Christian Dueñas, with production assistance from Lauren Tyree. Our graphic designer is Robin McCreight and our theme music is from Tagirijus. The Stacks is created and produced by me, Traci Thomas.