Interview with Author: Hannah Brohm

Anonymous peer review, professional grudges, and a conference that could make or break your career aren’t the usual ingredients for a swoony romance, which is exactly why this conversation works. We’re joined by neuroscientist and debut author Hannah Brohm to unpack how real academic life shaped Love and Other Brain Experiments, a STEM romance that pairs sharp humor with the very real instability of early-career research.

We also get personal about craft and process: drafting while doing neuroscience, learning where to bend reality for story, and why Hannah needs a little surprise to stay motivated as a plotter-pantser hybrid. She shares a key theme that runs through the romance and the research mindset: when you get new information about someone, you should be willing to update your view. We close with what she’s working on next, plus where to follow her online.

If you love STEM romance, women in STEM stories, academic rivals-to-lovers, and fake dating done with heart, subscribe, share this with a romance friend, and leave a review so more listeners can find the show.

Follow Hannah on IG & Threads: @hannahbrohm & TT: @Hannah.brohm

website: https://www.hannahbrohm.com

newsletter: https://substack.com/@hannahbrohm

Cover Art by: moi

Intro/Outro Music: positive vibes by nanaacom on Capcut

Contact Email: spillthesmutpodcast@gmail.com

Podcast IG: @spillthesmutpodcast TT: @spillthesmutpodcast

Jordan IG: @sipsoffiction TT: @sipsoffiction

Transcript

Welcome And Week Highlight

Jordan 0:21

A neuroscientist by day and a romance writer by night, she is proof that science and love stories are the perfect combination. She started writing when she was younger, but it wasn't until grad school that she picked it back up again. One day she had a thought. What would happen if two academic rivals fell in love? So she did what any writer would do. She wrote the story. The result is her debut novel, Love and Other Brain Experiments. If you love STEM romances, rival to lover's tension, a little fake dating thrown in too, then trust me, you need to add this one to your TBR. Welcome to the podcast, Hannah Brome. Hi, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. I'm so excited to talk to you and interview you. Hi, thank you so, so much for having me. I'm really excited to talk uh as well. Oh, thank you. Okay, so we'll we'll die. Well, okay, before we dive on in, I do like to ask everybody that I have on, what has been the highlight of your week so far?

Hannah Brohm 1:24

Okay, so the highlight of my week has been actually visiting my parents back home. I just came back from Berlin this morning. Um, and I was there with them over the weekend. So that was really great. We had wonderful like spring weather, warm enough to sit outside. So that was just beautiful. So I'm very relaxed now.

Why Romance And Academia Mix

Jordan 1:43

You're like, but now you're like diving back into like the swing of things of like not being relaxed. So that's gotta be an adjustment. Yeah. Okay, so we'll dive right on into the questions. So I have the questions broken down into three parts, but we'll start with authoring first. What inspired you to be like, what inspired you to start writing and to write a romance book?

Hannah Brohm 2:11

Um, so in general, I was already writing a lot as a teenager. I think what inspired me back then was probably just that I was a big reader, and at some point I wondered what it was like to yeah, just write stories myself and like be able to influence all of the things and um write them the way that I wanted to read them as well. But then I took a very long break afterwards when I went to university, um, so in college and then also in grad school. I stopped writing for a while because I didn't have the time, I didn't really have ideas, and then picked it back up maybe about like 10 years after I had stopped um before. And there I was very inspired to. So I think there the writing and writing romance in particular came kind of hand in hand, just because uh throughout grad school I was reading a lot of romance. Honestly, like all of the stuff that I had read before, there was always a very, very heavy love story or romance art, but romance as a genre, I mainly started reading um in grad school, and I loved it so much, and it also provided a lot of kind of comfort and distraction. And at some point I was reading a few romances and started wondering what it would be like to use the setting that I was getting so used to, like my day-to-day setting in academia, in neuroscience, and set a story in that kind of context. And that was, I think, maybe a few months before the love hypothesis came out. So at that point, I was like, well, I haven't really read any kind of like scientists or wasn't really aware of reading about scientists, especially in a romance context, maybe in a kind of like literary fiction context or science fiction context a bit more. Um, but even there it wasn't so common. Um, and then I just started to write it. So that's that's how I got into back into it and also into romance writing in particular.

Jordan 4:06

I love that. And I know I have some like questions about you being like a scientist, but we'll dive into your and I'm I have it with me because I I have to say I loved your book. I actually I slap I read it slash listened to it, and I I loved it so much. I I it's like the best time reading it, and I and I'm not sure too if you like being compared to Allie Hazlewood, but I like it in the way that I had never read any STEM romances, and I I haven't really read too many of Allie Hazelwood's books. I've read like I like I haven't even read the Love Hypothesis, but I read like some of her other ones, she had it was like a summery one, probably two summer romance, I guess.

Hannah Brohm 4:52

I don't know.

