National Book Award finalist Julia Phillips joins Zibby to discuss BEAR, a spellbinding and richly imagined novel about survival, obsession, and two sisters on San Juan Island whose lives are disrupted by the arrival of a mysterious bear. Julia delves into the symbolic and narrative significance of the bear, drawing inspiration from Grimm’s fairy tales and her personal fascination with the animal. She touches on family dynamics, isolation, violence, and resilience, all set against the backdrop of a vividly depicted island. She also delves into her writing process, her research into bear behavior, and her upcoming project—this time set on Cape Cod.

Transcript:

Zibby: Welcome, Julia.

Thanks so much for coming on Moms Don't Have Time To Read Books to discuss Bear. Congratulations. 

Julia: Thank you so much. Thank you so much for having me. 

Zibby: I have already been talking about this book so much. I, like, keep bringing it up. Like, I don't even know. It's in my head. You've, like, totallyyour characters, all of it.

I keep referencing how cool the setting is and, uh, just all of it. I don't know. I feel like in the last three book events I've done, I'm like, but I'm reading this book Bear. So. 

Julia: That makes me really happy. I think, I think bears are very hot right now, so it's very topical, I think, to be, uh, to be excitedly talking about bears, which I always am, so.

Zibby: Yes, you are. Yeah. You're on trend. You're on trend. It's really great. 

Julia: I've been waiting my whole life for that moment. Thank goodness. 

Zibby: I should send you the pictures of when my family, we went to a, a, like a, like a motel. I don't even, we took this crazy trip upstate and there were bears in the, at like by the pool and we had. 

Julia: Oh my gosh.

Zibby: A mother bear and her two cubs. Yeah. I'll send you the page if you care. I would love to see them. Are 

Julia: you kidding me? Of course I care. I'm like, I want to see these bears in these bikinis by the, by the swimming pool. I want to see this. 

Zibby: It was like out of a movie. They were like three feet away. And like, oh my gosh, in that dumpster.

And then I was like, that's a loud noise. And I'm thinking, is that going to be like a raccoon? And then all of a sudden the bears. Like head popped up and I like grabbed my kids by the back of their shirts and I was like, run! And we like raced across the parking lot, like went into the room and like tried to lock the door and I was like, stay in the room!

Oh my gosh! I just got scared by my own dog behind me after telling that story. But anyway, yeah. 

Julia: Well, I think your dog is ready to protect you now. I think your dog hears what's going on. You guys hear him? I'm here. 

Zibby: Yeah. Anyway, I feel like I can speak with authority about bears after, after this.

Julia: Absolutely. Close encounter. 

Zibby: Okay. Tell listeners what Bear is about. 

Julia: It is about two sisters who live in this beautiful place called San Juan Island off the coast of Washington state. And they have a certain plan for how their future will go. They've really been struggling to make ends meet there. And they have had this plan to get off the island.

And then their plans change when a, when a bear shows up at their front door and one sister feels. That's really drawn to this animal. The other sister feels really afraid of it and this changes the course of their lives. 

Zibby: Well, the family dynamics between the two sisters and the mom, who's the youngest, You know, not doing well in the beginning and progressively gets worse and worse and all of that.

Having a character who works in the snack bar of a fairy is so genius, like, it's so perfect on so many levels, right, that all the characters that she encounters and just the ups and downs and, you know. The transand how much she hates it, honestly. And how trapped she feels as she just goes back and forth.

It's like the ultimateit's just so, it's so good. How did you think of that? 

Julia: I really loved that setting of the ferry. So the island is accessible only by ferry, or I guess by, you know, airplane if you're very fancy, which these characters are not, but their lives are really ruled by the fairy. And so working on the fairy felt so natural, so right, and also such a great way for the readers to sort of have an entry point into this world, like to sort of, Rules that define how, how you get there, how it functions, when you're delayed, how much weather affects you, how much the schedule affects you.

And Sam, the main character, has this particular position there. As you said, she, she's not really a state ferry's employee. She's a, she works in a galley. She works for like food services. So she has this job in this essential place, but she is not. Like, she doesn't have a pension. She doesn't have state benefits.

