From Food Journalist to Fiction Novelist: The Inspirational Journey of Award-Winning Author Mary Carroll Moore

Get ready to be inspired by the awe-inspiring journey of award-winning author Mary Carroll Moore. With beginnings as a food journalist, Mary now pens enthralling tales, her latest novel "A Woman's Guide to Search and Rescue" drawing deeply from her mother's history as a WWII pilot. Her unique vision and passion for storytelling transform real-life into riveting fiction. This episode lets you into Mary's world, revealing her creative process, the challenges she navigates in writing, and her tips for productivity and focus.

Strap in as we go from the kitchen to the writing desk with Mary Carroll Moore. Our conversation takes you behind the scenes of her successful transition from a cooking teacher to a celebrated fiction writer. Discover how she skillfully juggles multiple projects, and what it feels like when your work starts to gain recognition. Join us as we discuss her upcoming book and the rewarding experience that is fiction writing. Whether you're a budding writer or an avid reader, this episode is sure to leave you inspired and ready to chase your own passion.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Well, hello everyone. Welcome to the Writers' Tripe Talk Show. I am so glad you're here with us and I'm especially glad that my guest is here with me today. She is Mary Carol Moore. She is an award-winning bestselling author and we are going to talk to her right after this. Mary Carol Moore, thank you so much for coming on the show. How are you today? I'm great and I'm so happy to be here. Thanks, elsa, absolutely, listen. I actually I feel like I want to say your full name every time, because it's such a great name, such a gorgeous flow.

Speaker 2: 1:12

If you grew up in the South, you'll call me Mary Carol, but that's actually not my name. That's Mary. So here we are.

Speaker 1: 1:19

That's funny. I love it. So, as I mentioned in the opening, you are an award-winning author. You're a bestselling author. You have written 14 books, correct? Yes, very prolific. I love it. Three different genres we're gonna be talking about your brand new book, guys. We're gonna talk about that in just a second. I want to ask first do you have a favorite genre to write in, or do you love them all equal?

Speaker 2: 1:48

I love fiction. It's such a relief after years of being a food journalist. I was a LA Times syndicated food journalist and I know I smelled like garlic. I loved writing for a long, long time. A good career of it. Now I am happily in the imaginary world of fiction.

Speaker 1: 2:10

Yeah, fiction is a blast. You get to create. You just get to be so creative and create this whole universe of your own design and, yeah, that's powerful. I love it too. So your latest book is fiction. You just released it in October, is that right? Yes, okay, and it is. And I want to make sure I get the title right, because it's such a cool title A Woman's Guide to Search and Rescue a Novel, let's go right into that.

Speaker 1: 2:38

I want to show everybody the picture first. Here is the picture A Woman's Guide to Search and Rescue, a Novel. So tell me a little bit about the background of this book. So I do know I did a little bit of cheating or I like to call it prep and I do know that your inspiration for at least one of the characters in there is your mom. So I would love to hear the background of this.

Speaker 2: 3:07

Well, my mom was a pilot she is very competitive and her older brother was a pilot entering World War II and she went up to my grandfather and said I'm getting lessons too. And so she took her lessons alongside him and got her commercial license in, I think, 1942. She was only 22 years old and she became. She applied for the Women's Air Force Service Pilots program, which was very competitive. They had 20,000 women apply and she applied twice and got accepted and only a thousand got in. And then she flew with them for two years and transported bombers and ferried planes and did training exercises so that the military could free up the men to go overseas. And then after that, after the war, she was a commercial pilot for a while and then she had my older sister and decided to stop flying.

Speaker 2: 4:04

But she'd always been this mystery to me. I couldn't believe. I grew up with this mother. You know my friends would say what did your father do? And I'd say my mom's a pilot, you know. So I grew up with this mother with a leg, this leggy legend mother, and I always wanted to know more about her. So I wrote the book to kind of solve the mystery for myself.

Speaker 1: 4:26

I love that. That is so cool and what an amazing role model to have and figure to look up to. I mean, everything about that story is really exceptional. That was you said 1942? I mean that was not a common path for women at all at that time, so that that alone is so exceptional. Has she since passed she?

