495: Hot Seat Coaching: Producer Andrew Parrella Steps Out From Behind the Mic

Hi, I'm Jenny Nash, and you're listening to the Hashtag Amriting Podcast, the place

where we help writers of all kinds play big in your writing life, love the process, and

stick with it long enough to finish what matters most.

Hi, I'm Jenny Nash, and you're listening to the Hashtag Amriting Podcast.

This is something new.

It's a hot seat coaching episode, where we're going to work through a real challenge

in real time with a real writer, and today I'm joined by a really special guest.

His name is Andrew Porella, and he has been the producer of this podcast for many, many

years, and is stepping out from behind the microphone to write his first novel.

Andrew participated in the Winter Blueprint Challenge that we recently completed, which

is to say he answered all 14 of the Blueprint questions during our challenge, and produced

a finished Blueprint, and so I wanted to get on with him and talk about what do we do

next?

How do we go from there to the next thing, and he agreed to do that to help show our listeners

how it goes?

And I'm so excited about it because he just did incredible work, and also has so much

work to go.

So hopefully we're going to get to follow Andrew as he does this for a few episodes and

bring you along on the journey.

So welcome, Andrew, from behind the microphone.

So much work to go.

Thank you, Jenny.

I'm really excited to be here.

So Andrew has a long career in public radio, and is a producer podcast for many people,

and is a storytelling guy, as well as a sound guy, so this is a big move.

I feel like this is a right big move for you, for sure, for deciding this is the time

to embrace the fact that you want to do this thing.

Does it feel like that to you?

It feels like a right big move for me that I'm prioritizing now this writing project

for me, emperor, or trying my project over the projects of others, whom I help with

projects.

So this is a big, a right big moment for me.

It is totally a right big moment, and you're in the hot seat, personally, which I really

appreciate you being willing to do.

So where we stand today is, as I said, you finished the blueprint.

You did all the work.

You did the thing.

So I'm just curious to sort of check in.

How do you feel?

Do you feel like that's an accomplishment?

Do you feel some moments?

And I'm like, what?

Where are you feeling?

I feel like it is a really big accomplishment, because as we were working through the blueprint,

I was getting feedback from you and KJ Delantonium about how I was creating my blueprint.

But it got me, it forced me to think about the book in some very real terms in ways that

I hadn't yet, and in ways that, you know, I had been kind of thinking about the book

in more abstract notions.

And like this was putting pen to paper on so many things to think about, you know, beyond

the simple plot structure.

And I realized as I was going through this, how much I hadn't yet considered.

And I think this helped to show me where the holes in my story were.

And even as I've finished, quote unquote, finished the blueprint, it's like, I finished

one iteration of it.

And like already the story has changed since I first started work on the blueprint.

And so already I know I got to go back and start reiterating on this as we go along

here.

Yeah.

I mean, and that's the point, right?

Is the whole point is this is a tool that reveals what's working and what's not working.

Is this what I want?

Does this reflect my vision?

And you get to play with that wet clay of the idea.

So that's really what we're doing.

But the reason that I thought you would be such a good candidate for coaching live in

this way is your story really hangs together in so many ways.

It's so great in so many ways.

And it would be easy to feel like, oh, I'm not that far I got this.

I can start right.

I can start right.

But I hope what we're going to show is really pushing yourself to answer core questions

is going to just make it so much stronger.

Absolutely.

So, all that being said, what do you think the best way to share what you're writing with

our listeners is?

Do you think reading your book jacket copy feels good or do you want to just say it out loud?

I feel like the book jacket copy that I wrote doesn't quite capture, I think, in many

ways what I think the book is going to be.

Well, we're going to actually get to that.

And we're going to get to that, I think.

So why don't you just just share what it is?

So the premise of the book is this happens.

The novel, it happens 20 years after the events of Bram Stoker's Dracula.

And so it involves some of the same characters and it also involves the next generation of

these characters.

So those characters, children, the, our protagonist is Abreana Harker, who is the daughter of

Mina Harker who was kind of the female lead in Dracula.

And she was, she was bitten by Dracula in the original novel.

And she is someone who was defended by her, by her friends and counterparts in that story.

Abreana is her daughter.

And Abreana is now facing a similar challenge.

There are bodies that are turning up around her circle.

And they appear to have similar injuries that Dracula's victims had 20 years ago.

And some people recognize that and are going to begin trying to unravel the mystery.

