Steve Cuden: On today’s StoryBeat:

Adam Rosenbaum: Finish what you start. You can’t fix something that’s not done. So if you start writing a book, if you start writing a song, if you start writing a script, a play, that’s awesome. It’s gonna be terrible at first, so don’t worry about that. Just finish it, because you can always go back and fix it. And that’s where the magic happens, is when you’re fixing it.

Announcer: This is Story Beat with Steve Cuden, a podcast for the creative mind. StoryBeat explores how masters of creativity develop and produce brilliant works that people everywhere love and admire. So join us, as we discover how talented creators find success in the worlds of imagination and entertainment. Here now is your host, Steve Cuden.

Steve Cuden: Thanks for joining us on StoryBeat. We’re coming to you from the Steel City, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Well, I’m truly delighted to speak with the author, Adam Rosenbaum, who recently published the beautifully written book, the Ghost Rules. I’ve read the Ghost Rules and can tell you this is a thoroughly charming, fun and funny story about 12-year-old Elwood McGee, who never asked to have ghost sight, but winds up seeing more than his share of drooling, mostly hilarious apparitions. Wonderful, lovable ghosts, are everywhere in Adam’s joyful debut novel. Adams had a varied career, including operating a sawmill in Kentucky, stocking groceries in la, and as a student draftsman at his local power company, growing up in the Nashville suburbs where he currently lives with his wife and kids. For the record, Adam and I met while we were in school together in UCLA’s professional program in screenwriting. So for all those reasons and many more, I’m very happy to welcome to Story Beat today, my friends, the exceptionally gifted writer, Adam Rosenbaum. Adam, welcome to the show.

Adam Rosenbaum: Thank you for having me. That’s such a great introduction. It’s awesome.

Steve Cuden: Well, you deserve it. So let’s go back in time just a little bit. At what age did you first become interested in stories and storytelling?

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, I actually know. I know the exact moment, which is really fun. In fourth grade, my English teacher handed out these, blank hardcover books and gave the assignment to write whatever we wanted. And I just, I remember staring at this blank book and being like, wait a second, I get to write whatever I want. And so I ended up writing this book. I still have it. It’s called the Secret Treasure and it is essentially a beat by beat rip-off of Indiana Jones in the Last Crusade. But I fell in love with writing and I just was like, I was like, this is, this is the best. I want to do this forever. You were immediately hooked immediately. Yeah, I loved it.

Steve Cuden: And were you also a reader prior to that?

Adam Rosenbaum: Yes, 100%. So many memories of my mom growing up, just reading and reading and reading. And she would go to the library all the time and take us with her, and we would check out books, and I just, I would be reading all the time. Lots. you know, I would also sneak some books, probably older than I should have know, reading, John Grisham as a fourth and fifth grader.

Steve Cuden: Oh, danger.

Adam Rosenbaum: I know, I know. I felt like such a rebel. Like, oh, they dont know Im reading the Firm.

Steve Cuden: Well, at least you weren’t reading Lady Chatterley’s Lover, right?

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, but I might as well have been in my mind. I thought I was such, a rebel at that point. Yeah. But I always loved reading.

Steve Cuden: Growing up, was this your first creative love? Was reading and writing your first love, or was it something else, like theater or movies or something like that?

Adam Rosenbaum: No, reading was definitely my first love. Movies took over in fifth grade with Jurassic Park. That’s when I discovered movies, and, like, directors and screenwriters, you know, that’s kind of when movies took over.

Steve Cuden: So who were your writing heroes early on? Was it John Grisham or was it other people?

Adam Rosenbaum: I read everything that Roald Dahl wrote. I was pretty obsessed with him. One of my favorites growing up, was a book called the Westing Game. It won the Newberry, like, early 80s, I think. and I discovered it in the late 80s when I was in elementary school. And it’s like a puzzle mystery. It’s always been one of my favorites. And I reread it every few years just because I love it so much. Jerry Spinelli is another big, writer of my childhood.

Steve Cuden: Do you think of yourself as a storyteller?

Adam Rosenbaum: Oh, yeah, I think so. Yeah. I don’t know that I’ve ever called myself that. There are so many elements throughout my life. When I was in middle school and high school, I started. I, grew up in Nashville and I started writing songs.

Steve Cuden: Songs.

Adam Rosenbaum: And started doing songwriting. Yeah, I thought maybe I wanted to be a songwriter. And then I abandoned that in college. I went to Belmont, University, which is a big music school, and realized that everyone else was a songwriter and they were way better than me. So in college, I kind of transitioned to movies. I was like, wait a second. I love storytelling. I love movies. Maybe I should write movies. And that’s kind of, you know, that kicked off that kind of middle part of my storytelling career.

Steve Cuden: Are you a musician?

Adam Rosenbaum: I’m okay. I dabble a little bit. I think I was probably.

Steve Cuden: What do you play?

Adam Rosenbaum: I played guitar and piano growing up, and my oldest son plays a little bit of everything. He puts me to shame now, so it’s hard to call myself a musician now compared to him. But, yeah, a little bit of guitar and piano.

Steve Cuden: You’re the most modest person I know, so you’re probably better than you’re saying. If I had to guess. When did you know? At what point as you were writing and writing, did you think to yourself, you know what? I not only love this, but I’m actually pretty good at it?

Adam Rosenbaum: Oh, wow. That’s a great question.

Steve Cuden: Or at least good enough to try to make something of it.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, I don’t know. I don’t know. I think it really didn’t hit home for me. Here’s the thing about me in writing is I. I just love it so much. It has been so ingrained in me, and I love it so much that I’ve always known that I would be trying to write something forever just for myself. And I might not have been really convinced that I could do this until I got an agent as a novelist. So, like, just in the last five years, have I even felt like, oh, this professional saw something that I did and said, hey, this is pretty good. That might have been the first time that I really believed it.

Steve Cuden: You mean prior to that, you weren’t quite so sure?

Adam Rosenbaum: I don’t know.

Steve Cuden: You believe it now? Here’s the question.

Adam Rosenbaum: I think so. Maybe some days more than others.

Steve Cuden: I’m telling you, I read a lot of books for this show, and yours is very good. You’re a very good writer.

Adam Rosenbaum: Oh, thank you. That means so much because I know how good of a writer you are and how, I know your taste and, so that means a lot. Thank you.

Steve Cuden: All right. So are you a people watcher? Do you like to sit and observe?

