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Jeri Shepherd
184 Plays2 years ago
While Jeri Shepherd is new to the world of fiction, the author behind the Fault Lines Series has been in the writing industry for decades in playwriting, children's books, sportswriting, biography, leadership, ministry, and more. She wrote under the name Reji Laberje as a solo author and as a co-author alongside celebrities, athletes, and leaders of industry.
As Reji Laberje, Jeri has 12 #1 bestsellers in her 60+ books and plays, as well as another 17 #1 bestsellers amongst those books for which she was a contributing editor; ultimately, her pen was on 29 #1 bestsellers and she has been nominated for prestigious awards in playwriting and fiction. Jeri has combined print book sales of half a million copies across all of her works, in addition to sales in both audio and e-books.
She's led more than 85 book projects in multiple roles including: author, co-writer, editor, designer, publisher, consultant, coach, and marketer; in that last role, she's led 80 different authors to #1 bestselling titles on lists with Amazon, Barnes & Noble, USA Today, and others. In addition, she consulted with and wrote for independent and traditional authors and publishers who then created entire new lines and book businesses as a result. Hundreds of stories have been told, published, and sold through her professional gifts and services.
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Transcript
Introduction to Art Slice and Something Rather Than Nothing
00:00:00
Speaker
When you walk through an art museum, what happens? You see some interesting things, you see some not so interesting things, and if you're like us at all, you're probably a little bit sleepy. Well, grab a cafecito and listen up. It's Art Slice, a palatable serving of art history.
00:00:15
Speaker
We are both artists, so we look at art history through that perspective. We cover the artists you know and those that have been ignored for so many different reasons. We look at the context of the time, we compare it to today. We don't dumb anything down, but, and this is a big but, we like to have a good time, okay? Nos gusta to goof around, all right? We have hungry pantry buns that might startle you. It's a long story. We feed them our materials.
00:00:39
Speaker
Art is just a visual language that is open for anyone to interpret. So if this all sounds good to you, join us on Art Slice, a palatable serving of art history. You are listening to something rather than nothing. Creator and host, Kendall Ante. Editor and producer, Peter Bauer.
00:01:06
Speaker
This is Ken Vellante with the Something Rather Than Nothing podcast. And we're chatting with Jerry Sheppard, writer, thinker, world creator. Jerry, welcome to the podcast. So excited to have you on. Ken, I'm so excited to be with you. Thanks so much for opening this conversation. Yeah, I really appreciate it.
00:01:30
Speaker
Prior to jumping on right here, listeners, Jerry and I were talking about writing. Being a writer, at least for me in my opinion, is a particular thing to do to try to get the right words and link them together.
00:01:49
Speaker
kind of create worlds. And Jerry is somebody who's done that throughout her life. And so when Jerry and I were talking, I was saying I'm just so interested in what it's like to write and to work on that craft and to teach it and to collaborate. So Jerry, I wanted to jump right in and ask you about
00:02:13
Speaker
you know, writing and your new work at fault and creating fault lines series, which is a big jump for you. We'll get into that, but like, so bring us into right now. Like what's, what's going on with you, with you doing this and what, what are you creating?
00:02:33
Speaker
Okay. So it's
Jerry Sheppard's Journey into Fiction Writing
00:02:35
Speaker
really interesting when I decided to, and again, we'll get into the leap that this was, but when I decided to get into fiction, um, you know, AI was really burnt out from the, the writing world that I had been in.
00:02:49
Speaker
And I really wanted to reconnect to the things that made me excited and just kind of lit my soul up. And I remember just really loving science fiction when I was a kid. And I actually was reading the Expanse series by James S. A. Corey, amazing partnership duo that they're Hugo award-winning, really incredible writing. And it got me excited again. I said, oh, this is what I have to write. This is what I have to write. I have to go in this science fiction world. And I had no clue
00:03:19
Speaker
what to write at that time. But it was in the beginning of the pandemic and when the race protests were going on around the country at the same time and just so much divisiveness over so many topics that I actually didn't even start from a place of building the world.