Jordan 4:53

Yeah, oh yes, yes, maybe yes, yeah, that one. And I and I loved that one because I loved like the summer part of it, but then I I feel like I really got the STEM romance from this book because I even though like she has written like STEM, I haven't really read those ones. So I loved this and I feel like it is an Allie Hazelwood. Like, if you like Allie Hazelwood, then you need to pick this one up because yeah.

Hannah Brohm 5:22

Oh, well, okay, sorry. So no worries. So thank you so much. I mean, I love that I love hearing when people like my book, obviously.

Love And Other Brain Experiments Setup

Jordan 5:29

But I like totally forgot the point of the question because I got too sidetracked. Um, so your debut book, Love Another Brain Experiments, uh, it released in February, and I was wondering if you could just tell the listeners a little bit more about your book.

Hannah Brohm 5:46

Sure.

Jordan 5:46

Which I love.

Hannah Brohm 5:49

Love another brain experiment is about a scientist. Her name is Frances, and at the beginning of the book, she is traveling to a conference in New York City that she has very high hopes for because she's in a kind of tough spot in her career where she's always just working on very temporary projects. She has to move a lot to keep her career going and to kind of work on the projects that she wants to work on. And that whole reality is actually quite realistic for uh researchers at that stage, scientists at that stage. And so she's traveling to New York City. There's this really, really important conference for her area of research where she hopes to network a lot and she has very high hopes for it because she needs to figure out what's next for her because she's going to be unemployed soon. Otherwise, um, and she's very, very passionate about her research. So she wants to figure out what uh um project she will be working on next. But the problem is that that conference is organized by her ex, who has in the meantime became become very, very successful. And when they kind of split up, he was very mean and he predicted that she would end up unsuccessful and alone. She wouldn't make it in science, and she's kind of nervous to travel there, but still determined to make it work. And once she gets there, she actually runs. Well, she already runs into him before, but um runs into uh Lewis, and they have been kind of fighting it out over social media, like reason like science social media for the past four years. They've never met in person. And when they get into an argument there at the conference, um, their colleagues think that they're actually dating, so they mistake it for some kind of like flirtatious banter, and they miss the moment to clear up the misconception and then realize that coming kind of clean about it afterwards might be a problem because it's not really like nice or good for a scientist to be seen as like lying about something like that. So they she basically convinces him to play along and to fake date her for the rest of the conference, so they're pretending to be a couple, and yeah, then all the all the fake dating shenanigans ins you, obviously.

The Plane Meet Cute Origin

Jordan 8:04

Oh, and fake dating is just like such a good trope. I also love like rivals to lovers is so underrated too, and I love and like also academic rivals to lovers. Oh, it's just so good. Okay, so um, and I I don't think this is a spoiler because it happens in the first chapter, but everyone talks about meat cute and the perfect meat cute, and I love this one with like it being on the plane, and I want to know did you always know this was gonna be like the meat cute that Francis and Lewis had? Or is this like how how did how'd you come up with this meat cute specifically?

Hannah Brohm 8:44

So actually, the meat cute was was one of the things that I had the idea about first because I had this general like um idea of, you know, like it plays a lot. The the first chapter plays a lot with that whole you're on a plane, people are calling for a doctor. Uh, and within academic circles, like within with my friends and so on, we always joke that technically we're doctors because we have the title, but we wouldn't be able to help in an emergency, like any kind of medical emergency, because we're just not that kind of like not a medical doctor, right? So I was thinking about this, and then I knew sort of I would wanted to have that kind of play. Um, and I also wanted them to be rivals, but I wanted them to meet in a kind of way where they didn't know really where the other one was. So I could already explore a little bit how they would um how they would interact if they didn't have all that history between them, because that was really fun for me. And I think also kind of maybe nice for the reader to see the sort of interaction they could have if there wouldn't have been all of those things that happened in between, almost as a kind of like maybe um yeah, sneak peek of what would be good about them if they can work past all of that. So I knew that I wanted to have that, and I knew that I wanted them to meet on a player, and they have to make it work for a little bit until they land, obviously. Um, yeah, so I it was one of the first things that I knew about the story, actually, that mute cute.

Jordan 10:15

Oh, okay. I because I do I really like that, Mewt, and I like how you wrote it. Again, I don't think this is a spoiler because it's in like the first chapter, but how it's and even as the reader, you don't really know like who this person is either. And because like I feel like the way you wrote it too, especially in the beginning, it's I feel like it could just be a random interaction too, and it's not supposed to be the love interest, but when he comes forward and is like, well, you actually would know my name and um like my my full name, I think is how he worded it. Is it true that like especially too like leaving those? Um I'm so sorry, I'm not I don't know any academic scientist stuff, but like with like hit with the paper and you leave a note or a review, is it true too that you you would leave in a a note with a specific name in that like or like anonymous? Cause like I know too, like some of them aren't known.

