Episode 118: Stephanie Landsem, author of Code Name Edelweiss
Stephanie Landsem introduces us to her fifth novel, Code Name Edelweiss
Based on true events, the novel tells the story of how a lone Jewish lawyer and a handful of amateur spies discovered and foiled Adolf Hitler's plan to take over Hollywood.
Stephanie shares her best writing advice, how she came across the true story that inspired this latest book.
Check out the book club questions and Stephanie’s recipe for Old Fashioned Prune Cake (German Brown Cake) on Book Club Bites.
Books Mentioned:
Code Name Edelweiss by Stephanie Landsem (Bookshop.org / Amazon.com )
Hitler in Los Angeles: How Jews Foiled Nazi Plots Against Hollywood by Steven J. Ross (Bookshop.org / Amazon.com )
Within These Walls of Sorrow: A Novel of World War II Poland by Amanda Barratt (Bookshop.org / Amazon.com )
Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt (Bookshop.org / Amazon.com )
Full Disclosure: We are part of the Amazon and bookshop.org affiliate programs, which means Lainey or Ashley get a tiny commission if you buy something after clicking through from link on this website.
Connect with the author:
Transcript:
** Transcript created using AI (so please forgive the typos!) **
Ashley Hasty 0:00
Hi, Stephanie, I am thrilled to have you as a guest on the best of women's fiction podcast because to quote your bio, you write historical fiction for women about women. I'm glad to be here. And yes, I do. And I love it. I love asking authors how they become authors. Their journeys are often as varied as the stories they write. So tell me a bit about your journey to becoming a historical fiction author, was it a direct path or more meandering? You know, it was remarkably direct. Once I decided that's what I wanted to do. The surprising thing to me was actually deciding it. Because I really never thought about writing historical fiction. I've always been a reader. And I've always had an interest in history. I stayed home with my kids, I have four kids. And when my oldest my youngest one went into school, my oldest daughter asked me what I was going to do now that I was, you know, had all this time on my hands, which you never have time on your hands. But anyway, I said, I don't know. And she said, Well, what would you do if you could do anything? And I said, Oh, I've read historical fiction, like if we're talking anything.
Stephanie Landsem 1:04
And she said, why aren't you doing that? I'm like, Well, it sounds hard. I don't know how to start. I've never done anything like this before. I'm probably not any good at it. All of those things. And she said, Mom, you would never let us get away with those kinds of excuses. Like, you're right.
Why? So that was kind of the start when I really started thinking about it. And it was hard. And I didn't know what I was doing. And I wasn't any good at it at the beginning. And so it was all of those things. But you know, years later and work and, you know, really giving it my best shot like I would expect my kids do. And lo and behold, my fifth novel,
Ashley Hasty 1:45
drawing from your personal experience, and the journey that led you to where you are now what one piece of advice do you think is most important for writers,
Stephanie Landsem 1:54
I think find the story that you really love, you know, maybe not something that you think will sell or that you think is popular at the time, but something you really want to write about, because you're gonna live in that world for a really long time. And it's gonna be with you your whole life, really, once you create that story. So make sure it's something that you really want to do like a time period, or a story or a character that you that you can stay with for a long time. I guess that would be it.
Ashley Hasty 2:24
So speaking of stories we love of course, the reason we're here today is to talk about your latest novel, codename Adel Weiss. Am I pronouncing that correctly?
Stephanie Landsem 2:32
You can pronounce it Edelweiss, or Edelweiss would be the German way right?
Ashley Hasty 2:37
Would you start by telling our listeners what it is about?
Stephanie Landsem 2:40
It is a based on a true story that happened in 1933, Los Angeles, about a lone Jewish lawyer, who with his band of amateur spies, discovered and foiled Hitler's plot to take over Hollywood, which sounds crazy, but it's one of those things that is where truth is, Stranger Than Fiction is based on an actual true story and events and people.
Ashley Hasty 3:06
I was fascinated to hear that this was based on a true story. Do you remember the first time you heard this story, which if I read correctly, it was relatively unknown until recently?
Stephanie Landsem 3:16
Yeah, it really is an unknown piece of our history in the 1930s. And that's because a lot of the records were, I believe, kept by the FBI and just released maybe 10 years ago. But yeah, I do remember very clearly, when I was researching my previous book, which is called in a far off land, and it's set in 1930s. Los Angeles sounds so. So sometimes you go down rabbit holes, or this and that. Well, I was looking at books, and I saw this book called Hitler in Los Angeles by Stephen Ross. And I thought, wait a minute, Hitler never went to Los Angeles. I mean, that I know. And so I started reading it. And as I read about this Jewish lawyer who really was prophetic in what he saw happening in Germany, and what he found happening in Los Angeles, in 1933, very early on when Hitler was barely known to us, and I thought, is this true? Could this really be true? And I did a little research and I was like, Yes. And I said, this is what I want to write about next time that makes a great book. And I read it by my husband, he was like, oh, yeah, so yeah, it was just perfect. You know, I couldn't wait to finish up with in a far off land and get started. And I knew the title right away.
Ashley Hasty 4:33
And how did the title come about? Well,
Stephanie Landsem 4:35
I love everything German because I mean, that's one thing that does draw me to to this book is because I speak German and Ben in Germany a lot. I studied in Austria for part of my school year. And and I love the Edelweiss the song, the idea of Edelweiss like the whole sound of music thing, it's just this pure, very perfect flower. And we also do associate it with World War Two, probably because of Sound of Music. So I thought, yeah, that's the perfect flower to use as a codename for my spy because Leon Lewis did use code names. And so that's, that's gonna be it.