00:03:39
Speaker
where I started from was this place of I felt like I was all alone in the center lane and like all of my friends on the left and on the right and on the extreme and the top and the bottom and wherever they all were just against each other and I really wanted to focus on
00:03:56
Speaker
what our common humanity was and how we can connect and I feel like i've always done that in my writing but that was that was the seed that started this whole story and that's why the motto in the first book is actually be gloriously human and I really wanted to just I wanted to focus on what brings us together as as a human people yeah I I love that be gloriously human and uh thanks for bringing it to the to the backdrop of course um
00:04:25
Speaker
As I mentioned to you, I lived out in Wisconsin for a bit. Wisconsin politics are pretty darn wild because the world and sometimes the nation kind of peeps in and says, what the heck is going on? And of course, steeped history of conflict. It was interesting for you to talk about within that.
00:04:47
Speaker
in reading about the book and the series is that what we're looking at, the way you describe it is kind of more of the connections amongst humans from different type of perspectives in a course. What type of world, what type of world exactly? I just get into the grit, what does the world look like that you create and tell us what it looks like, what's going on in it and like, what's the problem?
00:05:14
Speaker
I love this. This
Themes of Common Humanity in Sheppard's Work
00:05:15
Speaker
is kind of like you're going to get a little bit of the elevator pitch, if you will, here. So it's a globally racially gender and age diverse ensemble of characters, and they are telling the story of Earth after the melt.
00:05:28
Speaker
However, unlike so many stories where disaster happens, this is not dystopian. It's not apocalyptic. You know, humans have done what humans have always done. We've adapted. And so there are city ships out at sea where people live. There are impossibly tall skyscrapers where people live. The real struggle is still between humans. It's between
00:05:57
Speaker
You know, we've got a socialist society. We've got a fiercely independent society. There are off-world colonists, indigenous nations. The mobs and mafias, they've moved out onto the waters too. Those are now fleet families. And so, you know, there's still a lot of, it's a lot of that geopolitical division and kind of like factional groupings, much like you would see in like, you know, a George RR Martin book where it's like the groupings of people.
00:06:26
Speaker
Mind you, within that, because it's science fiction, I have been able to have so much freaking fun with creating some really cool things. There's tsunami defense. How have we learned to fight against Mother Nature, even as Mother Nature is taking her throne back from us? And what sorts of energy resources do we have? And how
Building a Realistic World in Fiction
00:06:52
Speaker
are people traveling?
00:06:53
Speaker
What do humans look like? There's a little bit of a transhuman element where it's like people are getting different types of implants and whatnot. And honestly, a lot of this stuff, what's crazy is in this world build, it really exists today. I just take a lot of today and
00:07:15
Speaker
and I expand on it or I bring a little imagination to it. And this is maybe another topic. I don't want to sidebar too much, but I used a lot of niche experts to help create this world in a way where that pseudoscience and that pseudo future could have buy-in and be very real.
00:07:36
Speaker
Yeah, well, that's excellent. That's excellent to do. I know I can speculate about science and other things in my head, but I know going up against any pro or somebody well versed in it. I'm going to defer very quickly. Those bad descriptions you read on like the free sci-fi movies that you get on whatever streaming service you have. And as soon as I'm like,
00:07:57
Speaker
One line in and I can't even buy in I'm like, oh god, I just don't want to be that don't let me be that Don't let me be the people who have to like blow up the core of the earth in order to cool it or something strange Yeah, and you know that making sure that everybody understands the differences between vent horizon and wormholes and things like that and just to be so So bringing in that science and of course in the future there. Um, I wanna wanna pop out a little bit and and and talk about
00:08:27
Speaker
the conceptual Jerry and and everybody definitely check out the fault line series and Jerry and I will tell you how to how to access that later on but
00:08:42
Speaker
Just just a wonderful start to the series and and of course we're here with the author Jerry Shepherd Jerry We're gonna hit you with with with the big question. I'm always talking art and philosophy on the podcast The big thing I know you were excited and you had been thinking about in creating now and what you're doing Over time and writing is what is art? What have you been trying trying to create? I know we've been trying to
00:09:12
Speaker
you know, create art. So what is it? What is it? Um, for me, art is, is what connects us. Um, I believe that we are, I mean, not just I believe science believes study and research believes that we are made as humans to connect. And, um,
00:09:35
Speaker
You know, not to get too like weird and sciency on you, but there's weird and sciency is fine on this part. All right. So there's like in our actual human brains, there's like white matter and gray matter and like the white matter. And I'm sure there's going to be some neurologist who says I've got like these two mixed up. Well, one of them is, um,
00:09:56
Speaker
it's it's like kind of creating like the silos in your brain like okay this is the part of your brain that's uh just for language and this is the part of your brain that's just for math the other part that that gray part i believe is the part that causes connection and it helps the different parts of our brains connect and um that actually is fueled by story and
00:10:19
Speaker
when we have connections like that, then we're better able to connect with other humans. And I just, I just believe that I have such a passion for story. I have such a passion for using story to connect people, to make sure that they can relate to one another. And that to me, that is art. Art is this, it's this place where, is this place where humans find commonality and
00:10:42
Speaker
I may look at you, Ken, and be like, oh, you're out there on the West Coast, and I'm here in the Midwest, and you're a guy, and I'm a woman. And we could probably, and our society is lined up for us to find all of the ways that you and I might be different. But as soon as we start talking, even when we were just talking before we started recording today,
00:11:12
Speaker
you start to find commonalities. And when you do that, there's compassion and there's connection and and it's honestly, it's the the only way that I think we can move forward as people. So that's for me, art is stories and stories are there to help us connect. Yeah. And I love that. I love when
00:11:39
Speaker
I've been doing the show and talking to different types of artists, but talking about stories, talking about stories in particular.