Adam Rosenbaum: 100%. I love it. I’m pretty introverted, by nature, and I do. I go to coffee shops when I’m at the airport. I used to travel a lot for work, and I would sit by myself at a restaurant for dinner and just like, take it all in and see what’s happening and look around and try to try to figure out, like, okay, that couple at the bar, are they fighting or are they just, you know, that kind of thing always interested me.

Steve Cuden: Are you a note taker? Do you take notes while you’re observing?

Adam Rosenbaum: No. I probably should. No, I just, I, I internalize everything and I like, make up conversations in my head of like, oh, I wonder, you know, wonder what those people are saying. And I’ve just always done that for some reason.

Steve Cuden: Do you give them names?

Adam Rosenbaum: No, I don’t think so.

Steve Cuden: So what kind of stories do you tend to avoid? We’ll talk about Ghost rules shortly. But what kind of stories? It’s just not for you. What do you avoid?

Adam Rosenbaum: I feel like something happened to me during COVID which probably a lot of people have experienced. But, I used to be able to watch and read anything. I just would devour it. And even in my, in my screenwriting days would write horror movies and dramas, like everything and something happened over Covid and I just can’t, I can’t watch the same things. It just, it affects me in a different way. And so, so right now I don’t know that I would, I would be able to write a heavy drama, or a really intense horror story, anything like that. I think.

Steve Cuden: Well, you’re kind of a light hearted person. Mean. I can’t imagine that you want to get into deep, heavy stuff.

Adam Rosenbaum: I definitely tried, in those screenwriting days that might have contributed to, some of the things I wrote not working, was me trying to get into that stuff.

Steve Cuden: You know what? There is no such thing as a writer who writes. Everything’s perfect. You’re going to write lots of stuff over time that is not, doesn’t work, it’s not for everyone, that kind of thing. Ah, that says you try to find who you are and what your voice is.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, that’s interesting that you say that about voice. I used to get so angry, like when I would listen to like a screenwriter podcast or be it, a seminar or something, and the screenwriter where the novelist would just kind of say in passing, like, oh, yeah, you got to find your voice, whatever. And every time I would just want to jump up and scream like, what are you talking about? Like, what is a, what is a voice? Like, it would be so frustrating and felt so foreign. And I remember, I remember the moments. I don’t know when this was it. Probably like, it was probably about 10 years ago and I was writing a horror script, believe it or not. I had this idea for like a Southern kind of comedic chorus script and I sat down and I started writing in like the first two lines. I was like, wait a second, what is this? It was like kind of sarcastic and I was like, kind of talking to the audience a little bit and I kept going with it. And I wrote this really quick and clean three page scene. And I remember like sitting back and looking at it and being like, oh, that’s what voice is. And I’m sure if I went back and read it now, I would cringe. But I remember, I remember that moment of feeling like, oh, this is my voice.

Steve Cuden: I like it because when you start to write, most people, you can’t generalize and say everyone, but I think most people tend to not feel like they know what they’re doing when they start. And so they are trying to write in a way that perhaps emulate someone that they admire. Or maybe they’re trying to write it perfectly in some way. And yet what voices is when you start to speak as sort of. I think as you speak.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yes.

Steve Cuden: You’re speaking aloud, but on paper.

Adam Rosenbaum: Totally, totally. I think that’s exactly it is. I would always try to write like this screenwriter. Right. Like this author. It never really worked until I kind of settled on like, oh, I kind of like how this sounds, and this sounds like the way I talk.

Steve Cuden: But I gotta say, I think that’s actually a good way to go is to. At first, if you’re really into it like you are, to write like someone else, because then you get a sense of it. You know, I’m trying to remember who it was. There’s. There’s a, pretty well known writer, and I’ve forgotten who it is at this moment, but they literally copied all of Hunter S. Thompson. They typed out Hunter S. Thompson’s books so that they could get into what his voice and what it was like for him to type that out. And then off they went to the races with their own voice. And so that’s a perfectly viable way to go. So let’s talk about the professional program for one quick second. I’m just curious.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah.

Steve Cuden: you were in that program for two years and do you think that there was anything that you learned in the program that has held you in good stead as you’ve gone off to write Ghost Rules and whatever else you’re writing?

Adam Rosenbaum: Yes, 100%. Paul Chitik was..

Steve Cuden: Who’s been on this show twice.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yep. A professor of both of ours. And he had these seven points that he. That he taught us. like these storytelling points that,

Steve Cuden: The seven plot points.

Adam Rosenbaum: The seven plot points. That’s it. And I use that in everything. And I used to, like, when I would think of a story, I would literally like, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. And I would that’s how I would outline. And now I almost feel like it’s so ingrained in my brain that my brain just drops the seven points on an idea. But, yes, I think that so much of that program was so valuable. Meeting amazing writers and people like you, just being able to be with writers and to hear your words. Like, we would. We would write pages and then we would read them to each other. And like, that was one of the first times that I had heard my words spoken out loud and realized, like, oh, that doesn’t work. Or like, oh, they laughed at that line. Like, that’s great. but those seven points was super valuable to me, and I still use it on every story.

Steve Cuden: So most people, when they start to write, if they don’t have any training at all, they don’t know that if they haven’t read books about it, they’re just going off of what they’ve read before or watched on TV or in movies or on plays. They know intuitively because that’s how we communicate with each other. We start at the beginning of the story, we go to the middle of the story, and we end on the end. And people understand that intuitively. But when you understand it academically, like you get in at, UCLA and other schools, once you understand it academically, then it’s much easier to apply it in a meaningful way. And I want to be careful. This is not a rule. I know we’re going to talk about ghost rules, but there’s no actual rules to writing. There is a form to it, and that’s what Paul and others teach, is that form. And I think the fact that it’s now ingrained in you is going to hold you an incredibly good stead no matter what you write.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yes. Totally agree. I come across writers now of all ages. I talk to kids mostly these days, but talk to writers of all ages in all genres. And I feel like when you’re first starting out, it’s easy to try to figure out the rules, because it feels like, a definable thing. Like, if I could just figure out the rules, then I could be a good writer, whatever. And I think the way you said it.

Steve Cuden: But there aren’t any rules.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, the way you said it is great. There’s not. There’s just no rules. And I feel like you can tell this was especially true when reading scripts, but even reading books now, you can tell when someone is trying to be a stickler for a structure or the way a character is supposed to be or something. And every time I Just want to be like, you don’t have to do this. Like you can, you can put a different spin on it, you can, you know, make it more original. It doesn’t have to follow a certain thing.

