A Little Buzzed by Alys Murray caused a BIG buzz amongst the staff at Parnassus. It’s a rom-com featuring a sex toy engineer, who happens to be a virgin, and the app developer they hire, who has never used a sex toy, coming (teehee) together to teach each other a thing or two. Murray is a sharp, clever romance writer who will take all your favorite tropes, flip them on their head, and make you positively feral for more. Katie Garaby, our romance-obsessed bookseller and coordinator of Love, Parnassus and Between the Covers talked to Alys about her wild career, grabbing joy where you can, and all the sex toy research she did for the book. If you loved A Little Buzzed too, join BTC on April 13th (when Alys will join via Zoom) or 14th at 7:15pm. In the meantime, enjoy this interview between Alys Murray and Katie!
Katie Garaby: You have such a fascinating professional career in the romance genre as both a screenwriter for Hallmark and an author of historical and cozy romances, and your most recent book, A Little Buzzed, just blows the doors right off. What drew you to the art of romance storytelling? Do you have different approaches to writing a screenplay vs a novel?
Alys Murray: Thank you so much for calling it fascinating instead of “totally unhinged and chaos-brained” which is usually how I describe it to my therapist! I’ve loved romantic storytelling my entire life. I firmly believe that love really is always the answer at the end of the day. The fact that romance storytelling gives readers the chance to experience the highs and lows of the human experience and then tie it up with a happily ever after bow of hope makes it the perfect genre for me!
Writing a screenplay and a novel are such different beasts, but the main difference for me is that when I write a book, I’m creating a movie in someone else’s mind. That means I’m not just telling the story, but I’m directing the characters, I’m designing the scenery, I’m establishing the mood, I’m doing the production design…but when I write a screenplay, I know there will be other collaborators at the end of the day who will bring the story to life and improve it with their skills and talents, and that takes some of the pressure off. It’s two totally different modes of creation – I’m beyond lucky to get to do both!
KG: A Little Buzzed is Love, Parnassus’s February pick, and from the moment I picked it up last fall I was completely feral for this book. Now it’s out in the world and I cannot wait to handsell it. Can you tell us a little bit about the book and how you came up with the premise?
AM: A Little Buzzed follows Scout, the lead engineer at BuzzCorp, and Hudson, who is designing an app to go with Scout’s latest toy. They both have secrets. She works at a sex toy company but has never had sex; Hudson just got hired at a sex toy company…but has never used a sex toy. So, they agree on a mutual, no-strings attached exchange. He’ll help her have sex for the first time, and she’ll teach him everything he needs to know about sex toys. Now, stop me if you’ve heard this one before, but their no-strings hookups quickly turn into more, and the two start to develop real feelings for each other…just in time for Scout’s ex-boyfriend/professional rival to enter the picture!
The idea for A Little Buzzed came about while I was working as a sex toy reviewer! I became fascinated by the sexual wellness industry as a whole and thought “virgin sex toy engineer” would be a funny place to start a rom-com. Virginity as a concept in romance has always fascinated me, so I wanted to see how I could take the “virgin heroine” into such a high-heat space!
KG: This book plays with so many beloved romance tropes (sex lessons, black cat & golden retriever, just once to get it out of our systems) and one particularly tough one to nail (pun intended) the virgin heroine. Tell us a little bit about why you chose the virgin heroine trope and how you approached subverting it?
AM: Thanks so much for this question! To me, part of the fun of a trope is taking it in new directions. Growing up in the deeply religious deep south, the concept of virginity has always fascinated me, and when I started really getting into romance novels, I was equally fascinated by the fact that a space I see as progressive (Romancelandia) still often prizes female virginity or inexperience. In fact, it sometimes feels that virginity is fetishized, and that the more a heroine has to depend on her sexual education from the hero, the better.
I love virgin heroines! Don’t get me wrong! But I wanted to do a different spin on it. So, when I decided I wanted to write a virgin heroine, I knew I wasn’t going to look at fiction or doctrine to help guide creating her. I was going to look at myself! My friends! My internet pals! No man ever had to tell us about our own bodies! Statistically, people of all genders are having sex later in life, the use of sex toys is on the rise, and there is a wealth of sexual health information and awareness easily accessed online. I wanted Scout to have the agency that I see every day in real life but that can feel rare in romance novels. I wanted her to know her own body, her own wants, her own desires, kinks, and be ready to demand them…even though she’s technically a virgin.
