Author Tiffany Crum joins Alan and Heather to talk about the twenty-year journey behind her breakout debut novel, This Story Might Save Your Life. From growing up on a dairy farm next to a maximum-security prison to working in the film industry, getting fired from Warner Bros. after accidentally insulting her boss over company chat, and writing multiple novels that never sold, Tiffany opens up about the long road to becoming a published author and eventual New York Times bestseller.

The conversation dives into the persistence required to survive the publishing industry, how motherhood reshaped Tiffany’s priorities, and why she finally gave herself permission to write the book she actually wanted to read: a genre-bending thriller and love story inspired in part by true crime podcasts like My Favorite Murder. She also shares the emotional story of her son writing a college essay about watching her chase her dreams for nearly two decades and how that became one of the proudest moments of her life.

Plus, Tiffany breaks down her unusual writing process of drafting entire scenes through voice memos while walking her dogs, the collaborative process behind creating the audiobook with narrators Julia Whelan and Sean Patrick Hopkins, and the surreal moment she found out she’d become a New York Times bestseller after assuming it would never happen.

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EPISODE TAKEAWAYS

• Sometimes the creative breakthrough comes when you stop trying to fit into a market and finally write the thing you genuinely want to read.
• Persistence matters more than speed. Tiffany spent nearly twenty years writing, revising, failing, and starting over before publishing her debut novel.
• Creative dreams often require public accountability. Declaring “I’m going to be a writer” changed Tiffany’s relationship to the goal.
• Failure is not wasted work. The unpublished novels helped Tiffany become the writer capable of creating the book that finally sold.
• Children learn from watching how adults pursue meaning, not just from what adults say.
• A supportive creative community can make rejection survivable.
• Drafting creatively does not have to look traditional. Tiffany built much of her writing process around voice memos and long walks.
• Publishing success can arrive suddenly after years of invisible work.
• Audiobooks are becoming a major part of how readers experience stories and can meaningfully expand the emotional world of a book.
• The “overnight success” story is usually decades in the making.