Steve Cuden: Absolutely, absolutely right. So I’m gonna ask you a question I ask lots of people on this show and I’ll be interested to hear your answer. What for you, you’re a longtime reader, you’re an now a writer, etc. What for you makes a good story good?

Adam Rosenbaum: Oh, wow. What makes a good story good?

Steve Cuden: Why does one story work for you and another doesn’t? What is it that you, you go, oh, I really love this or this is not working for me.

Adam Rosenbaum: I mean, it definitely starts with characters, which I think is maybe a cliche, answer sometimes in writing circles, but it’s true. Like I need to have a compelling character. They don’t have to be likable, but they need to be compelling to me. So I do think everything starts with a character. But ultimately I read so much mostly middle grade these days because that’s what I write. I read so many books that I forget about like a week after I read it. And I’ve even started books a second time thinking like, oh, here’s a new book. Ill read it and Ill get three chapters in and be like, oh, I read this like three years ago. I forgot about it because its just not memorable. And I think what makes a book, a story, a movie memorable is I just want to care. Like I want a story that makes me care, that makes me feel something, which is so hard to do. But I read so much middle grade right now that just feels like characters are going through the motions. It feels like know basic kind of story points and then every once in a while I’ll read something where I just fall in love with the characters and I just care. I care about what happens to them for good or bad. And that for me is the most important. I just, I want to feel something and I want to care.

Steve Cuden: Well, one of the things they teach at UCLA is that we as storytellers are in the visceral business. We are in the gut punching business and we need to grab people by the guts and hold their guts in our hands basically. And that sounds a little gory, but that’s not what I mean literally. It’s that we are in, not in the educational business, we’re not in the intellectual business, we’re in the passion business. And that’s what I think you’re talking about.

Adam Rosenbaum: Oh, I love that, yes, we’in the passion business. absolutely. Yeah.

Steve Cuden: So now you already alluded to the fact that you’re working in the middle grade. so let’s define that. Some people call it ya young adultep. You’re in this middle aged group of students more or less who you’re appealing to. How did you settle on that as your modus operandi, so to speak.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah. Great. I feel partially like maybe I just never grew up fully like the stories.

Steve Cuden: Nice to meet you, Peter Pan.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, well, I like the stories that I grew up. The Amblin movies from the 80s, et Goonies. like I still love, I love those stories and I love Pixar movies and I love, I still feel like I am. I don’t know if I, you know, I just never really matured fully. I think when it happened was probably in the professionals program at ucla because the first year that we were there we wrote two scripts. And the first script that I wrote was, it was kind of a, a terrible version of Waiting for Guffman, based on a small southern town where they got together and they made a movie. And I think there were elements of it that were fine, but it just didn’t, it didn’t work. And the second script I wrote was a kid’s spy story. and it was like this kid that found out his dad was a spy and then he gets thrust into, into being a spy. And I remember, I remember the moment of like writing this thing and being like this is so fun. Like I love, I love writing this. And then I took a second year there at UCLA and I wrote another kids script and it was like an action like die hardy thing and it was so fun and I’ve. And I’ve written lots of other things between then and now. And like I said horror movies and dramas and comedies and the thing that I just keep coming back to that are the most fun is that kind of middle grade space. And you said like defining it the way I define it is like third through seventh grade. So it’s kids that have moved beyond picture books, probably beyond like kind of basic chapter books, but they’re not yet jaded teenagers like in the young adult space. So there’s still like this awe and wonder where they can handle really deep emotional things, but they’re not yet, like I said, like kind of jaded in those teenage years. And that for me is such a wonderful sweet spot of storytelling.

Steve Cuden: Are you able to say what other authors are in that level?

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, absolutely. I mean the Most obvious popular one is Harry Potter. Percy Jackson is in that space. one of my very favorite middle grade authors is a woman named Rebeccca Stead. One of her books, when you reach me is one of my all time favorites. One the Newberry, maybe about 10 years ago. There’s so many wonderful, wonderful authors in this space that just care about kids and just want to make reading exciting for kids and. Because the way I feel about it is that’s when I fell in love with reading. I don’t know when you fell in love with. With reading. I mean, that’s the age I was.

Steve Cuden: What makes you think I have. Yeah, no, I fell in love with reading actually quite late. I fell in love with reading after I went to college as an undergrad.

Adam Rosenbaum: What was it that kind of like stirred it in you?

Steve Cuden: Stephen King.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yep. That’s awesome.

Steve Cuden: That’s what got me going. And then, you know, my tastes have expanded widely from there. But I read a lot before that, but I wasn’t into reading.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, what book was it of? Stephen King?

Steve Cuden: Oh, the Stand.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah. That’s awesome.

Steve Cuden: I still think that’s his best book. That’s just me, but you know, that’s pretty. If you ask me which is the best bond. It’s Sean Connery. But that’s. Sometimes your first love is your first love.

Adam Rosenbaum: That’s awesome. That’s really cool.

Steve Cuden: Would you say R.L. Stein falls into this group?

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, totally. Totally. Yep. He’s a really good example. Someone who’s been wildly successful. Wildly successful. Yeah.

Steve Cuden: Crazy successful. Allght. So Ghost rules. Let’s talk about Ghost rules.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah.

Steve Cuden: Obviously there are serious subjects in Ghost Rules. You’re talking about death and friendship and family and it’s. But yet it’s filled with lightness and goodness and fun and humor.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah.

Steve Cuden: Do you think of the Ghost Rules as a comedy?

Adam Rosenbaum: Oh, good question. I kind of do. When I wrote it, I wrote it thinking I’m writing a funny ghost story.

Adam Rosenbaum: And the further I got into it, the more I realized like, oh, you know, it would probably make sense if this character’s older brother died. And that would be like a really great emotional hook for this character. Okay, so the story of the Ghost rules is Elwood McGee is 12 year old boy. His older brother Noah passes away in a tragic accident that Elwood kind of blames himself for. And so he and his family moved from their beloved home in Nashville to a small Tennessee town. And a day after they move there, Elwood sees his grandfather Pops. Only Pops is Dead. So he sees the ghost of his grandfather, and he realizes, wait a second, I can see ghosts. And if I can see dead people and my brother Noah, is dead, maybe I could find my brother and say goodbye to him one last time. So I felt like it needed. I was writing these, like, funny ghosts and everything, and it was making me laugh, but it needed that emotional hook. And what’s been really amazing is I feel like that’s the thing that most readers, kid and adult alike, seem to have been drawn the most to, is that this is a story about grief and loss, which. Which I didn’t even intend, but I think is unbelievable that. That people have taken that from it.