Hannah Brohm 11:25

Yeah, so yeah, so in that's actually like part of how the idea kind of came to be like do like a little sidetrack first and then we maybe get back to that. But I was um when I started writing the book, I was actually in the process of having my research paper reviewed. So you basically you finish a project, you write about it, you have like that whole document that you want to publish in an academic journal, so you send it off. And in the ideal case, that journal thinks there might be merit to the paper, so they send it to a set of scientists to review it, to basically give you comments and decide whether they would recommend to the journal to publish the paper, but that's anonymous. That part, so you don't know exactly who it is that is reviewing your paper. You can often make guesses just because often the people that would be working on a topic so similar to yours are kind of like a limited set of people. You've maybe read their studies. So you can make guesses, but you never know for sure. Um, and I as I was going through that process, I was actually thinking, because you can get sometimes quite snarky comments, people not being very polite or just wording their questions in kind of like weirdly aggressive ways. It really depends. Sometimes it's completely fine, right? But as I was um going through that process, I actually started wondering what it would be like to run into this person that had been kind of anonymously maybe rude to you, but in person they were maybe a totally nice like person, right? So um that's what I was thinking about when I kind of came up with that idea. But it is true that even if you don't know exactly who is reviewing your paper, because you can make guesses, and also because sometimes on like science social media, you would be discussing new findings or interpretations, so that way you kind of can still um know who is on the other end and who you're discussing with all this time, that they maybe have a really different opinion from yours. Uh, so in that sense, um the way that they so Francis and Lewis um interact with each other in the book is quite close to reality in that sense, I would say.

Writing Neuroscience Without Losing Story

Jordan 13:41

Wait, that's kind of cool though. And I I mean I would I wouldn't know that at all. So I think that's really cool. Um okay, so we I know too that you're a neuroscientist. I got that from the back of the book though. Um, is that why you made Francis and Lewis both neuroscientists too? And did that make it easier or harder to write about?

Hannah Brohm 14:09

Um, yeah, so I knew I wanted them to be neuroscientists just because I was I wanted to write a story that was so close to the context that I was in. And I felt like the best way I could do that was actually taking neuroscience, which I'm the most familiar with, and not any other kind of like branch of science. Um and I also needed it to be that way, kind of because it does, there is a lot of like commentary on like academia and working in that field, and I really realized that probably the best way for me to kind of like portray that was to take from my own experience or the people around me from that field. So I really wanted to make them neuroscientists, and I think in a sense it made it easier for me to write because it could, I didn't have to do much extra research for it, uh, because I basically was living in that kind of context. But it also made it harder in a sense, because I sometimes find that if you know a lot about a certain topic, sometimes you have to simplify or like bend reality a little bit for the narrative to work properly, because no one really wants to read about, or it's very, very hard to write true to reality one to like really like 100%, and still make it the kind of like interesting for the narrative, interesting for the for the reader to get into those characters. So I feel like that part for me was the hardest to sometimes decide, okay, where do I stay really true to how it is, and where do I maybe deviate a little bit or take like a little step back and uh make it my priority to have a fiction novel rather than a portrait of science. So I think that it's kind of like um it has like its uh advantages and disadvantages to be so close to the topic. But overall, I would say that it probably made it easier. Yeah.

Jordan 16:06

Fair. I I didn't think of that, but that is true because I I could see even like anything in in life too, like to the T might be a little bit boring. So how do you keep it like real enough, but then spin things in other ways? So it's still the fiction and a romance book. Now, what since you are a neuroscientist, was it hard juggling that part of your life while writing this book?

Hannah Brohm 16:36

Uh yes, I would say. That's also why it took me so long. So um, I think maybe one of your later questions is about that as well. But I started writing it uh over four years ago, the book. Um, and obviously there's always like a very long process in terms of just finding an agent because it's also my debut. So I was going down like the traditional publishing route, querying agents, getting a book deal, all of that obviously takes time as well, and going through edits. But for me, the first part of until I get got to that point also took uh quite a while, just because I had to balance it. Um it was it took me a while, I have to say, but it wasn't hard in the sense of trying to make time for it, because I realized pretty quickly that working on the book was actually really, really good for my mental health while in grad school, because it was kind of like the way that you read romance to escape to this safe, nice place, right? Like you can discuss problems or like read about um certain things in romance novels that are serious, but you always know that it's gonna end up well. And writing that was like that for me too. So I knew that I was, I could like explore maybe all of these difficult feelings that I had about academia in general as well, or like um put them and shape them into something that Francis, the main character, was thinking about, but also any kind of like frustration that I was encountering in my day-to-day life in the lab, it was interesting for the story, right? So any, it's not that everything that I experienced ended up there. I also kind of um came up with a lot of stuff. So a lot of it is fiction, but it was still a nice perspective to have like on any kind of mishap to be like, oh, would this be fun for like a romantic moment between characters or something like that? So it it I was kind of drawn to working on the story because of that most of the time, even when I didn't have a lot of time or like mind space for it while also being working as a scientist.

