Comfort Reads: A Guest Post by K. L. Walther

Playing by the rules has always been her motto, but when Audrey’s dreams are on the line, she’s forced to rewrite them and maybe even find love along the way. Read on for an exclusive essay from author K. L. Walther on writing Our Monthly Pick, We’re a Bad Idea, Right?

The first musings of We’re a Bad Idea, Right? took place on a dark and stormy night on Martha’s Vineyard with my mom and my aunt. I was on island to revise While We’re Young, my fourth novel and a contemporary retelling of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off; they were there to have a lot of rainy fun. After dinner, I’d prop up my laptop so we could binge the eighties’ greatest hits, everything from Sixteen Candles to Some Kind of Wonderful to Say Anything. I knew I wanted to write another movie retelling, but it wasn’t until we watched Risky Business that I felt a spark of inspiration. Like Ferris Bueller, Risky Business is a ridiculous but edge-of-your-seat caper led by a male protagonist. I couldn’t help but think, Why should the guys get to have all the fun?

And so began the process of both gender-swapping the main character and updating the film for today’s readers. Like Tom Cruise, Audrey makes a mistake while her parents are out of town and needs to make some serious cash seriously fast. Unlike Tom Cruise, who sinks his dad’s Porsche, Audrey needs funding for her prestigious glassblowing fellowship. Rather than opening a brothel, she becomes a Here-to-Stay host (the KLW Universe’s version of Airbnb) to earn the money she needs for her tuition. It was a lot of fun to brainstorm different guests, all with their own quirks, and to see Audrey’s friends band together to help—especially Henry, her best friend and Etsy business partner. When writing their romance, I was hooked on the classic phrase: Don’t mix business with pleasure. Their pact to fake-date each other is nothing more than a business matter; Henry wants to win back his ex-girlfriend, while Audrey wants her crush to finally notice her. Simple, clean, and straightforward, no?

I devoured young adult novels as a teenager, and they have become the ultimate “comfort reads” in my twenties and beyond. And as an author, they are a joy to write. The genre allows me to create stories with a true sense of optimism and possibility. Young adult characters aren’t beaten down by life; they don’t have career or financial pressures. That’s not saying they don’t experience true hardship, but they are still free to discover who they are and who they want to be, all while making mistakes along the way. In a sense, they are waiting for their lives to begin, whether that centers around evolving friendships, their love life, or the horizon after high school—the possibilities of new relationships and the pain of letting some go. I think there’s romance in all of these themes, and I really enjoy finding them and teasing them out. Usually to the tune of a Taylor Swift song.