She's not sort of in the system that makes working on the ferry great. She's in the system that is supplementary to that. And I think that positioning is very, by the way, the amount of sirens behind me is. 

Zibby: It will probably come here. I'm okay. 

Julia: Fantastic. It's going to go from me to you. 

Zibby: I know. I feel like the city is like, yeah, we're like. 

Julia: It's, it's bustling.

Yeah. But yeah, she, she does not like the position that she's in at her job and she, it's sort of befitting or it speaks to the many different ways in her life. She feels like secondary or not doesn't have what she wants. She is a dreamer and a fantasizer, and she has an ambition of, of living a different life, but she has not been able to access it.

And I think her job supports that. 

Zibby: Yes. The whole family feels just so stuck. I mean, the girls. Had made this plan. They wanted to get off the island and then their mom was sick. And so they had to stay and they just felt, it just feels so, they're just so unhappy in a way. They're okay, but they're, you know, it's caretaking.

And just getting through the day and the way that you show all the challenges and when little things happen or the bills for the doctor or just like when each thing happens and how the pandemic affected them financially, like the portrait of a struggling family, just trying to adapt to the, continuous obstacles thrown by the universe.

It's just, it's so well drawn. And then of course, the introduction of, of the bear on top of everything. Tell me about just crafting the family and the sisters and the mom and you know, the mom of course had this horrible, you know, work related, you know, demise of her lungs and everything. And you could just feel, it's almost like the whole family has the air being taken out of them.

You know, it's not just the mom. 

Julia: Yeah. Yeah. I love the way you put that. I started writing this. During, after a year of being very stuck in my own life, uh, I started writing it in 2021 after, you know, pretty challenging 2020. I'm sure I'm not alone in that. And I had this sort of paired experience where right as the pandemic began, when I was here in New York, I also had my first kid and that like, twinned experience was, was very difficult.

I would not recommend having a baby and in a lockdown. pandemic lockdown. And I think the kind of stuckness I felt, the collision with all these systems that all of us were having, that I was having in my own life through the, through like, you know, you're pregnant, you have a baby, all of a sudden you're like in this prolonged conversation with health insurance and the healthcare system and the medical establishment.

And then also total lack of social services, total lack of child care, total lack of maternity leave that is, or parental leave that is like comprehensive and supportive. I think all of those experiences were really influential in shaping this family and shaping this character. So they have been dealing with healthcare, insurance, the medical establishment, lack of social services for more than a decade now and through because of their mom's illness.

And they have really not their day to day has been really challenging and they're managing that challenge. It's been very, very challenging for them. And I wanted this. Look to explore that for that new dynamic. Like they love each other so much. They're there for each other. All three of them live together.

These two adult daughters and their mother. And they, I think like love, there's no question that they're going to be each other's supporters, you know, like they are going to be there for each other and where there are cracks in the system that they're falling through. They're going to try their best to provide a safety net for each other individually, but that task is overwhelming sometimes and really, really difficult.

Yeah. And they have managed it as best they can, and it's still really hard. I wanted to, like, really explore that, how that shapes their relationships to each other, how that shapes their relationships to this place, and to their work, and to their life, and to their neighbors, and how that, of course, influences how they react when all of a sudden something changes, or the dynamic is different because of this kind of Beast that shows up.

Zibby: Yeah, and let's go back. Let's go to the beast for a moment here. Let's go. I always want to talk about the beast. Yeah. So I read about your sort of lifelong fascination and Grimm's fairy tales and all of that, but we're talk more about how the bear became the thing. 

Julia: I think the bear is kind of always the thing for me.

I think I, in my first book. Which was also my last book, you know, the only other book I've had come out. I put a bear in there. I love a bear. I do love to, like, think and talk about bears. And this, the roots of this story, the roots of this novel, are found in a lot of different places. But one very direct inspiration is this Grimm's fairy tale, uh, called Snow White and Rose Red.