Ashley Hasty 5:10
As our regular listeners know, my favorite part of the writing process is research. So I love hearing about how authors go about it. What was your research process like for codename Edelweiss? Did you have any favorite sources? Oh, yeah,
Stephanie Landsem 5:23
I mean, the book by Steven Ross was definitely the starting point. And his research is impeccable. I mean, that book was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 2017. I mean, he knew what he was doing. And I did contact him also, and got some more like research sources that he used. And of course, the back of the book with his with his footnotes was full of great sources. But then there's a website of the California State University in Northridge has all of Leon Lewis's boxes and boxes of his records, and he kept meticulous records. So it was COVID, sadly, or I would have been in California, but they are so good about helping you. And a whole lot of the records are scanned and digitally available. So you could really get those, those primary sources, which are just so fun to get and makes you feel like you're right there. When you're reading someone's handwriting. You're looking at, at the actual letters that anti semitic organizations sent out to people, you're just like, wow, so that was awesome. It was really fun to research. This one.
Ashley Hasty 6:32
Was there a piece of research that you wanted to include in the novel, but it didn't fit the story or had to be cut? Hmm,
Stephanie Landsem 6:39
I don't think there was, you know, there was stuff I would have expanded on in the book, because I just found it so interesting. But the book ran, I always run long on my novels anyway. And this one ran quite a bit over what my publisher wanted. So when I turned it in, I was afraid that they're gonna get back to me and say, you need to cut, which is what they usually say to me. And this time, my editor got back to me because it's long, but I can't see anything we can cut. And I was like, Oh, darn, I should have put some more in about this. This movie. This movie that was never made was I don't know if you know about who Herman make of it says he was a Jewish writer for MGM. So he wrote screenplays, he wrote Wizard of Oz, parts of Wizard of Oz, and almost all of Citizen Kane. And he wrote a movie script called Mad Dog of Europe. It was like basically a satire of Adolf Hitler. But but it was so early, it was like 1933. So nobody really knew what was going on. And they're like, why is he so crazy about this guy in Germany? Like, we have too many troubles here in the US. And most of the all of the studios rejected if they wouldn't, they wouldn't make the movie because they said it was too inflammatory to anti German, all these things. And so he never got that movie made. And it was fascinating how he saw early on what a problem Hitler was going to be. So I would have put more in there. But it is it did make its way and it does the finale, the final part of the book does have part of the movie in it.
Ashley Hasty 8:11
For those of us who don't already have a TBR pile to last a lifetime. Tell us a bit about what you're reading. What book should we not miss right now?
Stephanie Landsem 8:20
Oh, yeah, I've been reading a lot of World War Two kinds, and I really need to get away from it. I know that that's really big and historical fiction right now. And I feel like I need to expand my horizons. But I just read Amanda Barrett's book called within these walls of sorrow. And it is, it's brutal as far as like, emotionally, because it's about the end. I have been to Krakow. And I was like, Oh, I gotta read that because I love Poland. And it was really good, but it was really tough read. So yeah. What else am I reading? That's a good question. Oh, I just read. I just read a very fun book I needed like, after this within these walls of sorrow, I had to have something a little more. And I read the one. It's called, truly remarkable creatures are remarkable creatures. Do you know that one? In the title, right? But it's about this woman in Washington state who makes friends with an octopus, a Giant Pacific Octopus. The octopus is named Marcellus. And he has his own like point of view. It's absolutely adorable and such a good book. So that was my lighter read.
Ashley Hasty 9:33
I want to ask a bit about your background with German II mentioned that you've been several times that you speak German. How did that come about? How did you?
Stephanie Landsem 9:41
Yeah, it's a family thing. My dad was German. He grew up speaking German. And he lived in a Mennonite community in Pennsylvania. And so he spoke German and I just always wanted to learn it. So I learned it in high school. I went to Germany, even as a high schooler that started my love of Travel, which is a problem how much I like to get out of the country, but I just fell in love with Germany I, I love everything about it the cathedrals, the castles, the history, the language I find beautiful. Many people don't. So it's always kind of in the back of my mind is one of my favorite places and I like to research it.
Ashley Hasty 10:21
Well, I also want to share how people can find you. Can you tell us your website and where you like to hang out on social media?
Stephanie Landsem 10:27
Yeah, Stephanie land some.com. And I do a lot of research stuff there. Like if anybody's actually more interested in the historical side of the books, and just little tidbits that I find that's going to be on my, and then Facebook, too. I put a lot of that stuff on Facebook and Stephanie LANSON Instagram, I love. I do a little more fun stuff there, like my travel and my dog and my cat pictures. You know, Instagram is so I'm also there.
Ashley Hasty 10:58
Before we wrap up, is there anything else you'd like to talk about that we haven't covered yet?
Stephanie Landsem 11:02
No, other than I just am glad to be here. It's fun to talk historical fiction, and I hope everybody enjoys codename nativeness as much as I enjoyed writing it and researching it.
Ashley Hasty 11:13
Can you tell us what might be on the horizon for you? While you're like well, now?
Stephanie Landsem 11:17
Yeah, I'm I'm playing around with the idea of a new time period, the 1950s, which is, I think, really fun. I'm looking at a story about the 1959 Hebron earthquake, that not a whole lot of people know about it. It's also known as the Yellowstone earthquake. So it was an earthquake that pretty much ripped apart Yellowstone Park, and a whole lot of people died and a whole lot of stuff went on with the tourists there. So it's a neat little unknown piece of history that I'm looking into right now.
Ashley Hasty 11:50
I'll look forward to that one, too. I also, Stephanie, thank you again for joining us on the podcast and sharing your book and your experience as an author with our listeners. It's been a lot of fun chatting with you.
Stephanie Landsem
Yeah. Thanks, Ashley.