Steve Cuden: Well, if you’re going to write a story about ghosts, those are characters that are innately not alive.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah.

Steve Cuden: And yet you bring them to life in a different way, but they’re technically people who have passed on.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah.

Steve Cuden: So what fascinates you enough about ghosts to want to write a book, really about them?

Adam Rosenbaum: I don’t know. I mean, I definitely grew up as a kid afraid of ghosts. Even though, like, if you would asked me, I would have been like, no, I don’t believe in ghost. And yet I still would get a little scared when, you know, all the lights are on.

Steve Cuden: Have you ever seen one?

Adam Rosenbaum: I have never seen one. So I have kids ask me. I do a lot of school visits, which is awesome because you get to talk to kids about writing and, about this book in particular. And a lot of kids will be like, do you believe in ghosts? and I always say I don’t, but only because I’ve never seen one. I am open to the possibility, but I’ve never actually seen one, so I can’t say that I believe enough.

Steve Cuden: Well, so all right, then you came up with six solid ghost rules, then. That. The book’s called the Ghost Rules. That. So you came up with these. How did you develop the ghost rules? And we can go through them, but how did you devise these?

Adam Rosenbaum: Okay, so 2010, I’m living in Los Angeles, and I am sitting alone in my living room. And across the living room, a picture frame just falls over spontaneously. No one’s in the house, and this picture frame just falls over. And my first thought was, like, oh, what if it was a ghost? And then immediately after that thought, what if it was a ghost that bumped into the end table on its way to the kitchen to look at the refrigerator? And it just made me laugh. And I just thought, like, oh, that’s funny. I haven’t seen that before. And I sat down and at, ah, that stage of my life, I was only writing screenplays. But for whatever reason, I sat down and I just started writing a novel. And so in about 30 minutes, I wrote the entire first chapter of the Ghost Rules. Just out of nowhere, like, it just exploded out of me. And that version that I wrote that day is like 90% of what you see in the finished book today. Like, it’s pretty close, which is wild. But I didn’t know what to do with it, like, because I was like, I’m trying to write screenplays. Like, what is this weird kids novel? Like, So I just, I tucked it away. I didn’t know what to do with it. And then in 2020, I needed something to occupy my creative brain because I was losing it. Who wasn’t in my house with, I have four kids. And so I just was like, I need something. Like, maybe I could bust out that old story. And I got it out and I started writing it and joined, an online writing group. And we would, like, bring pages to each other every couple weeks. And I would read these pages that I had written. And, like, people were laughing at the funny parts and they were getting emotional at the emotional parts. And I just thought, like, oh, wait a second, maybe there’s something here. Like, I just was doing this for fun, but people were responding to it. And I thought, maybe there’s something here. Maybe I should really try to turn this into something.

Steve Cuden: You realized you had tapped into something.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, it was the weirdest thing because I don’t know that I had really felt that before then. There had been moments. U. sure. But that was the first time that I felt like, like, oh, you know, people are really responding to this the way I wanted them to.

Steve Cuden: Well, that’s a wonderful thing when that happens, huh?

Adam Rosenbaum: Oh, yeah, Lovely.

Steve Cuden: Did you need to then do research when you started to write it? Did you have to research ghosts or your characters or anything, or you just coming completely out of your imagination?

Adam Rosenbaum: Just completely out of my imagination. I grew up in the South. I grew up in Tennessee. I have a lot of family from small towns in Tennessee. I’ve. I’ve come across so many interesting characters with, you know, interesting ways of speaking. And so I just, I pulled a lot of that from, from memory, of, you know, the small towns that I visited growing up. And, you know, the way that strange old men sitting on their porch would talk to me, and just kind of threw all that in. And the.

Steve Cuden: Now wait a minute. Why were you talking to stranger man on their porches?

Adam Rosenbaum: I don’t even. That’s a great question. I don’t even know. It’s probably some, like, distant relative that my, grandparents dragged me to see.

Steve Cuden: And ah, by the way, I find it very amusing that you were triggered on all this by a frame falling over while you were living in Los Angeles, which, by the way, has little tiny earthquakes every day, all day long.

Adam Rosenbaum: Totally. Yeah.

Steve Cuden: That’s probably what knocked it over.

Adam Rosenbaum: Probably. Yeah, I think that’s very likely.

Steve Cuden: All right, so how did you then develop. We’ll get to the characters in a moment, but how did you develop the Ghost Rules?

Adam Rosenbaum: So I just, I came up with all but one of them that first day. they just kind of, they exploded out of me and I don’t even know. Maybe it’s something that I had thought about once upon a time or. I don’t know. But it just kind of, I think one thing led to the other and I just thought like, okay, like, if somebody’s going to die, like, they probably need to choose, right? They would choose if they want to go on or, or stay put. And, and then I would be like, well, wait a second, how would they, how would they look? And I would have to come up with, you know, a way to, to justify why did they stay in their house and how do they look? You know, so it’s kind of just like questions would pop up and I would have to answer them without thinking about it too much.

Steve Cuden: And a lot of it has to do with how ghosts interact.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah.

Steve Cuden: With the living world.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah. Yes, totally.

Steve Cuden: So I mean, the first ghost rule is when someone dies, they have to choose to stay on earth or move on to the next life. And there in that first ghost rule, there’s a lot of power in the. What’s going to touch people’s hearts? Does a ghost move on, stick around or, or not? So that’s, just right out of the gate, you already give us a good gut punch as to wait a minute. Ghosts can stick around or do they have to go on and you develop all that as the story goes on?

Adam Rosenbaum: I had one guy reach out to me after he had read the book and he said, hey, were, were you trying to reference C.S. Lewis, the great Divorce? And I was like, oh my gosh. I didn’t even think about that. That’s a book that I read several times, in college and was very interested in at that point. But I hadn’t thought about it in years. And he was like, you know, the way you describe ghost sounds like the Great Divorce. And so maybe it’s just one of those things that like, something got lodged in my head at one point and, and it kind of came out that way, but it wasn’t intentional. But I’d been really fascinated by that observation and like, thinking back and like, oh, yeah, I get, you know, that’s, that’s really interesting.