And it's about these two sisters who live in this cottage with their mother, quite isolated, and then a bear comes to their door. And in the fairy tale the bears, this turns out to be this enchanted prince. They like sort of have these foibles and adventures. They find a bunch of jewels. It's it's a very different structure than this story is.

And I loved this fairy tale as a kid. And I found it so perverse, I would say, and strange and compelling, the way these sisters reacted to this animal. And it always stuck in my mind. As a kid, I would try to rewrite it and not find a way to do that. And I think this was my, my biggest attempt yet. And it was the one that left me feeling the most satisfied.

I have these sisters. A bear shows up at their door, just like this, you know, long ago inspiration. It was never going to be a different animal for me. It was both because of the fairytale, because of my own love of bears. It was never going to be like, you know, uh, a moose or a lion. And then what, what happens next?

And is it a little perverse and is it compelling? I hope, I mean, my fingers are crossed. 

Zibby: Yes, i, I think it is. 

You've had so much early, you know, enthusiasm for the book too. I mean, it's, you know, it's just, it's, you know, sometimes when I feel like there's buzz around a book, I'm like, could it really be that good?

Do you mean? Like not just yours, I mean in general, like what is it? 

Julia: I know what you mean. 

Zibby: Are you sure? And then you read it and you're like, oh, it is really good. You know, and that's always such a relief. 

Julia: I love that. I think you're in a place where you hear the buzz. I feel that the. But my experience often is just like sitting alone in my home, not knowing what is buzzing or not.

So, so I'm glad to witness that experience. 

Zibby: There's a lot of scientific stuff here and then you even have somebody from the science department who's tracking everything and all, you know, where did all that come from? Do you have to research? Did you research for this? Did you research for the last one?

Julia: Absolutely. Yes, definitely. A lot of research. I mean, the, the way that the, the way that the bear behaves in this. The book is rooted in a fairytale, but it's not meant to feel anything but like hyper realistic in a way. I want it to feel very, very, very, very grounded, and to me that is sort of the most appealing part of fairytales, the way they would give you all these details and you would say, what is this weird world?

I want this to be the same way, to give a lot of details and feel like, what's this weird world? The way that the bear behaves in the book is I would say at the extreme end of what's possible, um, it's not, not at all, it's not like, unrealistic, but it's unlikely that, that, that they would behave this way.

The way that the sisters behave is also unlikely, and I would say unwise, and there are characters around them who say, you know, this is not how one should engage with this animal, and, and like, it's very much on, Then the way they are reacting to it, the way they are engaging it is shaping its behavior and kind of amplifying the, they're engaging like a feedback loop with this animal that is making the stakes higher and more difficult and more dangerous, which is fabulous for a narrative, but not good Zaire's behavior.

So I really love having this. This character from the wildlife department having a, providing a kind of check, a reality check and a chance for us to see like, this is the outside world. This is what, this is what like someone who knows what they're doing, how it would react, how, what they would say. But yeah, that is not how the sisters behave.

They do not, they do not listen to that good advice for sure. 

Zibby: So you had a baby during lockdown. You had another baby I saw about a year ago. And you have on social a picture of yourself, like vomiting from pregnancy with your son, sort of, you know, looking on with such concern and care. It's so sweet. 

Julia: It was very supportive.

Zibby: Oh my gosh. So, You know, having, I mean, I have four kids. It is, those, you're in it, right? You're in the weeds. How are you pulling this off? You're still writing beautiful fiction. When and how are you doing this? Like, do you not feel that your brain, like, I felt like my brain was mush for so long, for years, you know?

Julia: For years, yeah, totally. Totally. 

Zibby: And yet you're doing this. I mean, it's amazing. So tell me about how you were able to do this. 

Julia: After my first kid was born, I like my brain was at the end of pregnancy. I just like watched Bon Appetit Test Kitchen all day long. And that's all I did. You know, this was like spring 2020.

At this point, I was just after he was born, I really About anxiety. And it was again, like, you know, I get to pick this in June, 2020 that he was born right in New York city. Like this was not a great time in where I live in the world. It's not a great time in anyone's life. It certainly was not a great time in mine.