And this is all set against the backdrop of the Universal Suffrage Movement, which is

also happening in, you know, 1920s London, where the novel is set.

And so in broad strokes, that is, that is the primary premise of the book.

So the genre is horror, gothic.

And I did some digging, I'm not a big reader for.

So I did some digging into the genre to make sure that that was right, because there's

also thriller elements, there's mystery elements, there's, you know, there's other elements.

And as, yeah, I always like to, to test like, is this right?

Is this right?

Could it be, could it be better?

And it feels, it feels like there's really no question about the genre, right?

Do you feel that?

I feel that, I feel definitely feel that.

And I think, I did, like, gothic is a genre that I really enjoy.

And I want to develop some of those gothic themes in the story a little bit more than

I have so far.

But yes, I think gothic and horror is very much where, where this not, where this book lives,

yeah.

Yeah.

And that is something I want to talk about for sure when we get to the inside outline.

But I want to start with the second question of the blueprint is, what's your point?

And I know this is something you've struggled with a little bit, but so the current point

that you have here is, I feel like maybe this came from me, so, it's, you can't change

the world without upsetting people, the more you want to change, the more people you

upset.

And that's fine, but it doesn't, it doesn't feel like it captures.

There's a real moral philosophical debate at the center of your story, right?

Yeah, absolutely.

I think, you know, the characters are certainly in the midst of a paradigm shift.

You know, there's the world order is changing as, as suffrages is being opened to more

and more people.

And anytime the world order like that changes, there are people who are for it and there

are a lot of people who are against it.

And so I think that's an element in play here in the novel, and that's something that

I wanted to explore.

And obviously there are parallels in current times as well for this sort of change.

So I think that's certainly part of the story, yeah.

So I was, when I, when I review a blueprint and for anybody who's, who's got one all on

the page and, and you, you like it, and it feels pretty good.

This step is to really pressure test everything.

So I read through the whole thing, I love looking at a blueprint, a blueprint as a whole

rather than piece by piece.

And in this particular case, it's like this, yeah, this point feels the, the led list,

which is something we definitely don't want in this story.

So I went back to your why and your why is really powerful and really personal and really

political.

It's, it's fiery.

It's articulate.

Like there's so much about your why that I, you can see my comments on the page, not the

listener, but Andrew can, whereas going great, yes, very powerful, awesome.

You know, it's just, it's excellent.

And you had some lines in there about the, the monster in this story is not the vampire,

but a man who is refusing to change with the times basically.

And that felt to me, given everything else you're saying about the parallels between

this, the milieu of this story and the milieu we live in right now, the, the fraught climate,

political climate, cultural climate, that felt more potent as a point.

And I, I wondered what you thought about that.

Yeah, I mean, I think that, that is as much a part of the premise as I've conceived

it as, as anything else that I've, I've said, you know, the, the, the spoiler alert,

the murders aren't being committed by, by the vampire, or vampires.

The murders are being committed by an old white dude who is not happy with how the politics

are shifting under his feet and how the world is changing around him, and is trying to

at all costs prevent that from happening, even sacrificing a bit of his own humanity in,

in the process.

And so I think that is, is, is something that certainly resonates.

But I think it, yeah, is, as you say, there's a passion, there's a blood there that, in,

in, in the why that didn't quite make it to my point.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So I would suggest for the next iteration to, to really push that point and it's going

to keep changing.

It's going to keep, you know, getting refined as you go, but I think it's important to

move it forward as you keep writing.

So the, yeah, something that's, that's fiery and that's about, because that's a, that's

a, you're flipping an important trope in a, in a classic novel, right, but if it's not

the vampire.

So like, why, why are we flipping out?

What is that showing us?

What is the point of, of doing that in the story that, so I would really play with that?

Um, does that make sense?

Mm-hmm.

Yes, it does.

Yes, it does.

Okay.

So the next thing I want to talk about is your super, your super simple story.

And what's interesting about the super simple story is, I mean, I love everybody always, here's

three status who's listening to me for a very long, but I love a constraint on, in creativity

and this trying to get this story in a really short space often reveals something.

And what it, when it was revealing to me is, so you've got, you've got, I, I, Ariana,

she wants to, uh, become a doctor because of her mother's, her mother died in childbirth

with her.

Um, so that's, that's the storyline.

You've got the murders that are happening.

And, and then you've got the universal or suffragette movement, this political debate that's

going on.

So there's these three threads.

And even in the super simple story, it was feeling a little bit like they're disconnected.