00:11:47
Speaker
Um, thinking about, uh, writing, um, in literature, uh, for me, and I don't delve deep, deep, deep into it on the show because it kind of cover a lot of different things, but literature is just so foundational for me. I think maybe in terms of identity and imagination or thinking about what's in, what, what is, what is, uh, possible you've been writing your whole life, Jerry.
00:12:13
Speaker
and working and doing this. I want to ask a question.
The Passion and Business of Writing
00:12:18
Speaker
I'm also like a labor guy. I work for a union and I think about work and about work that people do and creativity. What is it like to write for hundreds and thousands of hours as a craft, as a work to do? What's that experience like for you in doing it?
00:12:43
Speaker
It's a roller coaster. So I would say that it's a little, I mean, for me, I was, I believe it's my purpose. And I've tried to not write at times when writing has itself burned me out. And I'm not successful at that.
00:13:04
Speaker
I end up, I can't help it. I have to write. I'm talking to you and I'm like, it makes me, ideas light up and I have to write them down. But yeah, it's, I think anybody who goes into an art has to go into it for that love of that art. And I don't care whether you're painting or acting or singing or writing or,
00:13:29
Speaker
you know, creating music, it doesn't matter, sculpting, whatever, you have to go into it for the art. And I think there are a lot of artists who go into their craft because they want to be rich, they want to be famous. Sure. Those are like these two myths that have been fed to us specifically in our Western culture and
00:13:56
Speaker
And you have to know that if you're using your craft as a business, it is a business. You're going to have to work. And, um, you know, I, I remember it was, it was 2016. I wrote eight full length books and I, in one book, in one year. And whoa.
00:14:24
Speaker
I was crying. I remember sitting at my computer and just writing. And this was when I was in my co-writing world. And I'm like, OK, I have this deadline. And I physically could not keep my eyes open. And so my eyes were closed. And I was typing. And I had carpal tunnel so severely in both of my hands that I was crying as I was typing. And it was total burnout.
00:14:52
Speaker
But every time that I've burned out in writing, as opposed to giving up writing, because I just can't, I've changed directions. And I've said, okay, well, how else can I do this writing? What else can I do with this writing? But yeah, it's a job. It's a job. And as much as
00:15:19
Speaker
It's a passion and I love it and I love the craft and I love the art. You know, you're going to have marketing. You're going to have to deal with publishing. You're going to have to deal with distribution. You're going to have to pay the stinking bills. You're going to if you're on the publishing side, I had a publishing house for a while. You're going to have to pay your author's royalties. You're going to have to pay your editors. I mean, like it's it's a job. And and so you really have to to take that into account. And for a lot of people,
00:15:47
Speaker
If they don't want to accept that, that's okay, but then your writing can be a hobby. And again, I think all of those same things could apply to any of the arts.
00:15:58
Speaker
Yeah, thanks for a peek inside there. Jerry, one of the things I love to do more than anything is going to comic cons or science fiction conventions. So like recently, in the last week or two, there's the Rose City Comic Con in Portland, Oregon.
00:16:20
Speaker
And I tell you, it was such a thrill for me because I was able to run into five or six folks that I've had on the podcast. But not only that, you know, being around authors and writers that I really enjoyed and just it's so much fun for me.