And the idea of writing or enjoying myself or having fun seemed really far away from what I was doing. And I felt like my priority for more than a year was just like, stay safe, keep everything as stable as possible, don't disrupt anything, I was afraid to go outside, like the idea of even I don't know, traveling in my imagination was daunting.

I felt so far from the person I was. I think those circumstances were extreme. And it ended up, writing this book ended up being the, the, a real return to like, okay, maybe I'm not going outside, but I can imagine going outside. Or maybe I'm, Feel stuck. But I can imagine someone else who feels stuck. It was like the first bit of getting to edge a little bit away from myself or a little bit away from my own experience or a little bit away from all the things I was afraid of towards something that could be exciting, could be different.

And it ended up being so, dare I say, healing. Just to imagine and play pretend and write down a story that was so different from anything I'd ever written before, but so fun and so exciting. I think that the extremity of that, if that's an applicable word in this situation, In this instance, I think how extreme that, that feeling was at the time helped me a lot when the second kid was born, because when the second kid was born, I was like, Oh my God, we can do things and people can come over and someone else can hold the baby when you're tired and breathing air is not going to kill you.

And it just felt such, it was a relatively like such an easier transition. And I was at that point, you know, already in edits for this project. I was like, this is fun. This is delightful. I didn't feel any more than that disconnection from the person I'd been. It felt like a smoother thing. Did you, four kids, did, your last two are twins?

Zibby: First two are twins. 

Julia: First two are twins. Okay, I have to imagine, talk about extreme circumstances. I have to imagine that was a pretty extreme entry into parenthood. 

Zibby: Yeah, that's true. That's why I can't imagine, you know, 

Julia: Well, I mean, I did not have twins. I did not have, like, did it get easier with each kid or each birth?

Or was it just a re entry? It's so variable for every kid, I guess. 

Zibby: Yeah. I mean, I had six years in between the twins and my next kid. 

Julia: Yeah. That seems reasonable. 

Zibby: So when I had one kid, I was like, oh my gosh, this is like a walk in. And she was such an easy baby, too. Yeah. And I was like Oh, my God. People experience life this way.

Julia: You know, that was me this last time around. Yeah, totally. Totally. 

Zibby: It's amazing. Like, it's amazing for me. I would have more kids all the time, you know, doing this. 

Julia: I was like, well, I got a million kids, which I can't have a million kids, but like relatively easy. 

Zibby: But I wouldn't have known how easy it was. So I was very grateful for that.

You know, that's how life works, right? 

Julia: Yeah. Yeah, totally. 

But of course. 

Zibby: Yeah. So are you, like, if this were in an English class, right, in 10 years or 20 years and people are like, okay, like, what do we think the significance of the bear is in, in these women's lives? Like how, how should we read into this?

Like, what is your answer to that? 

Julia: I think the bear is just the bear. Like from the writer's standpoint, the bear is a bear. It's an animal that showed up. It's just an animal. And I don't think it, I don't think It's not a symbol. It is like an animal that has fur. It breathes. It takes shits on their, on their sidewalk.

You know, it is lovely. 

Zibby: Thank you for that.

Julia: I, I think the way that they see it, I think both the sisters react to it as like, this is a visitation from another world. Sort of like this is something, I think the Elena, the older sister, who's really drawn to this animal, feels like, well, this is. I've been working so hard for so long. I have been really like I had to just go through day by day like don't think about what's coming next. Don't lose track of it Like I just really have to hold on grip as tightly as I can to my responsibilities to my tasks to like just getting through the next moment and I think to her the bear is almost like um It's such a joy, it's a reward, it's, it's a kind of way of escaping the life she's been living and having this ecstatic, transcendent experience to be able to be close to something that is so different, so magnificent, like majestic, I think really, yeah, it's a gift for her.