I don't think they're disconnected in your mind.

I think they're disconnected on the page.

Okay.

So I wanted to just ask you to articulate that a little bit more because you hint in the,

um, book jacket copy later, Ariana has things in common with, then, who's her uncle,

the vampire hunter.

Are you comfortable sharing what those are?

Yeah.

What those commonalities are.

Yeah.

I think, um, Abraham von Helsing is, is a character from the original novel, um, and

he helps guide the team to, uh, uh, find, track down and destroy Dracula, um, in the world

of my novel, his understanding of vampires changes as he's, as he continues to do research

on them.

And so he's discovered, he's discovered more about them that will spell out a little

bit more in the, uh, in the novel.

But first and foremost, and one of the, one of the primary roles he plays in, in, in,

in the original novel is a, as a doctor.

And that's one thing that Abraham really admires about him.

He becomes a bit of a, um, a surrogate parent to her with her mother dying and her, uh,

her father's grief turning into a little bit of emotional distance from, uh, from Abraham

and so von, uh, and Helsing kind of fills that gap.

And so she associates her, I think her desire to become a doctor stems from both her birth,

you know, ultimately killing her mother, but also because, and, and, and wanting to prevent

that from happening to other women, but also because she's seen, you know, Van Helsing

perform his, his service as a doctor.

Maybe she's seen it in action and what it can do and wants to, and wants to, wants to

emulate that.

And so, and, and I think one of the, one of the things that I get excited about is incorporating

a little bit of like historic realism into, into the novel as well.

And there was in, uh, the 1920s a, a, a medic, the London School of Medicine for Women.

Um, it, it, it, it had been open for, uh, a decade or so.

It was still a fairly new school at the time.

And so that there was a, a, a real place that she would have been able to go and get an

education is something that, uh, is something that I'm, I'm excited to have part of, part

of the novel.

And like, that school wouldn't have been possible if it was not for the women's liberation

movement, which resulted obviously in the universal, in the universal suffrage movement.

And so all of that, I feel kind of ties, ties together in a way that I haven't explained

very well in my super simple copy, super simple story explanation there.

So, so that's what I'm trying to get at is Avriana is not just some random young woman.

No.

I mean, she's, she's very clearly descended from a, a particular, uh, family, who's had

a particular thing happen and, you know, there are several generations.

So have you designed her as a protagonist, using those elements of the family yet, or,

or is it more kind of just convenient that she's there?

Does that make sense?

I think so, and I think it's probably somewhere in the middle.

I think I like the idea of tying her into these characters that, who have an existing

history, and it then gives her a little bit of, a little bit of a gravitas for the listener

when they, when they start digging in that maybe they, maybe they, maybe they have red

Dracula and are familiar with those characters.

And so, okay, this is the next, this is the next generation.

But yeah, I mean, I think Avriana reflects a lot of other things that aren't, that aren't

represented in the original novel.

I guess what I, I guess what I'm saying is it feels, one of my concerns is it feels

as if you could write this story about Avriana and not have her beat from this family.

She could, she could be kind of anyone, in this situation.

Gotcha.

Am I missing?

Am I missing that what would make, you know, let's just, I know there's, there's several

women in the novel who have, have important roles.

So I'm going to pick a name that's not them.

Let's say that there's a young woman Catherine, you know, not connected to, um, vent

housing, not connected to her mother, not connected to that whole thing.

And same time period, same motivation, she wants to be a doctor.

Maybe she had someone in her family die and that's her motivation, you know, like suffragists,

like that whole story could still play out with Catherine.

Am I wrong?

I want you to prove me wrong.

So like, yes, it could.

I feel like, I feel like one of the things I like about tying in vent housing is it,

it presents a red herring, um, in the sense that it's like, oh,

we all think that we're going to find out vampires are responsible for all of these

deaths.

Um, like I don't know, like, and I, and I can kind of slow burn the, you know, the reveal

of vampires in general and, and, and how they end up not actually being the antagonists

in this by, by, by borrowing, by borrowing his name and sharing his glory a little bit.

Yeah.

Right.

Back to Catherine or our physical protagonist, yeah.

Same thing could happen there.

Everybody thinks, oh, the vampires are back, um, the Catherine, you know, if they keep

happening around her, she's got to figure it out, you know what I mean?

So, well, so it's so, yeah, don't go ahead.

The question, the question I think that I've been grappling a bit with too is, do we

exist in a world where it is, does the novel, does the world of the novel, a place where

people have recognized the efforts of van Helsing and that vampires exist is that, is

that common knowledge in this world or is all of that still unknown to folks?