Music, Draft Changes, Ending Choices

Jordan 18:33

I I have like so many more questions, and I'm trying to figure out like I probably should have written them all down, but as I'm talking to you, I'm coming up with them. I so I'm gonna add them at different points in time. But I'll so sorry if this is jumping around a lot. I'm gonna go into my next question, which is I saw you have a playlist for the book. If you could only pick one song to pair or sum up the book, what song would it be and why?

Hannah Brohm 19:02

It's such a difficult one because even coming up with a playlist was already like narrowing down a lot of songs. But I think maybe one song that I think really describes it well is Maroon by Taylor Swift. I really like that one. I like that one too. And it's funny because it's funny because when I started writing the book, that album wasn't even out yet. But I was somewhere like in the middle of writing it when, or like I had the first draft done, I think, when I when Midnights came out, and then I listened to the song, I was like, oh wait, actually this this fits pretty well.

Jordan 19:37

So okay, so then this is going back to the other like the question that you saw where it's like I did a little digging and I saw that you first wrote the story four years ago. Did and so from that first draft, did the story evolve or is it still pretty much the same story?

Hannah Brohm 20:01

Uh I think yes, so I think it is the same, maybe at a very like zoomed out level. So the blurb on the back of the book, like just the kind of like summary, right? Like the what the what you would read um when you pick up the book and figure out what it's about. That one actually hasn't changed all that much. I mean, we've made it sound nicer, but the kind of like summary in there is basically what I wrote for the first draft as well. It's just that the execution of it uh has changed quite a bit. I would say maybe the key elements to the story, they've changed the same throughout, but um in reworking the manuscript, we so I I kind of like had to teach myself or reteach myself how to write with this one because it was the first book that I wrote after such a long time away from it. And um I feel like in that sense, maybe the first draft has very little tension, the characters seem a bit way more flat. Like, so in that sense, like that's what we kind of um improved through edits, but there were definitely a few scenes that I added later on only, or the ending changed quite a bit, not necessarily in terms of the outcome. The epilogue stayed the same almost through the entire process, but what happens before the epilogue to get there, for example, that has changed quite a little bit um as well from draft to draft.

Jordan 21:23

Oh, okay. So I actually okay, so this is a uh question I thought of as I'm talking to you. And I know we like want to try to keep it spoiler-free, so I'm going to try to not say anything. But the ending with because so we know that Frances is trying to find her next project, trying to find the funding for this project. Like, there's so many things of revolving around work for her and being an academic scientist, neuroscientist. But the ending you have, I thought was very interesting to say it in so few words that I'm curious. Is that did you always think that ending work related was going to be Francis' ending? Or is that Something that came along later.

Hannah Brohm 22:25

It's really hard to talk about this without without saying it was. Yeah. But yeah, but the I did have that ending work related for her in mind basically the entire time. Well, maybe not while I was writing the first draft, I didn't have it that clear because I was still also discovering the story as I went. But from the first draft on, I had that kind of direction pretty much in mind. Um because I think I don't know. I think sometimes it's good if we sort of like test the characters to figure out what they really care about. So that's what I wanted to do. And I think for her it was good to figure set things out before, yeah.

Jordan 23:11

Yeah, no, because I was gonna say I actually really liked the ending, but I thought it was interesting because and maybe this is like my own brain of I think the whole time you think it will go in one direction, and you're like, wait a minute, hold the phone. And I was like, Oh, and I actually really liked it because I also liked it too because I feel like it could have gone in another direction, but I like that Frances like held her own and was like, No, I don't want to do that because I don't want to like, yeah. So I so I at first I thought it was gonna go one way, and then I thought I was gonna go this other way with somebody, and I got not that I got nervous, but I was almost like, I feel like she was so like after things happened, she was so one way, and I was like, No, you can't do that, but then I liked it because it was like a full like 180, and I was like, Okay, okay. So I was just like so curious that, but I I have to say I really liked the ending because I also like didn't see it coming, like I didn't I didn't think you would go in that direction.

Hannah Brohm 24:30

I guess that's good. I don't know.

Revising First Impressions

Jordan 24:33

I yeah, I guess it's also would be a lot easier if I could actually say it out loud, but that's okay. You have to read the book to find out what we're talking about. Yes. Okay, what do you hope readers understand about either the story or the characters that might not be obvious at first?