Sam, her younger sister's reaction is very different. I think, Sam sees like, here is the, here is like a disruption that's going to ruin us, you know, this is this dangerous thing that shows up from the outside that is driving a wedge between us that is like actually quite literally very dangerous to us physically, you know, dangerous to our lives.

And it's just messing everything up. We had a certain way of thinking, and this is just, is destroying that. 

The reaction that Sam has to the bear is, she sees it like as a malevolent force, I think, in lots of ways, which I would say it is not. It But, you know, it is dangerous. It's it is threatening. 

Zibby: I'll peek in on some English classes in 10 years because I don't think that's what they're going to say.

Julia: If they're reading it in English classes in 10 years, what I'll actually say is, what are you doing? You read this book that's all full of bear poop and curses. 

Zibby: Maybe they won't, but I think they might. 

Julia: Maybe, maybe, probably not, not, not on like the middle school level, I think. 

Zibby: No, no, I'm thinking high school.

This is like 11th grade. 

Julia: Yeah, high school. 11th grade I can see. 

Zibby: 11th grade. 

Julia: Fingers crossed. 

Zibby: What is your next project? 

Julia: I'm working on another project that is again about women and violence and isolation. I think those are the subjects that I love to think about. It's set on Cape Cod, which I'm very, very excited about because my My husband grew up, was born and raised on the Cape, and my in laws still live there.

And I had had, before I met him, when I was a child, a child bride here, I was 20 when we met. I did not know what, I thought the Cape Cod was the Kennedys, you know, and I didn't know what it was like to live there year round. I really didn't understand there are people who do live there year round. I didn't understand there.

The particular demands of this particular place, and I think through him, got really interested in a setting that is isolated. Like what, what does that, I grew up feeling very stuck in suburban New Jersey, but it wasn't until I got to the Cape that I was like, oh, this is, Like, what, what being stuck looks like can look very different from the malls of New Jersey.

And I think I've been trying to write about that for a long time. And in this next project, I get to write about it a little bit more directly. I get to go to the Cape myself. Yeah. I'm like really excited. 

Zibby: It's right, it's right in time for the launch of this Cape Cod Book Festival. 

Julia: I'm very excited about Cape Cod, but I'm very excited about Martha's Vineyard Book Festivals.

I'm very excited about Nantucket Book Festivals. Of course, the book doesn't actually exist yet, but I'm already excited. Like Sam and Bear, I'm a, I'm a fantasizer and I like to fantasize about how good life will be before I actually live it or even have any hope of living it. 

Zibby: This is one of those secrets.

It's like write a book where, you know, you can be quite strategic if you want about where you set your book, you know, like where you. 

Julia: I mean, sometimes it works. Sometimes the place where you set your book, then. Invades Ukraine and you will never go back there again. So, okay. No good for you mileage may vary your mileage may vary I wouldn't recommend Russia currently probably as a setting or maybe I would I want to read always books it's everywhere.

True. 

Zibby: I didn't mean to be flip about that. 

Julia: No, no, no.

Zibby: I knew where your last mic was set and all, you know, all of that. So. 

Julia: I did not think you were being flip. I think I'm being flip. 

Zibby: Okay. Okay. Okay. So, okay. 

Julia: No, you're doing great. 

Zibby: I was just saying how great you'd get to go to Cape Cod. But anyway. 

Julia: Oh, I know.

Totally. I feel the same exact way. I feel like that's what I feel like is the gift of research, novel fiction research. You set up someplace and then you get to just hang out there. 

Zibby: In college, my brother was a runner at a restaurant, like who, you know, took the food from one place to the other, like in the kitchen on Cape Cod.

And lived in like this. 

Julia: Where on the Cape? 

Zibby: Oh my gosh. I don't know. I'm not familiar with it. I've only been there the one time when I visited him. And like he and the guys he was living with, I like wouldn't even sit down on the chair. It was so disgusting. You know what I mean? Like it was so, they were like, 19 years old.

Julia: I feel like that is, that is like visiting a brother's house is always, always like that. Visiting a brother's apartment. 