Okay.

This is the piece that I've been missing.

Okay.

That's exactly the piece that I've been missing.

It's totally it that so here, this is world building.

If anybody's writing anything with magic fantasy, sci-fi, it even just straight up history

and maybe it's a retelling or a reimagining, you often know those, those questions for

sure and especially for where, for my understanding, I'm like I said, I'm not a horror reader, but

you know, a little bit about Dracula, but that it was a sort of science versus, like science

played a big role in that, what can we know, what can we prove, what is what is unknowable,

those sorts of things.

Absolutely.

So, that, you've got to know that here, has it been proved, is it accepted knowledge,

is it been helping a hero who's locked away in his lab continuing to, you know, with

funding and whatever to research his thing, or is he some, you know, recluse who was

shamed in the public eye and people think he's crazy, like that's going to color everything.

Okay.

And that's going to be, that's going to then be the answer I'm looking for, like, why

a Brianna as a protagonist and not Catherine, okay, so she's going to have that, you imagine

her going to medical school with those two different stories behind her, how different

it's going to be when she shows up in the classroom and people know, or when they know who

she is.

Right.

Yeah.

So, there's a reveal to the reveal to the reader about her connection and who she is,

and then her reveal to the society she lives in about who she is and, you know, the meaning

she makes from all that, you know.

And no matter what you decide about Van Helsing, then you have to also decide about her.

She agree with the prevailing wisdom.

If everybody thinks he's a hero, does she think he is too, or does she think he's kind

of whacked and then learns otherwise, or, you know, like, or the other way around.

Yeah.

Or the other way around.

Right.

So, yeah, this is the piece that's missing is I feel like you have, and this is what

I felt the second I heard you talk about your story, I'm like, oh, this could be so

good.

Like, this is so potent, but you're, like, you're missing it that you're just, it's

like it's, it's like it's not landing as, as solid as it should.

And I think this is why my head not been able to figure it out, but that, and you have,

so I got to make sure I understand the character.

So Arianna's dad is the brother of Van Helsing.

They're not related in the original, in the original novel.

They're, they're, they're, they're just friends.

They're, but they're close, they're, they're close friends and because Van Helsing ultimately

saved both of their lives, he is kind of a surrogate uncle.

So uncle, uncle, in quotation marks, yeah, uncle is, is an honorific, okay, yeah, okay.

That confused me.

Okay.

So I thought that there was a direct lineage there.

Right.

No, no, no genetic link, yeah, yeah.

Let a link through her mother, a link to Van Helsing through the mothers and, and what

happened to her.

So okay, yeah, we have to understand his role, who he is, what he's doing in the world,

what people think of him.

And also this is important for just the environment of your story because we've got this

division, political division around the suffragette movement.

Is there, is there, are there other, like I want to say mood, like what's the mood of

the place where she's, the story's taking place?

Is it, you know, a creeping sense of doom on many levels, is the, the vampire, like is

the fact, oh, maybe the vampires are back.

Does that make sense for the times, like you and I are talking right now in 2026 during

very extreme political upheaval and also during the time when there's this, in this kidnapping

of this prominent media personalities, family member that hasn't been solved.

And there's this sense like, well, of course this is happening now, like this, you know,

is there a weird, are we going to have a famous serial killer story unfolding in our

time?

Like that's what I keep thinking, like there's a sense of, of course, these things are

going to start happening now, because things just feel so unstable and unsettled.

Yeah.

Is that what's going on there?

I mean, I think potentially, yes, I've, I've, because yeah, I feel like this, it, it,

it wasn't unsettled moment politically and, and also a little bit medically as they, as

like the medical establishment is transitioning from my asthma theory to germ theory.

And that was kind of late, late 19th century, early 20th century, but like there's, there

has kind of been a paradigm shift there.

So I think I feel like, yeah, there does want to be, as you were saying, kind of like this

constant, creepy, creepy feeling, like to lean into the gothic, like I, like I really want

that to pervade every, every chapter, every page.

I want that kind of like creeping sensation that, that doom is around the corner, that,

that, that, right.

And doom for many sources, because I think that that's kind of one of your points is, well,

what I'm going back to what the point point was, the point where kind of leaning toward

is people who reviewed refuse to evolve when the world demands it can become monstrous.

So the world is evolving in many different ways and probably giving the opportunity for

a lot of different people to have to evolve in a lot of different ways.