Hannah Brohm 24:53

I think one of the ways or one of the things that was really important for me in the story about well, the characters and their interaction is that people we might have different kinds of like impressions of people based on the information that we get, but that can be that can change. There is a scene in the book where Francis literally thinks about that in a very scientific way, but it's kind of like if you get new information, maybe sometimes it's it's worth evaluating everything that you have and changing your opinion on it or or something like that. And I think for me that was important, and I think academic rivals also lends itself to that because there's um yeah, they have they have a long way to go from really, really, really disliking the other person to actually, I mean, we know it's a romance novel, we know that things are happen are gonna happen, right? That's not a spoiler, um, that they don't stay just rivals throughout, but um kind of like love comes walking in as well. So I think that was one of the one of the things so that we are willing maybe to learn about people and to stay curious about them to how to like any new information we get about them, to maybe how they've changed in throughout time, um and to let go sometimes of like hard feelings if it's warranted. Um and I also really liked to kind of explore in the book, and what what I also hope will people will maybe take away is that um you can sort of even if you come from maybe different angles or if you have um conflicting kind of like goals, that there's a lot of stuff that you can communicate about to maybe sort of try to solve it and work your way forward. I don't know. Yeah.

Family Support And Sister Wake Up

Jordan 26:50

I I like it. I like it too in the sense of I feel like me as a person, I get stuck in my views of either a situation or a person based off like one thing. And I like that Francis had this one idea of Lewis from an academic standpoint, and then and that's why I think I also really like the Meet Cute because you get to see like that their interaction, like you said before all the um thoughts of who you thought you knew them were as. So I think it's like it's a cool, like, oh wait, they're actually like a really awesome person. Yeah, but like you don't but you don't have any of the added noise that if you knew who they were, you would have. Yep. Um, okay, so in the story, you have Francis who is really close to her family and sister, and then you have for Lewis that he's not very close with his family because of his career choices. What made you write their story like this?

Hannah Brohm 28:07

I wanted to because so one of the big themes in the story is that uh because of this kind of like instable job situation that both of them have, because that's how a career in academia looks like for a lot of people, if you really want to like pursue very specific research topics, um, because you only get like this temporary funding, often people move around a lot. Um, I I myself have moved a lot, I know many people that have done that, and it makes you feel kind of like unmoored after, or at least me personally, there are probably people that love it, but after a while it makes you maybe feel a little bit like you're not really building a lot of connections to the places that you're living in, or you're building connections and have friends all over, but you're never really like anchored at in like one place or something. So I was I am lucky enough that I have a very like supportive family and friend group. So in that sense, I'm a bit more similar to Francis, but I also wanted to then look at what does that sort of like moving around a lot and not being anchored anywhere look like combined with you not having that sort of like stable um supportive network around you because I think that makes it even more difficult or or leads to different kind of um maybe character traits or things that people like that that you would work towards or that you would think about. So I wanted to have that sort of contrast even more to see to have them kind of be able to relate to each other in certain ways, but have their differences obviously as well, and kind of like explore what that does to a person if you don't have that sort of like support.

Jordan 29:58

Okay, yeah, because I have to say, like one of my favorite scenes is the scene where they're on the boat and Frances like starts like I well okay, the the like the one scene where she's like, Oh, I can only imagine what Lewis's like graduation like from grad school would have been like if this was if this was what you had for and so I think like I love that scene and I but I also love like when especially with the when the M the FMC will stand up for to whoever for the MMC and I just I thought that was like so great because I feel like he especially the way it's like written, I feel like no one's in his corner that you can see like on page, and so it's like the first time that I feel like someone is in his corner, and I love that, but then it also goes to like I love the dynamic that Francis has with her sister, and I thought it was very interesting. The um that one scene with the phone call at the like I know what you mean, yeah, yeah, like at the end, and I was so curious, like I feel like what made you include that scene because I feel like not that it was like out of the blue, but I because leading up to it, you can see how that can happen. But I thought it was so interesting that you added that in, and I'm curious if there was a reason why you added that in towards the like like the end.

Hannah Brohm 31:43

Yeah, yeah. Um, so actually that's one of the kind of like developments in the story that the original first maybe two drafts didn't have. So they did have like the lead up to that, but not the actual kind of like where it culminates, and you have that like phone call. Um, but I did want to include it actually because I think it was important for um Frances to realize that they're like to kind of consider the people around her more. Um and I also wanted from a sort of yeah, from that sort of standpoint, like like you're everyone is like the main character in their own life, right? And in that, even even though in the book itself, maybe her sister is one of the side characters, she has stuff going on as well. So I kind of wanted to um create a little bit of space for that as well and make sure because that's how to me kind of like life naturally goes, right? Sometimes um kind of like the focus shifts. And I think I I also wanted Frances to realize that she makes mistakes as well. But there is, there are or there can be ways of coming back from them. And I think uh a lot of what she learns from that interaction with her sister is then important for her to take and learn so she can kind of like have the ending for her story that she needs as well or that she wants.

Jordan 33:15

Yeah, I do I do feel like it is like the start to like because I feel like she is so all about work, and I think that is like the start. Yeah.