Steve Cuden: Well, I doubt C.S. Lewis was the first person to think that way.

Adam Rosenbaum: Oh, sure, yeah. Absolutely not.

Steve Cuden: People have been thinking and talking about ghosts for a couple thousand years.

Adam Rosenbaum: Well, and also CS Lewis would probably be very disappointed if he knew I was comparing my book about drooling ghosts to, to his masterpiece.

Steve Cuden: What makes you think yours isn’t a master?

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, mine’s, mine’s a little sillier than that.

Steve Cuden: Yeah. But it’s fun and I think fun has a lot of merit.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah.

Steve Cuden: Were there any rules that you considered putting in but then didn’t include.

Adam Rosenbaum: I had thought, like, I wanted to keep it brief. I knew this was the first chapter. I wanted to be funny right off the bat. I wanted to make people laugh and to keep going. And I thought if I cram too much in there, they’re just going to be bored right at the start. So I tried to keep it brief. I have since thought of a lot of things like, oh, yeah, I wonder if I should have included that or that. But, you know, it is what it is at this point.

Steve Cuden: But you didn’t come up with one or two or more rules and then eliminate them.

Adam Rosenbaum: Correct. No.

Steve Cuden: Once you set on them, you went, okay, that’s good. That gives me the parameters of how this world works.

Adam Rosenbaum: Exactly. Yeah.

Steve Cuden: Because you’re developing a world that literally doesn’t exist and so you’re coming up with how this world is.

Adam Rosenbaum: Totally. And I’m saying it right from the get go. So I definitely had to. There were definitely moments of writing where I would write a cool moment and then realize, oh, wait a second, that breaks the rules. Like, I can’t do that. So had to go back and, you know, rethink something because I had to.

Steve Cuden: Yeah. Painted yourself into a corner.

Adam Rosenbaum: I absolutely did. Yeah.

Steve Cuden: So let’s talk about the characters a little bit.

Adam Rosenbaum: Okay.

Steve Cuden: Elwood. The name Elwood is. I’m sure there are people named Elwood today, but it’s a kind of an old fashioned name that we don’t hear too frequently anymore.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah.

Steve Cuden: How did you come up with Elwood P. McGee?

Adam Rosenbaum: Okay, so I have some people from like my dad’s generation that are like, Elwood, that’s from the Blues Brothers. Right. And I’m always like, no, that’s true. But I do love the Blues Brothers. It’s actually even older than that. So I told you my mom would take us to the library all the time growing up and I would rent these old movies, like she would. I think some of them she probably forced on me. And some of them I would be like, oh, what’s this? And there was one movie that has always just remained one of my favorites. It’s from 1950 starring Jimmy Stewart called Harvey. And Harvey, for your audience that may not know, is Jimmy Stewart plays this character whose best friend is a six foot tall invisible rabbit.

Steve Cuden: Yep.

Adam Rosenbaum: And it’s so charming and so wonderful. And Jimmy Stewart’s character’s name is Lood P. Dowd. And so when I was coming up with the name for this character, I didn’t even really think about it that long because I have a character who sees things that other people don’t see. There’s this movie that I’ve loved forever. So instead of, you know, Lood P. Douwd, I’m making him Lood P. McGee.

Steve Cuden: I think that’s a very charming way to go about it because you’re not going to get, accused by anybody of theft.

Adam Rosenbaum: Right.

Steve Cuden: It’s a name and you’ve given him a different name, even though it’s Lood P. I think that’s really, really good. All right, so then you also then develop Tabitha and Sidney.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yes.

Steve Cuden: Tell us about them and how they react and relate to Elwood and why you needed them and what their import in the story is.

Adam Rosenbaum: So Tabitha and Sydney are two girls that live on Elwood street, in his new town in this small town called Long Hollow, Tennessee. And I knew pretty quickly that I needed to have a couple of characters that helped guide Elwood, that helped shape him. Elwood is, he’s new to this whole thing. He’s new to the town, he’s new to the ghost world. and so he’s freaking out all the time and he needs, like, stable people in his life that are helping kind of guide him. So I think in a lot of middle grade stories, you see a trio of characters. It’s almost always two boys and a girl. And I started out that way, to be honest. It was two boys and a girl, and it just felt flat. And all of a sudden I changed one of the characters to a girl and it just came alive and it was so much more interesting to me. So much more fun. So these two girls kind of help him. Sidney is a character. She loves horror movies, old horror movies. There’s an old movie theater in town that is kind of run down and dilapidated, and she wants to fix it up. She’s kind of taken that as her personal project. And then Tabitha is this sweet little girl that wears pink, has pink shoes. She’s so just, like, sweet and loving, but if you turn on her, she will yell at you. She will defend the people she loves at all costs. So these two girls are probably my favorite characters in the whole thing. They were so much fun to write.

Steve Cuden: Well, they help contrast Elwood and keep him together at the same time.

Adam Rosenbaum: Totally. Yep. I’m glad that came through because that. That’s what I wanted to do. It’s just I wanted to have a contrast act. exactly what you said. A contrast to Elwood in a lot of ways, because he’s. He’s very skittish. He’s overreacts about everything. So it’s nice to have some stable women in his life.

Steve Cuden: Well, I think the. What you’ve also done, which I think is really good, is they’re both strong characters. They’re strong. They’re girls, and they’re strong girls. They’re not weaklings.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah. And Elwood definitely is a weakling for most of the book, is he. He doesn’t have his stuff together, and, he’s trying to figure it all out, so.

Steve Cuden: But both of the girls do.

Adam Rosenbaum: But they do. Yep.

Steve Cuden: And I think that that makes it very emotionally compelling. I think that’s what it feels like. It draws you in because they are the. The strength. But it’s his story.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yes. Yeah, that’s great. I’m glad. I’m glad that came through.

Steve Cuden: All right, so aside from Grandpa, and we can talk about him too. But how did you develop these other ghosts, these different ghosts that you came up with?