It's not just one way, it's not just like, oh, get on this bus or you're missing, get

on, you know, what's the metaphor?

You'll miss the boat if you don't get on the boat, but it feels like there's all kinds

of boats one, one might miss here.

Right.

I think so.

And so that's that.

Yeah.

Okay, so, so in terms of what to do next, I think your, your homework here is you've got

to get to know Van Helsing and the, and the world a little bit better.

So I would do some character development work on, on him and what the world thinks of

him and what Abriana is stepping into the, the light by insisting on going to medical

school does to Van Helsing.

Does it delight him?

Does it challenge him?

Does it, you know, what does he think of that?

I think that's important.

Yeah.

To know too.

Yeah.

A couple, a couple of things that are occurring to me, I think I had taken for granted

the reader's knowledge of the events of Dracula.

And I don't think I can do that.

I think I need to develop these characters for my own, as you're saying, I got to, I have

to develop Van Helsing character, I have to develop him for, for my own purposes for

this novel, which makes a lot of sense.

Well, that's actually a really good question.

You defined your ideal reader in a way that I thought was completely delightful.

Like, she was so fleshed out, she felt like a full on character and I was like, oh,

I know, no, I know that from it.

I loved it.

It was great.

But an important piece you missed in that is, you said that she enjoys books about London,

the city and maybe some horror and gothic, but what is her relationship to Dracula, your

ideal reader?

You need to know that.

Yeah.

You know, this is what's funny sometimes about being a book coach is, I always say that

the writers, the god of their own story, I can't possibly know everything that the writer

knows about what they're writing about, what they've read, what they thought, how they've

lived, any of it.

And in this particular case, I don't read, I don't read horror, I, I, I, I could barely

tell you the, the bear outlines of Dracula, if it's fast.

I mean, I know the, you know, cartoon, the cartoon version, I, I, I could tell you

a little more about Frankenstein, only because I, against my will, watched the recent,

retelling.

Oh, yeah.

I haven't actually seen that yet.

So I say against my will, because it's like, it's too much for me, but you need to know

if, so here's a perfect, let me finish my sentence.

You need to know if your reader is a fan, is a reader, is a immersed in the Gothic world

is going to know all these things and know all the tropes and know all the connections

or not.

And the perfect example of that is, remember that book, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies?

Yes.

So that appealed to people who love Jane Austen, like, you're probably not going to read

that book if you're not a Jane Austen fan.

But if you are a Jane Austen fan, you're, you cannot wait to get your hand on that.

And also probably if you're a zombie horror fan, you know, you would delight in that even

if you didn't understand the depths of the Jane Austen piece.

But that book spoke to such a very particular audience that turned out to be a massive

audience.

Right?

Right.

So, you know, I think you need to make a decision.

Are you writing for someone like me, who's, who's like, I don't know, like, I think when

I first read it, I was like, who's Ben Helsing and you're like, he's the famous guy

from the thing.

Right?

So are you writing for someone like me or does your avatar, your ideal reader here?

You know, does she watch the movie?

Does she, does she read the books, does she gobble that stuff up?

Right.

Yeah.

What, what is your instinct right now?

Sinkling out one of the other is going to, is going to change how I write the book.

What is my instinct?

I don't know.

Well, when I think about the character that I, that the character of the reader that I

fleshed out in the blueprint, I don't think she necessarily would have read it Dracula.

She might be familiar with the story, but she might not have, have read Dracula itself.

Okay.

So, yeah, let's get, let's get really clear on that because it's going to really change.

And for those listening, the ideal reader, oftentimes people think it's just a throwaway

part of the blueprint because they kind of can just picture, you know, generally who

their reader is.

I mean, first of all, no part of the blueprint is to throw away something really important

can come from any one of these.

So really go back to your ideal reader and think about them in a relationship to their

story because this conversation reveals how drastically you would change the writing

of this book, depending on your ideal reader's relationship to the, to Dracula.

Yeah.

And there's no right answer, either answers great, right?

So, so that's, I just put that on the list of things too, that you're going to be thinking

about.

So once you get that, so yeah, the understanding of, of, then healthy therapeutic in the

universe right now is going to be the way that you bring your reader up to speed a little

bit, right?

Like, famous vampire hunter still doing his thing or famous vampire hunter, you know,

shamed and not doing his thing, those are going to tie together and cement down the world

that we're coming into more.

Absolutely.

I can see how that will change things.