Hannah Brohm 33:28

Yeah, yeah. Very stuck. Uh I think you right, you said also before, like people can become stuck in their ways, and like maybe even even though she's becoming unstuck in different kind of like ways throughout the story, there's still stuff that she maybe has to reconsider and learn. And I think sometimes you need some some big shift for that to happen.

Jordan 33:47

And I feel like that was definitely it was almost like the wake-up call she needed. Yeah.

Hannah Brohm 33:53

Yeah.

Next Book Tease And Where To Find

Jordan 33:54

Okay, so this is the last question in authoring. I'm just curious, are you currently working on any like future projects? And if you are, can you say anything about them?

Hannah Brohm 34:07

Yeah, so I can I can say a few small things. I am working on a future on a different project. I handed in a draft of that next project uh with my editor. So we're still we still have to go through edits and everything. It's nowhere near done. But um I it will have uh women in stem again as a main character. But this time I'm kind of taking her a little bit out of the STEM world. So it still plays a little bit of a role, but the main story is her kind of being almost like a fish out of water, like conceptually speaking. Maybe not like in location, right? Like, not like big city person going to small town, not in that sense, but more in what she has to do in the book to yeah, what she has to do, basically. So that's there is um a bit of a crossover with kind of like a book, literary world, and there's lots of forced proximity as well. I can say that as a trope, maybe. Um and I think maybe I should stop here because I shouldn't talk much more about it.

Jordan 35:16

But there is more character, and that's very exciting. That is very exciting. I can't I can't wait. I'm so excited. Okay. Um, so we'll go into reading, and um, I just have like a few questions in reading, but are there any authors who you looked up to before becoming an author, or any authors you look up to now?

Hannah Brohm 35:39

For sure. Lots of them, actually. I think just um actually the the reason that I kind of picked up writing again was because of two authors that I didn't have contact with or anything, but I just picked up their books, and uh one was Rachel and Solomon, who wrote The X Talk. I don't know if you've read that one. It came out in like 2021, maybe, and I would recommend it. The X Talk, it's a great book. It's basically set at a radio station, and the main character um she works at that radio station, and she ends up kind of creating a show with a guy that is kind of like a rival as well. Actually, they have this not like kind of like hate relationship in a way, and they start a podcast on the radio show where they are two exes, but the twist is that they've actually never dated before. So it's kind of like fake fake dating, fake dating in the past. So they kind of like have to figure out all of this history about each other because they're pretending on the show that they used to be a couple when they weren't actually a couple, and it's a really it's really fun. You have like the whole radio station setting, which I loved as well. Um, and also Rachel and Solomon just writes. I love her voice, I love the way she writes. Um, so that's actually that book came about came out just before I started writing again, and I read it, and I also read The Spanish Love Deception by Elena Armas, which I also love. Yeah, she's great. I love all her books, and that one also with the rivalry and um like work rivals, the kind of office setting, fake dating, obviously, as well. Um, I had so much fun reading that, and that actually was I read the book, and then I was like, with those back-to-back having that kind of like fake dating um trope, I was like, okay, wait a minute, what how would I write the fake dating trope if I would write it? And that's how I then started writing. So those two I think I'm particularly kind of like grateful to for writing these books and inspiring me. Um, but other than that, they're just there, I feel like I I don't even want to start listing authors that I look up to because there's so many, and then I would feel bad if I kind of accidentally forgot about someone, but yeah.

Jordan 38:00

That's that's fair. That's fair. Um okay, so what is your favorite quote? And it doesn't need to be like a quote from your book, but like a quote in general.

Hannah Brohm 38:11

I'm gonna I'm gonna take a quote from my book in this case because I feel like I'm I feel like I'm I'm really bad with remembering quotes. There are many good ones that I I love from other books as well. But I just in the in my book, I really love the kind of like love is being accepted without revisions that they talk about, like how they conceptualize love, and I also love how they then reconsider that stance later.

Jordan 38:37

All right, so this is like one of my favorite questions to ask people, but what is your favorite book? And it could be a series, but a book you would recommend to anyone and everyone.

Hannah Brohm 38:47

Okay, this one is also a tricky one because I feel like again, choosing favorites is kind of hard with so so many. But one of the ones that I actually wanted to come back to is a YA book. No, or I don't see it like on social media these days, let's say it's called Saving Francesca, and the author is Melina Marquetta, she's from Australia, and it's one of the first kind of like books that had a really, really great sort of romance, but also some kind of like topics of mental health and um family in it that I picked up when I was 12 for the first time, and then I kind of like kept checking it out from the library like year after year to reread it. Um so that's one that I think not many people know, but that I would definitely recommend. It's called Saving Francesca, and then maybe modern kind of like modern times that sounds like it's it's ancient, it's not ancient, but um I would have to say probably Love Theoretically by Elie Hazelwood. I know that most people will have read The Love Hypothesis. You said you haven't read it, right? But Love Theoretically is the one that I love the most because I think it digs a little bit deeper into the academic context, and I just love the character dynamic. Um, I love the characters. It's uh I think love theoretically, out of the her STEM romances, while I love them all, that's my absolute favorite. So I would definitely recommend for you to read it if you haven't done so yet.