Zibby: And I do feel like I got a good taste of Cape Cod there and like meeting the people in the back of the restaurant and you know, the whole, you know, like the rundown, par three mini course in like, I have it all like in my 

mind, so.

Julia: It's a vibe, it's a vibe. And it's also like a stunningly beautiful place. It's so gorgeous. But yeah, it's a vibe. Definitely. Like there's a new book coming out in a couple of weeks, actually end of this month called wait by Gabriella Burnham. And it's also a second novel. Yeah. And so it's set on Nantucket and, and talk so much about like summer people and the people who live on Nantucket year round.

And she just captures, The Nantucket vibe so incredibly, which is a place, I mean, I'm saying that I like, hardly, I don't think I've ever been to Nantucket, but from a distance, I'm like, Oh my gosh. 

Zibby: Yeah. This is it. You would imagine. This is what it was. 

Julia: I imagine. And she, she, you know, grew up there. Like, she knows very, very well.

And I just love seeing it through her eyes. 

Zibby: Yeah, I feel like I read something similar said in the Hamptons and now I'm blanking on what. 

Julia: Oh my gosh. Okay. Well, I will live. 

Zibby: Oh, no, no, no. Amanda. Well, it's nonfiction, but Amanda Fairbanks wrote a whole book, but it was said a while ago, but still anyway, off topic.

Okay. Anyway, Julia, do you have any advice for aspiring authors? 

Julia: Yes, I do. 

Zibby: Okay. 

Julia: I'm going to blow aspiring authors minds, okay? I'm ready. I'm ready. I know you've never heard these before, okay? My, I have three go to things that I tell myself, and that when other people ask if I have any to say, these are my three go to things to say, so that's what I repeat to myself.

So one is write as much as possible, two is read as much as possible, and three is like take care. Build a community as much as possible, or connect to a community as much as possible. I say one, the writing part, because I think we get really psyched out sometimes. Or we, you know, like, perhaps one might. If one's name is Julia, sort of get so paralyzed by how good you want the writing to be that you don't actually write.

So just, just write, just like use the muscles. It's okay. You have, you might have an off day. You might have an off year. Not a big deal. Just keep going. Read as much as possible. Or off like decades, honestly. 

Zibby: Off a decade. 

Julia: Okay. Whatever. 

Zibby: Roll with it. 

Julia: Do it. Yeah. Just roll with it. I read as much as possible. I think a lot of times when I feel stuck, it's because I'm not.

Reading, um, and it teaches you so much and just read whatever is interesting to you and don't worry about whether it would impress your, uh, your English teacher and this mythical 11th grade English class, just read and connect to people. I was blown away by how much my craft improved. And my understanding of what a writing career looks like when I started to talk to other writers.

And that could like be in line, online, it could be in person, it could be going to readings, it could just be like, I don't know, hanging out at your local bookstore, whatever, whatever, but just building a world or entering a world where you're connected to books and writers really opens your eyes to what's possible.

Which you've done, Zibby. I mean, like, you have built your world. Oh. Do you feel like it changed the game for you? 

Zibby: I just am so happy. Like, I literally, I love, I love what I do and it's such an amazing community of, of people. And I mean, yeah. And, you know, some people have all, they've all different viewpoints on a lot of things, you know, and yet we all can connect over books and fictitious characters and human emotions and experiences.

And I think that's something that we all have to really focus on these days in particular. 

Julia: We can connect over those and then we can argue over, um, which character we like and which character we didn't like and then like. argue over the endings of those books that we are connecting over, like, yes. I have many literary disputes, which I always, always love.

Zibby: Better than, better than political. So, I don't know. Okay. Anyway, thank you so much. This is really great. And you should be very proud, in particular, given the life stage you're in. But any life stage, really captivating. And, um, Yeah. Congrats. 

Julia: Thank you so much. for talking to me. I really appreciate 

this and thank you for putting up with all the, all the background noise behind me.

I really appreciate it. 

Zibby: I barely even heard it and I had like a nice quiet half an hour. So that was a blessing. I jinxed it. Okay. Thank you.

Julia: Okay. Thanks.