00:16:40
Speaker
And I know you and I have chatted just a tiny bit about how with the series you're creating and moving into this, that it's opened up kind of the world of science fiction or that field, which is a fascinating area. What are your just open impressions as far as the newness of the experience and what you've learned and seen? It has been an adventure.
00:17:08
Speaker
So I came from nonfiction primarily.
Experiences at Sci-Fi Conventions
00:17:11
Speaker
I mean, a few other things. When I did my children's books, I was in a lot of school events. So this is not that. And so it's at once both an intimidating and a welcoming environment at the same time.
00:17:37
Speaker
you have to go in with an open mind and I, gosh, you hate to speak to stereotypes because stereotypes can be damaging, but they also exist for a reason. And there's something to be said about the sci-fi conventions, the comic-cons, the fan conventions, that there are a lot of people there who maybe weren't accepted in other parts of,
00:18:05
Speaker
society, whether it was in their school or in their, you know, communities or, you know, whatever it is. This is a place when you go to these these conventions where like everybody is accepted. And if you are somebody who can be a part of that movement of accepting others, you can really do well in them. But yeah, it's, you know, you might have somebody
00:18:32
Speaker
in a full fur costume with a dragon head, come up and like, you know, take your hands in theirs and you're like, I don't even know what's happening right now. Yeah, he's gonna experience. Um, but then you also will have, um, just incredible, like mutual support amongst the creators and, um, it's
00:19:00
Speaker
It's been a lot of fun. And once I realized that I didn't need to like put on any kind of persona when I went to these and I was just going to be me. And honestly, you know, when people see like the
00:19:16
Speaker
the middle-aged suburban woman at these things. I'm actually the odd man out, but there just is accepting of me. Everybody fits there. Everybody fits there, right? You really do. Once you put yourself in that mindset to be a part of that, it's a very joyful environment.
00:19:39
Speaker
Yeah, I do. It's like any community. There's aspects of it that run foul and some that are super. I think about the kind of elements, I think, maybe with the misogynistic elements, sometimes you'll find deeper in the crevices of the sci-fi and gaming, things like that. Not to tarnish everybody, but any community has its bits and pieces.
00:20:08
Speaker
One of the things overall in the environment is a whole lot of interesting and wild ideas. You can communicate them more freely, right? Because we think about our interactions in general society a lot of times. It's not like you're going to wave high your freak flag. I guess I do. I made a life out of doing it, I guess. But not everybody's going to be like,
00:20:36
Speaker
I want to talk about this weird thing. And it's just the ear feels a little bit freer for me. I mean, that's been my impression. Yeah, it is. And it's really interesting.
00:20:45
Speaker
I was an opposite one gentleman at one, I don't remember, somewhere in Iowa. I have done so many this year, I've lost track. But he was a university professor at the University of Chicago, huge science guy. But he had this zine that was all like, it was down the research rabbit hole.
00:21:10
Speaker
I, it just freaking cracks me up. And like, it's the kind of stuff that only would exist in, in a space like this. And he talks about like, he has one called space is sexy or is it? And it talks about what sex would actually be like in space versus the way they romanticize it and like every sci-fi show ever. And it, it's hilarious. But at the same time, it's like, okay, this would only exist in this space. And I've actually used some of his research.
00:21:39
Speaker
You know to influence the second book in the in the in the fault line series even so There are things that exist in that space that belong in the world and That wouldn't exist otherwise Yeah, yeah, I like a lot of the DIY elements you find, you know with within the zines and I gotta admit my for myself
00:22:03
Speaker
I don't think it was a matter of snobbery or anything. I just wasn't in close contact with a lot of independent presses and zines and things like that. As I've done the podcast, I've become a lot more connected into these phenomenal, independent creations that are just
00:22:20
Speaker
Fantastic. They're just independent and small and you just happened upon them and zines in kind of mini presses and a lot of that is really kind of pulled me in and just i'm pausing at those sections and spending my time there where in the past is You know, I just kind of went more quickly by it Um, you've seen some of that development for yourself or coming in contact with it at the con I have and and this some of this is also um
00:22:49
Speaker
from my
Insights into the Publishing Industry
00:22:50
Speaker
experience just in the publishing world in general. I tell people I sort of took a lot of back and side doors into publishing because I've worked with traditional publishers.