Adam Rosenbaum: I just. So much of this book, I really wrote for me, especially that year 2020, I just was writing, like, what. What would make me laugh? What would, you know, what would be, fun and adventurous to me as a reader? And so the ghost, specifically, I just tried to make myself laugh. Like, what would be funny and ridiculous? What could they say? What could they look like? You know, what could they do? And there were several that I had to cut out. there just wasn’t Space forum. I had a lot more stuff. There’s a. There’s a ghost named Jimbo that lives at Elwood’s house, and he’s just kind of a blob. He’s just kind of become a blob. he doesn’t say anything. And I had a lot more scenes with Jimbo that were just ridiculous. And my editor, very wisely, was like, hey, I think. I think we need to move on from Jimbo a little bit. Let’s get to. Let’s get to Elwood.

Steve Cuden: Were you overwriting? Is that what was going on?

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, I think I just.

Steve Cuden: But that’s an okay thing to do in a draft.

Adam Rosenbaum: Totally. Absolutely it is. And for me, I need people like an editor to help me because I will go too far on things like that that don’t matter. If I. If I have something that makes me laugh, I will go all in for way too long until it doesn’t be funny.

Steve Cuden: So you find an editor as a useful person to have on your side?

Adam Rosenbaum: Oh, 100%. 100%. I am very grateful. I have an agent that, is an editorial agent. And so when I signed with her, we did a lot of revisions before she sent the book out. So it was a radically different book, even from the book that she signed until we sent it out to publishers, and then it got edited way more after that. And it’s one of those things where, as a writer, I always think, like, okay, this is as good as it can be. And I. And I hand it over, and then they tear it apart and make it way better. And I’m like, oh, okay, well, this is as good as it can be. And then it happens again and again.

Steve Cuden: Well, that’s the same story in Hollywood.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, well, hope hopefully for the better. I definitely have heard the stories of, things going the other direction.

Steve Cuden: Well, they can go the other direction. They can all just get torn apart. You’ve had the good fortune of working with an editor that helped to make it better.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yes.

Steve Cuden: Didn’t tear it down and make it worse. That can happen. That’s possible. And what you hope for is the great outcome that you have where you’re not happy about it, but it actually makes the book sing.

Adam Rosenbaum: Totally.

Steve Cuden: And once you get there, that’s like, you know, that’s like the best thing ever, you know, you manage in the book. There’s tragedy in the book, as I alluded to earlier, but yet somehow, and I don’t know how you did it, you made the tragedy feel not quite as painful as it could have been. M. In reality, Was that your goal?

Adam Rosenbaum: So, like you said, there are some heavy elements in the book, but I knew, like, I’m Writing for fourth and fifth and sixth graders. Like, I can’t go too far into this both because I don’t know if they can handle it. But I also was trying to think like, okay, when I was in fourth grade, when I was in sixth grade, when my kids have experienced tragedy, when you’re seeing through the mind of a child, you’re not always picking up on like all the heavy things that adults are picking up on. You get little bits of it. But I think that’s kind of what I was trying to capture with Elwood. And his experience is just like, he’s very sad. He knows that he lost his brother. He doesn’t know the depth of the pain that his parents are going through. He kind of sees them, trying to deal with their stuff, but he doesn’t know what it, what it is or what it feels like. So I really just tried to take it from his perspective, from a 12 year old’s perspective, where one day he feels it all and the next day he kind of forgets about it for a little bit. Because, you know, that’s just kind of how kids process grief. And especially when, like Elwood, he’s not really ready to process it at the beginning of the book, it’s not until later in the book that he’s really ready to process what happened to him.

Steve Cuden: Well, as you know, I have written many cartoons, not necessarily mainly for this age group, but close to it, a little bit above it, is most of the stuff I wrote. And so one of the things that I really admire about what you did, that I hope I never did in my career, and you certainly did not do it in this book, is you didn’t talk down to your audience. you treated them like you were just having a conversation with a friend. It’s just the subject matter and the wording that you use is not above their heads, but you don’t talk down to them.

Adam Rosenbaum: Thank you for saying that. That, was probably the most important thing to me as I was writing this book is like I said when I started writing it, I was writing for me. But then as I went along realizing like, if this thing has a chance in the world, it needs to be read by children. And I read so much middle grade that feels like it’s talking down to kids or it feels like a book that’s written for. It’s in the middle grade section of the library or the bookstore, but it’s clearly written for adults. And I just, I wanted to write something that felt like a kid really experiencing it. And like I mentioned earlier, I think it helps that I may not have matured all the way, into adulthood, that I, that I still think, you know, along the lines of a kid. But that was really important to me. I appreciate you saying that.

Steve Cuden: Oh, my pleasure. I truly believe it. You know, I think a lot of that has to do with the way that you treat the tone of the story. Story tone. Are you conscious of that as you’re writing, that there’s a sort of tonal thing about it?

Adam Rosenbaum: Absolutely. I think, going back to your earlier question about making sure it wasn’t too heavy, I think anytime I felt like it was getting too heavy, I tried to come in with a joke or come in with humor. And anytime I felt like it was getting too silly, I tried to balance it out with, with an emotional moment. And maybe it’s not like a really deep emotional moment, but it’s just Elwood paying attention to his emotions. And that, to me, getting that pacing down, getting not only the story pacing but the tonal pacing was really important to me to make it work. Because there are definitely books that are 100% comedic and they’re great, but I didn’t think I could pull that off. And there are books that are just 100% heavy, intense, even written for the middle grade audience. And I wasn’t really interested in that either. So just to. Trying to play that back and forth and make sure it worked all the way through.

Steve Cuden: So overall, you’ve already told us that it took you more than a decade to actually produce this book because you came up with the idea in 2010 and then it sat on a, in your drawer on the shelf, whatever you want to say, for a decade before you started to go back at it again during the pandemic.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yep.

Steve Cuden: And so then my question is, is how long, once you said, okay, I’m going to dive in and write this thing, how long did it take you to actually write it?

Adam Rosenbaum: So I started in January of 2020. spent the whole year writing the first draft. So January to December 2020, writing the first draft. I probably spent four to five months revising many, many revisions and then started querying agents in May of 21. It took me almost a year of querying agents, getting little bites here of people that were interested. and then finally finding the, actually the very first agent that I sent it to who was like my dream agent is the one that, that came back and is the one that wanted it. And I went through a process with her in the fall of 2021, it’s called an R and R or revise and resubmit, where she said, hey, we really like this idea. Would you be open to taking some revisions, and sending it back to us? And at that point I was like, I’ll do whatever you want. Like, if you want me to turn Elwood into a squirrel, I’ll do it. Just tell me what you want.

