Haili Blassingame

And so I really was trying to look for models on how to how to be in an open relationship.

And like many writers, I turned to stories.

So I was like, reading novels, I was watching movies, I was just trying to find anything to sort of

to locate myself in this kind of relationship modality and could not find anything.

And I was like, okay, well, I'll write a book and this will help me figure it out because as one does, right?

So what happened was I had started this book in like

January 2020 which is a great time to start a book right that's set quote-unquote now which you know then the pandemic happens like okay you can never set a book now again um if it's you know realist fiction so I've been working on it I ended up writing a modern love essay at the end of the year that was about my experience in an open relationship and just trying to like

figure out myself through that relationship and why it ended.

And that is a funny story because I had recently purchased a house because interest rates were so low and I just like was out of money and I needed a new couch.

So I was like, what can I do to make money?

Oh, I'll write a modern love essay, which like thinking about it now, I'm like, that's like...

I don't know.

I was 25.

But they picked it up.

I hadn't heard of Modern Love, but I didn't understand the scale of it.

So I had, when I knew it was being published, I was reading things like, oh, you could get an agent or a book deal from this.

I'm like, okay, I'm not going to get an agent from this essay.

Then the essay came out and I got an email from my current agent saying, have you ever wanted to write a book?

Hello from book agent in the subject line.

And I was like, yeah, so it's charmed.