St. Paul writer Sam Tschida knows about spies, clogged toilets and smut

St. Paul-based writer Sam Tschida can thank a cappuccino for her writing career.

More than a decade ago, the University of Minnesota Law School graduate intended to study in a coffee shop. Except that’s not what she did. Instead, she hired a babysitter, went to Starbucks and started writing a novel. Jokes Tschida: “To avoid studying for the bar, I became a novelist.”

That book was published, under a pseudonym, as “Ruby’s Misadventures with Reality.” Tschida (it’s pronounced like “cheetah”) did pass the bar and worked for a few years in mostly “mind-numbing” legal jobs. Writing on her lunch hours gave way to writing full time.

After she published the amnesia-themed romance “Siri, Who Am I?” in 2021, Tschida remembers thinking: “I’ve got this. I’m a writer now.”

Then she sold the film rights, and it felt financially possible to be a writer, said Tschida, 46, who is married to Terrell Adams, a paramedic, and who has four kids ranging in age from 11-19.

The money part hasn’t always gone smoothly — the publishing industry is notoriously fickle — but Tschida has a pair of books coming out almost simultaneously.

Those two are “Undead and Unwed,” a vampire romance that reached shelves in October, and “Gabby Greene Knows Whodunit,” out Jan. 20. “Gabby Greene” is a sequel to “Errands and Espionage” and, like that 2024 book, it’s a rom-com about a recently divorced mom who, almost by accident, becomes a spy. In “Gabby Greene,” she and colleague/squeeze Marcus travel to Portuguese islands the Azores, where they investigate a shady luxury spa.

Tschida has friends and family she can call on for writing help: Adams comes in handy when she needs medical know-how. In line at a fast-food drive-thru window, her daughter asked what would happen if the trunk of the car in front of them popped open and there were a dead body inside; that became the novella Tschida is writing now. And, as of “Gabby Greene,” she has the number of a spy (who asked not be named), who helped her make the espionage in “Gabby Greene” more realistic.

“I didn’t even know I knew a spy but I realized it when I went to lunch with someone last year. She was like, ‘Oh, my husband is a spy.’ His job is teaching spies, actually. And I guess he had made jokes about the accuracy of the spy stuff in ‘Errands and Espionage.’” They met and now, he corrects “the spy stuff” in her work, said Tschida, a St. Paul native who grew up in Duluth.

Given the uncertainty of the publishing industry, many writers find it’s wise to have multiple revenue streams, and Tschida has developed a few. Although the movie has not been made, “Siri” sold to Hollywood, as did “Errands and Espionage.” Rights to the latter were purchased by a company co-founded by Justin Baldoni, who starred in and directed the hit romance “It Ends with Us,” and is currently embroiled in litigation with co-star Blake Lively.

“I’ve loved the people I’ve worked with there. I had breakfast with them when they were in town a month ago and they’ve been nothing but great. I met Justin Baldoni on a Zoom call and he had lots of good story ideas,” said Tschida, who will be credited as a consulting producer on the film version of “Errands and Espionage.”

There’s also Smut U, which Tschida founded. She jokes it’s “a fake university for real writers.” Weekly online classes and Zoom appearances by top authors such as Carly Bloom help guide about 20 writers through finding agents, querying publishers and writing sex scenes.

What makes a “worst sex scene”?

“A lot of physical descriptions. Everyone already knows how it works,” said Tschida. “You need to get in the person’s head — how they are thinking and feeling about the other person in the scene. Really, it’s just like a regular scene except that sex is what they are doing, instead of eating breakfast or whatever.”

Tschida, who’s also working on a werewolf book and assembling an anthology with fellow lawyer-turned-novelist Ellie Palmer, said she is drawn to writing romances that also boast action, mystery or horror.

Those mashups make finding an audience complicated. Initially, she amped up the romance in “Gabby Greene” — until her publisher requested more mystery. But Tschida said her agent dreamed up a description that sums up all of her quirky work: “delightfully unhinged.”

Gabby Greene Knows Whodunit

Publisher: Forever, 361 pages.