00:23:02
Speaker
but they brought me in to like write for other people, you know? So it was like, I was always kind of like back during it into like the traditional publishers. And I kind of have an analogy about the publishing world. It's like for decades and decades, people, there were gatekeepers behind this huge, beautiful gated community. And it was the big six, then the big five, and now it's the big four, which should tell you something in this gated publishing community.
00:23:33
Speaker
And you couldn't get in, and they were the guards of the gate, and there was nothing you could do. But every once in a while, there might be somebody on the edge of that gated community who'd look over the edge and go, oh, but hey.
00:23:46
Speaker
I like what that person there is doing. So let me invite them in. So these are some of those niche publishers and the side doors, if you will. And then after a while, people just got tired of it. And they're like, fine, you don't want us in your gated community. We're going to build a tent city right outside of it. And I think little by little, the people on the edges of the gated community are like, dang, they look like they're having fun over there. And I think it's just,
00:24:13
Speaker
You know, at the end of the day, it's there, the gated community still exists. But now there are some of these people who will invite other people in behind the gate, even though they didn't follow the protocols to earn their way there. And there's this, you know, rock intense city. So just, you know, you don't have to
00:24:33
Speaker
There's not just one way into publishing anymore. And just find your neighborhood and have your party. And that's what I think you got to do. Today, I do traditional and I do independent. And it depends on the book. It depends on who I'm trying to reach. There are like 1,000 things that play into that. And everybody is like, hey, I want to be on the shelves of Barnes and Noble. OK, well, you can do that. That's great.
00:25:03
Speaker
There are a thousand other avenues that are just as worthy and it depends on what each individual artist wants, what that story needs, where that audience is going to find that story. I see a lot of that independent stuff at the conventions.
00:25:23
Speaker
Some of these people are like, they're like, they're the best authors and artists. You've run into geniuses, you know, the genius on the corner, the corner, you know, on the corner, right? Yeah. It's great.
00:25:40
Speaker
Jerry, talking writing, talking literature, we talk a lot about some of the components of the business around it. But jumping back in deeper into the art and the type of writers, maybe, where you lose your mind over your possess, that type of thing.
00:26:01
Speaker
for me That's always the biggest draw from when I was younger that I will lose myself in the writing. I'm thinking of For me as writers like Faulkner Kathy Acker a lot of science fiction Octavia Butler I'm a big fan of Cara Wack. I love a lot of Victorian literature and
00:26:31
Speaker
Henry James and this is the stuff like you would I would devour and you're a writer and people would devour your stuff because it's like oh it's so inspiring who's that for you what are the type of writers where you like you want to talk you want to talk no seriously like you want to talk right and you gotta be talking about some of these folks who's that for you
00:26:54
Speaker
Absolutely. I mean, I would say if I'm going to hop on like today, totally James S.A. Corey, which is actually two different people. It's Daniel Abraham and Ty Frank. And I, oh, God, I hope I got that right.
00:27:09
Speaker
They were a partnership that wrote the Expanse series. And yes, they are definitely my number one right now. And I can tell you some of those reasons why but I'm trying to think about some other
00:27:26
Speaker
once. Like growing up, I was such a little dreamy girl. I read all of like the LM Montgomery, you know, Anna Green Gables series. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh, I know, right? I totally dated myself there because, and of course I read all of my kids. We read all of the Harry Potter's. We read all of the Mocking J's and Hunger Games and all of that. So
00:27:54
Speaker
So when I'm giving you like these different names, you can hear I'm kind of all over the map. I also, you know, I like an occasional really, oh my gosh, Laura, is it Laura Hillenbrand who did like, oh my gosh, Seabisc in on multiple. Like I can get into a really great biography too. And you wanna read about a bit of a tortured soul when it comes to,
00:28:21
Speaker
The the process around her right? I'm gonna check that out. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah, really really interesting stuff, but I I I just don't have one thing. I
Literary Influences and Reading Habits
00:28:34
Speaker
mean, there are so many things I would say that I'm actually I tend to be a really slow reader very slow because I Will read a line I like and then I'm like, oh
00:28:46
Speaker
I gotta read that line again and I'll read it again and again. So I'm very, very slow at reading. I would say the very first, very, very first book ever when I was younger that just absolutely captured me. I'm usually embarrassed to admit because you're gonna hear the name of the author and you're going to think something very different than who he is. Battlefield Earth.
