“The Kiss Quotient” Author Helen Hoang Opens Up About Love and Autism
4:19AM Mar 21, +0000
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Think dating is hard. Try finding love when you're neurodivergent. Today we're talking with a guest who not only has first hand experience but also just happens to be the best selling author of the kiss quotient. Hi, I'm Sarah Wendell.
I'm Alicia Rai. Welcome to lovestruck daily where we bring a love story to your years every single day. I'm in love with love with you,
Alicia. It's time for our latest New York Times question.
And of course, you're referring to the 36 questions to fall in love from the New York Times. I highly recommend this quiz for all people with their partners, romantic, bionic whoever, because you know, you just want to get to know each other better sometimes. And this is a good way to do it. I think
and you know, if you're listening and you want to tell us your answer, you know, we want to hear clearly answers to right. Yeah, we want to hear it. lovestruck daily at frolicked media. Alicia, when did you last sing to yourself or to someone else?
I think to everybody all the time. Always. I feel like most of my singing is in the form of theme songs or jingles. Oh,
every day. My dogs are a different song.
Yeah, I mean, when when we put we have little wings that we put on putting that it was a Halloween costume and she just likes them like a calm her down. Yeah. So when she puts those on, she has her bat cat jingle? Which I mean, of course it goes. chasing it. Are you joking? Yes, of course you can have questions that
that cat bat can do and the things that a cat can't.
So that's your bat, cat, strangle, um, every every Saturday and Sunday, we go get coffee. And when Kai lived downtown in downtown LA, we would walk to get coffee. And now we live a little bit far out. So we drive but the jingle remains the same and it goes.
Coffee, black
coffee. And then whatever day it is, it'll be like Sunday edition.
That's amazing. So you're basically the heroine of a musical all Yes. Yeah. If I you are in your own Hamilton
all day. Yeah, I am the main character at all times for every reason.
I think to myself, but the the dogs any pop song can be made to be about your pet. That's true. For example, Don't be fooled by the dogs that I've got. We still we still walk around the block. Ooh, I like that. Sometimes they poop a little sometimes they poop a lot. Yeah, I can make any song into an anthem. That's like a
great throwback. Fantastic. Yeah, blow Jenny from a block there. But yeah,
all all pop songs can be about your pets. And then I sing to myself constantly. One of my very favorite things to do on a weekend when no one's around, which is rare is to get on the treadmill, but then walk it just enough of a speed that I can sing. So I'll just do a whole a whole slew of songs on my workout playlist with you know, moderate dance moves. I don't want to fall off and hit the wall. But singing and walking is way too fun. And I love singing to myself.
But today, Sarah, we have something to sing about.
I agree. We have a
very special guest New York Times bestselling author, Helen Wang, author of The kiss quotient, the bride test and the heart principle. All very good books you should read. We are so honored to have her on lovestruck daily today to talk to us.
Welcome, Helen, thank you so much for doing this interview.
Thanks for having me.
So Helen, your novel, The kiss quotient has been translated into more than 30 languages, which is amazing. And now you have three books out, congratulations. What are some of the responses that you've received from readers
about your books, I guess they usually come in three categories. The first is I loved your book. It's a great romance. Those make me really happy. And then there are comments from family or loved ones of people who are on the autism spectrum. It's usually people expressing gratitude that I kind of offered a window into the minds of these loved ones. Of course, I love to get any kind of responses from readers and he's made me happy but the special ones really special are from autistic readers themselves. Some people say that the books helped them gain insights and set them on a path towards their own diagnosis, or else that it gave them hope that they can find love in the future for themselves. So those kind of responses are really special, because it feels like I really reached people and made an impact.
Oh, I love a good taxonomy. And I admire very much that you've created a taxonomy of your of your family. I think everyone should do that it makes for easier organization. Do you? Do you go back and reread your fan mail? I do sometimes when I'm having a bad day.
I haven't really. But I perhaps I should start.
You should. I mean, I never did. I always just sort of filed it away and never thought about it. I used to feel very shy when I read it. And then I was diagnosed with ADHD. And I follow a lot of ADHD creators. And there's one she talked about how anything that is complimentary is sort of like a quarter for her brain when she's feeling especially anxious or depressed and struggling with something. And so I made a folder on my phone that says quarters. So when I need a quarter, I go in there and I look at it. It's a nice, it's a nice little day. It's like a bank of compliments, sometimes you need them.
Now, you mentioned autism. And we know that you've written and spoken about being diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder in 2016. And that you write characters with autism. What are some of the assumptions that people have about love and romance for people with autism? And what do you see is the reality.
