Elizabeth Stroud, welcome to the show.

We're very old friends, you and I,

and I call you Liz, so I will do that today.

And it's nice to be here, Meg, with you as well.

So thank you.

My pleasure.

First of all, big congratulations on the recent news

that your novel, O'William, made the long list

for the Booker Prize.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

That's wonderful.

And you have a new novel coming out, Lucy by the sea.

Right.

But today, we're going to talk about your story home.

So Annie Applebee, she's a character

that you're revisiting here.

Right.

And you've created this whole ecosystem

for your characters to live in.

Did that start intentionally or did that just grow?

It just grew.

...