00:29:15
Speaker
Yeah. Which I read when I was like 14 and it's by L. Ron Hubbard. Yeah, no, I yeah.
00:29:23
Speaker
Yeah, I know. I know there's the whole the whole the whole Scientology thing. But I mean, as a writer, no, as as a writer, I mean, he's somebody to be reckoned, somebody to be reckoned with as a writer, you know, no doubt. Really was. And the movie was horrible. So anybody who's hearing this, I recall that. Yeah. Oh, my gosh. And what's interesting is I find that here I am. Well, gosh,
00:29:50
Speaker
like 30 some years later after the first time I read that book. And I still see some of his themes make their way into my own writing and
00:30:03
Speaker
But yeah, it's hard to say that there's just one that I like. I love reading. I'm a very, very slow reader because I want to eat and taste every single word that's on the page. Totally understand that. Totally understand that, particularly in the art that you make.
00:30:24
Speaker
Jerry, I want to ask you another one related to art. I really loved when you were talking about stories and the communication component.
00:30:35
Speaker
You know both as an artist and then the art itself. What do you think? Um, what do you think the role of art is? Right now in just one little comment for a late answer you got um, you got the elements in in your book in your series of kind of temperature rising climate change and things like that and
00:30:59
Speaker
And I interject that within you know, you what you've created just with the ideas What is the role of art and is there something now that the role of art might be different? you know, I'm saying if you identify climate change or any of other the world ills as being at a You know at that state so role of art and is it different right now today in September 2022 you you know
00:31:32
Speaker
Art plays a role in having very important conversations. I don't know that it's different than it's always been. There's the famous play, Our Town. It's Thornton Wilder. I mean,
00:31:50
Speaker
And he has this line, I'm not gonna get it exact. So anybody listening, look it up because he says it far better. But basically he says that our history, that history is told by the artists. And if you think about that throughout the course of history, it's true, you know, like the musicians and the concertos that were told Shakespeare who told his,
00:32:18
Speaker
his stories that mocked the royalty, but really kind of highlighted that divide between the classes of that time. The Greeks and Romans telling the story of their belief system through the stories and the visual art around their gods and how the gods would play and the people would pay. I mean, sort of...
00:32:47
Speaker
So I think that that role of art leading to the conversation has always existed. I think that generationally, where we currently are,
00:33:03
Speaker
This
Art as a Bridge for Important Conversations
00:33:04
Speaker
is a sad thing to say as an artist. I think there are a lot of people who abuse that. I know particularly in like the late 90s, but even to a certain extent, still continuing today, there are people who wanted that shock factor in their art, whether it was on a stage or in a book or in an art museum, you know, where they're
00:33:33
Speaker
they're not really causing a conversation. They're just causing people to be shocked. And I don't know that there's productivity in that. But if you're actually creating conversation between people, if you're actually trying to build bridges instead of walls with your art, then it's serving its current purpose.
00:33:59
Speaker
And then historically looking back, hopefully some of the best art will serve that longer term purpose of telling history.
00:34:12
Speaker
Yeah, I guess I guess that's that I do believe that and I believe like there's so many times that we want to our news is so stinking sensationalized and everything is just so extreme and divided and
00:34:31
Speaker
What causes extremities and division is numbers. You know, oh, this many people died from this and this many people that and this many dollars and this many, whatever diseases are, it's all numbers. And what I found, and particularly highlighted in these pandemic years that we have found ourselves is that when you take the numbers aside,
00:35:01
Speaker
And instead you tell the stories, people listen. And so yeah, it creates conversation in ways that find unity instead of highlight division.