So I think there was a point where I was actually researching love and autism. And I ran across this website, where they basically said that autistic partners are selfish and incapable of empathy. And it was basically a place for people to air their grievances, because they had been in a bad relationship with an autistic person. And, and I thought that was really sad. And it made me angry, because my husband doesn't think that of me, at least I not that he's told me. And I have a lot of autistic friends. And they're the kindest, most empathetic people I know. So I feel like you know, just just like with every other group of people, the bad ones exist. But that's not everyone. And it's not the rule it beyond this. So I also I really dislike it when people say that it's disrespectful to right autistic people falling in love and having sexual intimacy, I find that really infantilizing no offensive. You know, I'm in a relationship. We do all the things that people do. It's not that different than an average person's experience. And so I really hate being categorized as this protected group that can have regular experiences. So yeah, I just, I think they autistic women are just like other women. They're different struggles and things like that. But at the core of us, we're like anyone else?
What a dreadful misconception about a whole entire person and a group of people?
I think so. Obviously,
good heavens. Now, can I ask you about your own love story? How did you meet your husband? And when did you know
that you were in love with him?
We met in college. He is my first boyfriend. Also my only boyfriend as a late bloomer. And he was also my martial arts instructor.
This is a romance novel. I'm sorry. Alright. Alicia, are you taking notes? Yeah, that's fantastic. I love Yeah, keep going to tell us though. Okay, so chapter one. So
I do fairly on that I was interested in him. And I think I, I asked him out like five times. And I think, you know, he's a physicist. So he's really clueless. I remember the first time I asked him, I was like, Do you want to have lunch with me? And he said, Oh, no, I already ate. Second time. Do you want to have dinner with me? No, it was Oh, it's too late. And the third time since you don't have dinner at this time, do you want to have dessert with me? And he said, Oh, no, I don't eat sweets before bed. And and of course me i so clueless that I you know, I think like a normal person would have thought, oh, he just he just really doesn't like me. But like his. His reasons were so rational. Like they didn't imply that he didn't like me. They just implied that I wasn't asking in the right way. And so I kept going. And I asked him to house party I lived in this house with a whole bunch of other martial artists and we were having a big party and, and he said, Oh, I might show up and he didn't know. And we had a tournament. And I asked him to show up for that. He said he might. And again, he didn't. And then finally, I said, I was going to see a movie with a bunch of friends. Do you want to go see Lord of the Rings with me The Return of the King? And of course, like all the nerd bells went Ding, ding, ding. And he said, Yes, I'd love to see Return of the King with you. And he didn't realize till halfway through the movie, that it was a date. He told me this. He didn't realize oh, my gosh, after that, he he's like, Oh, I think she likes me. I might like her. And that took a whole semester.
A whole semester. Yeah. Oh my gosh. Now, I did not have martial arts physicists on my hero archetype chart. But I think I need to add that to the heroic archetype plus the martial arts physicist. Oh my gosh,
is he embarrassed now? Like, like he thinks about it? Or is he like, How did I not realize?
I think he should be a little embarrassed. Yeah.
Oh, do you want to have lunch? No, I
already ate.
I would have done the same thing though. I was also clueless and college. People asked me out all the time, I was telling. I was telling Hi the other day, because my friend was over interest talking about it. She's like, Oh, yeah, she was friends with all the football players and didn't know what was going on. I was like, Yeah, I'd be in the room. And one of them would be like, Hey, do you want to like, give me a massage? And I said to him, sure, lie down. And then I walked on his back. He really just had like a ache in his back and I was walking out of the back and but he said it was the best back massage he ever got. Very close. So I very much empathize with your with your husband. I feel like I would have been in the same boat.
Oh my gosh. Do you remember the moment that you fell, like fell for your husband? Yeah,
I was thinking about it. And I remember there's a on campus. They have this day called slope day, which is the day when the everyone celebrates the end of class. It's right before finals. And everybody celebrates with of course, drunken revelry. And I mean, I honestly, remember I was playing soccer barefoot on wet grass. And I slipped and I twisted my ankle really bad. And I got, I got taken to the nurse or the doctor or wherever. And I remember that I called him. And I told him, Oh, I can't meet you, wherever whenever it was, because I met the doctors because I slipped in, I hurt my ankle. And I didn't have any expectations that he would do anything. You know, I'm like the second youngest of six kids. So I know I don't have a high expectation of people taking care of me or worrying about me or anything. But he showed up he showed up right away and he you know, he had plans with all his friends but he just ditched them all and he raced over there. And and he was so worried and he carried me around all over and and I think like, just when he showed up, he had shaven he shaved his beard. And he had this awful Fu Manchu mustache. I think it was on a dare I don't know. It was hard. But I remember when he showed up I was like I think I love that guy.