Steve Cuden: That would be called the Squirrel rules, probably.

Adam Rosenbaum: But at that point I was like, here’s this dream agent. She’s interested in my book. I’ll, you know, I’ll do anything. So Revised it for six more months, signed with her in 22. spring of 2022, we did more revisions and it went out to publishers in the fall of 2022 and that’s when it was bought. And then it took two years from that point for it to come out.

Steve Cuden: So listeners, pay attention to what has happened here. It took Adam, 10 years to figure out he had something he wanted to write. That was the first thing.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yep.

Steve Cuden: And then it took four years of, writing, rewriting, going through the process to get it to someone who could publish it, and another two years beyond that before the book actually appears in the world. So if any of you think that this is just going to happen in a flash, think again. It probably will not. Even if you decided to self publish it, it wouldn’t happen that fast.

Adam Rosenbaum: That’s true. And even my experience is kind of fast compared to some other really, really wonderful authors that I, that I love and respect.

Steve Cuden: Now, the fact that you’ve published one, if you’re. And we’ll ask you this in a moment, you know, what are you working on next? There’s a chance that maybe that one goes a little faster because everybody’s trusts one another and there are some shortcuts you can take and the publishers are already waiting and et ceter, etc. Yes.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, totally. I mean, hopefully we’ll. We’ll see. I.

Steve Cuden: Do you have one in the, in the wings?

Adam Rosenbaum: I do. I’m working on a couple things that I’m really excited about.

Steve Cuden: A sequel to Ghost Rules or on the new stuff?

Adam Rosenbaum: Probably not a sequel. I would love to do a sequel. I’d love to do a series. I have lots of stories in mind for the Ghost Rules. I think it’s one of those things where it would have to be like a runaway bestseler, these days in the middle grade market. But no, I have some other ideas that I’m working on that I can’t talk about yet, but that’s fine.

Steve Cuden: Don’t’t.

Adam Rosenbaum: The, in the middle grade space, I just love. I love this space. I want to. I want to write here for. For as long as I can.

Steve Cuden: All right, So I think that this book. You wrote it. Here’s the. Here’s the beauty part. You have experience working on screenplays. You have a desire, I think, probably in the back of your head to be a screenwriter also.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah.

Steve Cuden: So my question is, I think this book would make an excellent movie. Have you made any inroads in that way? Have you written a screenplay, anything like that?

Adam Rosenbaum: I mean, I would love. I would love for it to be a movie. I’ve absolutely thought about it. I think the way my brain works, probably because I had so much experience, in the screenwriting world, is I just think very cinematically. So I think the way this book kind of comes to life is in a cinematic way. I think. I think it would be a good movie. I would love for it to be a movie. We’ll see. Maybe. Maybe one of your listeners is, interested in taking a shot at it.

Steve Cuden: Well, anybody out there that’s u, paying attention? You. I think you’d be wise to read it and at least give it a thought. What do you think you did eventually, right, to get it published?

Adam Rosenbaum: Oh, I think being open to, criticism. So initially, in 2020, when I was writing that first draft and I was in a writers group critique group, bringing pages every couple weeks, listening to my words spoken out loud and then getting feedback and people saying, hey, this didn’t work, or, hey, this was confusing. And I think there was probably a point in my writing life several years ago where I would have been really defensive and been like, oh, you. You don’t understand, whatever. But instead, taking that and saying, like, okay, this didn’t work for them. Why did this not work for them? And then changing it. And then when my agent was interested and said, hey, would you be up for revisions? And just being like, yes’ll. I’ll take whatever. And when you get revisions like that from an agent, when you get your first editorial letter from your editor at the publisher, it is so heavy and so heartbreaking because you’re like, this is, you know, like, did you even like my book? Because there’s so many things you want change. And so for me, I just gave myself a couple days to, like, regroup and then get to work and figure out, like, okay, they want to make these changes. Let’s make the changes. They always made the book better. Always.

Steve Cuden: So you’re saying always take the notes and at least consider them whether they are great or not. You want to think about those notes, Is that what you’re saying?

Adam Rosenbaum: Absolutely. You don’t always want to take the note, but you always need to think about why the note exists. Because they might point out something and you’re like, well, I can’t change that character. But what are they really talking about? Are they talking about this thing that happened on page 50, you know, 50 pages earlier? Are they talking about the way the character interacts with some? You know, I think always considering the reason behind the note is so important. Even if you don’t necessarily take the note. Paying attention and being just being open to what people are responding to.

Steve Cuden: Well, I love to hear that because I’ve taught forever that when you get notes, you never know. Even if a note is really dumb and you think they don’t, they didn’t read it, they don’t get it. Why are they give me this note? Even if you think that it’s wise to at least pay attention to the note because something triggered it. And sometimes even the worst notes somehow evolve into something, oh, I can make this better by doing X, Y or z, hundred percent.

Adam Rosenbaum: And there were plenty of times where somebody would give me a note and say like, hey, this is confusing. Like you didn’t explain this. And I wanted to in my head. I’m like, well, I did explain it 10 pages earlier. You just weren’t paying attention.

Steve Cuden: Yeah, but you don’t want to say.

Adam Rosenbaum: That that’s what I’m thinking. But then I go back and I think, well, maybe what I explained 10 pages earlier just needs to be more clearly defined. Or maybe instead of in the middle of a paragraph, I need to bust it out into its own line, you know, just to really spell it out. So even, you know. Yeah, just don’t be defensive. Be open to criticism.

Steve Cuden: I think that’s very wise. That’s very good advice. Don’t be defensive for sure. Do you have any thoughts toward pitching that you might find helpful for others pitching?

Adam Rosenbaum: I have found I’m not very good at it. I have found.

Steve Cuden: Take a number and get in line.

Adam Rosenbaum: Well, here’s the thing. I’m not very good at it, but let’s use the ghost rules in particular. I talk about the ghost rules all the time and I have kind of developed what has worked over many, many months. And I’ve kind of developed like a two paragraph thing that I say, some of which that I said earlier on this podcast, just doing it over and over and over again and doing it in front of people and seeing what they respond to and seeing when their eyes glaze over, just got to do it. You just got to do it over and over and over again until. Until it feels natural, until it feels conversational, and until you feel like what you’re saying is really conveying what the story is.

Steve Cuden: It’s the only way, I think. I believe there are writers who are naturally gifted at pitching, but I think they’re few and far between. I think most writers have to really work at it because most writers are inward and they are somewhat shy, and they. That’s why they spend their lives alone in a room, right?