Speaker 2: 4:54

has. But before she passed we got interviewed by the Library of Congress and she got her congressional medal for being military. Finally, you know they did. They weren't military for the whole program and they finally got their military whatever you call it acknowledgement yeah, sure you know. So to be able to consider that her service to her country had been really a good thing and acknowledged by the government was a big deal. So you know, she was just an amazing person and the fact that she could put away something like flying for two years when she was 22 and not talk about it very much with the family, you know she moved on to being a mother and raising kids and being a full-time worker too, and you know I just didn't believe how anybody could do that. So I took flying lessons to find out when I was doing research.

Speaker 2: 5:46

Yeah, I needed to know what it was like to sit in the pilot seat you know, as a woman in the pilot seat of a plane and see what it felt like and what my mom, what it did to my mom. So that was. Then my characters became pilots and that was the. That's the story.

Speaker 1: 6:03

I love it. That is so, so cool. And that's funny because one of my questions for you was about your research for your characters, because this is a unique character arc. Really it's a unique character job. You know Everybody else is they're always writers, they're always executives, they're always. You know, this is different, this is really different and unique, which you know if you don't have any kind of background on that, the like you know, like you said, the research for that is the hands-on part of it is a little bit different than going to visit an island somewhere. So did you love flying? I loved it.

Speaker 2: 6:43

I loved it and I thought, oh, you know, this is just. My mom would occasionally talk about the risks she took and the landing dead stick with her engine on fire at LaGuardia, things like that. You know. I mean really Buzzing my grandfather's house when she and my dad were dating and he kept trying to turn the radio to the jazz station and she wanted to talk to the tower. And you know, we grew up with these stories but we never knew the woman behind them.

Speaker 2: 7:08

So sitting in that pilot seat really gave me a feeling. And I also had to research, search and rescue, because one of the characters is a search and rescue pilot. And so I was lucky enough to have a student, a writing student, who was a search and rescue ground worker in California, and she got me in touch with the team there and I corresponded with them and sent them scenes and I said, well, would this be a scene that would be believable? And the person wrote back absolutely not. You know, here's what would really happen. And so I got to learn without actually having to be in a search and rescue operation myself. I got to learn and my biggest compliment was a search and rescue pilot wrote me after he read the book and he said this is totally accurate. So I thought, ugh.

Speaker 1: 7:58

Yes, and as we well know as authors, we well know that your readers will absolutely call you out if something isn't accurate. And that's an awful feeling, you know, because you're really trying, you want to do your best to tell the story with as much you know, and it's almost funny, in a way, you're telling a fiction story with as much reality as you possibly can you know, so to make it relatable, of course. So that is high compliment indeed, absolutely.

Speaker 2: 8:29

Because I really don't mess up on those technical details. It blows the book apart. You have to have the flying accurate. She crash lands in the beginning scene and I had to have her walk away and have the plane explode. And how do you do that? So again, I tapped into my students, one of whom was a flying instructor, so she and her cohorts helped me a lot. I was very lucky. I don't know. I took some risk going into that kind of scene. I could have, just like you said, stayed with somebody who was a writer or business professional, but I had another mission with this book.

Speaker 1: 9:04

You know, funny though I think what's especially cool about that too is that I think you know, and I hate to put all the stereotypical things, but they are what they are. I think that probably makes the book appealing to men as well as women, because we always think that you know certain genres are aimed towards certain you know groups, but that widens your audience perspective right there, because men you know, not to say you know you always have to give disclaimers on everything you say. There are, of course, women love action and adventure and all of the things, but that is typically men really love that especially. So I think that's great, that it opens.

Speaker 2: 9:44

your book is open to such a wide audience, and that's fantastic and hard to do really, and I didn't expect men to like it. I actually felt like it was women's fiction, it's about two sisters reuniting, and you know. But I've gotten tons of compliments. I mean I tons like maybe a dozen or more compliments from male readers who said this was great, you know. And I thought, oh, you know, it makes me feel like I've crossed boundaries. I've opened this, like you said, open the field up that men can read this and feel involved in the action and adventure and even in the relationships. So good.

Speaker 1: 10:25

And speaking of your two female characters, they're so different and so intriguing, so intriguingly different. Your main character I don't know if it's correct me, if it's not really fair to call her the main character, but you know, I guess she is your protagonist. She is a famous musician. Is that right? Indy called me a musician.