00:35:14
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, I think it's a really good instinct. And I also think it's a really good fertile ground in general, you know, in discussing that, right, as far as like access to space. And I think one of the things you brought up is really interesting. I mean, I think when you talk about shock or shock for its own sake, I think you get right into the debate is, yeah, sometimes, you know, what is underneath it all? And then at other times, you know, artists,
00:35:45
Speaker
shock whatever seems to be around. When you think of a political protest, one of the historical examples I think is one of Alaska's pieces in the British Museum. It's a Venus depiction. The suffragettes in the 1910s or maybe 1920s in England
00:36:09
Speaker
I believe it was one or two of them ran up to it and cut it through you know with with with a knife and I've always thought about that because I think it's just so unresolved whereas I'm telling you the story right now in 2022 about a political
00:36:26
Speaker
act that they did so like it works in the sense of that but you know in the sense of not even traditional outrage but just like art lover outrage being like you can't put knives true of Alaska it's like don't do that but then when you do it it creates the thing so I think it's always fascinating the
00:36:46
Speaker
you know the shock of the art or yeah sure around the the art and uh I think even lately people been throwing these cakes at everything um at the Mona Lisa in the Louvre where somebody oh that's right yeah like why why anyways it's a wild it's a wild uh wild idea not to take us way off the role of art yes um uh so um
00:37:14
Speaker
Jerry big
The Necessity of Connection Beyond Self-Interest
00:37:15
Speaker
question name of the show you can go any direction with this but like Why is there why is there something rather rather than nothing from your perspective like? Why? Yeah, honestly, I Otherwise what's the point, you know, I just I feel like the something is is Something beyond ourselves
00:37:44
Speaker
And if there's nothing, if there's nothing beyond ourselves, then none of us have a point. None of us have a point to do anything but what feels good in the moment, what is self-serving. And there would be zero reason to not just go out and take what I want and do what I want with no thought to who's hurt in the process.
00:38:13
Speaker
if there was nothing. So there has to be something, there has to be something, there has to be a reason that we don't just serve self in this world that we live in. And if we're not just serving ourselves,
00:38:30
Speaker
then we have to serve others. There has to be something. There has to be something that connects us, something that makes us want to make the world better. And again, if not,
00:38:45
Speaker
What's the point? No, that's the philosophy end point. What's the point of it? I think one of the funniest pieces about these absurd questions, and thank you for playing, Jerry, these absurd questions. I've always found this is, and there's some people who think this about philosophy,
00:39:07
Speaker
I like to laugh and I do think a lot of things are just fundamentally absurd and you know, so that that's part of that's part of me and Philosophy is so serious and so important until it breaks down and then it's not and you just end up laughing a lot around this so it's like the idea of Philosophy is therapy art is therapy Morning pages is therapy writing is therapy or work and work
00:39:39
Speaker
Jerry Shepherd, where do we go to find your stuff? We talked about the at fault book. Tell us where to find your website, get that book, what formats in, all that stuff. Okay, I like to try to make it really easy for everybody. I just made it at faultbook.com when that's the first book in the series.
00:40:04
Speaker
We'll be maintaining that website as it grows as a series. So it's at faultbook.com. We make it nice and easy. That takes you to my site. Currently it's available in
00:40:18
Speaker
print as well as an e-book. We are producing the audio book this fall. I'm so excited. So it'll probably be out. Yeah, it'll be out hopefully before the second book, which should be out next spring. And we also have
00:40:35
Speaker
I have an amazing, amazing on retainer artist who is creating all of the incredible artifacts, the maps and the flags and the portraits and some of those are gonna be found there too. But yeah, at faultbook.com that takes you to not just everything at fault, but everything. You can click to my backlist of books as well.
00:41:00
Speaker
Excellent. Well, that makes it that makes it nice and easy everybody check it out And I think one of the things I find too is when you know here at this point when you're starting out this series It's always good to get in at the beginning. I find sometimes it's tough to catch up. So Get in on the fault lines series with Jerry Shepherd and check out the the website there to find out
00:41:25
Speaker
about all her other work and things that she creates and thinks about. And I'm going to tell you, Jerry, it's so nice to chat with you from a place in the country of the United States that I love, the Midwest and Wisconsin, where I used to live. So it's a great pleasure to reach you out.
00:41:46
Speaker
um from there and just to hear about you know just meeting you and your new you know adventures and just like really just talking about doing some cool stuff like creating what you want and uh you know um just kind of uh you know sharing uh your thoughts on on philosophy um really appreciate you coming on and you know enduring questions like uh something why is this something other than nothing Jared
00:42:11
Speaker
That's right. Ken, I promise I'll throw some of those back at you the next time we get to talk like this. I'm always grateful to speak to another creative and I've really enjoyed this conversation.
00:42:24
Speaker
Yeah, thanks so much, Jerry. Best of luck with everything and it'd be good to keep in touch. And everybody check out all the other art Jerry was referring to and, you know, the different pieces in addition to the book. And thanks again, Jerry, and thanks for everything you create. Thank you, Ken. I appreciate it. This is something rather than nothing.