Jordan 40:21

I I haven't read that one, but I have heard a lot of people talk about that one, and it is like on my list to read, but I just haven't read it yet.

Hannah Brohm 40:31

I mean, I I relate to that. I have many of those books on my list to read. Yeah. Oh, the the TBR is endless.

Jordan 40:39

Yeah. Okay, so I only have three more questions for you, and they're in the personal. So one would be what would you would you say you're a plotter, pantster, or a mix of two?

Hannah Brohm 40:53

I would say a mix of two. And I think I still am trying to figure out how to do it the best way. Because I know that if I completely plot something, I lose interest in writing it. I have done, I have plotted books also before uh writing Love and Other Brain Experiments. I've completely plotted books, and then I was just like, well, but now I know the story. Why would I write it? So I think there needs to have there needs to be some kind of like curiosity, like a spark, something unknown, and sort of simulating, right? Like the way when you're reading a book, you don't know what's gonna happen. And I feel like there, I need a little bit of that while I'm writing to kind of keep me going and moving forward. But obviously, it's also helpful to know a little bit about the story, and at least for me personally, I need to have at least an idea where I'm going. So I'm kind of like midway between those two, I think.

Jordan 41:49

Okay, and that's so interesting, but I I I can understand it be in a in a way. I'm not a writer, I can't write. I have I've never tried, like I I don't know, I'm I can't do that, but I love to read, but I get it from your point of view of sometimes I'll put book down put book down, put books down because I find them predictable. And if I'm predicting the next scene, I'm like, well, I've already read it basically. Like I know what's gonna happen next, and I don't need to continue reading it. So that is so interesting. Cause like I never would have can like thought about that from like a writer's perspective. So that's it's like so interesting. I was about to say it's so cool, but like it's not that isn't necessarily cool, but I think it's cool that like in a way we can relate. Ish, yeah, I am not a writer, I just read.

Hannah Brohm 42:42

Yeah, but I do feel like I I so I'm experiencing that more and more when I hear it from others as well, that it also differs from book to book. And I feel like even as a reader, it differs from book to book, right? Sometimes you really want, or at least me personally, because I read, I I would say I read pretty widely, and sometimes I just want kind of like comfort, I want like things that are to be expected, but then written in like an engaging way, or capturing emotions in a very way, or like the banter has to be great, right? Like even if I know kind of what's gonna happen, it can still bring surprise in that like small in that way. But sometimes I also just want really unexpected. And I feel like even with writing, it's a little bit similar, maybe.

Jordan 43:24

And that's a good point. Because like, especially romance, like I feel like you pick up a romance book because you know the two are gonna end up together. Like, that's just like the whole point of a romance book. So it's like if I I definitely don't DNF those books because like you know that they're gonna end up together, but like I read it because I want them to end up together. But I I do understand, like, I feel like if I need something totally wild, I read like a thriller because those are like those could be like all over the place, and you never know what's gonna happen. So I I do agree with you there too. Um okay, so what is a fun fact that you that your readers and the listeners might be surprised to learn?

Hannah Brohm 44:05

About me? Or yes. Oh, yeah, sorry. About you. I was like, wow, I I have to come up with no about me. Um I maybe too, um, although it's written in the back, but uh English isn't my first language. I write in my second so right, like I my first language language is German, so I'm writing my second language for these books, which is I don't know why I do this, but it's fun, I guess. Um, so maybe that's fun fact one. And the other one is that I knit a lot in my free time, so I make a lot of my own kind of like sweaters and cardigans and stuff like that.

Jordan 44:39

That is so cool. I want to knit myself a sweater so badly. You should.

Hannah Brohm 44:45

It's fun, but it's also very soothing.

Jordan 44:48

I don't know how. I've like I'm trying to learn crocheting so I can like do that, but that's hard. That is hard.

Hannah Brohm 44:55

It is, but like that's it, that's a good place to start, right? I also I I'm completely self-taught. Like during the pandemic, I started to just teach myself with like YouTube, and then that is so cool.

Jordan 45:05

So there's hope that I'm trying to I'm trying to on YouTube, but it's not really working very well. But you know, we're gonna keep trying. We're gonna keep trying. I want to go back to so. Did you write was your first draft of Loving of the Brain experiments? Was that in German or did you write it first in English? Really? Okay, yeah. That I is there a reason, like is was writing it in English easier over writing in German?