In many ways, this is a book about the “teach me” trope. That was the main way I wanted to subvert the virgin heroine trope. What I find so fun about A Little Buzzed is that the virgin isn’t the only one getting taught. She learns a lot about relationships and intercourse, sure…but the virgin is also teaching the experienced one – Scout is teaching Hudson everything there is to know about sex toys!
KG: There are so many fantastic scenes in this book from the opening scene with Scout wrestling with Hudson’s response to her presentation at the conference, the heated mini- golf scene, to the meeting (and telling off) of Scout’s parents (an absolute favorite micro-trope of mine), did you have a favorite scene to write?
AM: Hardest question! This is like picking which of my non-existent children is my favorite! I will say, there is a scene where Scout uses a portable EEG machine to determine, scientifically, if she’s in love with Hudson or just in lust with him. A strip club, lap dance, and Hudson getting jealous are involved, with sexy consequences. That was a fun one to write!
KG: Scout is a mechanical engineer for a progressive sex-toy company, the only company that will hire her after her first job goes explosively wrong. As a former sexuality education instructor, I love this. What was your favorite thing you had to research to get Scout’s job right? What about the most unhinged?
AM: I think my favorite thing to research was the HR component of it all. How do you regulate safety in a workplace where you have to talk about strap-ons and ball gags all day? My mom is in HR, though, and I hope to God she doesn’t read this book. Not because the sex stuff would embarrass her, but because BuzzCorp’s HR department is totally asleep at the wheel. I mean, people (AKA Scout and Hudson) keep hooking up in there after hours!
As for the most unhinged…that’s a tough one! I did a lot of research into proposed sex toy bans nationwide, and those are pretty unhinged. But I think the trophy definitely goes to the time I (and my poor partner, bless his heart) tested the Clone-A-Willy kit, which Scout uses on Hudson in a later chapter. Full disclosure: creating a clay mold of a penis works way better in fiction like A Little Buzzed than it does in real life.
KG: Pleasure is such a central part of this book, both for Scout and Hudson and also the people they design their products for. What is something that is bringing you pleasure right now?
AM: I’m learning banjo, which has been an absolute delight! I’m also watching Artful Dodger, which is scratching all my romance TV show itches. Oh, and I have started correspondence. Every week, I send out a few random letters to friends and family (or postcards if I’m traveling) just to say hello. I adore taking time to think about my loved ones and drop them a line that’s not a text message or meme on Instagram, and besides – who doesn’t love getting mail?
KG: What are you reading right now? What kind of books do you tend to gravitate towards as a reader versus as an author?
AM: As a reader, I’m almost always reading one physical book, listening to an audiobook (usually nonfiction!) and swiping through my Kindle. My current line-up is Bold Moves by Emma Barry (paperback), Comet Madness by Richard. J Goodrich (audio), and The Paddock Club by Madge Maril (Kindle). I think my tastes as a reader and writer are pretty aligned…although, I read so much nonfiction and I know I am neither disciplined nor smart enough to ever write anything even remotely up to non-fiction snuff!
KG: I am so excited to hear about what you might be up to next? Are you able to share any upcoming projects with us?
AM: I’m not sure that I can talk about my second Berkley book in much detail, but let’s say this… Cyrano de Bergerac with OnlyFans stars…
I’m also currently working on some very rough, early-stage ideas that can be pitched as “Black Mirror Romance Dystopia where the government picks your partner and the heroine gets matched with her worst enemy” and another that’s “Righteous Gemstones meets The Bodyguard but what he’s guarding is her virtue and he’s doing a really bad job of it.”
KG: We always end every interview by asking, “what’s your favorite thing about indie bookstores?”
AM: Indie bookstores are community pillars. They don’t just sell books. They craft neighborhoods. They put up flyers for your theatre troupe and hold birthday parties for their bookstore cats and remind you to email your city council member in protest of book bans. Indie bookstores will put a book that makes you want to fight for a better world in one of your hands and then take your other hand and lead you to the events and people where you can put that fight to good use. Thank God for indie bookstores!
A Little Buzzed is on our shelves (and out to our Love, Parnassus subscribers) now!
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