Adam Rosenbaum: Yes, exactly.

Steve Cuden: You know, they’re not out in the world now. In Hollywood, it’s a little different. You have to really learn how to pitch in Hollywood. Yeah, that’s a whole other story. But as a novelist, yeah, you kind of have to develop your pitch, for sure. Well, I have been having just so much fun for almost an hour now, chatting with Adam Rosenbaum, and, you know, we’re going to wind the show down a little bit, and I’m, I know that you’ve had all kinds of crazy experiences in your life and career, but I’m wondering if you are able to share with us a story that’s either weird, quirky, offbeat, strange, or maybe just plain funny.

Adam Rosenbaum: I’ve, been thinking about this. I love that you do this on your podcast. I listen to it frequently, and I love hearing the stories that people tell. And I, like. I was like, oh, man, I got to come up with, like, a really great, quirky story. And I couldn’t come up with anything, like, really fun and quirky, but I do have, like, a kind of interesting, weird story about the ghost rules.

Steve Cuden: Go for it.

Adam Rosenbaum: Okay. So in the Ghost Rules, Elwood’s dead grandfather, Pops, who is a ghost in the house where he lives, had an old car. And the old car, was beat up. It was kind of like in the. In the carport behind the house, just kind of left to rot. And the car ends up playing a decent, decently, significant role later in. In the story. And I was trying to come up with, what do I want this car to be? I was, like, looking at pictures online. I couldn’t quite find the right thing. I found one car. I can’t remember what it was, but I found one car that I was like, oh, this looks right. And I typed it out. I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced this when you’re writing. But like, I typed it out and it just didn’t look right. Like, like looking at the words on the screen, I was like, it just doesn’t look right. So I went, I went back and I, like, I spent way too much time trying to find out, and I finally settled on a Chevy Caprice. A super old rundown Chevy Caprice, whatever. and I was like, that’s good enough’s. That will probably work. So I put it in the. In the book. The book, you know, went through all its revisions, everything. It’s about to come out over the summer, and I go on a road trip with my dad. You know, my dad is full of stories, always telling stories. And he was like, oh, yeah, this, you know, this one time in high school, I was driving the Chevy Caprice that I had. Whatever. And I was like, what did you just say? And he was like, oh, yeah, I used to drive the Chevy Caprice, you know, when I was in high school. And I, you know, took this girl to dance and it broke down, whatever. And I was like, I have a Chevy Caprice in my story. It’s like the significant car. And I had no idea. He’s never told me that story before. And for whatever reason, I just was like, that is. That’s super cool.

Steve Cuden: That, my friends, is called synchronicity.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah, it was. It was pretty fun.

Steve Cuden: You were just right in the pocket and you didn’t know it. Yes, I’ve done that where I’ve typed something out and it just. That’s not right.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah.

Steve Cuden: And sometimes you just keep going and then later you come back and realize, oh, it isn’t right.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah.

Steve Cuden: And you have to go figure out what’s wrong with it.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yep.

Steve Cuden: that happens to everybody, I’m quite sure. But yeah, the fact that your dad also had a Caprice, I mean, that’s, There’s something going on there.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yeah. That’s wild.

Steve Cuden: Maybe there’s ghosts.

Adam Rosenbaum: Who knows? Maybe.

Steve Cuden: All right, so you’ve already given us tons of advice throughout this whole show, but last question is, do you have a single solid piece of advice that you like to give to people who are starting out in the business or maybe they’re in a little bit trying to get to the next level.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yep. I’ve got two for you. Number one, especially for writers of middle grade novels, but I think this applies to any writer. Watch old movies. Watch, like, pre1960 movies. Tune into TCM, Turner Classic Movies. Go through the AFI 100 Best Movies list Find some old movies because there’s something. When everyone is consuming the same media, when everyone’s watching the same superhero movies, the same shows, whatever, our structures are all going to be the same and our characters are going toa be the same. And we may not mean for that to happen, but it just kind of happens because we’re all consuming the same media. But when you go back and you’re watching some of these old movies and movies, I say movies specifically because it’s easy to digest. It’s two hours. It’s not like, you know, spending weeks reading an old book, but when you watch some of these old movies and there’s some, like, really strange characters that you don’t find in modern movies, and there’s kind of weird structures and weird plot points that don’t happen anymore, and I feel like it just kind of opens up a new part of, at least for me, my creative brain. So that’s advice number one. Advice number two that I always tell everybody is finish what you start. You can’t fix something that’s not done. So if you start writing a book, if you start writing a song, if you start writing a script, a play, that’s awesome. It’s gonna be terrible at first, so don’t worry about that. Just finish it, because you can always go back and fix it. And that’s where the magic happens is when you’re fixing it. So get through that first draft of whatever it is, finish it, and then go back and fix it.

Steve Cuden: Oh, well, this is outstanding advice because as I have told many people, the first draft is the craft part of the business, but the multiple other drafts, the revision is where the happens.

Adam Rosenbaum: Yep.

Steve Cuden: And that’s that storytelling, where it comes alive and gets refined into a piece of art. And you can’t get to that unless you have that first piece of crummy clay that you can then mold into something more beautiful.

Adam Rosenbaum: That’s it. That’s exactly it.

Steve Cuden: Adam Rosenbaum, what a lot of fun this is to have you on the show. And I, you know, I’m so happy for your success, and I hope that you continue to write and publish and that you’ll come back on the show and talk to us about your next book.

Adam Rosenbaum: Oh, my goodness. Thank you for having me. This is truly such an honor. I mean, I love you as a person. I love your podcast. So this is really fun to be here, and I would love to come back anytime.

Steve Cuden: Oh, well, thank you. So go out and get the ghost rules if you want to read a lot of fun book. Thank you so much, Adam. I greatly appreciate it.

Adam Rosenbaum: All right, man. Thank you.

Steve Cuden: And so we’ve come to the end of today’s StoryBeat. If you like this episode, won’t you please take a moment to give us a comment, rating, or review on whatever app or platform you’re listening to. Your support helps us bring more great StoryBeat episodes to you. StoryBeat is available on all major podcast apps and platforms, including Apple Podcasts, YouTube, Spotify, iHeartRadio, Tune In, and many others. Until next time, I’m Steve Cuden, and may all your stories be unforgettable.