Speaker 2: 10:46

Yeah, and I got a call on her yeah.

Speaker 1: 10:50

So that's cool in itself. The storyline is just so fascinating to me and I personally thought it's so brilliant and it is at the very top of my to be read list. You know the to be read list. You know how long they are, so when you start shuffling them around, don't tell any of the other people. I feel very flattered, thank you.

Speaker 1: 11:11

Yeah, no, I love. I thought the storyline just sounds absolutely fascinating and just such a fun great read and I did. I took a peek on Amazon and saw those Amazon reviews all five star reviews and there's quite a lot of them. So there is a very good consensus that this was a really well written book. So you have every right to be proud of that book. Baby of Year.

Speaker 2: 11:36

I'm amazed that. You know I've done 14 of these and this is the first one that's really had jet fuel. I mean not to use a flying metaphor, but really all the other ones were slow burners. They've lasted a long time, they've done well, but this one took off and pre-orders put it in the Amazon bestseller category. So I, my friend, wrote me. She said you're a hot new release. I said what's that? Anyway, I'm kind of humbled by it all and I'm just delighted that readers are getting so much out of it and they're passing it to friends and talking about it.

Speaker 1: 12:07

So this is, this is like a dream come true after all these books, sure, oh, absolutely, I totally understand that, yeah, and you know it's, it's one of those things, that it's one of those books and I want to putting the words out into the universe. That boy, I would love to see this as a movie. I think it would make an amazing, wonderful movie. So if this gets into the right line of sight or ears of somebody in that lane, I would love to see that happen for you. That would be so, so cool and probably terrifying, right?

Speaker 1: 12:40

I mean it's it's so hard All of it. You know when you're starting to relinquish control of parts of your work. You know it's probably a little daunting, but but you know you still ultimately hold the control. So fingers crossed for something like that to happen for you.

Speaker 1: 12:59

Tell me a little bit more about your other books too. So there's 14 books, there's a lot, three different genres. Tell me a little, a little bit, if you can, and I know I won't make you go into like each one, but kind of your, your, your arc of what you started with.

Speaker 2: 13:16

Okay, well, I lived in France when I was in college and I just loved it and I I come from a foodie family. My parents were really into food, my father traveled a lot and we, we, we lived well, with food at least, and we all became locals. It's a little bit of a landmark to me, but it's a lot of fun. What other schools are open to you in the future? And your future is an spiritual Curator. What about your peaks?

Speaker 2: 13:32

When I came back from France, I got really interested in teaching cooking. So I got a job teaching French cooking and I got enlisted to write a column for our local magazine in Arizona and that became a cookbook and that became a cooking school in the Bay Area and that became more cookbooks, one of which was a Julia Child Award winner Again, I'm so naive about things that won this award and I got an invitation to the ceremony and I didn't go. You know I didn't know what it was about. So now I know you know people are, you know, celebrities in the chef world now. So then that the LA Times I got me. They got interested in my writing, so I contracted with them to do a weekly column with the syndicate LA Times syndicate, so it was in 86 papers around the US and Canada. That was really fun.

Speaker 2: 14:30

I did that for 12 years and then I moved into more self-help. I wrote a book about change and how to handle change, and then I decided I really wanted fiction. So I went back to school, believe it or not, at age 50. And then I my first novel was published in 2009 and it got nominated for Penn Faulkner. So you know, it's been a nice road as a writer and I couldn't believe that I left my career in food writing, which was very lucrative and very, you know, I was like on top of the heap at that point and went into fiction. I just gave it all up because I knew that I needed to do something. I was at that point in my life where I had to make some decisions like, is this all I'm going to do? And no, I really want to write fiction and I have no clue as to how to do it. So that's, I had to go back to school. Wow.

Speaker 1: 15:24

That's amazing. I love that. I love. Well, first of all, I love, I love the risk taking of it, moving from something that is secure and solid and known and deciding. And, like you said, I'm in my fifties and you know I was a late bloomer in doing all of this type of stuff and you know it is. It's a leap of faith, it's a leap of courage and and you don't know where the road is going to take you. And I love that you had so much wonderful validation for those steps along the way, because you know so many people don't get the overt validation that you kind of need to keep going forward with it. So what a testament to your, your talent. That's very, very cool. I'm so happy for you.

