How did the idea for The View Was Exhausting come to you?
We started writing in the summer of 2016, which was dominated by celebrity romances, with social media making it so easy to gleefully follow your favorite couple’s every move. We wanted to consider romance as spectacle, something very personal that was open for wide public discussion and the group activity of determining whether each relationship was real or fake. Rather than trying to find a concrete answer, though, we were interested in the idea of a romance being not quite real and not quite fake, with the truth lying somewhere in between. We wanted two characters who were intimate and codependent but not yet ready to fall for each other. Fake dating has always been a beloved trope of ours, and we wanted to combine it with our other favorites, best-friends-to-lovers and enemies-to-lovers. We wanted to really put our main couple through it—we were all in.
What’s it like cowriting a novel with the person you’re married to?
It’s so fun! We talk about our projects all the time—over dinner, at the laundromat, on the way home from a night out. Our characters feel like close friends that we’re gossiping about behind their backs. Writing a novel is an exercise in obsession, and there’s nothing better than getting to share that obsession with the person whose opinion and ideas you admire the most. Sharing the novel between you has so many advantages—it takes some of the pressure off, makes writing a less solitary experience, and keeps us from feeling too possessive or precious about the manuscript. We respond well to edits and suggestions from first readers because we’ve been editing each other extensively the whole time.
Your favorite places to eat or drink in Berlin? And shop?
This is a funny time to answer this question since Berlin just came out of a six-month lockdown and we’re still rediscovering all our old favorite spots. The place we visit the most is probably ilse eins, which is a local ice cream and arts-and-crafts store. It offers flavors like coconut licorice, black sesame, and Moscow mule, along with the classics—everything is always delicious. It closes for the winter, and you can always tell spring has arrived when you first find it open again with a line going down the block, everyone queuing up for an ice cream in their gloves and coats.
The first restaurant we visited post-lockdown was W.n.9 Oyster Bar, the best place to get fresh grilled sea bream and oysters with lemon and pastis and crémant.
In terms of shopping, Berlin loves a flea market. It’s shopping as a social event, because everybody gets dressed up to go out to market and meet friends for drinks and street food in between browsing the stalls. If you play your cards right, you can get a designer dress for five euros or a set of vintage Famous Five books for fifty cents, and then head to the bar for a mulled wine in winter or an Aperol spritz in the summer. Everyone has a favorite market that they swear is better and more fruitful than the rest, but they’re all a good time—even the famous Mauerpark Sunday Market, if you don’t mind the crowds. We have a soft spot for our local at Kranoldplatz.
Did your perspective on fame change while writing the book?
Coming into the book, we aimed to consider fame in a very open and balanced way—it would’ve been easy to go hard on the negative side of things, but we wanted to show a famous character who was thoughtful, considered, not just being directed by her managers or trapped inside her own ego. We don’t think that perspective changed while writing because it’s such a major facet of Win’s character, but we definitely went deeper as we wondered what fame would do to your self-image and which responsibilities come with being in the public eye.
Because our main character, Win, is a film actress and a woman of color, representation politics were constantly on her mind. We started by thinking about the structural obstacles she was facing, and then we followed that line of thought onto what duties she was expected to fulfill, what sort of pressure she would be under as part of a very narrow subsection of celebrity culture. There was a temptation to make her a superhero WOC, someone who had the perfect witty response to a racist comment and who was always boldly standing up for her principles, but we found that an authentic approach would be more complicated than that. It’s not a simple choice to speak out, especially when thousands of people will be discussing and critiquing every word you say. We realized we needed to give equal weight to all of Win’s alternating priorities—her image, her career, her dignity, her mental health, her personal and professional relationships, even her own confusion and indecision—and to show all of these things being desperately managed both in public and in private. Forgive us for stating the obvious, but we reached the conclusion that fame is…exhausting!
How did you two meet?
Mikaella was traveling around Europe in 2013 and she crashed on Onjuli’s couch in Bristol for a few nights. We spent a weekend drinking a truly noxious amount of cider and watching Pitch Perfect, going to Dan Deacon gigs, and hanging out at Wetherspoons. About a week later, Mik was in Prague and Onj took a spontaneous flight out to meet her there, and the rest is [redacted].
Who are your favorite writers?
In terms of contemporary writers, we absolutely love Tamsyn Muir, Elaine Castillo, Julia Armfield, Frances Cha, Carmen Maria Machado, Jennifer Down, Tara June Winch, Jamie Marina Lau, Torrey Peters—it’s honestly exciting just to sit and write this list and see the names pile up because there are so many authors right now whom we admire. A beloved lockdown discovery has been Mò Xiāng Tóng Xiù’s fantasy novels in translation; they’re a master class in romance with just the right blend of tragedy, tropes, and outrageous hijinks.
For the past year, Mik has been running a monthly newsletter with book recommendations arranged around a theme (past themes have included blood, group chats, siblings, snacks). It’s encouraged both of us to read more widely, and we’ve discovered some new favorite authors along the way; top hits would be Eileen Chang for love, Toni Cade Bambara for some of the sharpest and most moving short stories you’ve ever read, and Elizabeth Taylor Howard for British wartime family drama.
What’s the next trip you’ll go on?
goop, you’ll make us cry if you ask about travel! We’re desperate to go anywhere outside of the city really—it’s ninety-five degrees and we’re pining for a beach! Any beach! The first stop will probably be Onjuli’s hometown in the UK, Hastings. A third of the book is set just up the coast from Hastings and it’s so dreamy in the summer: Think pebble beaches, amusement arcades, fishing boats, and the ruins of a medieval castle resting sleepy on the hill.
The last book you read and loved?
OD: Like many others I devoured Torrey Peters’s Detransition, Baby in just a few days. Reese is such a gorgeously drawn protagonist: Complicated, witty, tragic, and intelligent—I fell in love with her.
MC: I just finished Tina McElroy Ansa’s Baby of the Family, a coming-of-age story about a girl growing up in rural Georgia who was born with a caul, which gives her certain powers and access to the spiritual world. It’s eerie and funny and so sad and so happy; I was just obsessed with it.