Yeah.

Okay.

So, we're not going to have time to dig into this yet, but I just want to touch on it

so that when you're doing this work, you can be thinking about, thinking about this piece.

But the, there's a cause and effect trajectory, that's obviously what the inside outline is.

And at some really key places in yours, you miss an opportunity to, to tie in.

So we always want our protagonists to have agency to be making the decisions that cause

things to get worse or cause them to be in a worse position or, and, and there's several

places in your inside outline where things just sort of happen, which is the plot.

And then she sort of happens to be there.

But if you understand better, these parts of her and her connection to this, not her

uncle now, her, this guy, and her connection to what's happened with her mother and those

things, then we want to use that to push the story, to push the, so the plot has to serve

the story.

So the things that happen are going to push your character in ways they want to be pushed

to make decisions that are going to then push them further and, and they're going to get

deeper and deeper each time and you have a murder mystery.

So each murder we want to feel more and more as if she is boxing herself in by what she

does, by what she thinks, by what she believes, by what she wants, and then the plot is going

to squeeze her to the point where she has to make a big decision, you know, comes, that's

the climax, comes to that, like will I, in this case, confront both the murder and

her father is kind of where it all ends.

So, you know, it's not going to be just like, and now we arrive at a place where she

confronts the people, it's got to be like, got wrenching along the way, right?

Right.

So there's a lot to say there, and I made some comments on the outline, which, which

you'll see sort of my thoughts and thinking there, but I actually think that this conversation

we've had is going to be the solution.

Because the big question I had was, is it coincidental that Averyana is, these murders are sort

of following her around and people think that she might be responsible, is that coincidental,

or is there something real there?

Yeah, do you know the answer or not?

I've been thinking about that, and I think there are ways that it's not entirely coincidental.

I mean, obviously she's not causing the murders, but I think, I think, yes, I think there

are things that she does that prompts these, that prompts these women to become targets

of the murderer.

That's what I hope you were going to say, because that's what's going to, that's like it's,

I think this was on the page, and maybe you didn't realize it, but being friends with

Averyana is a little dangerous, right?

Yes, yes.

I think that could definitely be part of the theme there, yeah.

So that shouldn't, that shouldn't be coincidental.

Well, and this is what's so great about the Blueprint and showing it to a critique partner

or a writing group or an editor or a bookage is somebody else can say, do you see that

you're doing this thing that's actually really cool, or do you see that you're not doing

it?

It's things are just revealed.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

So let's just wrap this up.

Your next iteration, you're going to work on sharpening your point, you're going to work

on sharpening the super simple story so that the Dracula connection is clear.

Dracula connection to your protagonist is more clear, and in order to do that, you're

going to understand then how seeing the world that we live in and what his relationship

of that world is, 20 years after, Dracula, what is happening with him, what is happening

with the world, and not just going to help inform the connection between your protagonist

and these things.

And then I think you already answered the idle reader, but just make sure that you're

comfortable with that, that she's not a super fan.

This is not an insider, folks who know and love and read Dracula, it's more someone

like me who's a little clueless.

And then if you have time to dig into how that all plays out in the cause and effect of

the inside outline, that's where I would go.

So it's, I had an agent, my first agent, my back in the day, he used to say, run it

through the typewriter one more time, because we were actually writing on typewriter.

And that's kind of what I feel, you know, with these ideas in mind, like run it all through

one more time and let it all flow through one more time, and we'll see where it goes.

Excellent.

This sounds good.

This is, this is some good homework I'm looking forward to digging into this now.

I know.

I can't wait to see too.

And I hope our listeners have enjoyed going along on this conversation and gotten some

inspiration for what, how to pressure test your own blueprint.

And if you're not doing the blueprint, also fine, but pressure test what you're writing.

This is just a tool for doing that, but there's this kind of questioning and making sure

that things are not assumed.

That's, that's the key, right?

It's, that you, you sort of make these assumptions, but we have to articulate them and pin them

down so that we can use them to make a much better story.

Well, thank you, Andy, really thank you for being willing to expose yourself in this

way.

Come out from behind the mic, share your journey, it's not easy to do that and I appreciate

it.

Well, it's, it's fun.

Thank you for pushing me outside my comfort zone, I've really enjoyed this.

I have too.

So for our listeners, thanks for joining in, now let's get back to work.

The hashtag Amriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perilla.

Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen.

Andrew and Max were paid for their time in the creative output because everyone deserves

to be paid for their work.