Speaker 2: 16:12

Thank you. I feel like I'm more stubborn than talented Elsa. I just I hate to give up stuff. I think I inherited that from my mom. You know, I just like little bulldog and if I'm trying something I'm going to do it, and that kept me going versus town. I think I got better at writing along the way, but thank you.

Speaker 1: 16:31

You're very welcome. That's wonderful. Are you working on anything right now? Are you in a pause? You're working.

Speaker 2: 16:38

I have another book coming out in the spring. I don't know, these are too fast, a little too fast for me, but they're. They were both ready, so we staggered them. And the next one is out in April and that takes place on a Caribbean island and it's about a gambling tournament that a woman gets drawn into against her will and the trouble that comes from that.

Speaker 1: 17:00

So I'm not a gambler I was going to say did you get to have some fun research for that?

Speaker 2: 17:07

I had mostly friends that I talked to and I'm not in that world at all, but it would have been fun if I had gotten into it, I guess. But I didn't, and this is. This is a completely different book than the one I just wrote, but I love it and I my agent says this is my best one, so I hope that people like it.

Speaker 1: 17:25

That is wonderful. Did you have any trouble changing gears from one set of characters to a whole new set? I mean, like, did you have any kind of process or do anything at all to kind of purge them to be able to move on to the next one, or were you able to just move into the next, next life?

Speaker 2: 17:46

No, it's hard. So while my book, I got advice from a really good friend who said while your books with your agent. She was a hands on agent, she was really into the editing thing, so I knew it would take her a while and she's slow. So she's good and slow. And so I thought what am I going to do? I'm going to go crazy and not bugging her. And so I thought, okay, I'm going to start another book. I had an idea and so I I'm. I deliberately divorced myself from the book that she had and worked on this other one, which was kind of a fun Caribbean Island, you know, little vacation. There's an artist who's the main character and she goes down to complete a portrait of this wealthy man who's fallen into hard times and she's stuck on the island, no money. So I thought that would be fun, I'll just write it. And then I got into it.

Speaker 1: 18:31

And.

Speaker 2: 18:32

I couldn't actually stop. So I was like don't talk to me my agent, don't talk to me the other way. You keep it aside, right.

Speaker 1: 18:41

I guess you're just saying that was actually. That's what a smart tactic too like to distract yourself. Just dive right into a whole new project and get immersed in that. That's brilliant strategy. I like it.

Speaker 2: 18:53

It was the only thing that saved me from being a total pest. So I thought this works for everybody. And then I had a new book and then I ran it through my writer's group and feedback and all this normal things, and then I gave it to my agent. She loved it. She said OK, we'll do this one after this one. So that's fabulous.

Speaker 1: 19:11

Now I'm going to stop for a while.

Speaker 2: 19:13

I'm going to stop for a while and do other things.

Speaker 1: 19:15

You think you're going to stop for a while. When those idea, those muses come to you, it's like you're compelled right, you're almost ordered to get back to work, but I get it. I totally get it, but you never really rest because I happen to see that you put out something called your weekly writing exercises. This is something you do every week for your subscribers, correct, since 2003. That's wonderful. Tell me a little bit about that, or I should tell our viewers and listeners a little bit about that.

Speaker 2: 19:50

Well, when I was teaching, I taught writing for several schools in the US for many, many years about two decades and my students would always have these incredible questions like rarely gnarly questions, and I hadn't had time in class to answer them. So I said I'm going to start a blog and you submit your questions and I'll just write an article every Friday and I'll answer your questions. And so I did. I started on BlockSpot and I got all these subscribers and it was like, oh my god, this is actually working. And then I got so many subscribers I had to move to a platform that could handle all the addresses. And then, finally, a friend of mine told me about Substack, which is a wonderful community, because I really wanted to create more of a community feel with the exercises, like people would try them and then comment.

Speaker 2: 20:38

So we have kind of a classroom there. So I moved to Substack in April and my subscriptions went way up, so I'm very happy. Yeah, there are like thousands, there's thousands of subscribers on there.

Speaker 1: 20:52

Yeah, it's amazing.

Speaker 2: 20:53

I'm really happy with it. And every Friday is hard, I tell you. Sometimes I just don't have it in me and so I think, ok, what can I? And then something will come and I'll start to get into the writing of how to do, like this last week was bad guys, how do you write villains that are believable?