So it wasn't so much showing up with the twisted ankle it was the it was the beard wasn't it
I can't even bring myself to say it sarcastically
So what inspired you to write your first novel because quotient were you inspired? You are it was the beard was? I just realized it was it was all of that fine facial hair. Actually the quotient is the beard ratio.
I before the kiss quotient. I had been kind of playing with the idea of a gender swapped pretty woman. But I had you know, I couldn't figure out why, you know, beautiful successful woman would need to hire an escort. And it wasn't in towel Intel. My daughter's preschool teacher called me in and we talked and she told me she thought my daughter was on the autism spectrum because they'd been having issues in class. And as I was researching autism in females, it basically put me on this path where I, you know, it led to my own diagnosis. And it also inspired the character for the kids kotian because she hires an escort because she's not good with people. She wants practice, very logical reason.
I have learned a lot doing this podcast. And we've had guests that talk about how people are expected to know things that are actually acquired skills, like nobody knows how to go out and date somebody, I still don't. Nobody knows about sexuality and how it affects their own body until they actually sit and focus and learn on it. So it means it seems entirely rational that someone who doesn't know how to do something would ask an expert. I think so. Yeah, I mean, it makes total sense. Now has romance writing helped you appreciate your partner? Has it changed any aspects of your relationship?
I don't know that the writing has impacted my relationship as much as the other way around that the relationships real life gets poured into the books themselves. Oh,
I can completely understand that. I think that's true of most writers, wouldn't you think, Alicia, I do definitely
steal from everything. Like I hear a conversation or something and kind of put it in the back of my head. If I watch something on TV, I put it in the back of my head. So yeah, I'm a thief. But But I also think that writing romance in a lot of ways, especially after writing many of them, it really does hone your appreciation for communication. Like that. That's the main thing that, you know, we just try to get these to people like we're trying to get her to kiss, but we're also trying to get them to talk to each other. And it can get frustrating when you can't get them together to talk to each other. So I think that's probably how it's impacted her relationships. Maybe the most the other way. Helen, can
I ask what you're working on right now?
I don't want to go into it too much, because it keeps changing.
Isn't it annoying when they do that?
I've been stuck in these loops as I've been, which is very exhausting. just rewriting the beginning feeling like hey, if I just keep going, I'll find the right beginning. Anyway, it's inspired by the movie Lars and the real girl. No. Oh, where he dates that blow up doll. which I loved. I thought that was so funny. There isn't act an actual blow up doll in this story. But oh, a little bit of something similar. Oh, that's so cool. Having fun
is very cool. Helen, do you want to tell us where people can find you online?
I'm on Instagram at h Wang writes, and I have a website? How in Hong Kong calm.
Fabulous. Thank you so much for doing this interview. It has been such a pleasure to talk with you. And I had such a lovely time chatting with you. Thank you.
I love talking to you both.
I absolutely love that conversation. And I'm so honored that Helen hung out with us today. Alicia, what is your love to go for listeners to take into their days with them?
I keep thinking about her story about her and her husband and how she had to ask, like 19 times before he figured out what she was awesome. Yeah. And I just think what a great example, though, is that of how there's somebody for everybody. I mean, she had to ask him a bunch of times. And he didn't get it. But also, he found somebody who would ask a bunch of times turned off by that. So I think that that is a great lesson. You know, if you're feeling like nobody understands you or you know, maybe you're not quite in step. It's it's nice to know that there are people out there who get you and who appreciate you the way that you are.
Someone out there is looking for you while you are looking for something exactly. Well, we are looking for you to email us and tell us what you think if you've got a love story and a lot of people have adorable love stories and then they send them to us and we are so excited and we would love to hear yours you can email us at lovestruck daily at Frohlich dot media. You can follow us on Instagram and the Twitter at lovestruck daily. And please consider leaving a review wherever however you listen so we can spread more love and joy into everyone's earbuds each and every weekday. Our researcher is Jessie Epstein. Our editor is Jen Jacobs. We are produced by Abigail steckler and little Scorpion studios and Gillian Davis with executive producer frolic media. This is an I Heart Radio Podcast. We wish you a very happily ever after today. Love with you I'm in love with you