Hannah Brohm 45:38

I think so at this point, honestly, because I was because I moved around so much, I didn't I haven't lived in Germany for a long time now. Um obviously I speak German to my family and everything, right? But also a lot of my reading is in English, both for research, because there's just in science, it's just like the language of communication of all the papers, everything is in English, and a lot of my just like fiction reading is in English as well. So I feel like even though it might not come as easily to me as to someone who has English as their first language, it's still I think a lot in English and a lot of the terms and like romance, kind of like the wit of it in a way that all works better for me in English than in German. So I didn't even think about writing in German for some reason.

Jordan 46:28

Now, would you like trans if like this were to be picked up in German, would you translate it?

Hannah Brohm 46:36

So it it it will actually come out in German, but I'm not translating it. So it's it's uh a publisher. I think so. One is I find translating is kind of hard because sometimes you have to move a little bit further away from the literal literal translation for it to make sense in that language. And I think I'm maybe too close to the text to do that well. Fair, fair. Also, I think it takes a lot of skill that I've never trained. I've um, right, like you have kind of like trained translators, I'm not a trained translator, and it would take a lot of time that I could spend writing new books, and I would rather like spend new stories. So okay, that's fair.

Jordan 47:15

That is fair. I guess I like don't think of the like whole process of trying to translate a book. I'm like, oh, you can translate your own book. And not that you probably don't want to do that.

Hannah Brohm 47:28

Yeah, but I mean I think it's fun that I could that I'm I could the translation, right? I I could and I also I can read the translation and understand it very well, and I think that's kind of fun as well. So probably that's what I'm gonna do.

Jordan 47:43

Yeah, that's cool. I have to say that's very cool. Okay, so we have the last question, and that is what is one future goal that you would like to achieve, either long term or short term? And it could be with like this book, it could be in writing or authoring in general. But what is uh future goal?

Hannah Brohm 48:04

Oh, it's so hard because I feel like some of the things that can happen to you, you don't really have a lot of say in or control over, right? Like um but maybe I think as a goal that like as a very like sensible maybe goal that I have is that I get to do this for longer and just like write more books and maybe also explore other genres at some point. That would be kind of nice. I would love to write a crime novel at some point, but I feel like I just haven't figured that out yet. So but at some point it it might be.

Jordan 48:42

Yes, yes, like well, I I also just like love romance, so I want it to be like a romance slash crime novel.

Hannah Brohm 48:51

Oh, obviously, like yeah, I would I think I think even if I would write something else, I would never be able to take out at least like a romance subplot because that's just how I like to read my books.

Jordan 49:02

I there needs to be some like we we need some romance, just like a well also I I agree, like a subplot's great, like just a little bit. I need like a splash, like a little baby splash. Uh okay. Well, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Oh, I do want to um, where can people find you? Like your Instagram, TikTok. Yeah, where can people find you?

Hannah Brohm 49:29

People can find me under so on Instagram at Hannah Brome. So just my name. Um, and then on TikTok, it's Hannah.bromo. And then website also hanabrome.com. There's also my newsletter there, which I don't really send out often, but with any kind of like actual news of like a new cover or new book is coming out, that one I usually put there because I know that for some people like social media is a lot of noise. So just like the most important information I send out in the newsletter. Um, and you can find all of those on my website also. So Hannah.brome uh hanabrom.com, sorry.

Jordan 50:07

Perfect, and then you can find love and other brand experiments. I think anywhere you can find books, like I I see it in the bookstores, like I see it at my local one. I see it's great, the big ones, yeah, yeah, and there's an audiobook too, obviously. Oh yeah, it's very good. So it's very, very good, and yeah, yeah. The audiobook too is nice. I don't know, I didn't check, I saw it on audiobooks.com, so it is available on other sites than just Audible, which I think is always a plus.

Hannah Brohm 50:42

And then I want to also on Libro LibreO FM.

Jordan 50:46

LibreO FM, because I think it also might be available in the library market.

Hannah Brohm 50:54

I think I guess I don't know. I I'm I don't have access to like American libraries because I'm not spaced in the US. So I don't know. But I think so. It should be it should be available in like local libraries as well and stuff.

Jordan 51:08

Yeah, wherever you can find audiobooks, you gotta go listen to it. And high I highly recommend do it. I don't know who the narrator is, but she does such a good job.

Hannah Brohm 51:19

I love her. Her name is Carlotta Branton. Brenton. She has done like a lot of she hasn't done much romance before, but she has like a big kind of like back catalog of other books that are great as well. And she reads everything super, super nicely. I love I love her audiobooks, so yeah.

Jordan 51:37

It was so nice listening to her because like I went since I went back and forth, and I was like, Oh, I like this narrator. So yes, it's Jordan approved. Yes, great. Uh okay, thank you so much for coming on the podcast. I had so much fun interviewing you, and sorry, the interview is all over the place, but like, thank you.

Hannah Brohm 51:59

No, that's so much fun. Thank you so so much for having me, and also for your questions. They were really fun to talk about. And yeah, thank you so much for for having me.