Speaker 2: 21:10

Because a lot of people stereotype, they're villains, and I got this impression as I was writing a villain for this novel that just came out that the actual part of them that is longing for something is the thing that makes them human. So if you can find out what your villain really longs for, you can make them a little bit more not necessarily relatable, because they're not really relatable people, but at least more believable. And so I did an essay on that and it's gotten a very good response. So I think the idea is that you can get a very kind of rhythm going with the people, and I love, love, love that. I love the whole idea of just having an audience not an audience, but a group of readers that are going to, I don't know, carry me along, and I just have a great time with it. Every week I sit down. I love it.

Speaker 2: 22:07

I don't know what I'm going to write about, and then I come up with something, so I guess I'll just go with it, that's fabulous.

Speaker 1: 22:12

Not only is it fun and great for you. The next amazing thing about that is that you're helping so many people spark their creativity, help problem solve for them in their own writing, and I think that's such a huge gift, and I think that is one of the things that I truly love the most about the author community that I have yet to meet. So I know they exist, but I've yet to meet a fellow author who isn't excited about and doesn't love sharing what they know, and I think that's such a great gift in itself to kind of pay it forward, put the hand out, hand up and help the next ones up, because there's room for everybody and there just can't be enough creativity in the world, so the more the merrier, the more the better, really. So that's wonderful and I think I put it. I did. I have it on here, so we're going to put that up and make sure you correct me if I have something wrong there.

Speaker 1: 23:14

That is your website, right? My website. Yeah, that'd be embarrassing if I put it up there and that wasn't right. I have to get the spelling right, which is unusual.

Speaker 2: 23:22

People don't get the spelling right. Two hours, two hours two hours.

Speaker 1: 23:25

Yes, yes, yes, and everything is on there. Correct your blog, where they can subscribe for your weekly writing exercises. Your books, of course. Do you have any events coming up? Are you doing any touring around at all for the books, or is it mostly?

Speaker 2: 23:46

Yeah, I did in the fall, you know, and now I'm home with my family for Christmas and just kind of settling in now and that's the until the next book starts. I think that's going to be my way just to online stuff. But I had a really, really fun time touring for this last book. It was just so fun. But now I'm tired and I want to stay at home.

Speaker 1: 24:09

Yes, yes, Listen, you earned it for sure, and especially with the holidays, there's nothing better than just being home and in a. I don't know if you're in a, I don't know if you're in a cold weather climate or a warm weather climate, but I'm in a cold one, but I go to Florida every month, so it's all good, yeah.

Speaker 1: 24:28

I don't mind the cold so much. Oh, it's so nice, but yeah, I loved hearing all about your books and your story. Thank you so so much for coming on and chatting with me. I appreciate it.

Speaker 2: 24:39

It was a delight. I appreciate it. All your encouragement too. I'm going away feeling even better about my book now.

Speaker 1: 24:46

Good, good, I love that. That makes me so happy. Tell me you'll come back again when your next one is released. I would love to have you back if you would, if you'd be willing. Nothing like being put on the spot, right?

Speaker 2: 24:57

Oh, I'd love it Also. That would be a treat for me. So after April, when it's out, I'll you know, we'll get in touch.

Speaker 1: 25:05

I appreciate that. Yeah, wonderful, yeah, absolutely have your people talk to my people. I don't have people. You have people, I don't have people I don't have one person.

Speaker 1: 25:15

I'm a one woman army over here. Mary Carol Moore, thank you so much for coming on the show Guys, I hope you enjoyed this and you got so much out of it. Get over to Mary's I won't say Mary Carol. Get over to Mary's website and check out all the wonderful things she has on there. And correct me again if I'm wrong, but a woman's guide to search and rescue is also on audiobook, correct it is, and the narrator is fabulous.

Speaker 2: 25:43

I mean it's worth it just to get the narrator. She's so good. I had to audition all these people, but she is it.

Speaker 1: 25:50

Oh, that's so cool. I love the audiobooks. I love a handheld book, I love all of them, to be honest with you, but the audiobook is a lifesaver when you're driving or cooking or you just can't, you know, hold a book and you can just listen to it. So I'm super excited. Thank you again. And guys we will see you in the next episode. Take care.